'Pop Over'

Quick tip... when negotiating there's often a case of someone buying into another's 'frame'. So someone might ask you to 'pop over' to see them. So they're saying two words, and expecting you to make an investment of time and petrol. I have fallen for this once this year by conforming to 'social norms' or just not doing enough research, but won't in future.

Best frame is 'win win'... where both people want positive outcome, and will invest similar amount.

The Best Alive

I read a lot of books when I was younger. I was in awe of most of the writers. Especially reading John Updike... such an amazing flow. I read as much of him as I could. It staggered me how many books he'd written... I was like "Fuck John... you're a great writer and you STILL have time to read everything... don't know how you do it."

John Updike died a while ago. Rare for a writer, it was even in the news. I haven't really had chance to think about it much, too busy doing sales, but if you want to think about it from a writing perspective it's a tragedy for the world.

I've read quite a lot of interviews with Updike and the interviewers were trying to find out his 'writing secrets'. He was like, I just write everyday. If your readers write everday they could become good writers and write books too.

Well... it's a bit different from that. You have to have intelligence, bit of luck perhaps, people supporting you... if you want to get a book published conventionally it's very hard. But writing each day is an essential part of it.

Everyone dies. People eventually slow down when they're alive. It's happening to my father now to an extent. When I was a runner at 14, I thought that I would just keeping getting faster as I got older. You don't.

With mental activities it's different to physical ones though. If you keep doing something every day... well you might not be the best alive, but you might become the best in your town or city.

Quick shout out here too... recently became friends with Bernard Cornwell on Facebook. Interviewers asked him if he ever got 'writers block'... he said nurses don't get nurses' block. Offered to reivew 'The Pagan Lord' here, maybe that will happen, maybe not. TBH... I might even buy it. Someone gave me a book token.

All that Matters is the Now

Future leading statements, you can't prove them. Backwards leading statements... you can sometimes learn from them. But you can't change the past. Just take the good parts from it, and work on what didn't go right.

It's really important to enjoy the now. People were quite surprised really, working at a call centre (which conned me out of money and made me work longer than I should have done for no pay)... I was still happy. Co-workers asked me if I'd always been this way... no. I rationalised it by telling myself that at least I was getting paid something- much of my life had been wasted by 'formal education' that was mainly worthless. If you're living in the UK for the most part, there's a lot to be thankful for. And if you feel like there isn't it's your responsiblity to make it better for yourself.

Abstract Concepts can Cost you Money

"It's good for the community". "This is really socially responsible". "This development is needed for our long term sustainability..."

Bitch please. Had to get that last one in for the developers in Lascelles Hall and Huddersfield in general. How about saying "We want to build something creating loads of noise pollution and everything bad which we haven't thought of... so we can make money." That would actually be honest. Things like "socially responsible" and "our (?) long term sustainability" are just bullshit leftist concepts which you have to see through. When reading things think exactly how they relate to your goals.

What's in it for You?

Every time you do something or learn something you should ask yourself...

What's in it for me?

This idea actually comes from a book called "Accelerated Learning for the Twenty First Century"... a book I started reading when I was 16. Didn't apply all the lessons in it though, but now I am doing more. Personally now, things I do have to be aligned with my goals. That means I'm investing time to get money, or meet great people for instance. I spent too long just doing qualifications because of social conditioning. Make sure you don't make the same mistake... everything you do and everything learn, ask yourself "What's in it for me?"

Closer or Further Away

Everything you do brings you closer or further away from your goals. I feel my goals are clearly defined in my mind... where I can improve is calibrating them when dealing with other people. Of course, everyone's always doing what they think is best for themselves, and what's best for them, or what they think is best for you, might not be best for you.

Soo...

You have to calibrate understanding what other people want, their motives for it, then work out how to reach your goals from that.

You earn money by producing value

The UK society doesn't value people playing chess much. Sure, it may develop your mind but people on the whole aren't willing to pay money to sponsor or watch it. This explains why one of the best chessplayers in the UK, Luke McShane, has a job in the city instead of playing chess much.

Overall when earning money the more rare or valuable your talent or skill is, the more you will get paid. So somone working in a supermarket won't get paid that much, because there are a large number of people who could do that, but a 'star footballer' will get paids hundreds or thousands times more because apparently not many people could do that. And people like watching football.

Sooo... how does this relate to YOUR GOALS? You have to discover something that people value and will pay you for which YOU like too.