Weekly Wisdom #309 - Why I've been absent from the newsletter

Designing Homes That Don't Need Heating, ChatGPT Becomes Real and Reasons Not to Work for Yourself

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Happy Monday!

I've been absent the past few weeks largely because I've been busy with other projects.

One of the main ones is figuring out all the processes around building a new home.

It's a complicated process, with many government forms, many documents written in difficult language—like the building code—and a ton of jargon.

But it's been a good reminder for me about how painful it is to learn something new.

There's a new language to learn. A new group of people to become part of, and learn about, and lean on.

And while it seems painfully slow and complicated at first, inevitably it always ends up seeming much simpler than you thought.

And when you go to do it a second time, it's much more straightforward.

So I'm trying to embrace the slow progress, enjoy the small wins, and push myself to think as though I'll need to teach it in the future.

It's all part of the learning process, something that I enjoy endlessly, even if it seems like a slog in the beginning.

Have a great week!

Graham

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Links

📚 Book I'm Reading: The Passivhaus Handbook - Janet Cotterell & Adam Dadeby - On the topic of building houses, I'm planning to design & build to the passive house standard.

Essentially, it means super-insulating the house and making it airtight so that it meets air-tightness requirements, maximum per-year heating requirements, and maximum energy requirements overall.

In theory, that gives you a house that relies mostly on the sun for heat, and makes it possible to have net-zero energy consumption if you add some solar panels.

📖 ChatGPT 4o Announcement - ChatGPT announced the release of their GPT-4o (“o” for “omni”) model, their most advanced yet, and it came with much faster voice interaction, the ability to see your screen and respond to what you're doing, and a bunch of related enhancements.

It's the biggest advance I've seen since they released the original model, and it might be the tipping point for me to make more of an effort to incorporate into my own life.

Feedback on what's on your screen, real-time translation, tutoring/help learning topics, all kinds of things are now possible.

​This was just one of several demos that I was excited about:

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Tweet of the Week

Working for yourself is often what most people imagine as their ideal life, instead of a 9-5 job. But it comes with a lot of costs too, and most of the time, it isn't easier.

​This list gives 10 reasons why:

Chris Williamson-->

@ChrisWillx

10 reasons why working for yourself absolutely sucks.

Pretty much everyone on the internet is telling you to leave your job and go work for yourself.

If you're not already side-hustling your way to a million, you should flip your soyboy boss off as you hand in your resignation… https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1772315163384746209

2:30 PM • Mar 25, 2024

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