I\u2019ve found myself thinking the title of this post (\u201cwtf just learn project management\u201d) multiple times in multiple conversations, or as a response to people\u2019s tweets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I used to feel bad about myself when I failed at things.<\/strong> I thought it was because I lacked discipline, or willpower, and that it was because of incompetence on my part \u2013 and underneath that it felt like moral failure, like I was a worthless piece of shit, and that if I could trade lives with some hungry, desperate kid in poverty, that would be for the best, I\u2019m wasting the opportunity I\u2019ve been given, what a selfish coward, waste of breath. I remember specifically feeling that, I have the journal entries to prove it. It took me a while longer to realize that I had internalized that from other people, from the culture around me, and also to see that it\u2019s not even helpful. If it worked, it would\u2019ve worked, but it clearly wasn\u2019t working. It took me years and years to see that, and these days I sometimes think, if I can help someone else see that for themselves even a few months sooner, I think that\u2019s a good life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Just because you haven\u2019t done it yet, doesn\u2019t mean you never will.<\/strong> it can seem “logical” and “evidence-based” to think that if you’ve never been able to do something, you’ll never be able to do it. why would you be able to succeed at something you’ve only ever failed at? and yet, people make personal breakthroughs all the time. But to make that breakthrough you typically have to believe that breakthroughs are possible. If you\u2019re determined to believe that it\u2019s not possible, then you\u2019re going to end up avoiding the things that could help make it happen. I\u2019m not saying belief is sufficient. But it is quite necessary. The absence of the belief in possibility can be ruinous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Youtube chapters:<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am not a natural at project management \/ cathedrals and rocketships \/ I never want to make people feel bad, but sometimes it happens \/ writing 1,000,000 words \/ you have to define your projects clearly \/ I know that I want to become a good writer, even if it takes my whole life \/ I like music, but I know I\u2019m unlikely to be world-class \/ my goal this year is to make 100 YouTube vids\u2026 to become a better writer \/ I was rambly and incoherent for the first 100,000 words<\/strong> \/ navigating by arbitrary internal standards \/ the point of doing creative work is to gratify your taste<\/strong> \/ what I learned writing ~800,000 words \/ consider the speedrunners \/ 1000wordvomits has given me confidence and makes me excited about the future<\/strong> \/ I fail at \u201cdo X every day\u201d-type projects \/ doing 1,000 pull-ups \/ doing experiments publicly \/ it feels good to complete mid-sized projects \/ doing anything repeatedly at volume is going to be interesting<\/strong> \/ DMs I get from aspiring writers \/ abandoned projects are still useful if you keep track of them \/ 1,000 omelettes \/ this is my 20th video this year, I\u2019m learning about lighting and audio \/ it\u2019s impossible to learn everything in advance, you\u2019d never get started<\/strong> \/ took me 10+ videos to realise that ad-libs are the best format I could be doing right now \/ studying my earlier videos \/ I design with failure in mind \/ I felt bad about myself when I fail, but the problem wasn\u2019t discipline or willpower<\/strong> \u2013 it was project design \/ my ADHD makes it difficult for me to motivate myself to do something indefinitely without a sense of completion \/ it\u2019s pretty great to have an existing audience \/ I can motivate myself by reminding myself of how I can help other people<\/strong> \/ friend meetup thread \u2013 it\u2019s a project! \/ people have already started their own threads because they saw mine \/ Karen x Cheng\u2019s dance for a year \/ each \u201cdo 100 thing\u201d project is an accomplishment that\u2019s yours, that you can be proud of, even if you don\u2019t subsequently follow up on it \u2013 it\u2019s a story you can tell \/ video games are fun partially because the game does the dirty work of project management for you<\/strong> \/ music, sports, dance \u2013 they\u2019re great for kids because it teaches them from experience that they can suck at something, struggle at it, and then GET GOOD by persisting \/ used to have limiting beliefs about how much I could squat \/ breaking that limiting belief felt profound, magical, almost religious<\/strong>. I wanted to cry, to realize I could do something I couldn\u2019t do before \/ you have no idea how much you can improve<\/strong> \/ I\u2019m making this video because I\u2019m not naturally good at this stuff \/ it feels logical and evidence-based to reason that you won\u2019t be able to do something you\u2019ve never been able to do before \/ things don\u2019t change if we decide that they won\u2019t change (self-fulfilling prophecies) \/ how do you break out? Baby steps! \/ the pessimistic mind writes off small changes, but big changes are made up of small changes<\/strong> \/ you don\u2019t know your own potential \/ most of us are bad project managers who may think we need motivation or discipline \/ I love supporting others and being supported by others \u2013 I don\u2019t feel important enough to do something just for myself \/ I gotta lift so I can uplift the mens \/ I remember the despair I felt 5 years ago because I was failing \u2013 but those failures weren\u2019t all bad, they were lessons<\/p>\n\n\n\n tactical inefficiencies \/ golden goose secret sauce is connecting things across different contexts\u2026 as a culture? we don\u2019t seem to have an appreciation for how someone might have to work on a thing for decades<\/p>\n\n\n\n Introspect<\/a> \u2013 300 page pdf<\/p>\n\n\n\n LessUnstrategic<\/a> \u2013 21 page google doc<\/p>\n\n\n\n Doing anything substantial requires project management<\/a> [45mins]<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was conflicted about writing and publishing this post because I want to be quite careful not to fall into a pattern of becoming some sort of productivity hustlebro. That\u2019s not a huge issue but maybe my audience might come to expect it from me? That\u2019s not a huge issue either because I can always just switch to writing about other things, and if people don\u2019t like it they can leave. I suppose at some subconscious level I\u2019m always worried about disappointing people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Part of me is slightly annoyed at the realization that I\u2019ve already made a video about this \u2013 it\u2019s funny, because I\u2019m mostly grateful to my past self for already having covered this, but I guess there\u2019s a part of me that feels underappreciated. \u201cOnly 1,912 views?\u201d Well, yeah, Visa, most people don\u2019t have the time to watch a 45 minute video that\u2019s unedited and rambly. And also, more people will watch it in the future as you continue to build and grow. And maybe think back to the time when you had no audience whatsoever, and you would have been excited to have even 100 views on a video? Yeah that\u2019s true. I\u2019m always hungry for more, but as I said in the second video, it\u2019s important to celebrate your wins.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I told a bunch of guys that I would write an essay today and so it would be good if I wrote the essay today. But I\u2019m starting to get tired.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2731 <\/p>\n\n\n\n Let\u2019s talk about project management. I\u2019ll start with what I think is the most important feature of a project. To me, a project is something substantial enough that it requires collaboration to complete. Even if you\u2019re doing it entirely on your own, it\u2019s big enough that you can\u2019t do it in a single session, which means you have to collaborate with your past and future selves. You have to pick off tomorrow where you left off today. <\/p>\n\n\n\n All great artists and athletes have to learn project management to accomplish the great things that they do, even if they don\u2019t necessarily call it that. They might not be particularly precise or deliberate about it, but they do have a process, and if they\u2019re really serious, they likely have a process for investigating and updating their core process. <\/p>\n\n\n\n When people sign their kids up for art classes or sports teams, to some degree I think what they\u2019re hoping is that their kids will learn project management. To manage their own psychology, to collaborate with themselves and others, and to do things tomorrow that they aren\u2019t yet able to do today. This gives people a sense of power and autonomy, it gives people a way of relating to others, a way of expressing themselves, all sorts of good stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Okay? Alright, now a bit of personal backstory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When I was a kid, I never thought about \u201cprojects\u201d. I just did whatever I felt like doing. I read a lot of books, played a lot of video games. I would meander around happily. That\u2019s part of the joy of childhood. You don\u2019t have any responsibilities yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (The following images are from Julie Zhou\u2019s \u201cJunior Designers vs Senior Designers\u201d, 2014)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Then came school, and with school came homework. And I hated homework, so bad. I would put it off, avoid doing it, sometimes try and do a rushed job minutes before class, sometimes copy frantically from friends. It was a lot of stress and anxiety. I would lose things, I would fail to keep track of things. It was a mess. <\/p>\n\n\n\n And\u2026 I\u2019m sure people tried to help me, but it didn\u2019t really work. My teachers couldn\u2019t really help. My parents couldn\u2019t really help. I would have to figure it out on my own, and it was a messy, painful, frustrating process. The \u201cobvious\u201d solution would have been to, well, do my homework before it was due. But I almost never seemed to be able to get into that headspace until it was too late. Sometimes I would do my homework immediately the moment I received it, and that would usually give me the best odds of not screwing up. <\/p>\n\n\n\n But this section is not about \u201chow to do your homework\u201d. I hated homework and I still do. After years of second-guessing myself and having lots of conversations with people, I now personally reject the whole structure and spirit of traditional schooling. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s how learning actually works, at least for me. I think real learning happens on a slightly unpredictable schedule. You can try and plan for it, and set things up to facilitate it, but you can\u2019t rush<\/em> it, sort of like how you can\u2019t have a baby in 3 months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I could write a whole separate section about this old meme. Part of it is that gaming provides clear rewards, immediate feedback, desired outcomes. The concept of \u201cgamification\u201d started out quite promising, but unfortunately I think it came to be associated with the superficial veneer of gaming \u2013 frills, trinkets, points, etc \u2013 when what is really required is that we investigate the fundamental structure of the systems we are trying to invigorate. To paraphrase Steve Jobs, design is not what it looks like, design is how it works.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m thinking now, what did I do<\/em>, as a kid? What projects did I indulge in? I know I kept a sticker book at some point, and a Digimon cards collection, almost by accident. Those didn\u2019t *feel* like projects, even though technically I would say they kind of qualify. Because a collection is something that you build over time, it requires collaboration with past and future selves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I had a personal website, which was something that I built over time, and I was very proud of it. It started with a few individual HTML pages, mostly text, some images and links. And then from there I learned to create a network of pages which referenced each other, related to each other. Nobody particularly taught me to do this, I learned it myself through trial and error, partially by copying what I liked about other sites. (Today, my personal homepage is on visakanv.com, which functions as a sort of \u201cmaster node\u201d that links out to my blogposts, youtube channel, etc. I consider this to be part of the same ongoing project, and it still makes me very proud and happy that I have a \u201chome\u201d on the web.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n I also remember writing a couple of video game guides, or FAQs, which you can still find on GameFAQs.com almost 20 years later. They were really just a list of moves with a bit of commentary on them, but looking at them now, it\u2019s remarkable to me how much effort I put into it. And these are legitimate projects! I wrote then in notepad.exe, and I remember it took me days of effort to do it. In retrospect, this was my earliest and most substantial creative work, and it laid the groundwork for me to get more comfortable writing longer blogposts and essays, and eventually, this book, and hopefully in the future, entire novels, even series of novels. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The above image is by @joulee, published in 2014 to articulate the difference in the process of a junior designer vs a senior designer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n —<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ironic that you\u2019re stressed about your chapter on project management<\/p>\n\n\n\nFurther reading:<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Comments:<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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