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- #50: Paint your picture
#50: Paint your picture
Shem Opolot
December 15, 2023
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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I’ll occasionally make you laugh
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Happy Friday, and welcome to the 50th issue of The Friday Fix 🎉
When this email lands in your inbox, I’ll be on my way to Kisoro for a dear friend’s wedding. But considering it’s an 8-hour drive, perhaps I should call it Ki-sorrow? And considering I can’t take my son with me, perhaps I should call it Ki-solo? No? Not all jokes are meant to land.
I’m excited to count trees, rolling hills, and sleep-disrupting speed bumps.
Estimated read time: 5 minutes
ONE THING I’VE LEARNED
Paint your picture
The crowd in the sold-out auditorium is dead silent, as though they’re all holding their breaths, and for a moment, the entire room goes dark, with only the spotlight at centerstage and the iconic red TED sign visible at the front.
A 6-foot, strapping dark male with a bald head and a shiny manicured beard that connects appears out of the darkness of the stage amid applause from an eager crowd. The chorus of the crowd is reminiscent of a sitcom in the early 2000s.
His blazer looks expensive—Italian, most likely—with peak lapels. The crisp white button-down shirt underneath his blazer fits like it was sewn on him, and its cuffs peep out of the blazer by half an inch at the wrists. His navy blue slim-fit tapered pants stand firm and creaseless at his waist, and they kiss his burgundy loafers.
With every step he takes closer to the spotlight at the center of the stage, the applause summons more decibels. Once dead center and under the brightest biblical lights, he pauses and drinks the applause like cold water on the hottest day. He squints to estimate the size of the crowd, but it’s a sea of people seemingly piled upon each other in a coliseum, so he finds the clicker in his jacket pocket and starts his slide show.
“What if I told you that everyone in Africa can access high-quality healthcare for free?”
The crowd is hypnotized.
***
Can you paint a precise picture of what your ideal reality looks like?
In research science, it’s good practice to approach research by starting with the end in mind. We pretend the research is out in the world, with big, broad wings. Soaring. With its soft underbelly inspecting the success it wrought. Once that vision is clear, we moonwalk back to the research question.
I do this with every goal I have, too.
***
To deliver that great TED talk while looking like a 6-foot Morris Chestnut, I must at least:
—Study innovative healthcare financing in Africa and develop functional models
—Publish tons of content (videos and articles) on the topic until my name is synonymous with innovative healthcare financing in Africa.
—Appear on podcasts, speak on conference panels, and network A LOT.
—Perfect the art of storytelling.
—Perfect the art of public speaking.
—Make money to buy nice clothes and stay married to my wife so she can choose the right combinations.
Then,…I break each of these objectives down until I reach TODAY: What can I do today to get closer to that stage?
When you get home at the end of your ideal day, what does your couch look and feel like? How big is your TV? Are you on a beach or a remote village home that locals use as a landmark to direct tourists? Do you have kids? Are you fat? What kind of haircut do you have? What’s in your fridge?
Make that picture crystal clear, and then get your paintbrush and paint.
SHAMELESS PLUG
TLDR Weekly has been read over 40,000 times this year. 40,001? 😉.
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MY FAVOURITE THINGS
A quote
If I have learned anything in this long life of mine, it is this: In love we find out who we want to be; in war we find out who we are.
Now Playing
I watched this one a while ago, but if you can stomach a good horror, it’s one of the best shows I’ve watched this year. A lot of social commentary therein.
The Good Library
Read a book this weekend.
A picture
I love a good ad.
PRO TIP
Trim the [fat] spaces
Here’s your data:
When you get data, it sometimes has awkward leading, trailing, and extra “in-between” spaces. Besides being ugly, these awkward spaces can also affect your calculations in Excel/Google Sheets.
In fact, when dealing with text data (names, etc.), running the TRIM function on the text first to ensure you remove any awkward spaces that may be invisible to your naked eye is good practice.
The ugly red arrows show you where the awkward spaces are
But fortunately, you have the TRIM function.
TRIM takes only the text you want to “trim” as an argument, i.e., TRIM(string), and removes all leading, trailing, and extra “in-between” spaces.
Let’s see it in action:
Notice the awkward spaces are gone!
If you want to learn how to use Excel, this is a good place to start.
WHERE FUN GOES TO FLOURISH
The Friday Fix playlist
Brain teaser
From Braingle.
When you behead a word, you remove the first letter and still have a valid word. You will be given clues for the two words; the longer word first.
Example: Begin -> Sour, acidic
Answer: The words are Start and Tart.
1. Pass by -> Temporary failure
2. Picture -> Wizard
3. Brave -> Fortunate
4. Enthusiastic meetings -> Partners
5. Attacked -> Helped
6. Choose -> Choose
7. Fragments -> Dice game
8. Customary practice -> Spiritual mentor
Answer below
Shem’s picks
✔️ Found the perfect place for you to stay the next time you’re in Italy
✔️ A functioning miniaturized ski lodge made of Legos
✔️ A few laws of getting rich
Brain teaser answer
Answer:
1. Elapse -> Lapse
2. Image -> Mage
3. Plucky-> Lucky
4. Rallies -> Allies
5. Raided -> Aided
6. Select -> Elect
7. Scraps -> Craps
8. Usage -> Sage
Have a great weekend,
— Shem
Et cetera
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