On the Power of Words

Words are powerful things indeed. 

By using them we, as human beings, are able to create into another human being’s mind a representation of what we have in our own mind.

Many times we are even able to secure with another human being comprehension, cooperation and compliance. This process starts when we share a number of common abstractions of reality with somebody else, metaphors of the physical world, psychological and emotional states and purely intellectual concepts and associate those abstraction with words. Then by uttering those common words we are able to force the other party to recall that abstraction.

That’s natures version of mind control right there! Don’t believe me? Try not to think of a pink elephant after you’ve read these words.

But as with any powerful tool, using it does not come without it’s dangers.

I will avoid going into the intricacies of neurophysiology that explain this, but fundamentally we can say that our brain is a pattern recognition associative thinking machine. In other words, we build an hierarchy of concepts, anchoring each new concept in a number of somehow related concepts we already have.

To give you one example, when you see a new animal you have never seen before, like an Okapi, your brain will immediately compare it to a number of related concepts (4 legs, so probably a mammal… back looks like a zebra, neck looks like a giraffe) and create an abstract model that roughly describes any Okapi in the world regardless of the characteristics that make any individual Okapi unique (like the pattern of stripes), doing so by relating this model to a number of other concepts you already have.

Problem is what happens when we then have a model of an Okapi and we recall one.

Want an example?

Take a pen and paper. Or just open a notebook app of some sort. Really, do it now.

Are you ready? What I need you to do is to visualize a scene I am going to describe, really see it in your mind, and then perform a small task that involves noting something down. It shouldn’t take more than 7 or 8 seconds.

Ready now?

So what I want you to imagine is a dwarf. A very happy dwarf. He is walking home, all dressed in green, coming home from work and whistling of pure joy, because he is a lucky dwarf, drinking some soda as he walks by. Yes, picture in your mind a joyful, lucky, whistling, soda drinking, green draped dwarf.

Now very quickly think of a number from one to ten and write it down in the notebook.

Did it already?

Ok. Chances are, as in "about 70%” chance, that you wrote down the number 7. Yes, 7 out of 10 people will have written the number 7, although pure chance and statistics tells us that there should only be a 10% chance.

What happened here?

When I mentioned the word “dwarf”, consciously or subconsciously your brain retrieved a number of related concepts to your model of a “dwarf”:

 

- Small human being;

- Miners and gold diggers in folklore;

- A whistling dwarf, one of SEVEN of the fairy tale “Snow white and the SEVEN dwarfs”, if you are a westerner born in an anglo-saxonic friendly culture (the fact that I am writing this in English increases the probabilities).

That activated the concept “7” in your mind.

Then I pile it on with other details that activate the same common “7” concept:

- Lucky, as in lucky number SEVEN. 

- Green and soda , concepts which in many people associate with a particular beverage, 7up.

So, unconsciously, the common concept of the number “7" got lit up from a number of different sources, and although you think I didn't mention it explicitly. Indeed, I actually did before, to prime you, mention “7 or 8 seconds”.

This is how our brain works, we subconsciously activate related concepts without being aware of it.

Why is this important?

Because every word carries a number of related, associated concepts every time it is uttered or written. This applies not only to the person who reads it or hears it but also to the person that produces it. So every time we use a word, a large number of related concepts “light up” and our brains become primed to find more easily those concepts in the world around it.

Therefore if you are using negative words often, like “bad”, “ugly”, “detestable”, “hate”, “anger”, you will be priming yourself and others around you to see whatever is presented by life in a worse light. Conversely, by using words as “positive”, “good”, “like”, “love”, you will be priming people around you to see the world with a more positive view.

A number of studies have shown this to be the case, with people dramatically changing their physiological responses to positive or stressful stimuli when primed accordingly.

And if you doubt how prone your brain is to priming, how good we are at finding what we are unconsciously looking for and overlooking everything else, why don’t you take the basketball test? Try it now at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJG698U2Mvo

Amazing, isn’t it?

Be aware of the power of words. Pay attention to the words you use everyday, not only with others but also in your inner dialogues.

Sometimes changing the way you describe the world is all it takes to make it a little better.

Afterword: All that has been written above has been extensively described in many ancient texts of various cultures and philosophies around the world, but using a different set of phenomena to model it. In may Eastern philosophies, for example, words have their own vibration frequency that causes everyone exposed to them to resonate with that frequency, thus conveying it’s explicit and implicit sense. This has led some cultures to take extreme care with their writing systems to make sure that words are not uttered with the wrong sound or frequency, as is the case with Sanskrit, in which each letter corresponds to a specific sound carrying a specific frequency, and words are combinations of such.

Holistic learning: Learning anything from everything

Before we move further along the innerpreneur path, it is of the essence to introduce the concept of holistic learning.

This approach to learning is derived from the general concept that all phenomena are bound to a set of physical and mathematical rules and behaviours, thus allowing to extrapolate and infer concepts from one domain to another. 

Putting it shortly, it’s the idea that anything you learn is somehow applicable somewhere else sometimes apparently unrelated.

Examples of this line of thought abound in History. These include insights into Brownian movement that Einstein got by looking carefully at the behaviour of a stirred cup of coffee and the ability of Charles Munger, Warren Buffets right arm (and some claim that is left as well), to predict market behaviours using some dozens of models derived from psychology, biology and physics. Those more technically inclined will also know how you can model electric flow using water flow, how you can define the overall control behaviour of any physical systems using almost the same basic mathematical tools, how new computers fail in pretty much the same fashion as new cars or new human beings (think burn-in).

This concept is of the essence because, if taken seriously, it allows you to speed up your learning exponentially. I have learned most of what I needed to know about the timing to market from surfing (go to soon, the wave crashes on you; go to late, you lost the wave; start paddling like a madman just when the wave starts pulling you; replace “wave” with “market”). Most of what I have used to handle business attacks I have learned from Aikido (use your opponent’s aggressiveness against himself, be a mirror, don’t be or give when where the most force is applied). Most of what I know of customer retention I know from being one.

Beautiful in theory, but how to do it in practice?

Be mindful. Be conscious. Pay attention. Whenever you encounter and deal with a new situation and adapt to it (i.e., you learn), try to realise how to abstract the new concept you just acquired from the specific situation you faced. Understand the concepts why what you did worked. Try to find other situations that are somewhat similar. Think and experiment to see if the concept still applies to that different context.

Life is an amazing school. Pay attention to its lessons. 

On Time (part V) - Defining a task, the Holy Trinity of Project Management and other stuff

On a previous article I mentioned that everything that required doing and took longer than 2 minutes to complete should be captured in some form of task list for future reference and planning.

But something seemingly as simple as noting down a task can also be optimised in order to avoid the most common pitfalls that may hamper your ability to deliver that task.

So, let's take it one tip at a time:

TIP #1 - Note down the intended result or deliverable as the task description, not an individual action.

The reason underlying this advice is that quite often performing a task does not mean the desired outcome is achieved, thus creating the need to either create a new task for the next step required or keep a task that does not necessarily reflect the required action.

Let's see one example.

You are at work and realise that you need to get a new laptop for a new hire that will arrive next Monday. That may require asking de IT guy what are the specs of the laptop, then calling one of the approved retailers to have it mailed to your offices and, finally, make sure it arrives in working order and then deliver it to the new hire.

You could create several tasks "Talk to Peter from IT", "Order laptop from retailer" and so on, or you could create just ONE task, with something like "Get laptop for new hire Jane" and then just defer it each time a new step is required. I personally prefer the latter.


TIP #2 - Always follow the Holy Trinity of Project Management

The unfortunately not so famous HTPM basically states in ominous terms that "No task is defined unless you can answer: WHO does WHAT until WHEN."

And thats it. A task should state clearly what needs to be done (see tip #1). A deadline or notification date should be scheduled along with it. And finally, it should be perfectly clear who needs to do it.

If you don't have this then you don't have a task.


TIP #3 - If possible, tag a task by context

Not all tasks are equal. Some can only be done when you're at home. Others when you're in the office. And some work better together.

So add a context to your tasks. It makes no sense to have to sort through tasks that cannot be done right now, so just look up the ones you can. And if you are going to be on the phone, take care of all of you phone tasks in one go, it will help keep you in the zone and be more productive.

TIP #4 - Prioritise and prioritise daily

Some tasks are important. Others not so much. So your task list should reflect that.

Life is dynamic. Priorities are dynamic. So your task list should also reflect that.

When you create a task, give it a priority that makes sense in the context of the priority you have attributed to other tasks.

On a daily basis, when you first start tackling your task list, have a look around what you have scheduled for that day and see if the set priorities still make sense. If not, change them.

Remember: every day there will be stuff that will not get done. Priorities should just make sure that the important stuff gets done first.

And that's it for now!

If you feel inclined to try out these tips, let me know your thoughts and results.

Quora question: What is your opinion on hiring someone to write a blog for your very small business's webpage?

Read David Carvalhão's answer to What is your opinion on hiring someone to write a blog for your very small business's webpage? on Quora

On Time (part IV) - To optimise or not optimise

The first time I brought up this issue at a talk I got a bunch of weird looks from the audience followed by some hesitant questions. Aren't we, as entrepreneurs, supposed to optimise everything to increase output and efficiency?

My answer is: as entrepreneurs, perhaps, as innerpreneurs, definitely not!

The risk that comes with becoming a fantastic optimiser is not knowing when to stop.

After it has become imbued in your mindset the evaluation of the resources it takes to complete a certain task and then reducing this resource usage whenever possible, it become an instinct. You look at something that needs to be done, you evaluate it, optimise it, do it, done.

This process gets an amazing amount of things done but at the cost of focusing you on achieving the end result, the goal, the deliverable, at the expense of making the experience of actually achieving it as fast and painless as possible.

But most of the things that are really worth in life are not about the end result, but about the path you walk to get there.

Have a new personal hacking project? Why would you want to hasten the pleasure actually doing it gives you in favour of getting the project done as quickly as possible?

Having a child? Do you really want to get done with his education and upbringing as fast and efficiently as possible?

That's what actual "living" is all about. The path and the experience.

Ultimately, you already know how this project called "life" ends. It's not pretty. Most want to avoid it. So we try to experience it for as long as we can.

So know when to take you optimiser hat off and enjoy life. Work, hat on. Personal life, hat off.

That's the Way of the Innerpreneur.

On time (part III) - Little things add up

One of the most powerful and yet most underestimated techniques to better manage time is the observation and optimisation of small habits and routines.

Lets take a quick look at some examples.

Say you have a bunch of keys on your keyring, and every time you lock your front door from the outside or you open the door, you fumble around for 5 seconds until you find the right one. For the sake of creating a more realistic scenario, let us also assume that you have a building door you have to open every time you want to get in.

So that's 5 seconds to lock, 5 seconds to open the building door, 5 seconds to open your flat door. 15 seconds per cycle.

Let's assume that on average you do that twice a day. So on a given day, you spend about 30 seconds fumbling with keys. 900 seconds per month. 10 800 seconds per year.

Now let's assume that you are a small business owner in Europe, where the average hourly labour cost in the Eurozone is 29,5€ (check it at: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Hourly_labour_costs)

That's 3 hours every year spent fumbling for keys! Or the equivalent of 88,5€!

So just by buying a simple pack of plastic sleeves to organize your keyring that saves you 4 seconds each time you look for a key, which costs less than 2 € on Amazon



Buy it here!

That's 2,4 hours per year saved or, discounting the 2€ investment, 68,8€ of savings on the first year.

Think about that! 2,4 more hours to be with the ones you love you do something you are passionate about instead of... fumbling for keys!

Let us now consider one of the most used tools in the world, the personal computer.

You work with a computer that is just "good enough" in order to save money on an upgrade. Lets be very conservative and assume that, on average, a typical user opens 200 pages per day (to put into perspective, in 2007 in the US the average would be 138, source http://kickstand.typepad.com/metamuse/2007/10/how-many-web-pa.html).

If your "cheap" computer takes one second more to render a webpage than an updated computer, barely noticeable to the average user. Still, that's 200 seconds per day, or about 20 hours per year.

Even if you did nothing else than web-browsing, your "cheap" computer costs you 590€ per year in lost productivity!

So it's time to invite you for a little exercise.

For one day, pay attention to how much time you spend on the little things, the one's that don't matter much but really add up. Make an estimate. Be amazed.

All this serves a purpose. In this blog I will sometimes point to small optimisations to your life that will make you wonder if they are worth the effort.

Probably on the short run they won't. But we're playing a long game here...

On Time (part II) - The Original GTD Method

Some books entertain you and some change the way you think. But a small number of these impact your life in such a dramatic manner that it is fair to say that they have, literally, changed your life.

One such books for me was David Allen’s “Getting Things Done”. You haven’t read it, buy it here, read it, and multiply the time that you spent reading it many times over (pun intended) in future savings.

You can get it on Amazon here:

Read it! :)

This book describes a workflow that, although quite simple, as all sublime things are, is extremely powerful, as not only allows you to fit the handling of all sorts of tasks into an unified process but, most of all, allows you to clear your mind and make mode Inner-time available.

The general look of the diagram that describes the workflow can be found at the FranckCrum blog and looks something like this:

So let’s walk through the whole process.

We start by considering that you have a virtual inbox where literally EVERYTHING that requires time and work goes into. Received a letter? Goes into your inbox. Got an email? Inbox. Someone requested you something? Inbox.

Once you have everything there, go through each item one by one. For each item start off by asking:

 “Is it actionable?”

The purpose of this question is to allow you to quickly decide if that item in your inbox requires you to do something about it or is merely informational. 

So, if the answer to this is “no”, you either trash it and forget it, keep it around for further review or, if you consider ii may be important in the future, you archive it somewhere you can find easily.

A recommendation I can give you here is: whenever possible, trash it! It’s amazing how fast stuff starts to pile up and becomes impossible to manage. Although I have been steadily improving, I am terrible at this, so I can guarantee it does become a problem. 😃

If the answer is “yes”, then ask yourself immediately “can I do it now in 2 minutes?”.

If you can, then there’s no point on spending any more time noting it down somewhere, the overhead alone would make it inefficient to do so. So just do it!

Should it take longer or you are unable to do it now, then you just note it down on you task list, task manager or calendar.

How to decide where? Easy! If there is a special time you need to do it, it goes in the calendar. So meetings, parties, trips and travels and other appointments go in you calendar, everything else to your task list.

Of the tasks noted on your task list, decide which ones can be done by someone who’s not you. And delegate them. BUT keep them noted in your task list as a delegated task, otherwise you’ll have to spend Inner-time trying to remember to check-up on people.

If you do this consistently, you will immediately feel an enormous decrease in stress and increase of inner time. But this is just the basic workflow!

But more about that on a later post...

On Time

Time is the ultimate commodity.

If you come to think of it, it is the only single thing that you can really trade for almost anything. Want money? Use time to earn it. Want a healthy body? Put time into an healthy lifestyle. Want a relationship? Invest it in someone worthwhile. Want inner peace? Take the time to meditate.

Therefore I will dare to redefine the old adage. Time is NOT money. Money is just one of the many things time can give you.

Time is happiness. 

So a considerable part of this blog will be devoted to how to save, manage and invest your time. But first an important distinction regarding time must be made, as there are various aspects of it. For the sake of simplification, I will start by considering just two main ones: chronological time, which I will address as chrono-time,  and mental time, which I shall refer to as inner-time.

Chrono-time is basically the type of time you can measure with a watch, you can use to synchronise activities with other people and the one that most people will call “time”.

Inner-time on the other hand, is a resource associated with your brain and focus. It is a measure of your ability to perceive, think, remember, relax and do a number of activities within your mind (discussions on the mind will come in later posts 😃 ). It is only marginally connected to the chrono-time, as we all know from experience when expecting a loved one or doing something highly pleasurable. It is also a resource that can, unlike chrono-time that can only be managed, be expanded.

So I expect in the next few posts addressing this issue to provide you not only with the tools to effectively manage chrono-time, but to expand and bring a new quality to your inner-time, which will become an important stepping stone on one’s path to happiness.

So, let’s begin...

The Manifest

Life is an amazing learning sandbox.

Daily we are submitted to a huge number of experiences that mold our personality and then, when consciously lived, allow us to grow as human beings. 

For quite some time I separated my work and professional lives, in the belief that the skill sets that I acquired for one of these realms only seldom applied or should be applied to the other. That has led me to search for personal growth in places as varied as a Tantric school in the center of Lisbon or a Xaman retreat in the middle of the Amazon.

But soon I realised that many of the lessons I was learning in my personal development were directly applied in my work life and vice-versa. In fact, I realised that it was quite pointless trying to contain these two parts of my life as if they were not part of a big, indivisible, whole.

Thus, I started as an Entrepreneur and eventually became an Innerpreneur.

This is my journey.