The Tea Letter #4 (Work, Fun, Web3)
Web3. There, I said it.
If you haven’t already thrown this email in the trash can, I’m glad you’re still here. You may be skeptical, but stick with me for a second.
First, the elephant in the room: yes, cryptocurrency has environmental impact issues. However, it's not as straight-forward as it seems.
The computer I’m writing this newsletter on; the mobile device you’re probably reading it on; the web servers and services powering this technology; the holiday gifts you're buying for loved ones; and the tea you’re hopefully drinking while reading this all have energy costs and environmental impact. At a minimum, the resources required to produce and transport these goods and services have a staggering impact on CO2 emissions.
One clear example is ballast water, which has caused incredible amounts of ecological damage to marine ecosystems (check out zebra mollusks and the Asian carp in the Great Lakes) around the world. Governments spend millions dealing with the consequences of global shipping on their local environment but civilization literally cannot function without the benefit these systems provide.
While this doesn’t excuse crypto from figuring out its problems (and I believe it will, because it has to), the new wave of innovation loosely described as “web3” is so critically important to the future of mankind it would be a travesty to dismiss it outright.
On a personal level, it’s important that I be able to discuss the ideas behind web3 and what they mean to me in my newsletter. There are two major reasons for this:
Web3 has significant implications for online creators like me.
Web3 has significant implications for the tea industry.
For more on both of these points, see the links below.
But first, it’s time for…
Tea of the Week: Natural Redhead, white2tea
It’s officially winter, which means it’s time for tea hugs.
What’s a tea hug? It’s the sleepy, calming, fuzzy feeling you get from wrapping yourself in the energetic embrace of a body-warming tea. For me, one of the best places to find tea with that vibe is in the form of ripe puer and black tea from Yunnan.
I don’t know if it’s the large leaf varietal, the old tree material, or some ancient rite of sacrifice at the foot of a shrine to Lu Yu, but I can (and have) had a session with a black tea from this region and then go straight into a power nap.
That’s why I picked Natural Redhead from white2tea as this week’s tea. It’s bold, medicinal, warming, and calming in a way that’s hard to describe. I like to load the gaiwan with heavy leaf (meaning a higher leaf-to-water ratio) and brew it hard with boiling water. It’s not uncommon for me to tap out before the tea does when I brew it this way.
Recent Readings
How to Care Less About Work - The Atlantic
In 2019, I drove myself to the edge of a psychotic break while working at a demanding tech job and dealing with the depression of a loved one. The experience was so intense, it led me to quit my job and launch a journey into a path of self-knowledge and healing that I’m still in the early stages of exploring.
Now I understand the dangers of overwork and burnout, but at that time I didn’t understand what was happening to me. I was literally coming unglued and didn’t have the tools to comprehend the experience of my unraveling.
I wish I’d had this piece to read back then.
Breaking Free from the Productivity Addiction - Deep Fix
There’s a theme to this week’s newsletter, and it’s this: our brains are massively warped from years of indoctrination into the cult of productivity. The devotion is fanatical and reaches deep into our psyche.
For knowledge workers like me, it usually emerges as a toxic dedication to work and an identity deeply intertwined with the perceived quantity and quality of work–yet another source of my deep depression from 2019.
This short read details one man’s attempts at escaping the addiction. It gives me hope to know there is light at the end of the tunnel.
The Pareto Funtier - NotBoring
Here’s where the web3 stuff starts. This piece will likely be confusing to web3 newcomers. If that’s you, dear reader, I hope you’ll take it on as an opportunity to stretch your mind.
In this email, Packy talks about the “Pareto Funtier”, which is a play on words related to the “Pareto Frontier”. In the piece, Packy draws a curved line from high money on the Y-axis to high fun on the X-axis. Packy makes the argument, and I happen to agree, that web3 “pushes out” the range of the curve by increasing the possibilities to achieve both maximum money and maximum fun.
For online creators like me, the ability to have more fun while decreasing the cost of trading off against money is an exciting one.
Yield DAOs - The Almanack
Welcome to the deep end of web3–decentralized finance, DAOs, yield, and tokens. If these words mean nothing to you, this piece might melt your mind. However, I included it in this week’s email because of the way the author discusses “CoffeeDAO”--a new business model for a real-world coffee cafe.
Anyone with any knowledge of the tea business will hopefully open their mind and consider what it means to them, and to all of us who love the true spirit of tea with a deep and fervent passion.
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That’s all for this week, and if you made it this far–thank you.
It scares me to think that people will leave this newsletter because of how culturally fraught the discourse around crypto and technology is. However, I can’t not write about it.
If it’s not for you, I hold no grudges if you unsubscribe. The unsubcribe link is in the footer of this email. But if you stay, then you’re directly helping me by encouraging me to write my truth. I don’t have words to express my gratitude for that.
So I’ll just say again: thank you.
Until next time, happy drinking.