Something I learned

I'm currently reading Smarter, Faster, Better by Charles Duhigg. This is what I learned this week in my reading about how to be self-motivated:

Motivation is more like a skill, akin to reading or writing, that can be learned and honed… The trick…is realizing that a prerequisite to motivation is believing we have authority over our actions and surroundings. To motivate ourselves, we must feel like we are in control.

Takeaways:

Something I did

I recently joined the nerdiest of all associations: A competitive programming club.

I did this because I want to improve my skills as a programmer and have something cool to put on my résumé.

As you can imagine, I meet a lot of "programmer stereotypes"; introverts who care more about reducing the time and space complexity of their algorithms than keeping up with the latest fashion trends.

What these people lack in trendiness they definitely make up in their ability to make a computer do their bidding. It's very impressive.

What is competitive programming?

Basically you're put on a small team of programmers and you have to solve as many problems as you can in the allotted time (usually 5 hours).

The team who solves the most problems in the fasted amount of times wins the competition (and some job interviews).

Something I used

I used the Notion app every single day this week.

Notion is a workspace app that lets you organize anything in your life that can be written down, categorized, captured in a picture, or put into a list.

I use it for taking notes on classes, preparing social media posts, writing down new ideas, journaling, etc..

It's available on desktop and mobile. 10/10 highly recommend.

Something I laughed at

Here's a video of Daniel Craig dancing

(Note: I'm not endorsing the consumption of alcohol, just his dance moves.)