Try to do hard things? Make it funny
I realized to start with a funny idea is the easiest gateway to start something difficult for me. It applies to my resistance to building…
I realized to start with a funny idea is the easiest gateway to start something difficult for me. It applies to my resistance to building my first website in my blog post, Build with a funny brain. I added more and more funny shit on the website and made my friends help me on this project. We found immense joy in the process even though the chicken is never positioned as we expected.
It also applies to my Chinese writing anxiety in the post, I don’t understand Mandarin. Back then, I freaked out about my poor Chinese writing skills, feeling that I cannot write in Chinese anymore. However, after I started writing a funny jobless post, so many ideas flow inside my mind, and more are flowing today.
The funny jobless post became a big hit after I posted it on my Facebook yesterday. My flatmate was amazed by the engagement in the post.
It makes sense, because humor is invitational, for both the creator and the audience. People aren’t here to be right or to be smart. We are all here to be funny and laugh at each other happily like an idiot. The funny debut also took away my fear of showcasing who I am in public because I know it’s quite unlikely to receive mean comments here, taking away my anxiety from people’s criticism.
The last example is my practice of learning LLM technology. I decided to do a project that can write like Tim Urban. Let me tell you why this idea is wonderful. One is it’s a feasible idea because Paul Graham has an AI generator too. Second, it is a project that will not fail. Let me elaborate on the second point.
Our house did an LLM idea to auto code fixing and realize the output code is trashy. When the output is trashy, it defeated the entire purpose of our project. If our code-fixing project cannot fix code, it is useless. On the other hand, what if my Tim Urban AI generator is trashy? It says nothing about the success of this project. Maybe will even create success because the AI output might be even funnier than how Tim Urban writes.
All the examples show that when encountering something expected to be funny, people (including the creator) no longer use social standards or output quality to judge others and themselves. Amusement becomes the measure of success, and one does not need to be skillful in a domain to be funny. This makes the learning process joyful because whether you are a professional or an amateur, you can show your stuff to others shamelessly and become influential.
Anyway, I’m using my life to write this blog because I’m so tired of coding out my funny Tim Urban idea. If you know how I can use AI to generate a stickman as well, please let me know. But I will probably skip tomorrow's writing. See you!
This is the 28th post from my 30-day writing challenges. I was inspired by Tung Nguyen, a friend who is a famous blogger. He overcame the fear of creation through mass-producing blogs and eventually found his own niche audiences.