Even when we don’t know where certain paths will take us, don’t we often know enough to not start off on them?
Category archives: Human nature
Call me by my name
My name is Ayomide and I want to talk about names: what they mean, who gets to give them and why all of it matters.
Why “normal” isn’t useful for describing things
I tell medical students early in our interactions to avoid describing things as “normal” because it’s not the useful description they think it is. It can mean two opposite things and that creates problems.
How we go from surviving to thriving
We are wired to remember bad experiences and normalise good ones. I was reminded of this recently when reading a review of Apple’s MacBooks that launched late last year. They contained the M1, Apple’s first desktop-class chip based on a decade of custom chips for their “smaller” devices from iPhones to AirPods. These chips that …
Hanlon’s Razor is a way to be generous
Shaving with Hanlon’s razor about once a week helps me stay generous and avoid cynicism. No, Hanlon isn’t a brand of blade, and it’s certainly not for shaving my beard. It’s a super helpful principle for thinking about why people do what they do. You might say it’s for “shaving” human motivation. I like to …
Sing the song of your life
There’s a world of difference in how we see ourselves and how others see us. I’ve often been described as intense. I’m the kind of person who tends to come on too strong and speak (or write) too forcefully. Sometimes it’s considered a good thing, and I’m perceived as confident. Other times and with other …
Behind every joke, there’s smoke
There are few things more tedious than someone acting in bad faith. You see it all the time on social media. Person A posts and then some other Person B shows up in the replies attacking said tweet. Person A (or some other Person C) then points out how the attack is unfair, only for …
How uniformity kills unity
We tend to mistake uniformity for unity. Uniformity is about looking the same, while unity is about actually being one.This means that unity is internal: it begins with agreeing on some fundamentals as being most important and then working together to build in alignment with those fundamentals. Uniformity, on the other hand, is external: looking …
Dancing at work
One of the favourite parts of my job is when I get to dance with patients and their loved ones. Not literally of course. Read more…
Technology is a double-edged sword
Technology makes a lot possible, but at what cost? At the cost of introducing abstraction, which in turn impacts on serendipity and accessibility.