Matthew's Blog
How To Pronounce Ikigai?
What is the appropriate pronunciation of the word ikigai? After reviewing several online sources, including the Oxford English Dictionary’s audio file pronunciation guide and multiple TED talks, I'm comfortable in saying that ikigai is pronounced “eeky-guy.” (Ref: One...
My Favorite November Blog Post
My favorite blog post I wrote this month is Edit Like a Cat!, published on November 4th, 2021. The reason is simple: the quote I mentioned in the post “Write like a dog, edit like a cat” is both forever memorable and forever useful—and that’s a rare...
On Three
There's something called “The Rule of Odds” in design, which states that visually an odd number of items are more appealing than an even number of items. Why is this, and why does this usually manifest as 3 items, rather than 1, 5, or 7 items? First, I speculate the...
Boxing Up Twitter For the Holidays
Once a year, I take a substantial break from Twitter—I put it in a box. This year I stopped using Twitter the day before Thanksgiving and I intend to keep off of it until the day after Christmas—roughly one month. I don't do anything fancy to achieve this digital...
Thoreau: On The Noun Simplicity and Verb Simplify
It’s in Walden’s second chapter, Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, that Thoreau’s famous quotes on simplicity and simplify occur. Here’s the context (italics mine): Our life is frittered away by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten...
Adopting My Own Blogging Hashtag
I’ve decided to adopt a hashtag for my blog posts for use on Twitter: #MatthewsBlog. The reason is simple. I always have a hard time with wording at the beginning of the tweets of my blog posts. “In today’s blog,” ”Today I am blogging about,” “In my blog today,” etc....
Too Much of a Good Thing?
In writing, too much of a good thing is often problematic. Clarity is not one of them.
On Things With Flaws
What are we to do with things with flaws? Often the flaws can be fixed. Sometimes the flaws can be ignored. But occasionally the flaws are so damaging—such as a chip at the lip of one of my favorite coffee mugs, as seen in the photo above—they will require that thing...
Why I Go to The Symphony
I go to the symphony for two reasons. First, it fulfills one of my weekly tasks: an “artist’s date.” As described by Julia Cameron, an artist’s date is a weekly creative outing—taken solo, to inspire oneself. It's usually centered around an artistic skill outside of...