26) Clarity

Behind-the-scenes building Vambrace AI, a company on a mission to figure out its mission. Please pardon the stream-of-consciousness style. Subscribe to follow along or visit the site here:

(typos are to make sure you’re paying attention)

Introductory Remarks

Dear Vambracers —

In last week’s post, Incorporation & Strategic Operating Paradigm, I revealed the meaning behind my legal entity’s name, Salterton Technologies, Inc., and explored the three-sleeve approach to my day-to-day. I thought it was a good high-level snapshot of how I’m thinking about things in these early stages—and how I’m attempting to balance operational structure with strategic opportunism to capitalize on insights as they arise.

Clarity

Today is going to be a short post about the importance of clarity and calmness in my day-to-day operating existence. As someone who’s been very go-go-go in pretty much all areas of my life, for probably about 10-15ish years, I’ve realized very quickly that the demands of entrepreneurship are unique—and that the skills that made me viable in the past aren’t necessarily going to be the skills that make me viable in the future.

I’ve always prided myself on speed and intensity and complexity and covering a lot of ground in a short amount of time. You could imagine these as sort of “red” skills—meaning more fiery, intense, burn-y, combustion-y skills (if you could attribute such qualities to professional skills).

What I’m realizing is that I’m less naturally-inclined to “blue” skills—meaning skills that require clarity, calmness, and cohesion. Hardcore examples might include time management, resource allocation, summarization, etc., things that require you to sort of take a breather and just think. I don’t think that I’m lacking in these areas. I just think it’s very natural and enjoyable for me to chase new ideas and go really really deep on certain things (in a way that can be distracting).

So all of this is to say that, as I come up on the ~2-ish month mark of my official entrepreneurial journey, I really want to exercise my “blue” muscles and work on cultivating an attitude that welcomes quiet thought and cognitive calmness, and (hopefully) promotes clarity—which I can then throw my “red” skills behind—and then transition back to “blue” when I need to review and revise the “red” output.

To promote this journey of personal and professional development, I also decided to stop drinking coffee and basically quit caffeine altogether as of last week. Caffeine has played a big role in my life for 10+ years and I’ve grown helplessly dependent upon it—and I think it’s time to see what life is like on the other side. I also believe that caffeine promotes red thinking and red skills, and that I just sort of have been in a constant state of speed and motion when I now want to be more still and stable.

It’s only been about a week but I already feel a good bit calmer and clearer—so I’m excited to see where that goes. I just think that if I’m always living for the immediate-next moment, then it’s hard to enjoy the present-present moment—and to allow yourself to think and be still without wondering what’s next.

Looking Forward

That’s all from me for this week’s post. More personal than past posts, but an important area for me to explore and improve upon as I try to grow and mature and develop as a leader and steward of an organization—even if it’s just a 1-person organization for now.

I hope you have a calm and contemplative and restful week!

Sincerely,

Luke