An old stoic method. If we invested more energy in improving ourselves for ourselves without comparing and wondering what people will think, we would be better off.
I often reverse engineer sites that I think look nice and want to use their CSS as a template for a project (and there’s nothing wrong with stealing code like this). This tool is invaluable.
I’m taking a nap from blogging. I ran a high traffic blog about 5 years ago using Ghost and proxied through a CDN for super fast loading times for my visitors. For the brief window that blog existed, I learned a lot. I setup Ghost manually on a VPS and learned how to configure a server manually. One notable thing was getting cold called by a journalist asking if they could link to one of my posts and they asked me for a few other thoughts on the matter. That was the high point and I tore the whole thing down because the blog was expensive to run. I paid for analytics, bare metal VPS, CDN, and domain renewals. I plan to jump back into blogging though.
Psychedelics can be therapeutic, but can also waken up latent mental illness you never thought you even had. They’re a double edged sword and also not some panacea cure-it-all. I’ve looked into microdosing psilocybin as a nootropic and to cure mild bouts of depression. Not sure if it’s placebo or if it’s the truffles though. I’m scared to try higher doses since I suffer with anxiety and truffles could exacerbate that.
Rather than cut out social media entirely it’s worth taking a break from it and then rejoining the fray once you’re calm and have enjoyed the more simple things in life (Sunsets, swimming in lakes, playing with your dog etc). Just like any drug, social media has a law of diminishing returns. There’s even people doing ‘dopamine starving’ to address their addictions. Worth trying.