Getting to know my former self

March 14, 2026 — 8:40 AMGood morning, team.I woke up after my most decent night’s sleep in about a week. Not perfect, but I managed six and a half hours of effective sleep time, so I feel somewhat more rested than I’ve felt over the past several days.Upon waking, I started thinking about the topic of why people keep diaries.One big reason, I think, is that diaries allow people to look back at their own evolution. They help you get to know the person you once were. In a way, it’s a form of time travel.If you’ve been consistent with a diary for a year—writing daily, or whenever you have meaningful thoughts, worries, or reflections—you create a record of yourself over time.When you reach the end of that year, you suddenly have a backlog: a full year of history of you, the historical version of yourself.Meanwhile, you’re constantly renewing. You’re changing as a person, accumulating knowledge and experience. And because of that, you can do something quite fascinating: you can dig through the archive of your own mind.Through that process, you can probably get to know yourself at a deeper level than most people who don’t keep diaries.Finding the Right FormatI’ve kept diaries before, but very sporadically.I think that’s mostly because I never felt I had the right format for it. In the past, I would make occasional entries in a notebook, and eventually that notebook would disappear somewhere and effectively be lost forever.But now I think I’ve found a format that works for me.Instead of writing everything down by hand, I can simply record a voice message. For me, speaking is far more efficient than writing. When I try to write, the hand and the pen are always lagging behind the brain.The voice, on the other hand, feels like a direct interpreter of my stream of consciousness.And now, with modern AI tools, it’s possible to automatically transcribe spoken words with fairly high quality. After that, all I need to do is lightly reformat the text so it becomes more readable.From there, the whole thing can be stored and shared easily.Sharing the JourneyI’ve set this up so that these reflections can be shared both as audio recordings and written text.For those who prefer reading, everything will be available on Substack, where I’ve named the publication Victor’s Odyssey—a reference to my own journey through life, especially after encountering the existential biological crisis I’ve been going through.For those who prefer listening, the recordings are also available on Spotify, as well as Apple Podcasts and other podcast platforms that pull from Apple’s feed under the same name.My hope is that this new technological pipeline—these tools and intermediate steps—will allow me to be more consistent with recording and sharing these thoughts.And honestly, I feel very grateful for the possibility of sharing this with you.I don’t know how many people will actually listen to long-form reflections like this. Our entire digital environment is pushing us toward short-form content.Which brings me to a side topic I want to explore more deeply at some point: attention spans in the modern world.Books on Attention and MediaOn my nightstand right now I have two interesting books related to this topic.A few weeks ago I saw a YouTube clip discussing how the attention span of humanity has been shaped by the types of media we consume. That led me to these two books.The first is Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman. It was written during the rise of television and explores how television changed the way people process information, replacing the culture of the written word with visual entertainment.The second is The Shallows by Nicholas Carr, which moves the conversation forward into the age of the internet. Carr explores how digital media fragments our attention even further.As anyone living in our time knows, that process is only accelerating.It’s a topic I’d like to dive into later, but I have a few other books ahead of it in my reading queue.A Fungi-Themed Reading JourneyInterestingly, my current reading streak has become a bit thematic.It’s indirectly connected to a big life decision I’ve made: pursuing a new professional path by studying to become an arborist—essentially a tree surgeon and climbing tree-care specialist.Trees, as many of you might know, are deeply interconnected with fungi. That connection led me to my last book:Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake.It’s a fascinating book, filled with remarkable insights into fungi from many different perspectives. I can highly recommend it.After finishing that book, I thought: why not stay within the same theme and pick up another book related to fungi?And it turned out that I already had one.Albert Hofmann and the Story of LSDThe book is written by Professor Albert Hofmann, the Swiss chemist who first synthesized LSD while working for the pharmaceutical company Sandoz.The book is in German, and I’m reading it in the original language with some difficulty. Its title is LSD: Mein Sorgenkind, often translated as LSD: My Problem Child.In it, Hofmann describes his complicated relationship with the substance he discovered.LSD was originally isolated from ergot, a fungal parasite that infects grains like wheat and rye. When ergot grows on grain, it appears as a dark, abnormal structure among the normal seeds—almost like a black protrusion on the wheat stalk.Historically, ergot caused severe disease outbreaks. One form, called gangrenous ergotism, could cause people’s limbs and tissues to deteriorate and die. These outbreaks were devastating in earlier centuries before the cause was understood.While studying compounds derived from ergot, Hofmann synthesized LSD.According to his account, he accidentally absorbed a tiny amount through his skin and began experiencing unusual sensations on his way home. This was effectively the first accidental LSD experience.What’s remarkable is how little LSD is required to produce effects.A dose of about 100 micrograms—not milligrams, but micrograms—is already a significant amount capable of strongly altering perception and consciousness.Hofmann’s book describes the entire journey of the compound: its discovery, the early scientific research, its entry into psychiatric experimentation, and eventually its explosion into public awareness during the counterculture and hippie movements of the 1960s.From there, governments around the world heavily restricted it.The book also recounts Hofmann’s encounters with well-known figures—artists, writers, and psychedelic advocates—who helped spread interest in LSD during that era.In many ways, it’s an atlas of the cultural and scientific history of LSD.What makes the substance unique is that it doesn’t behave like typical drugs categorized as stimulants or depressants. Instead, it acts more like a modulator of consciousness, dramatically altering perception and cognition.Closing ThoughtsSo at the moment, fungi has become my main reading theme.But to wrap up: I’ll do my best to continue using this format to share my thoughts in a long-form way.It benefits me to record these reflections, and hopefully somewhere out there it might benefit someone else as well.Love you all.Be mindful of your life force.And hopefully I’ll speak to you again soon. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit victorsalander.substack.com