👨🏻‍🦰 Life

Since February 11th, 2025, I've gone all in on using Obsidian as my 'productivity'/note-taking tool. And I've realized something about myself: I'm addicted to learning.

The tool is remarkable—it forces me to think not just about what I'm taking notes on, but also the connections between my content and other potential sources of knowledge.

The result? A mindmap revealing areas of blank knowledge I never knew existed:

Green are tags that I use to collect notes into single topics. Purple are things I've referenced but might not have a note on.

Why am I so invested now? I turned 30 last week, which prompted deep reflection on who I am and what I've become. Something clicked in my brain as I contemplated my growth throughout my twenties—and realized I want more.

But to get more, I need to know more. This motivation pushed me to find better ways to remember things and make cognitive connections within my knowledge base.

I plan on writing a more detailed analysis of how I use Obsidian (TLDR: read Building a Second Brain, study the PARA method, and check out Deep Work). For now, just know that I use it for daily notes/knowledge dumps and general note-taking.

In other life news—I'm three months sober! You can read more about my thoughts here.

📚 Books

I've been devouring books this month. It's been enlightening:

• Outlive - The Science and Art of Longevity — Spent the month listening to this and learned a lot about longevity—habits we need to adopt now to ensure we're not suffering in our later years.

• Understanding Distributed Systems — Going deep on distributed systems and their underlying algorithms. I need to improve my system design skills, and this book serves as a stepping stone before revisiting "Designing Data-Intensive Applications."

• Murderbot Diaries Vol 1 - All Systems Red — Yes. Yes. YES. Get the audiobook narrated by Kevin R. Free. The story follows a security bot on a sci-fi adventure. The stories are short, action-packed, and excellent—think Cyberpunk mixed with Alien.

• The DOSE effect - An okay book on the chemicals in the brain and how they affect our mood. It's a bit practice but I've taken some good tips from it.

• Stand Up Straight: 10 Life Lessons from the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst - Discipline, leadership, and how to be a better person. I've been trying to implement some of the lessons in my day to day life.

🏃🏻‍♂️ Health

I'm building my fitness back up to half-marathon distance. Aiming to smash my previous time with a sub-2-hour finish.

I've started using Fitbod to plan and organize my gym workouts. It simply tells me what to do, and if equipment is taken, I can get a replacement exercise.

I've also upgraded my morning supplement regimen:

• Ashwagandha (1x) — Mental benefits, reduces stress and anxiety
• Lion's Mane (2x) — Mental benefits and mood regulation
• Magnesium Glycinate (2x) — Physical wellbeing, muscle recovery, and nerve function
• Vitamin D (1x) — Essential in the UK's limited sunshine

👨🏻‍💻 Work

Work has been busy. Lots of conflicting priorities and internal tensions lately. Not the best vibe—too many context switches and rushing. It's been interesting to experience, though undeniably distracting.

The biggest frustration? Meeting room technology. I just want to join a call and have the audio and video work the first time. It shouldn't matter whether it's Zoom, Google Meet, or Teams. Just. Work. Please.

🔗 Links

• This FAANG blog post struck me as: "I quit my job before I could get a good redundancy package, and now I regret it." Read it and let me know your thoughts.

• TypeScript is going Go — Massive news as TypeScript migrates to GoLang. Really exciting development.

• Doom in TypeScript — I wonder how the TypeScript-to-Go migration will improve this 👀