LastThursday

I often think back to those three short years I spent at university. I wasn't aware of it at the time, but it really was a sharp change in my circumstances. I had managed to escape the misery and loneliness of being a teenager of effectively a one parent family: and I was welcomed with loving arms into a new family of like minded individuals. I gradually learned to be an adult and self sufficient over my time there. One other thing that nearly escaped my attention was how diverse my immediate set of friends were. Growing up in inner London, I had been exposed to different ethnicities and cultures early on, indeed having a foot in two cultures myself, this never felt unnatural to me. However, at university this was taken to another level, and I felt very at home with it. I'm really not sure if I naturally gravitated to having friends of different cultural backgrounds, or if with hindsight it was simply my openness and willingness to speak to anybody who would listen to me. It became a running joke at one point that our immediate clump of friends were like the Benetton adverts going around at the time. I personally went out with a Dutch/Nigerian (who gave me a run for my money in intelligence and only 17 at the time!). There were two Hong Kong Chinese mates doing psychology - a discipline that couldn't be any further from the engineering I was doing - turns out right at the end of university one of them was gay. There was a gaggle of Pakistani girls who were a good fun, and one of the them married the other Chinese bloke after he converted to Islam. My other good friend was a Ugandan Asian who eventually conceded that I was better than him at maths, when I did his final year computer graphics project for him (!) That guy also new Libyans, other Ugandans and a shy Mauritian who I variously hung out with. I used to play pool regularly with a black Ugandan (doing computer science) who always had an eye for the women and would regularly turn up to try and woo one of the few white Anglo women I had as a friend (she was another super intelligent engineer, and I fancied the pants of her too). In my final year I frequented with a Sri Lankan, and Indian, and a London Asian (Pakistani extraction I think?), oh yes and a couple more Nigerians. Anyway, I really do miss that diversity of experiences and the many Asian weddings I went to were great fun! Middle class suburbia is just so staid in comparison: I need more cultural excitement in my life. This was us, but we were waaaay less trendy:

That's 100% correct. However, a normie wouldn't see it that way, they would think they were normal.

It's the normies running the asylum. I count myself lucky to have strayed on to the path, even if it's hard sometimes.

I can see it now, all black, with ominous large white letters: "KNOWING" "Leo" "Gura".

Just the idea of tiny houses appeals very much to my minimalist tendencies. The following shows that you don't need to have complex skills to build a house, just banging and screwing:

So @LastThursday what style of music do you like? ?

Stop thinking, Start Living by Richard Carlson. Does what it says on the tin.

Certainly go with Tom Bilyeu's channel on YouTube. He seems open minded, curious and courteous.

Restructuring Life IX How intelligent is impulse? Judging by personal anecdote it is both highly intelligent and highly dumb. Some of the more dumb impulses I've followed have hurt people and caused a great level of negative emotion all round. Some of the more intelligent impulses have allowed me to make friends, find a partner, and remove myself from miserable situations. In the final analysis, impulse has tempered the person I am today. My fundamental nature is impulsive and scatter brained. I don't think this is especially different from anyone else: this is the natural state of most children anyway. We all learn to filter our impulses one way or the other - eventually - and try and apply reason and good judgement to them. It works to a lesser or greater degree. I've got it off pat by now, I've restrained my impulses largely. The restraints are only loosened either when I drink alcohol (which is rare) or if I'm particularly tired (in which case I'm less likely to act anyway). Is there a different way to use the intelligence of impulse to improve my life? It's not at all obvious from where I'm standing. It would seem like there always has to be some sort of filter on impulse, even just to stop any dumbness in it's tracks. How do I just let through the good stuff? In a way, that's an unanswerable question. What I'm hinting at here is that there is an underlying intelligence outside of rationality and analysis. Some call it intuition. The problem with impulse is that it always seems intuitively good in the moment. Maybe impulse wants to teach you a lesson, by triggering off drama and pain? I've certainly learned a lot about empathy and emotion through crappy impulse. It's possible to learn from any situation both negative and positive. It's funny that intuition is always seen a positive force, as if it were pure in intention and had total foresight. My thought is that intuition is only ever seen in contrast to logic and reason, and usually as a counterintuitive force. The times when intuition lines up with thought, thought is seen as the winner and intuition is dismissed. As ever, intuition is just an emotion or sensation or non-verbal thought. Ok, let's for argument's sake agree that intuition is a real and benign thing. In that case instead of mostly using analysis to temper impulse, I rely on intuition instead. It would go something like this: stimulus > emotion > impulse > (insert intuition) > action. The interesting thing here is, is that even if intuition is completely fictitious and/or random, then this will still break me out of the stalemate I'm in. In other words any level of randomness will allow me to explore other avenues. Either way it's a win. It's very akin to Pascal's wager: you may as well believe in God, just in case it's true (because the cost is small). I may as well believe in intuition. One very important aspect of impulse is its energy. Reason and logic is anti-energy, it sucks the life blood out of that very human need for movement and energy. For example running a marathon has nothing to do with reason and logic, it is pure energy - left to reason no-one would do such a stupid thing. I'm a very energetic person and if I examine it closely, some of my emotions around my situation is about lack of energy. The introvert me is all about reason and logic and nothing about energy. The extrovert side is pure energy and impulse. Hmm. I think my pickaxing through the strata of Restructuring Life has finally reached the mother lode of my listlessness and state of limbo: lack of energy. That feels right! More accurately, it's my entrenched inability to express the energy I have within me that is hurting me. It's like constantly having to hold my breath under water, only to surface occasionally and gasp in relief, but to sink quickly again into the murky suffocating depths (what a pretty picture eh?). What is energy for me? It is precisely following my nose: impulse. Energy is human interaction of any persuasion. Energy is creativity. Energy is living beautifully. Expressing my energy is ultimate freedom. Damn, I'm on to something. More in the next post about that. Lastly, doing without doing. That's a bit Zen. Since doing is constant: I'm always moving, thinking, emoting; there's is no doing outside of that. If I choose to sit still or to run a marathon, both are doing. Even if I don't have a choice, such as having to sleep, it is still doing. So whenever I think I need to do something, really I'm just playing a game of emphasis. I'm emphasising some acts of doing over everything else. The flipside of doing, is that once an act is finished, it is immutable and has the same status as all the other doing that's passed. In other words once finished, a particular doing is no longer special. Really, what I'm getting at here is changing perspective on what doing actually means. Rather than thinking, oh God I have to run a marathon today, you simply start, do it, and then it's done. Hardly ever do I think, oh God I have to sit on the sofa all day, no, I simply just start. This is how to flow in life, you don't a priori emphasise certain doings over others, instead you set an intention (I will run a marathon) and let your future self take care of it. Doing without doing. So, this mindset of doing without doing, can dovetail with impulse quite nicely. You let impulse loose, and let your future self take care of it. That doesn't mean that impulse has to ruin your life, it simply means future you will have further impulses which may well stop the negative ones from taking hold. In this way, the energy of impulse is not wicked away by unreasonable thoughts. Life flows, driven by impulse, intuition, energy and Zen calmness.

Restructuring reminder: impulse and just doing it. Doing without doing. Energy.

Restructuring Life VIII This is making me laugh, at what set of roman numerals will I start to take action? To expand out the subject of excitement I spoke about in Restructuring Life II; excitement is couched within motivation in general. Being excited is motivating. Motivation is driven either as an away or toward process; carrot or stick. It's not as easy as to just dumbly label these processes as positive or negative: they are not opposites. Generally, away motivation is intrinsic to a situation. By intrinsic I mean that the outside world has conspired to put you in a position of negativity, or you yourself have through unconscious choices and behaviours. However, most towards motivation is extrinsic, in that it is consciously set up and planned: a holiday abroad, or finding a partner. Naturally, that's not to say that all towards motivation is extrinsic; just that some of the bigger drivers of positive motivation tend to be extrinsic. Motivation comes in a sliding scale of intensity, for both toward and away versions. For any particular type of motivation there will always be a threshold of intensity at which you will take action. Below that you will suffer the cognitive dissonance of being emotional, but without taking action. Say you are motivated to change change jobs, but the intensity is not enough to actually spend time doing it, for example. The base of motivation is always emotion. In fact emotional signalling is simply a means of motivation. When I say that motivation has intensity, what's really being said is that emotions have intensity. Emotions are the driver. However, motivation is not just emotion, the other component of motivation is narrative. A narrative is built up either around your own circumstances or some fantasy about the future you wish would occur. You can see how important my model of Theory of Meaning is I talked about previously (yes I'm selling my own product). Any narrative you have is completely neutral, but the emotions give it colour and meaning. But the narrative definitely informs the emotions. So just like in advertising, where a compelling (strongly emotional) story is always sought for to sell a product; the same is true of motivation. The layer of archetype is important here, for having ready made tropes that are easy to latch on to. Maybe you can see yourself as the hero in your own story? So being that most compelling towards motivation is extrinsic, and built up by design, how is it possible to "advertise" to yourself? This is no easy task, how can you fool yourself to sell yourself a dream, and then forget that you've fooled yourself straight after? This is something I struggle with excessively. I'm not easy to sell to, even when someone else tries to do it. Selling to myself just plain doesn't work, I can see through my own facade. I also don't seem to have been able to garner enough intensity of emotion to cross that threshold of action. I was never particularly emotional in the past, I'm more so now, but not by orders of magnitude. Equally, my intrinsic away motivation (I hate my life type ideation...) doesn't have strong enough intensity of emotion for me to cross that motivational threshold. I'm stuck in that valley of low emotion (because realistically my life's just fine survival-wise), but still have the cognitive suffering which accompanies wanting to be motivated and have change, but not doing it. So what to do? Can I simply just turn the knobs of emotions up far enough to kick start motivation? It seems outlandish, I can only say that it's an avenue of investigation for me, I have no idea of where I would get started. Maybe I can become a better story teller and self-salesman? There may be some mileage in that (see Restructuring Life VI), but so far I haven't hit the magic story formula to get my emotional hooks into. Maybe the key is existentialism? To realise that wanting change and wanting motivation to change is already a story I've fallen for, and that it is actually possible to fall for my own stories. Maybe external motivation is what's needed? I could then engage with someone else's story which then engages my emotions - since I don't have to fight my own facade in that case. This is in fact what I've relied on in the past, especially with girlfriends: going along with their flow. I must say I can be more strongly motivated by other people than by myself, so this can work. But, this process is hit and miss, and currently I'm not in a position to do this. Shall I just throw my hands up? Almost certainly. Change will happen when it happens, regardless of whether I cogitate over it or not.

Two places: Attention Having something you have to do By attention I mean having attention taken away from the task at hand. You can't really control attention, but you can control the sources that grab attention (i.e. distraction). So the aim here is to reduce or remove all those things in your environment that distract you. But the worst offender is thinking. You can't control thinking either - which is why it seems impossible to break out of procrastination. But again, you can control the triggers of thinking: so meditate, have peaceful surroundings, use music and so on. And make sure the body is satisfied: get sleep, eat properly, sit comfortably etc - otherwise it will grab too much attention or not allow you to focus. Be aware you will be more focused at certain times of the day, use that to your advantage. The second point is less obvious. The only reason for procrastination is thinking you're being forced to do something. Sometimes that in itself can get your defences up, and make it hard to start. You always have a choice not to do something and just drop it, maybe you can live with the consequences? Here's some tips that I use to reduce procrastination: Have a routine - work on the task at the same times each day, this primes the mind to be ready for action Start small - aim to do the task in chunks, just half an hour at a time, the chunks don't have to be consecutive, but the Pomodoro technique can also help here. Have a plan - if it's a big task, break the task down and plan out times and dates, having a deadline and timeline can sometimes help. Seeing the extent of the task can make it seem less daunting. Reduce all distractions - meditate if possible beforehand to quiet the mind. Block the web: Facebook, YouTube etc. Switch off and put away your mobile somewhere inconvenient. Distract the thinking mind with music (works for me). Make sure you're not contactable or can be physically found by people. Have a reward system - if you do the task or a bit of the task, then reward yourself with food, coffee, a walk, showering, stretching, a break whatever. Keep the rewards as non-distracting as possible - i.e. they don't take a long time and don't engage the attention too much. Have a variety of tasks to work on - you'll probably get bored just working on one thing all day, find a range of different things to do in rotation. This will keep up the focus and stop the mind wandering.

Restructuring Life VII I haven't exhausted the other areas, but I am moving on to another angle: existentialism. The bottom of my existential barrel is should I be or should I do? Let's go meta already: being and doing are one and the same. Doing is only different from being with regards to the mental net that's cast over it (q: what is it)? Ok. So, I cannot not be. I am constantly being whether I pay attention to it or not, whether I like it or not. By extension I am always doing: moving, breathing, thinking, passing time. So any existential angst I feel about being/doing, is purely generated by emotion and thought. In their turn, emotion and thought are simply an aspect of being. I'm beholden to the inherent programming of being and unable to escape that. There is nowhere to escape to. So much so dense. Let's try and go lighter: If I am to cast a net over being and emphasise certain aspects of it over others, then what is the "best" way to do that? Being itself has no answers here, because it's all being being being. No. Only thought has the answers. What does thought think? LOL, see previous Restructuring Life I to VI. In other words I'm going round in circles here (from an existential POV). Doing nothing and doing something are equivalent to each other. Inaction and action, who cares, what cares? There's nothing really to grab on to here. This being, @LastThursday, wants to create meaning so it can feel self-satisfied in some way. That's still dense. Maybe I can't do it lighter. Right erm... meaning... meaning... meaning... Ok. So if I don't go question why I want meaning in the first place (too Alice in Wonderland), then @LastThursday will deem to create meaning out of nothing and then "do" something towards obtaining that meaning. It would be meaningful to have some of the things that I'm envious that other people have. Yes, that's sort of it, maybe. Or I can create meaning relative to my current circumstances, swim the ocean of relativity by pushing against its water. Yes yes! I know exactly what I don't want, that's it, that's exactly the resistance I need in order to push away. But I need a beacon of meaning to point my pushing towards. Why not just push randomly somewhere?: because I'm danger of going round in circles. So what? Being itself doesn't care. And, the mind is entertained because it thinks it's going somewhere. The body only cares as long as its fed and used nicely. Why is that so unsatisfactory? What is it that exactly cares that I'm going in a straight line to somewhere else? Also, my emotions will be whatever my circumstances dictate, they're just the waves on the ocean; in the end they tell me nothing, except to give me undulating nausea. All this existentialism is the source of my so called inaction. My thought and emotions are like little children who don't understand why they feel tired, all they can do is cry. My being is the patient parent, waiting for the kids to grow up or go to sleep.

@Preety_India I'm interested to know what your list is.

Happy birthday old chap. Have a spiffing day.

Some of mine: Introspection and questioning yourself Going constantly meta Imagination and being open to possibility Examining things from many angles, stepping into other people's shoes Understanding your emotions / growing emotional intelligence Improving executive functioning: decision making, impulse control, attention span and focus Clear communication with people (and with yourself as well) Being open minded and non-judgemental Being able to commit long term to achieve goals Loving people for being themselves

Gotta keep churning and not let myself off the hook and to keep up the energy. I need good stories to bypass the thinking mind. Restructuring Life VI+ March 23 2030 It's been nine years since I've looked at this journal. Boy, a lot's happened in that time. I remember back then when I felt lost and listless. Never would I have dreamt that the Restructing entries would lead to the life I have now. I decided that I would gather up all my ideas that I'd had in this journal, and write a short book. I knew that I could synthesise something fresh in the self-help domain. That book was key in helping me get known. From there I started doing short YouTube videos. I found that there were many people that just needed basic self-development, but that conventional advice just didn't click for them, they needed something different. I got my first few coaching clients through YouTube and I took the plunge. Eventually, I gave up my wage slavery and went with coaching full time. Strangely, once I did that, even though it was hard hard work, everything else fell into place. All those things that I'd been yearning for back then happened. I have a set of like minded friends which I talk to and see regularly, I help people which gives me a nice warm glow and financially things are looking good: I have even paid off my home outright. I have two homes in fact. One in the UK and one here Barcelona and spend half a year in each. And I finally sorted out dual citizenship. I've also gotten to know my family in Spain very well which is great. August 9 2025 I had my first piano concert today. It truly is a dream come true. I didn't think it would be possible all those years ago to get to a good enough standard to knock out Bach and Chopin to an audience. It felt amazing to be appreciated for my skill, I sure have put in a huge amount of concentrated time and effort into it. When I'd moved house, I decided to by myself a baby grand beforhand, the house had to fit the piano or else it was a no go. Over the space of a year I hugely improved my music reading and learnt all of the Well Tempered Clavier. That in itself gave me the confidence and level of skill I needed. From there I picked up other popular and less popular pieces, learning one every week or so. I have a good repetoire now. I just enjoy so much, it beats programming hands down, and it speaks to my heart rather than my head. Don't get me wrong though, it's hugely demanding, but immensely rewarding. Hopefully more concerts to come! Edit It's an odd sensation writing these little story snippets out. It feels extremely unnatural and awkard to do, and that's a sign of how underdeveloped my imagination is with respect to what I want. I'm very much a go-with-the-flow kind of guy, which is fine, but I need to get excited and to have goals and things to work towards: LIFE PURPOSE, PURPOSE IN LIFE. I have to re-purpose my imagination into developing good stories for myself. This sort of thing has to become more natural and fluid for me. Practice practice practice.

Restructuring Life VI I've covered top down, bottom up, emotion, pragmastism. Now it's fantasy's turn. This covers the "WTF do I actually want?" question. Maybe I do know, but I think it's silly, unattainable, unreasonable, unacceptible, un, un, un. June 13 2023 It was wam last night and I woke up a couple of times, but I got back to sleep easily enough. When I opened the wooden shutters, the sun blazed in, it looks like it's going to be another great day. I'll put on my straw hat - an affectation I've taken on to remind me that I could be on holiday - and get a small and intense coffee in the little cafe bar in the village. The owner knows me well and I try my broken Italian out on him, he's not really that much older than me. After that I'll walk down to the nice stretch of beach outside the village and take a swim. I rarely take showers any more. I think a late breakfast after that. Then on to the serious part of the day, working on my book. December 18 2022 I've been in New Zealand a few weeks now. It's great place, stunning scenery. The locals here are friendly and I've become acquainted with this beautiful woman, she sings in a bar for part time work. When I first heard her I was just so taken with her talent, she was like a songbird. Something inside me stirred and I stayed there all night, and built up some Dutch courage. When the place emptied out a bit, I told her how beautiful her singing was, to my suprise she was really interested in me and what it's like back in the UK. That was a month ago, and now tomorrow she's told me meet her at a certain venue I've never been to. Secretly, I think she's got a birthday surprise lined up for me. I hope. My birthday in Summer I must be dreaming. April 24 2021 After a 12 mile walk through the countryside my friend and I decided to drive back to a big pub we'd passed on the way. We shared stats about the walk and our amazement at the all day sunshine we were having. A few tables away a couple of women friends talked quietly together. I liked the look of one of them and she glanced over to me occasionally. After I bit I could tell they were about to leave. I just had to take my chance. "Sorry Alex, hang on..." I went over, just as they were getting up and asked the blonde, "Hi. Sorry. Do you mind if I ask you a very personal question." she looked slightly taken aback, but said "Ok?". "Do you have a boyfriend?", they both laughed and she said "no". I said, "Would you like to have one? What's your number?". And that was that, we exchanged numbers. She's very spiritual.

@Zigzag Idiot that's the best thing I've read all week especially for a towny like me, who knows nothing about this sort of thing. I wonder if the donkey idea can be applied to other areas of conflict, say, relationship counselling?

@Ook how do you know what God-realization is, without being God already? (thanks to @mandyjw for the hint)

When to say or do something and when not to? This is something I grapple with constantly. I'm impulsive by nature and sometimes impatient - the two are linked. With increasing awareness I've realised that it's not always best to go with impulse. So I have a little checklist of checks I go through before I respond to any situation (emails particularly): Should I respond? What is my intention behind responding: attention, manipulation, authenticity, desire to help, self satisfaction, annoyance, weasel words, sniping? Does my particular intention improve the situation for the other person(s)? If it doesn't, then I don't involve myself and move on. Alternatively, I reassess how I should be responding so that I can improve the situation. I've learned that generally if the intention is self-serving, then it doesn't serve others. This is especially relevant for getting attention and manipulation and usually for annoyance or outrage. Annoyance or outrage can be ok if you or someone else is being bullied or manipulated.

Good luck with that. The rest is doable by mere mortals. Although, writing is everywhere maybe only on a nature retreat is it possible to escape. Saying that, out of all them if you can achieve "no sub-vocalization" for prolonged periods, I think that would give the most benefit. It's impossible to get lost in negative rumination and stories if you don't talk to yourself.

The Blind Participator Effect. What? I just made that up, it probably has a real name. I made up the title, but the effect is a pattern I've noticed. To get to it: This is a judgement made about a situation where you exclude yourself from that situation, but in reality are part of the situation. Some examples follow. You're not sat in traffic, you are part of the traffic. The other person's drama makes you angry, you make yourself part of the drama. You have nothing to say about a circumstance, yet you still comment and make yourself part of the circumstance. You say you have no desires left, yet you desire to have no desires. You are outraged at someone's behaviour, and yet your behaviour towards them is outrageous. Hopefully, you can see the pattern here. The notion is that you mistakenly think that you are somehow outside of a situation, when in fact you are not. What to do about it? Avoid the traffic. Ignore the drama. Don't say anything. Accept it's not possible to be desireless. Express your outrage differently.

This begs the question: what should we be doing with ourselves? Is gaining knowledge enough? One answer is that we should educate ourselves in meta skills, for example epistemology, because they they apply to so many different areas. Breadth. This is just the application of the Pareto principle. Another answer, is that we don't have to do anything at all; who is judging us on what we should be doing anyway? And yet another answer is that doing never stops, we just keep on breathing and moving.