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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.
Why should you subscribe?
I have over ten years of work experience in healthcare, program management, and data analytics on two continents. So, I know a little about helping you work smarter
I comb through tonnes of self-improvement content so you don’t have to, and I distill the content into bite-sized wisdom for you
I’ll occasionally make you laugh
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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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Otherwise, grab a seat 🪑.
HAPPY FRIDAY 🎉 The planet Jupiter is experiencing a Plutonic (referring to the planet(?)) reckoning. Thought to be so big that 1300 earths can fit in it, recent images show that Jupiter is, well, smaller than expected. Perhaps it was just especially cold in space that day? Now estimated to be 5 miles narrower at the equator and 15 miles flatter at the poles, Jupiter teaches us that when you hear rumors about yourself,—good or bad—say nothing.
The Cozy Winter Ritual Behind My Energy and Glow ✨
Winter calls for rituals that actually make you feel amazing—and Pique’s Sun Goddess Matcha is mine. It delivers clean, focused energy with zero jitters, supports glowing skin and gentle detox, and feels deeply grounding on cold mornings. Smooth, ceremonial-grade, and crave-worthy, it’s the easiest way to start winter days clear, energized, and glowing from the inside out
LIFE
When will you marry?
Source: Disney
…it is difficult to love a woman and do anything else…
I often think of several quotes from Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky. Recently, I remembered what Tolstoy intimated about marriage in Anna Karenina when the character Serpukhovskoy advised his friend Vronsky about marriage:
If you had to carry a load and use your hands at the same time, it would be possible only if the load were strapped on your back: and that is marriage.
Man, married people really don’t know how to sell marriage.
But to me, what Tolstoy, via Serpukhovskoy, scratches at is the importance of commitment.
This might be ironic considering I encouraged you to experiment, but let me land. In fact, commitment is downstream of experimentation. The trick is in knowing when to stop experimenting and commit. Or, as David Perell puts it—stop hugging the X-axis.
Perell diagnoses the universal calamity of commitment-phobia through cultural (the rise of liberalism encouraging endless side quests), sociological (short-term thinking discouraging putting down roots), and technological (the internet’s exponential multiplication of our “options”) lenses.
So, how can you experiment and commit?
I’ll intentionally avoid the rampant commitment-phobia that plays out in relationships. I think that’s well documented in your life. I will say, though, I don’t believe in “the one.” I believe in the one you choose. I believe you could hit it off with multiple people in life and be perfectly content until death parted you from each of them. I think the Secretary Problem, one of my favorite mathematical theories—which Perell also talks about—plays out perfectly on the dating scene.
The secretary problem is an HR professional’s dream but a job-seeker’s nightmare. According to the theory, you only need to interview 37% of the candidates vying for a position before making the hiring decision. Interview less than 37% and you miss some quality candidates. Interview over 37% and you get overwhelmed, ultimately settling for the last half-decent candidate you interview.
But the same problem you had finding x in high school resurfaces here: how can that 37% help you in real life? Practically.
Well—
I’ve experimented a lot entrepreneurially: The Good Currency, TLDR Weekly, YouTube, a data science as a service company, various consultancies, formal employment, The Friday Fix, etc. One of the things I did as I reflected on my many failures was to look for the common thread in all my experiments. While distinguishing my commercializable projects from my hobbies, I found a pattern: I gravitated to, and thrived even, at the intersection of teaching, working with people, and telling stories.
Once I identified the common thread, I dismissed all the other ideas as distractions of novelty. And what remained were projects aligned with my best self that I could either make money from (my current job and consultancies), simply enjoy (this newsletter) or both (my current job and this newsletter, maybe?).
Wrapped securely in that common thread, I bagged those projects and carried them on my back, freeing up my hands to live a fuller, more intentional life.
So…you’ll know to stop experimenting when you sense that you keep repeating yourself. At which point, you should take that common thread, tie those projects together and wear them on your back. At which point, your marriage begins. Your new life begins.
THINGS
A poem
Future love does not exist. Love is a present activity only. The man who does not manifest love in the present has not love.
An article
I enjoyed this slightly long (but worth it) article on having meaningful conversations.
A picture
On my first day back in the office after a massive, snow storm-induced week indoors, I took this picture of the park near my office. The snow is covering what is usually a verdant football field. But on the bright side, this will make for a magical before/after pic in a month or two.
WORK
What’s in a name?
You have data:
You want to convert the revenue from UGX to USD, and you have the exchange rate, too.
You can do this:
Since you’re referencing the same exchange rate cell, you can divide the UGX revenue by the rate and “lock” the cell by using an absolute cell reference ($E$2)
One of the most powerful features in Excel are cell references. Every cell has a name, or address: A2, B2, E2, etc. When you know these references you can perform calculations on those cells without even clicking in the respective cells.
The dollar signs you see sometimes ($E$2), tell Excel how to handle the cell when performing calculations.
OR…you can do this:
Give the exchange rate cell a name:
Note the cell name change from “E2” to “rate” in the top left corner.
And then reference the new cell name in the calculation:
Nifty, right?
You decide ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ .
PRODUCTS
A course
Sheets for People who Hate Sheets
This course is designed to take you from zero to good enough, even if the last time you opened a spreadsheet was by accident. We'll start with the basics—no judgment—and build from there.
A guide
How to learn Excel
If I had to learn Excel again, this is what I’d do.
RATE IT
FUN.
The Friday Fix playlist
Your picks
> Not sure why you’d want to print one in 2026, but this site lets you print calendars
> The world’s most romantic hotels
> This game makes you spell words to open a safe
Have a great weekend,
— SO
