Practitioner v. Theorist

Hi,

I have written about this a little bit over the past few weeks, but this week, I am inspired by the idea of living life like an applied scientist.

For reference, my worst subjects in school were always the sciences. There was something about them that never sparked my interest. I have a working theory as to why that is: when you're in high school or even in the prerequisite science courses in college, the classes are structured around what we already know about the world.

The experiments you run are predominantly about recreating an already existing experiment in a controlled environment rather than trying to discover something new.

The reason for this is obvious. What are the odds that a 15 year-old is going to create a bias-free environment, have controlled stimuli, observe something novel, and then articulate their findings in a way that could be adapted into the zeitgeist, all in their 50-minute chemistry class period? The chances are probably close to zero.

So, we learn what we are capable of learning within the context that we inhabit.

The sad part is that we lose the spirit of experimentation in the weeds of memorization and the recreation of templated experiments. What we lose is the ability to see our lives through the lens of experimentation. We take the hypotheses that are given to us, not realizing that they are just that, hypotheses.

Here’s a classic one for you: Get good grades, go to a good college, get an internship, get a good job, work hard, get promotions.

This is one of the more common thought processes for how to live a successful life. The issue is that we lose sight of our own definitions in this format. Is a good college the one we know the name of, or the college that has the program we actually want? Is a good job the one that pays well, or the one with work that we find fulfilling?

There is a lot of nuance here, and the most important caveat I need to mention is the idea of creating an environment with as little bias in the experiment as possible.

This newsletter is a good example. I have a hypothesis that writing is a key part of a happy life for me. How do I prove that? By writing a newsletter every week and not giving myself an out to stop. Why add that last part? Because only writing when I feel like it doesn’t create a life where I write, it creates a life where I do things I like to do when I feel like it. That is a very different life.

Another example is The Hero’s Journal. I have been calling it The Kindness Hypothesis in my head for the past 48 hours. The words are subject to change, but the theory isn’t. Seven years ago, Nick and I set out to find out if being kind to yourself and treating yourself like the hero of your story could actually help people accomplish their goals more than if they were toxic about their approach.

We have gathered thousands of data points, technically 110,000 data points, since then, and we have learned a lot of really important lessons from this hypothesis.

In the future, I may do a deeper dive into defining my terms, such as breaking down what I mean by kindness and toxicity or taking a closer look at our methodology. But for now, the baseline is this: we set out with an idea of how the world could be different from what we had previously learned. Through an honest attempt at carrying it out, we’ve learned that being kind to yourself and others can be a way to make meaningful change in your life.

The Hero’s Journal

Over the past few newsletters, I have talked a lot about the hard times that the 2021 Kickstarter brought on, but another headline from this time period was the Comic Con circuit. When we first started The Hero’s Journal, our first-ever Facebook ad campaign targeted a lookalike audience of people who liked Funko Pops. That audience was like lightning in a bottle.

The logic was simple: Where do people who like Funko Pops hang out? Comic Cons. Therefore, we must go to Comic Cons.

Nick and I booked ourselves for seven Comic Cons around the country over a 12-week period, a few of which were back-to-back-to-back weeks.

The best part about logic is that sometimes you learn what your logic misses. Let me explain.

The original equation: People who like us also like Funko. People who like Funko like Comic Con. If we go to Comic Con, we will meet people who like Funko, therefore also like us.

All of this was true… partially.

The assumption we made was that if people liked Funko and also liked us, they would want to buy our product.

When you are spending a bunch of money to fly across the country, ship inventory, set up a booth, etc., something you want to know is: Will people actually buy our product?

Over all of those four-day weekends, we had countless conversations with people who thought what we were doing was cool. They loved the story and even the philosophical reasoning behind it. But that didn’t mean they wanted to actually buy a journal.

We realized something very simple: People go to Comic Cons to deepen their relationship with the fandoms they already love. They are there to find a rare Funko Pop of their favorite character. They want to see their favorite actors from their favorite shows or series.

When it came to learning about a new story or fandom, they were much less interested. On top of that, they were on vacation, worrying about goals and habits was something to think about after they got home.

This is why it is important to be an applied scientist rather than a theorist. We had an idea, the logic seemed to check out, but in practice, there were barriers we could never have predicted. It was a lesson learned through twelve weeks of intense travel, but a lesson well learned.

The silver lining was that the people we did talk to, the ones who did take the plunge, were unbelievably excited about their new journal. Those anecdotal data points lit a fire in us. The Kindness Hypothesis was making real change in real people’s lives.

Nick and I even got to autograph a few journals, which I still have mixed feelings about, but it was cool nonetheless.

Atypical

Working with Trey is a lot of fun, mostly because we are both building this because we think it needs to exist rather than for some promise of a big payout down the road. When you build something with this focus, you can prioritize impact rather than the profit-and-loss statement.

One of the things Trey has built within the brand is his newsletter. This is an area of his business that lives outside his normal analytics, views, watch time, comments, likes, etc. It’s a place where he can simply provide pure value. He has been doing it for a year and has grown not just his channel or business, but himself as a person.

His hypothesis is that he can build a platform that allows him to be the positive voice he wishes he had when he was coming up as a basketball player and as a man.

Pretty cool to see that grow.

Reading

I have been a content mad man this past week. My girlfriend is probably so annoyed because all I want to talk about is the book I listened to and the book that I am reading. 

The book I listened to was “The Forgotten Highlander” – This book was gut wrenching. The narrator is a man who lived through Japanese prisoner of war camps in WWII. He was close enough to the second bomb dropping that the gust of air knocked him off his feet. I would recommend this if you have the stomach for it. There is a lot of pain. 

The book I am reading is “Working” by Robert Caro. I am about 40% through this one. Since starting this newsletter I have been trying to take note of whether or not this is something that I want to be a mainstay in my life for years to come. This book has reinvigorated my spirit for this newsletter, not because I have lost any steam, but because it is something that I look forward to doing week in and week out, and that passion is what Caro exudes talking about all of the research he has done over the years. 

Coffee

It hasn’t gotten here yet, but this weekend, I am learning how to make Matcha because Casey said she wants to start drinking it intermittently as an alternative to coffee. I get a new little challenge in my barista career and I am looking forward to it. 

I look at it as another tool to add to my tool belt. My hypothesis around the coffee hobby is that I want to be able to make people their favorite drinks… Matcha has been on the rise. 

Conclusion

Being an applied scientist in the habit and personal growth world comes with a key warning:

When we have a hypothesis about our lives, getting up earlier, eating healthier, exercising more, we often feel better over time, and we credit that improvement to the new habit. This credit is due, but only in part.

What’s actually happening is that when you start a new habit, you also start evaluating how you spend your time. That intentionality, paired with a new positive habit, is like NOS for turning your outlook around.

The magic isn’t in the habit itself, it’s in choosing to prioritize something that matters to you. This is good news because it means you can do it more than once.

Let me know if you prefer: practitioner or applied scientist. 

If you read this back, you’ll probably guess which one I like.

Tata for now,

Kyle