cliff-notes on Cliff538

I Think You Should Have A Life Manifesto

Thu, 25 Jun 2026 18:41:53 -0600

Hear me out.

You need one of these.

It’s a base to check in with every so often. How often? Meh, it’s up to you. I check in with mine once a month. I have reminders set up to review it. Ask myself how I’m doing with it and any changes that need to be made. I log these reviews so I can look back on my progress and weak areas.

I make changes often and add to the Wisdom section when I come across something I like. Some are my own thoughts, others are “borrowed” from books and blog posts that I’ve come across.

It doesn’t have to be fancy, complex, or well-written. Keep it simple.

Write it out in your favorite notes app and set a reminder or calendar event to review it every month or so.

Using mine monthly has improved my life in so many ways.

I’m going to share parts of mine with you so you can see what I mean. It will show you my structure. Change yours to whatever makes sense for your life.

Here are portions of mine: (edited to remove really personal stuff)

This is a living, breathing document just like life. Things can and will change. Be Honest with yourself and how you are doing with your goals.

Once a month, check in on how you are doing and what needs to change. Where have you drifted? What was your most delightful moment last month? What was your best use of time? What was your worst? What went wrong, and what lessons did you learn? What are you looking forward to and why?

Big Picture

Happiness

Love

Friends

Simplicity: less stuff, spend less. Less really is more.

Work less, play more, take more pictures.

Outside: wilderness, camping, exploring, hiking, road trips, photography of all kinds, getting up early with a cup of coffee and smell the air, listen to the birds, listen to nature, listen to Mother Earth, she is trying to teach you.

Meditate every day.

Take pictures every single day. Print your pictures, hang them in your office, give them away, post them online.

Write every day, somewhere, anywhere, journaling, blog posts, Obsidian, Notes, send letters/cards to friends and family.

Help people, inspire people, encourage people, be a good human. Smile more.

Questions

Does this “thing, object, want, desire” fit into the big picture above?

Will this purchase fit into long-term plans and needs? Will it still be useful or used in 3 months?

Can you live without this thing? Is it something that truly will enhance your day-to-day?

Is this thing worth going to work extra days…?

You

What kind of person do you want to be?

What kind of husband, friend, son, do you want to be?

Check your drift; have you drifted from your values? From who you want to be?

What situations or triggers make you become someone you don’t want to be?

Housing

Think, don’t rush. What do you want in a house/apartment/condo?

Property, room for a shop, garden, trailers, room for the dogs to run around. Or small and super simple. Being able to lock the door and leave for a month without worry? What is important to you in this current stage of life?

Work

It’s complex… But it doesn’t have to be.

Keep it simple.

Attitude: be happy. Don’t be a dick. You don’t know how somebody’s day has been. Nobody likes working with a grumpy SOB.

Exude positivity.

Vehicles

Two total.

One small, efficient commuter.

Goal: One truck with a camper or a van for extended road trips.

No loans, use savings. If you don’t have the cash, you can’t buy it.

Money Saving

As much as possible!

Goal: Be debt-free and borrow from yourself.

No more loans ever. (except home loans)

No more credit card debt. Period.

Technology

(Big Area) Danger! Danger!

Does it bring you happiness?

Keeps you going back to work, you lose days off.

Usually fails down the road, causing even more stress.

Do you really need this? Or do you want it?

Put it in your cart, and wait two weeks. Still want it?

The upgrade isn’t worth it.

Keep it simple.

Wisdom

Only boring people get bored.

I’m fanatical about new projects; slow down, spend less.

Less IS more.

Spending money is giving away freedom. Money is freedom. Are you willing to give up $1,000 in freedom for that new iPad? With money, you have the freedom to do what you want, to take more days off. No money means going back to work, your freedom taken away.

Truth: You can skip the pursuit of happiness altogether and just be happy.

Environment matters a lot; move to where you can flourish most. Put yourself in environments where you have to perform to your utmost; if you can get by being average, you probably will.

Later, you’ll be nostalgic for right now.

Figure out what your primary focus is and make progress on that every day, first thing in the morning, no exceptions.

Pay attention to your production-consumption balance. If you’re only consuming and not producing, change that.

Lean into the good kind of fear.

No matter how bad things seem, everything passes. Everything.

Do a review of your year every year: write it out in Obsidian, figure out what was good and what was bad, and use this to set your goals for the next year.

Doing things is energizing; wasting time is depressing. You don’t need that much rest.

Form opinions on things and then find the strongest critique of those opinions. Repeat. Strong opinions loosely held. Be open to changing your mind.

Know your ‘triggers’ / what makes you the worst version of yourself.

There is some wisdom in “fake it till you make it”.

Don’t “slow down” as you get older; speed up. Lean into changes; be curious about new things.

Be honest about whether something is learning or entertainment. Real learning is hard and effortful.

Think in writing. Write in Obsidian, scrawl in notebooks. This extends working memory arbitrarily and allows your thoughts to compound on each other.

Luck isn’t a constant; it increases with surface area: be in the right places, have lots of conversations, put yourself out there, ask for what you want, and be optimistic and positive.

The most valuable feedback usually hurts a lot.

If you want to think originally and differently, seek uncorrelated inputs. Read minor works, older things, obscure journals.

Read as much as possible and remember what Doris Lessing said: ”There is only one way to read, which is to browse in libraries and bookshops, picking up books that attract you, reading only those, dropping them when they bore you, skipping the parts that drag – and never, never reading anything because you feel you ought, or because it is part of a trend or a movement. Remember that the book which bores you when you are twenty or thirty will open doors for you when you are forty or fifty, and vice versa. Don’t read a book out of its right time for you."

Beyond this, “Cliff538 Life Manifesto”, I usually write out my monthly reviews so I can see trends and have something to look back on. Write out three or four questions you want to ask yourself every month for your check-in. Writing this out gives you time to reflect on what truly needs to change and why. And most importantly, how.

I also do a “Cliff538 State of the State” where I write out what my usual day consists of, what is working, and what is not. I list options and what changes I’m going to make.

Another suggestion is to write out in detail about who you want to be to your spouse, friends, family, etc.

All of this is mostly because I honestly forget a lot of this and just need a monthly reminder to stay on track. It can seem cumbersome at first, but after a few months of check-ins, you’ll start to see improvements in your life. I truly believe you will.

Note: If you want a really deep dive into this stuff and see a whole role system, I highly recommend MacSparky’s Productivity Field Guide.

Morning Meditation

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 08:54:32 -0600

“When you wake up in the morning, tell yourself: the people I deal with today will be meddling, ungrateful, arrogant, dishonest, jealous and surly. They are like this because they can’t tell good from evil. But I have seen the beauty of good, and the ugliness of evil, and have recognized that the wrongdoer has a nature related to my own — not of the same blood and birth, but the same mind, and possessing a share of the divine. And so none of them can injure me. No one can implicate me in ugliness. Nor can I feel angry at my relative, or hate him.”

~ Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, Book 2

Pentel Arts Multi 8 Pencil

Mon, 20 Apr 2026 16:38:28 -0600

Hiro had this pencil in his last Hiro.report. Had to order it right away and get penciling.

It’s a fun pencil, and switching leads is easy. Rotate the clip to the color you want—the cutout in the clip shows which one is selected. Press the top button, and the lead drops down. Adjust it to the length you want, then start writing. To switch colors, hold the pencil upside down, let the lead fall back into place, and rotate the clip to your next color.

It’s surprisingly small for how much it holds. The tapered barrel makes it comfortable to hold, and it never feels awkward. It’s all plastic, so it has a slightly cheap feel, and you’ll probably want to be careful not to stress the clip too much. Still, it feels solid enough to last a long time with reasonable care.

Bright, fun colors in a very small pencil. This is definitely going to become a must-carry item with my journal.

Separate Blog Experiment For Short Notes Up and Running

Wed, 14 Jan 2026 18:26:58 -0600

Cliff538 Notes is up and running.

Not sure about all of this, but it bothers me that titleless short notes, really meant for Mastodon, are clogging up my home page.

I’m still investigating whether there is a way to separate titleless posts from the home page, but then you would still need a separate page to show all of them. Or, have a toggle to show/hide. Seems complex to me.

The easiest route is what most people suggested to me: just keeping everything on one blog. Keep it simple! I tried posting my short notes only to Mastodon, but then I don’t have a nice, clean running record on my blog. The answer seems to be a separate blog where you write all your short notes, tweets, skeets, and toots. Then you have a clean running list of all of them. Link to it from the home page.

Most people will never look at it; it’s mostly for me. A record of everything I posted to Mastodon. I suppose you could download all that info from Masto, but what then? Where do you put it for easy viewing?

We will try this for a few months and see how I like it. It’s easy to go back to having everything on the home page.

https://notes.cliff538.com

Cliff Notes: The Good Stuff!

Tue, 23 Dec 2025 16:04:43 -0600

A smattering of useful things I’ve come across lately

Pu’erh Tuocha - a new Pu’erh tea that I’m really into right now. Dark, earthy, smooth, and organic. In very handy single-serving mini tea bricks, suitable for 2-3 infusions.

Origin Reserve Sampler - Pretty expensive treat, but if you really enjoy trying new teas, this is for you. I haven’t tried them all yet, but so far, they’re outstanding.

Luis Mendo Book: Mundo Mendo, Book One. - Luis is an artist based in Japan that I really enjoy. He has a new book out that I received in the mail today. Check out his work, you won’t be disappointed.

Classic Manual Bread Slicer - I suck at slicing bread. I thought I’d get better, but nope. Not getting better. In steps the Zassenhaus manual bread slicer. I highly recommend. Click the link, and you can see it in action. My wife was totally against it, thought it was a ridiculous purchase, then she used it a few times, and she’s a believer now.

Backdrop - The Mac Wallpaper Engine. I’ve been using this for a few weeks now and just love it. A very nice collection of live wallpapers and screen savers.

The New Yorker at 100 - I really enjoyed this film. A sneak peek behind the scenes on how they put together the magazine and its long, rich history. You can watch it on Netflix. Also see the New Yorker at 100 webpage.

Let's Talk Email

Tue, 23 Dec 2025 13:56:51 -0600

I’ve never put much thought into email before. It wasn’t a super big deal to me; I had no professional needs with it, just a regular online-life email. I had no custom email addresses; I just used what Google and Apple gave me.

Until you read a few stories about people being locked out of their email accounts and losing everything.

This brings email to the forefront and makes you consider who your email provider is and whether you have a backup plan.

Most non-professionals end up with Apple Mail, Google Mail, Yahoo Mail, or a similar service. Remember AOL “You’ve Got Mail”. I’ve had them all over the years, including Hotmail. The last few years have been focused on Apple, Gmail, and Yahoo. You know the routine: an Apple address for business, a Gmail address for website accounts, and Yahoo for my spammy stuff - I don’t care if I lose this email.

That’s always been enough.

Recently, a lot of fuss was made on Mastodon about an individual who lost his Apple account after being locked out for using a bogus Apple gift card, according to the story.

This made me deep-dive into my reliance on big companies and who controls my data, especially email, email addresses, email Providers, backup plans, and best practices to avoid losing access to your email.

I’m not saying this is the best way, but it’s a lot better than what I had. It may help you as well. I think it’s pretty bulletproof.

What you want:

Your own email addresses with a custom domain: They are yours; you never have to change them. You can move them to any domain provider that suits you. Mine are at Hover. If Hover ever goes out of business, or things get flaky, I can move my domain names to another provider. The important part is that my email addresses will never have to change unless I want them to.

An email provider/service that you register your custom domain names to: This needs to be a service that has everything you need from a provider: cost, aliases, good apps, and a good look and feel. You can use your custom domains with Google or Apple, but why? You are risking some real hassles. There are excellent providers with minimal risk, such as FastMail, Proton, and others. This is where some good research will pay off. Review everything, find something that fits your needs and budget, then follow the Provider’s instructions to register your domain names with it. Remember, you can always move Providers later if you need to. At Proton, and now want to move to FastMail, just move your domains over to FastMail. In theory, you won’t lose any emails, as undeliverable emails will bounce for days, always trying to reach their destination. By the time your domains are registered with the new Provider, emails sent to and from you during this transition period will eventually reach their new home. At least that is what I’m told.

I went with Proton Mail. They have easy-to-follow instructions for setting up your domains, provide email aliases, offer good apps, and encrypt your email from start to finish.

An Alias Email Address Structure/System: The next step is to plan which email address to use for each location. You’ll have your primary email address, your favorite one. You want to keep this one mostly off the internet. You don’t want a ton of spam going to it after all these companies get hacked, and they have your email you used to sign up for all these services and accounts. In steps aliases. Most email services provide aliases for you to use. I went with a custom domain for my aliases, too; this way, I have complete control over how they look and can maintain a regimented structure. I’m using a service called SimpleLogin. I attached my custom domain to it, and now, I can make a unique address for each online account I ever sign up for. This way, when it’s eventually leaked online, and I start getting spam to it, I can change it. I only have to change one email address, and the spam stops. Suppose you use your primary email address for all your online accounts; you’re stuck. You will eventually get tons of spam, and the thought of going back and changing hundreds of email addresses will make your eyes cross, and you’ll say screw it.

My Email Plan in Action

I have three custom domains. One is for my personal email, one is for secondary/recovery emails in online accounts, and the third is my aliases email with SimpleLogin.

My business and personal email are with my main/favorite email address. Every other online account has a unique email address, an alias. This is where your email Provider will help, or you can use a custom service like SimpleLogin. I’ve been using SimpleLogin for years now, and it’s an excellent service. I’ve had zero issues with them. When that alias email gets compromised, and it will, I change that one email. Easy.

For example, I just signed up with The Atlantic magazine. It gets its own custom email: theatlantic@yourcustomdomain.com. I use the name of the account I’m signing up for; that way, I always know which account it is and which email has been compromised. Hit the easy button!

I now have 150+ email addresses out there on the internet; they all go to the same email Provider and open in the same Mac or iOS app—clean, simple, and pretty bulletproof.

Benefits

Everything can be moved.
Nobody can lock you out of your emails.
You’ll never have to change more than one email address when that one ends up on the dark web for sale, and hundreds of spam emails are inundating your inbox every day.
Every new account you sign up for gets its own email address. Your-new-account@yourcustomdomain.com or a structure that you can remember. You’ll never forget your username again.
An easy backup schedule that can be automated if needed.

Downsides

You’re not getting free email anymore. All this is going to cost you something every year. But, with that comes a lot of peace and a whole lot less spam.
Once you get your new email address, you will spend days, weeks, and maybe months changing all your emails from that Google address to your sporty new custom ones. But it’s worth it. It will be the last time you have to do this.

Let me know if you have any additional tips or if you see a vulnerability in my plan.

As always, thank you for reading.

Cliff Notes: Dreams of Analog

Thu, 11 Dec 2025 14:38:05 -0600

The Battle of Analog vs Digital

Always on the edge. Always contemplating, planning, threatening to go analog.

Caution: unorganized thoughts below: ¹

As a Gen X’er, I grew up in the analog era, and I retain both the right and the skill to return to it. I grew up without computers, cell phones, social media, or major newspapers. We had one local paper, some magazines, and plenty of books. In college, I got my first pager so I could find a pay phone, fish out some dimes and nickels, then beep a friend’s pager to call me back. We used all kinds of numeric codes for contact me, emergency, party tonight, what are you doing, etc.

For all the good technology brings, sometimes I’m not sure the good outweighs the bad. To a large degree, social media has a significant adverse effect on our mental health. With my current technology,² which is pretty substantial (Synology, servers, cloud storage, Tailscale, VPNs, Subnets, Exit Nodes, Macs, iPads, iPhones, two blogs, etc), when it’s all working, it’s terrific; when it breaks down, it’s incredibly frustrating. I’ve certainly noticed a degradation in my attention span; I’ve been known to doom-scroll, and my wife has accused me of having ADHD—symptoms of our short attention digital world. One example is the shutdown of the Creative Live long-form educational website. They cite the lack of interest in long-form photography education.³-⁴

Let’s envision our personal world without the internet. How would this work?

My parents are almost completely analog. My dad is entirely; he does not use anything digital at all. My mom uses light email and surfing with an iPad. No computer. Very little use of the internet for business needs. My grandmother has no internet and uses no digital devices. It can still be done in the modern world.

How much digital could you remove from your life? Let’s focus on your personal life; you’re stuck with what you have at work.

Ebooks: I like them, I travel a lot, and I can carry hundreds of books with me at all times. I highlight, take notes, and everything syncs via Readwise, then into Obsidian. Could I drop all that and go back to paper books? Yes. I miss the feel and smell of paper. I could still highlight, write notes, etc. For a while, I would write out notes and highlights from the book I was reading on 3x5 cards, then either leave them in the book or file them for later use. I enjoy going back and reading my highlights and notes from old books. I do this every morning using Readwise, but I do have that backup analog plan.

Journaling/Writing: I use DayOne and Drafts right now. Could I go back to pen and paper, maybe a typewriter? Yes. Would it slow down your writing, absolutely, and perhaps that’s a good thing. I still journal weekly in a paper notebook. I love the feel of a pen on paper. I print out pictures and put stickers on the pages. I very much enjoy analog journaling and want to keep it alive.

All things financial: Banking, paying bills, etc. This would be very hard. Can you use the telephone to pay bills and stop into actual offices to drop off a check? Yes, you can. Depending on the size of the town you’re in, this could be easy or very hard. My grandmother and parents still drop off checks and pay credit card and cell phone bills via the phone. Would I want to do this? No. Not at all, but it could be done if needed.

Photography: This is a big part of my life, a daily hobby. I love my digital camera and Adobe Lightroom, Photoshop, and ON1 software. Could I go back to film? Maybe even a small dark room to develop your own pictures? Again, part of me says this would bring back a lot of joy and simplicity. In high school, I shot on film and developed my own pictures in the photo lab. I loved it. I loved the craft of film photography and the darkroom, watching those pictures slowly appear, floating in the solution. Could be done.

To-do lists: I use Things and Reminders. They work great. Could I go back to a little notebook I carry in my pocket? Yes. Yes, I could. I have many Field Notes Notebooks that would be great for this.⁵

Surfing/News/Blogs: This would be the most challenging part. Losing connections to people that you follow on their personal blogs and Mastodon. When I left FB, Instagram, LinkedIn, etc, it was hard to lose some connections, but over time it’s been just fine. I can do it. But maybe this would also strengthen your connections with your community, your neighbors. I haven’t been to a local hobby group in many years. Not having the online world would change that for sure.

Business Needs: This would be impossible in some areas. Applying for jobs, grants, business forms, Federal and State applications, you may not have a analog choice here. It would be off to the library to use a computer. I think more and more is headed in this direction.

In summary, we may be moving toward a world in which it will be almost impossible to live without internet technology. But we can always limit it, watch out for the harm it causes in our lives, and adapt. Gen X’ers have seen a life without the internet; it was a good life. Is my life richer with the internet? Yes, in so many ways it is. I have so many more connections/friends and get exposed to so many more ideas/beliefs/thoughts that make me a better human being. That’s my lens I view all of this through, if it’s not making me a better, smarter, kinder, calmer, more compassionate human, then it needs to go. I think the good outweighs the bad if you control it and watch for the areas that affect you negatively. Long Live a Good Internet.

Card Catalog

Questions & thoughts that guided me in writing this post.

How much digital could you remove from your life?
How far could you push removing the internet?
Get rid of all social media?
There is a Luddite push that is active in America.
Paper book, paper journal, paper to-do lists, newspapers, magazines,
How much good does it bring to your life?
How much frustration and angst?
You’ll always have a little, banking apps, maybe one social media app.

Some areas I explored while thinking about this subject.

Books I read or referenced

Digital Minimalism – Cal Newport
How to Do Nothing – Jenny Odell
The Shallows – Nicholas Carr
Reclaiming Conversation – Sherry Turkle
Shop Class as Soulcraft – Matthew Crawford

If you’ve read any of my blog posts, you know that I’m a terrible writer and my writing structure is a hot mess. I need a good, cheap editor! Ya, I consistently received C’s and D’s in English classes all the way through college. No one will ever pay me to write. But, hopefully, it’s enough to make you think about things; that’s the purpose of reading something: to challenge, to inspire, to make you think. Oh, and if you’ve made it this far into my writing, Thank You! I appreciate you and your time. ↩︎
I do see the irony here. I’m maybe deeper into technology than the average person, but I always want a plan for an organized exit from it all. I’ve reduced my social media to a minimum and moved almost all of it to places I control. I love playing with and experimenting with new tech, using complex software that I really don’t need. But boy, do I have days when I want to drop all of it and just go build a cedar-strip canoe in the garage. Maybe a better way to say it is, I have a tech hobby, nothing in my life really depends on it, I could drop it all, and my life would be just fine, certainly better in some areas. Technology frustrates me to no end some days, but you know, all things have their day. Ever try to get your table saw fence straight… ↩︎
I’m really going to miss Creative Live. I’ve purchased many courses from them, and the quality has always been good. You have until the end of the year to download all your courses. I highly recommend doing so. They even built a little downloader app to assist in the process. ↩︎
This topic could be a whole blog post unto itself. I’ll cut it off here, stop babbling, and continue on with the central theme. ↩︎
For whatever reason, I collected Field Notes for years. I have two tubs full of them. They would last me the rest of my life! I’ve been selling my rare ones on eBay, and they move pretty quick. ↩︎

Cliff Notes: Q4 Photography Update

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 17:11:07 -0600

I’m going to try to update my photography goings-on every few months or so, so I have a good look back on all things photography-related.

365Pixels

365Pixels is coming along nicely. I think I’ve found my groove in posting every day. Life still gets in the way and forces a missed day or two. I haven’t back-dated anything yet. I don’t think I want to go down that road; I’m still deciding.

I want it to be an actual daily photo blog, and if I miss, I miss. It should be noted as such. If I back-date, then I really didn’t post every day… There are no real rules to this, I’m just making stuff up as I go ; )

I thought about putting everything photography-related on the website, but I have decided against it. Cliff538 really needs to stay the central hub. I came very close to posting my daily photo on Cliff538, and, to be honest, I’m still not sure whether 365Pixels as a separate blog was the right choice.

Hardware

My travel/hiking/flight-bag camera has always been my Olympus OMD E-M1 Mark II. It’s small, lightweight, and performs magically in handheld low-light situations. I would really like to do more bird photography, and the latest OM-1 offers a big step up in focus tracking and frame-per-second shooting. I went ahead and pulled the trigger on it and have been very happy with it so far. I know it’s an old camera now and needs to be updated, but it’s a big step up in performance for me.

Not sure if I’m going to sell the OMD or keep it for bashing around in a backpack or something.

Really Right Stuff Modular L-Plate Set I’ve been using RRS L-Plates on my cameras for years, excellent quality stuff. Of course, my OMD plate doesn’t fit, so I had to get the one for the OM-1.

Picked up the Godox iT32 with X50 Flash Trigger. I’ve had a few practice sessions with it, and so far I’m really impressed. The magnetic hotshoe lets you mount it on a camera or take it off and hand-hold it wherever the flash needs to be. I’m going to get this for the Nikon as well.

Rolleiflex

My focus screen is so dark that I’ve essentially stopped using the camera because I struggle to see what I’m shooting and focus properly.

In steps BrightScreen. Where have you been all my life! I got a prompt reply from Rick about a few questions I had, and days later, I had my new screen with good instructions attached.

I replaced the screen in about 20 minutes, and most of that time was spent cleaning while the hood and focus screen were off. It’s like a new camera! A very bright, clear, focus screen. I’m in love again.

If you have a dim focus screen, please don’t wait any longer and look at BrightScreens. They have screens for over 50 different camera models.

Stray Pixels

I’m told the Energizer Ultimate Lithium batteries don’t leak. I don’t know how many electronics I’ve ruined by accidentally leaving the batteries in and having them leak their acid into the inner electronics.

No more cans of compressed air to clean equipment: Wolfbox MF50 electric air duster saves the day. I love this thing!

The Find Lab I’ve read many good reviews and will be using their services soon. I’ll let you know what I find out with film purchases, developing, and negative scanning.

cliff-notes on Cliff538

I Think You Should Have A Life Manifesto

Big Picture

Questions

You

Housing

Work

Vehicles

Money Saving

Technology

Wisdom