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- #119: A case for not being present
#119: A case for not being present
Shem Opolot
May 02, 2025
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Who am I? I’m Shem Opolot, a health professional turned content creator, passionate about helping people be their best selves in life and work.
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HAPPY FRIDAY 🎉 No matter how many hacks you learn about procrastination, no matter how many self-help books you read, you’ll still put things off ‘til later. Know this and know peace.
But that being said—and I can’t remember where I learned this—procrastination is dangerous because it teaches your brain to be afraid of that thing you’re putting off, escalating a mere lack of motivation to a full-on physical and physiological aversion to doing something that might be good for you. So…um, will you work out today? Will you start that assignment?
LIFE.
A case for not being present
While lecturing in class a few weeks ago (subtle flex, I know), I concluded the 20-minute lecture by insisting all public health professionals should be historians.
Because—to adapt Kamala Harris’ famous statement—most problems don’t just fall out of a coconut tree.
So, I’m thinking about the assault on history being meted out by Trump’s administration as they try to redact the names of Black historical figures from the annals of history.
I’m thinking about Albert Einstein and Isaac Newton, geniuses so obsessed with the future that they secured it for us by helping us understand the present a little better.
I’m thinking about my friend Peter, who has every picture we ever took from our times in high school and university. Even the ones from the nights when some of us had escaped from our parents’ homes to drink beers in a parking lot and try to avoid getting roped into fistfights fueled by scuffed Nikes.
But I’m also thinking about the episodes of—what my physician calls—rumination that I experience, where, every now and then, my mind races with a thousand thoughts pressing against the inside of my skull until my head feels like a brimful glass of juice balancing in one hand as I walk gingerly to the dining table with a packed plate in my other hand. The doctor said the remedy for this temporary affliction is touching grass. Seriously. The doctor told me to go outside whenever I ruminate and do something mildly involved. “Something that forces you to be present,” she said.
Yes, being present is famously useful.
But if Einstein was unburdened by glorious purpose (h/t Loki), and Newton wasn’t curious about whether apples would fall from the tree the same way every day, we wouldn’t have modern physics.
And if we don’t contend with our history, we’re doomed to live in cycles of destruction, born out of our fear of staring into our rearview mirrors. I’m convinced this is why America has its racialized flare-ups every 3-5 business days. They can’t even agree on what history to teach in their schools.
You see, most of the greatest inventions in history happened because certain people refused to live in the present. They hoped for better. Dreamed for better. And built better.
And some of the greatest resolutions in history were born of people contending with a horrific past, memorializing it, and entrenching means to ensure history never repeats itself on stones and tablets.
So, as much as being present has great PR, we must always process the world as it was, as it is, but also, especially if we want to change it, as we want it to be.
THINGS.
A quote.
As the island of our knowledge increases, so does the shore of our ignorance.
A picture.
I have a folder of World Bank materials (pictures, badges, etc.), saved for the moment the World Bank finally hires me.
WORK.
NotebookLM for the win!
If you aren’t using NotebookLM, you should. Because:
You can upload up to 50 sources into it, including PDFs, Google Docs, Google Slides, website URLs, other document formats, etc.
It’s a quick way to gain knowledge about a topic by uploading the sources and allowing it to help you synthesize the information
You can create a audio podcast of the synthesis you create to listen on the go
It doesn’t hallucinate like other chatbots, as it limits its responses to the sources you upload.
If you’re interested in learning more, I recommend this video, this one, and this one, too.
FUN.
The Friday Fix playlist
Shem’s picks
✅ A Reddit-approved checklist for new homeowners
✅ A 3D modeling software to visualize your decor
✅ The science of one actor playing twins has come a long way
✅ Try this word game
✅ Another simple task manager if you need one
Have a great weekend,
— Shem
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