Finding My Way Through the Fog
31 May 2026
First steps, create a SFD of my situation. This is an assessment of the cliff I just went over (retirement after 20 years of military service) and the fog I find myself in (what do I do now?). It's useful to hang the assessment on something, so I'll use the structure from What to Make of a Life by Jim Collins as the foundation.
2. One Big Thing
For sure, I'm going to seek serial hedgehogs. The retirement provides a clean break from the previous life. If I wanted to continue precisely what I was doing, I could only be adjacent to that path since I'm no longer a military aviator.
3. A Constellation of Encodings
Much work to be done here. I'm well practiced at reflection, analyzing the past, but I know that I'll procrastinate doing this part because the feeling of needing perfection here is strong. So here's a SFD to break the tension; something that is likely nowhere near precise or accurate for this exact topic, but gets me started.
The goal: find what I can do exceptionally well relative to other ways I could expend myself (pg 59).
Self-Awareness to Encoded Operating Modes
One start to discovering my encodings is to use previous work I've done to discover my personal philosophy.
Personal Philosophy 2026-03-15
Curiosity and usefulness are my roots for growth, while creating tools and sharing knowledge are my techniques for developing meaningful short-term and lifelong connections with others.
AI Disclosure: I wrote the pieces of my personal philosophy below and a long conversation with an LLM helped me make it the one sentence above.
Question: What do you value?
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Curiosity - There is so much out there in the world to see, do, and learn. Yet more importantly to me, curiosity is about growing myself and bettering those around me. This is a great way to step back and view the world from a different perspective, especially when emotions and feelings are involved. Say I'm angry at someone; stepping back in curiosity to see the bigger picture. With others involved especially, what is the most generous interpretation of what the other person is experiencing?
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Usefulness - "Be useful" can apply to a large aspect of life. It's a way of being that is helpful to others and myself. Littering isn't useful. Putting time and effort into something I don't want to do is usually quite useful. Paying taxes is useful. Am I being useful to myself and those around me?
Question: In what do you find purpose?
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I find purpose helping others see for themselves what I've learned.
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I find purpose in creating software and hardware tools that are useful, even if for a small niche.
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I find purpose figuring out something and then applying it somewhere else in a seemingly unrelated field.
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I find purpose contributing to something bigger than myself, things that I could never do even with a lifetime of dedication and focus.
Question: How do you define success?
I define success by relationships and connection. Taking end-of-life people's thoughts, happiness, and regrets into account, it all seems to be about the people they've known, the things they've done with them, and the things they've endured or triumphed in together. Work, play, rest, admin, chores, etc. are all means toward building and maintaining both life-long and shorter-term relationships.
Measurement isn't about the quantity, but about the quality of the relationships. I have much work to do here. The first half of my life I didn't see relationships and connections with others as the point itself, got bogged down in the daily life, and have let many go far more stagnant than I'm comfortable admitting. But I can improve.
4. Flipping the Arrow of Money
Here are sources I have or could have to fuel my hedgehog. My intent is for us to financially support our family outside of my hedgehog work. My hedgehog isn't a salaried hedgehog nor do I want it to be. Using concepts from Seth Godin, I want to keep the art required for this hedgehog separate from the income needed to enable the hedgehog to reduce a need to create average stuff for average people in order to make ends meet.
Sources of income for us at this moment:
- Earned Earlier: 20-year military retirement pension
- Cross Funding: Get a part-time job that pays well for minimal external effort (maximal internal effort is expected). In other words, #1) on-the-clock and off-the-clock are clear boundaries and #2) part-time to maximize hedgehog time.
- Spousal Economics: Touch this as little as possible as I would like her to dictate what she wants to do with it. If she has no specific intent, it defaults to building our savings.
5. Focus the Fire
Extend Out/Circle Back
I think here is where I can creatively play. I've now instructed in aviation, in an organization, in a scratch-built team, and briefly in a public school. I've worked on and completed projects with these groups. Extending out is doing something completely new: a new project or a new community. Circling back is building on what I've already done: teaching, team-building, project-management.
My source of income comes from the circling back: staying within aviation. My growth and interest comes from both staying grounded in my comfort zone in aviation work and trying new things in pursuit of my hedgehog.
Choosing Responsibilities
- What did I enjoy about my previous work? Community, growth, distilling, teaching.
- If I had all the time in the world, who would I focus it on? My spouse, our kids, our circles.
- If I could do things over, what would I tell myself to focus on? How to be a good partner. How to be a good parent.
- What is a reason for military retirement and not continuing? To focus more time on my family.
These three things point to choosing a responsibility. A private one, focused on our family, about how to be a good human.
I want to say, "Done." What else is there to discuss? I know these things, they're simple in concept and complex in execution. Isn't that what I've learned in the past is a good foundation? Done.
The Stress and Drudgery Tax
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Stress
- Human lives are involved.
- The human lives are my family!
- That's a different level of stress.
- I do think about the moral to treat other's as if they're your family, but this is a rabbit hole for another time.
- I feel late to the game, behind the power curve, and without a means to ever make up what wasn't done.
- Parenting is a quiet, almost unseen endeavor. This doesn't translate well when mentioned "at parties."
- No "one solution" to parenting: customize the experience to the person.
- Each at a different level: meet them where they are, not where I want to them to be.
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Drudgery
- Results take years or decades to appear.
- Life is full of admin.
- Saturated topic.
Invigorating Side Passions
These are projects that feed into the main hedgehog. I actually think this is highly interesting: the types of projects with the intent feeding back into the main hedgehog are endless.
Family and Relationships
This needs to be separate from the hedgehog, which is to say also remember to just "be" in the world with my family.
The sphere of the hedgehog doesn't extend beyond my immediate family. There are many Family and Relationships that are part of my life, much like the book talks about. Don't be monomaniacal; continue to form and nurture relationships in my life.
6. Cliffs
Leaving the military service and military flying.
7. Simplex Stepping
Fog of retirement, for sure!
8. Simplex Stepping
Small commitments to leave room for "HELL YEAH!" as I find my way through the fog.
9. The Roulette Wheel of Life
What Luck
- Lived in many places for a wide experience.
- I've a reservoir of aviation knowledge.
- We're going to live geographically close to where aviation knowledge is valuable in many ways.
- LLMs are now a thing.
Who Luck
- Have a wide-range of family and friends.
- I crossed paths with many people in previous work who are now within the community.
- Job potential.
- Collaboration potential.
Zeit-Luck
- Fatherhood is changing.
- Parenthood has lost the tribe/community support.
- I'd say it's both better and worse than it's ever been.
- Internet provides connection and education like never before.
- The world is changing so rapidly our kids can make what they want in life within the chaos.
Seize NATILIE Moments
I'm in a NATILIE moment right now: I'm fresh on the job market with recent aviation experience. Aviation experience fades in value as time passes much like any work experience. It's time to immediately start simplex stepping through the fog to what's next for income to enable flipping the arrow of money.
10. Extend Out/Circle Back
The Changing Color of Fire is a topic much like the color of love we heard in Greece long ago. My color of fire is a slow, steady burn that burns persistently and consistently for a long period of time. Great topic for another post someday.
11. Choosing Responsibilities
Look forward in the saddle. There's too much to see looking backward and I don't have enough time for both.
This hedgehog is beyond myself.
This hedgehog is quite close to an intent of leaving a "Legacy". Here be dragons.
12. Feeding the Inner Fire (and Doing Great Work Late)
I have depth and breadth of raw encodings, cumulative experience, and credibility equity. This is due a deep-dive, but not today.
On the topic of leadership, my previous work is sufficient for now without further study at this point. It's clear from the book and my experience how leadership fits into this. Another great topic for a deep-dive in the future.
13. Questions Are Better Than Answers
This is THE next step for this assessment: create questions, start to answer them.