Dream 10X

The term 'Chaos Monkeys' originally came out of Netflix. The term was used to describe a process whereby chaos would be intentionally unleashed in a system in order to test how resilient that system was to breakages. Early identification of system weaknesses could help to shore-up system resiliency where and when needed for production releases. In the immortal words of the Amazon CTO, Werner Vogels, '...everything fails all the time'. The general idea is that intentional system disruption helps make a system better through weakness identification and mitigation. In Antonio Garcia Martinez's book, 'Chaos Monkeys', the disruptive and chaotic nature of startup culture can have deleterious effects on participants placing bets in the casino of Silicon Valley.

A couple of years ago, I had a vision of somehow getting out on the Ka'iwi Channel - the body of water separating the Hawaiian islands of Oahu and Molokai - in either a rowboat or to maybe swim it. Then, I discovered the 'Molokai2Oahu Paddleboard World Championship Race' causing me to arrest our current summer plans and to try to get into the race. I pulled my family headlong into my hastily conceived dream, only to find that the Ka'iwi Channel is known as the 'Channel of Bones' for a reason. In this episode, my family and I discuss our perspectives on surviving this adventure...

In this episode, we talk about our 158 mile row down the entire length of the Potomac River, from Gravelly Point Park, in Arlington, Virginia, to Smith Point Marina, in Reedville, Virginia, in the summer of 2023. It was the best of times.

What do you think it takes for an immigrant to become a citizen in a foreign land, with virtually no money and precious few contacts, to go on and create a multi-billion dollar company? For the majority of mere mortals, even in the best of circumstances, this feat is hard to even imagine. Yet, the life of Frank Hasenfratz, founder of the Linamar Corporation, is a wonderful example of how to achieve the near impossible. In this Dream 10X post, we do a quick review of the Rod McQueen and Susan M. Papp book, 'Driven To Succeed', about the life and success of Hungarian-Canadian, Frank Hasenfratz.

After discovering that metal could be shaped according to one's vision and physical effort, blacksmith artist, Ellen Durkan, decided to start making wearable art out of forged metal. Discovering this path less traveled, she decided to trail-blaze her own career path in the field of blacksmith art. Where others more commonly forge items such as knives, swords or cooking utensils, Ellen uses her forging and welding skills to create beautiful, wearable pieces of art. However, as is often the case in traveling the road less traveled, the journey can be challenging at times. Ellen tells us the story of her journey in discovering her authentic self as a blacksmith artist.

One of the hard things I frequently encounter in my own life is the constant realization of so many simple things that I just do not know (yet). For example, after reading this book and researching this blog post a bit, I came to the stark realization of what the term 'Numeronym' means. Most real software engineers are probably already intimately aware of this word's definition. Numeronym's like 'k8s' for kubernetes, or 'i18n' for internationalization, or 'l10n' for localization are frequently used in technology circles. I have seen these spellings for many years without even realizing why they were spelled like the were, or even questioning why they were spelled that way. Embarrassing huh? When I saw the name of Ben Horowitz and Marc Andreessen's investment firm, 'a16z', I finally dedicated a few minutes to learning the origin of the name. I guess this is one of the reasons I can never stop reading and learning. The Ben Horowitz book, 'The Hard Thing About Hard Things', shares some really big leadership lessons to learn from as well, which we discuss in this blog/video/podcast.

By 2019, the world had essentially been destroyed by World War Terminus. A nuclear holocaust had been unleashed that had pretty much destroyed all life on earth leaving but a few remnants who were strongly encouraged by global powers to emigrate to Mars, receiving a free Android to boot. What a deal! Who would want want to stick around on earth to deal with all the nuclear dust, kibble, electric animals and...sneaky androids? Philip K. Dick's book is a story of faith, hope, a never-ending search for life and grappling with a constantly advancing technology on a post-apocalyptic planet earth.

In this episode, we continue our research into how one might gain superhuman capabilities relative to an objective being pursued, whether it has to do with work, sports, crime fighting, or something else. Last December, we reviewed Dr. Paul Zehr's book, 'Chasing Captain America', for similar reasons. This month, we review Dr. Zehr's book, 'Becoming Batman', to see if it contains any tips or tricks for gaining superhuman capabilities for those of us seemingly chained to the entropy and mediocrity of human life on earth.

Apparently, my genome reveals a distant connection to the people of Scotland, Ireland, England, and Normandy. The Normans are particularly interesting to me because of the Battle of Hastings in 1066, in which William I, (aka 'William the Conqueror'), invaded England. The success of William I in conquering England was dramatically important in shaping world history, making the Normans largely responsible for these changes. However, it was the French who truly changed the world in the wake of this conflict, thanks to Angevin Geoffrey Plantagenet.

Can you solve the Rubik's Cube? If so, did you figure it out by yourself or did you learn from someone else? I spent the past few weeks learning to solve the Rubik's Cube, learning from a coach, while also conducting a bit of introspection on how my brain (and body) were going about learning the task. In this episode, we talk more about 'deep learning,' and how to get into its flow, with the Rubik's Cube puzzle as background context.