["Listen and Watch" - Tian Ge
The live performance recommended in the third episode of Le Xia 3 was very impressive. Wa Yina's hoe and leaves were stunning, and the director following along to plant rice was very funny. After the performance, during the interview, the host said that ten years ago, they used to work as a designer but couldn't continue, so they returned to the village to farm. They now live in Bengbu. There were many good bands and songs in this episode, but they decided to recommend this one.
- Gradually Entering Autumn
Recently, it has been secretly raining at night in Beijing, and it has started to cool down in the morning. It is autumn now.
- Organized Week
Because work was not so busy this week, I took the opportunity to organize the materials I collected during my usual design work. This will make it more efficient for me to find inspiration in the future. After organizing, I had a collection of 10,000 images. However, I had a doubt during the classification process, so I asked GPT, "As a designer, should I categorize inspiration materials based on industry type or style?"
GPT quickly replied, "In graphic design, the classification of inspiration materials in the early stage can be based on personal workflow and preferences. Both categorizing by industry type and finding styles by category have their own advantages and applicable situations.
The advantage of categorizing by industry type and finding styles is... (omitted due to excessive word count)
The advantage of categorizing by style and finding industry types is...
In the end, the choice of classification method depends on your personal work style and goals. You can choose based on your needs and project requirements, and you can even combine both classification methods for better organization and management of inspiration materials."
Well, that's a great answer. AI can sometimes be more objective. So, when organizing, I decided to include both methods. I created folders for each industry and style, and if there are similar materials, I added industry or style tags to make it easier to filter. I'm so smart.
- Received the First Order on Xiaohongshu (Little Red Book)
In June, I decided to share some of my favorite apps or productivity tools on my Xiaohongshu account. But until now, I have only published four articles (lol), and I have less than 100 followers. However, unexpectedly, this week, a browser app messaged me asking if I would like to do a promotion. Although the payment is based on the number of followers, which is almost negligible, I found it interesting. It turns out that the platform of Xiaohongshu is so friendly to creators. I also think of this as a random event, and whether I have it or not, it's all good. It's like a reminder for me to update:)
- Night Chat with a Friend
A friend came to Beijing for a business trip this week, and we made plans to have a chat tonight. After dinner, we went to a nearby internet cafe to play games and continue our conversation. It's been seven or eight years since I last went to an internet cafe, and it was quite novel. The conversation afterwards was as usual, with words overlapping each other, like reference points for each other, making everything clearer.
Everything is Cyclical#
Everything is cyclical, and the most easily overlooked aspect of cyclical nature is that it doesn't require external forces to push it in the opposite direction. Becoming big is enough to make you small without the need for anyone or anything to push you.
We have learned from history that complete victory is never the expected outcome for winners - a good and lasting peace. Because victory always sows the seeds of new wars, as it breeds the desire for revenge and retribution among the defeated, and because victory nurtures new opponents.
Perhaps this is the cycle: starting with a dream, achieving that dream, and then something that was once considered a dream becomes a new baseline, and your ambitious gaze shifts to the next dream. Insufficiency, effort, success. Insufficiency, effort, success. Everything is cyclical.
It seems that everything has an underlying balance. Recently, I listened to a podcast by Xie Yin and was deeply impressed by a sentence: "everything has a price." Everything comes with a cost. People who seem to be successful, rich, or happy on the surface also have something they have sacrificed behind the scenes.
Learning to be Healthy at 150 - Incomplete Guide to Optimizing Human Systems#
In the past few months, I happened to watch a podcast where Rich Roll interviewed Andrew Huberman on YouTube. They discussed the neuroscience principles and "tools" that can be used to improve our daily work and learning performance. It opened a new world for me. I then followed several episodes of Huberman's own podcast, which provided insights into various aspects of our daily life, health, learning, work, and exercise. The biggest difference between this and many other "health" articles and videos is that Huberman is a neuroscience professor at Stanford University, and the content he presents is based on high-quality, peer-reviewed scientific research. He explains the experiments and conclusions in great detail and provides practical advice.
Through this series of learning, I gradually feel like I have learned about the "composition and operation principles" of various human aspects. Through a series of tools and practices, we can "optimize" our own human systems just like optimizing software programs.
The Definition of Happiness and the Meaning of Life#
They went on to discuss what the definition of happiness is. Alan believes that instead of answering this question directly, it is more effective to think about what triggers this question. He believes that there must be a question behind it that triggers us to explore the definition of happiness. And the underlying reason is the key. Defining happiness does not solve the underlying problem. For example, if the definition of happiness is dopamine, knowing this definition does not solve the original reason for wanting to define happiness.
Perhaps what we really need to do is not to find the definition of happiness, but to find out why we want to start exploring the definition of happiness and then think about how to make ourselves stop exploring what happiness is in our daily lives.
AiTa - AI Generated Celebrity Voices#
Input text and it will generate voices of existing celebrity models. It does sound quite similar if you don't listen carefully.
Dollar Street - Video Showing Income Disparities#
What are the differences in different income households? The Gapminder team visited hundreds of households in various countries (I also saw households from China) and filmed everyday items to show how income disparities affect various aspects of people's daily lives through video photos.
DockX - Menu Bar Display Tool#
An interesting little tool that displays real-time internet speed (download/upload), CPU/memory usage, custom GIF animations, and custom program dock themes. The ability to upload custom GIFs is great, and creative players can come up with new tricks.
Muliti - Multiplayer Remote Control#
A well-designed remote control software. Requires submitting an email to join the beta test.
YesPlayMusic - High-Quality Music Player#
A visually appealing third-party music player for Netease Cloud Music. It also aggregates music from Apple Music. Fans of both platforms are thrilled.
deck.gallery - Collection of PPT Inspirations#
@deckgallery collects PPT inspirations from abroad, including WWDC and Linear styles. Although you can't download them, the quality of the inspirations is excellent.
Light and Shadows - Explanation of 3D Principles#
A very detailed and professional introduction to light and shadows! Worth bookmarking for future reference.
That's it. Thank you for reading. If you liked it, feel free to subscribe or recommend it to other friends so that more people can see it. You can also find me in these places to discuss thoughts on efficiency, work, and life:
Jike: @Yan Guanglin
Email: [email protected]
Of course, likes and comments are welcome to encourage me.