Hi All,

Here is my weekly '3-Bullet Friday,' a list of things I'm pondering and exploring.

What I'm reading

Less and More: The Design Ethos of Dieter Rams https://www.amazon.com/dp/3899555848?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2_dt_b_product_details

A great design book by Braun's designer Rams. True to the principle of “less but better” his elegantly clear visual language not only defined product design for generations, but also our fundamental understanding of what design is and what it can and should do.

The Practice - by Seth Godin https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Shipping-Creative-Work/dp/0593328973

Seth is one of my favorites authors, and Linchpin is my favorite book by Seth. If you are looking to grow professionally, follow Seth. He also has a podcast called Akimbo. The Practice is about creative shipping work. It's about showing up. While we are talking about Seth, check out AltMBA. I did graduate from AltMBA a couple of years ago. It has changed my perspective about putting in work, showing up, and being generous.

Designing Data-intensive applications - by Martin Kleppmann https://www.amazon.com/Designing-Data-Intensive-Applications-Reliable-Maintainable/dp/1449373321

A technical book about building scalable applications. I've been learning about distributed systems, and this book has only overviews and deep dives on topics about reliability and scalability.

What I'm watching

Cocomelon, the wheels on the bus: Yes, Cocomelon, and for a good reason. With a one-year-old, there isn't much a lot to watch.

What I'm listening to

Flow state show - by Bobby Lyte

This is a podcast with music. It has talk and music segments. This will keep you focused if you listen to instrumental and electronic music. I'm not the kind that quickly gets in the flow, and this has been very helpful. It also follows the Pomodoro technique. 30 minutes of music followed by 5 minutes break.

And I leave you with these ideas from Psychology of money by Morgan Housel. It's a good book.

"No one is impressed with your possessions as much as you are."

"You might think you want a fancy car or a nice watch. But what you probably want is respect and admiration. And you're more likely to gain those things through kindness and humility than horsepower and chrome."

That was it for this week. Next week I will share a project my wife and I have been thinking about for some time, and we are ready to get it started.

Stay tuned!