Skip to content
By using Twitter’s services you agree to our Cookies Use. We and our partners operate globally and use cookies, including for analytics, personalisation, and ads.
  • Home Home Home, current page.
  • About

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Language: English
    • Bahasa Indonesia
    • Bahasa Melayu
    • Català
    • Čeština
    • Dansk
    • Deutsch
    • English UK
    • Español
    • Filipino
    • Français
    • Hrvatski
    • Italiano
    • Magyar
    • Nederlands
    • Norsk
    • Polski
    • Português
    • Română
    • Slovenčina
    • Suomi
    • Svenska
    • Tiếng Việt
    • Türkçe
    • Ελληνικά
    • Български език
    • Русский
    • Српски
    • Українська мова
    • עִבְרִית
    • العربية
    • فارسی
    • मराठी
    • हिन्दी
    • বাংলা
    • ગુજરાતી
    • தமிழ்
    • ಕನ್ನಡ
    • ภาษาไทย
    • 한국어
    • 日本語
    • 简体中文
    • 繁體中文
  • Have an account? Log in
    Have an account?
    · Forgot password?

    New to Twitter?
    Sign up
vgr's profile
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
Venkatesh Rao
@vgr

Tweets

Venkatesh Rao

@vgr

Conversational account. For work follow @ribbonfarm, @breaking_smart, @artofgig. Tweets are 90% vacuous views, apathetically held. Mediocritopian. IKEA builder.

Los Angeles, CA
venkateshrao.com
Joined August 2007

Tweets

  • © 2020 Twitter
  • About
  • Help Center
  • Terms
  • Privacy policy
  • Imprint
  • Cookies
  • Ads info
Dismiss
Previous
Next

Go to a person's profile

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @

Promote this Tweet

Block

  • Tweet with a location

    You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more

    Your lists

    Create a new list


    Under 100 characters, optional

    Privacy

    Copy link to Tweet

    Embed this Tweet

    Embed this Video

    Add this Tweet to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Add this video to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Hmm, there was a problem reaching the server.

    By embedding Twitter content in your website or app, you are agreeing to the Twitter Developer Agreement and Developer Policy.

    Preview

    Why you're seeing this ad

    Log in to Twitter

    · Forgot password?
    Don't have an account? Sign up »

    Sign up for Twitter

    Not on Twitter? Sign up, tune into the things you care about, and get updates as they happen.

    Sign up
    Have an account? Log in »

    Two-way (sending and receiving) short codes:

    Country Code For customers of
    United States 40404 (any)
    Canada 21212 (any)
    United Kingdom 86444 Vodafone, Orange, 3, O2
    Brazil 40404 Nextel, TIM
    Haiti 40404 Digicel, Voila
    Ireland 51210 Vodafone, O2
    India 53000 Bharti Airtel, Videocon, Reliance
    Indonesia 89887 AXIS, 3, Telkomsel, Indosat, XL Axiata
    Italy 4880804 Wind
    3424486444 Vodafone
    » See SMS short codes for other countries

    Confirmation

     

    Welcome home!

    This timeline is where you’ll spend most of your time, getting instant updates about what matters to you.

    Tweets not working for you?

    Hover over the profile pic and click the Following button to unfollow any account.

    Say a lot with a little

    When you see a Tweet you love, tap the heart — it lets the person who wrote it know you shared the love.

    Spread the word

    The fastest way to share someone else’s Tweet with your followers is with a Retweet. Tap the icon to send it instantly.

    Join the conversation

    Add your thoughts about any Tweet with a Reply. Find a topic you’re passionate about, and jump right in.

    Learn the latest

    Get instant insight into what people are talking about now.

    Get more of what you love

    Follow more accounts to get instant updates about topics you care about.

    Find what's happening

    See the latest conversations about any topic instantly.

    Never miss a Moment

    Catch up instantly on the best stories happening as they unfold.

    Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
    • Report Tweet
    • Report NetzDG Violation

    The first time you learn a few thinking skills that can generate and sustain trains of thought indefinitely, it’s like learning to drive. Kinda exhilarating and you want to drive for the sake of driving. Then the thrill wanes and a fork in the road appears, with 4 options.

    12:10 PM - 12 Apr 2020
    • 17 Retweets
    • 141 Likes
    • Corey Haines 💡 nth horizon (ovc terminal go zrr) Joshua Grochow Vishal Sagar Andy Sparks Josh Thompson 🐢 airborne caipira Kylie Stedman Gomes Sandeep Kalidindi
    6 replies 17 retweets 141 likes
      1. New conversation
      2. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Option 1: the race car driver option. You work to improve driving skill to get back the same highs. With thinking skills, this is the kind of person who becomes invested in optimizer theology. You end up on thinking equivalent of racetracks, trying to win points, praise, prizes.

        1 reply 0 retweets 35 likes
        Show this thread
      3. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Option 2: The chore driver. You don’t particularly enjoy it, but you don’t gate it, and do it when you have to. You get good-enough mediocre at it, develop a few special tricks, but mostly drive for instrumental reasons. Not pleasure. This is most knowledge work.

        1 reply 0 retweets 36 likes
        Show this thread
      4. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Option 3: You become a cab/uber driver. Probably enjoy it more than most, better than most from practice, and slowly develop a broad/deep way of seeing world from the driver seat. Not as high-skill/talent as race car drivers but broader vision. In thinking, this is leadership.

        1 reply 0 retweets 31 likes
        Show this thread
      5. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Unlike option 2, this is not purely instrumental. You do so much of it, it better be more than a means to an end. Otherwise you’ll be miserable. But unlike option 1, it’s not enough in itself. You need wide-field view of real world to make the activity meaningful, not racetrack.

        1 reply 0 retweets 26 likes
        Show this thread
      6. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Option 4: At some point you develop a visceral hatred of driving. Maybe a traumatic/scary accident. Maybe going overboard on green morality. You only walk or bike or take powered transit if you absolutely must. The thinking equivalent is thinking-rejecting pure empaths/feelers.

        1 reply 0 retweets 32 likes
        Show this thread
      7. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        My history is interesting, in high school I was tagged as Option 1 type because in that limited field I was incorrectly tagged a race-car driver type. In college, I got better calibrated and self-tagged a Option 3 type but having to do Option 2 chores for others to “pay my dues”

        2 replies 0 retweets 15 likes
        Show this thread
      8. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Ie, I saw myself as the full-time uber driver equivalent of thinking work, who’d have to do driving chores for others for a while, and less driving (and less interesting driving) for others for a while. Good description of my life till I finished my PhD, ~ 2003, age 29.

        1 reply 0 retweets 15 likes
        Show this thread
      9. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Postdoc on, I was basically in charge of my thinking life and could think as much as I liked about almost anything I liked, within very broad limits set by employers. That’s really what a PhD buys you — right to own your thinking because nobody else is competent to.

        2 replies 3 retweets 42 likes
        Show this thread
      10. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        If you do it right, you become intellectually ungovernable. There are other ways to get there but a PhD is the easiest, most lucrative way, if you can get on that path. It’s framed as a sort of orderly manumission, but it’s really more of a jailbreak with collusion from warders.

        1 reply 2 retweets 36 likes
        Show this thread
      11. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Most people never realize that the default state of your brain/thinking skills is one of captivity/bondage. Like life without a drivers license in the US. Even if you don’t drive much, it’s nice to have the *option* to be contd. lunch break

        1 reply 1 retweet 22 likes
        Show this thread
      12. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        What about Option 4? It’s a kind of reactionary response to failure to make thinking a worthwhile part of your life. While there are days I’m tired of thinking and perhaps more in touch with the underdeveloped emotional or somatic side of my life, it will never be core for me.

        1 reply 1 retweet 9 likes
        Show this thread
      13. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Curiously enough, with actual driving I’ve almost turned into an Option 4. But I think that’s bad so I make myself drive a bit every few weeks. Sometimes I enjoy it, other times it’s just a chore to maintain muscle memory. I no longer “see like a driver”

        1 reply 0 retweets 9 likes
        Show this thread
      14. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        But back to thinking, at some point merely being ungovernable in otherwise governed thought spaces peopled by types 1-4 and non-jail broken non-thinkers. I got attracted to unthought “wild thoughts” spaces. It’s been a theme on my blog for years now.

        1 reply 0 retweets 8 likes
        Show this thread
      15. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        When I went free agent in 2011 my launch slogan was “where the wild thoughts are”. More recent bit of writing on this theme (from 2016):https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2016/05/26/how-to-take-your-brain-off-road/ …

        1 reply 1 retweet 22 likes
        Show this thread
      16. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Ok another break. Cliffhanger for later: can you hit the edge of a thought space? Not just off-road but have to exit car because your learned sustainable thought habits can’t go any further?

        4 replies 0 retweets 14 likes
        Show this thread
      17. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        Will continue this another day. Went for a walk and had lunch so a bit sleepy now and the next part, how to be an ungovernable thinker-feeler in unmapped territories requires two 2x2s I have to draw first.

        1 reply 0 retweets 10 likes
        Show this thread
      18. Venkatesh Rao‏ @vgr Apr 12
        • Report Tweet
        • Report NetzDG Violation

        @RemindMe_OfThis in 1 week

        1 reply 1 retweet 7 likes
        Show this thread
      19. End of conversation

    Loading seems to be taking a while.

    Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.

      Promoted Tweet

      false

      • © 2020 Twitter
      • About
      • Help Center
      • Terms
      • Privacy policy
      • Imprint
      • Cookies
      • Ads info