There’s something quite strange about the way I want to go about collecting and curating these links. There’s this constant push and pull of wanting to pick links that might showcase my diversity in what I read, or trying to curate links that might show people I read serious stuff.
In all of us, I think there’s a need to ‘perform’. To show the world a caricature of ourselves that isn’t really true; a mask that dulls our sharp and unpleasant edges. It is human to want to fit in.
But it would be dishonest of me to do this while writing. Writing is the only place I can find that real and authentic honesty comes easily to people.
Here’s my attempt at removing my mask, without a sharp sacrifice in writing quality.
On shortcuts and longcuts, a beautiful essay on essays. How good writing is allowed to meander, and sometimes necessarily needs to. Good essays take you from your comfort zone and makes you take the ‘longcut’ into ideas you might never have considered.
“Almost everything that is meaningful, beautiful, life-affirming, empowering, transformational, true—it can’t be reached by shortcuts. But what we can do is make the longcuts walkable, put out footbridges and stairs, and a table where the ocean comes into view.”
How Muse wrote a space rock opera, this is a breakdown of one of my favourite songs of all time, Knights Of Cydonia. Middle 8 understands the aesthetics behind the song really well, as well as the history tied so strongly to the song itself. A really good watch, and a really good song.
Childhoods of exceptional people, an in-depth piece of writing on how child prodigies came about, and what the makings of genius are. It also made me wonder where the geniuses of today went. Why don’t we have any groundbreaking people of any field like we did even 50 years ago. Check out Why we stopped making Einsteins, it’s a good start on answering that question at the very least.
The seduction of despair, a John Green video I revisited recently. John Green’s ideas on despair and how hope is the only logical answer to existence, and the only human answer to existence, are things I constantly need to hear and rehear and rehear.
“Destruction is often fast, loud, and dramatic, whereas reparative work tends to be slow and quiet and unspectacular.” - John Green.
An Evening With Silk Sonic, Here’s some ear candy that is oozing with charisma. I’m very late to the party, but this album is smooth polished perfection from beginning to end. I can’t get enough of it. If you haven’t listened to it, set aside some time, get yourself a bowl of grapes, tinted sunglasses, 30 minutes in your room with the loudest speakers you can find and groove out. It is an astonishingly good experience.
So that’s this week’s links.
The idea that we’re all performing is something that’s been on my mind. And I find the idea of being alone with yourself and enjoying music really beautiful. Silk Sonic is a really good outlet for that.
In a way, you can only truly judge yourself and your actions when your actions are taken when nobody else is paying attention. It is somehow obscurity that kills our need to perform.
But for the time being,
Thank you for reading.