First Steps and False Barriers

I have a stubbornly "anti" disposition. I don't react well to impossibilities. It goes way back - and I'm assuming it has its roots in my DIY and punk rock obsession that I developed as an early teenager. I know - how very unique.

But I've been thinking about possibilities more.

Partly because things are scary in the world, and fixing them seems impossible. Partly because being a writer / blogger in 2025 (the world of TikTok, etc) is a daunting semi-career, and getting anywhere with it feels impossible.

Here's my take on possible vs. impossible.

When someone tells you something is impossible, they usually mean, “I can’t see how to do it.” The first person, specifically. 

And yes, this might seem like a pedantic distinction, but it goes to something foundational about how we think through difficult problems.

Remember the classic “proof” that bumblebees can’t fly? In the 1930s, French entomologist Antoine Magnan used the aerodynamic equations of the time to demonstrate that bumblebee flight was impossible. The equations were correct. The conclusion was wrong. The problem wasn’t with the bees — it was with our understanding of how they flew.

This pattern repeats, as patterns are want to do. 

“Heavier than air flight is impossible” (1900s). “We will never break the sound barrier” (1940s). “No one will ever need more than 637KB of memory” (1980s). Each of these statements was made by experts, using the best available knowledge of their time. 

Each was eventually wrong.