Took an LLM Tutorial

In the preface of my book,
I talked about the layman’s struggle
to understand
software.

10 years since then,
I find myself
a formally trained computer scientist—
struggling
to understand
software.

Not because I don’t understand
how the software
works,
but because despite knowing
how the software
works,
what it does
is still
bewildering.

Vengefulness

Vengefulness
can be
a request.

One saying,
“I want you
to empathize.”

“I want you
to empathize
with what it was like
for me to go through
what I went through.”

“I want my experience
to be appreciated,
respected,
and deemed worthy
of attention.”

“I want my experience
to matter.”

Realizing Empathy

We realize empathy
when we empathize
with someone
or something‒
including ourselves‒
through an unexpected
realization.

One that might makes us go
“Ah ha!”
“Ah…” or
“Ha ha ha!”
concerning something
we either did not
or had incorrectly assumed
to have understood
or appreciated
enough.

Time for Another Metaphor

One
of the most important concepts
in my first book
is metaphors.

Metaphors
connect two seemingly
unrelated
ideas.

In doing so,
it can help us discover
new
or unexpected insights
into something we were previously
unaware.

For example,
while I was on tour
with my book
I shared the psychological pain
and struggle
I experienced
in the artistic
creative
process..

To my surprise,
entrepreneurs
resonated more deeply with my experience
than others.

It turns out
entrepreneurs experience
similar psychological/interpersonal pain
and struggle
in the process
of launching
and running
their business.

This experience helped me
create a metaphor
between the experience of artists
and the experience of entrepreneurs,
which lead me to do
what I do
now.

But until I created
that metaphor
I used to often say
that I don’t understand entrepreneurs.

If I said I do understand,
it was just so I could feel entitled
to say something negative
about them.

So now
whenever I say
I don’t understand someone
or say I do understand them
just so I can say something negative about them,
I tell myself
that it’s time
for another
metaphor.

Creative Empathy

A common inner conflict revolves around these two thoughts:

  1. I’m being treated unfairly.
  2. I’m not good enough to be treated fairly.

It may seem like these two thoughts cannot be thought by the same person.
Yet they are often thought by the same person at the same time.
That’s why it is an inner conflict.

Our inner conflict often takes the form of a paradox.
When laid out logically, paradoxes will not make sense.

By connecting what may seem like contradictory perspectives through empathy,
we can give birth to what we call creativity.

It is through such act of creation,
that paradoxes dissolve itself,
leaving behind a sense of clarity and understanding.