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Should You Burn Dirty Fuel?

2019-01-18 · letter vlog · Hank · 3:58 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Health (also: Personal life) · mode: Personal essay · tags: on location

Continuing the burnout discussion, Hank reports what people answered when he asked on Twitter for one healthy and one unhealthy fuel, and argues, against John, that unhealthy fuels can produce good work if you recognize them, like taking on debt, while seeking more sustainable alternatives.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Tired in Seattle with a two-year-old; Montana sandwiches; the President's McDonald's dinner

  • ★★ Hank is in Seattle and very tired; travelling with a two-year-old is, he says sarcastically, very easy. (playful) — 00:00:00 · Orin Green
  • ★ Hank says vegetarian sandwiches in Montana are not the saddest thing ever. (playful) — 00:00:00 · Montana
  • ★ Hank notes that John, off Twitter, probably doesn't know the President of the United States invited a football team to the White House to eat McDonald's. (playful) — 00:00:00 · Donald Trump, Twitter

00:00:29 — Hank's tweet asking for healthy and unhealthy fuels and the conversation it started

  • ★★★ Before John's video, Hank tweeted asking people who watched his latest video for one healthy and one unhealthy thing that fuels them. — 00:00:29 · Twitter
  • ★★ Hank's own answers: he feels good when he helps other people experience joy (healthy) and when he is more successful than people he dislikes (unhealthy). — 00:00:29
  • ★★ The tweet spawned a great deal of surprisingly healthy conversation on Twitter; Hank is proud he used Twitter for good, then jokes he undid it with a later tweet. — 00:00:29 · Twitter

00:00:58 — Patterns in healthy fuels (others, progress) and unhealthy fuels (spite, fear of being disappointing)

  • ★★★ Hank finds people's healthy fuels were often positive emotions about other people or humanity: love, loyalty, even obligation. — 00:00:58
  • ★★★ The other common healthy fuel was a feeling of progress, doing something you're really good at; it can exist without validation, and Hank finds it rare and precious and wants more of it. — 00:01:27
  • ★★★ Unhealthy fuels were more varied, often negative feelings about other people: many just wrote 'spite', others revenge, anger or fear of others. — 00:01:56
  • ★★★ Hank thinks the most common unhealthy fuel was negative feelings about yourself: fearing being disappointing, which differs from fearing you'll disappoint someone else. (hedged) — 00:01:56

00:02:26 — Unhealthy fuels can do good if recognized, like debt; seek sustainable alternatives

  • ★★★ Against John's point that he couldn't write the good parts of Looking for Alaska until he found a healthier fuel, Hank thinks it is possible to do good things with unhealthy fuels. — 00:02:26 · Looking for Alaska (novel)
  • ★★ Hank has at times not shied away from burning unhealthy fuels. — 00:02:55
  • ★★★ Hank says the key is to recognize unhealthy fuels while using them and their possible long-term cost, like taking on cognitive debt: do it for really good reasons. — 00:02:55
  • ★★★ Hank urges looking for alternative fuels that may be less efficient and burn less bright but are far more sustainable: 'solar panels up on your psyche'. — 00:03:24
  • ★ Hank has to go do PodCon stuff now. — 00:03:24

00:03:50 — Orin says 'podcon'

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

People: Donald Trump · Orin Green

Projects: PodCon

Works: Looking for Alaska (novel)

Organizations: McDonald's · Twitter · White House

Concepts: fear of failure · love

Places: Montana · Seattle

Replies to

  • continues · What is Burnout? — “For the people who watched my most recent video”
  • continues · On Burning Resentment — “continue the discussion that we've been having for the last two videos.”

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