Parallel Activities

There is only so much you can do in a day. Or in a lifetime. And most of what needs doing has an irreducible minimum duration — a floor below which you simply cannot compress it further. You can get faster, more efficient, more focused. But certain things just take the time they take.

That constraint is what got me thinking about parallel activities.

---

The Idea Behind It

If you can't always do things faster, the next best option is to do more things at the same time — not by multitasking in the frantic human sense, but by setting up processes that run independently of you. Activities that don't require your attention while they're running.

This is what automation means to me, practically. Not just saving time on a single task, but multiplying what's possible in a given period by running multiple workflows in parallel — while I'm sleeping, while I'm doing something else entirely, while I'm living.

---

Building Without a Team

I've been tinkering on automations for a while now, building workflows with the help of AI. And for me, a big part of the appeal is that this is something I can do alone, without a team or a significant budget.

Hiring people to run parallel operations is the traditional answer to the capacity problem. But that comes with real costs — financial, managerial, relational. Automation workflows, once set up, can run 24/7 at little to no ongoing cost, especially if you're already working off devices you own.

It isn't a perfect substitute for people. But for the kinds of tasks that are repetitive, rule-based, and digital, it closes a lot of the gap.

---

What's Next

My automations right now are limited to the digital side of things. But I've been learning about IT/OT — the intersection of information technology and operational technology — because I'm curious about semi-physical automations. Processes that cross the line between software and the physical world.

I don't know exactly where that curiosity leads. That's part of what makes it interesting to follow.

It's been fun so far. My own version of fun.

And maybe that's enough of a reason to keep going.