What I'm Up to Now

Maybe it's just that he notices, as any introspective person might, that you just start doing the same damn thing over and over after 20/30/40 years in harness.

He probably should take up the piano.

Note that I like the Manifesto, but have been underwhelmed by what I've seen, in its expression. I feel that Mr. Fowler, and his compatriots came out with a great "vision statement," that may not be applied particularly well.

Maybe work on "paving the bare spots"[0] on the Manifesto might be useful. I really want to see it work. I know that when I designed a fairly major infrastructure system, it took ten years, before it was really good enough for worldwide consumption (that might be a bit of an overstatement, but it took at least eight). The software, and the accompanying "vision," were ready by Version 2.0 (about 18 months in), but it took all that additional time to figure out how to get skeptical and stubborn people to accept it, win over friends, and make some embarrassing mistakes.

One of the big issues with coming up with "A New Way™," is that it usually means that "the way we've always done it" is implied to be wrong, and that's a real hard sell. I know that it was the biggest issue that I faced, and dealing with that was tricky. In some cases, I needed to make adjustments, and walk back my rhetoric, to avoid causing people to get their hackles up. That kind of thing is very important, and often neglected.

I've always wished the Manifesto folks had followed through with the shepherding process. If his experience is anything like mine, it will be a long, frustrating, but ultimately, incredibly rewarding endeavor.

[0] https://littlegreenviper.com/miscellany/the-road-most-travel...

I find there's a perpetual equilibrium between feeling confident in your output / yourself, and recognizing that much of what you do will likely be incomplete, messy, sub-optimal. This seems to be a fundamental part of being human as it extends across all types of creation.

Authors have stream-of-consciousness to overcome writers' block. Athletes get the 'yips'. Developers have probably heard "if you're not ashamed of your MVP, you took too long to ship." (does anyone know who originally said this?)

Doubt is a massively powerful and underrated tool that tends to signify the presence of many new variables. It's like a beacon saying "hey this is unprecedented" and the pursuit of any challenge will naturally yield unprecedented outcomes. In your context, you went from "hey let's do a thing" to "the Github CEO wants to call me and talk about this thing and there are multiple people that want to do this thing" and that is pretty damn unprecedented.

I've experienced >3 truly remarkable situations like you, and wandered between inflated ego, utter confusion, guilt, and pure existentialism. Honestly, I'm glad I felt such a spectrum of emotions because in retrospect those lenses provide me a lot of clarity when I invariably encounter another entirely baffling scenario.

I think your self-assessment is as balanced as it can be, and I'm certain that as you continue, you'll adjust the weights (heh) and become more comfortable... or maybe not. Maybe a hallmark of being a creator, founder, leader, is to double down on the discomfort, and rest later. Kind of like a marathon.

I'm following along. Good luck.

P.S. if you see this in time can you ask Nat what he thinks of the federated wiki? https://github.com/WardCunningham/Smallest-Federated-Wiki