Four Powerful Phrases

March 20, 2024

Mar 20, 2024

Current location: Milwaukee, Wisconsin, USA
Reading: Filterworld by Kyle Chayka
Listening: Cold Reactor by Everything Everything
(if you have a moment, reply with your own 3-item status via email or in the comments)

Four Powerful Phrases

There’s a quartet of phrases that I use a lot, but which I don’t hear as often as I believe their usefulness justifies.

The first is “I’m open to it.”

I most frequently use this phrase when faced with information or perspectives that don’t resonate with my existing worldview or body of knowledge.

Rather than dismissing something that seems discordant or jarring to me, outright, this phrase helps me express an openness to being convinced that tends to keep conversations going, rather than shutting them down, and it tends to encourage those on the other side of a disagreement to maintain an open mind, as well.

Then there’s “Tell me about that.”

This is an example of what I’ve heard called a “conversational doorknob,” in that it invites the person on the other end to open the door into a full-on discussion, but it also leaves them the option of providing a more concise, summarized explication of whatever it is they’re talking about.

It gives them the opportunity to choose whether to take that next step into a more complex conversation, or not, depending on their preferences, while also being open-ended enough that they can extrapolate in whichever direction they think would be the most meaningful or interesting.

I’m also a big fan of “I don’t know.”

Being capable of admitting ignorance is a strength, not a weakness, and one of the better ways to become more knowledgeable (about information, but also perspectives, experiences, etc) is to make clear that you lack whatever it is you hope to gain, which in turn provides other people an opening to help you.

There are social and sometimes professional incentives (implied or overt) to conceal our ignorance, lest we tarnish our reputations for mastery, but I would argue that those who are willing to admit they don’t know things are more likely to actually be knowledgeable and capable, because those who are unwilling to do so leave a lot of growth opportunities on the table.

And finally, there’s “I appreciate…”

This one is useful as an alternative to “thank you” (and everyone benefits from more frequent expressions of gratitude), but I get the most mileage out of it when using it instead of “like,” as in “I appreciate how you cropped the image to emphasize this portion of the composition” or “I appreciate how they orchestrated this event.”

I find that many of us casually carve up the world into things we like and don’t like, which can limit us because we then self-define in terms of these preferences, resulting in a self-enforced blindness toward anything positive we might discover in the stuff we don’t like (and the same toward negative aspects of what we like).

Deftly wielding appreciation can help us bypass these self-definition-linked biases, though, encouraging us to find things that were done well in (for instance) a piece of artwork we don’t care for, or in a genre of music that isn’t really our thing.

This helps us avoid closing ourselves off from new discoveries (about the world and ourselves), while also leaving us more open to developing “likes” that aren’t immediately obvious, but which we can discover and cultivate (if we choose to) over time.

Interesting & Useful

Photos From the World’s Largest Cypress Forest
“As he travels, Durrani looks for an array of vibrant landscapes, from the villages of Provence to the otherworldly expanses of Iceland. “I photograph places and animals mainly as a form of therapy for my own self, but I also want other people to see through my eyes and lens and enjoy the moment of discovery and joy that I feel when I capture a sliver of time,” he says.”
Casting Light on Relief Map Shading
“In 1927, geologist Albert Heim clashed with cartographers at the Federal Office of Topography as he was convinced that their relief maps of Switzerland were depicted in the wrong light. Heim believed that the light source on maps should correspond to natural sunshine.”
Weather Photographer of the Year 2023 Award Winners
“Lenticular clouds form when air flowing over the ground encounters an obstacle—like a volcano. This causes the air to rise and cool, which can allow moisture to condense and form clouds. For these particularly striking lenticular clouds to form, the atmosphere needs to be stable, which means that the air forced up over the high ground readily sinks back down again beyond, sometimes causing continuous rise and fall downstream or ripples in the air. Due to their unusual shape, they’re often compared to flying saucers—and we think this photo is a great example of why.”

Screenshot of a portion of the Scrivener chapter list for my new book, which is finally finished :)

Outro

I finished my book! Aside from a few little chapter-order considerations and a couple of stylistic decisions, the book itself is done, and all I have left to do is finalizing the formatting of the paperback version and producing the audio for the audiobook (which is about 25% done).

I’m not resting on my laurels yet, as those remaining tasks will still take a fair bit of time and effort, and once that’s all done I need to write up marketing copy, get everything uploaded for publication (on a multitude of platforms), and figure out my announcement schedule.

What I’m planning at the moment, though, is to have pre-ordering go live on my birthday (April 16) when I turn 39, as the book—How To Turn 39—is thematically aligned with that day.

We’ll see how it goes from there, as you can never really be sure about anything publishing-related ahead of time. But I’m psyched to get this thing out the door, I’m really happy with how it’s turned out, and I truly hope you enjoy it if you decide to pick up a copy when it’s available.

Woof, that was a lot of work. What are you working on at the moment? And it’s been fluctuating between freezing and Springtime weather here in Milwaukee: how’s the weather in your neck of the woods? Tell me what’s been up, or take a moment to introduce yourself—I respond to every message I receive and would love to hear from you :)

Prefer stamps and paper? Send me a letter, postcard, or some other physical communication at: Colin Wright, PO Box 11442, Milwaukee, WI 53211

Or hit me up via the usual methods: Instagram/Threads, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, or video game sound (and music) a capella singers.

100 of the world’s cutest photos.