No. 502 — December 11th, 2022 — Read on FS

Brain Food is a weekly newsletter with ideas and insights you can use in everyday life.

FS

The Stormtrooper Problem

Diversity of thought makes us stronger, not weaker. Without diversity, we die off as a species. We can no longer adapt to changes in the environment. We need each other to survive.

— Source

TKP Insights

Diana Chapman on embracing tension:

“We’re all scared kids trying to figure it out. And so, so many of us get caught in, let’s be appropriate. Let’s do it right. Let’s not offend anybody. And what I see is, the neater we try to get, the less growth we actually get to experience most of the time. We can certainly create environments that are too edgy where people are so anxious that they can’t learn and grow. And that’s not the kind of mess I’m talking about. But I’m talking about, can it be okay to have some tension sometimes?”

— Listen to the interview or read the transcript.

Insight

“Organisms in nature have survived and thrived for three and a half billion years, and they've done it without any kind of planning or predicting, or anything that we spend so much of our time doing.”

— Rafe Sagarin

Tiny Thought

We tend to assume that the worst that has happened is the worst that can happen, and then prepare for that. We forget that “the worst” smashed a previous understanding of what was the worst.

(Share this Tiny Thought on Twitter)

Etc.

Demanding and supportive are not mutually exclusive:

"Most people think of demanding and supportive as opposite ends of a spectrum. You can either be tough or you can be nice. But the best leaders don’t choose. They are both highly demanding and highly supportive. They push you to new heights and they also have your back."

— Source

The tamer the animal, the smaller the brain:

"Domesticated animals had brains about 25% smaller than their wild forebears"

— Source

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Cheers,
— Shane

P.S. Cellular Infrastructure

P.P.S. The toothpaste I use. (Not a sponsored or affiliated link), but they said to use “SHANE” as your code, and if you have two tubes in your cart, something magical might happen.