Newsletter #33 : Ponder, Sonder and Wonder

Andrew Weaver
February 15, 2021
Hello Everyone

Hope you’ve had a great week and welcome to the latest edition of “The 5 Minute Tech Break” … 

No theme this week, just 3 articles I recently discovered and which led me to connect them for your delectation.

Things to Ponder.
Introduction to Sonder.
Art and Wonder.

Andrew Weaver
https://cto.academy

Ponder, What impossible meant to Feynman

Richard Phillips Feynman was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in quantum mechanics, quantum electrodynamics and various other science topics that I struggle to ever get my humble head around. 

Which is why I enjoyed this article on ‘What Impossible Meant to Feynman’ – allowed me to understand this genius and his work, just a little more than I did before.


Everyone lives in their own complex bubble – Welcome to ‘Sonder’

I had no idea until recently that ‘Sonder’ even existed in the English language but, what a great word it is …From The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

“Sonder n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.”

We interact, however briefly, with hundreds and potentially thousands of people every day.

But we tend to be isolated in our own complex bubble.  So does the person next to you and the person next to them.  

I love “epic stories that continue invisibly around us ….”



 

David Hockney and the wonder of art

As we spend our time striving to make products that (a) work and (b) have a utility in the world, we might sometimes overlook another creative sphere and what it brings to the world.

I felt that particularly this week about the world of art. A world that generally passes me by as I don’t have a particular knowledge or deep appreciation of it but, I really enjoyed watching a documentary about David Hockney, called ‘The Art of Seeing’.  

I found it a really inspiring film, enabling me to understand more about the process of art.  

A formal description captures it more appropriately : “David Hockney, widely considered to be Britain’s best-loved living artist, has taken over the Royal Academy [RA] in London with his exhibition A Bigger Picture, made up of recent works depicting the landscape of his native Yorkshire. In this programme, Andrew Marr, a friend of Hockney’s and an amateur painter himself, is in conversation with the artist, both at his home in Bridlington and in the galleries of the RA.”

I really recommend setting an hour aside this weekend and indulging.


 

Changes afoot at CTO Academy

The next version of CTO Academy is due for release in August. A rolling canvas of new courses, lectures, podcasts aimed at building up your management skill set and providing you with market leading support via a dynamic mentoring network and vibrant community.

If you’re an existing CTO Academy customer then we will be paying tribute to your earlier support by providing you with a FREE lifetime subscription all future course material.

If you’re not yet a customer then what are you waiting for – sign up to package of ‘every course, every lecture’ before 1st August and you too will get a FREE lifetime subscription.

Just to assist, here is a link to the page that matters.
 

Quote of the Week … [bravo to all of you taking a risk]

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing
― George Bernard Shaw

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