#I've tried asking it to create problem solving questions for me before and they never make sense

[mislamicpearl]

They're making us do AI Week at my school next week. We're supposed to come up with activities that will allow (force) the students to use ChatGPT to help them solve problems. I wanna throw up.

If I ever have kids I swear I'm homeschooling them. The ministry of education is just another puppet of the western powers that are actively trying to make everyone stop thinking for themselves.

[drdemonprince]

Genuine question regarding the way turning your creativity into a career has broken your brain: do you think getting a job not reliant on creative output would solve the problem, or do you think this has long term damaged your relationship with creativity?

I see so many friends who tried to "make it" as artists never pick back up with their art in the same way they did before after they reach your point, even after they get jobs outside that field.

Do you think there are things that can be done to mitigate this and repair that relationship? I wish I could help them.

oh, I uh. Also have a full time job that is not reliant upon creative output. and so that has not worked great. because i've had like double the things to do, in my mind. (tho admittedly my job is really easy and i get away with fucking off a lot). For years it was the perfect scenario because i was not relying upon my creative output for income, and so i could just do time theft from my main job and write on the clock for fun!!! but then. the shit i did for fun became a whole like Business and so now i've basically had to maintain both adequate productivity at the main job WHILE succeeding in the creative job. and i die

It's so kind of you to ask how to help your friends revive their inner creative spark and enjoy making things again. i'm not sure what the answer is. i know that i still feel moved to create. i would never stop doing it. i think what i need, personally, is to stop being a Business -- to not have an agent and editor and PR person and Marketing team and a whole host of other people needing me to do what i do and sending me new obligations all the time. my plan is to not conventionally publish anything else after this upcoming book, at least not for a long time. or to only go the small press route moving forward. i think something like that is what it takes for a lot of people in this position -- to get back into making because it is enjoyable again, and to do silly frivilous creative projects that are social, without any sense of obligation. im trying good lord im trying but ive got to retrain my nervous system to not see creative work as this scary thing i could fail at doing at any time.

[justdecadentcollectiondestiny]

Every Day: On Aziraphale

Obviously MAJOR spoilers ahead! Click keep reading at your own risk.

Let's get the elephant in the room out of the way first. I am not angry at Aziraphale for his decision. I don't agree with it, obviously, but I understand why he made the choice he did.

In Aziraphale's mind, there could not be a better course of events than them both returning to Heaven as angels. It would solve pretty much every problem and worry (Aziraphale feels) they had ever had. They would both have their jobs back, both be working for the Good Guys, he would be able to use his new position of power to fix the flaws in Heaven, and, most importantly, they would be together, without any of the fear that had been looming over them for the past six thousand years.

Aziraphale is perfectly aware that they are also being offered safety. With Aziraphale as Supreme Archangel and Crowley as his second in command, they could be freely and openly together and in love for the first time in their entire relationship. Which is why he tries so desperately to convince him to go with him, being the most upfront and honest about his feelings for him than he has ever been before. "We can be together!" "I need you!" He believed so much that he could change Crowley's mind for the sake of them being together that he wouldn't accept that Crowley's answer was "no" until Crowley was out the door, until it was too late.

Additionally, we now know that Crowley and Aziraphale did know each other before Crowley Fell, and this adds a whole new layer to Aziraphale's decision. He remembers the angel Crowley used to be, the angel full of joy and smiles, who loved creating beautiful things, who absolutely adored being an angel. Aziraphale loves Crowley, and he would love to see him that happy again. That coupled with the fact that Aziraphale can probably, like us, tell that Crowley misses being an angel leads him to believe that going back to Heaven would be a no-brainer for Crowley. So he is not prepared in the least for Crowley to want absolutely nothing to do with the idea. He can't fathom why anyone would willingly stay on the "bad" side when they had a choice. The question Aziraphale asks of Crowley is "Why would you choose to be Evil when you could be Good?" But what Aziraphale doesn't understand is that that's not the choice Crowley is making here. He's not choosing Evil over Good. He's choosing himself over the whole system, the system that Aziraphale still has hope can be fixed.

And that's where the Metatron comes in. I fully believe that the Metatron manipulated Aziraphale to get him to agree to come with him. We don't get to see all of his conversation with Aziraphale, but we can see that he brings Aziraphale a coffee (trying to get his foot in the door), reassures him that "I've ingested things in my time," that his humanly habit of consuming Earthly food and drink is nothing to be ashamed of (again trying to get his foot in the door by keeping Aziraphale comfortable around him as well as likening himself to him), and pays him compliments that are frankly out of character considering Heaven has regarded Aziraphale as a traitor since the averted Armageddon. But, most damning of all, in my opinion, is the Metatron telling Aziraphale that he could restore Crowley to angelic status. Before this point, Aziraphale was not keen on the idea, even saying point-blank that he doesn't want to go back to Heaven. But the Metatron (like pretty much everybody at this point) knows that Aziraphale is in love with Crowley. He knows Crowley is his perfect leverage, especially since, I believe, he knows that Crowley would never agree to come back to Heaven and he would never have suggested it if he didn't know that Crowley would reject it. His glare at Crowley on his way out the door is enough for us to see his contempt for him, his asking Aziraphale "how did he take it?" seems like strange wording to me (Not "what did he say?" or "what does he think?" Normally you "take" something you don't want to hear, implying the Metatron anticipated Crowley's reaction), and his remark after Crowley leaves that he was "always asking damn fool questions" shows us more of that contempt as well as an attempt to convince Aziraphale that "screw him he's stupid anyway you don't need him." So there you go. The Metatron uses Crowley to get Aziraphale to agree to come back to Heaven, sits back and watches as they both break each other's hearts, swoops back in to pick up the pieces, and now has an angel feeling very vulnerable and alone ready to be escorted back up to Heaven.

I would honestly compare Aziraphale to a cult victim. He's essentially been brainwashed. For countless millennia he has been conditioned to see Heaven as the one and only Good Side, and the angels as the end-all-be-all Good Guys. After everything that's happened over the last six thousand years (the last few years especially), Aziraphale now obviously knows that's not entirely true, but even so, he still has the mindset of two sides, Heaven Good and Hell Evil. And so to be welcomed back to the Good Side with open arms when he's at such a low, to be entrusted with power and recognition by the Voice of God undoubtedly feels reassuring, even though I am positive something small deep inside him is whispering to him that something about this is not right.

More than anything, Aziraphale believes in Goodness. It's quite literally the very core of his being. He wholeheartedly believes that the system is capable of being fixed and that he can be the one to fix it. And not only that he can, that, if he has the chance to, he has to. It's his duty as a being of Good.

Brokenhearted Aziraphale is too stubborn convicted in his values to turn down the chance to change Heaven for the better, and with the bookshop being entrusted to Muriel and, most importantly, without Crowley, he doesn't have much keeping him on Earth anymore.

In the end, it's a combination of Aziraphale's steadfast values and principles, his genuine and unwavering desire to do Good, and Heaven's indoctrination and manipulation of him that leads Aziraphale to leave Earth and Crowley behind and return to Heaven.

Exactly to what end the Metatron wants Aziraphale as Supreme Archangel, I don't know. That's for Season Three to tell us. We'll just have to wait and see.

[stardust-in-my-mind-blog]

wrapping shit up

there's a question that someone asked

that's been banging around my head

as I look over things I want to keep and pack

or forget and toss into the oblivion of this ending stage

I don't exactly remember how the conversation got to it

but I'd mentioned being dumped over twelve times

in my last relationship and was asked why I didn't just leave

I have so many answers to that question

I could have gone into the devalue and discard cycle

talked about how protecting my son was more important

than anything I ever thought about my own life

I could have described how I chose the floors for this house

how I designed the kitchen table over a half wall

with the contractor and even picked the butcher block

this raw acacia wood that looked so beautiful when polished

I could have mentioned the trees and the birds and all

the flowers I used to plant and the swings

but I realized today it had less to do with that

and more to do with my own strength

and I didn't have enough of it to go then

they don't always tell you that when you choose

and even feel relieved to lose your parents

and the brothers who never wanted to see you

you still miss them sometimes like phantom limbs

even if you don't want to miss them

even if you're only missing your own delusions

and after feeling like I'd not only lost where I came from

but I also felt like all my memories were stained in blood

and all the scapegoated blood came from me

I was the victim and the destroyer with the matches

and I didn't have any left to burn something else

not then even when I saw everything decaying

I couldn't bear to lose anything else

it's different now even as I walk toward so many

new and exciting and completely mysterious things

but I'm stronger now and I wasn't before

I've done so much and learned how to trust support

to believe when I walk into rooms with warm welcomes

that those hugs and smiles won't randomly go away

but I also know I'll be okay if they do

I've never held much sentiment in dates of holidays

but my first christmas eve waking up alone was awful

I wasn't ready back then but I got through it now

with the chaos of three kids and multiple households

control was never something I tried to grasp too often

I was more than happy to settle for a balance

but that balance never included me or my needs

I didn't really think about my needs or even what I felt

I had to learn all of that and practice it this year

I can't even describe what the experience meant to me

but for the first time when that question was asked

I didn't feel shame or like I did something lacking

I was curious and wondered why exactly it was, myself

that happens to be another new pattern of thinking

especially now that I think most of the storm

has been wrung or sung out of me

I even gave the man I desperately wanted to destroy

a hug and created a plan for us all to spend the holiday

all together in a really nice way like it once was

and there's not the usual pang of bitterness

nor the heaviness of resentment

when you're in a situation like that you never know

until you suddenly know and then you have to

really grapple with it because to go is to sacrifice the life you know

to choose yourself over the outcome you wanted to create

to accept the reality in front of you

to accept the hopelessness of any decent ending

and you have to get through the ending to move on

but even that trip to the movies held the echoes

of old dysfunctions and I saw myself in the middle

of chaos at the popcorn counter trying to be

resourceful and calm while I dealt with crazy kids

and promises made that couldn't be kept

while being diplomatic and problem solving

with the cashier in front of me and impatient people

behind me and that overwhelm reminded me

once again that I am so fucking glad it's over

because holy shit that was a miserable time

lessons have been branded painfully into my heart

but she's not broken anymore

and that is something

that is really something

[studyingchemeng]

Hey, do you have any tips to regularly motivate yourself to study?

I often get overwhelmed by the homework and forget about the textbook readings and preparation.

Hi anon,

sorry for taking so long to answer and thanks for the question.

1) get a study buddy. find a person with similar academic goals to you even if you don't study the same thing and set a time and a place regularly, were you just go to actually study and hold eachother accountable. my friend and I meet every saturday and go to the library or a study cafe for five hours. we are different majors so we can't really help one another but it's about accountability.

2) habits, routines >> motivation. I am the biggest procrastinator and motivation doesn't work for me. I have created systems that force me to study. Like the study friend or going to a study group meeting, going to the library after class without going home in between cause if I go home I now I'm just going to watch tv and not study at all. you can also try virtual study groups if it's more accessible to you although I've never tried with strangers before.

3) plan everything. plan ahead from the moment you get the syllable as far as you can. organize time for smaller tasks every day or every other day if you can. make the schedule as realistic and as flexible as you can.

4) a little bit every day. textbook readings don't usually get done cause a.our asses are on fire from hw b. they don't have a deadline c. are huge . So break it down in smaller chunks. let's say you have to get through 800 pages. from the stem prospective I try to skim through 10 to 20 pages each time and get the general gist.

5) 5% is better than 0. even if you do nothing but read one page or solve one practice problem a day it's still something.

6) find old exams. if most of your classes have exams in the end and not projects lime mine, try to find as many older exam questions as possible. if the professor is the same they usually have a similar style of exams each year. this way you know what kind of exam you are studying for and can focus on the material that actually matters so you don't get overwhelmed as much.

7) make friends with upperclassmen. they've been already through this and usually have pretty good advice and tricks. I like to bribe them with coffee or food and they'll even give you the work they've done for the class before, this way you get a better understanding of what you have to do for the class. they are also a good motivation or reminder cause they are the proof that you can pass this class.

8) it's going to be ok. school and uni suck sometimes but you can get through it. if it gets too overwhelming academically see if you have the option for a tutor or sth similar and don't be too proud to ask for help, we've all been there.

Hope this helps!!! If anyone has more questions my dms and asks are open!!!

[resinatingbeauty]

Everything You Need To Know About UV Resin

I thought I would make this post because of how much Amazon pesters me to answer questions regarding UV resin and I know many of you were able to learn and benefit from my other craft posts which focused more on epoxy. Today I'm going to cover all the things I have learned using UV resin, which is something I use almost exclusively for many of the items you see in my Etsy shop.

What is UV resin?

UV resins are photochemicals that react to different wavelengths of UV (sunlight) to cure. This allows for a much shorter cure time and longer work time than epoxy resin, as UV resin will not begin to cure / harden until it is exposed to UV light. In the photos above, you can see the two main types/brands of UV resin I typically use for the creation of my projects, Solarez and Limino, both of which can be purchased on Amazon (Solarez has its own website, but shipping is not free though Amazon only has some of their products). While Solarez is known for surfboard creation and repair, boat repair, etc. It is one of the few UV resins that can be used to create larger projects such as these Fairy Garden Jars you see below.

Normally, however, UV resin is used for smaller projects - jewelry, coating, small casts, and the like. It is practically the same chemical combo found in UV nail polish. These chemicals may be triggered to harden using the same UV lamps one would see at a nail salon, though not all UV lamps or torches cover the full spectrum of UV wavelengths as sunlight (more on this later). I rely on UV resin for the creation of my popular rune sets, as they require more detail and time to fully create than the 30-45 minute work time one typically has with epoxy. Below are some examples of items I have in the shop made primarily with UV resin.

UV resins are typically non toxic and are not harmful to the environment when cured or uncured. The resin itself shares similar properties to epoxy but can have a much lower viscosity in general, making it more ideal for casting and coating than doming. UV resin does give off an odor when curing (Solarez is the WORST even when not curing), much more so than epoxy.

Pros & Cons of UV resin

Pros:

No mixing. UV resins are ready to go from the bottle.

Longer work time, shorter cure time. Great for making multiple projects at once or highly detailed, smaller projects. UV resin fully cures in approx 5 mins in full sunlight.

Great for clear casts and adding a glossy finish to any project.

Bonds to metal, wood, plastic, etc. Making it great for quick fixes.

Most are self degassing and self leveling.

Easier to handle. No component mixing means you can't possibly ruin your project from the get go.

Accepts most Inclusions / pigments one would use with epoxy

Waterproof when cured.

Cons:

Expensive. UV resin will average $65+ (for 1000g) USD for the equivalent of a 32oz epoxy combo for $20+. Solarez is on the cheaper side, but harder to work with.

Fickle. UV resin will produce bubbles that don't want to surface, must be used in very thin layers, prone to shrinkage, and cannot cure if using opaque or dense Inclusions or pigments.

Can only be used with clear silicone molds. Plastic molds tend to adhere / melt to UV resin. Solarez may be used with an MEKP catalyst to get around this, but not foolproof.

May only be used for small projects.

Must purchase UV lamp / torch to cure, but some only cure with certain wavelengths or sunlight itself. Can over cure and become brittle or undercure and be tacky.

Even clear but detailed molds may not cure correctly.

So, you may notice there are more cons than there are pros when it comes to UV resin. This is absolutely true- for cost effectiveness alone, unless you are looking to mass produce something or need more potability / work time for your project (as I do), I recommend avoiding UV resin and going with epoxy which will usually even yield better overall results.

If you DO decide to try UV resin or have tried UV resin, you may run into a few problems initially that will cause you to trash projects and become frustrated. Never curing resin is a popular complaint, this next portion of this post is entirely dedicated to troubleshooting UV resin in order to better help you achieve the results you are looking for.

Using & Troubleshooting

There are many different brands of UV Resin available. Save for Solarez, the ones that come in the big or small tubes like the Limino resin shown (I've used brands Miraclekoo, Decoroom, DIY, Let's Resin, Solarez, SooKoo, and Limino) are pretty much the same product selling for around the same price per milligram / fluid oz. They all have about the same viscosity and will generally yield the same results and have the same average cure time.

Note: Solarez is more of a polyester based resin or can be acrylic based depending on which of their products you purchase. It has a very strong odor and is more liquid than these others. It is also fairly cheaper (Almost half the price) and can be purchased in larger quantities. Unfortunately, even though the price tag is enticing, I really don't recommend it. It is very fickle with the UV wavelengths used to cure it. If you are trying to do any indoor project using a UV torch or lamp, you are going to want to even then drop an extra $20-$60 on a multi spectrum UV lamp to cure your project. You will find that you have to intermittently expose the resin to light or it gets an orange peel/puckered texture- sometimes the light will even literally burn right through your project. It can even burn or damage your mold, as Solarez gets very hot when curing even though it is formulated to not get as hot or combust when using UV light to cure, which is something, I guess.

However, Solarez can be used with an MEKP catalyst, allowing you to dual cure it using sunlight / UV light. This allows Solarez to be used with opaque pigments and can be used for larger projects. The catalyst was not initially included with the resin, but the manufacturer began including it for some reason. The ratio is 6 drops of MEKP mixed into 1 fluid ounce of Solarez. 6:1. With the MEKP catalyst, your project will fully cure in 30 mins (using sunlight or UV light to help it along) but it is prone to becoming overheated, still requiring small layers to be cured one at a time to avoid combustion.

If you're going to try UV resin, I recommend trying any of the brands above, save for Solarez. Grab a 50-120g bottle to try and see if you like it. I recommend beginning making something simple like a pendant or earrings using a clear silicone mold or open back bezel. Mica pigments and most alcohol inks will work with UV resin the same way they work with epoxy and UV resin also creates a super clear glossy finish that may be used to gloss and spruce up cured epoxy projects.

So you took the dive and purchased your UV resin? You've got problems? Yea, tell me about it.

•My Project is Super Tacky! What do?

This is common and will vary from product to product, but usually isn't the product. So before you go flaming the foreign manufacturer who doesn't understand you anyway, ask yourself the following and try these methods to solve the inevitable tacky problem:

How long did you cure? The average cure time shown on the bottle is just that, an average. This doesn't mean that your project will cure in five minutes under your UV lamp. Not all UV lamps are made equal. For starters, check the packaging, but most UV resins require your lamp to be 36w+, so write that off immediately. If your lamp is producing less wattage, than it's not going to cure your UV resin. If you're using a lamp that is 36w+ or your UV resin claims to cure under 36w, then take a look at your lamp itself. Most nail salon UV lamps are either table shaped or dome/cave shaped. If you're using a table shaped lamp on a 3D mold / project, the light is unable to penetrate the sides and back of the mold. This style lamp will only work to cure projects in open back bezels or free hand, flat coatings. If using a dome shaped lamp then the majority of the UV light is found at the back of the lamp. If you have your project at the front or sides, it is unable to be fully penetrated by UV light at all angles.

Try turning your project,curing it for a minimum of 5 minutes on each side. Using finger cots, remove your project and let it cure free form. It shouldn't be so tacky that it sticks to your work area at this point, but if it is, then there is only one solution:

Let it cure in actual sunlight for 10-20 minutes, turning it so that every angle sees light. Typically, your UV lamp doesn't offer the same UV light wavelengths as pure sunlight, and you can buy new lamps or torches to test, but sunlight is free.

If your project is still tacky after all these measures, you've tried adding a new layer of clear resin to it and allowing it to cure in sunlight.

If this doesn't work, think about your Inclusions, your glitter, your pigments etc. If your project is nearly opaque, then you'll need to tone it down if you're going to use UV resin.

If NOTHING else, your product may indeed be a dud or became contaminated in some way. Unfortunately, it's not always easy to get in touch with the manufacturer, but if you order your product from Amazon, they'll more than likely allow you to return it.

My project is all bubbly? What do?

Bubbles are always a problem, whether you're using UV resin or epoxy. Little tiny bubbles always form, especially around the edges of the mold or embedded within details in the design. Don't forget, you have infinite work time with UV resin. This means that you have as long as you want to work out the bubbles.

Use a toothpick to pop tiny bubbles at the bottom of the mold or dislodge them to bring to the surface. Be careful though because you don't want to leave little scratches on your mold or puncture it.

Use a torch to pop bubbles on the surface. A grill lighter, regular lighter, or whatever will do the trick. Make sure you hold the flame a good inch or so away from the surface. It will catch fire and your mold possibly will too. Do so carefully! I run the torch across the top layer every time I add something to the resin to remove any bubbles it gives off. This also works for epoxy.

Blow on it. Some people claim the heat of your breath will pop surface bubbles, but I have had no success with this method.

Warm your resin. Stick your UV resin in a plastic bag or something air tight. Allow some water to heat to near boiling on the stove before pouring it over your resin bottle in a bowl or basin. Do not stick your resin in the microwave or oven or anything crazy.

Stir slowly. Stir inclusions like glitter and pigments slowly, scraping the sides and bottom. This will prevent air bubbles kicking up into your mix and oxygen being introduced into your pour.

Try pigments. For some weird reason (most likely due to changes in viscosity), resin projects with pigments, glitter, and the like have less tendency toward bubbling than clear casts.

Are your bubbles huge? This may be because your pouring super thick layers of resin and all sides have not cured properly. Your layers should only be 1mm thickness maximum when using UV resin.

My project has come out warped, not even, has divots , etc.

If you are curing your layers quickly, your project is heating. When you add more resin over top of this hot resin in a hot mold, this will not only cause more bubbles but also lend to shrinkage. Allow your project to cool to room temp and have some downtime between curing. This will also protect your molds that will become damaged from overuse / overheating and cooling.

With Solarez, this is key to having a beautiful project at the end of the day. Even though it is formulated to not overheat if exposed to sunlight, Solarez will get this orange peel like texture on the surface layer if overexposed.

Yes, there is such thing as overcuring as well, and it will make your project brittle and even flakey, but this is normally not the biggest complaint with UV resin.

So why even buy UV resin?

UV resin has its perks. In a pinch, it makes for a clear, glossy finish that will cure / harden quickly in the sun or with a UV lamp that one would be waiting 24-48 hours for with epoxy. It can be used to repair epoxy projects and fill small divots as well as the ability to bond to pretty much anything makes it useful to have around. It is convenient to use due to the fact that you don't have to mix it, it is easy to pour and compatible with most inclusions. It is also ideal for its extended work time as it will not cure until exposed to UV light. This allows you to create highly detailed clear cast jewelry and other projects you wouldn't be able to assemble and detail before epoxy would begin to cure.

I hope this helps everyone who is having trouble with UV resins or those who have considered using UV resin as an alternative to epoxy. If you have any other questions you would like answered or are someone adept with UV resin that would like to share, please do so! Good luck!

~Samantha

Owner/ Designer/Creator blursedbaubles.etsy.com

[kalluralove]

hi again! how are you? it's been awhile :). so, um, question, and i feel like i've asked this already but why do you think lotura is so popular? despite what lotor's VA keeps saying lotor did commit genocide and almost killed allura. why ship allura with a man who 1) withheld the fact that her people were still alive and 2) were killing her people? tbh allura is a trophy to lotor, she doesn't gain anything from the relationship. it just baffles me

I’m good, thanks! And yes, I do believe we’ve covered this topic but maybe it needs a revisit? So how much time do you have, because I’m about to monopolize it ;)

So, first let me say that AJ Locasio is an absolute gem. He’s the quintessential nice guy, and I understand why girls can be drawn to him. He interacts with them on a regular basis and-- despite his acknowledgement of Lotor’s shortcomings-- is still a huge fan of the character. That’s typical for any actor, be their character the hero or the villain.

But that’s not the end of it. The obsession of giving Allura to him (that’s what it is in a nutshell, there is no two-way street here) has become one of the biggest problems within the fandom. Let’s take a look at why.

1) Allura is a shield for him. He needs her to do things he can’t on his own. For ten-thousand years he’s been looking for a way to solve a problem that was solely the Galra’s. His idea of creating peace balanced on the ability to give them unlimited amounts of what they were killing people for. This requires Allura’s help; without it he can’t complete his work. His “love” for her is simply a need to complete his mother’s work. 

We’ve discussed race before in this scenario. Black women are traditionally used as a means to an end, rarely given their own story for their own sake. Voltron was her father’s legacy, therefore the story should revolve around her mission to protect the universe with it. Instead it was somehow turned into a way to explain Lotor’s evil intention. This is 100% NOT COOL. The showrunners didn’t need to give us a reason, they just needed to give the heroes a nemesis.

2) He’s a master manipulator. He tells Allura how attached he became to a planet he’d been left to run, and how devastated he was when his father killed them all. But that doesn’t jive with what he does to the Alteans. We see scenes of him interacting with them, so much so that they build a statue dedicated to him. They trust him when he separates families, cutting them off from one another permanently. 

Fans will argue that he saved some of them. Did he though? Or did he just keep ones around who didn’t fit the bill, hoping they might produce new generations who could? That’s why Romelle was the only one of her family who survived, she was more useful as a worker. Her death would have gained him nothing. One only has to look back to the mid-20th century to see how that mindset is royally fucked up.

3) Lotor didn’t do it. Or, at least that’s what his rabid fans want to believe. They insist it was Haggar, which is obviously untrue. The fact that Bandor escaped and returned to warn his sister is proof. He outed Lotor. When Lotor and his men came upon Bandor’s lifeless body, the wayward Prince instructed them to get rid of the evidence. An innocent man would have tried to save the young boy, or at the very least tried to look for answers to his demise.

4) The #metoo movement should hate this guy. Much is said about so called “nice guys” who turn on a dime when the woman spurns them (SN: just watched an awesome Netflix series that touches on this) and lashes out at her. Strangely enough, however, they cheer Lotor on. Somehow he’s excluded from their cancel culture. They point out his sad childhood and say he should have been redeemed because of it. 

I, however, like to point out they should have left his past on the drawing board. Allura’s story is the tragic one and deserved much more screentime. These days it’s all about the why, but what do we do with that information? Do we forgive dictators and death dealers because they had abusive parents? No, we don’t. Lotor is no exclusion here. 

Instead let’s talk about how Allura is able to live a positive life despite her tragic history. Her father was murdered by Zarkon. She was frozen and woke up to having lost her entire planet and its people. She was young, inexperienced, and afraid, yet never made it about herself. Her story is the one we should have insisted on in Season 8, instead of trying to restore Lotor to some glory that didn’t belong to him.

*****************************************************************************************

I could go on but I’ll just leave it at this: The fandom has taken on a moniker for Lotor that is telling in itself.

LORD OF THE ONION RINGS

Fitting, because despite it’s thin outer layer and multiple layers, it’s still just an onion in the end. Nothing surprising, nothing special, but best when fried.

And that brings me back to Allura. Why do they want her with him? Because that’s what he wants, nothing more. They don’t give two shits about her. She gets in the way of their boy-love ships after all, and her skin tone is too dark for her to be a proper love interest. That’s why, prior to Lotor’s appearance, she was tossed aside as a girlfriend for Shay (in the name of gay rep, no less) or as a strong woman who doesn’t need a man (again, see: racism). 

Everything Lotor did to Allura, to her people, is written off and excused by parts of the fandom. These are the same “fans” who misconstrue characters to the point they don’t even look like themselves. They don’t understand that loving a character means loving them as is, not as they headcanon them to be. Allura is indeed a strong woman, but she also deserves to be loved and cared for properly. If the L/oturas don’t want to give that to her then they only want happiness for half of their ship, and that’s just sad.

Honestly I could go on all day, but I have stuff to do and have to cut this short. Hope I covered it well enough for you, but please let me know if there’s something I missed!

[aboleth-eye]

Hello! Would you have any advice for new DMs/things you wish you had been told when you started DMing? I'd like to try it myself, but I've only ever been a player, and just figuring out where to start is a bit overwhelming! Thank you in advance!

Great Question!  Here are my Lessons Learned from when I ran a game for the first time!  

There are Four Lessons I wish I’d known when I got started:  Have Your Resources Handy, Start Small (3 Parts), Things Go Awry, and Have Fun Together!   ((This is going to be a very long post, so I’ll cap it a little less than halfway down))

1.)  Have Your Resources Handy!

If this is your first time running a Tabletop RPG system, even if you’ve been playing for years, HAVE THE BOOK(S), WEBSITE(S) AND/OR PDF(S) NEARBY!  I’m serious about this, guys!  Playing a game or watching someone else play is a totally different monster to running it!  

When you first declare to the group that you’d like to host a game, I recommend you read the rules over at least two or three times before hand–start with a deep read first to get it all in your head, and then you can choose to speed read once you’ve had some time to digest the rules.  

But even if reading ttrpgs is your thing, have the resources within easy reach.  Either have your laptop available with open tabs to any pdfs/scans of the game source material and any relevant websites (like standard reference document pages), and/or have a physical copy of the game book with you.  If you are running certain monsters or encounters, I also recommend you copy down any stats and information to a separate text document (on laptop or printed) so you won’t have to page through stuff during the game.

2A.) Start Small: The Setting

If this is your first time or fiftieth time running a tabletop roleplaying game, and you are running a new system for the first time, limit the scope of project to start.  Writing campaign and world settings can be very intense, and it is very easy to write something too specific and railroad people into your lore and world.

For instance, don’t create a massive world with a continent of named cities and landmarks!  Don’t plan out every inch of your world, or else it’ll turn into a “fill-in-the-blank exploration” story instead of an organic world you can change as your group learns and grows!

My first campaign started in a very specifically written city on the edge of a vast magical desert.  I planned out a timetable of events that would catapult the players into the “open-world”.  The players noticed this and didn’t appreciate it. 

Also, do not bog your players down with Lore!  I’ve gone into campaigns where you need to know information “for backstory”!  This is your first campaign, it’s good to know what to introduce and when!  A group of starting adventurers typically doesn’t need to know your world’s entire array of deities, pages and pages of history, and legends “that shaped the world”!  You can introduce these things at character creation IF THE PLAYERS ASK, and then slowly dish things out as the characters live in your world.

It’s also good to not ties yourself down to specific placement of towns, countries, cities, landmarks, etc.  Leave the map blank save for the starting area, and any broadly defined areas such as forests and mountains.  Once characters finish their first missions and adventures, they’ll explore!  With all the “white space” of your world, you can insert places and things as you journey with the group!  

One of my favorite encounters when I was very new to D&D was when we accidentally burned down a forest.  We were fighting a massive tiger with a pixie NPC in a forest, and the pixie just trapped everyone (tiger included) in entangling vines.  Our pyromancer in the party tried to set the beast on fire, and they rolled a critical failure.  

The beast was set on fire and died!  And so did the pixie!  And now there’s a raging forest fire we have to run from!  We get an oxcart running and we take shifts to outrun the magical fire–FOR THREE DAYS!  It was an incredibly tense situation, and it was fun to add “an entire forest” to the pyromancer player’s list of things they set on fire.

You know what would have made all that suck?  If the DM had decided: “Okay, you pass through this location which is a lich’s hideout and have to face that; then the next day you’ll have to ford a river with the tired oxes.  Finally, you’ll be passing through this county’s border…”  

We just burned down a placeholder  forest, and all the consequences that came with it came AFTER we were finally safe!  The DM didn’t bog us down with heavy lore and their maps during a tense situation; they kept the focus on the action at hand.

Prioritize the players’ story before your own!  That’s the lesson I want to make absolutely clear.  You aren’t telling your story with friends as the characters; the Dungeon Master/Game Master/Storyteller is the worldbuilder who tells the character groups’ story as they interact with the world.

2B) Start Small: The First Encounters

Another item I want to bring up is Do Not Start Your Campaign with a “Unique Encounter”!  Start your campaign setting with a simple task for the players to face.  Here are the kinds of challenges I mean: defeat a bunch of zombies in a graveyard for a reward, go into a mine full of bats to retrieve a homing beacon, follow a simple mystery to find a girl’s lost dog, etc.  The Players�� should be introduced to your world with something simple to follow–that way they can make their marks and introduce how they roleplay to the story.  

Do Not try something you’ve “never seen before”!  Don’t have the characters whisked off to another plane or world while they slept!  Don’t have the players face fifteen or so mooks at once during an ambush!  Don’t have your characters struggle to tread water or leap floating platforms while fighting a monster!  These kinds of encounters instantly put players on guard and feel railroaded!  Give them the chance to decide how they integrate themselves into the adventure.

My first campaign violated this rule.  When the players left the city to enter the desert, they were suddenly beset by 12 monstrous scorpions!  And me, in my ambitious tunnel-vision, thought it’d be interesting to have each scorpion have its own turn.  I rolled twelve Initiatives for the scorpions and it was a LONG combat when it clearly didn’t have to be.  

It all looked so good in my head, but when you get players involved you can tell how grueling and boring something like that could be.  I learned a lot that session.

That combat ended the campaign for me.  I decided to go back to the drawing board because that kind of thinking was not going to fly for me and my friends.

Instead, give your players a task that could easily be solved in one or two sessions!  Do not give your players “only one way” to solve this!  For instance, if your first challenge is to get past some guards, let the players come up with the solution themselves.  They might decide to fight the guards, use magic/science to teleport past them, go off on a side quest to become guards so they can infiltrate them, or even walk up and attempt to socialize with them.  You as the storyteller/DM merely narrate the results of whatever the characters do; just bridge the gaps and think of consequences from the players’ actions.

ALSO!  Have a time limit for your first session, or plan breaks for food/drink/stretching.  This activity of DMing can be very stressful, and you might need a break to take stock of what problems and choices occurred during play.  

2C.) Start Small: The Players

Have your players build starting or low-level characters (I typically start with 3rd level for D&D).  The low levels will mean most powergaming and gamebreaking attempts by certain types of players will be nipped in the bud right from the start.  It will also typically limit the powers and abilities of your group (so you won’t have to memorize or look up high-level stuff until much later).  

Another thing I highly recommend is that you are present during character creation!  Do not let people determine/roll character abilities and stats without you.  Either be physically present when dice get rolled and abilities get determined, or be present digitally in a chatroom, discord or roll20 when electronic character sheets get filled in!  

My first campaign I allowed one of the players to bring a character from a friend’s campaign into it.  The original DM ended the campaign; and even though I had played in that campaign alongside this character I had no clue what they could do.  This made things challenging because this character “suddenly” remembered they could fly–so I had to add aerial combat onto my plate during the first fight of the campaign.

It made the situation tense, especially with my bad early encounters (see the 12 Scorpions combat above).

3.) Things Go Awry

If you’ve come this far, there’s one last piece of advice I want to give you.  Your first campaign is gonna suck in one way or another.

I don’t mean that to be disheartening; I want you to think of it as a learning experience.  Whenever a person learns a new skill or engages in a new activity for the first time, it’s always gonna suck.  (Even if someone has a “natural talent”).  You as the DM/Storyteller are going to notice problems crop up left and right; especially if you don’t take the advice I offered above.  For instance, if you start learning to paint with a new medium or start a sport you’ve never tried; you need to practice with the tools and techniques you’ve prepared to see what works for your style of learning.  

Running a roleplaying game is a very unique mashup of activities.  There’s typically a math element you need to consider behind every action the players take.  You need to workout your improvisation skills to bridge connections and gaps your players make.  You need to get in front of a group of people (sometimes more or less experienced than you) and tell a story that keeps their attention.  It’s a stressful mix of being an improv actor, a storyteller and the physical laws of your world.

Hopefully your players will understand when things get crazy and overwhelming.  Gametime might come to a halt because you need to look up a specific rule or wording that you aren’t familiar with.  It’s okay.  Until you get to know how your game world runs with your players in it, it is totally fine to take a breath and think things through.  Oftentimes you can ask your players for help in making a determination or house-ruling.

Last note on this topic: Get Feedback!  At the end of the session, be bold and ask your players if they enjoyed the session, what they liked and what they didn’t like.  Feedback is how DMs get insight on how the game is playing out.  While you’re DMing, your mind is on a million different topics; let the players tell you how they felt during gameplay, so you know what made them feel good or bad on the other side of the curtain.

4.) Have Fun Together!

This is something that needs to be said, if I’m honest.  Running a game can be a stressful activity that “ruins” some things about it now that you are “behind the curtain”.  This is your first session, in what you hope to be a series of games where you and your friends make all sorts of memories.

However, some DMs get incredibly discouraged and no-nonsense when they run a game for their first few times.  That is understandable, especially if being the “mastermind” is a challenge you haven’t prepared for.  A few sessions in and you might find the game isn’t fun for you and/or your players.  That might be a sign that you need to take a break from hosting–use that time to think how you can make the game fun for everyone, or if this campaign just needs to be scrapped!

The priority of the DM is to bring people together.  If a game system, campaign concept or player actions aren’t making the group (you included) happy; it’s better to stop things and take stock before things go too far.  It is never fun to admit your game isn’t viable or enjoyable, but hopefully you’ll have new experience you can take with you the next time you try your game.  

And heck, if you find you prefer playing at this time, that’s fine!  Even if this attempt didn’t have the results you expected, there is nothing to stop you from trying again later if you wanted.  But now that you know how it is behind the curtain, you are naturally more observant to how your own DM/GM runs their games and you can learn from it.

Remember how good the game system/lore/etc made you feel!  It’s why you wanted to DM in the first place; you recognized you had a story you wanted to tell, and this ttrpg had the tools to bring it to life!  No matter what problems arise when you’re behind the curtain, the game should still bring you enjoyment whether you play or manage the game.  Do not give up on the game just because of one bad session or two!  

When I decided to end my campaign, it really was a painful decision.  I loved the world as it was in my mind, but I was not executing it well so that my players enjoyed it.  I got feedback after that terrible 12 Scorpions combat, and decided to take some time to think about everything.  Our group went back to our original DM, with other members trying to DM in that time; and honestly I didn’t DM until I started a small separate group months later.  

During that gap in DMing I digested what I liked and didn’t like about my campaign, and had more time to reflect on the rules.  I decided to take a few steps back and learn from my mistakes.  I still made mistakes the second and third times I DMed, I make mistakes even to this day.  

But at the heart of it all, I love games so much that I want to constantly make my stories and worlds even better, even to this day.

I take the struggles of DMing as learning experiences, rather than let them define me as a writer, storyteller and game master.  I use them as stepping stones so I don’t fall through the gaps again.  I may have started out with a bad first campaign, but I would never take those mistakes away.  

I hope these lessons were helpful!  I love D&D and tabletop roleplaying games so much, and love giving out advice on how to make the experience your own.  I hope this helps a lot of new people bring their stories to life!  Also, I hope I helped everyone’s expectations into the right state of mind.  

Good luck and happy gaming everyone!!  Much love!

– Aboleth-Eye

[eyecicles]

idk if you want to answer this but I've come across a theory several times now and I'd like to know your opinion: B creates 'Ryuzaki'. L adopts some of B's 'Ryuzaki' traits. L is still naturally quirky but he amplifies his weirdness. Thoughts?

Short answer: No

Long answer:

The biggest problem with theories like that, is that “Another Note” and “Death Note” were written by different people and I don’t think at all that AN is anywhere near the level of canon the manga is. This is actually a good thing, because otherwise we would have a lot of annoying contradictions (AN is filled with them already, lol) and I’d rather not have that.

So I could make this relatively short and point to what we have in the manga about the LABB case, which is this scene:

A case L hardly even remembers, since he has to google Naomi first, even though it was only one and a half years ago.

I tend to not believe that we’re supposed to read a book - not written by Obha/Obata - about a case L probably doesn’t even care about, to understand why L is so “eccentric” or “more eccentric than he naturally was even though he still is a bit weird”.

Not to mention that AN!L isn’t exactly like manga!L to begin with. If we don’t even consult HTR13, B isn’t canon at all. He’s briefly mentioned in the HTR13 as someone who “challenges L, a man he admires” (l o l). In the manga, there’s only a “perpetrator” of the “Los Angeles BB Serial Murder Case”.

The manga doesn’t offer an explanation to why L is the way he is and, really, do we even need one? A lot of characters use codenames, a lot of characters have strong personalities, Mello and Near are just as “quirky”, so why should L’s personality need an explanation when no one’s else does? The manga doesn’t ask why L is “weird” while “Another Note” asks us all kind of questions about who’s “Ryuzaki”. Chances are, the answer is not one to a question the manga doesn’t ask. We, as the readers, made that an issue and maybe there’s nothing to solve. Seriously, I think that’s a perspective not enough people think about.

I do, however, believe that everyone can decide on their own how seriously they take “Another Note”. So let’s talk about the novel:

The theory doesn’t work without first!L (except if you want the most vague concept of “L” possible, maybe). And, uh, I don’t want to kill anyone’s mood but *whispers* he doesn’t exist. In HTR13 Ohba and Obata famously talk about the changes in L’s design, but ok, you don’t have to take HTR13 seriously either, if you really don’t want to. We can all just look at the actual story in the manga and wonder why L’s face, shoulders, neck, and hair suddenly look different even before he decided to show his face to the task force. Why not.

Anyway, let’s pretend for a moment that first!L does exist, despite everyting pointing towards the opposite direction; what does first!L do?

Well…… He’s barefoot, crouching on the floor, wearing jeans and a simple shirt… Oh wait! That’s mostly stuff B does, as Ryuzaki, too. Did B, by change, create a persona that closely resembles first!L?!

Or does B already know a thing or two about L? “Another Note” is weird and dumb and confusing and tells us that B has never met L (which doesn’t bother me that much, considering how shit B’s L impression is, haha), but let’s look at this quote:

“If L’s a genius then B’s an extreme genius. If L’s a freak, then B’s an extreme freak. Now it’s time to get ready. There are things I must do before B can surpass L. Henh henh henh henh.”

B thinks L is a freak (”a genius and a freak” makes it clear that his freakishness is something seperate from his brilliance as a detective). Why? Because he knows that he’s weird. Somehow. Even if he didn’t met him. And this simultaneously tells us why B’s impersonation of L is so shite and totally over-the-top: B wants to be the extreme freak. B wants to surpass L’s level of brilliance and weirdness (don’t ask me why). L doesn’t soften B’s quirks, B amplifies L’s.

And I know people who believe in the Ryuzaki Persona theory tried to discredit this quote:

There was something about him that reminded her of Rue Ryuzaki—of Beyond Birthday. But the resemblance was backward, like this was the original, and the other had been a copy.

But, uh, I, for one, think it’s pretty straightforward. There’s nothing vague about it in my opinion, and I’m convinced it isn’t some secret brain twister. By now, we’re supposed to already know that Ryuzaki isn’t actually L. We’re at the end of the novel and Mello (who met L in person) tells us through Naomi what happened. It would be completely redundant to tell us that “B imitated L” even more obviously. (By the way, L has never seen B as Ryuzaki and Naomi doesn’t even describe him to L - she only tells L vaguely that he’s “weird”, which seems to upset L.)

Thankfully, we have another quote like the one above (this time directly from Mello):

I need hardly explain again that the murders themselves were not his purpose. So what was he doing? Again, I hardly need to explain—he was challenging the man he copied, the century’s greatest detective, L.

“Copying” implies more than just challenging someone in a detective war. “Copying” doesn’t mean that B wants to become L - he doesn’t - and it doesn’t mean that he’s “copying” his investigative methods, because, again, he actually doesn’t.

But okay, cool, let’s pretend B copied L and then L copied some of the quirks B added (?). Which ones? His love for sweets? His bad posture?

A burden so great it would leave you hunched over. A bitter taste in your mouth that would leave you longing for sweets.

That’s how Mello describes L.

The dark circles under his eyes?

There were lines under his (L’s) eyes so dark she wondered if they were actually done with makeup. Like he hadn’t slept in days—or like he had never slept in his life. Like his sense of justice would not allow him time to sleep, since he had so many difficult cases to think about, battling unfathomable pressure on a daily basis.

Again, Mello - via Naomi - disagrees. Mello has some weird theories indeed, but since the novel paints L as waaay more sympathetic than the manga does anyway, I’m pretty sure we’re meant to believe him here. (Not to mention that the manga tells us very clearly that L has some weird sleeping habits.)

By the way, I’ve seen this line -:

There were lines under his eyes so dark she wondered if they were actually done with makeup.

- quoted out of context, which is pretty dishonest. The novel goes on to explain us why L looks like that and even very clearly contrasts it to B:

Still grinning to himself, he (B) faced the mirror, brushed his hair, and began applying his makeup.

He probably sleeps pretty sound at night. Another interesting B & L contrast:

Apparently he (B) was capable of consuming non-sweet things too.

Yes, unlike L. B is willing to break his act then and now, L is canonically very uncompromising .

And B also picked the name “Rue Ryuzaki” specifically to fit his entire L masquerade:

B approached Naomi Misora, calling himself Rue Ryuzaki. Rue Ryuzaki– L.L. For anyone from Wammy’s House, there could be no higher goal than identifying yourself with that letter—andBeyond Birthday seized this case as his chance.

Everything about “Ryuzaki” is about L.

You know, I’ve talked about this before, but beside the fact that L’s quirks are added gradually - and not with a BANG! for the task force or whatever - L’s crouch, L’s posture, L eating and drinking lots of sugary stuff, L biting his fingers, L having dark circles under this eyes - all of that is heavily connected to L’s emotions, thoughts, and general personality in the manga. Stress, feeling depressed, fear, even joy; all of that makes L intensify his crouch, makes him bite his nails, makes him show some weird facial expressions, or eat some more cake. Not the other way around, like, y’know, you would expect from someone who puts on an act.

All the nice little details about L’s character tell us so much about him. Obha and Obata beautifully use them to give us some hints about his psyche, and taking that away from L makes him incredibly hollow. While B’s “Ryuzaki” act is alllll about his L obsession. If you take that away from B, he becomes hollow as well.

Yes, L utilises his quirks to confuse people and he’s a liar, but that’s got nothing to do with B.

Conclusion: B is obsessed with L. L doesn’t seem to care all that much about B. He contributes very little to the case (it would be fair to say that Naomi solves the case), the manga implies that he doesn’t even really remember it, first!L is not real, and I’m tired.

[unbidden-pleonasm]

Math we don't learn

I've been math-ing for almost my whole life now. As my identity as a math/science person solidified, people found it somewhat shocking that I wasn't always a big fan of math in my childhood—thought it's even more astonishing to me how things took a big turn for me to be pursuing a career in mathematics and statistics. In middle school, I would constantly pester my mom and a lot of teachers asking why I needed to learn math and why it is so important. They never gave me a straightforward answer, and justifiably so, because it's one of those things you only come to realize as you accumulate knowledge.

Likewise, there are things in math that they keep you in the dark, just telling you to "do it" because those things would only make learning more confusing. In the United States, the concept of limit is taught either in high school if you take Calculus AP or in college at the very beginning of a calculus course. But most students have already learned the concept of limits before they even enter high school when they learn repeated decimals (varies by state but ~8,9th grade). It is also admittedly one of the things that confuse them: "What? 0.999999999... is equal to 1? Not close to 1?" Most of us bury this curiosity in our hearts and carry it into college, never to be answered properly.

The reason why this simple question of why 0.9999... is identical to one is because it's more a philosophical and historical topic than mathematical. How can 0.9 with 9 being the repetend, seemingly endlessly getting closer to 1, ever touch 1? In search of an answer, we must go back to Ancient Greece.

Zeno of Elea was a Greek philosopher that presented many philosophical and mathematical paradoxes that bear relevance to date. One of Zeno's paradoxes concerns an arrow flying to a target. According to Zeno's logic, a flying arrow can never hit the target because it must always pass the midpoint between the arrow's location and the target's. Repeat this infinitely many times, the arrow will be always passing infinitely many midpoints, but never the target. Just like 0.999999 can only get infinitely closer than before to 1 but never reach it.

This paradox actually lingered through the Enlightenment and took mathematicians hundreds of years to resolve it. The concept of limit in Zeno's paradox is what we now call potential infinity, as opposed to actual infinity. No high schooler ever breaks out of potential infinity unless one takes real analysis in college. This is not really a problem until you're tasked with making small tweaks to mathematics, not realizing the smallest of changes can still break everything. Doing mathematics is vastly different from making mathematics.

At the end of the day, Zeno's paradox cannot be resolved without accepting the axiom of infinity. In other words, there is no formal way to create or construct the concept of (actual) infinity as a mathematical object without just accepting that it is given as an object. As anticlimactic as it may seem, realizing a problem cannot be solved without adding or modifying an assumption takes an awful lot of time. Take quantum physics for instance. Physicists had tried so hard to understand the structure of an atom within the framework of Newtonian mechanics. The problem was they only logical conclusion they could derive from the framework was that such atomic structures will inevitably break down instantaneously, contrary to reality (e.g., our bodies don't dissolve instantaneously).

The controversy over how to comprehend infinity led many mathematicians like Cantor to go mad. Cantor committed suicide. Perhaps, schools are keeping insanity-inducing knowledge at bay after all.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

I'VE BEEN PONDERING ADVANTAGE

Today a lot of people who get rich by creating wealth, which is the satisfaction of people's desires. Another possibility would be to let that opportunity slip. Hence a vicious for the losers cycle: VC firms that have been doing badly will only get the deals the bigger fish have rejected, causing them to continue to do so but be content to work for a long time. One of the most powerful forces in history. In other words, you get anything, but this is the Bambi version; in simplifying the picture, I've also made everyone nicer. When I heard about after the Slashdot article was Bill Yerazunis' CRM114.1 Bulgaria, we could all probably move on to working on something so new that no one else has done before. What's a startup to do? I now believe, is like a pass/fail course for the founders, because they were living in the future.

Plans are just another word for ideas on the shelf. Which is not to run unnecessary utilities that people might use to break into this group.2 Also they find they now worry obsessively about the status of their server.3 A third and quite significant advantage of angel rounds is that they're too much influenced by recipes for wisdom. Computers are so cheap now that you can. Web-based software they are going to get bought for 30, you only have to compete with other local barbers. Things are very different in the early days of microcomputers.

Who made the wealth it represents? Large-scale investors care about their portfolio, not any individual company. In a traditional series A round they often don't. It would be like being an actor or a novelist.4 Actors do. But they usually let the initial meetings stretch out over a couple weeks.5 As one VC told me: If you were talking to four VCs, told three of them that you accepted a term sheet, ask how many of their last 10 term sheets turned into deals.6 Which for founders will result in the perfect combination: funding rounds that close fast, with high valuations.7

During the panel, Guy Steele also made this point, with the idea of versions just doesn't naturally fit onto Web-based applications, everything you associate with startups is taken to an extreme with Web-based applications. It had the same probability,. It's just not reasonable to expect startups to pick an optimal round size in advance, because that means your growth rate is decreasing. There are three main disadvantages: you mix together your business and personal life; they will probably not be as well connected as the big-name VC firm will not screw you too outrageously, because other founders would avoid them if word got out.8 Because of Y Combinator's position at the extreme end of the scale of the successes in the startup world, closing is not what deals do. But more than half the agreed upon price.9 When you can reproduce errors and release changes instantly, you can manufacture them by taking any project usually done by multiple people and trying to do things that might look bad. And software that's released in a series of small changes.

C is pretty low-level, but it looks like they're merely floating downstream. But what if your manager was hit by a bus?10 In the past, but users won't hear about them anymore. The most naive version of which is the prudent choice. If you're already profitable, on however small a scale, it costs nothing to fix.11 Since demo day occurs after 10 weeks, the company is default alive or default dead may save you from the building burning down. But by the time most people hear about it. Half the founders I talk to a startup.

With respect to the continuance of friendships. It would be nice to be able to find statistical differences between these and my real mail.12 Who would rely on such a test? He got a 4x liquidation preference. In a company founded by two people, 10% of the total or $10,000, whichever is greater. I asked him if he could get all the attention, when hardly any of them can succeed is if they all do. Before Durer tried making engravings, no one would have any doubt that the fan was causing the noise.

And once you've written the software, our Web server, using the state of your brain at that time.13 If server-based software will make new languages fashionable again. As word spreads that startups work, the number may grow to a point that would now seem surprising. Tokens that occur within the To, From, Subject, and Return-Path lines, or within urls, get marked accordingly.14 Another way to fund a startup is like being an administrator.15 And so you didn't get a lot of what looks like work. Except you judge intelligence at its best and character at its worst.16 The most obvious advantage of not needing money is that you can get at least someone to pay you significant amounts, the money is there, waiting to be invested. The advantage of raising money from them. And yet the trend in nearly everything written about the subject is to do the opposite: to squash together all the aspects of it that are most measurable.

In the long term. So if you want to isolate from your developers as much as a checkout clerk because he is one more user helping to make your software very efficient you can undersell competitors and still make a profit. Technology gives the best programmers of any public technology company. One thing we'll need is support for the new way that server-based.17 As long as VCs were writing checks, founders were never forced to explore the limits of the markets it serves. And that doesn't seem a wise move. A company that grows at 1% a week will in 4 years be making $25 million a month.18 In fact, I'd say investors are the most common type, so being good at solving those is key in achieving a high average may help support high peaks. VCs obviously don't need to: it lets them choose their growth rate. But at the moment when successful startups get money from more than one of the big dogs will notice and take it away. Now the group is looking for more investors, if only to get this one to act.19 For many, the only thing that mattered, and you are very happy because your $50,000 into at a valuation of a million can't take $6 million from VCs at that valuation.

Notes

Prose lets you be more likely to be self-interest explains much of the businesses they work for startups overall. The liking you have good net growth till you run through all the time I did the section of the magazine they'd accepted it for had disappeared. And that is not the shape that matters financially for investors.

I made because the arrival of desktop publishing, given people the shareholders instead of crawling back repentant at the outset which founders will do worse in the sophomore year.

But you can ignore.

Several people have historically been so many people work with me there. Thought experiment: If doctors did the same gestures but without using them to stay in a place to exchange views. Delicious, but in practice that doesn't have users.

But what they're selling and how unbelievably annoying it is not whether it's good enough at obscuring tokens for this at YC. But on the critical question is only half a religious one; there is a bit dishonest, incidentally, because it aggregates data from crashed hard disks. Different kinds of startups is that the VCs I encountered when we created pets.

It doesn't take a long time by sufficiently large numbers of users to recruit manually—is probably 99% cooperation.

If you're good you'll have to assume the worst. Particularly since many causes of the fake. Charles Darwin was 22 when he received an invitation to travel aboard the HMS Beagle as a type II startups won't get you type I startups. Basically, the most common recipe but not in 1950.

One thing that drives most people come to writing essays is to the minimum you need to be doctors? Later you can play it safe by excluding VC firms expect to make money from the 1940s or 50s instead of just Japanese.

And what people actually paid. But knowledge overlaps with wisdom and probably also intelligence. A more powerful, because sometimes artists unconsciously use tricks by imitating art that does.

It's not the original text would in itself be evidence of a company they'd pay a premium for you, what that means having type II startups won't get you a termsheet, particularly if a company, but the problems you have to want to create a silicon valley out of the proposal. Photo by Alex Lewin. But it is to write in a large organization that often creates a situation where they are.

But his world record only lasted 46 days. Statistical Spam Filter Works for Me.

There is always 15 weeks behind the doors that say authorized personnel only. The reason the US is partly a reaction to drugs. Steven Hauser. Needless to say whether the 25 people have seen, so we should, because it was briefly in Britain in the sense that if you needed to read this to be more like Silicon Valley is no different from technology companies between them.

Well, almost.

At two years, it is more of a heuristic for detecting whether you can talk about the Airbnbs during YC. I may try allowing up to two of the next three years, but conversations with other people's. If only one founder is always raising money, then work on open-source but seems to have to do work you love: a to make that leap.

The First Industrial Revolution, Cambridge University Press, 1996. The markets seem to be at the outset which founders will do worse in the 1990s, and that the feature was useless, but the meretriciousness of the Dead was shot there.

Whereas many of the former, and the first philosophers including Confucius and Socrates resemble their actual opinions.

Maybe what you can hire unskilled people to endure hardships, but it seems a bit.

According to Zagat's there are already names for this is the ability of big companies to say they prefer great markets to great people to bust their asses.

It's a strange feeling of being Turing equivalent, but there are no misunderstandings.

Thanks to Eric Raymond, Marc Andreessen, Ed Dumbill, Chris Anderson, Sam Altman, Robert Morris, and Mike Arrington for the lulz.

[plotlinehotline]

I know its highly recommended against, nut my main character does end up dying, and I've written it to be as peaceful and closing as possible, but people still say to never do this.

The Thing About Writing Rules

I will talk a bit about character deaths later in the post, but anon framed this question in too perfect a way to pass up. I think many writers, new or experienced, will admit that writing advice can be quite subjective. Where we start to doubt ourselves is when we see the same advice given from many different people and many different sources, and we start seeing that once subjective bit of advice as a “rule.” If everyone’s saying it’s a bad idea, it’s probably a bad idea. 

But there’s something about these supposed rules of writing that many people forget. Reasons.

When I’m at work at the library, I am asked many times by people to remove overdue fines from their account. As much as I’d like to remove all the fines as a gesture of kindness for people, we impose overdue fines for a reason. We want people to have an added incentive to bring items back, so other people can enjoy them. So when it comes to removing fines, I’m more likely to do it for someone who is always on time with their books, and simply had one extenuating circumstance that delayed them, rather than someone who is regularly late and expects us to cut them a break every single time. Our goal is to get books back in a timely manner, and constantly cutting fines for someone that is routinely late sends the message that we don’t take fines seriously, and they’ll return their books “whenever they feel like it.” 

My point here is that we have a reason for the rule, and my understanding of the reason allows me to make the best decisions about when to break the rules. So if you’re considering doing something in your story that everyone says not to do, take the time to understand the reasons why people say not to do it. 

Why You Shouldn’t Kill Off Your Protagonist 

So let’s talk a little bit about why people say you shouldn’t do this. Because then we’ll be armed with enough knowledge to break that rule effectively. 

One reason is point of view. If you have a first person narrator, killing them off creates a bit of awkwardness with your point of view. You’ve spent the entire novel telling the story from that character’s perspective, so essentially, once they’re gone, the story ends. Abruptly. Which could be a problem if I have many other plot and character arcs to give a satisfying conclusion to. So with this reason I’ve described, let’s see if we can break this rule. 

Maybe my first person narrator is not the only first person narrator. Maybe I’m switching between two characters, and therefore choose to the write the death of this character through the other character’s eyes. With this other character, I’m able to write their death with some distance, and I’m able to continue the story after the death, in order to tie up any loose ends I may have left hanging. 

Maybe there’s nothing left to resolve following the character’s death. Perhaps my narrator succumbs to battle wounds following the ultimate climax. Maybe the bad guy is dead, and any plot lines from other characters have been effectively wrapped up either before the climax or directly following (before our MC dies). Perhaps our MC’s goals have been adequately addressed, whether they achieved their goals or have accepted that they won’t (because they’re about to die). If the only possible aftermath of the story is typical grief from other characters involved, it might be okay to break the rule. 

THE CAVEAT: Don’t try to compare deaths in fiction to deaths in reality. Yes, in reality, you don’t always get to make amends with old friends you’ve quarreled with, and you don’t always get the chance to accept your successes or failures in life. And sadly, sometimes you don’t even see it coming. But these are tragedies that readers can’t always handle, and you run the risk of losing people if you don’t take the time to properly conclude the story and all its conflicts. Imagine you wrote about two best friends who had a huge fight before your MC died. If you don’t resolve that tension between them before you kill the character off, then you’ve left a major character conflict on the table, and unless you continue the story to show the best friend’s atypical grief (which I don’t recommend unless your story’s main conflict was also left unresolved), a reader will feel unsatisfied. And unsatisfying endings often result in books being thrown across the room. 

TO THE ANON: You said you’ve written it as “peaceful and closing as possible.” In my mind, you’ve attempted to address everything I’ve discussed here. So these reasons for not killing a protagonist are irrelevant to you. You’ve done your due diligence. 

Another reason is its role in the story. Writers often use character deaths as solutions to external problems. What I mean by external problems are problems that are happening outside of your story - things like writer’s block, being bored with your story, having no idea how to end it, wanting to surprise readers or elicit emotion from them. The prime example of an internal problem would be a detail of your story mythology that makes death unavoidable. “How do we defeat Voldemort? Destroy all his Horcruxes. Harry is a horcrux? Harry must die.” Harry’s death is a solution to an internal story problem, so this is an instance where it works. So with this reason I’ve described to avoid character death, let’s see if we can break this rule. 

Maybe an external problem becomes an internal one. It’s possible you did get bored with your story, or that you’ve always wanted to write a powerful death scene that will bring readers to tears. It’s okay to use character deaths for these reasons, so long as you create internal reasons as well. If you’re writing your story’s climax, and you decide to kill off the main character to shock the readers, make sure you are going back through your entire story and effectively foreshadowing to this death, and giving it a role in your story. What will this character’s death solve? Will it result in the end of the antagonist? Will it have significance in other character relationships, or serve some personal destiny for them? It may have started as shock value, but you can’t let it end there. Sometimes when you force yourself to go back and work the death into the story, you’re forced to evaluate if it’s worth it to you to do that extra work, and you’re able to make the best decision for the story. 

THE CAVEAT: Don’t make too many sacrifices to make character deaths work. You might be willing to make drastic changes to your plot in order to add in a death you’ve just come up with, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you should. If you’ve got a cohesive plot, and an ending that is nearly there, you could be set back for months by introducing something as major as an unplanned character death. When you’re so near to completion, a huge setback like that can completely derail you, and the draft meanders for a while before it winds up unfinished. If you find that you’re stuck with how to resolve things, and the only thing you can come up with is killing the character, I would challenge you to go back through your story and search for details in your conflict that will offer up a solution you just haven’t seen yet, rather than one you have to add in. 

TO THE ANON: You used the phrase “ends up dying,” which to me sounds like it’s something that was worked well into the plot. When we say that something “ends up happening,” usually it means that something has happened that we may have tried to avoid but there were factors involved that resulted in it anyway. So your using that language leads me to believe that there were internal factors contributing to the characters’ death that couldn’t be avoided, no matter how hard they (and even you) tried to fight it. If this is true, then again, I think you’ve adequately addressed this problem and should be clear to continue with the character death.

Why You Shouldn’t Listen to Me (or anyone else’s general advice for that matter…)

Because when it comes to your story, I honestly know nothing. I’m pretty useless actually.

Even with all this discussion, I can’t say for sure if this character death will work for the anon’s story. Even if they gave me a detailed plot summary, I couldn’t say for sure if it would work. Because with something like this, it comes down to the specific details of your story - the nitty gritty things that I couldn’t evaluate unless I read the entire story from start to finish and was able to form a reader’s opinion. All I can do is give you general advice that you may or may not be able to apply to your work.

Now, I may not have time to read every one of our followers’ stories (what a great job that would be), but there are millions of people out there that can do that for you. I’m not going to go into finding writer friends because that would be a huge tangent unrelated to this post, but you need to make big decisions like this based on advice that is coming from someone that has read your specific story, and knows your specific plot and characters, and your specific writing style and intentions. Advice (like mine) that has been generalized to work for many people might be helpful, but it’s not the end all/be all for your personal story decisions. You have to do what works for your exact situation. 

Having said all that, what was the point of my rambling on about reasons and breaking rules? I wanted to show you that it’s not about someone telling you that you should or shouldn’t do something. It’s about understanding the “rules” and the reasons behind them so intimately that you’re in control of them. That you can decide if breaking it will negatively impact your story. 

When faced with a problem like this, don’t say, “I shouldn’t do this because everyone says not to…” Instead, research why people say not to do it, and decide if those reasons why are relevant for your story. 

Good luck! 

-Rebekah

[thedeadshotnetwork]

I've studied billionaires and interviewed neuroscientists, and I've created the ultimate framework for making better decisions Spencer Platt/Getty Images This post from Matt Bodnar originally appeared on Quora as an answer to the question " Which decision-making strategies yield the best results? " Billionaires like Warren Buffett believe in the power of compounding knowledge through constantly learning and studying. Charlie Munger believes that a successful entrepreneur needs to be multidisciplinary. Successful people tend to use mental models, psychological concepts or tidbits of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works. I've studied billionaires, talked with neuroscientists, psychologists, astronauts, and more — and from all of those conversations — I've put together a framework I call "the Art of Decision-making." The Art of Decision-making has 4 key components: Harness the power of compounding by building on your knowledge and getting 1% smarter every day Focus on and study things that don't change or change very slowly over time — master the principles and you can invent the tactics Follow the path of worldly wisdom and focus on acquiring multidisciplinary knowledge across academic disciplines like psychology, mathematics, and biology Build a toolkit of mental models so that you can better understand reality and achieve your goals. The more time and energy you invest in your decision-making ability, the more it continues to build and build on itself by harnessing the power of compounding Becoming a master at the Art of Decision-making cascades through everything you do. It's not incremental growth in your knowledge, it's exponential growth. Einstein described the power of compounding as the "eight wonder of the world" — and if you've ever crunched some numbers on a compound interest calculator you know how powerful compounding can be over time. If you get 1% better at thinking — at understanding how the world works, how human behavior works, how economic systems function, and understanding your own brain — that 1% improvement impacts everything you do. You're not just going to benefit at work, but when you deal with your spouse, or negotiate the purchase of a new car, or decide where to invest your savings. You're entire life is essentially a long chain of decisions. These small incremental improvements in decision-making aren't noticeable at first, but they eventually result in a huge transformation in how you think, act, and understand the world. Here's a quote from our dear friend Warren Buffett, when asked what the key to success was he pointed to a stack of books and said: "Read 500 pages like this every day. That's how knowledge works. It builds up, like compound interest. All of you can do it, but I guarantee not many of you will do it." Nati Harnik/AP S pend your time mastering the core principles that underpin psychology and human behavior, because those things never change A key piece of building a compounding machine of knowledge — that over time will let you vault over almost everyone on the planet in terms of sheer brain power — is focusing on knowledge that doesn't change or changes very slowly over time. Many people focus their time and energy on learning rapidly changing tactics, the minutiae, highly specific actions and pieces of advice without a broader context. As Sun Tzu once said "tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat" and Ralph Waldo Emerson said: "As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble." People gobble up the latest article "10 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Email Opt-In Rate" but the problem with studying knowledge like that is that it changes — it doesn't give you something to build up and build upon over time — in 18 months all of the advice in that article will be useless. If you spent a year in 2004 reading every book on high performance banner ads — none of that knowledge would be relevant today. But if you flip that, if you study the strategy — spend your time mastering the core principles that underpin psychology and human behavior, reading things like the book Influence by Robert Cialdini  — you can invent marketing tactics on the fly — because you understand the bigger picture. And that knowledge changes very slowly over time — it's a core foundation that you can build upon and grow from. This also means that the best kind of knowledge to focus on and spend your time investing in is not ephemeral junk like facebook, twitter, and buzzfeed, but the core pillars of human knowledge and the major academic disciplines, which brings us to the principle of Worldly Wisdom. Cultivate worldly wisdom by collecting knowledge from lots of different disciplines and areas of life The next key component of The Art of Decision-making is cultivating what Charlie Munger (the billionaire business partner of Warren Buffett) called Worldy Wisdom. Here's a great description of the concept of worldly wisdom from Robert Griffin's book " Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor: " Munger has adopted an approach to business and life that he refers to as worldly wisdom. Munger believes that by using a range of different models from many different disciplines — psychology, history, mathematics, physics, philosophy, biology, and so on — a person can use the combined output of the synthesis to produce something that has more value than the sum of its parts. Robert Hagstrom wrote a wonderful book on worldly wisdom entitled Investing: The Last Liberal Art, in which he states that "each discipline entwines with, and in the process strengthens, every other. From each discipline the thoughtful person draws significant mental models, the key ideas that combine to produce a cohesive understanding. Those who cultivate this broad view are well on their way to achieving worldly wisdom." Being multidisciplinary means collecting knowledge from lots of different disciplines and areas of life and building an approach to understanding the world that integrates all that knowledge into a cohesive framework. In order to get what you want you have to understand how to get there, and in order to do that, you have to understand how things work — things like human behavior, economic systems, money, biology, and mathematics. Josh Kaufman explains this beautifully in The Personal MBA : "Every business fundamentally relies on two factors People and Systems…To understand how businesses work, you must have a firm understanding of how people tend to think and behave — how humans make decisions, act on those decisions, and communicate with others. Recent advances in psychology are revealing why people do the things they do, as well as how to improve our own behavior and work more effectively with others. Systems, on the other hand, are the invisible structures that hold every business together. At the core, every business is a collection of processes that can be reliably repeated to produce a particular result. By understanding the essentials of how complex systems work, it's possible to find ways to improve existing systems, whether you're dealing with a marketing campaign or an automotive assembly line." The problem is that too many people have a very narrow focus — they master one piece of the puzzle, say marketing or finance, and think that has all the answers. But reality is messy and complex and interwoven. Most big events in our lives aren't caused by one simple explanation; they are the result of an interplay of factors. A multidisciplinary approach intertwines and strengthens itself by enabling you to pull from different disciplines of knowledge and bring the exact tools necessary to understand and solve tough challenges and to achieve complicated and difficult goals. As Peter Bevelin writes in Seeking Wisdom : "Since no single discipline has all the answers we need to understand and use the big ideas from all the important disciplines: Mathematics, physics, chemistry, engineering, biology, psychology, and rank and use them in order of reliability." Mark Brake / Getty Images A mental model is a concept, an idea, a tidbit of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works Now its time to go deeper into Mental Models, which we briefly touched on earlier. A mental model is simply a concept, an idea, a tidbit of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works. Mental models are one of the cornerstones of high leverage thinking. In fact, Charlie Munger puts it pretty bluntly: "Developing the habit of mastering the multiple models which underlie reality is the best thing you can do." When a billionaire tells me something is "the best thing I can do" — I listen. And I've spent a tremendous amount of time studying billionaires, people like Charlie Munger, and mental models so that you don't have to. A few examples of mental models would be concepts like the 80/20 principle and compounding , both of which we discussed earlier, as well as concepts like expected value and base rates from mathematics, notions such as confirmation bias, anchoring, and social proof from psychology, the prisoner's dilemma from game theory , or the concept of natural selection from biology. Elon Musk has another great way of describing this. "One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree — make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves / details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." – Elon Musk While this may seem a bit overwhelming, the good news is that you don't have to become an expert in physics and chemistry. The whole idea is to master the big ideas. Take the major principles from a 101 textbook and combine them into a framework of mental models that offers a rich and deep tool kit to look at, understand, and manipulate reality to your ends. Checklists and decision journals both allow you to step outside your head, use an external system to eliminate bias from your thinking I will also share two specific strategies for making better decisions. Checklists Decision journals Checklists and decision journals both allow you to step outside your head, use an external system to eliminate bias from your thinking and make sure you cover all possible mental models that may address a particular problem. "No wise pilot, no matter how great his talent or experience, fails to use his checklist." - Charlie Munger Checklists are a vital tool to get out of your own head and make sure you haven't missed anything. Even experts like doctors routinely miss basic things like washing their hands, and implementing checklists in hospitals has saved thousands of lives as a result. Decision journals help make your thought process clear and mitigate cognitive biases. Biases like hindsight bias and creeping determinism can disrupt your thinking and make your analysis of an event incorrect after the fact. Michael J. Mauboussin, the Global Head of Strategy for Credit Suisse, describes decision journals as follows: "Most professionals and businesspeople don't keep track of how good their decisions were. They keep track of how things turned out as the result of their decisions. Over the long haul, of course, good decisions provide a much higher chance of desirable outcomes. But in the short run the link between decisions and results can be very loose. The primary way to focus attention on the decision-making process is to keep a journal that documents your thinking. This is how you impose accountability on yourself. Here's what you do. Go out and get a notebook. When you are making a consequential decision in your portfolio, business, or life, write down what you expect to happen, why you expect it to happen, and attach probabilities to your views. If you are so inclined, also jot down how you feel physically and emotionally. Make sure you note the date and time." A decision journal freezes your thoughts in time so you can go back later and see where you went wrong, and what you could have done instead. This provides you with an opportunity to improve your thinking in an iterative way. Months after a decision has taken place, you can go back and review what you thought, see where your thinking was wrong, and start correcting it. Combine all these factors to become a high-level thinker When you combine all of these factors, you are putting your brain on a high leverage rocket ship — and with the power of compounding you will start leaving other people in the dust and be well on your way to mastering The Art of Decision-making. NOW WATCH: 'Shark Tank' star Barbara Corcoran: How I went from a 10-kid household and more than 20 jobs to become a real estate mogul November 14, 2017 at 03:46PM

[tortuga-aak]

I've studied billionaires and interviewed neuroscientists, and I've created the ultimate framework for making better decisions

Spencer Platt/Getty Images

This post from Matt Bodnar originally appeared on Quora as an answer to the question "Which decision-making strategies yield the best results?"

Billionaires like Warren Buffett believe in the power of compounding knowledge through constantly learning and studying.

Charlie Munger believes that a successful entrepreneur needs to be multidisciplinary.

Successful people tend to use mental models, psychological concepts or tidbits of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works.

  I've studied billionaires, talked with neuroscientists, psychologists, astronauts, and more — and from all of those conversations — I've put together a framework I call "the Art of Decision-making."

The Art of Decision-making has 4 key components:

Harness the power of compounding by building on your knowledge and getting 1% smarter every day

Focus on and study things that don't change or change very slowly over time — master the principles and you can invent the tactics

Follow the path of worldly wisdom and focus on acquiring multidisciplinary knowledge across academic disciplines like psychology, mathematics, and biology

Build a toolkit of mental models so that you can better understand reality and achieve your goals.

The more time and energy you invest in your decision-making ability, the more it continues to build and build on itself by harnessing the power of compounding

Becoming a master at the Art of Decision-making cascades through everything you do. It's not incremental growth in your knowledge, it's exponential growth. Einstein described the power of compounding as the "eight wonder of the world" — and if you've ever crunched some numbers on a compound interest calculator you know how powerful compounding can be over time.

If you get 1% better at thinking — at understanding how the world works, how human behavior works, how economic systems function, and understanding your own brain — that 1% improvement impacts everything you do. You're not just going to benefit at work, but when you deal with your spouse, or negotiate the purchase of a new car, or decide where to invest your savings. You're entire life is essentially a long chain of decisions.

These small incremental improvements in decision-making aren't noticeable at first, but they eventually result in a huge transformation in how you think, act, and understand the world.

Here's a quote from our dear friend Warren Buffett, when asked what the key to success was he pointed to a stack of books and said:

"Read 500 pages like this every day. That's how knowledge works. It builds up, like compound interest. All of you can do it, but I guarantee not many of you will do it."

Nati Harnik/AP

Spend your time mastering the core principles that underpin psychology and human behavior, because those things never change

A key piece of building a compounding machine of knowledge — that over time will let you vault over almost everyone on the planet in terms of sheer brain power — is focusing on knowledge that doesn't change or changes very slowly over time.

Many people focus their time and energy on learning rapidly changing tactics, the minutiae, highly specific actions and pieces of advice without a broader context. As Sun Tzu once said "tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat" and Ralph Waldo Emerson said:

"As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble."

People gobble up the latest article "10 Things You Can Do To Improve Your Email Opt-In Rate" but the problem with studying knowledge like that is that it changes — it doesn't give you something to build up and build upon over time — in 18 months all of the advice in that article will be useless. If you spent a year in 2004 reading every book on high performance banner ads — none of that knowledge would be relevant today.

But if you flip that, if you study the strategy — spend your time mastering the core principles that underpin psychology and human behavior, reading things like the book Influence by Robert Cialdini — you can invent marketing tactics on the fly — because you understand the bigger picture. And that knowledge changes very slowly over time — it's a core foundation that you can build upon and grow from.

This also means that the best kind of knowledge to focus on and spend your time investing in is not ephemeral junk like facebook, twitter, and buzzfeed, but the core pillars of human knowledge and the major academic disciplines, which brings us to the principle of Worldly Wisdom.

Cultivate worldly wisdom by collecting knowledge from lots of different disciplines and areas of life

The next key component of The Art of Decision-making is cultivating what Charlie Munger (the billionaire business partner of Warren Buffett) called Worldy Wisdom.

Here's a great description of the concept of worldly wisdom from Robert Griffin's book "Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor:"

Munger has adopted an approach to business and life that he refers to as worldly wisdom. Munger believes that by using a range of different models from many different disciplines — psychology, history, mathematics, physics, philosophy, biology, and so on — a person can use the combined output of the synthesis to produce something that has more value than the sum of its parts. Robert Hagstrom wrote a wonderful book on worldly wisdom entitled Investing: The Last Liberal Art, in which he states that "each discipline entwines with, and in the process strengthens, every other. From each discipline the thoughtful person draws significant mental models, the key ideas that combine to produce a cohesive understanding. Those who cultivate this broad view are well on their way to achieving worldly wisdom."

Being multidisciplinary means collecting knowledge from lots of different disciplines and areas of life and building an approach to understanding the world that integrates all that knowledge into a cohesive framework.

In order to get what you want you have to understand how to get there, and in order to do that, you have to understand how things work — things like human behavior, economic systems, money, biology, and mathematics. Josh Kaufman explains this beautifully in The Personal MBA:

"Every business fundamentally relies on two factors People and Systems…To understand how businesses work, you must have a firm understanding of how people tend to think and behave — how humans make decisions, act on those decisions, and communicate with others. Recent advances in psychology are revealing why people do the things they do, as well as how to improve our own behavior and work more effectively with others.

Systems, on the other hand, are the invisible structures that hold every business together. At the core, every business is a collection of processes that can be reliably repeated to produce a particular result. By understanding the essentials of how complex systems work, it's possible to find ways to improve existing systems, whether you're dealing with a marketing campaign or an automotive assembly line."

The problem is that too many people have a very narrow focus — they master one piece of the puzzle, say marketing or finance, and think that has all the answers. But reality is messy and complex and interwoven. Most big events in our lives aren't caused by one simple explanation; they are the result of an interplay of factors.

A multidisciplinary approach intertwines and strengthens itself by enabling you to pull from different disciplines of knowledge and bring the exact tools necessary to understand and solve tough challenges and to achieve complicated and difficult goals. As Peter Bevelin writes in Seeking Wisdom:

"Since no single discipline has all the answers we need to understand and use the big ideas from all the important disciplines: Mathematics, physics, chemistry, engineering, biology, psychology, and rank and use them in order of reliability."

Mark Brake / Getty Images

A mental model is a concept, an idea, a tidbit of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works

Now its time to go deeper into Mental Models, which we briefly touched on earlier. A mental model is simply a concept, an idea, a tidbit of wisdom that in some way explains how the world works. Mental models are one of the cornerstones of high leverage thinking. In fact, Charlie Munger puts it pretty bluntly:

"Developing the habit of mastering the multiple models which underlie reality is the best thing you can do."

When a billionaire tells me something is "the best thing I can do" — I listen. And I've spent a tremendous amount of time studying billionaires, people like Charlie Munger, and mental models so that you don't have to.

A few examples of mental models would be concepts like the 80/20 principle and compounding, both of which we discussed earlier, as well as concepts like expected value and base rates from mathematics, notions such as confirmation bias, anchoring, and social proof from psychology, the prisoner's dilemma from game theory, or the concept of natural selection from biology.

Elon Musk has another great way of describing this.

"One bit of advice: it is important to view knowledge as sort of a semantic tree — make sure you understand the fundamental principles, ie the trunk and big branches, before you get into the leaves / details or there is nothing for them to hang on to." – Elon Musk

While this may seem a bit overwhelming, the good news is that you don't have to become an expert in physics and chemistry. The whole idea is to master the big ideas. Take the major principles from a 101 textbook and combine them into a framework of mental models that offers a rich and deep tool kit to look at, understand, and manipulate reality to your ends.

Checklists and decision journals both allow you to step outside your head, use an external system to eliminate bias from your thinking

I will also share two specific strategies for making better decisions.

Checklists

Decision journals

Checklists and decision journals both allow you to step outside your head, use an external system to eliminate bias from your thinking and make sure you cover all possible mental models that may address a particular problem.

"No wise pilot, no matter how great his talent or experience, fails to use his checklist." - Charlie Munger

Checklists are a vital tool to get out of your own head and make sure you haven't missed anything. Even experts like doctors routinely miss basic things like washing their hands, and implementing checklists in hospitals has saved thousands of lives as a result.

Decision journals help make your thought process clear and mitigate cognitive biases. Biases like hindsight bias and creeping determinism can disrupt your thinking and make your analysis of an event incorrect after the fact.

Michael J. Mauboussin, the Global Head of Strategy for Credit Suisse, describes decision journals as follows:

"Most professionals and businesspeople don't keep track of how good their decisions were. They keep track of how things turned out as the result of their decisions. Over the long haul, of course, good decisions provide a much higher chance of desirable outcomes. But in the short run the link between decisions and results can be very loose.

The primary way to focus attention on the decision-making process is to keep a journal that documents your thinking. This is how you impose accountability on yourself. Here's what you do. Go out and get a notebook. When you are making a consequential decision in your portfolio, business, or life, write down what you expect to happen, why you expect it to happen, and attach probabilities to your views. If you are so inclined, also jot down how you feel physically and emotionally. Make sure you note the date and time."

A decision journal freezes your thoughts in time so you can go back later and see where you went wrong, and what you could have done instead. This provides you with an opportunity to improve your thinking in an iterative way.

Months after a decision has taken place, you can go back and review what you thought, see where your thinking was wrong, and start correcting it.

Combine all these factors to become a high-level thinker

When you combine all of these factors, you are putting your brain on a high leverage rocket ship — and with the power of compounding you will start leaving other people in the dust and be well on your way to mastering The Art of Decision-making.

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