‘The AI revolution will occur more quickly than most humans expect. Unless we develop new concepts to explain, interpret, and organize its consequent transformations, we will be unprepared to navigate it or its implications.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future. Henry A.Kissinger, Eric Schmidt and Daniel Huttenlocher. John Murray Publishers. London. 2021.

‘A machine intelligence would benefit from flawless memory, even of events that occurred deep in the past, and would have the ability to calculate and to sift and search through enormous troves of data at fantastic speed. It would also be able to directly connect to the internet or to other networks and tap into virtually limitless resources; it would effortlessly talk to other machines, even as it mastered conversation with us. In other words, human level AI, from its very inception, would in a great many ways be superior to us.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything. Martin Ford. Basic Books. London. 2021.

‘AI is the ultimate intangible asset, because it takes on the qualities of a perpetual motion machine—the algorithms give you more and more value without you having to do very much. The cycle looks like this: You feed data into an AI and it becomes more effective—tailoring a product to your needs, perhaps recommending news stories you want to read or songs you want to listen to. This improved service becomes more desirable, and so more of us use it. As more of us use it, we generate more data about our tastes and preferences. That data can then be fed into the AI, and the product improves.’

The Exponential Age. Azeem Azhar. Diversion Books. 2021.

‘…what has always been the Holy Grail of artificial intelligence: a machine that can communicate, reason and conceive new ideas at the level of a human being or beyond. Researchers often refer to this as “artificial general intelligence,” or AGI. Nothing close to AGI currently exists in the real world, but there are many examples from science fiction..One could make a strong argument that the development of general machine intelligence with superhuman capability would be the most consequential innovation in the history of humanity…’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘To chart the frontiers of contemporary knowledge, we may task AI to probe realms we cannot enter; it may return with patterns we do not fully grasp…We may find ourselves one step closer to the concept of our knowledge, less limited by the structure of our minds and the patterns of conventional human though. Not only will we have to redefine our roles as something other than the sole knower of reality, we will also have to redefine the very reality we thought we were exploring.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘Most AI researchers recognize that significant breakthroughs will be required in order to achieve something close to human-level artificial intelligence, but there is no broad agreement on precisely what challenges are most important, or which ones should be attacked first. Yann LeCun often uses an analogy of navigating a mountain range. Only after you climb the first peak will you be able to see the obstacles that lie behind it.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘Individuals and societies that enlist AI as a partner to amplify skills or pursue ideas may be capable of feats—scientific, medical, military, political, and social—that eclipse those of preceding periods. Yet once machines approximating human intelligence are regarded as key to producing better and faster results, reason alone may come to seem archaic.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘Until now, humans alone developed their understanding of reality, a capacity that defined our place in the world and relationship to it. From this, we elaborated our philosophies, designed our governments and military strategies, and developed our moral precepts. Now AI has revealed that reality may be known in different ways, perhaps in more complex ways, than what has been understood by humans alone. At times, it’s acheivements may be as striking and disorienting as those of the most influential thinkers in their heydays—producing bolts of insight and challenges to established concepts, all of which demand a reckoning.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘One important approach is to look directly to the inner workings of the human brain for inspiration. These researchers believe that artificial intelligence should be directly informed by neuroscience.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘We must recognize that AI’s achievements, within its defined parameters, sometimes rank beside or even surpass those that human resources enable. We may comfort ourselves by repeating that AI is artificial, that it has not or cannot match our conscious experience of reality. But when we encounter some of AI’s achievements—logical feats, technical breakthroughs, strategic insights, and sophisticated management of large, complex systems— it is evident that we are in the presence of another experience of reality by another sophisticated entity.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘Students studying statistics are often reminded that “correlation does not equal causation.” For artificial intelligence, and especially deep learning systems, understanding ends at correlation…[Judith] Pearl…likes to point out that while any human understands intuitively that the sunrise causes a rooster to crow, rather than vice versa, the most powerful deep neural network would likely to fail to achieve a similar insight. Causation cannot be derived simply by analyzing data.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘Pre AI algorithms were good at delivering “addictive” content to humans. AI is excellent at it. As deep reading and analysis contracts, so, too, do the traditional rewards for undertaking these processes. As the cost of opting out of the digital domain increases, it’s ability to affect human thought—to convince, to steer, to divert—grows. As a consequence, the individual human’s role in reviewing, testing, and making sense of information diminishes. In its place, AI’s role expands.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘Yet in the worlds of media, politics, discourse and entertainment, AI will reshape information to conform to our preferences—potentially confirming and deepening biases and, in so doing, narrowing access to and agreement upon an objective truth. In the age of AI, then, human reason will find itself both augmented and diminished.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘…AI may operate as we expect but generate results that we do not foresee. With those results, it may carry humanity to places it’s creators did not anticipate.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future. P. 216

‘The truth is that no one really has any idea exactly how the human brain achieves it’s unparalleled competence at autonomously learning from unstructured data.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘The ability to learn information in one domain and then successfully leverage it on other domains is one of the hallmarks of human intelligence and is essential to creativity and innovation. If more general machine intelligence is to be genuinely useful…it will need to be able to apply what it learns, and any insights it develops, to entirely new challenges.’

Rule of the Robots – How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything.

‘Social media companies do not run news feeds to promote extreme and violent polarization. But is is self-evident that these services have not resulted in the maximization of enlightened discourse.’

The Age of AI And Our Human Future.

‘To be a good winemaker, you must first be a good liar.’

I could not believe such words—smoothly spoken by a long-haired surfer perfectionist winemaker from a family of vignerons with impeccable attention toward sanitation and quality. I was convinced this young man was an honest individual, as well as a paragon of integrity and industriousness.

Perhaps he was.

He continued.

This time he referred to the 2017 vintage—when a howling frost knocked half of Bordeaux grapes dead.

‘In years where there are few grapes, believe me—a lot of Pomerol wines will include juice from Blaye,’ he stated, referencing an illegal practice of trucking and then infusing wine from one appellation into wine from another.

His words shocked me.

Could it be?

Perhaps.

During years of living in rural Bordeaux, I had witnessed slivers of brazen but arrogant skullduggery in the winemaking world.

In the year 2010 I purchased hundreds of bottles of vintage 2009 Bordeaux wine on speculation (en primeur), which means the wine was still aging and not yet bottled. After it was bottled, I stored cases in my small cellar in the town of Blaye. Four years later this wine tasted wonderful. I then spoke to a son of the château owners and mentioned still having hundreds of bottles from the 2009 vintage. He was surprised. He admitted their own winery kept no bottles from that renowned vintage.

Curiously, the next year that same winery started shipping out boxes of—yes—(supposedly) vintage 2009. The labels differed slightly from those on the bottles I had: a lighter color and bolder text. Overnight, the value of my precious cellared bottles plummeted because some juice (hardly from that same vintage) flooded local markets. One storekeeper invited owners of this château to a blind tasting, served up their own juices—real and faux—and watched their chagrined faces betray their own sleight of hand.

2009 produced a sound vintage. As did 2010. It came as no surprise then, when somewhere close to the middle of the decade this same château began issuing boxes of faux vintage 2010. When I entered a restaurant in the nearby town of Bourg I saw cases of the supposed 2010 lined up against a wall. Same label changes: lighter color, bolder text.

Or—consider how, after the U.S. government slapped significant import duties on French wines with alcohol levels of less than 14.5%, vast quantities of Bordeaux wines—normally between 12.5% and 14% alcohol—were suddenly labeled as ‘14.5%.’ Perhaps they were—but unlikely without some deft cellar alterations to boost their booze levels. Whenever I asked a jacketed château owner, or some weathered vigneron with a coiffed goatee about these unusually high alcohol levels for the region, they nodded a chin or waved a dismissive hand and explained it was all the result of global warming.

How convenient.

In just a year, apparently, temperatures had skyrocketed enough to boost grape sugar quantities and consequent alcohol levels all over France. Throughout Spain and Italy too.

The truth is that institutional deceit is not uncommon in the wine world. The very premise of the supposedly bedrock backbone classification scheme for Bordeaux wine quality—that of 1855—is, literally, a century and a half out of date.

Although I live here and love it, I now remain somewhat leery not only of Bordeaux, but of the entire wine world.

The Bordeaux Wine Official Classification of 1855 took place in, of course, the year 1855. At the behest of Emperor Napoleon III—who was hosting the world’s fair (‘Exposition Universelle’) in Paris—scouts visited Bordeaux to discern the best quality wines so they could be displayed to visitors in the capital city. Their selection created a classification system still utilized today and—bizarrely—somehow considered practical by ample wine sniffing professionals.

It’s more like a quaint relic.

Books have been written about this classification, so I’ll avoid details.

But, consider time.

Since that classification too place, two world wars have been fought, the atom split, the airplane invented, the computer created, slaves emancipated, golf balls knocked across the moon, and buggies replaced by automobiles.

In 1855, ballpoint pens, air conditioners, television sets, PVC pipes, cars, washing machines, pasteurized products and elevators did not exist. This was the year missionary David Livingstone set eyes on Victoria Falls, the year Isaac Singer patented the sewing machine, and a year when steamboats transported goods and passengers into the interior of the U.S.

Would you buy a brand based on the reputation it had 160 years ago?

Many do. Frequently. In great volumes. And at huge expense.

Seriously.

Some argue this classification retains merit because soils underlying grapes have not essentially changed. True. But the world of agriculture was reshaped during the past century and a half—including land management practices, technological innovations, pesticides, herbicides, management techniques, climate alterations, quality control, and economic impacts of multiple external variables–including the invention of sophisticated processing equipment, deployment of air cargo and container ships, and viability of ‘flying winemakers’–able to provide precision advice from having worked vintages in dozens of countries.

Yet if both pedigree and integrity are not magically inherent to Bordeaux, why do its wines maintain their stellar reputation? The reasons are simple but intriguing.

Before revealing what they are, I’ll first share more tales about life in rural Bordeaux.

Recently I bought these books in the city of Bordeaux, France.

Below are insights harvested from three of these books regarding time, the universe, reality, and applying these insights to the unexpected lives of two defiant Irish fighters.

TIME.

The Order of Time by Carlo Rovelli reveals a few surprises.

– Time passes faster in the mountains than at sea level.

– Wherever there is a difference between past and future, heat is involved.

– Time passes more slowly for someone moving than for someone resting.

– The smallest unit of time is called Planck time. It is 10 ^{– 44} seconds, or a hundred millionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second.

The book notes that time passes “at different rhythms according to place and according to speed. It is not directional: the difference between past and future does not exist in the elementary equations of the world…The notion of the ‘present’ does not work: in the vast universe there is nothing that we can reasonably call ‘present.’ ”

Author Rovelli explains.

“The world is not a collection of things, it is a collection of events…things persist in time; events have a limited duration. A stone is a prototypical ‘thing’: we can ask ourselves where it will be tomorrow. Conversely, a kiss is an ‘event.’ It makes no sense to ask where the kiss will be tomorrow. The world is made up of networks of kisses, not of stones.”

“The physics and astronomy that will work, from Ptolemy to Galileo, from Newton to Schrödinger, will be mathematical descriptions of precisely how things change, not of how the are. They will be about events, not things…We therefore describe the world as it happens, not as it is. Newton’s mechanics, Maxwell’s equations, quantum mechanics, and so on, tell us how events happen, not how things are.”

Ah.

So, time is a changing character, much like a chameleon modifying its colors as it climbs a tree.

THE UNIVERSE.

The first chapter of the book titled The Grand Design by Stephen Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow states that:

“…philosophy is dead. Philosophy has not kept up with modern developments in science, particularly physics. Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge.”

And later,

“…we now have a candidate for the ultimate theory of everything, if indeed one exists, called M-theory … According to M-theory, ours is not the only universe. Instead, M-theory predicts that a great many universes were created out of nothing. Their creation does not require the intervention of some supernatural being or god. Rather, these multiple universes arise naturally from physical law. They are a prediction of science. Each universe has many possible histories and many possible states…”

REALITY.

From where do we get our impressions of the world? Well, from living in the world, traveling in the world, working in the world, speaking to others about their situations in the world, and reading about the world.

We also get impressions from news outlets. Taking this information too seriously may not be such a wise idea.

In the book Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker, he writes first about news, and then about progress. A slice of this context comes from the quotes below.

“The data scientist Kalev Leetaru applied a technique called sentiment mining to every article published in the New York Times between 1945 and 2005, and to an archive of translated articles and broadcasts from 130 countries between 1979 and 2010. Sentiment mining assesses the emotional tone of a text by tallying the number and contexts of words with positive and negative connotations, like good, nice, terrible and horrific. Figure 4-1 [not shown here, but the second figure is shown in this Forbes article]. Putting aside the wiggles and waves that reflect the crises of the day, we see that the impression that the news has become more negative over time is real. The New York Times got steadily more morose from the early 1960s to the early 1970s, lightened up a bit (but just a bit) in the 1980s and 1990s, and then sank into a progressively worse mood in the first decade of the new century. News outlets in the rest of the world, too, became gloomier and gloomier from the late 1970’s to the present day.”

“So, has the world really gone steadily downhill during these decades?

“Most people agree that life is better than death. Health is better than sickness. Sustenance is better than hunger. Abundance is better than poverty. Peace is better than war. Safety is better than danger. Freedom is better than tyranny. Equal rights are better than bigotry and discrimination. Literacy is better than illiteracy. Knowledge is better than ignorance. Intelligence is better than dull-wittedness. Happiness is better than misery. Opportunities to enjoy family, friends, culture, and nature are better than drudgery and monotony.”

“All these things can be measured. If they have increased over time, that is progress.

“As it happens, the world does agree on these values.  In the year 2000, all 189 members of the United Nations, together with two dozen international organizations, agreed on the eight Millennium Development Goals for the year 2015 that blend right into this list.

“And here is a shocker. The world has made spectacular progress in ever single measure of  human well-being. Here is a second shocker: Almost no one knows about it.”

CONCLUSIONS.

Let’s consider a few insights from these three books.

If time is not quite the fixed entity we thought it was, if the universe is more bizarre and multi-layered than we could ever imagine, if indices indicate that the living situation on earth appears to be moving in a generally positive direction with regard to increases in living standards, reductions in illnesses, diminishment of war casualties and in several other ways—than two obvious conclusions can be made: First, the world in which we live is neither fixed, static, or hostage to any pre-ordained or predictable trajectory, and, second, often we humans can—through conscious thoughts and actions—modify and potentially improve our own reality as well as possibly the reality that surrounds us.

Those conclusions may sound facile, even simple. Yet they are not.

Every day humans struggle to move forward and to make progress. Often they encounter difficulties not just because of challenges presented by their task (such as becoming a better athlete) but also due to opposition from others who are scared that their actions may change the current reality they are so familiar and comfortable with.

Two examples  are below.

FIGHTING IRISH.

Because the origin of this website relates to Ireland, and because my father went to the University of Notre Dame (whose athletic teams are described by the motto ‘The Fighting Irish’) I’ve selected two stories from Ireland (which I recently found in piles of my past notes) about a determined man and woman who had to fight pre-conceptions of reality to attain their success.

Conor.

I have little interest in televised sports, but read and kept clippings from the August, 2017 edition of The Financial Times Weekend. An article titled A brawler with the gift of the gab, by Murad Ahmed told about an Irish boxer.

In 2017, the fight between Irishman Conor McGregor and Floyd Mayweather was a huge sporting event (Mayweather won).

I had paid no attention to this event until after it took place.

But the story of McGregor is astounding, and tells how quickly life can change.

Ten years before that fight, McGregor was a plumber’s apprentice. He quit that job to practice boxing and to try to make money at that sport. This action infuriated his parents in the Dublin city region of Lucan.

At his first UFC fight in Stockholm (in April of 2013), McGregor cashed in his final welfare payment of 188 Euros.

Four years later, in 2017, he was worth, according to Forbes, $34 million.

In an interview with The Guardian newspaper in 2015, McGregor said, “I had no love for plumbing. But it’s weird how society works. Rather than allowing you time to find the thing you love and can pursue with complete conviction, we’re told: ‘You must work, no matter how much you dislike it.’ ”

Conor, in other words, disregarded the insinuation from others that the world in which he lived was fixed and that he had to labor at a job he didn’t like. He decided he could, and would, change his life. He did not take reality as fixed, and did not fear changing it.

Katie.

In 2012, I read a story about another Irish boxer. This caught my attention because Katie Taylor comes from the same town in Ireland (Bray) where I had spent years going to school in Ireland when young.

Katie’s father Peter was an Irish boxing champion in 1986, and taught his two sons and daughter Katie how to spar. Katie trained in a gym that was so small that when she had to use the toilet she walked 150 yards up the road to the Harbour Bar (the same bar where my brothers used to knock back pints of Guinness). Because women boxing was not sanctioned in Ireland at the time, she had to pretend to be a boy in order to enter contests. (“When I took the headgear off at the end of a fight, there was uproar,” she said.) In 2011 she participated in the first ever sanctioned women’s boxing fight in Ireland.

My friends Barb and Ocean in County Wicklow, Ireland

Later, the Olympic Committee decided to evaluate Katie’s performance in Chicago to determine if women boxing could become an Olympic sport in the London 2012 games. After they watched Katie, the committee agreed to allow entry of the sport. The 26-year-old, religious, non-alcohol drinking, hard-working Katie won a gold medal at the Olympics, and riveted the nation of Ireland. Modestly, she said afterwards, “I actually think there is great strength in quietness.”

In a country that forbade sanctioned women’s boxing, Katie ignored the ‘contemporary reality’ of limited thinking of her peers. She changed the regulations regarding boxing forever in Ireland. She later helped change the regulations of the Olympic Committee regarding boxing.

Conor and Katie used time as their allay, ignored any concept of a fixed universe and decided and then acted to improve their personal situations.

Time, the nature of the universe and the fate of our planet and personal situations are not fixed and unchangeable. We can all choose to modify our situations, and try to move to focus more on what it  is that we love doing and what interests us.

The Best of the Holiday Season to all of you!

Thanks for reading these posts during 2019.

This post includes a few quotations picked up in recent years from different books. They include wise, and sometimes practical words.

‘The idea of a mental reducing valve that constrains our perceptions, for instance, comes from the French philosopher Henri Bergeson. Bergeson believed that consciousness was not generated by human brains but rather exists in a field outside us, something like electromagnetic waves; our brains, which he likened to radio receivers, can tune in to different frequencies of consciousness.’

From How To Change Your Mind—The New Science of Psychedelics, by Michael Pollan [Penguin; 2018]

‘No other animal can stand up to us, not because they lack a soul or a mind, but because they lack the necessary imagination. Lions can run, jump, claw and bite. Yet they cannot open a bank account or file a lawsuit. And in the twenty-first century, a banker who knows how to file a lawsuit is far more powerful than the most ferocious lion in the savannah.’

From Homo Deus—A Brief History of Tomorrow, by Yuval Noah Harari. [Penguin; 2016]

‘Another study, of 38,000 knowledge workers across different sectors, found that the simple act of being interrupted is one of the biggest barriers to productivity. Even multitasking, that prized feat of modern-day office warriors, turns out to be a myth. Scientists now know that the brain is incapable of paying attention to two things at the same time. What looks like multitasking is really switching back and forth between multiple tasks, which reduces productivity and increases mistakes by up to 50 percent.’

From Quiet–The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, by Susan Cain. [Penguin; 2012]

‘Social status is not quite the same as companionship, granted, but it can be a bewitching substitute.’

From the ‘Citizens of Nowhere’ column titled ‘The anti-social secret of success,’ by Janan Ganesh. Financial Times Life and Arts section. [May 25&26, 2019; page 20.]

And  three quotes from a Nobel Prize winning scientist:

‘As you become skilled in a task, its demand for energy diminishes.’

‘If you care about being thought credible and intelligent, do not use complex language where simpler language will do.’

‘Substituting one question for another can be a good strategy  for solving difficult problems, and George Pólya included substitution in his classic ‘How to Solve It’: ‘If’ you can’t solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it.’ “

From Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman [Penguin; 2011]

‘…the universal touchstones of holiness—chastity, the renunciation of property, extreme bodily asceticism, devotion to prayer and spiritual exercises—appealed to people who were troubled by rapidly increasing disparities of wealth and power.’

From The War on Heresy, by R.I. Moore [Belknap Press of Harvard; 2012]

‘The best cooks are  ex-dishwashers. Hell, the best people are ex-dishwashers. Because who do you want in your kitchen when push comes to shove, and you’re in danger of falling in the weeds and the orders are pouring in and the number-one oven just went down and the host just sat a twelve-top and there’s a bad case of the flu that’s been tearing through the staff like the Vandals through Rome?…A guy who’s going to sulk if you speak harshly to him? A guy who’s certain there’s a job waiting for him somewhere else (‘Maybe…like Aspen, man…or the Keys…’)? Or some resume building aspiring chef? …Or do you want somebody who’s come up the hard way? He may not know what a soubise is, but he can sure make one! He may not know the term monter au beurre…but who cares?’

From The Nasty Bits, by Anthony Bourdain [Bloomsbury; 2006]

The attacks that felled New York’s twin towers occurred a little more than 18 years ago—in September of 2001. Soon after that, stricter security procedures were implemented at airports. They involved, and still involve, basically—passengers  removing belt, coat and sometimes shoes, emptying pockets, taking laptops out of bags and putting all these items onto trays that pass along a moving belt through a scanner. Passengers then walk through a metal detector.

The entire experience is inundated with trays, trays, trays.

Fundamentally, the same system is still used at thousands of airports in hundreds of countries. There are variations at different locations and airports, but basically it’s the same: Off with belt, coat, sometimes shoes, empty pockets, remove laptop and put everything on trays before walking through a scanner. The system has been fundamentally the same— for millions and millions and millions of passengers—for about 17 years now.

Think about that.

More importantly, think about how many technological advances have taken place in the world during those same years. As you do so, consider this question: why have airport security procedures for passengers fundamentally not improved for almost two decades?

Here are a few technological advances that have taken place in the last 17 years.

The first ever iPhone was released in 2007 (about 5 years after we began putting belts on trays at airports). It has undergone almost a dozen evolutions since. About 2.2 million apps have been developed to make life easier while we use our phones on the move.

The final sequencing of the human genome occurred in 2003.

Skype was founded in 2003, and Facebook began revolutionizing global social communications in 2004.

YouTube began in 2005.

Uber began in 2009—some eight years after you began taking that laptop out of your bag at airport security.

In 2010 the first completely artificial cells were completed.

The Curiosity Rover landed on Mars in 2012, and has been exploring ever since.

And if you traveled on an airplane in 2012, you were still taking your belt off and putting it on a tray.

Just two months ago an explorer descended to more than three miles below the ocean—to a depth of 18,208 feet, or 5,550 meters.

Since 2012, the technology to allow vehicles to ‘self-drive’ has increased drastically.

In 2013, researchers at Cornell University 3-D printed an outer ear that functions much as a real one.

Since 2013, bionic eyes are increasing in prevalence and quality.

In 2017 gene therapy was used to cure a teenager of sickle cell diseases.

In 2019, astronomers captured the first image of a black hole.

And, yes, you and millions of others still have to empty your pockets and put the contents on a tray at any airport.

Yes, most of us are DELIGHTED that airport security is thorough, and the processes do work to  reduce the threat of danger. Fantastic!

However—I suspect that through a bidding process and technical innovations, such systems could be altered in a way so that they become quicker, and easier (and still remain secure).

That’s something to think about that the next time you, and millions of fellow passengers, pick up your tray and struggle with taking off your belt or coat at the airport.

Let’s look at each more carefully.

Proactive Rather than Reactive.

Going to work everyday and just reacting to emails and voicemails is a formula for frustration. Think about the future—where do you or your company want to go? Stop messing with the small stuff and get galvanized to tackle future goals.

I used to prepare technical and financial proposals while working in Dubai for a large engineering corporation. I was happy to control the preparation, because otherwise here is the type of scenario that would usually unfold. We would receive an RFP (Request for Proposal) for a proposal to be submitted by 5 p.m. in, say, Bahrain, on a date six weeks in the future. About three weeks before it was due, someone at the head office would assign the task of proposal preparation to an individual, and a week later that person would assemble a team. But because it was late and staffing was short, they would end up flying some experienced staff member from California or, say, the Philippines to help with the work. Ten days before the proposal was due this team would realize the massive scope of the effort required, and within days before submittal staff would be frantically working until 2.00 a.m. each morning. Obviously, had a designated proposal response person proactively assigned tasks and prepared a calendar for this effort as soon as the RFP was received—six weeks earlier—this slapdash, last-minute, high-stressed effort may not have unfolded.

Proactive requires anticipating the future; reactive is the result of running with a leaderless pack.

Ahead – Two Steps.

Staying one step ahead is good. Staying two steps ahead is better.

This is not always easy. You may manage a department of energetic and competent individuals, but need to interact with another department which is mismanaged. Because your efforts partially depend on their results, their delays will slow down your team. The solution here is oversight from a leader who understands the value of close communication with teams of competent individuals.

Underpromise And Overdeliver.

Humans have an innate sense of when they are being told a load of nonsense. It is why the Velvet Revolution took place in Prague; it contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Ex-Mayor of New York Rudolph Giuliani used the phrase ‘underpromise and overdeliver’ frequently. Humans often focus on short term wins and promise what they know they cannot deliver, just so they can win contracts. The result is that their company may win that one contract, but the chance of them winning successive contracts is slim. If you are proactive and stay two steps ahead, you can usually please clients by delivering either more than they want, or by delivering what they want ahead of schedule. This leaves a lasting impression that your team (or company) are organized and focused about accomplishing a job. Also, if a client makes unrealistic demands regarding a schedule, talk with them immediately to extend the deadline so that it is more realistic. Otherwise, by agreeing to a schedule you know is unachievable, you are setting yourself up for perceived failure simply because you allowed a poor timetable to be imposed on your effort.

The opposite—to overpromise and underdeliver—is a formula for failure.

Systems Approach. 

Creating systems, whether for your team or for your company, is a powerful way of helping to achieve results.

When I worked in other countries, co-workers often asked me what led to the success of the United States. I told them that it hinged on both creating and obeying laws, but also on creating systems decades ago. Whether from creating postal systems, electrical distribution networks, interstate highways or rural water supply systems—these systems were practical, replicable and acheived results. Setting up intelligent systems can reduce inefficiency, increase standardization and simplify day to day operations.

Does your team meet once a week to plan future goals and to review accomplishments? That meeting may only last 10 minutes, but having that gathering each week embodies a system. Do your sub-contractors all submit progress reports on the same type of form that you created? That’s a system. Do the H.R. staff evaluate applications according to specified criteria? That means they have a system. It sounds simple, but the quantity of humans working late hours at offices in stressful conditions because of a lack of standardized and reliable systems is astounding.

What’s required to set up a good system? See the ‘System Requirements’ section below.

Evaluate. 

Are you working hours that do not stress you out, getting enough physical exercise, eating well, enjoying time with family and friends and occasionally exploring new geographical regions or embarking on learning new topics? Is your life generally in balance? If so, that’s a pleasing way to live. It is also likely indicative that your work/management scenario is set up well. The key to evaluation: are you achieving balance?

Evaluating is critical for indicating whether your efforts are bearing fruit and whether your project team is moving in the right direction. Do your systems need to be scaled down or scaled up? Are your processes streamlined? Do you need to hire more staff or change their duties? Do you need to provide more training?

Routinely, and systematically, evaluate your progress. Do it on a monthly or weekly basis, but set up a schedule and involve other people to help consider how you can improve your company’s situation.

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS.

Thanks for tuning in again.

Clockwork precision requires intelligent planning

This post is not about books, or love, or wine (though I enjoy all three) but about pivotal methods that, if adapted, will change how to manage any situation in life.

This post follows another recent post where I revealed other simple management secrets that are tornado powerful for achieving results.

Here we go.

Tides of life turn relentlessly

Realize that Change Can Happen Rapidly.

When I was about 10 or 12 years old, we spent some time living in Ireland (hence the name of this blog, after a nearby town named Roundwood) and one day I came home from school and found beneath our walnut tree hundreds of walnuts that had fallen, perhaps having been by wind. I collected many and put them in some bucket or pot. The walnut oil stained my fingertips, so at school the next days classmates asked if I had taken up smoking and rolling my own cigarettes.

Hardly.

I collected a bucket of walnuts, because I realized that more could be collected during the following days.

A day or two later I went out again.

The walnuts were gone!

Gone.

Obviously some animals gathered them and  took them away.

I was shocked, but learned a powerful lesson:

Situations can change rapidly.

You can move from abundance to scarcity in no time, and from scarcity to abundance relatively quickly. There were times in life when I despaired—how would I get a job and income? Looking back, months later, from a nice home in Africa or from an apartment in Dubai, I appreciated reasons why life changed dramatically in a short period.

Three keys to help facilitate and propel such positive change are these:

1. Identify what you want
2. Keep an open mind.
3. Maintain a positive attitude

Sometimes, intuition may help guide you in ways you never expected possible.

Put in the work, ask for universal guidance, and when opportunity rains on you, forget about opening your umbrella.

Best to drive when it’s not rush hour

Use the Power of Rhythm.

Once, I was with a brother and his wife and her sister camping out during winter in Colorado.

We stayed at a Mongolian style ‘yurt’ hut near Fort Collins. We skied in to this hut (it was not far from the car), and spent the night. I woke every few hours to stoke more wood into the stove to keep the inside space warm.

On our way home, our Land Cruiser got stuck in snow. Eventually another truck came along and the driver helped extricate our vehicle. We worked together to accomplish this, by rocking the vehicle. We pushed and let go and let the car return to its original position;  we then pushed again—and repeated this process several times until the vehicle was free. Pushing at strategic times was critical.

Imagine standing behind a child on a swing and pushing only when that swing stops moving at the height of its pendulum.

Injecting strategic energy at keys moments can help achieve optimal results.

So it is with life.

If you are working, working, working, working and moving like a rat on a cage wheel without rest or stopping—you are living inefficiently.

And you are probably stressed and feel imbalanced.

In breathing we use energy to inhale (actively), and then to exhale passively.

So it is with life.

Oscillate effort with rest for optimal results.

A forest of possibilities

Tweaking A Variable Can Change All Results.

While I was a volunteer in the country of Malawi in Africa, we attended a weekend seminar about ‘Value Engineering’ that was held by a donor agency.

We were trying to figure out which aspects of building a rural water supply system cost the most. During this exercise, a consultant from Washington DC plugged different factors related to a water project into a computer spreadsheet, and then generated results based on those inputs. The inputs may have included the cost of pipelines, cost of transportation, labor costs, etcetra. But when we watched what they did, it became obvious that by changing one variable a little this way, and a second or third variable a little that way—they could generate any result they wanted to. Because this was computer generated on a spread sheet and performed by a so called ‘expert,’ and because no one variable appeared to be a suspiciously overt outlier—the results could be manipulated with relative ease.

This truth led one Malawian engineer—who had never used a computer before but who had plenty of experience—to say  to this consultant (Malawians call any technical device a ‘machine’) —’Ah, but you are cheating us with your machine.’

True.

Be wary —a few tweaks to common sense that are considered ‘truth’ can propel others to believe in what common sense would dictate as being invalid arguments.

We sometimes end up in unpredictable situations

Identify A Few Alternatives, then Deduce to Predict.

This subject enters Sherlock Holmes territory, where a fictional detective can generate conclusions by identifying possible alternatives, and then eliminating several as invalid.

The process is powerful.

When commercial aircraft crashed into the Twin Towers in New York city on September 11, 2001, I was sitting on an airline on the runway tarmac at Heathrow Airport in  London. We were about to take off. The pilot then told us that the flight was cancelled because two planes had crashed into a building in New York.

This sounded bizarre. First of all, our flight was destined for Chicago, not New York. Second, if one airline had flown into a building it could be considered unusual but understandable. But two flights?

Something was wrong. With seat mates we concluded that this was some orchestrated and pre-meditated event; we used simple deduction applied to key information.

When uncertain of situations, evaluate key facts to generate the likeliest alternatives before evaluating the entire picture.

In summary:

Be aware that changes can be rapid, respect the value of rhythm, understand the power of manipulating even one key variable, and evaluate key alternatives, emotionless, to improve a situation.

First – My Forbes pieces on gnarly transatlantic sail racing, Burgundy rambling and the First World War are here.

Second – After being recently approached, I’m now in partnership to have my other wine related blog site—Vino Voices—internationally syndicated with a New York based company that syndicates content for, among others, The International Monetary Fund, The Economist‘s blogs, The Business Insider and The Huffington Post. I’ll let you know whether that will impact this site (probably not).

Third – Here is some brief, sage and free advice on how to successfully manage any project.

I spent 25 years managing projects and performing overseas consultancies while living in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Latin America, the U.S. and Europe. I worked for a massive U.S. engineering corporation, for environmental consulting companies and for multiple international development organizations and agencies.

In my last two positions I managed portfolios worth approximately a quarter-billion dollars apiece.

Each project I have worked on has been completed ahead of schedule, on (or under) budget, and to the client’s satisfaction.

Perhaps it was just luck or fortune, or the vagaries of time.

However, if asked, I would suggest a few simple steps.

Just a few.

The steps are simple.

You can apply them to any project you are involved with in life—whether fixing a garage door or writing a book or running a multimillion dollar project.

The first step is seeing the end first.

Simple visualization techniques are summarized in many books, including my own book Visual Magic. Just three to five powerful seconds can lead to successful months, or years, of project management.

Here are a few other key steps that can help lead to successful project outcomes.

• Stay two steps ahead.

Staying one step ahead is good. But not good enough. Strive for two steps, so that when questions roll in (they will) you will answer them with confidence. In fact, you’ll knock them out of the ballpark with such vigor that only the brave and intelligence will dare risk asking you another question, leaving you free to get on with your work. See where you are going, and anticipate what is around the corner. Make a weekly plan. Also a three month plan. Remember—effective project management is just the intersection of a specific goal, a specific date, and a specific person (or team) responsible for accomplishing that work.

The practice of staying two steps ahead has a secondary beneficial effect: it helps moderate communications and reduces emotional outbreaks. Many times when a client and donor held a meeting and emotions flew and communications frayed, they inevitably came to our technical group with questions. Once we provided rock solid, objective input—based on staying two steps ahead with our work—tempers almost immediately deflated. More importantly, our projects stayed on course, and on schedule.

Work calmly, methodically and sequentially when possible. You don’t need to thrash with energy and constantly try to control reality. That’s going over the top. That’s the birth of a micro-manager, or the genesis of a person in need of eventual therapy.

Don’t overdo it. Just do it.

• Use a systems approach.

Systems are for the intelligently lazy. Imagine heating a room. It takes time and effort before the room is heated. But once it is, it requires only a small shot of heat now and then to maintain equilibrium. Same as with your project. Work hard at the beginning to set up systems—procedures, routines and methodologies that you can replicate again and again for success.

A poor leader calls ad hoc meetings in an emotional frenzy and yells at staff. A good leader sets regular and consistent times for meetings, knocks off a standard agenda cooly and in sequence, then takes Friday afternoon off to go skiing. When you implement effective systems, staff will arrive on Monday clear about their tasks for the week, and aware of what they can realistically accomplish. Why? Because they met for a half hour the previous Friday to plan out their next week. (Remember? Stay two steps ahead.)

When you have no systems in place you will constantly tackle short-term problems as they flare up, your staff will work late and with little direction and will appear tired and unhealthy. They will eat poorly and stress out because they don’t know what tomorrow will bring. They will complain that their family lives are becoming harried and disjointed.

Put intelligent and replicable systems into place, and staff will happily work reasonable hours to accomplish challenging goals ahead of schedule, and with relative ease.

• Decide that you will begin and end a project.

This may sound like simple drivel. But it’s important.

Years ago I read of a popular ‘Dear Abby’ letter in which the writer said that they wanted to study medicine, but if they did they would not be finished until they were 40 years old. And Abby wrote back, asking them how old they would be at that time if they did not go to med school. The same.

Beginning a project that you believe in, or have been hired to implement, is important. But it’s a waste of time beginning an endeavor if you are not committed—via making a conscious and clear decision—that you will complete the effort, and successfully so. If you are going to make the effort, what benefits do you eventually expect? And if you don’t undertake the project, what will you do instead?

• Make a tentative plan before you take action.

Make a plan and stick with it. It’s like computer programming. If you spend more time planning out the original overall route, or algorithm, then you will have less delays once you begin writing code. Neglect to do that, and you will be completely bogged down in the details of writing code when you realize that you are headed in a completely wrong direction. You will need to begin again. Suddenly, you’ve doubled the time necessary to complete the project. Same as with any project. Plan intelligently, then execute.

Identify the staff and resources and funds you need. If you don’t know, solicit intelligent input from those with ample experience and a track record for success. Ask questions. Ask more questions. Scrutinize for details and see if you can discern the hidden hinges on which the power of the situation swings.

Sometimes, a back of an envelope general plan is better than a detailed, but incomplete plan. What did General Patton say? ‘A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.’

That notion helped win the Second World War.

• Stay clear of crowds when possible.

Keep your mind clear and sharp, your vigor untainted by negativities. Focus on the final project. See the goal, not the obstacles. When you are successful, others may clamor to take credit, to discredit you, or to usurp your power. One of the most astounding truths about reality is that most people are more interested in keeping their secure position than in actually accomplishing anything. I mean ANYTHING. It’s bizarre, but true. If you are one of those people? Get a life. If you are not, then create and nurture the mental and physical pathways leading to your objective, and move on despite the howls of any madding crowds who are intimidated by someone who takes bold action.

• Read the situation before you even begin.

The first phone call you have with a prospective client, the first email you receive, the way you are sent a plane ticket and every detail of your early communications with an organization reverberate with the professionalism of how the eventual situation will likely pan out. My father used to tell me, if you want to gauge the quality of a restaurant, visit their toilets. If the toilets are unkempt and dirty, so too will be the kitchen. It’s the same with managing a project. If your clients can’t organize themselves to get to a conference call on time, can’t send you clear instructions or book your flight and hotel with utter competence, then that lack of professional organization will likely be reflected in the situation to which you arrive.

I once watched a documentary about a famous horse rider who had won multiple world class championships. He told how, when he sat on a new horse, he was able to sense the feelings of the horse, its mood and state of being, within five to ten seconds of being in the saddle. So too it is with life and work and consulting. If the people hiring you don’t coordinate themselves and communications professionally—the situation you are being sent to will likely be the same, and likely worse. Get the vibe of that horse as soon as you get in the saddle in order to read the creature. That will help you better anticipate future needs.

• Focus on a major goal, and lesser goals will fall into place.

If you spend too much time mired in day to day problems, then you will likely continue to swim in an ocean of irrelevant minutiae.

See the Big Picture—the major goal, and make strategic moves necessary to achieve it. Bizarre serendipity accompanies this. When I am galvanized to achieve a large goal—in work and in life—unexpected situations and scenarios help deliver lesser goals, often when unexpected. [I mentioned this in the introduction to my fictional book River of Tuscany as one of the ‘Twelve Lessons of Rivers that Apply to Life.’ It is also lesson two in my book Leadership Lessons from an Irish Chieftain.]

Finally, don’t forget to laugh now and then.

It’s life, so live it!

Don’t be afraid to go out and learn for yourself.

Thanks again for tuning in.

Life is a trip. If you don’t want to take it, it will take you.

You can also venture on your own. Most of us do this with a mental rubber band tied to our back. No matter how far we go, no matter the glory and beauty and uncanny wildness we experience, we usually want a return ticket to Home. Then, once back, we wish to roam again.

Maybe it’s time to remove the dang rubber band. Sure, it’s hard. You’ve got kids. A mortgage. Vesting in your company plan. Tuesday night bowling with friends. A library card. An address where Amazon sends you stuff. A local grocery store. A newspaper subscription. Pets. A gardening service. Some book club you joined.

Oh, yes. We don’t need to attach a rubber band to ourselves, because we’ve been attaching strands of that cable for years and years, getting dug in with ‘stuff’ and ‘things’ and ‘recurring payments.’ And the like.

When I was seven years old, my parents moved our family to Ireland. It was traumatic for me. I left a safe, secure, police patrolled little village with a post office and park and speed limit signs and a railway station and a school with bright lights and huge windows and ample games in the suburbs north of Chicago. Next I knew I was in a pre-fabricated little wooden hut in a country where kids went home for lunch, where teachers swatted students on the hand if they didn’t memorize the national anthem in Gaelic and where there was one dingy light bulb dangling from the classroom ceiling.

I played with the local butcher’s sons on weekends and they’d bring me up some narrow lane crowded with hedges and blackberry brambles and then open a rickety wooden gate to a field so they could gather and lead a few heifers back to their slaughterhouse and the big ass animals bolted and I screamed and cried while my friends thrashed the asses of these massive bovines with some canes they’d cut from the local forest and I was thoroughly bewildered by this land where roads were not rectilinear but winding and where students sang aloud as they walked (and everyone walked, everywhere, for miles and miles in the countryside) and friends had me ride on the crossbar of their bicycles without brakes as they whistled down steep roads with names like Struan Hill and Blackberry Lane.

Oh My God. Ha, that was a needed wake up call.

But, you can’t go back. Sure, I wanted to for years. I dreamed of returning to the United States and seeing my friends in the nice little town park with the merry go round and slides and drinking fountain. But I never did. I grew up in Ireland and discovered girls and learned to drink Guinness and went to school in Europe and explored little alleys of Bologna and Pieve Ligure and after that life as I knew it as a seven year old—orderly, organized, 8.30 p.m. to bed, fast food drive throughs and multiple television channels—was a long way gone.

I have a home now. Well, put it this way—if I absolutely had to leave in 12 hours I could do so. Goodbye books and wine and framed maps of the Cote D’Or wine regions of Burgundy. Farewell cutlery and apron and a few back issues of National Geographic. No big deal. Although I am quite content to stay.

A friend I worked with in Pakistan has spent life working overseas. After four years in Pakistan he packed up one suitcase and left. He wrote last week to say that after two years in Honduras, he packed up two suitcases to leave. Apparently he’s getting more possessive with age.

When I was in college I lived in a house where a woman named Jonell and another guy also lived. Jonell was not a student. She had a real job. She had lots of furniture. She had many plants. She arranged all of these things in the house and it it looked beautiful. One day the other guy who lived there, the owner, told us he had sold the place and we had to move out by the end of the month. Bastard! No wonder he never asked us to sign a lease. For me, not a problem. I chucked a few bags in the back of my pickup truck and camped down by Boulder Creek for a few nights and rummaged through the Daily Camera newspaper classifieds until I found some alternate place to live. For Jonell, moving all her crap to who knows where was more of a hassle. So, this I learned: The More You Have, The More You Have To Take Care Of.

That lesson has served me well.

Having less means that you are freer to roam. Here is what you may learn when you roam:

• Things you never expected. I once crossed the border from El Paso to Juarez and took a train to Mexico City. But first I wandered, wearing a backpack. I went to a market and people were selling fruit salad in plastic cups, and they had sprinkled chili powder on top. It was delicious! Have you ever put chili powder on your fruit salad? If not, then go catch some train to somewhere you’ve never been and learn about the local food on the way. Recently, a winery owner showed me how to pour Prosecco into risotto. Wonderful! Or a friend in New Mexico taught me to coat pancakes with peanut butter before pouring syrup on top. Splendid! And, after decades of ‘killing spaghetti’ by cutting it up with a knife and fork before eating, my friend Elena in Switzerland recently taught me how to eat it with only a fork. No spoon or knife. Finally!

• How to adjust your sense of time. As an American, I was raised to eat dinner at 6.00 p.m. In France we eat dinner at 7.30 p.m. I once visited Chile, where arriving at a restaurant before 9.00 p.m. was laughable. Once my friend Dyna in Panama brought me to her friend’s house to begin cooking tamales after midnight on New Years, because that’s was what everyone did. Cool.
• Hospitality glues us together. As a volunteer in Malawi in Africa years ago, I could never visit a house without being treated to a feast. Sure, the house had no electricity or running water and was built of mud and the owners couldn’t afford shoes, but by god they were going to stuff my stomach full of chicken (‘nkuku’ in the Chichewa language) and nsima (gluey, boiled, pounded maize) and ground nuts and tea. I learned that generosity is abundant even in regions with scarcity.

• Home is just a state of mind. Sometimes I’ll take a week off drinking wine and when I eventually begin again, I realize that the wine I so revered is just this artificial pleasure which is not needed. It’s an additive to life. A bonus. Sometimes an impediment. It’s like all those ‘things’ we have at home that we adore but hardly need. And which, after we let go, we may be able to wander out to a world of starlight and peaks and stories and the most generous locals laughing and joking and insisting that we try their fruit salad. With chili powder sprinkled on top. I heartily recommend you do so. It’s splendid.

Thanks for tuning in again.

My latest Forbes pieces are here and include sailing, wine, and the most gorgeous Dolomite mountains of Italy…

View from outside Pagosa Springs, Colorado

Nomadic hunters and gatherers, even early agricultural societies, aligned their lives and toils to the rhythms of nature. How much and how often they worked, and when they migrated and to where, were influenced by surrounding conditions and pressures: hours of daylight, weather, migration of wildlife, outbreaks of sickness and health of tribal members.

Effort then related to environmental conditions.

On a balmy harvest moon, whole rural societies might toil together to reap and store grain until well after midnight, bolstered by the mutual drive and appreciation of working with neighbors and achieving a common goal. Or, during cold winter storms, Native Americans hunting buffalo on the Great Plains (of what is now the United States) might be curtailed until temperatures ascended. Effort, and time spent wielding effort, were inextricably related to surrounding natural conditions.

Then came the Industrial Revolution, and subsequent abuse of employees working over a dozen hours a day, at least six days a week. Cruel and lengthy work hours were finally curtailed by legislation (and by bold initiative of a few companies) into a healthier and saner (and likely more productive) ‘forty hour workweek.’ This was a blessing within an almost cursed framework—that which incited relentless toil to attain maximum productivity, and profit for a few, within simplistically delineated packages of time.

Today, most employees in the world are expected to begin work at X hour, end work at Y hour and take Z minutes break at Q o’clock to eat lunch.

In other words, a somewhat rectilinear organization of time for toil and relaxation has been superimposed—like a well carpented window frame—over the previously malleable time frame followed by (not imposed by) hunter-gathering tribes and early agricultural societies, who were more attuned to the rhythms of sunlight and seasons.

Near Craters of The Moon National Monument, Idaho

No doubt this is more efficient, and allowed the development of a middle class to emerge from agricultural societies. The fruits of such organization have led to greater aggregate wealth, health care, availability of nutritious and diverse foods, increased life spans and a better climate controlled lifestyle for adherents of society weaned under this structured lifestyle paradigm

As we gained, so also we lost. When is the last time you watched a sunrise or moonrise or peered at a meteor shower or got lost in the woods tracking the flight of wildlife? How often do you wander along the fractal, splitting and unpredictably aligned edges of rocky coastlines?

Layers of Himalayan foothills in Pakistan

As our societies organized time, they also delineated space.

If you inspect a map of the western United States (a topographical ‘quadrangle’ printed by the U.S. Geological Survey), you will notice that the layout of towns and cities and geographical parcels belonging both to private and public landowners is almost rigidly rectilinear. That means: squares, rectangles, straight lines and ninety degree angle corners. This is the Township system, the geographical milieu imposed on California and Oregon and U.S. geographies by limited minded technocrats who dwelled in Washington DC over a century ago. These persons knew little of wilderness except for tangled Virginia overgrowth and swampy banks of the Hudson River.

In other words, a 17^th century Cartesian coordinate system, favored by East coast politicians with no direct knowledge from having ever visited the West, was superimposed over the organic, curling, swerving patterns of geographical natural landforms—rivers, watersheds, wood lots and mountain ridges of the Pacific and Rocky Mountain states.

[I wrote a chapter about this in my book Rivers of Change – Trailing The Waterways of Lewis & Clark. Here is a link to that chapter. It also mentions how ‘climate change’ is nothing new, having altered landscapes 200 years ago, as it has impacted our earth for millions of years.]

Somewhere in the Western U.S.

In the same way that the Industrial Revolution led to the imposition—like an omnipresent flyswatter—of modular and measured parcels of structured minutes and hours over the fluid and ephemeral nature of quotidian time, the map makers of yore (ignoring the pleas of wise explorers such as John Wesley Powell) smacked a grid—like window mesh—over intricate topographical undulations, declivities, hilly skylines and roughly spaced scrublands of the natural topography of the Western United States.

In other words, rather than choose to divide up geography following the natural, fractal boundaries defined by watersheds, they chose a geometry that is largely unrelated to landforms.

Again, as we gained, so we lost.

In adopting this system, those responsible ignored the truth that ranchers and farmers and shopkeepers tended to congregate with neighbors who lived within the natural boundaries of their own watershed, rather than others who may or may not have shared land within the same rectilinear basin/township/range land division. Those communities might also have lived over a mountain ridge within that same system, and therefore included virtual strangers.

The imposition of a rectilinear grid over landscapes legally separated people who lived within the same geographical communities, while associating them with others they may never have met before.

Not Idaho, but Iceland

These two actions, the artificial division of work life into measurable minutes as measured by a clock, and the division of geographies using Cartesian coordinates, have led to effective and replicable management systems, but are unnatural enough to a degree that they may tend to alienate people from the very seasons and geography in which they live. This is not a criticism of these systems as much as an encouragement to temper them with time spent ignoring watches and wandering in the wilds, when possible.

Mountains lack straight edges. Lakes are never shaped as perfect circles. Yet such ‘sloppiness’ belies a greater, powerful longer-term economy of natural energies than any organizational system humans have ever devised.

The ‘badlands’ of New Mexico

That is why the beauty of nature attracts us. It is why the glow of a full moon or the fulsome whish of tidal waters attracts our attentions fully. These vistas may lack the engineered attraction of television scenes where camera angles change each three seconds or sooner; they may not be as dopamine churning as fingering your cellular screen to review the number of ‘likes’ you received within the past hour, but they are—through millions of years of coevolution with life on earth—effectively calming, inspiring, and suggestive that perhaps we should be more appreciative of our precious time on this planet, and our natural surroundings.

We should, at times, listen to nature to better understand how to live with, and within, its wise but jagged organization, as well as its thundering beauty.

Again, thanks for tuning in.

What is success?

There are many definitions. For me, the ability to have control over time is critical—to be able to work where I want, when I want, and to do whatever I want is key, as well as to be financially solvent and to have peace of mind.

Often, contentment is simply the absence of strife.

I’ve not yet gotten there.

But, am working on it. More appropriately – cultivating it.

Internally.

For decades I’ve ingested the wisdom of self-help books, and they have been inspiring in various ways.

Here are a few lessons learned from experience during past decades.

• An open mind and a positive attitude are key—they form about 80% of the magical juice that will allow the fabric of reality to bend to your desires.
• There come moments in life when situations and circumstances fall into place. Pay attention to those times, and why they harmonize with your own desires.

• Sometimes your key to success is revealed by where your enemies lie. Whether you like it or not, whether or not you are honest, tolerant and humble, there come times in life when others rabidly dislike you—through no fault of your own. You will have done nothing wrong to bring their animosity into your life. They detest you merely because you exist. Perhaps it is your very equanimity they dislike. Or your situation or status. Regardless, pay attention, and do not be afraid. For they can be like dye-markers indicating the direction you must journey toward to reach your desired situation. They are beams of light indicating the very signal strengths that, until then, you may have been unaware of possessing. They can be the springboards off which you can leap into new, bolder, newer directions. As Napoleon Hill wrote in his book The Law of Success: “Don’t be afraid of a little opposition. Remember that the “Kite” of Success generally rises AGAINST the wine of Adversity—not with it!”

• At other times, the direction to success may be pointed to by ‘angels’ – those who wish you well. The most ludicrously beneficial advice may arrive, unexpectedly, from that individual you previously considered ludicrous. That strange dude with the twee scarf, and the drooping handlebar mustache? He may whisper advice leading to your personal fortune. On this point, trust me.
• The more you have, the more you have to take care of. Be prudent in your selection of how many possessions you want in life.

• No situation remains the same. You take a job, learn who the key supervisors are, and then, one-by-one, they will leave or be replaced and just when you learn the ropes, the rigging changes. This can provide frustration or opportunity. All situations and power structures alter with time. Often our desires arrive in life, apparently unbidden, by a few mere natural changes in circumstance.
• Discipline—in work, exercise and thinking—is a muscle that thrives on exercise. Still, allow yourself a bit of latitude. After all, we only live once.

• Don’t be too concerned with what other people think of you. They are usually too busy thinking of what groceries to buy tonight, or where the next gas station is to fill up their fuel tank.
• When life throws you in a direction several times, pay attention. I once re-visited the town of Atchison in Kansas, and locked my car keys in the car THREE times in the space of two hours (police and locksmiths came to the rescue). I then slowed down to consider this bizarre situation. Perhaps, I realized, before leaving town on that day trip, I should call a friend who lived there, and who I had promised to contact. I did so. We met, had dinner and both appreciated the reunion. The car key scenario, thankfully, made me re-evaluate the selfish desire to rush out of town without fulfilling a promise made months earlier. Another time I spent six hours hitchhiking in one direction in rural Malawi, Africa. No rides. I crossed the road, hitchhiked in the other direction and got a ride within minutes (there were about the same number of cars moving in both directions). I went home, and realized that I truly had not wanted to make that planned trip to Mount Mulanje that day anyhow, and that not getting a ride worked best. This happened repeatedly in that country: whenever I truly did not want to go somewhere, cars and buses broke down or thunderstorms closed in and those journeys ceased prematurely. Whenever I truly did want to get somewhere, and cultivated a calm confidence in eventual arrival, travel opportunities appeared in abundant, often bizarre ways.

• Move away from people who hassle you or give you a hard time or consider you their punching bag of sorts or their bemused object of perpetual competitive zeal. Breathe deep, walk into the sunshine of relief and be grateful for simply having taken yourself away from a situation you no longer deserve, one you have decided you will simply no longer tolerate.

• Sometimes a simple single action can make an incredibly powerful difference. When cross-country skiing with a brother in Colorado while in college, my hands became painfully cold from wearing wet mittens. This pain pushed all sorts of unrelated psychological anguish into thoughts. I suddenly felt out of control. I thought my backpack was probably packed in a sloppy way, criticized myself for not having a girlfriend at the time and for getting poor grades in studying engineering and having clothes that never fit….My brother, meanwhile, pulled out an extra pair of dry wool mittens and passed them over. Once I put these on, all other worries in the world vanished. Life once again felt good. Sometimes implementing a single positive action can eliminate a dozen unnecessary worries in ways unpredictable. As an ancient eastern saying goes: When the mind is troubled, the multiplicity of life increases; when the mind has found peace, that multiplicity goes away.

• Success? Consider what you want. Take moves, or a move, in that direction daily. Focus on the big picture. Have faith. Disregard distractions that clutter clarity.

Thanks for checking in.

I hope you will follow my Forbes posts by clicking here and pressing ‘Follow,’ or my wine blog by clicking here. And THANK YOU to all new recent followers on Twitter…

Finally, a few book recommendations:

Future Crimes, by Marc Goodman – amazing stories of how cybercrime has become huge business.

The Basque History of the World, by Mark Kurlansy – recommended by a friend; the Basque people of Spain? Their history is cryptic, their culture singular and their cuisine outstanding…who are these people? Fascinating.

Have a superb May!

Years ago I noticed that a lot of popular literature appeared to mention the beverage Coca-Cola, or the abbreviated name – Coke. Tuning in, I soon noticed two other related aspects. First, if the drink was mentioned once, it was often later mentioned another time in the same book. Second, not many other soft drinks were mentioned as frequently.

The question was whether this was paid advertising. This is not illicit or illegal, as product placements are common in movies and sports games. I had just never heard of this possibility before.

The answer to that question is: I still don’t know.

Some books can bubble with surprises

Many of the books read in the past were paperbacks, discarded or elsewhere now. However, today I opened my Kindle and chose dozens of titles collected during past years.

Ignoring those that were historical (before the time when the popularity of this soft drink spread), I searched each of these books for the words ‘Coca-Cola’ or ‘Coke’ – disregarding references to the use of the word coke (lowercase) in the context of the drug cocaine.

Of 52 books checked, surprisingly an exact 50 percent (26 books) mentioned either Coke or Coca-Cola. Of those that did, mention was made an average of 2.5 times per book (more often in fiction than in non-fiction). Of course the sample size is so small that these numbers may mean little, statistically.

Listed below are 26 books that included these words (both fictional books [F] and non-fiction [NF]).

The books are varied. They are about the environment, wine, technology, cooking, history and self-improvement – as well as fictional thrillers. Subtitles have been omitted or abbreviated because of space constraints.

[NF]  War of the Whales: A True Story – by Joshua Horwitz: (1 mention)

[NF]  Wine Wars… by Mike Veseth:  (5 mentions)

[NF]  You Are Here: From the Compass to GPS… by Hiawatha Bray (1 mention)

[NF]  Trust Agents: Using the Web to Build Influence… by Brogan and Smith (2 mentions)

[NF]  Unbroken: A World War ll Story of Survival… by Lauren Hillenbrand (1 mention)

[NF]  Tom’s River: A Story of Science and Salvation, by Dan Fagin (1 mention)

[NF]  To Burgundy and Back Again: A Tale of Wine… by Ray Walker (2 mentions)

[F]  Sweet Liar, by Jude Devereauk (1 mention)

[NF/F]  Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace… by Greg Mortenson (2 mentions)

[F]  The Square of Revenge, by Pieter Aspe (4 mentions)

[F]  The Salome Effect, by James Sajo (6 mentions)

[NF]  The Road to Burgundy, by Ray Walker (1 mention)

[NF]  How to Love Wine: A Memoir and Manifesto, by Eric Asimov (3 mentions)

[NF]  Happy Money: The Science of Smarter Spending, by Dunn and Norton (2 mentions)

[F]  The Expats, by Chris Pavone (2 mentions)

[F]  The Devil’s Banker, by Christopher Reich (5 mentions)

[NF]  Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health… by Thaler and Sunstein (1 mention)

[F]  The November Man, by Bill Granger (3 mentions)

[NF]  Made to Stick…by Heath and Heath (3 mentions)

[F]  Innocent, by Scott Turow (1 mention)

[F]  The Martian, by Andy Weir (2 mentions)

[F]  I Am Pilgrim, by Terry Hayes (4 mentions)

[NF]  The 4-Hour Chef, by Timothy Ferris (1 mention)

[F]  The Colorado Kid, by Stephen King (7 mentions)

[NF]  Corkscrewed… by Robert V. Camuto (2 mentions)

[NF]  The Buy Side… by Turney Duff (2 mentions)

What to conclude?

One book was written by an acquaintance, a self-published author who lives in rural Italy. It mentions Coke six times. Because the book was self-published, I somehow doubt any corporate interests contacted him in advance in the Tuscan countryside to wave a check at him for any potential endorsement.

All this, as well as caffeine and carbonation…

Several bestsellers mention this drink, while other bestsellers (which were obviously going to be bestsellers even before they were printed) do not. Those that do not include Carte Blanche, by Jefferey Deaver, The Key by Simon Toyne, and Steve Jobs, written by Walter Isaacson. Perhaps monetary offers were made for endorsement, but refused.

Or, perhaps this beverage is a universal currency in popular culture, an item so familiar to readers across the world it is known as well as other renowned physical symbols – The White House, Japanese sushi or the koala bear, for example. That might encourage writers, even sub-consciously, to mention this drink as a token of the familiar, a simple icon many readers can collectively recognize and relate to.

Even if no payment is associated with endorsing this product – mentioning it makes it more familiar, hence more likely to be included in the texts of other authors in the future (or on their web pages, such as this).

Free advertising at its best.

Perhaps next time you thumb through a paperback or ebook and see the words Coke or Coca-Cola inside, you too may wonder…

First – all Roundwood Press books have been reduced to $2.99 apiece (at most) for the finale to summertime.

Second – am now reading Originals: How Non-Conformists Move the World, by Adam Grant (2016, Penguin Random House, New York). It’s a good read, and recommended. The gist is that many individuals whose actions changed the world were normal people who held onto their day jobs even when they plunged into a business venture, uncertain of whether their notion would work or not.

Third – also recommended – a quick video where Oprah speaks to Anthony Robbins, and he gives a hint about a ten minute ritual each morning that can change your life.

Fourth – here are sage words about food, life, and respect for locality – from a powerful Scandinavian character I may soon have the fortune to meet (yes, will keep you informed):

Fifth – Here are some quotes  about life, and living, from some ‘success gurus.’

The Book of Secrets: Unlocking the Hidden Dimensions of Your Life, by Deepak Chopra M.D.

“If it weren’t for the enormous effort we put into denial, repression, and doubt, each life would be a constant revelation.”

“Ever since you and I were born, we’ve had a constant stream of clues hinting at another world inside ourselves.”

“Clinging to old behavior is not an option.”

“Thus we arrive at the second spiritual secret: You are not in the world; the world is in you.”

“Violence is built into the opposition of us versus them. “They” never go away and “they” never give up. They will always fight to protect their stake in the world. As long as you and I have a separate stake in the world, the cycle of violence will remain permanent.”

“Now step into your social world. When you are with your family or friends, listen with your inner ear to what is going on. Ask yourself: Do I hear happiness? Does being with these people make me feel alive, alert? Is there an undertone of fatigue? Is this just a familiar routine, or are these people really responding to each other?”

“Just by paying attention and having a desire, you flip on the switch of creation.”

“Instead of seeking outside yourself, go to the source and realize who you are.”

“So you have to give up on the idea that you must go from A to B.”

“Everyone knows how to choose; few know how to let go. But it’s only by letting go of each experience that you make room for the next. The skill of letting go can be learned; once learned, you will enjoy living much more spontaneously.”

“The universe has no fixed agenda. Once you make any decision, it works around that decision.”

“For most people, the strongest externals come down to what other people think because fitting in is the path of least resistance. But fitting in is like embracing inertia.”

“Now let’s reframe the situation in terms of the operating system programmed from wholeness, or one reality. You come to work to find that the company is downsizing, and the following implications begin to come into play: My deeper self created this situation. Whatever happens, there is a reason. I am surprised, but this change doesn’t affect who I am. My life is unfolding according to what is best and most evolutionary for me. I can’t lose what’s real. The externals will fall into place as they need to. Whatever happens, I can’t be hurt.”

“Nothing is random—my life is full of signs and symbols: I will look for patterns in my life. These patterns could be anywhere: in what others say to me, the way they treat me, the way I react to situations. I am weaving the tapestry of my world every day, and I need to know what design I am making.”

“Today is for long-term thinking about myself. What is my vision of life? How does that vision apply to me? I want my vision to unfold without struggle. Is that happening? If not, where am I putting up resistance? I will look at the beliefs that seem to hold me back the most. Am I depending on others instead of being responsible for my own evolution?”

“…a musician coming out of the Juilliard School of Music hears every note on the radio through a different nervous system from someone who has just graduated from M.I.T. as an electrical engineer.”

“The absolute break between life and death is an illusion.”

Wishes Fulfilled: Mastering the Art of Manifesting by Wayne W. Dyer

“If you would like to become a person who has the capacity to have all of your wishes fulfilled, it will be necessary for you to move to that higher plane of existence where you are a co-creator of your life.”

“You must begin by replacing your old set of truths with a belief in the existence of a higher self within you.”

“Your concept of yourself that includes any limitations can be revised by you, and only by you.”

“You simply no longer choose to form your identity on the basis of what you’ve been taught.”

“The greatest gift you were ever given was the gift of your imagination. Within your magical inner realm is the capacity to have all of your wishes fulfilled. Here in your imagination lies the greatest power you will ever know.”

“In order for something to get into this world where things exist and are proved, as Blake says, they must first be placed firmly into your imagination.”

“Be willing to dream, and imagine yourself becoming all that you wish to be.”

“Highly functioning self-actualized people simply never imagine what it is that they don’t wish to have as their reality.”

“Do not let your imagination be restricted to the current conditions of your life…”

“In your imagination, you can replace the thought of I will one day be in a better place, with I am already in my mind where I intend to be.”

“Remind yourself that your imagination is yours to use as you decide, and that everything you wish to manifest into your physical world must first be placed firmly in your imagination in order to grow.”

“Let go of all doubt, forget about the when.”

“It is absolutely imperative to learn how to assume, in your imagination, the feeling of already having and being what you desire.”

“You want to decide to live from the end you’re wishing for—not toward an end that others have decided for you.”

“As William Shakespeare put it, “Our doubts are traitors.” Anyone or anything trying to diminish your inner feelings with doubt is a traitor to be banished.”

“I always loved the words of Michelangelo regarding this subject: “The greater danger is not that our hopes are too high and we fail to reach them, it’s that they are too low, and we do.” ”

“My story concerning the manifestation of abundance throughout my life is never allowing anyone, no matter how persuasive, to infiltrate my imagination, which feels prosperous and able to attract unlimited abundance.”

“State your intention to live a happy, contented life…”

Below are selected quotes from two books recently read.

Both, by chefs, are not only about their lives, but their philosophies of life.

The Devil in the Kitchen: Sex, Pain, Madness, and the Making of a Great Chef by Marco Pierre White.

“You can’t just say, “Come on, boys, let’s try to get it right.” That just won’t work. If you are not extreme, then people will take shortcuts because they don’t fear you.”

“Later on, when I went on to run my own kitchens, I too would insist on silence.”

“I discovered that there is something beautiful about the sounds—chopping, clattering, sizzling—of a working kitchen.”

“When I eventually came to run my own kitchens, I promised myself that if an apology was due, I would make it in front of the rest of the staff.”

“But I had seen talent in other chefs—it’s just the touch, the way the food falls, the way the sauce pours, the way the garnish is put on the plate. If you watch a great chef, he moves elegantly as he cooks.”

“I talked to my new friends about food with such passion that they all thought I’d lost the plot. They were amused by my obsession.”

“Three years earlier I’d used my spare time to fish or poach, and now I was in this melting pot of rock ’n’ roll people. The contrast seemed extreme. They did what they wanted, when they wanted, and that attitude was infectious.”

“…lamb, rosemary and Provençal vegetables go well together.”

“Cook’s brain. It’s that ability to visualize the food on the plate, as a picture in the mind, and then work backward. There’s no reason why domestic cooks can’t do the same thing. Cooking is easy: you’ve just got to think about what you are doing and why you are doing it. Too many professional chefs never think about what they are doing.”

“When you fear, you question. If you don’t fear something, you don’t question it in the same way. And if you have fear in the kitchen, you’ll never take a shortcut. If you don’t fear the boss, you’ll take shortcuts, you’ll turn up late.”

“You move on, don’t you? I didn’t feel sad to leave. I felt it was time to move on, time to progress.”

“I became obsessed with what I call the illusion of grandness. The plates and silverware had to be the finest, and the tablecloths had to be beautiful.”

“Young men were coming into the industry because they wanted to be famous, not because they wanted to cook. They aspired to be celebrity chefs rather than chefs. Lots of famous chefs today don’t look whacked, because they don’t work. They have a healthy glow and a clear complexion. There is blood in their cheeks. They haven’t got burns on their wrists and cuts on their hands.”

“If food is that good, you don’t have to do that much to it.”

Bacon wrapped figs with cheese, cooked by Danielle Davis

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain.

“And the cooks? The cooks ruled.”

“No one understands and appreciates the American Dream of hard work leading to material rewards better than a non-American.”

“The ability to ‘work well with others’ is a must.”

“The great cathedrals of Europe were built by craftsmen — though not designed by them.”

“When I hear ‘artist’, I think of someone who doesn’t think it necessary to show up at work on time.”

“I don’t eat mussels in restaurants unless I know the chef personally, or have seen, with my own eyes, how they store and hold their mussels for service.”

“Cooks hate brunch. A wise chef will deploy his best line cooks on Friday and Saturday nights; he’ll be reluctant to schedule those same cooks early Sunday morning, especially since they probably went out after work Saturday and got hammered until the wee hours.”

“I won’t eat in a restaurant with filthy bathrooms.”

“Vegetarians, and their Hezbollah-like splinter-faction, the vegans, are a persistent irritant to any chef worth a damn.”

“If the restaurant is clean, the cooks and waiters well groomed, the dining room busy, everyone seems to actually care about what they’re doing chances are you’re in for a decent meal.”

“Like I said before, your body is not a temple, it’s an amusement park. Enjoy the ride.”

“Popping raw fish into your face, especially in pre-refrigeration days, might have seemed like sheer madness to some, but it turned out to be a pretty good idea.”

“Do we really want to travel in hermetically sealed popemobiles through the rural provinces of France, Mexico and the Far East, eating only in Hard Rock Cafes and McDonald’s? Or do we want to eat without fear, tearing into the local stew, the humble taqueria’s mystery meat, the sincerely offered gift of a lightly grilled fish head? I know what I want.”

“You need, for God’s sake, a decent chefs knife. No con foisted on the general public is so atrocious, so wrongheaded, or so widely believed as the one that tells you you need a full set of specialized cutlery in various sizes.”

“Nothing will set you apart from the herd quicker than the ability to handle a chef’s knife properly.”

“Margarine? That’s not food.”

“It takes so little to elevate an otherwise ordinary-looking plate. You need zero talent to garnish food.”

“…as I came to understand — that character is far more important than skills or employment history.”

“All the food was simple. And I don’t mean easy, or dumb. I mean that for the first time, I saw how three or four ingredients, as long as they are of the highest and freshest quality, can be combined in a straightforward way to make a truly excellent and occasionally wondrous product.”

” ‘You know, Anthony,’ he said, ‘I have many, many enemies. It’s good, sometimes, to have enemies — even if you don’t know who they are. It means you are . . . important. You must be important. . . important enough to have an enemy.’ ”

Finally – my most recent Forbes posts are here.

Rivers alter course over time – The fabric of reality is pliable

Tributaries join primary currents – Smaller objectives are achieved in the wake of pursuing larger goals

A river’s true power is hidden from view – Personal power can be inconspicuous

A river needs a flow path – To enter a new reality, first imagine it

Rivers meander to balance their flow – Misfortune can swing us toward fortune

Steeper flows have fewer meanders – Challenging goals provide fewer distractions

Da Vinci’s lesson:

A River which has to be diverted from one place to another ought to be coaxed and not coerced with violence – It may be better to work with the flow of times and temperament of personalities rather than defy them

Machiavelli’s lesson:

Fortune is a river – Fortune floods into life

Great rivers grow from many small tributaries – True success comes from helping others succeed

Faith flows like a river; fear looms like a dam – Faith floats us toward our desires; fear generates obstructions

The river of today is not that of tomorrow – Seize opportunities that may not reappear

Rivers find their own confluence – Personalities modify journeys

Images and text* © T. Mullen. Text from the book River of Tuscany.

(*Except for Leonardo’s and Machiavelli’s sage words, of course.)

It’s Tuesday. Oops.

Commitment…to a bridge, a lover, or writing a blog

I write a weekly blog about self-publishing, which is published every second Tuesday. For the past two weeks I’ve not delivered, not published. Suddenly, the prospect of becoming an extinct blogasurus, for lack of publication, looms large.

I was going to write a polished blog post tonight, then deliver.

Forgot.

So, let me tell you about two magnificent books you must consider reading.

Food News from California

Book 1. Cooked – A Natural History of Transformation, by Michael Pollan.

If you like eating, Cooked is the book.

I found it in a cafe bookstore, and tucked into hours of gastronomic entertainment from Michael Pollan, who has produced many bestselling books regarding food and eating in recent years. This book includes an excellent chapter about barbeque, and another section that talks in depth about making bread. Last night, I found out that this book has been made into a Netflix documentary series (with excellent videos of Australian hunting-gathering, by the way).

Book 2: Lunch with the FT (as in, Financial Times).

These interviews over lunch, over many decades, were published in the Financial Times newspaper. Many are golden, including the cheap lunch in a ramshackle airport office in Dublin with Michael O’Leary – CEO of Ryanair. He’s cheap. He’s theater. He’s an object to loathe. People hate the man, who advocated charging people to use toilets on airplanes, until he realized that would reduce their incentive to buy his on-board booze to drink.

But, he saves you thousands of dollars, or pounds, or Euros, via his inexpensive flights.

There are also interviews with George Soros, James Watson, Morgan Tsvangirai, Steve Wozniak, and Jeff Bezos. Soros talks of how his father’s evading concentration camps by acquiring fake identity papers gave him the appreciation of what it takes to survive, and the propensity for personal motivation:”…the fact that it might be more dangerous to be passive – it can be less risky to take risk.”

Sit here, and read…

So, Yes.

I neglected this blog for a few weeks. But thanks for not abandoning the site.

We’re Back.

Six years ago I was studying in northern England.

We took a trip south to London’s Royal Albert Hall. There, we listened to speakers from the Institute of Directors. These included the mayor of London – Boris Johnson, Olympic gold medalist (and organizer of the London 2008 Olympics) – Sebastian Coe, and computer company founder – Michael Dell. Another speaker was Tim Smitt. He had founded the Eden Project in Cornwall. This is a rainforest housed in domes inside an abandoned quarry, now one of the UK’s top ten visitor attractions. Before beginning that project, he had been a young musician.

He told his story.

“In 1981 I had the good fortune to have a Number One hit record in France called Midnight Blue. I was in a chauffeur-driven limo going down the Champs Élysées and the record was playing on the car stereo. It was the biggest selling record in French history at that time, and the record that was going to knock it off the top spot was also written by me, which was tough – and I burst into tears. I had never felt so miserable in my entire life, and I decided I would give up the music industry, because what I want to say to you is that very often people make a terrible mistake in their life, that they have a vision of what success is for them, and it is the weirdest thing that you suddenly have this success and you are wondering…Why does it not feel great? Why do I not feel changed? It felt like ashes, it felt meaningless.”

Sometimes the light just arrives

Sometime after that, Tim began working on creating the Eden Project, which gave value to his life. He also learned to be honest with himself. As he said:

“I believe in Tinkerbell theory. I really do. If you get three or four people to believe in something, it will happen. I believe in last man standing, which is that if you have a certain amount of charm and people know you will not go away, they will eventually pay you large sums of money to do so. I also believe that you should not pretend to know what you do not know, because people are fantastically generous if you admit your ignorance, and they love pricking your bubble if you pretend to know more than you do.”

The Blue Skies of Letting Go

Sage words from a down-to-earth visionary.

The book Visual Magic includes similar stories about unusual ways to take control in life.

More insights are in some of my books, including:

Visual Magic

Synchronicity as Signpost

There can be beauty in adjusting our focus in life

Today is the second anniversary of the online version of Roundwood Press. Thanks for your readership, and your business. Truly. The most popular title remains Water and Witchcraft, though The Deep Sand of Damaraland and Synchronicity as Signpost follow closely behind.

Putting this online publishing company together has been fun, though much work remains. I still work my ‘day job’ as a contracted consulting manager and engineer for infrastructure projects located throughout the world. Balancing writing, consulting, and moving to a new home (Bordeaux, France) has been a mind spinning experience.

And…when the mind spins because of change, we need to remember our overall priorities to move in the direction of our dreams. Sometimes it helps to have a tool, a method, or a reminder of how to keep ‘on track.’ Fortunately, I recently discovered one that is simple, but powerful.

Thoughts are like sheep – sometimes they wander, sometimes you herd them in one direction

During a recent drive across huge, open spaces between the cities of Las Vegas and Albuquerque in the USA, I had hours of free time to think.

This occurred during a major transition time in my life – including deciding on ‘the next phase.’  These free hours on the road provided time to mentally ‘clear the clouds.’

But how? Multiple aspects of life swirled through my thoughts like clouds shifting in cross winds.

During those hours, I invented a potent method for clarifying thoughts and identifying priorities.

I’ll share this because it rapidly put me on a clearer path regarding where to focus in life, and what to prioritize.

First, I decided to identify all ‘loose ends’ and ‘major items’ in life that appeared important to address. Identifying these was like herding sheep into a corral. Once they were distinctly in one place, I could better organize them.

I soon identified 13 aspects of life that needed to be looked at. These included what to do with a chunk of property I own, how to assess current finances, why certain relationships were working or not working or bothersome, and what next steps to take after I moved to a new country.

Open space – beautiful for clearing thoughts

[Without a tape recorder and not being able to write while driving, I remembered these 13 concerns by creating mental images, then assembling these into a larger, memorable, scenario. This ‘mnemonic’ or mental trick for remembering lists, is simple and powerful. To learn more, I suggest reading Moonwalking with Einstein to learn the techniques, as well as to learn about the intriguing world of competitive memory championships].

Completing this first step was huge. While cruising at 85 miles per hour through raw, desert beauty, I was mentally able to quickly identify which items in life needed to be considered, addressed, and perhaps resolved.

It was now time for step two. Perhaps it’s because I recently developed a method for scoring wine values that I decided to somehow ‘score’ which of these 13 items were most important to deal with.

To come up with a balanced solution, and to keep both halves of the brain happy, I assigned a priority score for each item – the corralled sheep – in two ways. Here’s what to do. Based on analytical thinking (cold, emotionless, focused intelligent brain power), assign a value score (from, say, 1 to 10) to prioritize which items are most important to deal with. Second, based on emotions, what score would you give each item based on how strongly it impacts your feelings? For example, from an analytical point of view (and a need to pay bills) reviewing personal finances naturally scored high. Yet it also scored reasonably high from an emotional point of view because I’ve learned that decent finances provide potential freedom to increase travel time and writing time, and because I also remembered certain strong emotions (ones I wanted to avoid) attached to past times when income was tight.

Priorities may include making time for your friends

That was easy. There would be two scores. I’d simply take the average of the two.

I then decided to do more. For BOTH the analytical and emotional scores – I would give scores for three different time periods: the coming month, the coming year, and the coming five years.

It was time to pull over to eat lunch. I brought a laptop computer inside a highway restaurant and entered scores in a spreadsheet.

This simple scoring process will likely bring you key realizations:

1. Prioritizing for a month or a year can be straightforward. But for five years? Some items will either get a very high score, or a very low score – depending on whether you are going to dedicate yourself to them for the next five years. So many of the five year scores have two numbers. For example, let’s say one item of concern is building a new website. Will you really put in the constant effort to maintain that website for five years? If the answer is a definite YES, it may score 9.5 for priority. But if you’re unsure and may not dedicate effort for more than a year, then the long term – five year – priority value may fall to 2 out of 10.

You suddenly realize you have decisions to make. What will your highest priorities be for the next five years?

2. This process can also help you realize your values. For me, the aspects of continually learning, of meditating/visualizing on a routine basis, and of maintaining sound relationships with friends and co-workers all scored highly – analytically and emotionally – for all time periods.

3. This process can also dramatically reduce uncertainties in your life.

I began with a list of 13 uncertainties – major aspects of life which I was unsure of how to prioritize to address. By the end of this process I realized only four were immediately critical. These four could be bunched into two groups of two. There were now only two major uncertainties regarding life priorities. Because these two groups were similar – from a professional standpoint – I merged them together to become one larger item.  Those four items were really part of one concern – about dedicating myself to a professional avenue.

By the time I was driving on the highway again, less than forty minutes had passed since this I began this identification and ‘scoring’ process. Already the nebulous cloud of uncertainties in life – the field of wandering sheep – had been reduced in size from 13 to one.

Wow.

Priorities may include being grateful for what you have

4. The process may make you realize certain priorities you never even knew existed.

For example, one item to address was whether I should keep a certain piece of property or not. From an analytical point of view, this seems to be a good investment because it requires  little money to maintain. From an emotional point of view, I love visiting this location, even if only for a few days a year. Considering both analytical and emotional priority ‘scores,’ it made sense to hold onto this property for the next year. But for five years? The decision of whether or not to sell the property would depend on whether I needed to gain money to buy a house.

A house? Wow. I had not even considered that before.

In other words, this scoring exercise was not only useful, but illuminating. My final decision was to keep the property for at least a year, but be flexible in the long term regarding selling it. That was it. There was no further need to consider that aspect of life for now.

Below is a table based on what I used. I’ve included some representative examples of ‘loose ends.’ Everyone will have different items they need to consider and prioritize. The entire process takes less than an hour – but is powerful.

Once you have identified priorities, remember that you can ‘begin at the end’ to resolve them. I’ve written about the process in my short book titled Visual Magic.

This week it’s time for something different.

I write two blogs – one about wine, the other about books and publishing.

What to do after you’ve launched a new book

Every Tuesday I try to fire off one blog post, alternating posts on different weeks between the wine and publishing sites.

Why Tuesday? I checked the stats. People don’t check the internet much on weekends. They’re at football games or soccer matches or fixing up their homes or cooking with friends. They tend to look at the internet quite a lot on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. So I write during weekends and post on Tuesdays, hoping to snag attention when most eyes surf the net.

This week – I am posting the same blog for both sites: vinoexpressions (also known as wineandwork), as well as roundwoodpress.

The reason is simple.

This week we go from Barolo…

A few years ago, a friend sent a link to check out Wine Library TV. Someone named Gary Vaynerchuk ranted about wines on videos. I thought he was a bit over the top and loud, but he did come across as down to earth.

…to books

I’m now reading Vaynerchuk’s book – Crush It. Basically, he used the internet to promote his family wine business and succeeded wildly, then decided to step away from wine in order to work on promoting how the internet can be used for personal branding. The book is filled with short videos that keep the narrative lively.

This self-appointed wine wizard transformed himself into a branding guru.

Branding –

Here are a few quotes from Vaynerchuk’s book regarding following your passion, and branding yourself.

“…live and breathe your passion. Do that, and you’ll no longer differentiate between your work life and your personal life. You’ll just live, and love doing it.”

“Everyone – EVERYONE – needs to start thinking of themselves as a brand. It is no longer an option; it is a necessity.”

“…skills are cheap, passion is priceless.”

“Tell me your story, and if you’re good, I’ll come back for more. Then I’ll tell my friends, and they’ll come…”

[Italicized quotes above – copyright: Vaynerchuk, Gary (2010). CRUSH IT! Kindle Edition.]

His steps toward success in building your brand are simple, but require that you work your tail off. The major factors he attributes toward succeeding in building your brand are: do what you are passionate about, create excellent content, keep it down to earth and real, create a community, and make the world listen. This is a fun book to read, because Vaynerchuk is down to earth and energized.

Whether you like wine, are an aspiring author, are looking for work, or trying to carve out your own professional niche, it’s worth reading this book. Why? Because personal branding is critical to selling your product or yourself. I never met Gary. But what he says resonates with the same message provided by the authors of the book titled: APE, Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book, described in an earlier blog post: if you want to succeed in this internet wired world, don’t pump out BS or try to be what the Irish call a ‘chancer.’ Because whether you are describing wines you love or trying to get others to tune into your latest series of sci-fi or pet grooming book series, you truly have to believe in what you are doing.

No BS

That confidence resonates with others.

Your brand will grow as your outreach expands, your confidence notches up, and your communities grow.

Community – 

The internet has created a brave new democratic space. Writing web log posts has allowed me to gain access to a community of people who are passionate and informed about what they do. The virtual community is far larger and more diverse and international than if I was only able just to walk around the ‘hood getting to know neighbors.

Let me illustrate, first about wines, then about publishing.

If I have a question about wine from the French Riviera or the Ligurian coast, I’ll contact blogger Chrissie who writes The Riviera Grapevine; if I want to know about Italian Piedmont wines such as Barolo (or if I want to talk about a new fiction book idea), I can drop an email to author / wine guide / blogger James Sajo who lives in Italy and runs a guide business and is dialed into local wines. To get the scoop on the best deals in Bordeaux wines, I’ll get in touch with my friend Les Kellen, who runs wine tours and operates a guest house in Blaye, Bordeaux.

If I want advice on publishing and marketing (or want to see some zippy artwork), I’ll check out Robin Kalinich’s site, or check out the blog or drop a message to Fiona Pearse – an IT guru and author living in London.

Bordeaux is a region, a wine blend, and also a very successful brand

Using the internet, I don’t have to hop on a plane or drive (though that’s fun) to get up to date information from people who are passionate about what they do. Instead, I just check in with the virtual world, and zip off an email query.

Another Word about Wine and Books –

What else do wine and books have in common? I subscribe to the Wine Spectator magazine. Because I’m working in Asia, I get the digital rather than the print edition. So I recently looked at the site and realized they have an entire wine course – with quizzes, instructional materials, quotes, and multiple videos that are free for subscribers. As the site says, homework was never so much fun. One lesson is about Buying Wine. To encourage people to be experimental at wine stores, they write:

“Think of a trip to the wine store as if it were a trip to the book store…None of the titles are familiar, so you read the plot descriptions on a few back covers as well as the employees’ comment cards…Buying wine is pretty much the same, only a bottle of wine is often less expensive than a hardcover book…” [Copyright Wine Spectator magazine.]

Thanks, as always, for tuning in.

In California recently my friend Nazli Ghassemi, author of Desert Mojito (a fictional book about Dubai) recommended a fresh book about self-publishing. The landscape of this world is changing so fast that most books about the topic are obsolete if they are more than a year old.

Home, Studio, Publishing House

The book is titled APE: Author, Publisher, Entrepreneur – How to Publish a Book, by Guy Kawasaki and Shawn Welch. At $2.99 for the e-book version, this is a steal. The book covers all aspects of self-publishing, but is certainly geared for e-books, an avenue that wasn’t available on a practical basis when I published my own first book in 2004. The book includes practical editing advice (hire an editor, first, then check yourself for copy editing; one chapter explains the correct use of serial commas, hyphens, and underlining). It also discusses marketing, e-book formats, how to sell your book on Amazon, B&N, Google and Kobo, as well as how to market your book.

Another book that addresses book sales, but it is really about how the internet is changing YOUR world, and how you can use it to change yourself is Trust Agents – Using the Web to Build Influence, Improve Reputation, and Earn Trust. (Thanks again, Nazli!) This book will change the way you think about how you choose to navigate through day-to-day life, and work. It basically says that most humans can spot a fraud, and those who use the internet often spot the bull&%$! floating around. This book (and some websites listed below) highlight a truth amplified by the ubiquity of the internet – that to succeed in your chosen field, you have to be genuine. Otherwise few will visit your website, buy your product, or want to communicate with you.

Farewell to the Fortress of Mainstream Publishing

Until recently, many self-publishers were regarded disdainfully by New York publishers, as well as by some authors (one author refused to write a testimonial for my first book, claiming that professional publishing equated with higher standards of editing quality; he should read the latest ‘blockbuster’ Dan Brown novel, complete with multiple and egregious editing errors). Nowadays, who cares? Enough authors have found that scaling the walls of Fortress New York Publishing Houses is a waste of effort when there are lush, economically fertile publicity pastures elsewhere. If you want to self-publish, read these books.

I almost attended a three-day internet marketing conference in Boston during vacation. Before going there I decided to contact an Irish friend who recently started up a new e-commerce business in London. He told me to hold off on the conference, and instead check out the sites listed below. Hope you don’t mind that I am sharing some (not all) of these, Howard Kingston (of Future Ad Labs HQ, 42-46 Princelet St, London, E1 5LP).

One of the key lessons shared is that if you attend a conference, forget about sidling up to ‘key’ and well-known people and faking that you like them. Instead, find some buds – whoever – who are the type you want to hang out and drink a beer with. You’ll feel comfortable, spend time with people who share your interests and values, and good things will start to happen.

Lessons learned from marketing ‘the 4-hour body.’

Everything you should know about book marketing.

The future of books.

Search Engine Optimization Recipe

Zen Social Media Marketing (for UK readers); Click here for USA readers.

Podcast:

This podcast is not cutting edge.  But, if you are a novelist and like listening to radio discussions, check this out from PR Insider Radio Show – about the challenges of getting publicity for your novel. It’s engaging and informative. If you want to promote your book – you should try gaining all the knowledge that will help you.

Today – Roundwood Press releases a new ebook.

Okay, it’s a pamphlet.

How powerful are these lessons?

Nine hundred and ninety-nine years, one month, ten days and give or take about an hour ago (as of this posting), Ireland’s greatest ever chieftain – Brian Boru – wielded these lessons to change the destiny of an island, and crack the power of Viking invaders.

On Easter Day in the year 1014, these lessons powered the man who grew up as a shepherd boy to galvanize a thousand tribes, summon enemy longboats from as far away as Iceland to do battle, coalesce the energies of vibrant but disheveled island people, and smash the raging armies of arrogant foreign plunderers. Boru’s greatest battle – at Clontarf along the Irish Sea – raged all day, but the outcome was clear by mid-afternoon.

This pamphlet summarizes challenges faced, and victories won, by Brian Boru, and highlights lessons he mastered to change the fate of Ireland.

Today, these lessons are still potent – whether to gain personal victory, or to reshape the course of life.

This is the first publication from the new Dreaming Leader series. It kicks off a series of concise, inexpensive lessons that are clear, simple, and practical.  Upcoming titles will include lessons from a Carthaginian general who invaded and defeated the Romans, as well as lessons from Eleanor of Aquitaine, a powerful but unconventional female ruler in France.

The main Roundwood Press website page will soon be updated to include this new series.  In the meantime, click on the cover image above for information from Amazon, or click here for details from Barnes and Noble.

You don’t need an ereader – you can download the Kindle app or Nook app to your phone, computer, or Ipad.  We realize and understand how you love printed books.  So do we.  And they are not going away.  But the time has come to also enjoy another format for reading – that of ebooks.

We appreciate your visit to Roundwood Press.

As the Irish say – Go raibh míle maith agat.  

Let a thousand thanks be upon you.

Click here to read more about Leaderships Lessons of an Irish Chieftain.

Welcome to Roundwood Press.  Millennia of battles, raids, subjugation and victory forged the character of Irish people, while years of writing shaped these books.  I hope you find a topic you enjoy.

These books were written over a span of decades. Whether you like fiction or non-fiction, or history, adventure, romance, philosophy or self-help – something here should suit your tastes. Some reads are quick and easy, while others are longer and more intricate.

Click on the Home tab – there are a dozen books available.  Here are suggestions about what to choose from any series:

Water and Wine Series –

Wine and Work – is an easy read that includes words, stories, and insights told by more than 50 people from around the world.

African Raindrop Series – 

The Deep Sand of Damaraland – is a simple read about quirky people working in a stunning land.

Curving Trail Series – 

Synchronicity as Signpost – is a fast, easy read that may open your mind to fresh possibilities.

Rivers of Time Series 

River of Tuscany – includes tales of battle, genius, and even cookery based on real events.

Vagabond Series –

Trailing Tara – skips around the world with unusual surprises, determined characters, and a hunt that can change the course of civilization.

Thanks for visiting Roundwood Press.