No desserts at the office canteen, ever

Let me give you an example: I never have desserts at my work office’s canteen. No exceptions. This makes my decision process straightforward: “Should I have a dessert? No. Move on. Nothing to see here”. I’ve been able to maintain this habit for 5 years. If I want a dessert, it will need to be elsewhere, like during a dinner night out.

If I would allow myself for a dessert only now and then, I am pretty confident it would derail my sugar consumption, since “every now and then” would be dictated by how much will power would be available on any given day, and there are days where I just have too much going on and will power is at short supply.

A single dessert at the canteen would break the streak, allowing for optionality to creep in, and deliver me to my limited will’s mercy.

No exceptions, less decisions, more output

I’ve been consistently accumulating several of these simple rules / habits throughout the past years, which allowed me to build strong foundations, move closer to the type of person I want to be, achieve what I want to achieve, and sustain a high output for a significant amount of time. Here is a list of the most impactful ones:

• At least one hike or long walk every week. 8+ year streak.
• No alcohol consumption, other than at New Year’s Eve. 8+ year streak.
• No desserts at my office’s canteen. 5 year streak
• On work days, starting at about 9AM until I finish the work day, I disable internet access on my personal phone, but still have it available for incoming calls or SMS. It allows me to focus, and enter “the zone”. 5+ year streak.
• Every work day, write down on a personal .txt log the relevant work events that happened throughout the day. 5+ year streak
• Deeply ingrained habit to write relevant events in my personal journal. 12+ year streak.
• On the first days of each month (normally the first weekend), go through every financial asset I own and write down their balance, invest or move stale funds. 8+ year streak.
• Intermittent fasting: only start eating at 12AM, this is, no breakfast. Even on hiking days. 3 to 4 year streak.
  • Makes me feel good, focused, and end up spending less time on yet another meal during the day.
  • When I first started skipping breakfast, I still ate something before a hike, and every time that happened I would end up breaking the streak, and have breakfast again most of the days. Once I realized that it was completely ok to hike without having breakfast, the routine finally stuck for good. Can’t tell if this will work forever, but until now it has been great.

Simple rules, consistent habits

These simple rules were a boon for me to implement consistent habits, and the reasons why I think they kept working so well are:

• they are simple and easy to remember
• they don’t make room for exceptions, thus less dependent on my will power (a limited resource)
  • as a result, I am able to redirect that will power to more productive endeavours.
• they become almost like a personality trait which some people know me for. This external expectation of consistency also starts to help.

They are all so ingrained in my life that if any of them slip, something starts to feel off and uncomfortable, just like any other deep habit or routine that gets halted.

Give them a try. There are rules and obsessions worth having.

I once struck up a conversation with someone during one of my trips where I told them that there wasn’t a prescriptive way of organising work at the company I was working on at the time. We were not dogmatic in using kanban, scrum, lean or waterfall, we used whatever worked best for the problem at hand, many times resulting in a mix of these approaches, and even changing them mid-project.

Leads and people in the ground were trusted to take ownership and organize accordingly.

My interlocutor, with a disdained grin said “You do that? You don’t do Scrum?”. One could almost hear the “pff, ridiculous” undertone.

Process should not be a dogma

I still stand by it. You should not be dogmatic about it in scenarios where the problems keep changing and there is a constant need to adapt. At some point, all companies need to adapt to overcome competition, changing consumer behaviours, regulations, etc. The only thing that really changes between companies is how much time it takes for that change cycle to happen.

It is sensible to have a stable and institutionalised process across a company, when these cycles are long and harmony between people and departments is valued highly, but that same approach in a fast changing environment will the company’s death kneel, crumbling under its own comfortable rigidness.

Overall, the world is moving faster and faster, specially with the ongoing revolution of AI that is slowly creeping through many branches of our society, and the increasing amount of people entering the labor market.

An example

On one of the latest projects I was involved in, where requirements would change very rapidly, and product market fit was crucial to first understand, having bulky processes would have done more harm than good. What actually worked was:

• Having a simple tracker
• Small team
• (Almost) every day in the morning having a talk async or sync (via call or in the office), where each one of the team members mentioned what they were going to focus during the day, and de-dup where required
• Once product market fit was established and the product matured, iterations started being mostly incremental, and we started adding processes wherever controlled chaos was not being productive, this is, wherever things started to break and harm the project’s objectives. No process was added for the sake of adding it and make it sound professional

Silver bullets

To this day I cringe when thinking about that conversation.

There is not a silver bullet. Processes are like tools. You should use the right one for the right job, combining them when necessary. You wouldn’t use a jackhammer to drive a simple nail.

Don’t be a process zealot. Use it as a means to an objective.

• 1 day consumption = 100W * 24h = 2.4k Wh
• 365 days * 2.4k Wh * 18 years = 15,768k Wh = 0.015768 GWh

GPT-4 took about 50 GWh of electricity to train.

It takes 3,170 times more energy to train a model than to raise a human to 18 years old.

GPT-4 is really good at specific tasks, but is nowhere near as generically inteligent or able to function efficiently and adaptively within the real world. GPT-4 can’t even drive a car.

This suggests that just scaling existing models will not be enough to reach real AGI. New fundamental breakthroughs are still required to get there.

Origin Story

During the past years I’ve been wrestling with the idea of building a website that could be:

• Useful
• Aligned with my views
• Lean: debloated both in terms of experience, but also behind the scenes
• Low Maintenance: minimally dependent on outside sources of information

Turns out that ticking all boxes proved to be incredibly hard, but somewhere around 2025 I noticed how hard it was to come up with good ideas of how to use my free time to the fullest. Turns out that even though there were tons of exciting things to do in the world, not all were aligned with my ideals.

On the other hand, time here on Earth is very limited, and in between busy lives and distractions, opportunities, time and energy pass in an instant. We’ve been given a beautiful gift, and we should honour it.

Hence the idea to build vivotime.net. It shows you, without any sugar coating, how much life time you are predicted to have left, and then according to your goals, it suggests a series of meaningful ideas that you can allocate and manage for the time you have left. That’s it.

Tech

Vivotime.net was implemented using Laravel, Livewire, picoCSS and a sqlite database. Stripe is used for processing payments. I’ve tried to make it as lean as possible. No need for an overpowered MySQL database, or using tailwind, react, vue, or any other (default) technology du jour that would not serve the site’s purposes.

Docker is used to containerize the website, including the nginx web server. Deploying the website is as easy as running a bash script, and setting up the dev environment is likewise a script execution away. Pure bliss.

There is something beautiful about keeping things contained to their essence, with nothing more, nothing less than what is required.

As a result of having only a few moving parts, maintaining the website has been a breeze.

A Note about AI

I’ve liberally used Copilot, most of the time with Opus 4.5. There is no way I could have finished this website in such a short (hourly) time span, considering that I’ve worked on it sporadically during some free hours on weekends or after a busy work day.

There is something to be said about coding on these limited time slots, something that I would have found much more challenging before LLMs, given that I would have needed continuous large time blocks just to get all context, system designs and best practices loaded into my head. AI makes the warm up process much easier, and of course, it is a powerful code machine that can produce high quality code, if directed correctly.

How it works

Vivo Time was built to be simple and to do a limited set of things, but do them right.

Step 1: Find how much time you have left

First, you need to introduce your year of birth, and optionally your sex, health status, relationship status, if you have children or not, and your occupation. These are used to provide an increasingly accurate estimation of how much time you might have left, and to provide you with relevant objective suggestions (for example, if you already have children, the “Start a Family” objective will not be presented).

Moreover, if you do not want the above information to be saved and associated to your account, you can enable this privacy setting in your account settings:

Step 2: Allocate objectives

Then you are presented with a list of objective suggestions, which you can allocate or hide from the list. Each allocated objective decreases the amount of useful time left.

Step 3: Manage objectives

Afterwards you can manage your objectives by changing their allocation or visibility status, and you can also search for more specific objectives you have in mind.

That’s it! Let me know your thoughts about it!

Almost two years after visiting New York City, I’ve come back to NYC and its two neighbouring cities: Boston and Washington DC.

Again, I’ve asked several people about their perspective of these cities, which helped immensely when planning out my itinerary. Let’s pay it forward: here is my guide / personal perspective of Boston, Washington DC and (more) New York.

Moving between cities

Boston and Washington DC are roughly 4 hours away by bus or train.

I’ve made NYC my homebase, and opted to take the bus (FlixBus) between cities and they were very reliable and arrived always before the stated time. These cities are connected by non-stop highways which make the course more reliable and smooth.

Trains (Amtrak) are generally faster, but be aware that delays due to freight train interference are a known issue, and ticket prices are higher, when compared to bus.

Boston

Freedom trail

Boston was the epicenter of some of the most impactful American historical events, and the home of several historical figures, such as Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and John Hancock, to name a few.

The Freedom Trail (map) exposes you to this rich history, and connects 16 locations significant to the history of the United States via a 2.5-mile-long (4.0 km) path throughout Boston, which you can walk at your own leisure, and can be completed in single day.

The path is quite popular in the city, but if you are struggling to find it, look for the denser lines of tourists walking in the city. Likely they will be following the red brick lane that you just need to follow.

The Donkey and the Elephant

Ever wondered why a donkey is used to represent the Democratic party, and an elephant the Republican party?

It is thought the Republican elephant was first used like this by an Illinois newspaper during Abraham Lincoln’s 1860 election campaign - perhaps as a symbol of strength, although it is still debated.

It was then made popular after a man called Thomas Nast - who was a Republican - drew it in a cartoon in a magazine in 1874.

As for the origins of the Democratic donkey, they hark back to the presidential campaign of 1828, a re-match between Andrew Jackson and the incumbent John Quincy Adams. Opponents of Jackson labeled him a “jackass” for his populist beliefs and campaign slogan “let the people rule”. More entertained than provoked by the moniker, Jackson decided to incorporate the strong willed animal into his campaign posters and went on to defeat Adams, becoming America’s first Democratic President

Again, Thomas Nast later used the cartoon animal to represent the Democrats and it became a popular symbol for the party by the end of the 19th century.

MIT

For many years I’ve been yearning to visit MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) to better understand the energy and environment from where multiple outstanding breakthroughs and alumni came from.

The campus was built with “serendipity” as a principle, to encourage productive accidents which occur when people exchange ideas with no specific agenda but end up inspiring each other.

Most of the campus is open to the public, allowing for a very enjoyable exploration of its spaces.

Great Dome

This is one of the most distinguishable features of the entire campus, which is also a prized location for “hacks”, such as the placement of fire truck upon its top.

You can catch a glimpse of the internal part of the dome by going all the way up to the Barker Library reading room, which has a convenient elevator that you can take right from the main hall.

Kendal Band

The Kendall Station “T” subway station right next to MIT has a wonderful interactive sound sculpture which consists of three interactive instruments that are played using handles located on both the inbound and outbound subway platform walls.

Stata Center

You’ll immediately notice how daring and almost fantastic this building looks like. Academic celebrities such as Noam Chomsky, Ron Rivest, and World Wide Web Consortium founder Tim Berners-Lee have offices in the building, apart from multiple other facilities and departments.

West Campus

To the west, you can find Stratton Student Center; the Briggs Field which serves as the home field for the MIT softball program, in addition to the recreation field beyond the outfield fence that is used by over 80 club and intramural programs; and Simmons Hall (aka honeycomb) which serves as a student hall.

Harvard Bridge

One of the best ways to reach MIT via Harvard Bridge, where you can get appealing views of center Boston and MIT. The bridge is 364.4 smoots long. If you look at the ground, you’ll see how far you’ve progressed across the bridge, in this revolutionary measure.

Cambridge

Harvard University

You can reach Harvard University by simply doing a 30 minute walk from MIT. The proximity between these two powerhouses was something that struck me, and I didn’t realise until that point.

The main campus is open to the public, where you can check its magnificent buildings and surroundings.

Harvard Museum of Natural History

I’ve lost count of the amount of dinosaur fossils and attractive rocks, crystals and gemstones. Make sure to allocate a few hours to appreciate a good part of the collection.

Sanders Theatre

As I was making my way toward the Harvard Museum of Natural History, I stumbled upon an imponent building and wondered what it was. Once I entered through one of the open doors, I was in awe. I had entered the Memorial Hall, in which a concert at the Sanders Theatre was about to start. The inside of the building was stunning and reminded me of the Great Hall in Harry Potter.

TheFacebook birthplace

Room H33 in Kirkland House at Harvard University was where Mark Zuckerberg developed “TheFacebook” (now Facebook) in 2004 before dropping out to focus on the burgeoning platform. For obvious reasons, you cannot visit the room itself, but it was still interesting to visit this location and understand its environment.

Other notable places

Cheers - The Bull & Finch Pub

The Bull & Finch Pub was the model for Cheers, a wildly popular American television sitcom. When the show was being conceptualized, Tom Kershaw, the pub’s owner, agreed to allow the show’s production team to shoot exterior and interior photos, charging $1. Kershaw has since gone on to make millions of dollars, licensing the pub’s image and selling a variety of Cheers memorabilia.

Naval Shipyard

One of the Liberty Trail paths will take you to the Navy Yard, where there is more to discover other than the USS Constitution and its museum. It offers a beautiful view of Boston, is the home of the Massachusetts Korean War Veterans Memorial and familiar animal statues like the ones you can see outside the World Trade Center.

Italian Corner

The italian corner in Boston, not only houses a wealth of quality restaurants and pastry shops, but also the angelic St. Leonard’s Church, one of the oldest churches built by Italian immigrants in the United States.

The New England Holocaust Memorial

The memorial is composed of six glass towers towering well over 50-feet on a black granite path in a grassy area. The towers symbolize the six major concentration camps, steam often rises from openings beneath the towers representing the smoke from crematoriums.

RH Boston

This luxury home furnishings store is housed in the previous historic museum of natural history, and is striking to observe at night. I just happened to stumble upon it while I was walking around and it was already closed by that time, but this would be one of my go to places to visit if I come back to Boston.

Food

There are two things one must try in Boston:

• Anything seafood related: Boston sits right next to the shore and receives a steady supply of fresh sea produce. I suggest getting:
  • New England Clam Chowder: almost any place at Quincy Market is amazing. Be sure to have it in a bread bowl.
  • Lobster Roll: grab one at James Hook & Co, they are well worth it.
• Cannolis at Mike’s Pastry or Modern Pastry:
  • From these, I recommend Mike’s Pastry, which has its main location in Boston, but there is also another one in Cambridge. Expect long queues in the Boston location at any time. I’ve tried both of the locations, and quality is essentially the same. Don’t overdo it though, each cannoli is massive.

While in Cambridge, be sure to also go to Joe’s Pizza. Same delicious slices as you would have in New York, with less hassle.

Community spirit

If I had to summarise Boston to a single word, it would be “community”.

While going through Walter Isaacson’s Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, it became apparent to me how fundamental was for Franklin to be involved in Boston’s community, not only for what he received, but also for what he gifted. His birthplace was on the same street of the Old South Meeting House, so no way could have escaped.

Notice also how many meeting houses, state houses, halls, religious congregations and halls exist in the Freedom Trail alone. This, paired with the many past confrontations with Great Britain, seemed to create a tight group of people that strived and leaned on each other.

With this, comes the service to the community and its legacy, which is nicely rendered in this phrase from Kevin Hagan White, previous mayor of Boston:

We can erect thousands of building thousands of buildings and put down miles of concrete, but unless the next generation can say that Boston is better place to live, we will have achieved nothing

New York City

I’ve covered the majority of my favorite NYC places in this post, but here is always something more to explore.

MoMA

I recommend starting on the upper floor and then work your way down. It dawned on me closer to the museum’s closing time that the top floors had much well known art pieces than I imagined, so I ended up rushing through many of them. The upside was that I spent more time absorbing other less known pieces, which I found inspirational and fresh.

Being Human

The piece that most struck me was “Being Human”, not so much for its content, but for its form. The piece is set up in a room which has a large semi transparent panel where a movie is being projected. As I was sitting on one side of the room to see the movie, at key parts of the movie the entire back room lights up, revealing the sculptures and paintings. That was unexpectedly surprising as I sat there not only to watch the movie, but to rest from the 100km+ I’ve accumulated up until that point¹.

The main thing I found inspiring about that piece was how it was filmed. It wasn’t an “in your face” headshot, it wasn’t a typical documentary interview, but instead the main protagonist was talking about fundamental ideas as he walked, shaved, talked with his family over the phone, while travelling in a bus, or just dancing. That was so refreshing, especially when I mostly consume (and produce) YouTube content, where the format is a very “like, subscribe, thumbs up” kind of thing. This inspired me to look at the small videos I produce in a different way, and ever since I’ve been experimenting with some new shots and ways to convey my message. In the end, it is a labor of love, and I think there is value in adding beauty to the world.

Ruth Asawa: A Retrospective

I took some time to go through this exhibition, where I’ve mostly enjoyed the explorations around the negative space and the abstract mimicking of natural structures. This temporary exhibit will be available until February 7th, so you are still on time to check it out.

Governors Island

Instead of getting into an expensive, overcrowded tour of the Statue of Liberty, walk a few meters east from that ferry at Battery Park, and get a $5 ferryboat trip to Governors Island instead. The trip is beautiful, the island can be walked easily and has some interesting houses, and you’ll actually get a good view of the Statue of Liberty from there.

Lincoln Opera House

Remember to activate subtitles by pressing the button in front of you. I didn’t realize this on the first part, so needed my colleagues from another aisle to explain me what is was all about, for me to catch up

Exchange Place

This is where you can get one of the best views, if not the best land level view of New York. Then get a ferry ride back to Manhattan for extra premium views (this part I did not do, since I was running out of time, but I was advised by a local that it’s a must).

Summit Vanderbilt

I didn’t try any formal observation decks the last time I visited New York, so this time I had to do one. I’ve picked Summit Vanderbilt, which is a pretty good experience, not only because of impressive views of iconic NYC landmarks, but also due to the different indoor experiences and mesmerizing light effects it offers.

Other notes

The best Tiramisu in town

I got this hint from a colleague, and it is spot on. If you are looking for the best Tiramisu in NYC, look no more, just head to Piccola Cucina, where they serve you a freshly made Tiramisu that is assembled right in front of you, and it is delicious.

Salt Bae Steak Restaurant

Right in front of MoMA sits the Nusr-Et Steakhouse, owned by exuberant Nusret Gökçe, the Salt Bae.

Giant Louis Vuitton bag

Fashion brand Louis Vuitton has concealed its under-renovation New York flagship store with a luggage facade, and it looks surreal. When I first glanced at it, it felt like it was placed there via augmented reality.

Washington DC

I visited on a curious time: the government was shut down, so all main museums were closed, and a “No Kings” rally was held on the same day I arrived, so some of the main attractions were fenced and there was a heightened police and secret agent presence. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed my time there, and if anything, would want to go back to visit all the incredible museums I missed.

Capitol

As you exit Union Station, Washington DC’s main station, the first view that hits you is the Capitol, the seat of the United States Congress, the legislative branch of the federal government. While walking around DC’s main attractions along the National Mall, the Capitol is a permanent sight.

Jefferson Memorial

Make sure to not miss this emblematic memorial, which is not only incredibly beautiful inside, with the towering statue of Thomas Jefferson and his quotes, but also outside, as you walk towards it along the Tidal Basin.

The quote I most appreciated was:

I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

Lincoln Memorial

This was one of my most long awaited memorials, and has been in imaginary for several decades, but apparently I was not the only one, because this was one of the most crowded attractions. Adding to that, to accommodate visitors during the upcoming elevator replacement, contractors built a very large temporary switchback ramp in front of the memorial’s plaza, so it felt like entering into a monument under construction. This is an attraction that I hope to come back to sometime later when this work is completed, to better savour it.

White House

As it is expected, you can only have a limited view of the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States (currently, Donald Trump), but after seeing, hearing and reading about it countless times, it felt great to see it with my own eyes.

National Mall

The National Mall is a landscaped park that sits right at the center of all main attractions in DC, a charming place to walk about. Along the way I’ve encountered several branches of folks on their way to join the “No Kings” manifestation.

Martin Luther King Memorial

This was the memorial that most struck me in terms of symbolism. It was smartly built.

Notice that on the side of Mr. King’s statue there is an inscription that reads “Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope”. Then notice that behind the statue there is a rock formation from where the statue’s “stone” was clearly symbolically extracted from. Beautiful.

FDR Memorial

The large memorial for Franklin Delano Roosevelt has four outdoor “rooms”, representing his four terms, all of them sprinkled with many of his insightful quotes.

World War II Memorial

The most striking portion of this memorial were the bas-reliefs consisting of 24 separate panels. The 12 on the north depict the Atlantic front; the 12 on the south depict the Pacific front. All of them are neatly connected, telling a story that is worth diving into.

Arlington Cemetery

The most striking aspect of this military cemetery is how large, exquisit and well kept it is.

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

This is a monument in the middle of the Arlington Cemetery dedicated to unidentified U.S. service members from World War I, World War II, and the Korean War.

After the periodic change of guard that me and the small crowd were watching in total silence, the chatter in this small crowd started growing after the ceremony had ended. With this, the guard in duty shouts assertively to the crowd to respect this space and maintain silence. The crowd quieted down immediately. That moment reflected what the entire cemetery transpired: an immense respect and dignification of the ones that served that country and gave their lives during their service.

Marine Corps Memorial

Again, another emblematic memorial, which is not as easy to reach as DC’s main attractions, but worth the visit.

Georgetown

In the northwest quadrant of DC sits Georgetown, a beautiful area that feels like a transplantation of a piece of Europe into DC. In fact, it predates D.C. itself.

Georgetown University

Keeping up with the theme of visiting university campus, this one was also interesting to visit, with building buildings and hidden places like a nice terrace near a coffee shop, a good place to relax after a long walk.

I’ve noticed several “Hoya Saxa” references. In case you are wondering, it is generally translated as “what rocks!”, and is the official cheer and “college yell” of Georgetown University and its athletics teams.

The Exorcist Steps

You might have noticed the header image of this article is again me on a flight of stairs. What’s up with that?

I thought it would be fun to keep up with the theme of emblematic staircases, last time being the “Joker steps” in the Bronx, so this time I’ve visited the stairs where Father Damien Karras fell down in 1973’s film The Exorcist.

Waterfront

Beautiful, relaxing space to relax and appreciate the view of the Potomac river.

Kennedy Center

The concert started with the orchestra playing the USA’s National anthem, Star-Spangled Banner. All rose to hear it, and the spectacle moved me. This was one of the last days I was spending in the USA, and after experiencing so much from this culture that highly fascinates me, this was a cathartic moment. I came to know right after this that some deeper political motives were behind this recent inclusion of the anthem pre-concert, but still I found it moving how much its citizens esteem their nation.

The concert itself was “An Evening of Beethoven”. It was the best classical music concert I’ve even seen, and I’m not saying this to sound highbrowed or anything. It was genuinely incredible.

There had been a sudden replacement of the original conductor, Christoph Eschenbach, due to illness, by the young Emmanuel Tjeknavorian, who was completely on fire, and propagated that energy towards into the orquestra and the audience. The sheer energy and emotion that the conductor transpired was incredible. Never experienced anything like that in such a context. If you are around the area and can catch the show, you should.

Watergate Hotel

Remember the Watergate scandal, a political scandal in the United States involving the administration of President Richard Nixon? Well, the complex where a group associated with Nixon’s 1972 re-election campaign were caught burglarizing and planting listening devices in the Democratic National Committee headquarters, is just a stone’s throw away from the Kennedy Center.

Other notes

Community spirit and legacy

If I had to summarise Washington DC in a single word, it would be “legacy”.

Incredible achievements of the past won’t guarantee a prosperous future, and it is up for current and next generations to keep nurturing the gifts from ancestors, by continuing their work, remembering their deeds and honoring good ideals.

The “test of time” many times comes down to a generation’s choice to keep past stories and memories alive, or not. The meticulously preserved Arlignton cemetery, the zero tolerance for noise and chatter at the “Tomb of the Unknown Soldier”, the fact that a Freedom Trail actually exists, the tiny USA flags that “someone” tend to on Boston’s cemeteries, the free monuments and museums available for all, the highlighted “freedom is not free” message at the Korean War Veterans Memorial. All of these send a strong message that the past glories are dependent on their maintenance and elevation.

The gifts

There was also space for gifts offered by other nation states, and the ones that stuck most to me were:

• the Japanese Lantern located next to the Tidal Basin, among the cherry trees first planted in 1912, which lighted during the annual National Cherry Blossom Festival.
• and the large Netherlands Carillon. Throughout the day, the carillon automatically plays the Westminster Quarters. On significant days of the year in Dutch and American culture, it plays automated concerts, and from June to August, the director-carillonist Edward Nassor hosts a concert series whereby visiting carillonists perform weekly concerts on the instrument.

Extra notes

The people

Along the way I’ve met and had interesting conversations with some very generous and interesting people, be it in the queue to Mike’s Pastry, at Joe’s Pizza, in the airplane, at Kennedy Center. They were incredibly friendly and I’m thankful that we crossed paths.

It’s my birthday: Stop and Wave

Someone got a lot of attention at Harvard’s Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology :)

Halloween

It was near Halloween at the time of these travels, so I got to observe some of the fantastic work of local residents.

Wait

When I arrived in Boston, the first thing I needed to do was to cross a sidewalk. I pressed the button to request the cross, and heard the emblematic “Wait!”. I thought that was pretty amusing. I feel like this could make a great sample to insert in a trance music.

Fun fact, these are notoriously hackable, and last year the audio on these crosswalks were changed to mimic Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg.

Legacy

The most common themes stuck to me were legacy and lore.

A great example of this is Washington DC. At its core, I see it as a condensation of the story and values of the USA. What it means to be an American. There is real power behind the culture and soft influence that the USA transmits externally and inland.²

Even if a nation sports an incredibly past, it will only survive if every new generation maintains that legacy and iterates upon it, as Kevin Hagan White alluded to. The tiny American flags placed in the historical Boston cemeteries, the exemplary maintenance of the Arlington cemetery, Boston’s freedom trail, Boston’s Bunk Hill that was erected with the money from the community, the free DC museums, the USA cultural exports, and so on and so forth. All of these keep the American story and lore alive.

I really like to walk. Let me tell you why.

How it started

Eight years ago I injured my knee. The following 2 months I could hardly walk 10 meters. It took me 6 arduous months to fully recover. Even though I had done several types of physical activities up until that injury, like surfing, biking, rock climbing, running, etc, the only capability I wanted to regain was walking, nothing else.

Walking to the grocery store. Walking to the subway without having to rely on elevators and ways to avoid stairs¹. Walking around the city. Walking to work. Walking in nature. This made me realise how important it is to have this ability, for the freedom, independence and health benefits it provides.

Recovery

Progressively I’ve improved. 10 meters turned into 100 meters. 100 meters to 1km. 1km to 5km. 5km to 10km. 10km to 20km. I vividly remember all of these milestones, and every time I surpassed one, I was rejoiced. The more I walked, the more I recovered.

I’ve made a pact with myself during this journey that I would do everything under my control to not lose this ability again.

Simplify. Focus.

All those sports I did before? Scrapped. I was asked if I missed running, surfing and all those sports. I do, but no way am I going to risk injuring my knee again for some short term gratification.

This simplified my life greatly.

• No more of “What am I going to do today for sports?”. The answer is easy: walk
• No more dispersing of my energies within several different disciplines, only to be mediocre on most of them.

Walking was the only option, which led me to discover a whole world of depth that was not immediately apparent. It gave me immense focus and showed me how powerful it can be.

Benefits

Consistency

Ever since I recovered, I’ve started doing at least one long walk every week. No matter if I’m abroad, on vacation, if it’s raining, scorching heat or I’m feeling under the weather. I will find a way to walk somewhere, somehow. This has become a deeply entrenched habit and a part of my identity.

Turns out that the most difficult thing about maintaining a good exercise routine, is actually maintaining that routine. I need to walk, so that’s sorted.

Health

A natural consequence is its positive effect on health.

For the past 5 years I’ve been employed as a software engineer, meaning that I tend to spend a lot of time in front of a computer. Exercise² for such a “butt in the chair” kind of job is not only crucial for maintaining my health, but also gives me the fortitude to consistently perform in a demanding high stakes environment.

Relationships

Since walking became an unconditional and non-negotiable part of my life, soon I’ve started inviting friends to join me.

I realized how powerful it was to go for a walk and just have a chat. The quality, depth and focus of conversations surpassed any other I’ve had through other means. I love deep conversations, so this was a balsam.

I’ve then made several friends during these walks, and created stronger bonds with the ones I already had. This beats by a mile the type of interactions in places like pubs.

Giving back

Turns out that London has an incredibly active walking and hiking scene. I first discovered this when searching for ways to get to Seven Sisters, and found a wealth of walking groups that not only did this walk, but also others around London. “I’m in heaven”, I thought.

After attending several of these organized hikes I’ve realized: why not organize them myself?

I’ve then picked some of the routes I enjoyed the most and prepared them by mapping them out and repeating them several times. Soon I started organizing walks in my company (at one point, more than 40 people joined), in my local urbanization, with groups of friends. Gratifying experiences, with all the benefits of shifting away from consuming into producing.

Learning

I’ve lost count of how many audiobooks and podcasts I’ve finished while walking. Listening to these in peaceful places like somewhere in the woods, is an experience I thoroughly enjoy. Several places where I’ve walked tend to be associated with memorable sections of audio contents that struck me the most.

Discovery

Walking is one of the best ways to explore a city or surroundings. Even if it takes longer than other means.

Within reason, it is essential for me to walk around in any new city or place I visit, to absorb the environment, the vibes, the random sentences. It gives me time to decide which places I want to explore further, since I’m not tethered to any external transport mechanisms. This explains why I ended up walking 180km in New York in 4 days.

Same for my local surroundings. In case I don’t have better ideas, my default activity is to get out of my house, pick a direction, and then start walking towards it. The mapy.com app is pretty good in these situations³, since it has an impressive coverage of all possible paths, even the most remote places imaginable.

I’ve discovered several gems hidden in plain sight just by doing this. This also helps fight my natural tendency to take local surroundings as granted, ending up knowing more about foreign places rather than my own.

Reflection and Ideation

Walking helps not only getting acquainted with the external world, but also with my internal world. It is my favorite way to think long and hard about problems and strategies, hence why I used long walks at length when thinking about ideas for Survival Ball’s game levels and dynamics.

I don’t think I’m alone here. Charles Dickens for example, was known to be a prodigious walker, who was estimated to walk about 19km per day. He did so because walking time was thinking time, or perhaps more accurately dreaming time. I understand that. This becomes ever more important in today’s world, where we are constantly flooded with information and stimuli. Walking is grounding.

Physical joy⁴ and good biodynamics

There is a physical component of walking that makes it deeply enjoyable. I don’t know what it is for sure, but likely it is related with our evolution.

Two years ago I found another layer of enjoyment: barefoot walking. Or at least, barefoot shoe walking, when I tried my first pair of Vivos. I was hooked from the first time I tried them.

The connection with the ground, especially when walking around nature, and how it felt in my body, is something that I have expressiveness limitations on how to describe. You need to try out for yourself.

Evolution made us prodigious walkers

And it makes sense right? It’s been relatively recent in our human history that shoes started being widely used. My father still tells me stories of how good it felt to just go around barefoot in the fields, while taking care of the land.

Yes, hard city floors are also novel, and it helps having something in our feet to diminish their impact on us, but still, our feet have natural shock absorbers (the tips of our feet), and having some minimal padding by barefoot shoes plus the immediate feedback will make you more aware of your stride, forcing you to adapt your walking technique.

Trainer crutches

Mainstream trainers go too far by having too much support, too much padding, too much. That comes at a price, because our body then needs to adapt to whatever structure the shoe manufacturer chose. It makes our bodies crooked by unsettling the balance we were designed for, and shifts more work to muscles, joints and bones that are not made for such loads, while other structures get lazier and underused. These shoes also have little space for our toes, leaving them crooked and warped, in the name of a toebox style that was originally meant to distinguish wealthy classes from peasants, since peasants could not afford to have their feet crammed into small little shoe coffins when doing hard physical labour.

Wellness by being well shod

I can tell you from personal experience that my biodynamics are for sure better. I’ve only used barefoot shoes for these past two years, be it walking around, at work, or even weddings. I just can’t stand wearing other types of shoes at this point. I’ve never walked so much in my life, and still feel nowhere near the pains I felt before in my hips, knees and other parts of the body. Pure bliss.

Of course, years from now things might change, but that is not the direction of travel I see. I feel much better walking with barefoot shoes than otherwise.

Go out and walk

The main message is: go out there and enjoy one the greatest gifts you have been given, and walk to your heart’s desire.⁵

I was pleasantly surprised by how many people took walking as their main activity during COVID, but once that faded away, many went back to their old ways. Don’t wait for the next crisis to remember the gifts you’ve been given. Use them while you can.

I’m of the opinion that once you get asked multiple times the same question, then it’s time to document it and have it available for the next person.

It’s time to address it.

Behind the scenes

This is how my kitchen stand looks on an average work day. I didn’t prop it up for the picture.

In case you are wondering, the container in the center is soaking buckwheat groats, which after a day of soaking I grind, mix condiments and sometimes small vegetables, put in the oven, resulting in a delicious loaf of buckwheat bread that I use as a replacement for bread. I highly recommend it.

That should answer the question that yes, I do cook.

Why

There are 3 reasons why my kitchen looks virtually the same, every time.

1. I like to have my environment organized and free of clutter and distractions. I’ve had a long, conscious effort to reduce clutter and inconsequential distractions from my life, stemming from an experience that I might write about in a later day.
   • The positive ramifications of consistently living and being surrounded by an environment and stimulus of objects that really matter, are more than I could ever describe in words.
   • It’s a small present for my future self: when I cook, do something in the kitchen, or at home, I have a deeply ingrained habit of sorting and cleaning everything out before moving to the next thing. That way, my full energy can be allocated and focused towards a single place.
   • This goes beyond the physical realm. On both my personal and work laptop it is rare to have more than 3 browser windows open, each one often having less than 10 tabs. Whenever those numbers temporarily increase, I document their state, close them down, and arrive at a clean state again. Essentially using documentation as a checkpoint mechanism
   • There are other examples of this. In case you follow Tech ingredients, you’ll notice that their laboratory and space is quite neat, regardless of the outstanding breadth of experiments done in the channel. I found it amusing that some years ago they were once asked by some viewers “how do they keep their lab so clean”, to which the main presenter replied that “we are not hiding anything, we just take care to tidy and store the components we are not working on” (paraphrased).
2. The rest of the utensils are away from camera sight. When I am having a meeting or sharing my thoughts via video, I want to get things done and not have my mind occupied with non-consequential thoughts such as “Oh, my background looks a bit a messy. That piece looks out place. I wonder how that looks for someone else”, nor do I want to distract my interlocutors with something irrelevant in the background. There are video filters which blur out the background, but I don’t like the way they look, not do I want to have yet another moving component in my workflow that might (or might not) work. If my background is relatively the same and neutral, then I don’t have to worry about it, and can focus my energies on the the things that really matter.
3. Apart from my weekly buckwheat bread, I only cook at weekends, since I am fortunate enough to often cook for pleasure, rather than necessity. The rest of the week I either get to have my meals at the office, or through Planty, a plant based clean food subscription.

Dangers of over-consumption

One’s life can very easily be wasted away on non-consequential, “time passing”, filler, short-term hedonistic experiences.

It’s a blessing to enjoy life’s little pleasures, but it’s perilous to lead a life consisting of only discrete pleasures and experiences that are not, or cannot be chained together in any way shape or form. Essentially, a life spent as a passive spectator through and through, observing the years scroll by.

That feels like an egregious squandering of the most precious gift we’ve been given: life. Chaining experiences together and compounding them into a product that amounts to much more than the sum of its parts is one of the most intriguing, addicting, but most of all, rewarding parts of life.

Benefits of production

Building up years of study to land to land a job that takes one out of poverty, raising a child into a full grown adult, building relationships consciously into heartwarming friendships or a loving family, writing a book or article that not only helps oneself but also many others, building a successful company based on years of networking and experiences.

They require considerable amounts of deliberate actions where different experiences are aggregated, chained and combined in novel ways that add value to a system. Value is produced.

Best of all, society rewards you for that! If something you produced is deemed to be of value and (directly or indirectly) consumed by a fellow human being, you can get compensated in currency, recognition, access, friendship, amongst others. As the products of your labor expand and compound, an even more interesting non-trivial effect starts to happen that could not have been predicted in the first place. Personally, both articles and a presentation I did resulted in interesting job offers that I didn’t plan for, nor could I have predicted.

But it’s not easy

Discipline, self reflection and the hard work to plan and aggregate different actions and experiences, are the most important ingredients to consistently produce value.

If this would be easy, everyone would be doing it by default. That’s why self help books are such a profitable business. This difficulty stems from our inherited hardwired behaviours that optimize towards immediate gratification, which served our late ancestors to such success that these traits got selected and filtered through the ages as an essential part of our species.

However, in the context of our modern societies where resources and entertainment are abundant, these traits backfire and when left to their own devices, can easily stray one into a life of misery and value bankruptcy¹.

The antidote. Self-discipline workout.

Just like any other muscle in our body, self-discipline requires consistent and intentional work to stay strong, but relying solely on will power, a scarce and fleeting resource, is often not enough. In order to protect this precious resource, one can set up an environment to block out frivolous distractions and non-consequential instant gratifications. In my case, I don’t have video streaming subscriptions (since I’ve come to realise that most series and movies add little to no value to my life), I have blocked distracting websites and videogames on my computer and expelled junk and sugary foods from home².

Remember, any time spent in over-indulging consumption, is time not spent producing value.

Instead, create the habit of self reflection and journalling, organize events (at work, with your friends or loved ones), write articles and publish videos that can be seen and judged by others (like this article), welcome accountability and reposability, clean your room. These actions are very likely accessible to you now, at (close to) zero cost. ³

Replace non-consequential consumption with fruitful production. Start anywhere, start now.

Leadership

Spirit de Corps

• “A general’s principle talent consists in knowing the mentality of the soldier and in winning his confidence. And, in these two respects, the French soldier is more difficult to lead than any other. He is not a machine to be put in motion but a reasonable being that must be directed”’ - Napoleon
• “More battles are lost by loss of hope than loss of blood” - Napoleon
• “It is astonishing what power words have over men” - Napoleon, speaking of the 32 demi brigade, who had his words “I was tranquil, the brave 32nd demibrigade was there” embroidered in large gold letters on its colours, which further increased their courage
• Napoleon found it essential to keep his troops moral high, which he actioned upon in different ways:
  • Napoleon was known to give electrifying pep talks (harangues) before battles
    • “One must speak to the soul. It’s the only way to electrify the men” - Napoleon
  • Napoleon had a strong sense of identification of soldier with his regiment’s corps
  • Ordered for plays and songs to be held for the troops, gave medals, made sure there was pride his platoons
  • Upon receiving petitions from his men (such as on the subject of increasing their pensions), he would act on them immediately
  • Napoleon held small gestures like removing a medal of honor from him and giving it to a soldier that he observed a particularly valiant behaviour
  • He joked around with troops, reminiscing on war stories with veterans. He would make sure to share his wine with the sentries. He was accessible. Small things perhaps, but helped build morale and breed devotion.
  • Napoleon references to the ancient world made their troops see that they were part of a larger whole, a larger part of history. Their lives, and if it comes to it, their deaths, mattered.
  • Napoleon told his troops how much their family and neighbours would honour their valiant behaviour

Leadership style

• “[A leader’s] youth is almost indispensable in commanding an army” - Napoleon
• Napoleon was first frowned upon by his peers when being given control of the army of Italy, near to his marriage with Josephine. They were not impressed by him showing unimpressive pictures of his wife, and his small stature. But as soon as he started talking about operations, logistics, asking for info and laying out the plan, they immediately saw Napoleon “grow”. Competence and diligence, above appearances.
• Napoleon’s planning and concentration of forces were crucial to his consecutive battle victories
• It was an intense environment, but his staff generally admired him. He was polite, and would forgive small mistakes
• “Fear and uncertainty accelerate the fall of empires: they are a thousand times more fatal than the dangers and losses of an ill-fated war” - Napoleon
• Julius Caesar once faced a mutiny that forced him to draw back. Caesar allowed them to be released, but addressed them as mere civilians, rather than soldiers. He won them back with this gesture. Like Julius Caesar, Napoleon was sure to admonish the troops that were under expectations.
• To his troops Napoleon was lavish in praise, but to his family, ambassadors and ministers he was acerbic. Severe to his officers, kind to the men.
• Napoleon instructed officers to hold 4 to 8 hour reviews, where the group, weapons and drills were inspected. It made soldiers used to being ready and weaponed, and showed them that their leader was attentive and cared about them.
• “You don’t need wit during times of war. You need to be precise, display backbone and simplicity” - Napoleon to Jerome, who he placed as king of Westphalia

Leading masses

• “The masses should be directed without them being aware of it”. Napoleon to Fouché
• When Napoleon centralized power and appointed the prefects, the regime was turned into a meritocratic system, where officials would be promoted according to their performance. They would need to provide statistical data and annual tours of their departments, and Napoleon made sure they were properly trained.
• “The men who have changed the world never succeeded by winning over the powerful, but always by stirring the masses. The first method is a resort to intrigue and only brings limited results. The latter is the course of genius and changes the face of the world.” - Napoleon on St Helena
• Napoleon mentioned that a nation is always what you had wit to make of it. Triumph of faction, parties, divisions, was the fault of those in authority only. No people are bad under a good government, just as troops are bad under good generals. As such, Napoleon mentioned the directory men brought France down to the level of their own blundering and were degrading her, and she was beginning to repudiate them
• After a decade of revolution, many French men were desperate for leadership, and recognized that the parliamentary process inhibited that, as did a constitution that was next to impossible to amend. So they were willing to see their representative government to be temporarily suspended, an opening that Napoleon took advantage of.
• “Confidence from below, authority from above”- Bonapartist dictum
• “Chouannerie and the émigrés are skin diseases, terrorism an internal malady” - Napoleon
• “If you treat the mob / rabble with kindness, these creatures fancy themselves invulnerable. If you hang a few, they get tired of the game, and they become submissive and humble as they ought to be” - Napoleon when defending Place de la Concorde

Governing

• States are ever more vulnerable as when they are attempting to reform themselves
• Upon unification of law codes in France, Napoleon recurrently asked: “is it fair? Is it useful?”
  • “One should not overburden with over-detailed laws. Law must do nothing but impose a general principle. It would be vain if one were to try every possible situation.” - Napoleon
• Because of labor shortages caused by constant war, wages increased by 25% during his 15 year rule.
• High inflation brings forth the opportunity for having a newcomer governing, because people are desperate for solutions, and will reward anyone who brings forth a solution. As seen with the arrival of Bonaparte to France in 1799, where inflation was high (price of bread was astronomical, but directors were immune since they paid themselves a salary linked to the value of 30k pounds of wheat). Bonaparte was seen as being a good top down zealot autocratic solution that placed a constitution with strong executive power with central control.
• Napoleon’s marriage to Marie Louise, the daughter of the Austrian leader Francis, was strategic. For some time it coerced the Austrian leader to not join the Prussians and Russians, which would reduce Napoleon’s chances for a victory

Central command and control

• “Nothing is so important in war, than undivided command” - Napoleon
• Dangers of overbearing concentration of power with a single point of failure:
  • His controlling nature likely stifled initiative. Several of his leads were only good in his presence, but without him present, they would falter. Dupont was one of them
  • The allies successful strategy was to only attack Napoleon’s lieutenants, but avoid confrontations with Napoleon himself. Napoleon, by not scaling himself properly, caused this situation where only where he was present could the army thrive. Everywhere else, it got defeated. A big lesson.
  • Choosing the right people is crucial:
    • Some of the biggest blunders Napoleon made were about the placement of people in the wrong positions. Like Ney on a big battalion, sul on a more administrative position, and another one as war minister when he should be in the battle of Waterloo. It’s very important to play to people’s strengths
    • Like Julius Caesar, Napoleon was betrayed and placed in bad position by people who previously wronged him but he didn’t persecute, like Talleyrand and Fouché, who were openly planning a cue against Napoleon’s empire and negotiating peace terms in 1814.
  • During the Russian campaign, he was regularly lied to by his senior officers, since no one wanted to be Napoleon’s line of fire. There is an example of a deception that involved 3 of them, one of them being Murat. Napoleon was once very close to his men, but in this campaign, where he needed their support the most, he was often lied to. For example on the number of provisions available for men, 10 days were communicated, when they were close to none.

Leanness

• Napoleon’s core system allowed him to be quick and flexible, living off the land instead of relying on vulnerable supply lines. This flexibility allowed it to outmaneuver the enemy and exploit its slowness.
  • This leanness is comparable to what fast moving startups do to adapt to new challenges, by reorganizing their organization quickly and effectively, allowing it to change course very quickly, and concentrate power of the crucial aspects of the business
  • As a contemporary counter-example, Kmart was not able to move fast and adapt, leading to its bankruptcy after Wallmart innovated with a store logistics network design that made it much more efficient. Kmart needed to have change fast and efficiently for that to happen, but instead just kept doing the same, with mostly superficial changes like barcode scanners that were did not yield the same impact because it did not have an evolved network to leverage them

Behaviour

Energy. Urgency. Moving fast.

• His father died at 38 when Napoleon was 15 years old. Napoleon’s urgency, drive and boundless energy might be partly explained by that, in that he foreseen that his life too, would be short.
• Napoleon was energetic and injected immediate energy wherever he went. Everything around Napoleon happened at a tremendous pace. He hated wasting a minute in a day. Napoleon read newspapers or had texts read to him while he was in a hot bath, being shaved, or in the carriage with his wife Josephine.
  • “If you want to dine well, dine with Cambacérès. If you want to dine badly, dine with Lebrun. If you want to dine quickly, dine with me” - Napoleon to a general
    • Napoleon often took only 10 minutes to eat, except for family suppers on Sundays, where he might spend half an hour.
    • Everything in his palace revolved around work. He dined when he could.
    • He never drank spirits, and there are no examples of him being drunk.
  • Napoleon also didn’t take the time in his love making: “the matter was over within 3 minutes”
• “If you make war, wage with energy and severity. It’s only means of making it shorter and less deplorable for mankind” - Napoleon
• “Impatience” is the word that appears when other people portray Napoleon
• In the beginning, he moved fast with his armies because he didn’t have resources to do sieges. That need led to rapid movement that caught the enemy off balance. He did have many problems just having his men fed and shod:
  • He had a consistent concern to have his men well shod, such that he ordered Prussians to exchange their boots with the french, since they would not be needing then anyway
  • He sent multiple letters requesting for supplies, specially footwear for soldiers
    • He likely didn’t say that an army marches on his stomach, but surely knew that they marched on their feet
    • He had a chief of staff writing his dictations that was crucial. He transposed his rapid fires and raw wishes into well defined, polite and diplomatic plans and commands. He was so proficient that he managed to convince his wife to share a chateau with his mistress, and vice versa.
• “Energy, energy!” - Napoleon to his brother, who he made king and found to lack energy and drive
• “Activite, activite, vitesse. Je me recommended a Vous” (translated to “activity, activity, speed. I’m counting on you”) - Napoleon postscript of a message to his lieutenant

Preparation

• Napoleon would take care to know the terrain, topology and other details of the places he would fight or invade. Before the Russian campaign, he ordered for very detailed descriptions to be made of the territory. Everything from road length to depth of river. Every possible detail.
• He was more keen to glean information directly from the place, rather than hear its dignitaries’ speeches. As an example, he once left a dignitary haranguing to the air as Napoleon moved to his next destination.

Seizing the opportunity

• “Winning is not enough if one doesn’t take advantage of success.” - Napoleon
• “All great events hang by a single thread. The clever man takes advantage of everything, neglects nothing that may give him some added opportunity; the less clever man, by neglecting one thing, sometimes misses everything.” - Napoleon
• “I’ve destroyed the Austrian army simply by marches” - Napoleon
• There is immense value in initiative and making sure your advantage is not lost and you don’t need to cross the same bridge twice. After the defeat in Russia, the army’s weak position exposed Napoleon to allied assaults, forcing him to lose territories. When trying to get them back, the allies used the tactics previously used by Napoleon against the allies, making them work against him. If Napoleon would have kept those territories and army, then he wouldn’t have needed to be in this very tough spot.
  • As a learning, do a decisive victory, and don’t take it for granted and leave it to chance. Keep your advantage, stay lean, don’t allow bloat to creep into the organization, don’t get too comfortable in a high stakes environment. Past performance gains don’t mean you’ll get the same results in the future, using the same strategy and tactics.
  • Napoleon also made the mistake of not keeping his forces concentrated, contradicting his own war maxims, and allowed for lesser political concerns to take over, like focusing on taking over Berlin to punish Prussia which was of low strategic value
  • The corp system that Napoleon introduced was replicated, and his tactics were exploited and studied by enemies, losing one of his main leverages.

Taking risks. Decisiveness.

• “If the art of war was only the art of not risking anything, glory would be prey to mediocrity. We need a full triumph!” - Napoleon
• ”(…) If one is not ready to take risks when the time is ripe, one ends up doing nothing” - Napoleon on Waterloo
• “When the house is crumbling, is it time to busy oneself in the garden? A change here is indispensable” - Napoleon to Mamond
• “There is no immortality but the memory that is left in the minds of men. To have lived without glory, without leaving a trace of existence, is not to have lived at all.” - Napoleon

Persist, don’t drop the ball

• “The first qualification of a soldier is fortitude under fatigue and privation. Courage is only the second; hardship, poverty and want, are the best schools for a soldier.” - Napoleon war maxim
• “A general-in-chief should ask himself frequently during the day: What should I do if the enemy’s army appears now in my front, or on my right, or my left? If he has any difficulty in answering these questions, his position is bad, and he should seek to remedy it.” - Napoleon war maxim
• “I have never been seduced by prosperity; adversity shall find me superior to its blows” - Napoleon
• “Posterity would never have seen the measure of your spirit, if it had not seen it in misfortune” - Napoleon
• “True heroism consists of being superior to the ills of life, in whatever shape the may challenge to the combat” - Napoleon (1815)

Continuous improvement

• He was not embarrassed by his initial little knowledge he had about the details of general administration. He asked many questions, asked for the definition and meaning of the most common words, he provoked discussion, and kept it going until his opinion was formed
  • “Sometimes in these discussions I have said things that a quarter of an hour later I have found to be all wrong. I have no wish to pass for being worth more than I really am” - Napoleon
  • “He brought to the discussions a clarity, a precision, a strength of reason and range of views that astonished us” - consulate about Napoleon
  • He quickly taught himself to ask short questions that demanded direct answers like “How far along are we with the Arc of Triumph?” or “Will I walk on the Seine bridge upon my return?”
  • Napoleon allowed strong discussions to be held in the counsel because he believed to be the strongest debater in the whole conseil. He allowed himself to be attacked because he knew how to defend himself.
  • Napoleon liked to talk in a familiar way, was fond of discussions but didn’t impose his opinions, and made no pretension of superiority, either of intelligence or rank.

Over ambition

• “One must never ask of fortune more than she can grant” - Napoleon on Saint Helena
• One needs to know when to stop. Know when you’ve reached your peak, stop, and maintain your position (which is incredibly hard by itself):
  • Relying on fortune is a risky endeavour. Napoleon was lucky several times. Once you are lucky too many times, you might come under the impression that fortune is on your side. But the more times you roll the dice, the higher the chances that you’ll get a disastrous result
  • His dream to be like Julius Caesar or Alexander the Great blinded him, as was seen in his pursuits in Egypt, that he was fascinated there because Alexander the Great was there. Different times, different factors come into play.
• Napoleon could have held his empire at its peak, and only he could bring it down. He had an army to fight off the Russians at the border, and could have French limited territorial expansion. The downfall was self-inflicted.
  • Invading Spain was a blunder. He should have kept her as an allie, to avoid France being surrounded on three fronts.
  • Napoleon had the entire Europe at his control. Instead of a Russian invasion, he could have held the borders and defended them as needed. Even if he had to abdicate some territories, he should have stopped there, and tried to make peace with Spain and Britain, and end the continental blockade.
  • When the Russian invasion was failing, Napoleon should have backtracked from going to Moscow. It was greedy to expect that Alexander I, Emperor of Russia, would accept peace.
  • As the empire was on its decline, Napoleon was given the opportunity to sue for peace by Metternich, by losing Warsaw and other territories, but would still hold Italy and avoid further battles and men being killed, and having France’s borders reduced to even less than was proposed in this offer.
• As a consequence of the empire’s defeats in Russia and Leipzig, and subsequent invasion of France:
  • The patriotic republican anthems (that Napoleon had previously banned) no longer worked. The French surrendered without a fight. With a town surrendering to a single horseman for example.
  • “Public opinion is a mysterious and invisible power, to which everything must yield. There is nothing more fickle, more vague, or more powerful; yet capricious as it is, it is nevertheless much more often true, reasonable, and just, than we imagine” - Napoleon, upon the allied invasion to France

Complacency

• Upon the Russian invasion, the empire’s army structure seemed to show several signs of complacency:
  • When invading Russia, one of the generals brought a personal chef, fancy clothes, Napoleon HQ had 50 carriages carried by 650 horses, had a multi national army ordered by his step son to lead an important maneuver that should have been done by an experienced general. Because it was such a big army, the Russians did not want to counterattack, leading Napoleon to stretch his supply lines. This compromised speed and leanness (which was a crucial piece of Napoleon’s war tactics), having an immense cost to sustain this vast army.

Perception. Deception.

• Data manipulation:
  • It’s a principle of war that you should over-inflate the communicated number of available units, and this practice got so out of control that Napoleon snapped at a poem sincerely lauding him for defeating armies thrice his size, which was actually true since he only 30 thousand units. The problem was that it did not align with his inflated battle reports where he communicated to have a 300 thousand unit army.
  • He would pepper his troops addresses with statistics and their achievements.
• “We must speak to the eyes” - Napoleon on luxuries, in its imperial days
• “My health is very good” - repeated at exhaustion by Napoleon on his closing remarks, even when his health was not the best.
• “Truth is so precious that it deserves to be protected by bodyguards of lies” - Churchill
• “The historian, like the orator, must persuade. He must convince.” - Napoleon
• On the day of the Coup of 18 Brumaire, there was an extraordinarily early meeting that the objecting elders didn’t know about where highly consequential decisions were made in the presence of elders that were believed to not compromise the coup. Extraordinarily “extraordinary” early meetings are one of the oldest tricks in politics.

Religion and War

Religion

• “Wishing to be an atheist does not make you one” - Napoleon
• “If I had to choose a religion, the sun as the universal giver of life would be my god.” - Napoleon
• “In religion I do not see the mystery of the Incarnation, but the mystery of the social order. It associates with Heaven an idea of equality that keeps rich men from being massacred by the poor…Society is impossible without inequality, inequality intolerable without a code of morality, and a code of morality unacceptable without religion.” - Napoleon on the social value of religion
  • Napoleon viewed the idea of god to be useful to maintain good order, to keep men in the path of virtue and to keep them from crime. To robbers and galley slaves physical restrictions to be imposed. To enlightened people, moral ones.
• Napoleon believed the major problem with Christianity was that it did not excite courage, since it took too much care to go to heaven, and that christianity and its promises of afterlife detract men from this life, diminishing its practical value.
• Napoleon mentioned that no man is considered just and virtuous if he doesn’t know where he came and where he is going. Simple reason cannot guide them in this matter. Without religion, one continuously walks in darkness.
• “We should not deprive the poor merely because they are poor, of that which consoles their poverty. Religion is a kind of vaccination which, by satisfying our love for the marvelous, keeps out of the hands of charlatans and conjurers.” - Napoleon, about priests charging more than 6 francs per funerals
• “Fighting is a soldier’s religion; I never changed that. The other is the affair of women and priests. As for me, I always adopt the religion of the country I am in.” - Napoleon
• “The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally false; and by the magistrate as equally useful.” - Edward Gibbon

Cruelties of war

• “To cannon, all men are equal” - Napoleon
• In the battle of Borodino in Russia near Moscow, the combined killed and wounded were equivalent to a fully laden jumbo jet crashing into a 6 square miles area every 5 minutes, during the 10 hours of the battle.
• Ahmed Jezzar, also known as “The Butcher”, was known for his cruel punishments, such as nailing horse shoes in the feet of enemies. At the same time, Ahmed also enjoyed doing origami for his guests.
• Half a million men were lost by France after the Russian war, and Russia had 200k killed and about 300k wounded.

The Person

Who was Napoleon

• Napoleon as a name was not common at the time, but not unheard of.
• Napoleon was protective and concerned about his family. His siblings went on to be kings, nobles and leaders appointed by him, which several times proved to be unfruitful.
• His mothers’ father was the governor of Ajaccio, and his father Carlo was close to Pasquale Paoli, who fought for the independence of Córsega.
• Napoleon attended the royal nursery, because his father applied to be noble and sat on the royal assembly.
• Napoleon was well read and voracious reader of biographies and history. At age 9, he apparently read the 800-page La Nouvelle Héloïse, a novel about love and redemption, and said ‘It turned my head.’
• Napoleon had a disdain for human rights, free press, equal outcome, and parliamentarism. He was favorable towards central power, order, education and military values.
• Napoleon took a leave from the military to resolve the debts from his father that threatened to bankrupt his mother.
• Nomenclature was important for Napoleon, and renamed several places. For example, Place Louis XV to Place de la Concorde.
• Focus on the important things: Napoleon was excellent at prioritization, dealing immediately with urgent matters
• In times of difficulty, he was a master of his nerves. He had immense self control, he trained himself to not let his emotions betray themselves. This was seen at the time as a classical virtue
• Towards his later years, Napoleon was more lethargic and less performant, likely because of ailments like hemorrhoids that likely were the reason for him to not ride horseback in Waterloo. He had a potbelly at that point, was overweight, and was less energetic, and didn’t have many proper nights sleep.
• In Kalinengrad, he joked that he had found a new element: earth, wind, fire, earth, water and, mud
• “The soul wears out the body” - Napoleon

Relationships

• “Love is the occupation of the idle man, the amusement of a busy one, and the shipwreck of a sovereign.” - Napoleon, after Désirée rejected him.
• “A soldier must remain faithful to his wife, but must only think to return to her when there is nothing else to do” - Napoleon
• “The prettiest women are the hardest to make love to” - Napoleon on the way to Saint Helena
• “The French are like women: you must stay away from them for too long” - Napoleon, after the retreat from Russia.
• The only letters he did not dictate were the ones to his wife and mistresses, and when he needed to sign a document.
• Napoleon was ruthless. He divorced Josephine because he didn’t have a male heir yet, and no sons. And he didn’t want to fall into a situation like Caesar or Alexander the Great, where upon their death, everything descended into chaos. It was the best for his dynasty, and for France, in his view
  • Napoleon divorced from Josphine, who received 2 million francs per year, two properties, and was allowed to keep the title of empress. “She wept, but she took”
  • Although it was a grandson from Josephine that would become the next emperor of France, and her direct descendents today sit on the thrones of several countries. Napoleon’s, held none.
• A friend of Josephine was known to have slept with so many ministers that she was considered government property.
• Josephine only disclosed her debts when she had Napoleon’s ring around her finger.
• Napoleon’s relationships were brittle. When Napoleon started to fall and France was invaded, Marie Louise (his wife at the time) seemed to be in denial, only worried about futile matters and etiquette, in an attempt to drown out the earthquake outside, and the clash between Napoleon and her father (the leader of Austria). Also, Joseph, Napoleon’s brother, was wooing her, and eventually she had relations with another man later on.
  • Talleyrand, previously Napoleon’s foreign minister, sent a letter to Alexander from Russia saying that Napoleon’s Paris defenses were weak, which was a decisive piece of information that led to the last kneel of Napoleon’s defenses. Talleyrand had already proved to not be trustworthy by Napoleon, yet no decisive reprimand at the time was made by Napoleon.

Soon after I was researching the underlying electronics and how to experiment upon their concepts. The most obvious microcontroller to drive these would be an Arduino, but several recommendations pointed towards acquiring a kit rather than a single microcontroller, and the Elegoo Arduino Uno R3 Starter Kit seemed the best.

The kit contains over 200 components and an extensive guided tutorial, which I’ve completed (except for the last section using an extra expansion shield). In this article, I’ll go through the highlights of this journey, delightful deviations along the way, and exploration of core electronics concepts. Let’s dive in!

See the video version of the article here.

LEDs

Hello World: Light up a LED

I’ve been involved with electronics in different ways throughout my life, but surprisingly I hadn’t yet done its Hello World equivalent, which is to light up a LED. This simple exercise it by itself incredibly interesting that opened a series of questions:

• Q: Why is a resistor needed? A: High current and increased temperature damage its delicate heterojunction structures, which eventually cause it to burnout
• Q: What happens if the polarity is inverted? A: Similar to a normal diode, current will not flow and the LED will not light up. As long as this reverse power is not high, the LED will not burn and can still be used with correct polarity afterwards
• Q: How to interpret its data sheet? A: There are several interesting aspects its datasheet, like the LED’s wavelength curve, operating current and voltage, etc

RGB LED [Code]

RGB LEDs package a red, green and blue LED inside it that can be controlled independently, allowing for wide range color representation using three pulse width modulation (PWM) outputs from the Arduino.

PWM is a technique used to control the average power delivered to an electrical device by varying the width of pulses in a digital signal, which when done fast enough in a visual output such as a LED, is perceived to the human eye as being of a smooth continuous amplitude, instead of a stream of single bursts.

8 LEDs controlled via 74HC595 [Code]

We can attach an 74HC595 IC to extend the number of outputs possible by an Arduino, at the cost of some latency.

When writing the desired values for each of the inputs into 74HC595, they won’t be externalized until its latch is activated. Once the latch is triggered, all of the stored inputs will be externalized in one go. Very similar purpose of double buffering in video. A flicker free experience.

We are essentially controlling a piece of very limited external memory.

Smooth LED intensity fade out using capacitors

Capacitors are essentially energy stores (i.e. batteries) that with consistent charge and discharge times. By placing a condenser (or two, as in this video, so that their capacitance is summed up) in parallel with a LED, when powering the circuit both the LED immediately lights up and the condenser(s) charge in tandem. Once the main power source is removed, the condenser(s) start to smoothly discharge into the LED, creating a smooth fade out of their intensity.

Display

One Unit Segment Display: Digit Countdown [Code]

We can control this single unit seven segment display at the segment level, and in this example we sequentially write a set of segment sets that we perceive as digits.

One Unit Segment Display: Custom Patterns [Code]

We can also create any patterns, in whichever sequence and timing we so desire. Here are three examples of some custom patterns.

Four Unit Segment Display: Same Character for All [Code]

Expanding on the above, if we write the same patterns as above on a four unit segment display, we see these replicated on all units.

Four Unit Segment Display: Distinct Characters [Code]

In order for each of the units to present their specific segment pattern, we need to write the pattern and then select which of the units should have this pattern written to, wait for a short amount of time, and then move to the next unit, where we will do the exact same thing, only this time selecting the unit(s) that should have this pattern written.

LED Matrix: Scrolling [Code]

This LED Matrix accepts an explicit bitmap, where each of the pixels is either enabled or disabled. To achieve a scrolling effect we set an offset based on value received via the potentiometer.

LCD Display: Showing a Long String [Code]

The scrolling effect is achieved by leveraging a functionality from the LiquidCrystal library. Here we are using a string of normal characters, but custom characters can also be used.

Sound

Buzzer

From the guide: “We should be careful not to use the UNO R3 board analogWrite() function to generate a pulse to the active buzzer, because the pulse output of analogWrite() is fixed (500Hz)”. I’ve used analogWrite(), and this is the result:

Making the buzzer sound like an 8-bit engine [Code]

By adjusting the frequency in which the buzzer is discretely triggered, we can achieve a perceived effect similar to PWM used above for controlling LEDs intensity, only this time to allude to a certain sound pitch, which in this case is quite similar to the sonority from older computer / console games.

Sensing Sound [Code]

I’ve burned the on-board LED (13) while voice fiddling with this integration, since one of the dupont wires touched a wrong spot of the board while going through this.

The red LED represents audio peaks, the yellow LED represents audio troughs.

Spatial Sensors

Tilt ball switch [Code]

This component consists of a very conductive sphere that is free to move inside the component’s cylindrical shape. One face of the cylinder conducts electricity, and the opposite does not.

Ultrasonic sensor to measure distances [Code]

I wondered why an external module was required to calculate distances, so I’ve implemented an algorithm from scratch that took into account the speed of sound and the time taken by an ultrasonic pulse to be received back by the sensor. I’ve validated the measurements using a real life ruler, and they were actually accurate! No external code modules required.

Passive infrared sensor (PIR) Motion Sensor [Code]

This is a sensor commonly used to detect movement from heat emitting, like people, and then trigger a side-effect, such as a hall light. Its output is a simple binary HIGH or LOW.

MPU-6050: Accelerometer and Gyroscope Plotting [Code]

Used the Arduino’s Serial Plotter Tool to visualize the inputs from the MPU-6050 module that bundles an accelerometer, gyro and temperature sensor.

MPU-6050: Interrupt signals [Code]

Going through the datasheets of the gyro module, I’ve noticed that the module could be commanded to dispatch an interrupt signal whenever a certain threshold of movement was detected. This could be useful for low power systems for example, where this interrupt would signal that relevant movement data is starting and the main controller should be fully active.

The objective of this experiment was to make the blue LED blink whenever the gyro was disturbed, but this resulted in a mostly unpredictable output, where the root cause is likely to lie on the incorrect combination of commands needed to set up the module. Further exploration would be needed here.

Environmental Sensors

Light intensity measurement via photoresistor [Code]

A photoresistor is a light-sensitive resistor whose resistance decreases when light falls on its surface, if we place wire in connected from one of Arduino’s analog inputs between the photoresistor and another fixed value resistor, we are able to detect the resulting voltage caused the photoresistor’s variable resistance.

Temperature measurement [Code]

With the exact same setup as above (save from the slight tweak of the script), by replacing the photoresistor with a thermistor (which yet another variable resistor, only this time changing its resistance based on temperature) we are able to measure ambient temperature, which I manipulate by using my hand’s warmth and the cooling it off by blowing air into the thermistor.

Water level sensor [Code]

This consisted of some nervous plunging of the water level sensor into a tea mug, near my computer 😬

Actuators

BJT Transistor driven DC motor: Controlled via On/Off Button [Code]

The Arduino is made to drive logical circuits with low output currents, so when we want to control a high power circuit, we want our Arduino microcontroller to control the “valve”, but not the “pipes” themselves. This is a perfect application for a transistor (or relays, as we’ll see below), where the transistor functions as a “valve” that either lets current flow through freely, or block it completely.

The kit comes included with two models of NPN bipolar junction transistor (BJT) transistors: the PN2222 and S8050. Both are often used interchangeably (as seen in this video), but the PN2222 has a higher voltage rating for collector-to-emitter voltage (60V vs 25V), which in this case is not relevant, since we are not surpassing the 5V barrier. In these, the base is the “valve”, and collector and emitter function as the “pipes”.

Note here I am not using a flyback diode to protect the circuit from back EMF voltage spikes caused when the DC motor is switched off, which is not the wisest idea when performing multiple tests. I was not aware of that effect at the time, and fortunately no harm was done.

BJT Transistor driven LED and DC motor: Controlled via Potentiometer [Code]

Same setup as above, only this time we are driving a LED instead of a DC motor.

L293D driven DC Motor using battery power [Code]

L293D is a neat IC that packs inside everyone one needs to drive inductive loads such as relays, solenoids, DC and bipolar stepping motors, along with bidirectional drive and overcurrent and kickback protection (so no flyback diode needed).

Notice that when attempting to drive the DC motor at low power it struggles to start its rotation, but once power is increased of a slight nudge is given, it quickly starts to rotate freely.

L293D + Relay driven DC Motor [Code]

Relays are larger and have slower switching speeds when compared to transistors, but handle higher currents and voltages and provide good electrical isolation.

As a fun fact, in older cars, “tick-tock” heard when activating the turn signal are actually the sound of the respective relay closing and opening the circuit to light up the blinker. Those relays are very similar to the one used here, and a similar noise can be heard in the video, as the relay closes and opens the circuit that powers the DC motor

Resistor and Capacitor (RC) circuit for delayed triggering

When setting up a Resistor and Capacitor (RC) circuit, we can take advantage of its predictable charging curve to delay the activation of a transistor, which in turn can activate another set of components. Depending if the transistor is a BJT (current-controlled) or a MOSFET (voltage-controlled), they would have different current or voltage thresholds at which they allow current to flow between the collector and emitter (BJT), or drain and source (MOSFET).

In this case, a bipolar junction transistor (BJT) has its base connected to RC circuit, and upon its activation a LED and/or a DC motor are activated. Notice that the DC motor either does not have enough power to start, or barely has a delay once a smaller resistor is placed on the RC circuit, which I think to be caused by having low capacitance capacitors, and not having the ideal resistor being used on RC circuit, but this would warrant further exploration and a deeper understanding of the problem.

Servo Motor controlled via Potentiometer [Code]

Servo motors are used in applications requiring precise and controlled movement, where the motor’s position, speed, and torque need to be accurately controlled. In this example a button is used to switch between the state where the servo’s position is synced position defined by the potentiometer, and the state where a default servo motor position is set.

Notice as well how the slight voltage noise created when manipulating the detached potentiometer input wire, and the effect it has on the servo that is attempting to sync with these received values.

Stepper Motor: Automatic Control [Code]

The stepping motor is a clever piece of engineering that enables precision movement without the need of external feedback.

In this setup the motor is controlled fully by an automated script, and since the 9V battery was starting to die, it was powered via power adapter.

Stepper Motor: Rotary Encoder Control, using ELEGOO script [Code]

To the above we add a rotary encoder to send precise commands of how much we want the stepper to move. This rotary encoder is the same you’ll find in several appliances such as mouse wheels, car radio knobs and washing machines.

Notice that the movement is quite jerky, and no matter how much we move the rotary encoder, only the most recent movements are actually accounted for.

Stepper Motor: Rotary Encoder Control, with Extra Precision [Code]

To fix the above behaviour, this script takes into account all the movements from the rotary encoder to establish a target rotation angle that every cycle the stepper motor is correcting itself towards.

Notice that in the beginning of the video the two LEDs are lighting up as the rotary encoder is manipulated, so that we can see which are the signals captured by our script. These signals consist of a predictable gray code sequence that lets us perceive with high accuracy whether it is rotating right or left.

Once the two demonstration LEDs are disconnected, we’ll have signals coming through our Arduino inputs, that we interpret leveraging the above concepts, plus we also make sure to trigger device interrupts not only for one of the inputs (as in the script above), but for both inputs, so that we can capture all movements.

Stepper Motor: IR Remote Control [Code]

Combining the IR sensor and remote above, we can also control this stepper motor using this remote control mechanism.

Communication Interfaces

How Arduino Keypad Works under the hood, from scratch, without extra libraries

One of the peripherals you can provide as input to Arduino is a 16 button keypad that provides a useful human interface component for microcontroller projects.

This keypad module comes included in the Elegoo UNO R3 Starter Kit, which also comes with its respective tutorial and library that helps facilitates its usage.

In this video we will code from scratch an implementation that will use this keypad module, without using extra libraries, and we will go through the respective concepts and circuits, including how pull-up resistors work (which are accessible via INPUT_PULLUP)

Supporting code:

• Using one column source code (as seen in the video)
• Using two columns source code

Note that the code resorts to a fair amount of duplication, but this is explicitly show how the entire mechanism works, without occluding via abstractions

IR Signal Replication [Code]

While exploring how common infrared communication protocols are used in every day appliances, I wondered if it was possible punch in custom light pulses via a red LED source that could be interpreted as valid signals by the IR receiver, and started by pulsing it in 25ms intervals in order comply with the 38khz signal modulation expectation on the IR receiver (1 second / 38000 Hz ~= 25ms).

Turns out this would never work with a normal red LED, since its wavelength sits around the 640nm peak, whereas we would need a 900nm to 1000nm wavelength for an IR receiver to pick that signal.

In this attempt, I am comparing the continuous pulsing by the red LED vs the pulsing generated by a standard IR remote. An interesting follow up would be to attempt the same setup, but with a IR LED emitter instead.

RFID Card Reader [Code]

This video shows what the MIFARE content dump from the two cards included with the kit, but the setup is able to read minimal information from other sources, like credit cards or electronic passports.

Note that this module reference voltage works best when connected to the Arduino’s VIn output, instead of Arduino’s 3.3v power output.

Joystick [Code]

This joystick module is essentially the same used in several game controllers, and its usage is fairly straighforward using an Arduino.

Communication and Storage

Transmitting Serial Information via TX output [Code]

This might come as obvious to many, but only after using Serial.print() on different Arduino scripts as a debugging mechanism, did I realize that this command actually sends structured information not only to the host via USB (computer), but also via Arduino’s TX output.

This video/script are very simple: they write very long strings and individual bytes to the serial interface, using a very low baud rate, so that their individual bits can be roughly seen upon the right yellow LED that is attached to the TX output. The left green LED stays enabled before we start sending commands to the serial interface, and is disabled once the writing phase is completed.

Notice that even after all writes were committed, there are still bits flowing through the TX output. This goes on until Arduino’s internal serial communication buffer is completely flushed.

Writing individual bits and feeding them back via RX input [Code]

Building up on the above, if we write individual bits by carefully timing the a normal pin output’s LOW and HIGH to comply with the UART standard to form 8 bit packets, feed these through a wire to the Arduino’s Rx pin, read the resulting serial communication receive buffer, and then finally write these contents into the serial port, we are able to see these logged into the serial monitor.

This was one of the most 🤯 while fiddling around with the Arduino.

Sending information from the host to Arduino [Code]

Using the Serial Monitor, we can easily send packets of information to the Arduino via Serial communication. In this script, Arduino reads from the serial communication buffer an enables or disables a LED if the corresponding received information is a zero or a one.

Using internal EEPROM to persist information [Code]

Building on the above setup, we integrate ATmega’s integrated EEPROM to persist information. This means that even after a power outage that information is still available, as seen in the video below.

Sending information from the host to Arduino + 74CH95 to drive LEDs [Code]

We can attach an 74HC595 IC to extend the number of outputs possible by an Arduino, and do the same as above but for extra outputs. The setup supports 7 different LEDS, but only 3 are shown in the video, and for this specific example there is no real gain from using 74CH95 IC, other than demonstrating its usage.

Time

Real Time Clock (RTC) Module Square Wave Output [Code]

I was curious about the RTC module’s square wave output, and found a YouTube video on how to send a command to the module that forces the square wave pin (SQW) to output a 1Hz square wave, meaning that the cycle of this wave repeats every second.

In the video, this signal is first connected to a LED, which leads it to blink every second, and then the output is directed towards Arduino’s pin 8, thus showing this cycle’s result on the serial output.

Integration

Putting it all together: the Timer [Code]

The time project is the opus maximus of the provided tutorials provided by Elegoo, but there were components which were not working directly, namely the interrupt library, so I’ve adapted the provided example to use the built in Arduino interrupt library, and changed some of the connections, leading to a beautiful culmination of all the the lessons from above.

Searching for replacement wired ANC earbuds

To my surprise, not only have these types of earphones been discontinued by Bose, but the selection of wired in-ear active noise cancelling headphones is incredibly slim. After an extensive search, I’ve found Asus ROG Cetra II and Bang Olufsen B4, which appear to offer inferior quality in terms of Active Noise Cancelling (ANC), when compared to recent highly rated Bose, Sony or Apple headphones, which are either wireless or are over-ear / on-ear. Quality in-ear² ANC earbuds are almost exclusively wireless.

Health

I understand the popularity of wireless earbuds. They are extremely practical and neat. It is not surprising that penetration of bluetooth headphones has jumped considerably in recent years, but given that I use my headphones for several hours each day, it is not an enticing proposition to have two wireless devices extremely close to my brain, even if they output a low amount of EMF radiation. The (cumulative) dose makes the poison.

Several experts ^{3 4 5} claim there is no danger in prolonged usage of these devices, because they don’t emit ionizing radiation, but it has been reported both in studies and anecdotally that exposure to high levels of EMF radiation might have detrimental effects long term.

I’ve found it challenging to uncover quality studies that correlate the usage of bluetooth headphones and health effects. I assume this correlation is hard to experiment upon with statistically significant results, due to how long this exposure needs to happen, and other confounding environmental and behavioural factors. Regardless, one of these studies draws a significant link between the usage of bluetooth headset and thyroid nodules.

Unknowns Risks

Widespread adoption of these devices is still relatively recent, and we should be humble enough to acknowledge that we don’t have the full picture clearly laid out of the all repercussions related to their long term usage, especially when in close proximity to one of the most valuable organs of our body, our brain.

It’s not what is known that concerns me, but rather what is not known. Until proven the contrary, I will continue to play it safe, and avoid using wireless earbuds.

Hopefully a larger swath of the population will increasingly exercise caution and awareness on this issue, signalling manufacturers to drive the supply of competitive good quality wired in-ear ANC headphones that empower the consumer to make the best choice for their use case, and their health.

Why we are, the way we are

It is all about how energy is used

Us humans and other living beings are essentially organisms that use energy to reproduce and maintain ourselves.

• Natural selection prunes off organisms that don’t use energy in a way that is suited to their conditions and environment.
• Every energy transformation feature / trait has a cost. For example: walking upright allows one to walk using less energy, but lacks the speed of a quadruped.

Long Distance Walking / Running Machines

What drove selection for bipedalism

Hominid bipedalism was likely to have been initially selected to help the first hominids forage and obtain food more effectively in the face of major climate change

Between 10 and 5 million years ago, the earth climate cooled considerably, and overall effect in Africa that caused rainforests to shrink and woodlands to expand. If you were to be in the heart of the rainforest, you likely wouldn’t have noticed much of a difference, but if you were in the margins, this change must have been stressful. As the forest shrinks and becomes woodland, ripe fruits become less abundant, more dispersed and more seasonal. These changes would require you to travel farther to get the same amount of food.

Walking on two legs is more energy efficient for longer routes. Main trade off is less speed, because we could not gallop. We are 3x more efficient moving a distance of 6km than a chimp.

The consequences of bipedalism

Not only was endurance walking useful, but also long distance running was likely selected for scavenging. Running to fresh carcasses, running with food and, persistence hunting, where a big animal is followed by running and walking on sun. They need to find shades and pant, and eventually collapse due to heat stroke.

• We are unique in that we have sweat glands all over the body. Other apes mostly have on the palms of their hands. And we. Don’t have fur, allowing the air to come in contact with sweat and cool your body down. This is essential for long distance running and walking.
  • Other animals have fur that reflects solar radiation, but does it allow body to cool down through sweat

Other features that help us to run effectively. Some of them not specially helpful for walking, like shorter toes:

• Big gluteus maximus muscles, mostly active when running.
• Nuchal ligament is a back neck ligament that connects head to arm that helps stabilize the head while running. It was developed independently in humans and other animals well adapted for running.
• Big semi circular inner ear canals to have more signals to allow for stabilization of our inner systems, such eye actions to compensate for the jiggle.
• Predominance of slow twitch fibers in legs. More endurance, thus compromising speed.
• Narrow waists, wide shoulders, shorter toes.
• Long noses are selected for walking long distances without drying up. Nose humidifies air coming into the lungs, which is necessary, and retains moisture going out. Trade-off is that lungs have to work a bit harder.

All of these walking and running adaptations made us clumsy climbing trees, like shorter toes, but also freed up our hands to interact with the world, create the first tools and throw objects (we are especially good at throwing, having shoulders and upper body that makes it ideal for it), which not only provided some protection, but also allowed us to obtain and process fallback / lower quality foods (which were essential due to scarcity from global cooling climate).

Only mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun ― Noël Coward

Better dexterity, tools, cognition, less digestive cost, more energy availability

In the average adult human, the brain represents about 2% of the body weight, but accounts to about 20% of total energy consumption.

As the ability to create and use tools allowed the gathering and processing of fallback foods, more usable energy was able to be extracted. Processing foods to smaller chunks, or cooking it, largely increases how much energy can be obtained during digestion, but also requires less intense chewing (we didn’t need as bigger teeth as australopithecus, which resulted in use losing the snout due to less space being needed in the head) and shorter intestines, which reduce energy required for digestion, increases surplus energy to be used by the brain. These factors selected hominids with better manual dexterity and better cognition.

Our manual dexterity, and what it unlocks, plays a big role in our evolution.

Energy hungry brain, and relation with fat

If our brain¹ is deprived of glucose for even 1 minute or two, it causes irreparable damage. This likely selected humans to become unusually fat. 400 to 500 calories daily, are for the brain alone. Extra intense thought only increases hourly usage by 5 calories per hour.

Hunter gatherer mothers have to expend about 2.3k calories for themselves alone to raise kids. Babies are unusually fat. 60 percent of their energy consumption is for the brain. It takes 12M calories to grow a child into a full grown adult. Twice as much as those needed for a chimpanzee.

Our way of living affected the size of our gut so profoundly, that now we are pretty much dependent on cooking to get the caloric intake we need for our body and brain.

Exercise is not great to lose fat (unless you don’t succumb to overeating after exercise) but it’s good to prevent fat gain. It increases muscle (and not fat) sensitivity to insulin and makes the muscles more readily available to store energy, and also increases the number of mitochondria that burn fat and sugar.

• A lean man that doesn’t exercise has twice the risk of dying, compared to obese men that engaged in regular physical activity

High offspring investment

Life is fundamentally a way of using energy to make more life.

• If the environment is risky: quick returns are favored, where little investment is made during life, but a lot during reproduction. Such as spiders, salmon that lay a lot of eggs, hoping that a lucky few will survive
• But when resources are predictable and infant mortality is low, it is feasible to mature slowly and invest a lot in raising the few offspring. This is the strategy of humans, elephants and apes.

Cost of clear speech: choking

What good is it to have a good idea, if you can’t communicate it? One of the main features we developed as humans was our ability to use speech to clearly communicate thoughts, ideas, plans, and other information.

The price is that we are the only mammal that can risk asphyxiation when swallowing something too large or imprecisely², because of the big common space behind the tongue through which food and air both travel to get either into the esophagus or trachea, a consequence of our short and retracted faces and selection of anatomy that favors clear speech. As a result, food sometimes gets lodged on the back of the throat, blocking the airway.

When you are having lunch with friends, consider that you are doing two things: speaking clearly, and swallowing a little dangerously.

Diseases

We’ve created a system that makes people sick through a surplus of energy, and keeps them alive without needing to turn down the energy flow

Lieberman presents the concepts of Mismatch diseases and Dysevolution:

• Mismatch diseases: Diseases that occur because our bodies are poorly or inadequately adapted to environments in which we now live. An example would be eating large amounts of sugar or being very physically inactive leads to problems like diabetes or heart disease that then make us sick
• Dysevolution: Form of cultural evolution where the symptoms of a mismatch disease are treated, but not the cause. One example of this is cavities, which are treated with dentists, and not by removing the sugar from our diet, which is the underlying cause. Lieberman emphasizes that mismatched diseases and their causes must be understood fully to treat the true cause.

Too much energy surplus

Our ancestors ate fruits as sweet as carrots, but as energy dense foods had their availability increased³, more humans moved from subsistence farming and physically strenuous jobs to lower physical effort jobs (in the USA, only 11 per cent are actually factory workers. The rest are in management, services, wealth management and banking services), the same mechanisms that made us effective is storing energy and craving certain foods, are also the ones that have become maladapted to our current environment.

It has been only about 300 generations since we’ve been subsistence farmers, which didn’t give enough time for natural selection and body adaptations to develop.

Sugar and fat absorption mechanisms and effects

Your body can use glucose as energy readily, but fructose can only be worked as fat or in the liver.

• When the liver is flooded with too much fructose, too quickly, it is overwhelmed and converts most of the fructose into fat, triglycerides. Some of this fat fills up the liver and causes inflammation, which blocks the action of insulin in the liver.
• Chain reaction occurs, in that the liver releases stores of glucose into the bloodstream, driving the pancreas to release more insulin, shuttling extra glucose and fat into cells. The rest of fat created by the liver is dumped into the bloodstream, where it ends up in fat cells, your arteries, and other potentially bad places.
  • Visceral fat is more hormone sensitive than other fat cells, resulting that its stores are dumped fat more readily than other fat cells, and since it sits close to the liver, it tends to clog up the liver and constrain its glucagon function when it dumps fat.
• Sugar is 50 percent fructose; fruits also have it. An apple for example has 13g of sugar. 30 percent is glucose, the rest is fructose.

Comparing an apple to a highly processed fruit roll, apart from nutritional differences:

• Fiber covering the apple (the skin) prevents the full absorption of sugar. Fiber makes food stay longer in the stomach, generating signals that release appetite suppressing hormones.
  • Speed of eating and amount of fiber is important. That’s why salads and low glycemic foods should come first in your meal
• An apple gives your pancreas time to realize how much insulin to release. On the other hand, high glycemic, calorie dense foods are easily and quickly absorbed in the digestive process, prompting the pancreas to produce a lot of insulin, which it often overshoots, plunging blood sugar levels, which in turn makes us hungry.

Height as a measure of extra caloric availability and health

• Maximum height is constrained by genes, but available energy will limit actual height. Because if you spend most of your energy fighting diseases and toiling in the fields, then you won’t have extra calories to gain height.
  • It was seen for populations that turned to subsistence farming, like in Asia and America, to have had their height shortened. For example, subsistence farming children spent about 4 or 6 hours working, as compared to children of hunter gatherers that would spend about 1 to 2 hours working in tasks like gathering firewood and helping in domestic tasks.
• Tall people are naturally selected in hot climates, because of higher surface area to release heat. Colder climates select for shorter ones, because they can retain more heat.

Too much Stress

• Stress is an ancient adaptation to save you from dangerous situations, and activates energy reserves when you need them.
  • If a Lion roars nearby, a car nearly runs you over, or if you go for a run, your brain triggers your adrenal glands (which sit on top of your kidneys), to secrete a small dosage of the hormone cortisol.
• Cortisol does not cause stress. It is released when you are stressed.
• One of cortisol’s functions is to cause liver and fat cells (specially visceral fat cells) to release glucose into the bloodstream. It increases heart rate and blood pressure, makes you more alert and prevents sleep, and makes you crave for calorie rich foods.
  • Chain reaction for long bouts of stress: as you crave more energy rich foods and consume them, this increases insulin levels, which inhibits the brain’s response to leptin (fat cells release it to increase satiety), as such, the stressed brain thinks you are starving, so activates reflexes to make you hungry and other reflexes ot make you less active.

Too little Sleep

• Insufficient sleep promotes stress and stress promotes insufficient sleep. Higher income populations get on average more sleep, likely because of having of less challenges of making ends meet and less stress
  • Sleep deprivation is sometimes caused by elevated levels of stress, thus more cortisol.
  • Sleep deprivation elevates the ghrelin hormone, a hunger hormone that stimulates appetite.
• Only until recently did we do start sleeping alone or with a single partner the child detached from parents during sleep, and in stimulus deprived environments
  • On the other hand, hunter gatherers used to sleep in relatively noisy environments, woke up at about 7h, took a one hour nap in the middle of the day, and then went to sleep at 9pm, where they would get two sleeps. Likely an adaptation, that prevented predator under vigilance
  • But now we have entertainment and lights that are able to keep us awake far beyond 9pm, in sensory deprived environments, with less exercise, excess calories, and stress

Too Crowded

Villages, cities, are our human fortresses from the wild. Because we have that fortress, we don’t need to carry arms and be attentive to outer animal threats, like lions. Mostly. There were costs to these though:

• High concentration of humans in low⁴ sanitation⁵ environments facilitated the spread of these diseases, and close contact with animals gave rise to diseases such as influenza, coming from pigs.
• Before the 1900s, the death rates in cities such as London were higher than in rural areas, so they needed a large influx of rural immigrants to keep them going. Which they did, because of a larger scope of opportunities and wealth.
• Cows’ digestive systems were adapted to eat grass, but in the crowded industrial complexes they are fed grains, and as a consequence they have to be constantly medicated with antibiotics, to counter their chronic diarrhea and diseases coming from these crowded, filthy environments.
  • Antibiotics given to industrially raised animals because microbes also consume energy. So this makes them fatter

Cancer

There is a positive correlation between cancer development in reproductive organs and high energy balance.

• Women’s bodies adapted towards delivering as many children as possible, and are maladapted towards having a high energy balance:
  • High exposure to estrogen incentives cell division in breast, ovaries, and uterus, in preparation of a fertilized embryo. Chances to develop cancer in these organs increases substantially from the number of menstrual cycles, and decreases as the number of children the woman bears.
    • During the menstrual cycle the levels of estrogen and progesterone rise significantly
    • While nursing, chances of having cancer go down, as there is less exposure to reproductive hormones, and likely breast feeding aids flushing memory ducts.
  • For women, the incidence of breast cancer was observed to be higher in nuns (hence, the nuns disease)
  • Women in contemporary USA have about 350-400 menstrual cycles, start menstruating at 12, 13, and then stop at early fifties
    • Hunter gatherers have about 150 cycles, and start menstruating at 16. They spent most of their life being pregnant or nursing, while barely having energy to do so.
  • Obese women can have 40 per cent more estrogen, because of the role of fat in the endocrine system. So after menopause being obese is correlated with cancer in women
• For men, higher exposure to testosterone throughout their life is correlated with prostate cancer. But correlation is not as strong as in women.

More exercise results in lower chances of cancer. Likely because the energy spent there is not otherwise spent on reproductive hormones that have these side effects.

• There is compelling evidence that routine physical activity is associated with reductions in the incidence of specific cancers, in particular breast and colon cancer. Physically active men and women exhibited a 30%–40% reduction in the relative risk of colon cancer, and physically active women a 20%–30% reduction in the relative risk of breast cancer compared with their inactive counterparts.

Use it, or lose it; No strain, no gain

Imagine you are tasked with building a robot that is aimed to accomplish a task in the future that is unknown. You can either create a series of specialized robots (e.g. only able to swim, to dig, jump, etc), or a single one that adapts to multiple situations. When you don’t know what the robot will do, the latter works best. That is how animals and plants work. But if you don’t use it, you lose it.

Bone loss

• Bones are a reserve of calcium, an essential component to the body. If there is not enough calcium, osteoclasts start dissolving them at a higher rate.
• Most people will reach their peak bone mass between the ages of 25 and 30, then it keeps going away. Specially struts in spongy bones like vertebrae and joints. They don’t come back.
• Just having a supply of calcium and vitamin D is not enough. You also need to load your bones, otherwise the osteoblasts will not kick in to start building bone.
  • High intensity weight bearing can stop or even moderately reverse some loss.

Teeth problems

If you don’t chew enough when you are young, teeth will become misaligned, and overcrowding happens, leading to issues on wisdom tooth growth for example. The body needs that stress.

Allergies and hygiene hypothesis

Hygiene hypothesis states that early childhood exposure to particular microorganisms (such as the gut flora and helminth parasites) protects against allergies by properly tuning the immune system. In particular, a lack of such exposure is thought to lead to poor immune tolerance. There are two main hypothesis for it:

• First hypothesis is that T helper 1 cells are not busy enough⁶, which increases the number of T helper 2 cells. With more sterilized environments, children’s immune systems are less busy, having more of these T helper 2 cells swimming unemployed, leading to a higher probability that they react to a non-threatening component. First reaction is mild, but the immune system keeps a memory, so the following time that component is detected, it’s devastating.
• Second hypothesis is microbiome destabilization, the “old friends” hypothesis. Microbes have evolved to cohabit with others and us in a cold war kind of environment. Once you start killing several of them with antibiotics and cleaning products, you destabilize their equilibrium
  • There is a case to be made that possible treatments would be to have fezes or filth
  • And it also follows that after antibiotic treatments, that probiotics are taken

We frequently mistake comfort for wellbeing

Hannah Arendt introduced the expression and concept of the banality of evil, where a common person does nefarious actions, since they became accepted and normalized in their society.

Actions that we perceive as normal, such as usage of cancer inducing sodium nitrate in foods (which stems for a trade-off between structural economic gain and health), wearing comfortable shoes, reading and sitting, are in fact not normal when seen through the lenses of long term evolution.

Comfortable shoes

Our feet have adapted for us to efficiently run and walk, but highly cushioned, constraining shoes deform and inhibit our feet from fulfilling their purpose

• Habitual barefoot people have much lower incidence of flat foot, which very likely is due to the high usage of the foot arch, which is restrained on comfortable shoes with arch support, which instead overload the plantar fascia, leading to plantar fasciitis
• A constrained toe box restrains how much stability the foot can provide, and an unbalanced foot leads to an unbalanced knee, hip, body.
• I’ve personally transitioned to using barefoot shoes daily and when hiking, and can only recommend them after using them for more than one year.
  • One common question is if these are appropriate on hard terrain. Turns out that your foot already has a built in mechanism, which is to forefoot / midfoot strike, instead of heel strike. Try to jump to see how your foot automatically lands using the ball of your foot, and how softly you land, when compared to a (dangerous) similar jump landing on your heel.
  • Going barefoot or using minimal shoes, provides you full perception of the terrain and impact, so you’ll adapt towards hitting the ground more softly, and not using heel strikes as much.

Reading

Myopia is a formerly rare evolutionary mismatch that is exacerbated by modern environments. In the USA and Europe, about one third of all children (aged 7 to 17) become nearsighted.

Evidence suggests that being nearsighted used to be very rare: that less than three per cent prevalence amongst hunter gatherers and populations that practices subsistence agriculture. In 1813, it was noted that amongst the Queen’s guards, many were myopic. On the hand, from the 10k foot guard, less than half dozen were myopic.

The mechanisms of how myopia are still not fully understood, but two main causes are suggested:

• Close work, forcing long bouts of close focus. Singapore study found that students who read more than 2 books per week had strong myopia.
• Children spending more time outdoors have lower incidence of myopia. Brightness of light and visual stimuli appear to have a beneficial effect.

Sitting

While sitting in different positions to rest after strenuous activity has been around for much of our species, only until recently have we been multiple hours sitting in a chair, day after day, which is a risk factor towards:

• Muscle atrophy and shortening: calf muscle shortening also happens for high heels usage
• Lower back pain. To prevent this issue, make sure to maintain a strong back via moderate intensity load, but not too much load, like furniture movers.

How to solve these issues

One solution would be to wait for natural selection to sort out these problems, which is very unlikely due to the high rate of change in our societies and environments, in short time windows. As the commander of the Albigensian Crusade said, on a mission to eliminate heretics: “Kill them all; let God sort them out.”

We are all subject to influence by advertising, availability and peer pressure, but we can be nudged to acquire behaviours that benefit us. Daniel Lieberman suggests:

• We should invest in prevention over treatment
• Although adults have the right to get sick, children need guidance. How different is it to restrict fast foods to them, to restricting which movies they are able to attend? Or availability of alcohol to them?
• Just like nature obliged us to do the right thing and evolved our behaviours, government has the right and duty to have information to do rational decisions and nudge or even push us to do so:
  • Question is how much and where and when
  • Government shouldn’t prevent you from smoking, but “you are free to do as wish, as long as I don’t have to pay for it”

Culture does not allow us to transcend biology

Culture is roughly everything we do and monkeys don’t. ― FitzRoy Richard Somerset

Clever as we are, we cannot modify our human bodies any more than superficial ways. And it’s arrogant to think we can engineer body parts any better than nature did. There will be no Pasteur for mismatched diseases.

We should come to terms that:

• We are fat, furless, bipedal primates that crave sugar, salt, fat and starch.
• We crave comfort, but our bodies are endurance athlete machines.
• As Voltaire wrote: “Let us cultivate our garden”. We must cultivate our body.

I’ve recently built a set of Grafana dashboards to track my personal goals, which I’ve been finding incredibly interesting to explore and visualise (something that might be interesting to share in a later post).

Final Tally

There are other metrics I track, but specifically to 2024 content creation, these are the final statistics¹:

• 17 posts on this blog, 16 of them being notes (not counting this one), and one of them being a full blog article sharing how to build a personal local (Llama3 8B) LLM, extended with WhatsApp and Obsidian data
• 10 YouTube videos on my main channel. 8 of them being long form, the other 2 being shorts.
• 5 YouTube videos on Out and About, a recently created channel where I share random experiences on activities such as walking / hiking around or driving.

Notice that the tracked metrics are on the volume of content produced, not their number of views, subscribers, likes. Although keeping track of topline metrics makes sense for a full fledged business, I chose instead to track what I can control, which is my output. At the end of the day, this is a hobby, a labor of love.

If I can influence someone’s life for the better, that will already fill my heart to the brim. This, added to how important posting these contents has become to consolidate and structure my thoughts, and serendipitous opportunities they randomly opened, make this an incredibly satisfying endeavor.

I’ve experienced time and time again that consistency eventually bears wonderful fruits. Who knows which doors might open one day later? I don’t, but I’m curious to find out.

2025, one day away

With 2024 wrapped up, let’s welcome 2025. I’ve pinned down next year’s goals and will be looking forward to sharing what I learn along the way. Happy new year, and see you on the other side! 🫡

Over the past 4 years, I’ve written about 1820 pages on the 13 A5 notebooks shown in the picture above. This tool has become essential for my job, and in this article I’ll describe the simple process behind it, which I’ve found to deliver consistent results, reliably.

See the video version of the article here.

Write, Consolidate, Repeat

The process I’ve been using for several years is based on Option 3. of Solving Task Switching Through Documentation, and is broken down in three steps:

1. Write

• Material: A5 spiral notebook (it makes it easier to be written anywhere, because the pages can always be flipped around in a way that only the writing page is facing up, and the rest of the pages serving as a solid writing surface; plus the notebook’s rings are great for carrying your pen or pencil reliably), with clear pages (this allows for diagrams, phrases, texts, tidbits, collaborations to happen without any formal restriction). Have another backup notebook within reach, to replace the main one when it runs out.
• When: Make sure to always have your notebook and pen / pencil at your desk, meetings, conferences, 1:1s, and any environment where a collaboration is made, within reason.
• What: Write down your thoughts, key points that coworkers communicate, ideas, anything else you find relevant. These are your notes, so allow yourself to expand and experiment.

2. Consolidate

With several notes written, their consolidation can happen in three different time spans:

• Immediately:
  • The mere act of writing often helps the thought process, since it forces ethereal concepts to be materialized into paper. Expect that a good portion of the written notes to not be read ever again.
• Shortly after they are written:
  • Keeping track of conversations: has it ever happened to you that suddenly you completely lost track of the discussion, especially a complex / ambiguous one? Refer back to the jotted down key points to quickly recall and connect points. Soon after you will be back on track, and maybe with new insights.
  • Summarization of conversation segments, usually at the end of a meeting: leverage the written notes to summarize key takeaways and action points. There is nothing worse than spending 30 minutes in a discussion without material end results or follow ups.
• Some time after notes are written: I avoid this period to be longer than one day.
  • Transcribe key points into a structured medium, such as a document, article, or personal log (I use a simple text file where I log important events during the day; this text file has been consistently updated for 4 years, and is a personal historical treasure trove spanning several thousands of lines).

3. Repeat

Just like other processes, their value only becomes apparent after they have been used several times. Build a habit. It will then become immediately apparent whenever a notebook is not at hand, or when structured notes are not written down.

Building high performance groups

Incentives and culture

• If you want to predict what a group of people will do over the long term, you need to look at their incentives, not their instructions.
• Companies don’t have one company culture: every manager in an organization creates a subculture underneath them.
• In a small group / startup, when the culture is strong, new joiners become like the culture. When the culture is weak, the culture becomes like the new joiners.
• In a small group / startup (and likely this can be applied to teams), create a cult-like dynamic upon its inception, but then transition it to a more sustainable structure. Key elements of a cult:
  • Provides meaning, purpose and belonging. Asserts superiority of the group.
  • Clear shared identity and commitment to ideology.
  • Leaders present themselves as infallible, confident and grandiose.
  • “Us vs Them” mentality: there is a clear adversary.

Traits of a good leader

• The factor that kills meaning the fastest is a leadership team that dismisses employee’s work or ideas, removes their sense of ownership and autonomy, and asks them to spend time on work that is cancelled, changed or disregarded before it’s been completed.
• Allow people the space to fail and succeed. The main job of a leader is to be a supportive enabler, not a critical micromanager.
• Leaders should proactively remove any obstacles, bureaucracy and sign-off processes that prevent the team to achieve daily progress, this includes identifying and providing the required resources for them to do their job. To discover these gaps, ask the teams informally or formally about these problems (via retros for example).
• Leaders need to point out, publicize and praise progress as loud, far and wide as they possibly can. Recognition reinforces behaviour, but it also acts as evidence to adjacent teams that progress is possible for them too.
• Alex Ferguson, the widely successful manager from Manchester United, didn’t care about tactics, strategies and formations. He cared about getting the best out of each individual, the team’s culture and attitude. He didn’t want them to be become complacent:
  • He had different ways of dealing with different players. He knew how to get the best out of everyone. He knew his players well, and what made them tick, like Gary Neville’s important connection with his grandparents.
  • Some players strived under Ferguson’s “hairdryer” treatment, others under a more compassionate approach, and others by being more hands off. There was not a size fits all approach. The main objective was always to have the team and club at a higher ground.
  • It is impossible to seamlessly blend into a team as a jigsaw piece, unless you comprehend the unique shape of each of your team members.

Ask who, not how

• Every CEO and founder will be judged on their ability to hire the best, and bind them into a culture that gets the best out of them. An environment where they become more than the sum of the parts.
• Your ego will insist that you do. Your potential will insist that you delegate.

Excise bad apples, promote bar raisers

• “The cost of one bad apple can be the loss of many good ones” - CEO of General Electric
  • Study found that employees were 37% more likely to commit misconduct at work when they encountered a new co-worker who had a history of misconduct themselves. Toxic employees really are contagious.
  • When a bad apple isn’t fired, it can lead to employee disengagement, other employees copying the behaviour, social withdrawal, anxiety and fear. Culminating in the deterioration of trust in the team and further disengagement from its team members.
• 3 bars framework
  • Ask yourself, or managers: “if everyone in the organization had the same cultural values, attitude, and level of talent as this employee, would the average bar be lowered, maintained, or raised?
  • Fire the ones that lower the bar, promote the bar raisers.
• “(…) not settling for B and C players, but really going for the A players”. “It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do” - Steve Jobs

Dealing with discomfort

• “Hard” is the price we pay today for an “easy” tomorrow.
• When you refuse to accept an uncomfortable truth, you’re choosing to accept an uncomfortable future.
• When something is unresolved because we’ve chosen to bury our heads in the sand, it doesn’t sit dormant, waiting to be addressed; it becomes toxic, contagious and poisonous to those around us, inflicting more collateral damage with every day that it remains unaddressed.
• When seeking the truth that is causing the discomfort, listen to understand, not to look for a victory, but rather in the perspective of a partner that wants to overcome that difficulty.
• In a relationship, if you’re having the same conversation over and over again, you are having the wrong conversations. You’re avoiding the uncomfortable conversation you should be having.
• It is in talking about our disconnections that people create more connectedness with one another.
• You can predict someone’s success in any area of their life by observing how willing and capable they are at dealing with uncomfortable conversations. Your personal progression is trapped behind an uncomfortable conversation.
• As mentioned by George Vaillant, denial can be healthy, enabling individuals to cope with rather than become immobilized by anxiety, or it can be unhelpful, creating a self deception that alters reality in ways that can be dangerous.
• “People think they’re motivated by seeking pleasure; they’re wrong, they’re motivated by avoiding discomfort” - Nir Eyal

Pressure only comes to those who earn it

• “Pressure is a privilege, and champions adjust” - Billy Jean King (BJK)
• Pressure is external, stress is internal.
• How you handle pressure and its resulting stress is essential, and makes a difference between positive and negative outcomes.
• Great pressure moments often precede great privileges.
• Life without pressure is a life without purpose.
• Pressure is neither good nor bad. It’s what we do with it that matters.
• Kelly McGonigal looked at a study made for 30k American adults, and noticed that people who experienced a lot of stress during their lives had 43% increased risk of dying, but this was only true for the ones who perceived stress as harmful. The ones that did not perceive it as harmful had the lowest risk of dying, even when compared to the ones who experienced relatively little stress.
• Objective is not to get rid of pressure, it’s to change your relationship with it altogether.
• “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat” - Theodore Roosevelt

Building good habits

• Instead of fighting against a bad habit, acknowledge the cue, routine, reward habit loop. When removing any of these elements, its void will need to be replaced. Replace rather than delete.
• Cues are powerful, since they are the starting points to routines. As such, be mindful of how you set up your environment. For example, Steven Bartlett placed his DJ set in the kitchen table, in plain sight, and made sure to take only one click to start practicing, in order to reduce perceived cost of practicing it. I’ve personally done the same thing with my camera setup to shoot YouTube videos, by using a simple and predictable set up for video and microphone, which I have with highly visible in my living room, incentivizing me to do more videos.

Persistence

• “We don’t have to be smarter than the rest. We have to be more disciplined than the rest.” - Warren Buffett
• Katherine Milkman shared research that having a plan B, in any ambition, has a net negative on our chances of succeeding with a plan A.
  • The more you perceive negative emotions in the event of failure, the more driven you will be to succeed-
  • But don’t be reckless. Take risks that don’t put you in irreversible and dangerous circumstances.
• “If there be no alternative but death, the soldiers exert themselves to the utmost.” - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Incremental wins, keeping momentum

• How much you are achieving is pretty much irrelevant to your motivation: but if you feel like you are getting somewhere, you’ll be driven to keep going.
  • When problems seem insurmountable or too hard or unknown, that’s when procrastination creeps in.
  • The key here is to break down the problem into smaller, more manageable ones. The small resulting improvements and the sense of momentum will keep you going, and these will eventually compound.

Applying time and energy effectively

• The exact same skill applied in a different industry or context can have a widely different value, as seen by a Washington Post experiment where one of the world’s greatest violinists Joshua Bell, who was able to professionaly command $1,000 a minute, barely got any attention or spare change from playing in the subway.
• Position yourself correctly, and get the skills that your industry finds to be rare and valuable, and that your competitors don’t have.

Time

• Time betting exercise
  • Imagine you, and everyone is sitting around the game of life. Each player is assigned a number of chips, each representing an hour. They don’t know how many they have. Maybe it’s one, maybe it’s 500k. You can try to predict, but you don’t really know.
  • The rule is that every hour you need to put one chip on the table, or it will just be placed automatically. You can place it on Netflix, learning a new skill, sleeping, etc. Certain actions that increase your health will increase your stock of chips.
  • Your fitness will block you from betting on certain positions. For example, if you have a serious locomotion injury, you cannot choose to run.
  • The game ends when all chips are gone. You don’t get to keep anything you earned during the game.
• Being selective about how you spend your time, and who you spend your time with, is the greatest sign of self respect.

Failure as an advantage

• Ask the questions: Why will this fail? Why is this a bad idea?
• Apply the pre-mortem process to visualize and attempt to preempt failures in your plan. This will mitigate risk and likely increase your prediction accuracy.
  • A 1989 study found that prospective hindsight—imagining that an event has already occurred—increases the ability to correctly identify reasons for future outcomes by 30%.
  • Steven Bartlett’s pre-mortem method:
    • Set the stage: the objective of the exercises. It is to uncover risks, not to look for escape goats.
    • Fast forward to failure. Ask team to visualize failure as clearly as possible.
    • Brainstorm reasons for failure.
    • Ideate independently, and then share and discuss.
    • Develop contingency plans.
• Share experiment failures, so that their knowledge can be leveraged when building new experiments.
• “I have not failed, I have just found 10k ways that won’t work” - Thomas Edison

This ad struck me as the culmination of a long-standing trend. I struggled to articulate it at the time, but I’ll attempt to do just that in this article.

Let’s start by the ad itself. It carries implicit symbols and memes, whose interpretations will vary wildly from person to person, but in general I believe it attempts to convey these subtle messages:

1. In order to be seen and acknowledged as an individual, one must spark admiration and rise above the crowd with a stylish look, makeup and fashionable garments. Appearance is the solution.
2. Feeling seen is about exterior validation (which requires the advertised beauty products), rather than real understanding and connection with another being.
3. You need to command the attention of acquaintances and strangers, their judgement is important for your self worth.¹

Relying only on external validation, specially from foreign entities, as a means to sustain one’s self-esteem is a time honored strategy to produce nefarious results. Yet, it’s celebrated by certain influencers, mainstream media, TV shows, ads and movies that attempt to distort a small sample into a normality.

Demanding Standards

When external validation is postulated as a basic human need, and one’s default natural, vanilla body is not sufficient to garner the validation one needs (as the above ad suggests), it soon follows that external interventions are required to achieve it.

I was fortunate enough to grow in an environment where artificial external displays of vanity were seen as a quirk, and sometimes even frowned upon (depending on the situation), thus not a requirement for a happy and fulfilled life. But once one is born or dislodged into the eye of a hurricane, it is hard to see the surrounding damage, especially when peers abide by those standards, generating an underlying group integration peer pressure.

Hazardous trends

Several off-the-shelf beauty products are known for their toxicity, contributing to increased prevalence of cancer and infertility, yet they stand as one of the cornerstones of modern standards of beauty.

How we show up is important, and is a meaningful way of self expression, but when the baseline for allowing one’s self expression requires one to consume / apply several products (sometimes on the go), or even subject to invasive body modifications, then I would argue that something is wrong in the underlying societal system.

Mind the ouch

One such body modification, turned mainstream, is the injection of botox.

Botulism is an often-fatal nervous system disease, first recorded in Europe in 1793, claiming the death of over half of those patients who had become ill through eating uncooked blood sausages. botulus being the Latin word for sausage. One one-millionth of a gram this neurotoxic protein can kill a man, and one pint would be enough to kill everyone on earth.

In 1989, purified botulinum toxin was approved as a drug under the brand name Oculinum, and later renamed to Botox. In small doses, the same nerve damage that causes fatal paralysis in poisoning cases, helps to remove forehead creases and crow’s feet, with the only side effects being an inability to express emotion using your face, and an occasional case of drooping eyelids.

Today, injecting the deadliest substance on earth into one’s face is normalized, as seen in this TV commercial (where its mid-commercial disclaimers makes one question if it’s a real ad, or a parody²), or as seen in this suggestive London tube ad:

Look Within

I hold nothing against those who choose to subscribe to a certain mode of expression or style. I too, have my own. I do welcome you to introspect why you chose it. If your sincere why comes from a deep rooted desire to feel accepted and valued by others (good to receive these in healthy dosages, but dangerous when overbearing), then it might be something to look out for.

Relying solely on external validation likely results in feelings of emptiness and insatisfaction. I’ve been there several times, and its not pleasant. Instead, attempt to obtain self validation by looking in, rather than out. Some simple, yet powerful strategies:

1. Consider your ancestors, a stable past. For example, what would your ancestors eat, do, that worked out for their health? Our bodies have adapted throughout milenia to certain patterns, and if we are on their descendancy line, surely they did something right. Time is the great filter of nonsense and fallacies.
2. Recognize the cycle: ask yourself why you are seeking external validation, and understand the patterns and needs that lead to it.
3. Practice self-appreciation: build your self-acceptance structure, practice gratefulness and appreciation for what you are and did (a journal might help).
4. Rejection therapy: put yourself in situations you seek rejection. Start small, such as asking for a discount or applying for a job you think you are not qualified for. It helps you realise that rejection is not as bad as it appears, which decreases the need for other’s validations.
5. Set personal goals: instead of relying on others to measure against, take control, and set goals that serve your needs and desires. Keep yourself accountable to hit them.
6. Listen to your intuition: you know yourself best, so why rely on others for answers? Reach within and take distraction free time to listen to yourself.
7. Self care to self validate: do activities that make you feel good, use self affirming thoughts, take care of yourself.

I found it to be an eye-opener on some fronts, but mostly as providing different perspectives on things that on the surface, appear obvious.

I can recommend this book to just about anyone. Its information, just like a knife, can be used for useful, enriching and productive endeavours (like cutting vegetables for a family dinner), or for nefarious activities (such as inflicting harm upon others). It’s ones responsibility to use it correctly and morally.

Below are my key takeways, segmented by Behaviour, Resources, Relationships, Strategies and How you Show Up.

Behaviour

Attitude and Behaviour

• Be royal in your demeanor. How you present and carry yourself tells the people how they should treat you. As seen in Columbus, son of a cheese maker, who behaved like royalty, as someone who deserved to be treated well. He amazed the Portuguese king, and eventually got the Spanish royalty to get him what he wanted: a fully paid expedition, except for a lifetime 10% profit shares for him and his descendants. They felt like he was one of them. Even though he knew less about navigation than any of his sailors and was a bad leader, he still got what he wanted, because of how he carried himself.
• Beware of venerating a new seductive culture that is not your original one. Don’t despise and look down upon the culture that raised you and provided you gifts, for it will grow resentment of the ones that follow it.
• Boldness over timidity. Both are acquired behaviours. Timidity gives others time to think and plan. Makes even the tamest prone to attack when they sense blood in the water.
• Only the weak rest on their laurels and dote on past triumphs.

In victory, don’t go past your mark

• Success is intoxicating and dangerous. The moment of victory is the moment of greatest peril. Do not allow success to come to your head. Set a goal, and when you reach it, stop.
  • Know when to stop and consolidate wins, instead of persisting in pushing forward.
  • When success is attained, step back, and reflect upon the conditions that led to it. Don’t simply repeat the same actions again and again.
  • History is littered with corpses and fallen empires who did not know when to stop.
  • There is a Japanese saying that Furuya Sensei was fond of, “Katte kara kabuto no o wo shime yo” which means After victory, tighten your helmet. Never let your guard down even if you think you have won. That just might be what your opponent wants you to think.
  • The moment when you stop has great dramatic importance. What comes last sticks in the mind as an exclamation point. Best time to stop is after a victory. Keep going, and it will lessen it’s effect, or even reverse it.
  • “Nothing can be more important than to close your examination with a triumph. So many lawyers succeed in catching a witness in a serious contradiction; but, not satisfied with this, go on asking questions, and taper off their examination until the effect upon the jury of their former advantage is lost altogether. “Stop with a victory” is one of the maxims of cross-examination” - Francis L. Wellman, The Art of Cross Examination
• Bad luck teaches you patience, timing and the need to be prepared for the worst. Good luck deludes you into making you think your brilliance will carry you forward. And when inevitably misfortune comes you will lack adequate preparation.
• As it’s taught in riding school: you have to be able to control yourself, before your can control the horse.
  • And even when you can control yourself, there will be people forcing you to push forward. Be careful, and manage them. Feed them with small victories, but don’t allow yourself to be engulfed in the momentum and go all in.
• “A man famed for his tree-climbing skills once directed another to climb a tall tree and cut branches. While the fellow was precariously balanced aloft, the tree-climber watched without a word, but when he was descending and had reached the height of the eaves the expert called to him, ‘Careful how you go ! Take care coming down !’. ‘Why do you say that ? He’s so far down now that he could leap to the ground from there,’ I said. ‘Just so,’ replied the tree-climber. ‘While he’s up there among the treacherous branches I need not say a word – his fear is enough to guide him. It’s in the easy places that mistakes will always occur.’ Lowly commoner though he was, his words echoed the warnings of the sages.” - Yoshida Kenkō, Essays in Idleness

Don’t appear too perfect. Don’t boast.

• By making others aware of their inferior position, you are only stirring an unhappy admiration, this is, envy.
  • To show envy, is to admit your inferiority, and that is why people don’t normally admit it.
  • “Of all the disorders in the soul, envy is the only one no one confesses to.” - Plutarch
  • Cosimo de’ Medici avoided such issues by being simple on the outside, and only showing his wealth, elegance and opulence on the inside (of his house, for example).
    • “There is in the garden a plant which one ought to leave dry, although most people water it. It is the weed called Envy.” - Cosimo de’ Medici
• Kierkegaard believed that the creator of envy is as much to blame as the person who feels envy. Don’t crow about your victories and superiority.
  • The naturally perfect are the ones that need to work the most to hide their features. One does not require innate characteristics to aquire money and power, in contrast to bearing sharp natural intellect and bodily features considered to be beautiful.
• A sudden increase in power or promotion are dangerous. Downplay them, don’t flaunt them, and attribute them to luck, since luck is possible to all.
• Be careful of false modesties that can be seen through. Put on a good act. Otherwise it will only create more envy.
• People cannot envy power that they themselves have bestowed upon a person.
  • When Ivan the Terrible died, Boris Godunov knew he was the only one on the scene who could lead Russia. But if he sought the position eagerly, he would stir up envy and suspicion among the boyars, so he refused the crown, not once but several times. He made it point for people insist that he take the throne. George Washington used the same strategy to great effect, first in refusing to keep the position of Commander in Chief of the American army, second in resisting the presidency. In both cases he made himself more popular than ever.
• If needed, pay a high price to keep envy in check.
• “Envy is the tax which all distinction must pay” - Thoreau
• “It takes a great talent and skill to conceal one’s talent and skill” - La Rochefoucauld

Rationality and Control

• In the face of a hot headed enemy, an excellent response is no response.
• Nothing is as infuriating as a man who keeps his cool, when others are losing theirs.
• Petulance is not power, it is a sign of helplessness.
• Only use raging tirades if you are in control of them, with precision, and very rarely. They are a (dangerous) tool.
• “Wise men [should be] like coffers with double bottoms: which when others look into, when opened, they see not all that they hold.” - Sir Walter Raleigh

Use your words and actions wisely

• Once your words are out, you cannot take them back. Keep them under control and be particularly careful about sarcasm. The momentary satisfaction you get from your biting words will be outweigh by the price you pay
• “Oysters open completely when the moon is full; and when the crab sees one it throws a piece of stone or seaweed into it and the oyster cannot close again so that it serves the crab for meat. Such is the fate of him who opens his mouth too much and thereby puts himself at the mercy of the listener.” - Leonardo Da Vinci
• “If you are not in danger, do not fight” - Sun Tzu

Be strategic in your approach

• When in a position of power, don’t be completely predictable, as that could be exploited. when is a position of serving others, be careful when doing that, because it might make you be seen as unreliable, or even having a psychological pathology.
• Attach yourself to the real decision maker, not people with titles. As seen for Richelieu, who attached himself to King Louis XIII’s mother, instead of the king himself, since she was the one calling the shots. As a result, Richelieu rose quickly through the ranks.
• Winston Lord had worked on a report for days, which Kissinger handed back with the notation “Is this the best you can do?”. Lord rewrote and polished and finally resubmitted it; back it came with the same curt question. After redrafting it one more time–and once again getting the same question from Kissinger–Lord snapped, “Damn it, yes, it’s the best I can do.”. To which Kissinger replied: “Fine, then I guess I’ll read it this time.”
• North wind and the Sun made a bet on who could make a man take off his coat. First, the North wind gushed one him, but that only made the man hold on to it more tightly. Then, the Sun provided a warm heat that made the man take off top coat, and then blazing heat which made the man strip and bath in the river. Persuasion is more effective than force.
• “MAN: Kick him-he’ll forgive you. Flatter him-he may or may not see through you. But ignore him and he’ll hate you” - Idries Shah

Resources

Focus your energies

• What’s concentrated, coherent, and connected to it’s past, has power.
• Concentrate your forces: Intensity beats extensity every time. You gain more by finding a rich mine and digging it deeper, than by fleeting from one shallow mine to another
• Dispersion can be a good strategy when your opponents are stronger.
• Caveat: if the sole person providing you power dies or leaves the scene, you will be in trouble. Protect yourself against that risk by having different concentrated sources of power. As seen with Cesare Borgia’s transgression of this, who derived his power mainly from his father, the Pope, who gave him armies to fight with. When his father died, he was as good as dead.
• Do not spend time, attention or energy on things you cannot have. Your attention, or lack of, is a form of power. When King Louis wanted to punish someone on their court, he would just ignore them and cut them off.
• “I had far rather be confined to one element, and be admired in that, than be a Goose in all.”

Focus on the important things

• Paranoia over small ticket issues are often destructive in the end. As seen when Kissinger made a recommendation to create a group to “plug the leaks” after the publication of the Pentagon Papers. The Plumbers, as they became known, eventually broke into the Democratic Party offices in the Watergate Hotel, setting off the chain of events that led to Nixon’s downfall.
• When you make a mistake, treat it lightly. When a petty enemy attacks you, make none of it, show contempt. Show contempt publicly, but keep track of it privately. Don’t let a small problem or foe become a cancerous cell that gains power and overtakes you. Deal with them as appropriate.
• “To disregard, is to win regard” - Italian proverb

The value of Time

• Time is a human construct. Perception of time is subjective. Younger people feel like time is going slowly. Older people feel like time is whizzing by.
• Three types of time: Long, Forcing, and End Time:
  • Long Time: happening on a years time scale, and must be managed with patience and gentle guidance. Key is to not react impulsively, and wait for the right opportunity.
  • Forcing Time: when people are indecisive, give them a deadline. Never give them time. As seen with successful art dealer Joseph Duveen, who when dealing with indecisive clients, would mention that another tycoon would be interested, something happened and he had to leave the country, etc. This strategy works as long as the party does not know what you are up to.
  • End Time: when a plan must be executed with speed and force.
• Patience is worthless if it doesn’t conclude with action. A period of waiting that does not lead into an action is a sign of indecision and procrastination. Timing is important.
• “Space we can recover. Time, never” - Napoleon Bonaparte

Despise the free lunch

• Nothing is more costly than something given free of charge.
• What is worth, is worth paying for. Always pay the full price, there is no cutting corners to excellency, for bargains are often accompanied by a complicated psychological price tag.
• Generosity is a sign, and a magnet for power. Keep money in constant circulation.
• The powerful understand they need to protect their most precious resources. Indepence, time, energy and room to maneuver. By paying the full price they keep themselves free of dangerous engagements and worries.
• Avoid bargain demons (who only consider the explicit price tag, and not the cost in time, energy, dignity and peace of mind), the money sadists (who abuse their payer position power, by for example making you wait for a payment), the indiscriminate givers (who likely are looking qualm a emotional need, are emotional drains, and want to be loved; if they give to everyone, why should you feel special?)
• The powerful must have have grandiosity if spirit, and should never reveal any pettiness. Money is the most visible arena in which to display either grandior or pettiness.
• And if you want to meddle with the work of the creative people you hire, at least pay them well. Your money will more easily buy their decision, rather than your shows of power.
• Powerful people give freely, buying influence, rather than things.
• Consider strategic generosity: give when you are about to take.
• A one time gift given at a sudden unexpected time, bears more force and impact. It will not spoil your children, but rather keep them under your thumb.
• The more the money you spend on gifts and acts of generosity that play with sentiment, the more powerful they are.
• Don’t give in to greedy and inconsequent “El Dourado”s that will only exhaust your time and energy.

Relationships

Perils of Isolation

• Do not create a fortress around you, it will make you detached from the world and make you an easy target, since it will be easy to know where you are, and be attacked.
• Pontormo, a painter who spent 11 years secluded inside a chapel painting for his patron. Terrified of being copied by others and growing more and more afraid of fellow humans, he died, and his paintings / frescos did not survive him. Vesari, who saw his paintings, described them as being embodied by madness. Perspective flaws, too many characters, several compositional flaws, figures that overlapped one another. Pontormo obsessed over details, and lost track of the composition.
• Shakespeare was well known because many people knew about his works, he didnt work in isolation.
• Isolation is good to gather one’s thoughts and escape the claws of conformity by society, but this should be done judiciously.
• The more time you spend isolated, the harder it is to come back to society. Make sure you always have a way to come back to society.

Enemies, and Friends

• Without enemies we grow lazy. Having enemies sharpens our wits. If you don’t have enemies, find them
• Without a worthy opponent, a man, woman or group cannot grow stronger.
• You are better having declared opponents, instead of not knowing where they lie.
• You need people who deliver results, not that appease you.
• Men are more ready to repay an injury than a benefit. Gratitude is felt as a burden, revenge as a pleasure.
• A brahman, a great expert in Veda who has become a great archer as well, offers his services to his good friend, who is now the king. The brahman cries out when he sees the king, “Recognize me, your friend!”. The king answers him with contempt and then explains: “Yes, we were friends before, but our friendship was based on what power we had. I was friends with you, good brahman, because it served my purpose. No pauper is a friend to the rich, no fool to the wise, no coward to the brave. It is two men of equal wealth and equal birth who contract friendship and marriage, not a rich man and a pauper. An old friend—who needs him?” - The Mahabharata
• “To have a good enemy, choose a friend: They know where to strike” - Diane De Poitiers, 1499-1566, Mistress of Henry II of France

Succession

• The formulas used by the successful father worked well for him, because he had nothing to lose, and gave him his kingdom and fortunes. The son, who lives in a different set of circumstances, could have his father’s ways imposed onto him, in a domineering and oppressive way, imposing his lessons on the son. Instead of trying to put the son in a new direction, the father tries to put him on his own shoes, perhaps secretly wanting the son to fail, as he often resents his youth and opportunities. Resulting in the son to be cowed and cautions and fearful of losing what the father had gained.
  • Alexander the Great only wanted to outdo his father. To obliterate his name from history. He resented that his father conquered most of Greece, leaving not much for him to conquer. He wanted to out his successful father in the shadows, instead of the opposite. Which he did.
  • As a young rebel grows older, his struggle with his father often wanes, and he gradually comes to resemble the very man he used to defy.
  • The presence of the “father” must be constantly slain and kept in check. The old ways, the father, the comfort, are enemies of progression and power.
  • Keep an eye on the young, since they will do the same to you. Identify them and keep them under control.
• It would seem easy for the son or successor to build on a grand foundation left for him. But in the realm of power, the opposite is true. The pampered indulged child, almost always squanders their inheritance, for it doesnt start with a need to fill a void. As seen with Louis XIV, XV, XVI. Louis XIV, while navigating through troubled times, built Versailles instead of taking over his father’s palace, the Louvre, and reigned for (mostly glorified) 55 years. The last years of his reign were difficult, but it was hoped that his child would develop into the kind of strong ruler who would reinvigorate the land and add to the firm foundation that Louis XIV had laid. Instead, his son, Louis XV gave himself over to pleasure. Worn out by debauchery, his country and his own finances were in horrible disarray. His grandson Louis XVI inherited a realm in desperate need of reform and a strong leader. But Louis XVI was even weaker than his grandfather, and could only watch as the country descended into revolution.
  • “Necessity is what impels men to take action, and once the necessity is gone, only rot and decay are left” - Niccolò Machiavelli
• In Sumatra, the king would be killed ritually in a brutal fashion, in order to limit his boundless power and give space for the new generations.

Strategies

Strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will disband

• Athenians found an effective way to deal with socially undesirable individuals. They didn’t fight, punish, or re-educate them. They ostracized them.
• Cancer begins with a single cell. Be quick and swift to isolate bad seeds from the group, before they infect a critical mass.
  • It’s better to isolate them, rather than destroy them. It’s less brutal. For in a game power, isolation spells defeat. Ostracize, limit their power. Spare no time arguing with them.
  • Swindlers isolate their targets from their normal social circles, making them more vulnerable to influence and manipulation. Apart from the void left I’m the sheep
  • Lure the poisonous person away, while staying away from their attacks, as seen with Pope Boniface’s isolation of Dante from the “Whites”, leaving a power void upon their faction. As a resultm Florence was taken over by the “Blacks”.
  • “If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared” - Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince
• “When the tree falls, the monkeys scatter” - Chinese psroverb
• Alternate harshness with mercy to soften your target. Play on their fears, but also their loves. Target primary emotions: Love, hate, jealousy.

Mirror effect

• Dr. Milton H. Erickson, when faced with a couple with problems in bed, Erickson observed the same dynamics when they talked how they liked to dine. He didn’t address the problem directly, but rather them to schedule a dinner where both would have their desires met (for one desired a slow pace, the other a big meal). It worked as expected, and they transferred the lessons aquired in the dining table into their bedroom.
• Addressing people head-on will often lead to conflict. Instead, mirror their actions so they can reflect at their own time and pace, and fix themselves without admitting fault. They will think to have achieved it on their own, without anyone realising it. But be careful when being too obvious, as it will make them think you are manipulating them, undermining your efforts.

Reformation Perils

• People know that change is needed, and are ok with superficial changes, but are deeply troubled when the changes are deep and affect their core beliefs, structures and habits.
  • Change is upsetting to the human animal, even when it’s for the good. If change is needed, find ways to disguise it. Sweeten the poison.
  • As seen from Cromwell’s beheading due to his role in the overly ambitious reform and uprooting of Roman Catholicism.
• When you destroy the familiar, you create a void that people will rush fill. The past is powerful. Borrow from its legitimacy to create a comforting and familiar presence. It will sustain your actions with a familiar and romantic feel, cloaking the nature of the changes you are attempting.
  • Because the past is buried and dead, it gives you the flexibility to interpret it as you see fit.
  • The Roman used this when transforming monarchy to republic
  • Romans used this device when they transformed their monarchy into a republic. They may have installed two consuls in place of the king, but since the king had been served by twelve lictors, they retained the same number to serve under the consuls. The king had personally performed an annual sacrifice, in a great spectacle that stirred the public; the republic retained this practice, only transferring it to a special “chief of the ceremony, whom they called the King of the sacrifice.” These and similar gestures satisfied the people and kept them from clamoring for the monarchy’s return.
  • When Romans declared Christianity to be Rome’s official imperial religion, the evocation of light and fertility (Saturnalia, Festival of Lights, Germanic celebrations of the re-birth of the Sun which all happened in December) could not be ignored. In 354 AD, the Christian church co-opted the birthday of Mithras (the Aryan god of light), and declared December 25th to be the birthday of Jesus Christ.
• The ones that finish a revolution are rarely the bones who started it.

How you Show Up

Be flexible, assume formlessness

• Just like an animal’s shell protects them from dangers, it also makes them slower and inflexible to change. Same can be said for governments and systems that build protections that ultimately make them more rigid and vulnerable to change.
  • Rigidity heightens the desire for change.
• In a Chinese tale, a farmer observed a hare running straight into a tree, breaking it’s neck. Afterwards, he waited in front of the tree waiting for the same thing to happen. He never caught another one, and was ridiculed. Same could be said for someone who tries to govern using the same strategies as those of early kings. They would be acting no differently than the tale’s farmer.

Presence dilution

• “Love never dies of starvation, but often of indigestion” - Ninon de Lenclos
• “Absence diminishes small passions, and inflames greater loves. Just as wind douses a candle, and fans a fire.” - François de La Rochefoucauld

Reputation and Respect

• Be the master of your fate, and your reputation.
• Reputation is a critical resource. When you have it, protect it.
• “When the great lord passes, the peasants bow deeply and silently fart” - Ethiopian proverb

Symbology

• A symbol is a powerful form of expression that summaries several concepts
  • For example, the Sun King symbology created for Louis XIV which symbolized his provider god like status.
  • Or Diana the mistress of king Henri II of France, who dodged the common fate shared by many other elder mistresses of abandonment, by scattering around the reign multiple symbols related to her (Diana’s favorite colours [black and white] imprinted in several buildings and images, associations with goddess of hunt Diana), and creating a motif intertwining her initials and the king’s, which king Henri disseminated widely. There was no escaping her presence. Until his death, in 1559, he remained faithful to her.
• A symbol is a shortcut of expression, containing in itself several dozen meanings. Symbols are generally subtler and less threatening than words, which can be too incisive.
• Primacy of sight amongst the senses: “Truth is generally seen, rarely heard” - Baltasar Gracián

Rise and Fall of Rome

Romans were obsessed with the past

Romans were absolutely obsessed with the past, especially with their own family.

Entering an aristocrat Roman’s house, the first thing you would see would be a big wooden cabinet with several rows of wax death masks. These masks were imprints of Roman aristocrats at the time of their death.

Every child in the family had obsessively memorized every accomplishment of every one of those ancestors: their career, what offices they held, what battles they fought in, what they did.

At a funeral, people would talk about all the things their ancestors had done. The children would take out these masks, tie them onto their own faces, and wear them in the funeral procession. They were wearing the face of their own ancestors. You, as an individual, weren’t important. You were just the latest iteration of that family, and was a huge weight to live up to the deeds of their ancestors.

Brutus honors the past, kills Julius Caesar, Roman Republic dawns

Rome started out as a monarchy. They had kings and were not happy with their kings. Around 500 BC, they held a revolution and they kicked out the kings, and the Roman Republic started at that point. One of the people who played a key role in this was a man named Lucius Junius Brutus.

500 years later, Julius Caesar² came along as the culmination of a sequence of generals trying to overtake Rome and declare themselves as kings. Even though he was populist who provided entertainment to the state, Julius Caesar was arrogant, didn’t hide his power, ignored the senate, and got several people angry. Romans don’t like kings.

Just so happens that one of Caesar’s best friends is Marcus Junius Brutus. People went to Brutus’ house and wrote graffiti saying “Remember your ancestor” or “You are no real Brutus”. He had no choice. He forms a conspiracy, and on the Ides of March, 44 BC, he and 23 other senators take daggers, stick them in Julius Caesar, and kill him for acting like a king.

Brutus killed his best friend because of something his late ancestor did.

Filling Julius Caesar’s power void

Julius Caesar and left a power void. There are many contenders for filling it up:

• Mark Antony: a relative and supporter of Julius Caesar. Most expected him to be the new Ceaser.
• Lepidus: another of Caesar’s lieutenants.
• Senate: which wants to reassert its power, to become the dominant force in Rome again.
• Assassins who killed Caesar: Led by Brutus and Cassius.
• Pompey’s son: Pompey was Caesar’s great rival. Pompey’s son, Sextus Pompey, was at the time a warlord who seized control of Sicily, one of the richest provinces, and amassed a whole navy.
• Octavian: Julius Caesar’s 18-year-old kid grand nephew. When Caesar’s will was opened after his death, he posthumously adopted Octavian as his son.

Octavian emerges victorious

By now being Caesar’s son, Octavian gets to rename himself Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus, and it just so happened that in the Mediterranean, there were about 12 legions full of hardened soldiers following the orders of a man named Gaius Julius Caesar.

As such, Octavian inherits an army overnight and becomes a player in this game for power, and a civil war starts.

Octavian emerges from it as the victor. He wasn’t a good general and lost almost every battle, but was politically savvy and very good at manipulating public image and propaganda. Octavian waged a propaganda war against Antony, portraying Antony as a foreign aggressor allied with an enemy queen, Cleopatra, and who was an official enemy of the Roman state). Octavian takes what’s a civil war and makes it look like a war against a foreign enemy.

Octavian is the “king”, but can’t act like one

Octavian now becomes the sole ruler, essentially a king, but could not take the same approach as Julius Caesar, otherwise he would end up murdered all the same.

Instead, he was very modest, lived in an ordinary house like other aristocrats, wore just a plain toga, was respectful to the Senate, and ate simple foods. He’s someone who cared about the reality of power, not its external trappings. He wanted real power, not the appearance of it.

In terms of government, everything seemed the same from the outside, but in reality Octavian was able to retain absolute power. He did by resigning from all public offices to give that appearance, but at the same time got voted to have the powers of a consul, by which he could command armies, he got tribune power, to control meetings at the Senate, he could veto anything, and got several other powers.

Each year elections are held, and notionally, these people are in charge. But floating off to the side, there Octavian, who can just appear and say that “I don’t like this, let’s change it”

Nor can he be named like a king

Octavian wondered what to call himself. He couldn’t call himself a king, or anything that could suggest it, so instead he picked ambiguous names, that when joined an interpret in a certain way, would proved to be powerful:

• Augustus: Augustus could mean that someone is very pious, or could mean that something is divine.
• Princep³: Meaning, first citizen. Could be interpreted as a citizen just like everybody, or the first citizen, superior to all the others.
• Imperator: traditionally something that soldiers shout at a victorious general who’s won a battle. Octavian took this as a permanent title, implying he was a good general⁴.

What being Roman meant

It’s wonderful to contemplate how the roman empire in about 100 AD overlaps with the regions where olives could be grown. Romans consumed olives, grapes, wheat. Barbarians meat, dairy, beer. When you are a farmer, you tend to stay in the same place, when you raise cattle you follow them around. They are two fundamental forms of living. Diet was a big part of their culture and one of characteristics that was considered fundamentally Roman. Not having their diet was barbaric.

Roman empire crumbles

There are many factors that could explain the fall of Rome, and there is not a single clear cut explanation. Even the date of the empire fall is debated.

Geography, climate, religion, disease (there were a whole series of waves of plague that started to hit under Marcus Aurelius and continued after him, which seemed to caused real serious death and economic disruption), Marcus Aurelius leaving is succession to his child (who turned out to be deranged), instead of picking the best suited person for that role ⁵, as it was done on the previous 80 years, which is often regarded as the high point of the Roman Empire.

Power of the past

No way to escape the power of the past

Gregory and his wife wife wrote The Long Shadow of Antiquity: What Have the Greeks and Romans Done for Us?”, where they provide several examples of things that we think are just in truly unique parts of our culture or things that we think are just innate to human nature, that are actually rooted in the past, such as government, education, art, architecture, language / words, culture, medicine, habits, law, the way we get married, the calendar (Julius Caesar was the one who basically came up with the 365 days, 12 months, leap years).

We’re the accumulation of the knowledge of several generations that have come before us. Everything we do is based on that. Otherwise, we’d all just be starting at ground zero.

Understanding the past to mold the future

It’s vital to have some understanding of the past in order to make competent decisions in the present. Not just in your own life, but it’s in understanding others. You need to understand where they’re coming from, where they came from, and what shaped them, and what forces affect them.

The study of history is the best medicine for a sick mind; for in history you have a record of the infinite variety of human experience plainly set out for all to see: and in that record you can find for yourself and your country both examples and warnings: fine things to take as models, base things, rotten through and through, to avoid.

― Livy, The History of Rome

People from antiquity had different environments, technologies, and information available, but were just as sharp as we are nowadays. They were not stupid. Even though it might seem that many concepts and ideas were invented by our contemporaries, many lessons, successes and mistakes were already discovered in the past ⁶. The real challenge is to incorporate them into our own lives.

As we experience an increase of massive amounts of AI generated content, this note will go through the role and added value that a connection with reality and nature brings not only to your business and craft, but also to yourself.

Striking a balance

Walking or hiking has been a recurrent weekly habit of mine for several years, and its one of my favorite activities.

I find it essential to have a walk outside the office / home and be in contact with the surrounding world, be it in nature or around the city. This is especially relevant for those, like me, who have their daily jobs working at the computer.

I love to be enthralled in the digital world, think about abstract concepts, and use digital devices to, for example, communicate this content to you. But like anything else, a balance needs to be kept, and a balance between the digital and real domains seems essential.

The added value of (connecting with) reality

As generative models get better, more and more people will just assume that a given piece of text, image or video is likely fake, and I believe there will be an increased demand for a connection with the real world through experiences such as in-person events, travel, spirituality, or consumption of digital content by certified entities.

Businesses and creators that prove their connection with the real world and real people, will likely have an edge and rise against the noise.

So if you’re creating a business, a piece of content, anything really, think how it relates with the real world. Ask yourself: how can you provide that connection? How can you provide reality as a service?

Keep yourself connected with reality

Apart from all this, and just as important, it’s for you to maintain your contact with reality.

So if you feel you spend too much time around the internet, digital devices, TV series, etc, I invite you to the outdoors, the world outside. It’s free, it’s accessible. You just need to open the door and step out, provided you are fortunate enough to have the required physical capabilities. I’m pretty sure that it will make your life much better.

I’ve been getting into the habit of writing down what I learned from content I consume and I’ve recently seen an interview with Andrew Bustamante, a former CIA intelligence officer on the Diary of a CEO with Steven Bartlett.

Andrew Bustamante is a former covert CIA intelligence officer, US Air Force combat veteran, and Fortune 10 corporate advisor, who founded Everyday Spy, where individuals and teams are trained to leverage influence, intelligence and intent. Techniques once reserved for elite spy agencies can now serve everyday people in their pursuit of personal and professional objectives.

Andrew shared his candid and unfiltered views on the human condition and how his previous CIA intelligence officer (commonly known as a spy) can be leveraged towards gaining an advantage in business and everyday life, and in this article I will share some of the highlights and learnings from this interview. Here are my key takeaways:

Do an Action, Any Action

For you to be a step ahead of everyone else just do an action, any action, and you’ll already be ahead of everyone. Even if you fall, you’ll already be four steps ahead of everyone else.

Two kinds of people

There are two kinds of people:

1. Those who fall victim to their fears and will be stuck on a cycle of consumption, he calls them the cogs, the bobbleheads. He mentions that we actually need them, because they are needed by the kind.
2. Those who face their fears and produce the things that the cogs want, but fear of doing. So they exploit them.

Motivation & Manipulation

Motivation and manipulation are two sides of the same coin.

Using motivation just exploits something that people are already prone to do, and we just give them something that they want.

If they’re not motivated, then we use manipulation, so they can actually give us what we want.

Moral Flexibility

Moral Flexibility is a gateway for manipulation, which makes something acceptable in one context, but unacceptable in another context.

Public, Private and Secret Spheres

Then there are three spheres: the public, the private and the secret.

Public Sphere

The public sphere is the safe zone:

• It’s what you wear
• It’s what you say in Instagram
• It’s what you state to everyone
• It’s the identity that you want other people to perceive

Private Sphere

The private sphere is what the people in your inner circle see:

• They know your birthday
• They know your favorite ice cream
• They are the ones that really know you

So it’s small by definition. This makes you feel good and special, and you have this elite group which is distinct from the public.

Secret Sphere

The secret sphere is where all of your secrets lie:

• It’s the affair you’re having
• It was the molestation you had as a kid
• It’s all of your dark thoughts

To move from one person’s public to secret sphere, you need to pass by the private one first.

We want to have someone to tell our secrets, but we don’t have enough trust on the people that are in our private sphere.

Once you get to someone’s secrets, they’ll trust you so much that even if you break their heart. They’ll resist leaving you, because it is very rare to find someone who we can tell our secrets to.

4 Core Motivations

About the four core motivations, they are described by RICE: Reward, Ideology, Coercion and Ego

1. Ideology is the biggest driver. This could be politics, values, morals, etc
2. Ego comes next. Even showing yourself to the world for people to see and to validate how you want to be seen is ego. Andrew mentioned that Madre Teresa wanted to be seen as someone who is a martyr.
3. Reward: Money, sex, alcohol, drugs, etc
4. Coercion: this is the negative one, and includes things like blackmailing

2 Questions, 1 Validation

If you want to get information from a person, then you can ask two questions and then follow up with the validation.

For example, if the other person mentioned that they have an issue with their wife, then you ask:

• “Oh what happened?”
• After their reply you ask: “Did she really do that?”
• Again, after their reply, you do a validation, so it doesn’t sound like an interrogatory, by saying for example “Yeah, I had a girlfriend that did the same thing”
• After their reply, you then ask another two questions, and so on and so forth.

Doors and Windows

Use windows instead of doors when leading a conversation.

Opening a door is when you change the topic completely. For example, if the conversation is about the weather and all of a sudden you ask about someone’s income. The analogy is that you’re breaking through someone’s door.

Instead you’ll want to open a window, which is to leave a hint for the other party that will organically lead them towards a new ramification of the conversation. You open a window by giving a queue, a suggestion, or an implicit conversation seed.

Volunteered Information

People will also volunteer information to you, and you can actually assess that by the information that they give you through their statements.

The Power of Questions

The person that is asking the questions has the power over the conversation, and not the person who is saying the most words. For example, in the interview it was agreed by both that Steve was the interviewer, so Steve had the power there.

SADRAT in Business

Andrew mentioned how the SADRAT methodology can be used in business. SADRAT stands for: spotting, assessing, development, recruiting, agent handling and termination.

• Spotting is finding the client, this is, you need to kiss a lot of frogs to get to the prince.
• Recruit means you provide a given product in exchange for their money.
• Assess is about finding if someone is going to be a good productive client, so you can place your Investments on the clients that give you the return on the time span that you want. This can be known through their common traits, their profile, etc.

Detecting Lies

In order to know if someone is a liar, you need to first establish a baseline. Once that is acquired, you need to put pressure on them to see if they react differently.

The difference between good liars and bad liars is that bad liars tend to twitch and turn, as if they were in a hot seat when they get exposed to pressure.

Good liars, on the other hand, they occlude all of these signals. Good liars tend to be the ones at parties that ask a lot of questions, and you felt like they were so friendly, but in reality you know nothing about them.

Perception vs Perspective

Perception is your gut view. Perspective is seeing the event through other lenses.

You should not trust your perception, because most of the time it is wrong and it is emotion based. You need to use your rational side to process challenging situations.

To achieve that, you need to be inoculated by getting exposed to small doses of something you fear. For example, asking someone if you’re overweight. You’ll get the physical fear arousal, but once it’s over no real harm was done.

You can train yourself to not respond to that physical jolt to make your emotional part slower, and your rational part faster.