Adolescence, Life-Saving Drones, Cool Reads, and Grief

Hello friends and welcome back to Life Reimagined, a free weekly elixir designed to make you feel good and live better.

📚 I. Books I’ve Enjoyed

I’m reading at a good clip this year. I’ve mostly gobbled up memoirs that take me into the unfamiliar and interesting worlds of the authors who wrote them. Below are five of my favorite books from the year so far.

• Saltwater Buddha by Jaimal Yogis: A memoir about a lost teenager who finds his path in life via Zen and surfing.

• Journey to the End of the Night by Louis-Ferdinand Céline. One of the few novels that Bukowski enjoyed, this is a wild and dark tale of a European man who navigates a life of poverty.

• Gift from the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh: A wonderful collection of essays from a woman reflecting on relationships, parenthood, and solitude while vacationing in Florida.

• Troubled by Rob Henderson: An American Dream story about navigating and growing up in the foster care system.

• This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff: A phenomenally-written story that captures the uncomfortable and confusing experience of adolescence.

📦 I. Cool Company Creating the Future

I recently toured Zipline, a company creating autonomous drones that deliver goods and services to people.

The most interesting part of the experience was learning that Zipline’s drones have primarily been used in Africa to deliver blood and other life-saving medical interventions to hospitals. In some countries, they have helped reduce the number of deaths from postpartum hemorrhaging by 50%!

Outside of learning about Zipline’s progress and impact, it was awesome to be on the ground floor of a hardware company making real things. I left the facility feeling like I should leave the digital world and start working on something with more direct impact.

If you’re curious about the company, the popular Youtuber Mark Rober created a great video about what Zipline is doing and how it works.

🌊 III. A Good Description of Grief

A few weeks ago, I shared The Wave I’ll Never Forget, an essay about a paranormal experience I had while grieving the loss of my mom.

A reader reached out afterward and recommended this Reddit post from an older man who has lost “friends, best friends, acquaintances, co-workers, grandparents, mom, relatives, teachers, mentors, students, neighbors, and a host of other folks.”

It’s one of the better descriptions of grief that I’ve seen. I particularly enjoy his metaphor for the early stages of loss:

Since I write about losing my mom from time to time, many people have reached out to me over the years to ask for advice after losing their mom.

Providing “advice” on such matters feels impossible, but I still try. One universal theme in the responses is that a big loss can feel like a fight with a force far more powerful than you.

Fighting the force or trying to “solve the problem” is futile. You will only wear yourself down. Instead, you must surrender and offer yourself as much self-compassion as you can.

I think this Reddit user captures what I’ve been trying to say for years.

🎙️ IV. Podcast Worth Listening To

I enjoyed Lex Fridman’s interview with Annie Jacobsen, a journalist who writes about war, weapons, security, and secrets. Lex and Annie dive deep into what it would look like if the world entered a nuclear war. They get into the details of the nuclear capabilities of different countries, the unbelievable power of these weapons, and what would happen if they were deployed.

What they discuss is both informative and horrifying. In listening, I realized that my idea of nuclear war has always been opaque. I knew it was a primary threat to human civilization, but my thinking stopped there. This interview turned that opaque thinking into something more concrete.

On the whole, I left the interview with a deepened sense of the fragility of life and the importance of our efforts to preserve and improve the world that we have.

You can listen to the interview here.

🧠 V. Something I’m Thinking About

In This Boy’s Life, Tobias Wolff discusses the blissfully ignorant period of adolescence and your early 20s when you still believe the world is an oyster designed for you and your specialness.

For most of us, this period ends. As we mature, we realize that we are not special, or at least that we are not uniquely special. That realization can feel like a punch to the gut, but ultimately allows us to live out our small piece of the cosmic puzzle without all of the angsty egoism of youth.

That's all for now. See you next Sunday.

— Cal

🌎️ Three other things you might enjoy

1. Doing Time Right: Everyone wants to get more done in less time. This course will show you exactly how to do that with the eliminate, automate, delegate, and iterate framework.

2. Foundations. Looking for good books to read? Check out Foundations, a growing digital notebook with notes & lessons from 100+ timeless books.

3. Listen to the Podcast: Feel like school didn't prepare you for adulthood? The Sh*t You Don't Learn in School podcast exists to help make up for this societal failure.