Create Inflection Points
Reflections on another of my favorite children's books
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The older you get, the more you realize that the path your life follows is far from straight and simple. More often than not, the most pivotal moments in your life are small and seem almost inconsequential when they happen. It’s only as you look back, many years after the fact, that you can see the outsized importance they had in shaping your life.
As many of you know, I’m a big fan of children’s literature and particularly of books for toddlers and early elementary kids that are meant to be read aloud—the kind of books that are tailormade for library storytimes. The five-minute duration, coupled with a roughly 32-page canvas of full-bleed pages overflowing with colorful illustrations, is a wonderful creative constraint. It’s a shame that we adults don’t spend more time reading children’s literature. It would be good for us. One of the highlights of being a dad—and there are many—is having an excuse to read more of these. The fact that I’m reading them to my kids is a happy coincidence.
As we continue to settle into our new digs, we finally finished what felt like an important step. The built-in bookshelves that were the last project (for now) on the list for our painter, Mr. John, were finally done, repainted in Swiss Coffee to match the walls. As we installed them last week and I brought in box after box of books from the garage where they had been living for the past few months, there was an almost palpable new sense of home and rest. We love our books in the Brake household.
As we were unpacking our books, I was keeping my eyes peeled for one in particular. I brought a new copy I had bought as my piece of art for our Praxis Media Team offsite, but I gave it away to one of my colleagues who is expecting his second child next month. The book I was looking for was Because, written by Mo Willems and illustrated by Amber Ren. It tells the story of how small and seemingly insignificant events can compound to have a big impact. #1 and I read it last night before I put him to bed (you’ll see his fingers helping to turn some of the pages as I read). Take a few moments to watch.
Big impacts start small
In addition to showing how a series of small events can have a life-altering impact, I love how this book makes clear that the process that leads to beautiful things is often filled with loss. In the story, the young girl is only able to experience the concert that changed the direction of her life because her uncle got sick and she took his place.
It is also delightful to see the way Willems highlights the breadth of people who have an impact on the girl’s journey of being changed by music. It’s not just the people who are directly involved in writing or making the music who make it happen. It’s the custodial staff that prepares and maintains the concert hall. It’s the librarian who prints and organizes the music. It’s the train conductor who brings the people to the concert hall. It’s the ushers who help the people find their seats.
I bet that if you stop to think for a moment, you’ll find lots of these people coming to mind from your own life. Yes, it includes the obvious people like your parents and other family members. But for so many of us, it is also the teachers, coaches, mentors, and friends who provided for us. It’s even the people whom we never saw or thought of who created the places and things that enabled us to keep going.
As I’m thinking about my own work, the story of Because is a reminder that almost everything I do has meaning, even—and perhaps especially—those things that we may think are unimportant or insignificant.
All of the little moments are potential inflection points. Small moments whose impact will only be seen much later. As you think about your own work, consider how this story might reshape your imagination for the way you go about your day.
Got a thought? Leave a comment below.
Reading Recommendations
Peter Rojas writes over at the Mozilla blog about How Mozilla builds now.
As we build new products, programs, and systems, we’re choosing clarity over speed, boundaries over ambiguity, and trust that compounds over time instead of short-term gains.
The future of the internet won’t be shaped only by what technology can do — but by what its builders choose to prioritize. Mozilla intends to keep choosing people.
Pretty interesting blog post here from Drew Breunig on writing a software library that contains no code. Instead, it contains specs and tests, written in English. (h/t Andrej Karpathy for the find).
SPEC.md: A detailed description of how the library should behave and how it should be implemented.
tests.yaml: A list of language-agnostic test cases, defined as input/output pairs, that any implementation must pass.
INSTALL.md: Instructions for building
whenwords, for you, the human.
This op-ed (gift link) in the Wall Street Journal from Dartmouth College president Sian Leah Beilock was quite good. Her five main points:
Make college affordable
Return on investment matters
Re-center higher education on learning rather than political posturing
Emphasize equal opportunity, not equal outcomes
Testing is important
The Book Nook
I finished Vonnegut’s Player Piano this week and really enjoyed it. Perhaps the most striking passage is a letter that the main character Dr. Paul Proteus writes near the end of the book, railing against the dehumanizing aspects of a society where machines are ordering the affairs of humans instead of humans ordering the affairs of machines. Sound familiar?
Lots of refrains of Borgmann’s Device Paradigm.
Worth a read if you’re looking for something insightful about what might be a not-so-distant future with AI.
The Professor Is In
I had my first lunch meeting with the students who are the new Fellows as part of my Lab for Imaginative Prototyping with AI. As we were meeting, President Nembhard just happened to walk by and stopped to chat for a few minutes. Really excited to get to work with these folks!
In other related news, we’re hosting a conference at Harvey Mudd later this Spring with the theme of (Re)Imagining Liberal Arts & STEM Education in the Age of GenAI. It’s been great fun to work with a small group of my colleagues at Mudd and across the Claremont Colleges to see this idea coming to life and I’m really looking forward to it.
If you’re interested in learning more, check out the conference web page here. If you want to get an email when registration opens, fill out the interest form here or click the button below!
Leisure Line
Was glad for the chance to speak at Biola last week about AI and Higher Education as part of a panel session during their Board of Trustees meeting. Really encouraged to see the depth of conversation and serious engagement that Biola is having in this space!
Still Life
Sumo citrus at Costco!
Looking forward to more time with children’s stories!
When we interpret everything from our own perspective, we tend to misread things because of our limited view (we lack objectivity). That’s why we all benefit from someone who can look at things from the outside and guide us in a personal, tailored way. Thanks for making me think!