We Don't Have Earlids, TikTok's Food Label, and Virtuous Pleasure
We Don't Have Earlids, TikTok's Food Label, and Virtuous Pleasure
Baxter's Blend #7
Hey everyone,
Greetings from Austin!
During a workout this week, I busted out beast mode and did 100 pull-ups. 10 sets of 10. I’ve never done that many in one workout. Last week, I did 75. The week before, I did 50.
This made me think: what if you’re a lot tougher than you think you know you are, both physically and intellectually?
We Don’t Have Earlids
On the note of intellectual fortitude, I started reading a book called Understanding Media by Canadian media theorist Marshall McLuhan. One of my top writing influences is David Perell, and McLuhan is one of his heroes.
McLuhan’s writing is some of the most confusing prose I’ve ever read. Any time I read a new paragraph, I’m like, “what the hell are you saying, dude?” But after rereading the same thing seven more times and then talking to Mrs. GPT about it, I’m like, “Holy shit, this guy is changing my entire perception of reality!”
One such insight is from one his other books, The Medium is the Massage: “We can’t shut out sound automatically. We simply are not equipped with earlids.”
If we can’t close our ears, then we have to be disproportionately more careful with what we listen to. Music, podcasts, or even some random parent telling their kid to follow the rules because that’s apparently what you’re supposed to do. It’s no exaggeration to say that sound can be a passive programming of the mind.
New Essay: People Want to Talk to You
I recently wrote about something I know will stand the test of time: talking to strangers. Especially in the AirPods age, where saying hi is the equivalent of bothering someone.
I open the essay by writing:
“I used to struggle with talking to strangers. Even if I wanted to compliment someone on their shirt, I usually didn’t. I told myself that I was an introvert and shouldn’t bother. While it’s true that I tend to be socially shy, the real truth was this: I was scared to talk to people because I believed that I wasn’t worth talking to.”
Then I share a story about how when I was in Spain, I didn’t go talk to some guys on a beach playing soccer because I thought they would reject me. By telling myself I was an outsider and didn’t belong, some sinister part of me wanted to preserve that self-concept. As I learned:
“People treat you how you treat yourself. Whether you realize it or not, the things you tell yourself are the things you tell other people—all without words.”
I later came to the conclusion that there’s only two things that you should tell yourself: people want to talk to you, and people are shy, so often times they probably want you to talk to them.
In the words of Walt Whitman:
“Stranger, if you passing meet me and desire to speak to me,
why should you not speak to me?
And why should I not speak to you?”
— Walt Whitman
You can read the full essay below:
Pain Precedes Virtuous Pleasure
In 1910, the British writer G.K. Chesterton wrote a series of essays called What’s Wrong With The World. In it he shared a beautiful insight on what I’ll call virtuous pleasure:
“The principle is this: that in everything worth having, even in every pleasure, there is a point of pain or tedium that must be survived, so that the pleasure may revive and endure. The joy of battle comes after the first fear of death; the joy of reading Virgil comes after the bore of learning him; the glow of the sea-bather comes after the icy shock of the sea bath; and the success of the marriage comes after the failure of the honeymoon. All human vows, laws, and contracts are so many ways of surviving with success this breaking point, this instant of potential surrender.”
Nutrition Label of TikTok
When one of my friends sent me an Instagram Reel this week, I instantly felt my brain rot. I’ve hardly consumed any video content in the past few months, so I was probably about as shocked as someone in oral society might be to discover a sheet of paper with words on it.
I know that short-form video content can be used for good, but it often tends to be like a bottomless bowl of cotton candy ice cream. There’s almost no natural foods that have high combos of carbohydrates and fat, so short form content is also like ice cream in this way.
Enjoy my satire on the Nutrition Facts of TikTok:
See you next week,
—Baxter
P.S. If you want to laugh your ass off, check out Bisexual Jesus.