Conversation

Still thinking about this question, the first thing that came to my mind was simple household maintenance stuff because it feels like anyone could do it if they wanted to. At work it’s easier to appreciate everyone’s different skills, including my own.
Quote Tweet
this might not always work for everyone, but probably worth sharing anyway: whatever comes up when you fill in the blank of "Why doesn't everyone just... _______" is often a clue about something you might be uncommonly well-suited to do what fills in the blank for you?
Show this thread
1
11
Having that said, there’s a meta skill to it all that’s, I don’t know how to say this… really wanting to figure things out and caring a lot about the outcome? It’s like most people would rather put in a lot of effort before they make sure it’s in the right direction?
7
Replying to
I think this skill is called Agency.
Quote Tweet
This insight is one of the big & important ones. Have you tried solving the problem by just thinking about and then solving the problem? It is very hard to learn — my guess is @QiaochuYuan was ready and this workshop was the last puzzle piece. I think of this skill as “agency”. twitter.com/QiaochuYuan/st…
Show this thread
1
2
Replying to and
Hmm. Agency isn’t quite it. Agency = I can choose icecream flavor or rearrange my books. The defining feature might be self-permissioning. The idea that you don’t need permission to think and solve problems which are not obviously common problems with available standard solutions
Replying to and
Hm, all I know is that the skill that *I* call Agency is exactly the thing you seem to be describing, but I agree I made up the definition and it isn’t a standard by any means. Probably means I should put more effort into popularizing my definition…or maybe there’s a better word
1