Principles
These are the core domains of my life, and they act as the guiding principles upon which my daily routine is based. Additionally, they function as buckets into which I use to categorize lifestyle advice I hear or read.
I am working on developing measures for my progress in each domain. For Body, I do a health screening yearly.
Mind
The mind is responsible for our experience of the world, and the decisions we make in it, which subsequently affect that experience, like a feedback loop. It is therefore of prime importance.
Meditation: Meditation opens the mind to inner experience and the subconscious, and lessens the hold the ego has over oneself. I practice Vipassana, and read Zen.
Dreams:The expressions of our subconscious, dreams provide not only novel experiences one could never have in real life, but also allow direct interaction with the subconscious, such as in lucid or liminal dreaming.
MMO
Intellectual Stimulation: Maintaining a constant source of quality intellectual stimulation is a project I have been working on over the years. I enjoy finding ways to maximize maintaining the state of flow.
In addition, after watching The Social Dilemma, I have disable (proprietary) recommendation engines, such as Youtube, or Reddit, via extensions.
Filtering Phone Notifications
To balance notifications and distractions, I currently have my phone setup as follows:
- Lockscreen: show details, except for Messaging (since OTPs appear there)
- Telegram
- Notifications: sound and vibration. However, in-app, all notifications are disabled, and individual exceptions are made for groups and persons.
- Whatsapp (Personal and Work):
- Notifications: sound and vibration
- Calls: sound and vibration
- Group notifications: disabled
- Message notifications: vibration disabled
- Notifications: sound and vibration
- Discord
- Notifications: silent
Body
Maintaining healthy habits helps detoxify my mind from the drudgeries of work, and enhances my performance in other domains.
Yearly Health Screening
I do a health screen yearly:
Lipid Panel
| Test | Goal |
|---|---|
| Total Cholesterol | <160 mg/dL (4.1 mmol/L) |
| LDL-C | <81 mg/dL (<2.1 mmol/L) |
| HDL-C | >60 mg/dL (1.6 mmol/L) |
| Triglycerides | <150 mg/dL (1.7 mmol/L) |
| Fasting Plasma Glucose | <100 mg/dL (5.6 mmol/L) |
| HbA1c | <5.6% (prediabetes: 5.7-6.4%) |
Minerals/Vitamins/Misc:
| Test | Goal/Notes |
|---|---|
| B12 | Due to my mostly vegetarian diet |
| Iron Panel | Due to my mostly vegetarian diet |
| Vit D | >30 ng/mL |
| FBC | Baseline |
| RP | Baseline |
| LFT | Elevated in toxin (e.g. aflatoxin) consumption |
Travel: I keep a bucket list of the places I want to visit, and the mountains I want to climb.
Diet: I have developed a diet over the years, by trial and error, advice from friends and the internet, and medical knowledge.
Exercise: Provides both physical and mental benefits.
Career
Finance and my Career are what sustain me fiscally, and give me room to progress in the other domains.
Finance: This relates to money and financial risk management, and includes:
- Investments
- Property
- Trading bots
- Insurance
Job (Career): Having a meaningful career, which provides not only fair remuneration, but intellectual stimulation in a positive environment, is a blessing.
Social
I form relationships with emotionally mature people, and actively seek to avoid negativity/toxicity. Intelligence is orthogonal to moral goodness.