J.D. Moyer

sci-fi author, beatmaker

Category: Metaprogramming Page 3 of 29

Having More Fun With It, Getting Better At It (Instead of New Year’s Resolutions)

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On January 3

In Metaprogramming

This year I wasn’t in the mood for revving myself up for ambitious goals or New Year’s resolutions requiring a lot of discipline. My family is recovering from Covid, we’re still in quarantine, and the best I can do is try to avoid being a complete grouch. None of us got seriously ill and I am grateful for that. Knock on wood, but we’re over the worst of it as far as I can tell.

Anyway, instead of making any big New Year’s resolutions, I made a simple list of activities I want to do more of in 2022. Activities I usually enjoy. Writing fiction, making music, the usual suspects…

But also asking myself — can I have more fun with it? While also getting better at it?

My life needs more fun. But not hedonism. I don’t want to get drunk and fat. But more fun and playfulness, yes. It’s been a fucking serious couple of years.

So my motto for 2022 is to have more fun with it, while getting better at it. That applies to writing, making beats, making money, parenting, getting healthier, playing chess, everything.

That’s all I got: a simple plan.

Wishing you the best for 2022. May this year bring you health, wealth, joy, and many excellent experiences.

Doing <> Training, and Natural Talent is Not Holding You Back

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On December 4

In Metaprogramming

Following the World Chess Championship, I’m starkly reminded that there are many levels to the game that I will never personally experience. Magnus and Ian are freaks of nature in their ability to recall and analyze hundreds or even thousands of games, to perform deep calculations extremely rapidly, to rival the play of even the most powerful chess engines.

You and I will never be that good.

At the same time, I know perfectly well that I can get much better of chess if I put in the time and effort. A lack of natural talent is not what’s holding me back. In a few months my ELO went from 500 to around 1100, and though it has plateaued lately, I’m fairly sure I can crack 1200 if I learn a few more openings, and maybe even a gambit or two. Of course there is a hard wall out there somewhere, some natural limit that I will never surpass no matter how much I study. But I’m nowhere near that wall. Nor are the vast majority of most people pursuing improvement in any particular skill.

That said, just playing more chess isn’t helping me much at this point. Nor will writing more words make me a great writer. Same for making more beats and becoming a great producer. In those areas, where I’ve achieved some level of basic competence, I’ve already made whatever gains I can make by just doing the thing. To get better, I need to actively study, to learn new techniques, to analyze and correct my weaknesses, and so on. It’s easy and comfortable to believe that doing=training, but it’s a lie.

Active learning is uncomfortable and makes me feel dumb. When I actively learn in chess (by studying and trying new openings, for example), I lose more games, and my rating goes down. When I try to write in a genre besides science fiction, or write music that isn’t dance music, I feel like a fish out water. But those experiments stretch my skill boundaries. And when I come back to my strengths (the London system, science fiction, dance music), I come back with a broader perspective and more tools.

Don’t give up just because you’ll never be the best. Being much better than you are now is achievable, and hugely satisfying.

Be Stupid Faster

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On November 20

In Metaprogramming, Personal Updates

I’m in a life phase where I’m doing a lot of things for the first time. Kia and I are remodeling our Oakland house. I’m managing projects and coordinating teams of software developers. I’m parenting a teenager. In all these cases, the stakes are high, but my levels of knowledge are low (or at least have significant gaps).

I’m finding some success in a new strategy: admitting my ignorance as quickly as possible. While I’ve never really minded “losing face” because I didn’t know something, I often took pride in trying to figure things out on my own. And sometimes I’m reluctant to bother other people with questions because I don’t want to impose.

But my life circumstances don’t have room for such delicacies. These days I’m asking, and asking aggressively. Of course I’m still going to make mistakes and take wrong turns, but I need to make as few mistakes as possible, and correct the mistakes I make quickly.

That’s my thought for the week! I’ll eventually have time for longer blog posts, but my to-do list is insane at the moment.

Life Update

  • We continue to enjoy life in our San Francisco high rise apartment. I’ve noticed I have an enhanced sense of security here. Some of that has to do with moving to a city with less gun violence, but I think most of it is the environmental psychology effect of my primate brain thinking I’m high in the trees.
  • While dance music has taken a back seat this year to everything else, Loöq Records is spinning up some new releases for December and 2022. We’ve landed a remix from Nosk, some of my favorite breakbeat producers, and I can’t wait to hear what they come up with.
  • I completed a first draft of a new novelette, “Alexandria”, a far-future archeology expedition featuring cuttlefolk, dogkin, and a godling construct of Anubis.
  • All editions of The Last Crucible are officially released. I’m so happy to have a science fiction trilogy in print (and digital, and audio book). If you haven’t yet checked out any of my Reclaimed Earth series, please consider doing so. And if you enjoy the books, you’d do me a huge favor by leaving a rating or brief review.

Ten Years Later, a New Pivot Point

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On August 15

In Metaprogramming

Ten years ago I wrote this post about pivot points. Pivot points are conscious decisions about how to live your life differently. Examples could be quitting alcohol or drugs, leaving a toxic relationship, resigning from an unfulfilling job, starting your dream career, or changing the way you interact with people so that you’re not constantly giving away your power and making yourself smaller.

Rereading that post, I realized that I’d made another pivot point. What I had intended to be a one year experiment turned out to be a permanent change.

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Superpower Habit: Learning How To Not Self Reject

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On June 27

In Creative Work/Career, Metaprogramming

Recently I submitted some beats to Timbaland. He’s been reacting to beats live on his Twitch stream. Anyone can submit. I picked a few Momu tracks that my friend Mark and I have been working on and submitted them via the app. I knew chances were slim that he would like any of them. It took weeks for Timbaland to get to our tracks. But he finally listened.

And yeah, he didn’t like them.

But I don’t regret submitting the tracks. Rejection doesn’t feel great, but it’s a minor discomfort that every creator needs to learn how to handle. Just as you can’t get stronger without the temporary discomfort of physical effort, you can’t make progress as an artist without the temporary discomfort of rejection.

Same goes for finding a romantic partner, a job, etc. Rejection is a part of life.

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