CLI cool-off
After a couple months of CLI fervor, I’ve reached a state of relative calm. Despite my heavy reinvestment in Neovim and several other CLI tools, during which I tried to use them for damn near everything, I now find myself not really caring which editor I fire up. I’m writing this post in iA Writer, for example, and I'm going to finish writing it in the dead-simple Bear Blog textbox. If I were to edit a Python project right now, I might use Neovim, or I might use VSCode. If I use the latter, I may or may not enable the Vim keybindings.
I’m happy about this. I feel less anxiously tied to any particular tool, and more importantly less tied to the idea that I should be tied to any particular tool.
I’d probably feel differently if I were still a software engineer. I suspect that choosing a tool, like Neovim or an IDE, and learning it very deeply pays much larger dividends in that role than in mine as a people manager.
Although I do have my own version of this: the macOS default movement keys. They work in just about any text box in macOS, and they’re deep in my bones after 24 years as an OS X and macOS user. I continue to rediscover my appreciation for them as I try alternatives. Yes, Vim movements and operations are more efficient (and more fun) by certain measures, but it'd take a long time before they become faster and cognitively cheaper for me than the defaults I know so well.
What are the lessons here, I wonder? I think one lesson is that, for me, there is no end-game or Nirvana state. Every app has its pros and cons, which means I’m always susceptible to FOMO no matter what thing I choose and how deeply I study it. I should dispel the notion that there is one true, superior path to be discovered, and instead live by the principle of good enough.
Another lesson is that there's value in giving myself freedom to choose the best tool for the job. For example, using Things for tasks and Day One for journaling rather than trying to shoehorn those use cases into Neovim. Those tools feel good and remove friction.
A third lesson is that I will eventually get bored and look for novelty in my computer use. That's how it's always been. I should expect it in the future and point myself in healthy directions when it arrives.
I’ve admittedly learned some version of these lessons many times over the years. But I wouldn’t say I learned them the “hard way” this time around. I dove into this knowing there was a good chance I’d end up back where I started: using macOS defaults and my go-to native apps. I launched the experiment anyway because I was hungry for novelty and a technical challenge.
So this time, I’d say I relearned these lessons the fun way.