Los Angeles Painting

My brother lives in Los Angeles. During my visit a few years ago, he took me to one of his favorite surfing spots. He taught me to surf here at this beach.

This spot happens to be right off the road of the Palisades fires.

I snapped this photo of him then did a digital painting of it.

Sketchbook

The Blessing Of Exposure to Other Cultures

Traveling around the world does something to a person.

Seeing church done in other cultures stretches our paradigms.

“It’s not wrong…it’s just different” is a common phrase in the missions world.

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A post shared by Ken - StradCopy (@stradcopy)

This post captures this idea wonderfully.

When our ideas are not challenged and sifted through the filter of Scripture, we can become numb to what is “biblical” and what is merely from our culture.

An Homage to the Bluey Theme Song

Bluey’s theme song might be one of my all-time favorites.

Our family has been a little late to the show’s bandwagon. But here is my curation of my favorite theme song variations.

Aside from these beauties, I enjoyed seeing this time signature, a guitar cover, and this dance.

Cheers (mate)

4 Reasons to Sing When You’re Depressed

William Plumer on Psalm 89:

Whatever our own state, or that of public affairs may be, les us sing of God’s glorious attributes. No darkness in our sky can excuse us from making known his perfections (Ps 89:1, 2, 14, 24, 28, 33, 49).

Here are his 4 reasons why “We greatly wrong our own souls when we decline the religious use of song”:

1. This is the fittest way to express joy for anything.

2. It will be best inculcated in this way.

3. It will be more easily remembered.

4. It will be more easily delivered to others, in order to be remembered.

Many a sorrowing child of God has had his gloom, like the evil spirit of Saul, quite removed by the hard of David.

When you think you should pencil…

I’m a detail-hog. A perfectionistic pamperer. A resident in the trees.

Details are my happy place. Don’t even ask how many tabs (nestled into how many Chrome browsers) are idly waiting my return.

For many years, this gift (trait, strength,…curse?!) drove my art-making. If you look at my corpus of lifeworks, you’ll see many hyperrealistic pencil portraits. But something felt wrong.

I didn’t realize how imprisoning perfection-seeking would make me.

In the last 5 years, I’ve returned to what originally drew me to art in the first place: play and joy. The fundamentals excite me again. The beauty of the rudiments enliven me. This season of parenting littles forces creativity within the limitations of interruptible 20 minute restraints.

For this reason, James Gurney’s advise has been a lifeline: learn to sketch by painting.

Instead of forcing the details of trees, live in the forest. Hang out in the bigger picture of life. Preach to my heart from the cliff rather than listen to it from the weeds.

Enjoy Mr. Gurney at work:

Year in Review 2024

What made me a better culture-making this year? Here are some of the most memorable things I learned, enjoyed or came across in 2024.

1. Constraining Your Curiosity - I learned about this from Jack Butcher from his interview with David Perrell. Even though I learned this in 2023, I found myself implementing it in 2024.

Jack Butcher

2. Start a business is all about serving a community and finding the gap where you can help.

3. “We do not rise to the level of our goals. We fall to the level of our systems.” (James Clear)

4. Five lessons from Space X launches.

5. Compounding principle: whether it be habits or money.

PJ Milani

6. Creator flywheels.

7. Take my health more seriously as I get closer to 40.

8. Viewing life as series of projects rather than different jobs: Seth Godin 40 years of projects.

9. Thinking about death. Lost someone close and people I love are getting more sick. Wisdom comes from thinking about it.

10. 1 Year of Chat GPT. 2024 was my first full year of using ChatGPT and other AI tools more intentionally. Here were some takeaways.

11. Learned a new rhythm this year: how to work from home more.

12. Dad Awesome - The Intentional 40. Jeff Zaugg, host of the Dad Awesome podcast, shares this idea of 40 different experiences to mark turning 40.

13. Screwtape on prayer: "Of course, at the precise moment of terror, bereavement, or physical pain, you may catch your man when his reason is temporarily suspended. But even then, if he applies to Enemy headquarters, I have found that the post is nearly always defended."

14. Tim Keller's parenting advice. This talk was fantastic. Keller cites a specific study finding: Kids who believed their parents understood the real world and understood what they, as kids, were going through were much more likely to follow their parents beliefs.

15. So many warnings and illustrations about Christians fighting and quarreling.

16. Memorable reads: Power of Moments. Art and Lit. (Seerveld). Show Your Work. Love and Logic Parenting. The War of Art. The Abolition of Man (C.S. Lewis). The Four Loves (C.S. Lewis).

17. Enjoy AI as play. Photoshop’s generative fill feature. I took Kevin Kelly’s advise and have enjoyed it as an assistant.

18. Biz resources: Seth Godin, Chris Do, Kit, Daniel Priestly, friends.

20. Learning about the “creator economy”

21. Show Your Work by Austin Kleon

22. Kevin Kelly’s 1,000 True Fans

23. Rumination - perpetuating depression by dwelling on sorrows. (Joe Rogan, Abigail Shrier)

24. How to be thankful (How to remember the Lord).

25. Review your corpus.

26. The power of converting my goals into SMART goals.

27. In today’s world, people are not aiming to be good, they’re aiming to be true to themselves. The focus of life is to find it, not give it. But the key apologetic for today is this: life is found in giving it up (Steve Leston). This is similar to a lot of what Tim Keller talked about.

28. Paul Miller- asking, “where is Jesus?” Miller says you can find him in the hiddenness of the world. Look for humility, lowliness, apologies, cheerfulness, forgiveness, integrity, obedience, etc.

29. Jon Tyson’s advise on how to give life to your wife.

30. I read “The Intentional Father” in 2023 but have felt the impact already in 2024.

31. What setting goals is like…

32. Daniel Priestley on discovering value: something others perceive as valuable, something I enjoy doing, and something commercially viable.

33. Permission Marketing concepts from Seth Godin.

34. Unleashing the Ideavirus ideas also from Seth Godin. 1) Consumer wins status for sharing + 2) Recipient benefits because the idea changing their life + 3) Creator wins.

35. To solidify family identity, create mascots for each family member.

36. More Seth Godin goodness: when making a product, fill this out: My product is for ___________. I will focus on people who want _____________. And I promise that engaging with what I make will help you get ____________.

37. Donald Miller’s Storybrand Storyscript.

38. Gary Vee on if your family died next week.

39. “We have trained them to think of the Future as a promised land which favoured heroes attain—not as something which everyone reaches at the rate of sixty minustes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.” Put in my own words: The future is the result of who I am and what I choose to do in the next 60 minutes (Screwtape, 139)

40. The Japanese concept of Ikigai - Finding your life and worth.

41. Sketching out a personal brand.

42. Finishing a 1,000 piece Van Gogh puzzle (that we’d had rolled up for nearly ten years).

43. Learning how to use Notion.

44. Learning website, Etsy, Patreon, Shopify, DBA taxes.

45. The mission is the point.

46. I boiled down my advise for songwriting.

47. The power of the bee as a symbol.

48. Why Yellow Ochre is a fitting title I am using.

49. What is the mission of learning a thing?

50. Releasing Off the Bench: 33 Ways artists interface with God’s mission.

51. C.S. Lewis on four types of humor.

52. Ted Lasso and mental health.

53. Raising kids is like nurturing pecans, not strawberries.

54. Considering the Christian life: From Eustace to Useful.

55. The most convincing reason for sketchbooking I’ve ever come across. Just last week, I started doing a daily illustration.

56. I learned that complaining is a symptom. My job is to discover and address the root of the complaints.

57. Discover your Family ID and the Incredible Parent assessments.

58. Derek Sivers book notes.

59. My wife and I loved this cooking show 24 in 24: The Last Chef Standing. We’ve also enjoyed watching The Good Doctor this year.

60. The Psalms took most of my Bible intake this year. I leaned into Spurgeon, Boice, and Wilson for supplemental devotional reading.

61. Using Notion for notekeeping.

62. Getting an espresso machine (my wife found a killer deal on Burlington’s, wh-what). We’re still klunky, but enjoying homemade lattes.

63. Embracing the good friendships in life.

64. Refreshing staff retreat.

65. Enjoying our “lasts” as a family living in South Texas before moving up north.

66. Had lots of great conversations with friends from our church about the Sabbath, family culture building, multi-generational investments. Took some notes from Jewish Shabbot for creating a system for the week/weekend.

67. The ESV Psalms journal has been wonderful to use.

68. This talk by Patreon found, Jack Conte, on the future of creativity on the web.

69. Found comfort having the system of working out rather than the goal.

70. Committed to my first marathon in 2025 with some good friends.

71. Streaming jazz music in the background at home (our family likes the Disney jazz playlists).

72. I jumped on the Friends bandwagon way late in life. It was sometime this year or last year my wife and I finished the series.

73. Clarified my personal mission: I love making resources. But I love even more making useful resources.

74. I’ve been building a small collection of written books—each in various stages of completion. One book on 2 Corinthians and mission helpers is in the final edit phase. One book is a series of parenting reflections on Deuteronomy. Another is a collection of observations and takeaways from my journey in the Young, Restless, and Reformed movement.

75. Around this time last year, our daughters created their own little farmer-market business: Sea Shell Sisters.

76. I made and gave away some surprise paintings to friends and family.

77. I create a whole bunch of designs to test the waters of print on demand.

78. Read through A Praying Life…again.

79. Last, but certainly not least, my wife and I celebrated 10 years of marriage this last year!

What SpaceX Launches Teach Me

As my daugher and I sat in our community pool with a neighbor’s family, we saw another plane fly over. “That’s Elon’s jet!” he exclaimed. “For real?!” I replied. I couldn’t believe it.

Fast forward 2 years to our home rumbling from the 33 raptor engines on the Starship, 20 miles away. A Boeing 747’s four engines produce about 230,000 pounds of thrust combined. Just 1 raptor engine is like three times that.

I didn’t realize when I moved to the Rio Grande Valley years ago, I’d be writing about takeaways from some company called SpaceX. But here we are.

Here are 5 things SpaceX’s launches are teaching me.

1. blow things up to learn.

Elon Musk and other employees have been open about this idea. Does it cost a fortune, of course. But Musk is playing the slow game. His aim is to get to Mars to make life multiplanetary. So, in Musk’s paradigm, it’s worth the cost (also…he’s rich).

Blowing things up helps us learn. We must have the freedom of play to see if what we make functions. I was recently helping my daughter make a dominos set up. This principle came to mind while she was getting frustrated with how her efforts kept failing. I reminded her of the bigger picture.

She learned to ask, “what did this teach me so I can improve next time?”

2. A mission moves you and others to stretch.

Musk is driven by missions. Whether it be population decline, interplanetary living, or reusable rockets. These missions lead him to set the bar high for employee output. Just follow his flight tracker, and you see what drives him.

Missions motivate. They help us endure pain. They create community.

3. compounding: play the slow game.

Thirteen years ago, I drove out to Boca Chica beach with my dad, then a year later with my brother. The 20 mile stretch seemed like the ends of the earth. No one around. The road ends at the sand (literally).

Fast forward a few years to a visit my wife and I made. There appeared to be one new-ish looking building with a fence and security guard. “No vehicles are allowed here,” he said. I didn’t realize it then. But this would become the site of Starbase.

Do not judge missional-thinking behavior by outward appearances alone! Before too long, you see the compounding effect.

4. Create moments with family.

Tim Urban wrote this piece on taking his toddler to view a recent SpaceX launch. I didn’t realize until seeing this that I am living in plain site of a historic moment in time. Our family has been able to watch nearly all the SpaceX launches from our driveway.

This continues to teach me an important lesson on remaining present and creating moments with loved ones.

5. Sometimes, explosions can be beautiful.

Few spectacles have made my jaw drop. This specific launch was one of them. Seeing this explosion live felt like watching visual effects in a movie but in real life.

Sometimes, what seems like our greatest hardships, God uses to weave something beautiful for us.

My Top Culture-Making AI Prompts

2024 marked the first year I used Chat GPT or some equivalent. Artificial Intelligence is and will permeate everything in the world going forward. I took Kevin Kelly’s advise and have been thinking about it more as a personal assistant. Here are some of my most useful prompts from AI.

Ideas for Family stuff

• Asking it to come up with a list of family night games to teach my kids _______.

• Asking it to come up with a list of experiences or moments about ___________ in style of Chip and Dan Heath (who wrote The Power of Moments).

• Asking for movie suggestions. What are 10 movies where the main character struggles with _______.

• Asking for 5-10 conversation question for kids (based on my kids ages) based on whatever movie or TV show we just watched. The questions ought to be aimed at engaging with the worldview of what we watched. My goal is to extract truth, values, and where the movie did and didn’t hit the mark.

• Asking for a list of ways [any parenting author I’ve liked] would engage with a certain issue I’m facing.

For learning Stuff

• Learning about any topic. But asking it to teach me like a specific person or at a 5-year old reading level.

• Asking about any topic that’s hard to grasp, but explain it to me in the style of Mr. Rogers.

• Asking about a philosophical concept, but explaining it to me like I’m 5.

• Copy and pasting a Hebrew of Greek word from the Bible and asking it to translate it.

Learning about myself

• Asking, “From all of our interactions what is one thing that you can tell me about myself that I may not know about myself.” (h/t).

• Asking it, “based on everything I’ve asked you, come up with an image.”

Managing Life

• Asking to convert a goal or aspiration I have into a SMART goal.