Self improvement

Oscar Wilde famously wrote, “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.” But this quote is as profound as it is misunderstood.

People believe that giving in to a temptation is a weakness. And they judge harshly those who can’t resist their unhealthy urges. Yet, they don’t apply the same standard to people obsessed with, say, sports or arts. The difference between these two is thinner than most think.

Does running make you a better person? Does climbing mountains make you a better person? Does becoming a parent make you a better person?

Some people seem to believe that it does. And there are plenty of those (especially those that don’t run, climb, or have kids) who believe that it doesn’t. And I tend to agree with them.

My deep conviction is that nothing extrinsic can ever make you a better person. Or a worse person, for that mater. Being rich won’t make you a better person. Being poor won’t either. Believing in God won’t make you a better person. Nor being an atheist. Surviving cancer or becoming terminally ill won’t make you a better person. And even helping others won’t magically turn you into a better person.

There are many lessons to be learned from rock climbing, but the following three are the main ones for me.

Don’t give up

Very often giving up in rock climbing is scarier than persisting—nobody likes falling. Especially if it’s a long and nasty fall. And what you very quickly discover is that in rock climbing, like in life (or Jazz, if you’re a musician), sticking with it for long enough eventually gets you up there. If you are persistent and don’t give up, you sooner or later find your groove and come on top victorious.

It’s been six months since I switched to Dvorak. My current typing speed is 56 words per minute with the average error rate of 6.4%.

It is slightly slower than the 60 wpm I had with QWERTY just before the switch. And the error rate should be below 5% to consider my typing accurate.

Some might say that it’s a failed experiment—not only do I not type 40% faster than I did before the switch, as I hoped, my typing is also slightly less accurate.