Blog posts about things that intrigue me.

All of my thoughts on philosophy, communication, paradoxical ideas, and more, collected in chronological order.

HackMentalHealth Yale’s Collegiate Mental Health Hackathon

Including links to the finalists’ winning proposals It’s a wrap! HackMentalHealth’s first collegiate hackathon is over, filled with passion, laughter, and lots and lots of code! Read more to find out about the event including the top winners below! The Winners Each of the hackathon winners wrote their own blog post detailing the redesign proposal. You can find the links below. * First Place: Flip: Changing the Narrative on Suicide * Second Place: Sonda: Making DBT therapy easier for clini

Announcing HackMentalHealth 2019, The World’s Largest Mental Health Hackathons

Join us at Yale University on Feb 22–24, and UCSF Mission Bay on Mar 23–24 to innovate and redesign mental health + technology. * Get Yale Hackathon Tickets Here * Get UCSF Hackathon Tickets Here In the current century, mental health has become one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness: * 1 in 5 U.S. adults experiences mental illness in a given year. * Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. for people aged 15–24.

How can technology improve end-of-life and palliative care?

Lessons from a Technology + Palliative Care Brainstorm with doctors, chaplains, and palliative health experts at the University of Colorado Denver. Palliative care is a relatively new concept in the field of medicine. Historically, medicine has had a primarily curative goal. Yet, instead of focusing on curing a terminally diagnosed patient, palliative care provides relief from symptoms, pain, and associated mental stress. As with most trends in healthcare, including palliative medicine, we’re

The Perfect Structure for Every Product Management Interview Question

7 simple steps to acing your next PM interview After coaching hundreds of PM interview candidates via PMLesson.com, I’ve realized that every great PM interview response employs a common underlying structure. Depending on the question, an interviewee may need to define the set of users or mention prevailing tech trends. Yet no matter what, these seven steps are crucial for a successful answer: 1. Listen & Take Notes It may seem obvious, but this is the most important part of the interview. D

Peak Minimalism: The Infinitowel

Minimalism is about reducing items. That’s why we’re introducing the only one you’ll ever need. Do you frequently lose your possessions? Do you feel like you keep buying more things that you don’t need? Wish you had fewer items that could handle more tasks? Don’t panic. We’re excited to announce The Infinitowel — the ultimate multitool for every minimalist. Our team spent months in the lab perfecting an innovative new design for what we believe is a revolutionary universe altering multitool d

So, Are You Supposed to Tip your Uber/Lyft Driver?

Tipping sucks, but we should still tip our ridesharing drivers. Here’s why. Last year, I drove for Lyft in the Denver area. I recently posted an article analyzing my tips, discovering that under a third of my riders actually tipped me. To my surprise, this article received polar reactions on the issue of Uber/Lyft tipping etiquette. Many readers were floored that Lyft passengers don’t tip: "As a fairly frequent rideshare rider, I’m SHOCKED that so many people don’t tip, ESPECIALLY for…Tips are

Dear Chase: Your Travel Notice Is Broken. Here’s How To Fix It.

Bugs in the Wild is a case study series where I identify live internet bugs and propose product redesigns. The Bug Chase, like many banks, records user travel notices to prevent falsely detected credit card fraud. Chase offers a feature where users can set a travel notice online, without having to phone in to customer service. I recently traveled to South Korea, and attempted to enter my information into the form fields shown above. However, for some reason I couldn’t find South Korea in the

Bugs in the Wild: Instagram Setting Doesn’t Sync

Bugs in the Wild is a case study series where I identify live internet bugs and propose product redesigns. The Bug Instagram’s setting page lists a feature where users can toggle “Hide Inappropriate Comments” to hide offensive comments on Instagram. Here’s what it looks like on desktop and mobile web: There’s a distinction between the native app platform (the Instagram application that you download to your phone) and the web platform (www.instagram.com viewed in a desktop or mobile browser).

I analyzed my Lyft driver tips, here’s what I found

Lessons from the road as a former Lyft driver in the Denver area. For rideshare drivers, tips are an important source of income. But what variables correlate to a large or small tip? Do controllable factors like conversation or the day of the week affect tip outcomes? I designed a mini-experiment to investigate. After each ride, I collected selected information on the ride, including the tip amount I received. Of the fifty passengers in my data set, sixteen of them tipped. Disclaimer: This ex

Control Technology, Not The Other Way Around

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. By sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. The past few weeks have been an awakening for many with respect to technology usage. Facebook has perhaps never been more in the critical eye of the consumer, with #DeleteFacebook campaigns reaching even Elon Muskand the WhatsApp co-founder. Let’s take this opportunity to observe and intentionally redesign our inter

Announcing The Reverse Hackathon — Ethics+Technology

It’s time to rethink technology. Technology news this week has been horrifying for many. A pedestrian was fatally hit by a self-driving Uber. Facebook is involved in a data breach of an incredible scale. Last month, Twitter put out a public call for more meaningful health metrics as a recognition of the growing issues across social media (something Mark Zuckerberg aims to fix in 2018). The old motto of “move fast, break things,” isn’t as enticing anymore. There’s a need to consider the ethics

Try This: Text Only in Emojis 💬😃😞💬🤐

A silly experiment reveals fascinating insights about language In case you’ve been sleeping for the past twenty years, emoji usage has been going 📈📈📈. By mid-2015, half of all comments on Instagram included an emoji. Hollywood released a full feature-length film titled The Emoji Movie. Even Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai is posting about urgent fixes to the hamburger emoji. For some, emoji have caused frustration for users (how the heck are you supposed to use the 🙃 emoji?). Yet for many other

HackMentalHealth: 9 Lessons From The World’s Largest Mental Health Hackathon

Lessons from planning the world’s largest mental health hackathon in six months I was recently part of an amazing team of individuals to plan what now appears to be the world’s largest mental health hackathon, HackMentalHealth(our blog recap here). It was an incredible and inspiring event: not only did we have over 350+ attendees and 30+ sponsors but also we started planning this event in August 2017! It’s important to our team to continue to learn and grow post-event so we can amplify its imp

HackMentalHealth 2018: “The Movement Has Begun”

In the upcoming century, mental health is one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness: * 1 in 5 U.S. adults experience mental illness in a given year. * Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. for people aged 15–24. * 46% of homeless adults live with severe mental illness and/or substance abuse disorders. Coming together That’s why, on February 3–4, 2018 at California Institute of Integral Studies, we held Silicon V

Technology and the Mind: An Existential Psychotherapist’s Thoughts on the Meaning of Tech

With many in the technology sector inspired by Facebook’s 2018 mission to make its platform more meaningful, there’s been a greater conversation about the influence of technology on our mental health. To investigate this phenomenon further, I interview Dr. Nicolle Zapien, PhD, Dean, School of Professional Psychology and Health, California Institute of Integral Studies about technology and its important influence on our mental health. Q: What are some shortcomings in the technology sector with r

HackMentalHealth 2018: “The Movement Has Begun”

In the upcoming century, mental health is one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness: * 1 in 5 U.S. adults experience mental illness in a given year. * Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. for people aged 15–24. * 46% of homeless adults live with severe mental illness and/or substance abuse disorders. Coming together That’s why, on February 3–4, 2018 at California Institute of Integral Studies, we held Silicon V

Technology and the Mind: An Existential Psychotherapist’s Thoughts on the Meaning of Tech

With many in the technology sector inspired by Facebook’s 2018 mission to make its platform more meaningful, there’s been a greater conversation about the influence of technology on our mental health. To investigate this phenomenon further, I interview Dr. Nicolle Zapien, PhD, Dean, School of Professional Psychology and Health, California Institute of Integral Studies about technology and its important influence on our mental health. Q: What are some shortcomings in the technology sector with r

Shit Programmers Say, Translated

We all know that product managers speak the same lingo to explain what they actually mean. But software engineers are just as culpable of a common dialect with hidden meaning. Here are eight of the most common programmer sayings, translated. Disclaimer: I’m a former PM. But with the help of Google SWE Pragya Bajoria, these shouldn’t be too far from the truth.  1. This will take me a week to finish. “Yeah that sounds great, I’ll get this done in about a week.” Translation: I’ll probably get

3 Tech Tools For Meaningful Interactions

Social media FOMO. Video game addiction. Notification spam. When was the last time you caught up with someone who didn’t check their phone at all during the conversation? Admirably, Mark Zuckerberg’s latest post addresses the lack of meaningful online connection to be Facebook’s biggest challenge of 2018 — signaling an important change necessary for the technology industry as a whole. Sites like Time Well Spent and The Slow Web Movement are great places to get involved in this campaign. Instea

Shit Product Managers Say, Translated

“Hey, let’s close the loop offline. I’ll block some biweekly time for us to sync. Gentle ping to submit your AI.” What the heck are these PMs saying, and how did they all end up speaking the same language? Here are nine of the most classic phrases that product managers use, and what they actually mean. 1. Block Some Time “A meeting sounds great, Lisa. I’ll block some time for us to chat.” Translation: I’m going to book a calendar meeting and it sounds cooler to say “block time” than “schedu

Announcing HackMentalHealth — Silicon Valley’s Mental Health Hackathon

In the upcoming century, mental health is one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. According to the National Alliance on Mental Health: * 1 in 5 U.S. adults experience mental illness in a given year. * Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. for people aged 15–24. * 46% of homeless adults live with severe mental illness and/or substance abuse disorders. Coming Together There are talented, inspiring mental health practitioners tackling mental health issues on the fr

Announcing HackMentalHealth — Silicon Valley’s Mental Health Hackathon

In the upcoming century, mental health is one of the biggest challenges our nation faces. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness: * 1 in 5 U.S. adults experience mental illness in a given year. * Suicide is the second leading cause of death in the U.S. for people aged 15–24. * 46% of homeless adults live with severe mental illness and/or substance abuse disorders. Coming Together There are talented, inspiring mental health practitioners tackling mental health issues on the f

I Hacked HQ Trivia But Here’s How They Can Stop Me

HQ Trivia, one of the hottest apps of 2017, is reinventing what game shows look like in the 21st century. On HQ, you can tune in live every day to answer trivia questions for the chance to win thousands of dollars. However, as HQ Trivia increases in popularity, it exposes itself to a significant risk. Hackers, hoping to make some extra cash, can programmatically Google the answers to the questions. If these hackers and their scripts are successful, it could ruin the fun of HQ for honest players

Why I Send Annual Friendship Feedback Emails

For the past three years, I’ve sent out “friendship feedback” emails to some of my closest friends. Here’s why. Friendships are essential Friendship is like peeing in your pants. Everyone can see it, but only you can feel the warm feeling inside. Friendship is one of the most critical, beautiful types of relationships. As C.S. Lewis puts it: “Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art…. It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things which give value to survival.” While

Mention these five tech trends in your PM interview

As I’ve mentioned before, one of the best PM interview preparation strategies is to create a “Big Ideas” list of tech trends. When asked questions like “What is the future of the microwave?” or “How would you redesign the airport experience?” these tech trends can help frame your answer, and demonstrate your forward-thinking skills. Below are a list of the top five tech trends I bring up in my PM interviews. I suggest you not only make a list, but study the topics deeply and stay abreast of maj

Dear Facebook, “Download My Archive” is Broken and That’s Not Okay

Facebook’s “Download My Archive” feature is incomplete and unusable. We have a right to our data. Facebook has a lot of our data. The time you and your friend got into that huge political debate. The hilarious conversations from your high school chat groups. The moment you realized you were in love with your future husband. As users of the platform, we have a right to our data. And from the outset, Facebook appears to comply. Facebook has a feature called “Download My Archive” which you can ac

Moving to a New City? An Immersion Checklist

Moving to a new city is hard. New location, new home, new job, new friends, new coffee shops, new mailman, new weather, new supermarkets, new everything. Especially as adults, it’s challenging to fully immerse yourself in new locations. It’s been hard for me too. But, as I travel around the US, I’m getting better at it. I’ve learned some reliable heuristics to connect with others and build my metaphorical “home.” I hope these suggestions help others feel more connected to their city. Quick Su

I Listened to Emotionally Vulnerable Strangers on Reddit

The power of peer-to-peer emotional support communities Before I tell my story, I want to clarify that I’m not trained as a clinical psychologist or therapist. My only exposure with mental health counseling has been serving as a suicide hotline counselor for two years at San Francisco Suicide Prevention. Beyond that, I yearn to provide a kind and non-judgmental ear for my peers in my daily life. /r/KindVoice I’m interested in the intersection of technology and mental health (I’m planning a M

How I Live: Track Ideas with a “Dump Doc”

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. By sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Stop Losing Your Ideas We’ve all been there. You’re driving along the freeway in morning rush hour traffic, staring at the bumpers of the vehicle in front of you when… you’ve got it! The next brilliant idea for that startup you and your roommate want to found! Or, on your walk back home, you see something strikin

Ace your PM Interview: What is the future of X?

Product Management interviews are not easy. Each PM interview quizzes you not only on your product “spidey senses” and general business intuition, but often includes questions testing design, PR, marketing, entrepreneurship, leadership, and engineering skills. What is the future of x? “X” can be an industry like wearables or libraries. “X” could be a location, like airports or coffeeshops. Heck, “X” could even be non-technical, like a wrench or a carpet. This is one of my favorite product ma

The Chaos of Memories: Photographic Recursion

What happens when you take a photo of a photo over and over again, recursively? Memory as Recursion A 2012 Northwestern study investigating memory concluded that memory is like the telephone game. When you remember something, you’re actually not recalling the original event. Instead, you’re remembering what you remembered from your last recall of this memory. What does this mean for memory? Not only does it explain a cause of false memories, but this phenomenon can be helpful in treating pa

Why “Nature-Hunting” Should Be Your Next Hobby 🍄🌟🎣

Mushroom beer. Un-bolete-ably bad mushroom puns. Hundreds of people in mushroom costumes prancing down the street in a mushroom-themed parade. Drug policy discussions. Open “myc” night. Mushroom foraging expeditions. Mushroom cook-offs. Mushroom farming lectures. Who knew there was so mush-room to love mushrooms? Volunteering at Telluride Mushroom Festival 2017 was a phenomenal experience. One of my largest takeaways: a new sort of hobby, which I’m dubbing “nature-hunting.” Nature-Hunting W

I started my own T-shirt company in 24 hours and made $0

A fantastical idea, inspired by internet legends, comes crashing down Want to make some money? Have you heard the news? The easiest and quickest way to become a full-fledged “entrepreneur”? Start a T-shirt company! A few weeks ago, I stumbled across some articles: * How I Built An Online T-Shirt Business In 24 Hours With $24 That Made $347 The First Day * How I Built an Online T-Shirt Business and Made $1,248.90 in 3 Weeks * How to Start a T-shirt Business in the Next 24-Hours At the ti

Five Practical Life Hacks for Minimalists

There are countless articles about why minimalism is awesome, or what stuff people own. But the most frequent question is: How the hell do I get started? Here are five, concrete minimalist tactics you can enact today. Get a damn multi-tool Multi-tools are practically created for minimalists. You can replace five different items with one item, which makes it way easier to find, maintain, and keep track of. I personally use the Victorinox Swiss Army Knife, which has a knife, scissors, tweezers,

Hacking Social Interaction with a Me-Shirt

I designed my own personalized “me shirt,” and how you can too. Fashion is powerful. Fashion defines popular culture, symbolizes ideological movements, and perhaps most importantly, fashion is an expression of one’s self. Fashion is also a perfect opportunity to spark connections between people — if I want to engage with another person’s “expressed self,” I can do so by commenting on a piece of clothing or laughing at a funny t-shirt. However, most people wear clothing that show common brands

Mind Control: How to Influence and Persuade

Lessons from “Influence” by Robert Cialdini Do you ever wish you could get what you want? How to convince investors that you have the right business ideas? Trying to get people to come to your event or party, but no one is RSVP-ing? Or, do you wonder how to prevent yourself from getting scammed by salespeople? This blog post summarizes material from Robert Cialdini’s “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” and general psychological phenomena. 1. Give and You Shall Receive Reciprocity is a

I get paid to eat food

The cost-effective wonders of mystery shopping WTF is Mystery Shopping? Mystery shoppers are any people, just like you or me, who get paid to assess the company for things like food quality, cleanliness, and friendliness of staff. The awesome thing? You as a mystery shopper get paid to do this! Mystery shopping helps fast food joints, restaurants, gas stations, and many other companies to regularly evaluate their customer service experience. How it works First, sign up for a mystery shopp

So, what do minimalists own?

Minimalists like myself often post articles listing all the things they own. This article is a compilation of several lists that various online minimalist bloggers have posted. Stephen Cognetta — My 115 Things Notable items: * Radix One Slim Wallet (Amazon Link) * Foldable Storage Ottoman (Amazon Link) * Swiss Army Pocket Knife (Amazon Link) Courtney Carver — My 100 Thing Challenge Notable items: * Bible * Rosetta Stone headphones (Link) The Minimalists — Everything I Own: My 288

Stop Waiting to Live your Life, from The Monk and The Riddle

Four Lessons from The Monk and The Riddle As a part of my book reading system, I list key concepts I want to remember from every book I read. This article lists my top four lessons from The Monk and The Riddle by Randy Komisar. 4. Business can be a creative institution Fascinatingly, Randy Komisar makes the case that creating a business is comparable to creative expression. “It comes down to my realization over the years that business isn’t primarily a financial institution. It’s a creative

WTF are gifts for minimalists?

So, you have a friend that’s one of these so-called “minimalists.” They own a ridiculously small number of items, and keep telling you not to buy them any more stuff. And now, it’s the holidays or their birthday and you still want to show them appreciation! Don’t panic. Here’s a list of “non-things” you should get. 1. Experiences and Shows Tickets to a concert, movie, or performance are great gifts for minimalists — you can even go with them! Here’s a long list to get you started: massages,

The Surprising Paradox of Proverbs

We often quote proverbs and pithy statements that appear to hint at larger self-evident truths. Yet, most of these adages have directly contradictory counterparts. What does this mean about our understanding of the world? Do adages have any truth to them? This apparent paradox indicates there isn’t a particular overarching truth to any of these expressions. However, their usage reflects the values of the individual or group, and are highly dependent on the particular situation. In that way, ada

The One PM Interview Question you Should Rehearse

Product management interviews contain a whole gamut of questions — some questions involve grilling you on your analytical skills while others assess your product intuition. However, there’s one two-part Product Management question that, without fail, you will be asked in your interview process. I recommend every PM applicant have a well-thought answer to these questions, for multiple products. 1. What product do you love, and why? Pick a product you actually use. I also generally try to pick

Transform the SF Transit Clipper Card into a Wearable

As you know, I’m a serious minimalist. I was getting tired of carrying around so many cards in my wallet and wanted to experiment with transforming my cards to a different form factor. Luckily, all it takes is a jar and some nail polish remover to dissolve the Clipper Card. After that, Chris So and I tried out three different form factors: 1. Embed the NFC Chip in Sugru 2. Encase the NFC Chip in a Waterproof Silicone Wristband 3. Fashion a Bracelet with a PC Board and Wire I’d love to

Five Things I Learned from Reading Sapiens

A book review of Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari As a part of my book reading system, I list five key concepts I want to remember from every book I read. This article lists my top five nuggets of wisdom from Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. 5. The power of shared fictions The success of homo sapiens relies on the ability to create “shared fictions.” Shared fictions are commonly held beliefs in fictional entities. For example, belief in the power of money is a “shared f

How to get over $200 of free food in SF

Take advantage of the food delivery wars As VC firms hurl money into the battling Silicon Valley food delivery startups, the consumer can really benefit from the influx of free meal discounts and referral codes. This list consists of all pre-cooked food delivery services that serve the San Francisco area. It does not include services like Blue Apron or Plated, which involve cooking (I aim to make a separate guide for these later). If you use all of these codes, you can get yourself over $200 w

How I live: My iPhone home screen

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. By sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. The home screen, your virtual bedroom In many ways, your phone’s home screen is your virtual bedroom. It’s a familiar, customized place you visit every day, matched to your interests and personality. Similar to a bedroom, I find it important to carefully curate and organize the home screen space for an appropriate

How I live: My 115 things

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. By sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Minimalism: Living with Nothing I started becoming a minimalist two years ago, inspired by sites like The Minimalists and Marie Kondo’s The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up. I quickly got addicted to reducing my possessions, and found more and more ways to declutter. I now have only 115 items! There are three mai

How I live: Making the inbox an actual “In” box

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. By sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Why should I care about this anyway? You forget your aunt’s birthday every year. You never actually remember to get the milk. You always forget to follow up on that article your friend sent you on Facebook. You’re never finishing your long term projects, and you’re constantly delaying going to that cool new restau

How I live: Reading books so they last

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. I’m no expert, but by sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Why should I care about this anyway? “There are two motives for reading a book; one, that you enjoy it; the other, that you can boast about it.”— Bertrand Russell For the last five years, I was allergic to books (unless I could boast about them). I thought fiction books purely for fun, and non-

Crying Parties: 4 reasons to cry with your friends

WTF is a Crying Party? Sit down and watch the saddest shit you can find on the internet for an hour. Bring close friends, keep the lights off, and have plenty of tissues handy. Mascara optional. I made this custom YouTube playlist, if you’re looking for inspiration of which videos to play. Generally, the videos fall into three categories: * Sad movie scenes (Lion King, Up, Inside Out, Cast Away) * Touching moments of ecstasy (Deaf woman hearing herself for the first time, US Marine surprisin

How I live: My finite news system

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. I’m no expert, but by sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Why should I care about this anyway? Information is everywhere, and there is tons of it. Passively collecting your news information will fill your mind with thousands of cute cat pictures (don’t get me wrong, I love cat pictures), or just straight up wrong information (cue the “Fake News” chant)

How I live: Organizing my finances

This post is part of a larger attempt to share my personal “systems” that help me organize my life. I’m no expert, but by sharing my system, I hope to get feedback and inspire others to share as well. Why should I care about this anyway? So you’re thinking, I’m young, free, wild and I don’t need to be caring about myself 5, 10, or 50 years in the future — I’ll probably have enough income by then anyways! Screw this, I want money now! I won’t spend this article addressing why you should be sa

Dinnerisms: a philosophical potluck

Last weekend, Jacob, Nihar, and I hosted a potluck with a theme: prepare a dish that represents an “-ism.” For instance, unhealthy desserts (e.g. donuts) symbolize hedonism. We all had a ton of fun being creative, and got to see some awesome dishes! Check out the dinners (full list at the end): The full list of dishes: * Plagiarism: Box of Safeway madeleines with the label “Baked by Stephen and Jacob” * Optimism and Realism: Optimism is a healthy salad, and Realism is the bowl of mac and ch

5 insights from a “Blindfold Party”

Fashion, makeup, skin color, height, jewelry, gait, musculature, hairstyle, eyebrow shape, glasses, acne, shoes, eye color. After taking it all in, we think we have a clear picture. Judgments uttered within brief minutes of interaction: “Oh, she’s a cool artsy type, probably a drug user.” “Ah, he’s one of those annoying cocky tech bros, don’t let him hit on you.” “Her hair is so frizzy, she clearly doesn’t know how to take care of herself.” Sometimes they’re right. Sometimes they’re wrong. But

Noot Experiment: Caffeine, L-theanine, and Bacopa Review

In my first Noot Experiment blog post, I explain why and how I’m drugging myself for the next few months. This article discusses my review of three drugs I took so far: caffeine, L-theanine, and Bacopa Monnieri. Caffeine + L-theanine: I feel alive! Holy cow, caffeine and L-theanine are awesome. After taking it, I quickly felt a jolt of energy and alertness — I felt like I was “more alive.” Not only did I feel more productive — I was happier. The only negative side effect I experienced was nee

Noot Experiment: Why I’m drugging myself this month

Imagine Multivitamin X. Research says taking Multivitamin X every day improves your alertness, reduces incidences of depression, and elevates your mood daily. There are no major side effects for most healthy adults. The multivitamin consists of naturally occurring nutrients and dietary supplements, and is inexpensive. Multivitamin X is mildly addictive — but it’s entirely possible to get completely off the multivitamin if you don’t like it, and stop using it with no negative long-term effects.