“‘Really, sir,’ the arcanist said, appalled. ‘It is every man’s job to improve himself. A man without the benefits of education is hardly more than an animal.’”

— Patrick Rothfuss, The Wise Man's Fear

shilin typing...

core principles i (try to) live by

A few days ago, I stumbled upon Ava's blog that spoke to me on some deeper level. Her battling illness and struggles to fall asleep felt personal. I felt heard, understood. And while she has many posts that touched the strings of my soul, there's one that inspired me to write something too. Ava lists the things that are important to her. Something that she values and wouldn't easily (or ever) budge on.

It's time to make my own list. Partially because I've never had one. But also because I've been compromising on many values throughout my life, and it's been hurting. It causes cognitive dissonance to do something that you know deep down you aren't supposed to do. Like when your mom tells you not to eat sweets before lunch, but you know exactly where she hid all the cookies and candies. And you get on a chair to reach that drawer in the farthest corner of the kitchen, so high up you have to stretch on your toes before the tips of your fingers touch the cookie box. But you reach it anyway, and eat the cookies. And you feel glorious for a minute, before a big realization daunts on you. That your mom will eventually come back and find the box so empty, you could hear the crumbles bouncing around in the void.

The kind of cognitive dissonance that eats you alive for days, months, and years, until you find the rotten root and weed it out, removing a big chunk of healthy soil and pulling several other flourishing plants along.

Here, in no particular order, are the values that serve as a compass in my life. I try to follow it myself, and I try to surround myself with people who resonate with some things from this list.

Kindness

We live in a world full of jealousy, anger, hatred, anxiety, and depression. Take a moment to look around. Social media fosters insecurity by encouraging constant comparison. It's impossible to ignore the charts showing a significant mental health decline since the introduction of Facebook and Instagram.

Consider the news and media — what do we see every day? It's wars, deaths, and a global crisis. People are struggling — we all are struggling. Trying to make our ends meet. Trying not to get insane, while keeping up with the Joneses. The least we can do for each other is to be kind. To show empathy, to tell another person, “I care about you”. Even if it's a stranger from the other side of the world. We need this, now more than ever. Be patient, and be kind.

Vulnerability

Goes hand in hand with kindness. I once tried to explain the concept of vulnerability to my brother, who still lives in Russia. He asked, “Is it like… a system vulnerability? Easy to exploit?”. How to tell you are an engineer without telling that you are an engineer… To his question, I replied, “Pretty much”.

I remember when I first immigrated to Canada, I didn't know the meaning of this term either. And it took me long years before I fully grasped it. And even though I understand it much better now, I still struggle to explain it to other people. Vulnerability is like a wall that people lift so you can see what's behind it — it uncovers the true self. Vulnerable people are honest. They don't play games. And because I don't like playing games, partially because I am bad at it, I tend to avoid people that can't put their guards down as I get to know them more.

After all, I won't be able to explain the concept any better than it does Brene Brown:

“Staying vulnerable is a risk we have to take if we want to experience connection.”

I do want to experience connection.

Never-ending learning journey, or 'the growth mindset'

The term itself, 'growth mindset', once popularized by Carol S. Dweck in her book “Mindset”, became rather toxic. We started to associate it with over-achievers. Those celebrities and successful business folks who don't sit around even for a minute, and instead always chase the next big goal.

For me, the growth mindset means that you are growing as a person every single day. And I oftentimes associate growing with learning. I love learning new things, be it a new recipe, a new language, or a new programming framework. We don't know what we don't know, and by exposing ourselves to new uncharted territories, we expand our brains to fit a bigger picture of the world.

For example, three days ago, I learned about the blogging platform Bear — again, from Ava's blog — and decided to move all my entries there. That's where you are now reading this post. Because I was already satisfied with my blogging platform, it doesn't mean I shouldn't expose myself to others. And turned out, there was something that suited my needs even better. I also started learning piano six months ago, and it's been such a pleasurable experience so far.

Even the smallest insights can be amusing. Just the other day I found out from my barber, that you have to flip newborns on a stomach occasionally, so they don't develop a flat head. Turned out, babies of single moms are more prone to this condition, as its only caregiver places her baby on the back throughout the day, so she can go put down other fires around the house. Such a random piece of information. But I was happy, like a baby myself, when I heard it. Mind-blowing!

Being healthy

I've been an active kid growing up. Everyone from my circle used to joke that my last name comes from a Russian word “shilo”, and represents a sharp object with a handle that tailors use to make holes in leather. Google says the thing is called an awl. It was common for me to hear that I may have a “shilo” in my butt, considering I wouldn't stay put for anything longer than a second. But most of my adult years I've spent in front of my computer, coding away cool projects. I wouldn't go to the gym, and even a walk around the block felt like a burden. But my things have changed since then, and so did my priorities. I no longer play video games 6 hours a day, and while I still do spend a lot of time working from my laptop, I block chunks of my day for exercise and movement. Some days, I take breaks just to walk up Mont Royal. Otherwise, I sometimes like to work from a café, so I can add an extra 40 minutes to my day walking to and from the place.

But health is about exercise only in part. I take care of my mental health by sleeping better more. I don't smoke. And I don't drink alcohol. The idea of slowly killing myself with these things is as alien to me as the idea of consuming a bit of lead every morning. As a civil world, we stopped doing the latter, but somehow never truly cared about the other two.

Having projects

This is about hobbies and interests that we start, work on, and finish. I enjoy being around people that inspire me to do things, no matter how grand or small. I once wrote a post “how to meet interesting people”, and it reflects most of what I have to say about this topic.

As vaguely as it may sound, what I have in mind is my friend Armaan, who created his own board game. By the way, it's awesome — I had a blast playing it with him. Now he's doing another iteration on it before it hits production. Or my other friend Nima, who ran the biggest trade show for entrepreneurs in Quebec for many years. Or May-Lee, who started her sexology practice and is now looking to onboard other counselors because of how much demand she has.

Do something. Life is too short to sit all day in front of the TV, making holes in your pants.

Entrepreneurship, money, and wealth creation

There's little health without money. Similarly, it's hard to start new projects and hobbies when you are broke. You'll need a camera for photography; shoes for running; a rope for climbing. Things are not cheap, and especially not free. There's free knowledge — libraries are a great example of this. But the right tools speed up the process of acquiring knowledge. And money is one such tool. Online courses have a cost, and so do tutors. While self-educating yourself with books can advance you in the right direction, it might be faster to go to a university. And unless you live in Russia, university is also not free.

From my other posts, you may notice that I work towards my financial freedom through building businesses. It is the only way towards financial freedom, period. After working for 6 years in Canada on a six-figure salary, I stashed half of my income away. And yet, even if it was enough for a down payment for a house, it would have taken me and another 30 years to pay off the mortgage. And that was while I lived with my partner. Needless to say, if you are single, you are fucked. And as some of my readers may know, I did get divorced.

Ethical non-monogamy

I hesitated to add this one to my list but decided to keep it. At least for now, until my view of the world changes (it often does). When I say non-monogamy, I mostly mean polyamory. And even then, polyamory for me is a concept of having multiple partners with deeper connection than just friends. Jessica Fern showed in her book Polysecure that there are about a dozen more types of relationships that don't fit into a “monogamous” box.

For me, polyamory is tightly coupled with vulnerability and self-growth. Being able to overcome jealousy takes a great effort and a calm mind. I don't have a sense that my partner belongs to me and me alone. The concept of an 'ideal' partner also feels outlandish. The kind of partner that checks all the boxes, so you don't have to look elsewhere. It's a lot of pressure to become your partner's everything, as if we are a one-stop shop.

Instead, I view relationships as friendships with a deeper connection. Sexual closeness makes us vulnerable. And if you haven't skipped that part above, you know that vulnerability is another thing I value in people.

For those curious, I wrote about my personal discovery journey in polyamory here.

Things that are less about values but that I have a somewhat strong opinion on

Also, in no particular order.

The article came rather long already, so I'll explain each of these items in my future posts.