Week #19, 2025
Week #19 of 2025 has arrived... Astronomers have discovered chemical compounds in the atmosphere of a planet 124 light years away that may hint at biological activity.
Time to walk over to your 4K Weeks poster and fill in another square. Done?
Nearly every part of that sentence will blow your mind if you let it.
Astronomers: Humans can actually study the universe.
Chemical compounds: Humans can understand the building blocks of life.
Atmosphere of a planet: Humans understand what an atmosphere is and what it means for us and other life in the universe.
124 light years away: The light that is arriving from this planet today is older than airplanes.
Biological activity: Imagine for a minute what it would mean for humanity to discover life of any kind off of this planet.
My friend often reminds anyone around him that, "These are the good old days." You better believe it! Now, make sure you act like it!
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ON WEEK #19 OF 1961...
Russian Chess Champion Mikhail Botvinnik won the world chess championship for the third time.
He was 2,612.57 weeks or 50.1 years old.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
"Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending." - Lazarus Long
They are both skill, aren't they? As adults, beginning is easy. It comes with all the excitement and possibility and almost no sad feelings. Endings are almost always at least a little sad, even if you know it's the right thing.
And sometimes, as we are finding in our home life right now, beginnings for some are endings for others.
When it comes time to face an end, do it with grace. No gnashing of teeth, or prolonged clawing for what once was. Move from ending into beginning... because if something is ending for you, then I would bet all I have that something is also beginning... if you have the courage to look for it.
WHAT I AM CONSUMING THIS WEEK
Again, I have been creating a lot this week instead of consuming... We are having an open house for our brand Port of Curiosity in a few weeks, and we have also just started accepting commissions for the sculpture studio again.
I finally finished book 5 of The Stormlight Archives... wow... what will I do with myself now!!!
I thought instead of linking to a few podcasts this week, I would show you around the studio. So, here is a part one video tour of where I spend most of my days.
WHAT I AM THINKING ABOUT THIS WEEK
Taking shots.
I think I have talked about this here before, but it bears repeating.
I am a brutish basketball player. I always played center in high school, I am strong, and my role has always been to push people around under the basket and get rebounds. The guys I play with regularly don't really like to guard me because they know it will be a battle.
But I am getting older, and If I want to keep playing basketball into my 50's and beyond, I can't rely on being able to give and receive punishment like I used to. And so, I have been changing my game. I have been focused on trying to play out from under the basket, and also taking more shots from the field.
I have never been great at taking shots. In the 1990's, when I came up, centers didn't shoot unless they were under the basket.
When I started this experiment, a few months ago, I decided to try to shoot a 3 pointer in one game. I shot one, I missed, and so I didn't shoot anymore. I certainly didn't want to be that guy taking and missing shots.
But then I started watching the "good shooters" and noticing what they do.
You know what I noticed? They take LOTS of shots... And they miss lots of shots, too. More than I realized when I wasn't paying attention. A solidly good three point percentage is anything over 37%. That is only making one out of three shots!
And so, I committed to taking shots when I am open. And low and behold, I am making a lot more shots... My point totals have doubled in the last few weeks.
It's so simple. If you want to be a shooter, the first thing that has to happen is: YOU HAVE TO TAKE A LOT MORE SHOTS!
It's so simple, but very profound... especially since we are all waking around TERRIFIED that people might see us miss a shot.
The lessons here are: If you have an open shot, take it. If you know you are a pretty ok shooter, try to optimize for shots taken, not shots made.
Until next week!
Spencer,
Owner of 4KWeeks
DAD JOKE O' THE WEEK
Where can you buy soup in bulk?
The stock market.
Think you can do better? Join our Dad Joke thread!
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