One of my big failure modes is juggling too much, and dropping stuff too quickly. The problem is - there’s so much cool stuff to learn. Recently I’ve dabbled (or more) in learning:

  • John Boyd (and his zeitgeist, shoutout Frans Osinga)
  • Heidegger (and Hubert Dreyfus)
  • John Vervaeke
  • Microeconomics
  • Macroeconomics
  • Vim
  • Linux/Arch
  • AI safety
  • The nuclear risk cause area
  • Other tools like Aerospace and terminal commands
  • Maths via mathacademy.com

It’s really fun, but it’s a lot.

I think if I were approaching this more skillfully and/or strategically, I’d do something like “I can only apply for jobs until 4pm, and then I can do my disparate learning time”. (Tbf, I’ve been in a limbo period whilst waiting to see if I got a job that I was in the final 2 for, so I had lower energy for further job applicants and lots of energy for e.g. reading about AI safety).

All this to say that – man, I’d love to pause time and learn software engineering properly. Do the MIT opencourseware course on computer science. Learn the programming language Rust. Learn Linux properly, from a textbook, from the basics on up, so I have a proper grounding and don’t just have to defer to Gemini 2.5 to hold my hand through all the commands.

I’d love to do a full-time sprint where I do as much Mathacademy.com as I possibly can. I think it’s very plausible that upskilling in maths (+ software engineering) could open a lot of doors for me.

I’d love to do a true deep dive on John Boyd, finish the Osinga book in a full-time sprint. Same with Heidegger. Same with Vervaeke! John Vervaeke has a 50 hour lecture series called “Awakening from the Meaning Crisis” that I would love to consume in a focused burst, and make a bunch of flashcards from.

But alas – I really need to get a job first. I’ll still have time for all of this - less time for sure, but you know. Maybe 1-3 hours per evening. A big chunk of the weekend. I’ll keep making progress, whilst learning on the job too.

In an ideal world, I’d maybe not get a job for a year - I’d upskill, up-educate (my world model is poor, my lack of maths, my lack of true software engineering skills). But a) I doubt I can live at my mum’s for much longer 2) I really do love having a full time job where I’m useful and the mission is great (e.g. the effective altruism-aligned biotech startup I worked at). 3) Even if I e.g. got a grant to learn as much as possible in a year, I imagine I still wouldn’t be able to learn enough per day to feel truly satisfied. I think the thing is to reframe this as a long, slow game, rather than something I desperately want to front-load.

So anyway – I downloaded a Linux textbook yesterday, and a Vim one the other day, but – I absolutely should not open them. The allure of becoming a Linux nerd is strong, but it’s absolutely a nonsensical option if I think strategically.

What I should do is read about internal operations, whatever the skillset is there. It feels to me right now that internal ops is this non-codified, intuition-based thing, so I haven’t done any reading into how to improve at it. I have a sense that any book about it would be desperately dry, and non-useful. But this may not be the case. At Alvea (the biotech startup), some mental models like The Mom Test and some stuff from Paul Graham did feel useful, even if it still feels that ultimately I was very good at the role because of my intuition, my amount of care, and my attention to detail.

But it’s absolutely the case that I should explore this more, and see if maybe there are some great foundational texts or mental models that could make me a better “operator”. Surely there are. There must be a gulf between me and a COO, a chief of staff. What do they do that I don’t? And can it be learned through books, or is it necessarily experiential, tacit? Another reason why I want a job ASAP – I want peers, mentors. Ok great, applications begin again on Monday. Let’s do it.