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- #128. Change management
#128. Change management
Shem Opolot
July 04, 2025
Hi! Welcome to The Friday Fix! You’re reading this because you probably stumbled upon this post somewhere on the internet instead of where it should be—in your inbox. But no worries; we can fix that.
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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Hi! I'm Shem Opolot, and this is The Friday Fix, my weekly newsletter. If you've received it, you’re either subscribed or someone forwarded it to you. If you fit into the latter (yes, I’m the kind of person who uses words like “latter”) camp and want to subscribe, then click on the shiny button below:
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HAPPY FRIDAY 🎉 Expert or generalist? I haven’t explicitly picked a lane, but the expert ship sort of sailed when I abandoned the clinical medicine route. It doesn’t help that I pull on all my threads of interest. I wanted to write, so I wrote. I wanted to make videos, so I started a YouTube channel. And most recently, I romanticize the idea of being that dad that can fix everything—a drippy tap, an unhinged door, a button divorced from its queue on a shirt—so…watch this space.
Expert or generalist? This reminds me of the incomplete sayings we store in our heads and hearts, like round, context-less Bible quotes wedged into the square-shaped holes in our lives.
For example, “a jack of all trades, master of none” actually reads, completely: “Jack of all trades, master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one.” Does this change anything for you?
So…expert or generalist? I think I’ve decided. Have you?
LIFE.
Change Management
No social order is inevitable. No structure of power or inequality is fixed. Adaptability has defined our species since its origins. For societies that seem stuck, reclaiming flexibility might be the greatest challenge—but also the solution to their existential afflictions.
Why did the tribe cross the numerous hills, valleys, and plains?
Vic Mensa, a rapper who released one of my favorite songs ever with Justine Skye (I’m Yours), posted a video on Instagram where he sat on a fence next to you and me.
Basking in Paris’ gaudy, gold-coated streets during fashion week, Vic paused to acknowledge that France wouldn’t be France but for its past and present plunder.
Vic essentially said [paraphrasing], “It’s beautiful here, but it’s fucked up.”
I sit on that same fence. I critique capitalism constantly but marvel at the miracle of the Amazon marketplace. You can go to bed on Friday evening wondering what you’ll wear for a dinner party the next day, wake up, order an outfit on your phone, and have it at your doorstep right before you shower for dinner.
In my reality, Amazon is beautiful, but it’s fucked up.
One of my favorite writers, Cole Schafer, taught me the concept of the three levels of reality: objective reality, subjective reality, and intersubjective reality.
When you’re on a bus, and a man stands up, walks to the middle, pulls down his pants, and shits on the floor, the steaming, reeking pile of shit is part of the objective reality for everyone on board. It’s undeniable.
To understand subjective reality, scroll through Instagram and listen to any conversation about any social issue. Love, politics, couples splitting bills, or the definition of feminism are all subjective. Defined inside us, but not necessarily shared by others.
But intersubjective reality is the interesting one. Country boundaries, money, and wearing clothes are perfect examples. These things are only real because we collectively agree they are real. For a good lesson in intersubjective reality, withdraw 300,000 Ugandan shillings, wake up in a village in Southern Mongolia, and try to buy a sandwich.
Intersubjective reality is a patchwork of our collective belief. We all agree money is real, so it is. We all began to think clothes were compulsory, so they are.
This collective belief is humanity’s greatest strength and its greatest weakness. It shrunk a vast globe we once thought was flat into a navigable network via complex telecommunications, laws, and waged wars. But at the same time, it prevents us from birthing new paradigms. New intersubjective realities.
The BaYaka, a foraging community in Central African Republic, and the Nambikwara in Amazonia, change their entire lifestyle—diet, homes, social hierarchy—based on the seasons. A different leader for planting season. A different leader for harvesting season.
These communities, primitive though they may seem, have mastered the kind of social fluidity necessary for humans to survive and, more importantly, thrive.
So, as my friend Melvin said when I commented on the Vic Mensa video he posted on Instagram, “The first step is knowing.”
The next time you find yourself accepting something as a rule, ask yourself which reality it occupies. Is it objective? Or are you simply too complacent or powerless to change it?
Poverty isn’t inevitable. Homelessness isn’t inevitable. War isn’t inevitable. We’ve simply accepted these things collectively, and in the same way, we can collectively reject them.
So…the tribe crossed the numerous hills, valleys, and plains to survive. To thrive. To make a new reality.
THINGS.
A quote.
This quote would’ve been a better conclusion to my piece about social graces.
But I think warmth and coldness accumulate and radiate out. It matters which you choose, each time, at every stage. I wasn't born a "warm person" and it doesn't "come naturally" to me. But I've decided that it matters and that it's possible to improve for the sake of others
And not just for the sake of others—for your OWN sake. Learning how to be warm to others helps you feel like less of a zombie. It reinserts soul into a "soulless" customer service job. It's actually a way to make work feel MORE dignified and meaningful, not less
A picture.
I went on a boat ride a month ago, and now I might have to use a caret (I also just learned its name) to update my lofty dreams to include a boat.
WORK.
Freeze!
You have data with several rows and columns:
The wider or taller your table becomes, the more likely you’ll need help getting your bearings.
One thing that helps is to freeze the header rows so that you can check the column you’re in as you scroll up and down.
This process works differently in Excel (better, in my opinion) than in Google Sheets.
In Excel, you click the cell directly below the row you want to freeze and click Freeze Panes.
Note that in this case, selecting a cell to the left of the first column also freezes the first column. This could also be useful if the table is very wide.
You can use the default and most commonly used “Freeze top row” or “Freeze first column” options, but using the logic I’ve shown you above in Excel, you can freeze any number of rows or columns you want.
Google Sheets assumes it knows what you’re most likely to do, so it presents more limited (and more automatic) options
FUN.
The Friday Fix playlist
Shem’s picks
✅ If you’re a fan of keyboard shortcuts, this is for you
✅ Here’s how a shovel is made if you want to dig in
✅ Soundscapes to listen to while you work
✅ The secret to building a mega mansion
✅ Vote for the best illusions of the year
Have a great weekend,
— Shem
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