When I first read Stephen King’s On Writing, I was surprised to learn that he only writes in the morning, eats lunch, then spends all afternoon reading. A serious writer, I imagined, would spend most of their day writing, only stopping for sleep or food. But Stephen King realised that when he was exposed to other books and ideas, his own writing got better as well. His writing improved because of his reading, not despite of it. His inputs determined his outputs.

It makes sense in other domains, doesn’t it? Hard exercise grows muscles; deep conversations drive insights; quality sleep promotes rejuvenation. The stimulus drives the results. But for whatever reason, the idea of reading as an equally necessary input for thinking and writing seems a bit odd. Maybe that’s the product of a society that rarely reads.

Yet in my experience, the lesson holds true. Whenever I’m in writers block, a useful antidote is to stop writing altogether and just read until something interesting appears. The new input usually leads my subconscious towards some output which I can then work with. This is ultimately why I read and journal and take notes – to capture ideas to build upon later.

I like what the writer Ted Gioia said on the Conversations with Tyler podcast:

“I think the most important skill anyone can develop is time management skills. How you use your day. But there is one principle I want to stress because this is very important to me. When people ask me for advice — and once again, this cuts across all fields — but this is the advice I give:

In your life, you will be evaluated on your output. Your boss will evaluate you on your output. If you’re a writer like me, the audience will evaluate you on your output.

But your input is just as important. If you don’t have good input, you cannot maintain good output.

The problem is no one manages your input. The boss never cares about your input. The boss doesn’t care about what books you read. Your boss doesn’t ask you what newspapers you read. The boss doesn’t ask you what movies you saw or what TV shows or what ideas you consume.

But I know for a fact I could not do what I do if I was not zealous in managing high-quality inputs into my mind every day of my life. That’s why I spend maybe two hours a day writing. I’m a writer. I spend two hours a day writing, but I spend three to four hours a day reading and two to three hours a day listening to music.

People think that that’s creating a problem in my schedule, but in fact, I say, “No, no, this is the reason why I’m able to do this. Because I have constant good-quality input.” That is the only reason why I can maintain the output.”

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While googling around, I came across this blog post I wrote on this topic from over three years ago! I forgot this existed and the writing is almost unrecognisable. Fun throwback.

I love newsletters. I think they are the most underrated form of finding quality insights from people you know and trust.

Currently I’m subscribed to eight: Austin Kleon, Ali Abdaal, James Clear, The Art of Noticing, Nathaniel Drew, Lawrence Yeo (More To That), Farnam Street, and Dr. Jordan B. Peterson. They all vary in their style and content, but two common features across these is that they are generous with their insights, and they write well. Some blogs that I routinely follow as well include Seth Godin, Derek Sivers, and James Somers.

Each month, I take down hundreds of lines of notes from these newsletters. Some of the insights I’ve gained through them have been the inspiration for many of my best ideas. If I ever need a goldmine of new ideas, my inbox is where I go.

Our output, after all, depends on our input.

Where we look is where we go.

A few days ago, I came across idea of the Input-Output Framework from Ali Abdaal’s newsletter. It’s been a while since I’ve come across a new idea in personal productivity – the main ones of meditation, pomodoros, gratitude and ‘eating the frog’ seem to have been done to death – but this one I’ve found to be new and quite effective for the few days I’ve experimented with it. Here it is:

How to make the most out of free moments: the Input-Output framework

There are many free moments throughout one’s day. These little moments could just be 10 or 30 minutes such as space between meetings and classes but they can accumulate into a significant amount of time. How do we make the most of these little ‘time pockets’?

1. Divide everything you do into either an input or an output activity.

Input is seeking to understand the ideas of others. For me, the main input activities are reading, listening to audiobooks/podcasts and studying. Output is creation. For me, the main output activities are writing, journaling and more recently, making videos.

2. Decide what your inputs and outputs will be.

As a medical student, a significant part of my inputs include content in the form of lectures, tutorials and textbooks related to the medical field. However, I also enjoy learning about psychology, spirituality and creativity. I learn about these in the form of books, podcasts and articles. These are my main inputs.

For my outputs, I love to write and journal. This gives me gain a sense of clarity in my thoughts, freeing up space for other random musings. Recently, I’ve been reflecting on the notion of sharing one’s work and the intersection between psychology and spirituality. Aside from making videos, which is a less frequent activity, these are my main outputs.

3. Establish a hierarchy.

Within both inputs and outputs, there should be a rough hierarchy in the value of the task and the attention required. I’d rather read a book than listen to an audiobook, but it requires more attention. Likewise, I’d prioritise listening to an audiobook over reading short articles on my phone, which is above watching YouTube videos, with each level broadly requiring less optimal conditions than the previous one. There should be a similar hierarchy for output activities.

The next step is where productivity arises. Whenever a free moment arises, all I need to do is ask myself:

4. “Is my current priority input or output, and what is the highest task in the hierarchy I can currently do?”

If I’m at home, with few responsibilities and distractions, I can grab a book or my kindle and start reading. But if I’m on a noisy bus or out walking, I’d struggle to read a book. Easy: I can listen to a podcast or audiobook. If I’m catching up with a friend and waiting for them to arrive, I can take my phone out and read an article on The New Yorker or Brain Pickings, my recent go-tos.

The beauty with this approach is that it removes the need to make decisions in the moment. Free moments pop up throughout the day and when one needs to be productive, this framework makes it frictionless to decide what to do in these moments. If the context changes – perhaps a lecture is cancelled or a friend wants to call in 15 minutes – I only need to ask myself, “In this new context, what is the highest task in the hierarchy I can do?” And start cracking.

Of course, productivity isn’t everything – the need for time socialising, exercising and protecting one’s mental health cannot be overstated. But for the moments when work needs to be done, I’ve found this framework to be great at deciding what to do in those ‘pockets’ of time, where I would previously be scrolling through social media mindlessly.

Beware the stories you read or tell; subtly, at night, beneath the waters of consciousness, they are altering your world.

– Ben Okri

When I was a kid, I used to obsess over this type of Lego called Bionicles. It was more than just blocks and pieces, there was this whole universe about it – movies and comics with heroes and villains and twists and turns, and 5-year old me devoured it all. When I went to Big W with my parents, I would always beg them to buy me a new Bionicle to play with. And usually, out of what I now suspect was a ploy to get me to pipe down, they complied. Little did they know how much these toys would take over my time, thoughts and obsessions.

From the ages of 5 to 7, hours each night were spent on my bedroom floor with swarms of Bionicles pieces in front of me. During these hours, I’d create epic battle scenes, new ‘hybrid’ Bionicles and a complex story with my figures which I thought was honestly pretty good. At the peak of my obsession, I even created a card game out of Bionicles. For each card, I would give each unique Bionicle a name, a ‘description’, some attack/defence stats and draw its face on a piece of paper like a Yu-Gi-Oh card. Looking back, it was absolutely ridiculous but as a kid, I was in my own little world and I loved it.

This strange phase of my life illustrates how my inputs directly influenced my outputs. It was only through my constant input of Bionicles: the movies, comics and buying new figures, that I was able to fuel my ideas of storylines, new figures and even a card game. If I had never taken any of these ‘Bionicles inputs’ in, there is no chance any of these weird ‘Bionicles outputs’ would’ve ever transpired.

Of course, this concept applies to almost all domains. If you want good grades, you’d better learn the lectures. If you want a healthy body, you’d better eat right. And if you want to be an epic Bionicles producer, you’d better have some interest in what the Universe and characters are like. Our outputs are directly influenced by our inputs.

Output	Necessary Input
Good grades	Learn stuff
Healthy body	Eat right
Epic Bionicles ideas	Obsess over Bionicles

This seems obvious. But due to the enormity of the information available on the internet these days (let alone podcasts, movies or books), there is huge potential for our ideas about ourselves, the world or other people to be radically altered. Whether it’s a subtle Facebook comment or an alarming news headline, the amount and diversity of stimuli out there that we can interact with is astronomical. This means negative and unproductive stimuli can hurt us, inspiring and exhilarating stimuli can build us up, but on unprecedented levels.

Which leads to the idea of the importance of developing ‘intentional inputs’. Whether it’s reading good books, avoiding unproductive pieces of information or having a stronger filter, controlling the ideas and products we input can help make dramatic changes in our outputs, whether that’s ideas, physique or anything in between, illustrating the ever-increasing need to defend our inputs.

I’ll admit, this can be uncomfortable as it creates responsibility on us to decide how we want to see things, and responsibility can be scary. But at the same time, this notion of defending inputs is also remarkably liberating, as the ideas that shape how we see the world can be slowly but surely moulded into something new, if we only decide to choose so. The potential for this is enormous.

So what you need to do, if you really want to broaden your horizons as a listener, is to get exposed to new things. Pick somebody. It doesn’t have to be me…. Find somebody who you trust as a guide, and let them open your ears to these new experiences.

If you do that, you will be rewarded infinitely…

– Ted Giota, from a podcast episode on Conversations with Tyler.

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On another note, I’ve been enjoying writing recently and so I’ve decided to write more during this Easter break. Starting today, I’ll aim to write 2 thoughts a week on this online journal: probably on a Sunday and a Thursday. I’ve absolutely no clue how long this’ll last, but we’ll see how it goes. As always, any feedback or comments are always appreciated!

Last month, I began an experiment to publish one blog post every day. It was fun, and I’m glad I tried it, but have decided to stop. Here’s why:

1. My writing often felt incomplete. One day is not enough time to choose a topic, explore its nuances, create a story around it, and come out with something meaningful. My writing felt shallow, and I found myself rushing to a conclusion to get something posted. I didn’t like that: I was sacrificing quality for quantity. There is truth in getting better with more repetitions, but at some point you need to create work you are truly proud of.

2. Posting every day was taking a long time. I would spend 2-4 hours each day on a post, and that took away from reading or working towards more serious writing projects. Before this experiment, I would dedicate a day to reading and thinking before writing, or writing more short stories. Now, those parts are missing from my practice.

As a result, I’ll go back to my old publishing schedule: Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. That way, I’ll be able to take time to rest and read, but more importantly, write without feeling the need to rush to conclusions.

It’s interesting to note that the results of my experiment are similar to those of Derek Sivers, who also tried writing daily a few years ago. Despite this, I believe there is still utility in daily posting, which I’ll explore another time, but for now, for me at this time, this experiment comes to a gentle close.

For interest, these were the 30 posts that wrote, starting from the announcement of my experiment:

1: My Daily Posting Commitment
2: Taking The Leap and The Asymmetry Of Reward
3: Trauma and Software
4: Life is a Verb
5: Useful Make Believe
6: The Magic
7: Rain
8: The Joy of Being Wrong
9: People Are Unbearingly Interesting
10: Suspensions In Time
11: Suggested Resolutions
12: The Effort and The Reward
13: Perfection and Goodness
14: The Problem With Sparknotes
15: On Giving Your All
16: The Secret
17: Aching Kind of Growing
18: That’s Interesting
19: ChatGPT and Creating
20: Knowledge Vs Experience
21: Here We Go Again
22: On Half-Finished Ideas
23: Planting The Little Acorns
24: Why Storytelling Matters
25: Our Worst Days
26: My Favourite Newsletters and Inputs
27: Books Speak To Each Other
28: A Fine Day
29: The Riches of Daily Life
30: Centre of My World

This week three patients died on the hematology ward.

I had met them all before, though in varying degrees. Two I had only met on the morning ward rounds, perhaps a few seconds of eye contact here and there. I had chatted to the third for 30 minutes last week, trying to take a history, but mostly talking about his life. He was still able to smile and talk fondly about his family. Weak, but still breathing. Still alive.

It feels strange to walk on the ward now, new patients sleeping where they once laid. Because I wasn’t there to see their body pronounced dead and wheeled off somewhere else, it’s like they only exist in my memory and the hospital’s electronic records. Friday afternoon, they were there. Monday morning, they were gone. There’s no “this is where patient X once laid” or photographs of them anywhere. They’re just gone.

But the strangest thing of all this is how little emotion I’ve felt. When I heard the news, I was shocked for a bit, but didn’t think too much of it. Just paused, whispered a “rest in peace”, and got on with my day. It was only when my colleague brought it up did I consider how significant it was. Yeah – the man I had spoken to last week, who told me about his childhood and love life, is now no longer alive. Isn’t that crazy? I expected, even hoped, to feel a larger wave of sadness, perhaps an inability to focus, maybe even some tears. But it just didn’t affect me that much.

Three years ago, I wrote a post outlining my fear of becoming an emotional void. It was one of my most honest and personal posts I had ever written. And now I worry my fears are coming true.

Why didn’t I feel more emotion at the news? Am I too sleep deprived, and just numb to any input? Am I too used to death, having experienced heavy loss growing up? Or am I still unconsciously processing it, waiting for the tears to erupt randomly one day?

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows has a phrase called the wends:

n. frustration that you’re not enjoying an experience as much as you should, even something you’ve worked for years to attain, which prompts you to plug in various thought combinations to try for anything more than static emotional blankness, as if your heart had been accidentally demagnetized by a surge of expectations.

Maybe I’m going through the wends and expecting too much of myself. Maybe death is just no big deal and a natural part of life. Maybe it’s fine, even good, to feel little in the face of death, as a sign of resilience.

But if it comes at the cost of my humanity and my empathy, then dear God, please let me be more sensitive. Please let me love more readily, let me cry more heavily, let me sleep less easily. Let me feel again.

RK, may you rest in peace.

I occasionally get asked, where do you get your writing ideas from? Good question.

Usually, my ideas are taken straight from my journals then refined into a simple one-minute idea. Because I write down my thoughts daily, there’s rarely a drought for things to share.

But sometimes, nothing clicks. Maybe none of my scribblings feel interesting or unique enough, or I feel like something fresh. That’s where goldmine sources come in.

Goldmine sources are places you visit to find new ideas. These could be books, videos, blog posts, or talking to people. The point of these sources is to find ideas that you resonate with, from people you respect. The purpose of this could be to share content yourself, or just to change the way you think.

My goldmine sources are predominantly blog posts. I adore blogs, especially ones that are well written and have similar interests to myself. Three goldmine blogs I read on a weekly basis are:

• Seth’s blog – on productivity, business, learning and education.
• Derek Sivers – on happiness, life, music and creativity.
• Farnam Street – on decision making, self-improvement, reading and mental models.

Whenever I’m in an idea drought, I often browse these blogs for inspiration. The writing is clear, succinct and the ideas are powerful.

Inputs determine outputs. Having goldmine sources to continuously feed you with ideas is one of the most important ways to be a stronger thinker.

There are many potent teachers that can transform your thinking.

Choose them wisely.

Over this year, I’ve realised that most medical students don’t read books.

When I ask why, the most common answer is I don’t have time. Instead, their time is spent doing other things like working, watching lectures or exercising.

What’s the common denominator between these other activities? They are productive. Let me explain.

Productivity, in its most basic form, is more output per given input. If factory A produces five boxes per hour and factory B produces fifty per hour, factory B is more productive than A. There is more output (=boxes) per hour of input (=work).

Working, watching lectures and exercising are productive exercises. They all have a product, such as money, good grades, or better health, and this improves with time. The more you work, the more you’ll eventually get paid. The more you study, the better grades you’ll get. The more you exercise, the better health you’ll achieve.

Importantly, these parameters are measurable. Systems are in place to track how these parameters change with time.

Reading, or art generally speaking, is the complete opposite.

What happens when you read a book?

Nothing.

You have nothing measurable to show that you have improved as a person. If a spy watched you through secret cameras, they couldn’t see anything tangible happen to you at all. They would see you pick up a book, flip some pages, then put it down when you’re finished.

Art is not productive. There are no outcomes that can be measured; no way to track productivity. You look the same, your social standing is the same and your net worth hasn’t changed. And since we live in a hyper-efficient society,, art is largely forgotten.

But art, dear reader, is still seriously important. It teaches us to feel, think and imagine. It reveals grand, spectacular worlds to us – ones better than our own. It teaches us that we are not alone. It paints our world with colour.

Just because it is not productive, does not mean it is useless. Art is a most priceless gift.

2020 has been a crazy year. Yet, chaotic times tend to be fertile ground for precious lessons and this year was no exception to the rule. To wrap up the year, here’s 3 new lessons, 3 quotes and 3 resolutions for 2021.

3 New Lessons

1. Contradictions are normal and that’s okay. (post here)

My biggest takeaway this year is that people can be irrational and contradictory and that’s totally fine. This was quite the revelation, as I used to be short-tempered and quick to call out inconsistencies in behaviour. I can thank many factors for this lesson, but the two main inputs are:

• A podcast episode between Jay Shetty and Malcolm Gladwell; and
• Fantastic characters found in literature. Tt’s amazing how much detail and complexity some authors can give fictional beings. Reading dilemmas and faults in literature has been illuminating in making me a less angry person overall.

2. Action breeds motivation, not the other way around.

This one is simple but has been a game-changer for getting stuff done. In my pathologically neurotic period, starting tasks would be a chore as I would always mentally prepare myself for the hard effort required to do a task.

This year, I’ve found that the easiest method of doing hard stuff is just to dive straight into it without thinking, kind of like diving into an icy-cold bath. The hardest part of doing something is usually just getting started.

3. Words are works of magic.

2020 had a record number of books read and difficult conversations had. These experiences have illustrated the power of both the written and spoken word.

Words can elevate people to the realms of the heavenly angels, yet equally plunge people into the depths of hell. The Four Agreements describes this dichotomy as white magic vs. black magic, and I’ve found this to be very true. In 2020, I’ve learnt to be more mindful of the things I say and write and to prioritise values of love and truth above all others.

3 Quotes

1. We aren’t uniquely awful, we just know ourselves unusually well. – The School of Life. Note: this quote quite literally saved my life in some of my darkest moments this year.
2. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation. – Life of Pi.
3. One of the painful things of our time is that those who feel certainty are stupid; and those with any imagination or understanding are filled with doubt and indecision. Let doubt avail. – Bertrand Russell.

3 Resolutions for 2021

1. Keep reading and writing.

I’ve tried many habits in the past, but the two that have stuck are my propensities for writing and reading. These have helped me find order amongst apparent disorder and have been reliable punching bags for my heavy emotions. If these are the only good habits that I take to my grave, then so be it.

2. Limit phone use.

Aim: <2 hours per day as a weekly average. I’ve set a challenge for this with my partner to keep me accountable and I hope to keep it.

3. Cultivate good relationships.

The best moments of my life have consistently been times where I’ve had strong and healthy relationships – times where there was a mutual and beautiful understanding that two people had each other’s backs, no matter how crazy things got.

Unfortunately, it’s easy to let relationships slip, so in 2021 I’m making a conscious effort to schedule catch-ups with friends, family and loved ones.

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So, that’s a wrap for 2020. Finally, dear reader, if you’ve made it here I’d just like to give a big thank you for taking the time to follow along with my musings. I don’t think I’m that interesting and it constantly amazes me that I get visitors every month on this site. If you’ve been lurking for a while, feel free to leave a comment – feedback is always appreciated.

Otherwise, I hope you all have a wonderful New Year. I can’t wait to see how crazy 2021 will get.

Cheers,
Eric