(Editor's Note: This article was originally published in January 2020)
The legend of Russian poker with the image of Darth Vader on his avatar has been keeping a diary on our forum incognito since 2011. "Ferwell's Well" works in a special format: only the author can publish posts in it, and the discussion is put in a separate topic. With a huge number of people wanting to ask Ferwell a question, the usual blog format simply did not work, so the owner of the well decided to independently select interesting topics for discussion. We have re-read all his forum posts and present a collection of selected posts with slight abbreviations.
I plan to maintain something like a personal blog and apparently answer questions. Graphs and figures may or may not appear, since posting them is not very far-sighted.
Hi all.
What pros and cons do you get from your anonymity?
The advantages are obvious – there is less chance of encountering something unpleasant. Well, it’s simple – why do I need my blog entries to be found by my name and any casual acquaintance could be aware of my affairs?
There aren't really any downsides. In general, I feel sorry that I cannot write about many things that would be interesting for me to write about. Even with a certain anonymity.
I am very grateful to those people who know about my real identity but keep the information to themselves. Let's leave it like that until better times.
About a systematic approach to health
Maybe because health is given to us as a given, people do not realize its full value. Perhaps the fact that the struggle is not about getting something new, but only about maintaining existing positions, makes it less attractive. Maybe the fact is that no one forces people to take care of their health, and without the whip, they act very poorly. To be honest, I don't know what's going on, but there's a problem. People are indifferent to their own health.
But this is one of the main values that we have. This is much more important than an apartment, a car, clothes, and all the other material items you can think of. If I had a choice, give up all my money or stop caring about my health, that is, start living the lifestyle of an average St. Petersburger, I would, without hesitation, give up my fortune.
Without money I can be happy, without health I cannot.
I'm glad that no one forced this choice on me.
By the way, a lot of things to maintain health can be done completely free of charge. Don't drink, don't smoke, don't use drugs – it's easy and free. Avoid eating junk food, sweets, and unhealthy foods – free of charge. Playing sports is practically free. Walking in the fresh air also costs nothing.
The first part of a health plan is a healthy lifestyle. Unfortunately, this is not enough. You can do the best sports in the world, eat only organic foods, drink the purest water, walk in alpine meadows and all that other stuff, and still die at the age of 30 from pancreatic cancer. Sorry, genetic bad beat.
The good news is that we live in an age of advanced and rapidly developing medicine. And it offers us a second line of defense. Annual preventive examinations. I think there is no need to explain their significance. Many diseases caught at an early stage can be cured, while advanced diseases lead to serious complications. You need to start from the level available to you now, and then think about how to improve it.
For example, in Moscow, I am sure that you can find quite decent places where they will give you a high-quality check-up for a thousand dollars or two.
Interestingly, doctors sometimes recommend starting to do examinations after 40, but this, in my opinion, is nonsense. The earlier the better. This is your life, do not spare time and money to maintain it.
When it comes to sports, a whole range of cognitive errors arise in people.
If a person does not play sports, he mentally imagines those who play sports incorrectly, and says to himself: “Why do I need this?”
Instead, try to imagine those who exercise correctly. And look at the fruits it brings. Not only increasing life expectancy but also improving its quality. You feel better, you can do more, you look better. Well, the fact that you live longer is practically a bonus.
To convince yourself that “I don’t need sports,” you need to really try. But people cope.
The next category of people firmly believes in their training system. Whether it's yoga, bodybuilding, or football on Saturdays with friends. This feature of the human psyche is well described in the relevant literature. A person makes a semi-random choice and then finds arguments as to why this choice was the best choice in his life.
Instead of praising yourself and what you do, think about the shortcomings of your approach. What important things are your classes not giving you that you can do better?
If you actively think about this, you will be doing yourself a huge favor.
In case you're wondering, I've been doing Pilates for the last two years. Three times a week in the studio with a personal trainer. Well, in my free time, work out for the soul, push-ups, pull-ups, that’s all.
I don't think this is a solution for everyone, which is why I didn't promote this idea on the blog. The classes are very expensive, the quality of the trainers is very important, and I have no idea who teaches Pilates in Russia. By the way, if you think that Pilates is for girls, then you are deeply mistaken, but I don’t plan to argue with you.
How do you feel about alcohol? How often do you use it? Your opinion is very interesting.
Well, how can you relate to alcohol? An extremely harmful, dangerous, and addictive substance.
By the way, I’ve already switched to this version of working at the computer for about a month now.
It was hard at first, but I think I got the hang of it. This is one of those health ideas that all the experts seem to agree on.
I have dreams and I really don’t like to sleep. Because I am disgusted by the fading of my consciousness, even if it is temporary. This is also why I do not use any substances that affect brain function. The disgusting design of human bodies leads to the inevitable need to sleep, but I would be very glad if people learned to avoid it.
I don’t believe in psychoanalysis based on dreams, although, naturally, there is an interesting connection between dreams and reality. But no one understands her.
About family life
F – Women's logic.
In other words, my wife cannot stand anything German. Like in a coffin, she saw all these Germans with their German snobbery. But lately, I noticed that she liked going to a German restaurant. Such a classic place: schnitzel, strudel, sausages and cabbage. Somehow I didn’t attach much importance to this, but today during a walk she suggested we go there together.
We came, made an order, and sat down at a table. German speech is heard all around, there are huge glasses of beer on the tables, and the aroma of cabbage is in the air. My wife looks around with pleasure and says: “I love coming here so much, it reminds me that we no longer live in this damn Germany.”
Until you go through this yourself, you can hardly feel the significance of the moment, but today my son was born.
I received a British birth certificate for my son yesterday.
They named him Victor. Maybe because he listened to Tsoi, maybe because he read Pelevin, or maybe because the name is universal, Russian-English.
I can't say I've ever been shocked by the fact that children can talk. Well, yes, they are talking, why not? But if you think about it a little, it's amazing.
Because a child not only needs to learn a new language from scratch, he needs to learn a language from absolute scratch, when there is not even any way to explain that a tree is a tree and a dog is a dog. He is simply born into this strange and incomprehensible world, naked and helpless. Nature gives him only a piercing cry and a pink face, and then – grow as best you can. And he grows. Gradually developing and accumulating skills and resources. One day he will learn to smile, another day he will learn to pick up a rattle, and then he will grow his first tooth and be able to chew an apple and a pear.
And one day he will return with his mother from a walk and to the question “Who will meet us at home?” will smile, look at you and suddenly clearly say: “Pa-pa, pa-pa.”
And in this moment you can die.
Don't believe the advertising. Raising children is more difficult than the photos on Instagram show.
About playing poker
When I started playing, I didn’t say anything to anyone. I studied a lot and worked intently. And I told them when there were already good results.
In principle, there was not the slightest difficulty with this. The only funny moment was with my sister, who asked: “Don’t you think that they deliberately let you win first so that they can take it all back later?”
A normal question, in principle, for a person not in the field, but it was difficult for me to refrain from laughing, imagining how fish players with 5-10 (I was playing 5-10 at that time) were luring me into their net.
I haven't had a resume for many years and I'll never need one again.
This is an absolutely disgusting topic with all these job interviews. “Why do you think you deserve to work in our company” and other hypocritical crap.
I will remind you all of the true meaning of the word “punish.”
It always amazes me when professional MTT players agree to chop the weak final tables. After all, all the money is made there!
In my opinion, if you are a pro, you can only chop with players of a comparable level.
The argument that the final is not in line with your bankroll is not accepted. Because playing outside the roll is dangerous only if it happens regularly. If you play expensive final tables several dozen times a year, there is no risk here, and your financial well-being is protected by the MTT structure, where you cannot lose a penny over the buy-in.
That is, the situation of a final table for a million dollars is not equivalent to an offer to play a high roller with a buy-in of 100k. Because playing such SNGs you will probably go broke, but playing final tables you won’t. Giving money to weak players at a time when the game is going at maximum rates – this somehow does not fit with my idea of poker.
Isildur generates news, Isildur generates traffic, and creates a heroic image of a poker player. Absolutely priceless.
There is simply no better ambassador for poker. The more stories and news about wonderful ups and victories, the better for the pro. Mathematics, software, and working with databases are for weaklings. I learned the rules and went into battle, conquered 2-4k.
In general, if a reasonable person with extensive experience bets on himself in a specialized discipline, he probably has more information than you, and there is no need to bet against him.
Offhand, you can bet against marathons if:
a) they relate to your core discipline
b) a marathon runner, a gambling addict, and an emotionally unstable person
c) inadequately assessing his skill
d) you have calculations why the marathon is impossible
One very strong player wrote on Skype that he could give 5% on some tours in Macau. I'm like, sure, thank you. Five percent is, of course, not very much, but the chicken will peck at the grain. Then he wrote to me that things didn’t work out very well and I had to make several reentries. Well, no big deal, I only have 5%, I thought. Some time passed, I almost forgot about this share. And yesterday he wrote to me: “I calculated everything here, from you it’s 50k.”
Macau is Macau.
Have you never had any serious downswings or are you just not whining? If you don’t whine, then how do you throw out the negativity?
There have been and still are.
I’m not throwing it out at all. The overall results are good, there is no point in worrying about individual sessions. And since there is no point, then I don’t worry. Preparing your psyche for the game is one of the key elements that need to be thought through in advance.
Graduated in July [2011 – editor’s note].
To the results you need to add 40k, which were not imported into XM, I forgot to Photoshop. For those who understand, it’s even more beautiful in BB.
I don't know if it will ever be possible to repeat this. 70% of the time was played against the regs, and I gave it away to almost everyone.
Law of online poker: all changes are only for the worse.
Players compete against humans in a fair game whose rules and risks they understand and have voluntarily accepted.
As for the benefit to society, what benefit does a stock market player or, for example, a football player bring? We live in a complex world where not only primitive professions are needed. Poker is an important tool for redistributing money from those who have extra money to those who deserve it.
This is a necessary mechanism to help prevent stagnation and disease in the financial system.
About girls and relationships
It is impossible to give any useful advice about communicating with girls. But this view of the world is a little strange to me, where it’s difficult to meet girls. There are millions of girls in the world, and they all want to date someone. So if you are better than average, then the problem is not how to get acquainted, but how not to get acquainted.
I must say that the idea of open relationships is quite popular among the smartest people. Feynman ( a scientist and physicist) immediately comes to mind. Lev Landau, the brilliant Soviet physicist, also tried to practice this in the sixties in the USSR, but his wife did not really like it.
In general, if you think about it, relationships between the sexes are largely similar to friendship. But no one would think of demanding that each person have only one friend or expecting your friends in kindergarten to be your friends in your thirties. That is, such cases do occur, but they are exceptions rather than the norm.
I think it is normal and correct if the share of open relationships in society increases. But at the same time, of course, many people will want to maintain a closed relationship, and this is also correct. Moreover, the value of closed relationships will increase if people make conscious choices in favor of each other, even when society does not require them to do so.
A wedding as a ritual is a rather disgusting phenomenon. I hate falsehood, boredom, and crowds of people. Either people feel good together or they don’t. And no wedding will change anything here.
About the structure of society
It is often said that poker is an unreliable job and all poker players will have to go to the office sooner or later. Which is, in principle, true. However, the irony is that in the next ten years, anyone can lose their job, both manual workers and so-called mental workers aka office plankton. In 20-30 years, it will be difficult to come up with a job that a person can avoid losing. Robots don’t care what they do: drive a truck, dig a hole, or fill out spreadsheets in Excel. He doesn’t get tired, isn’t stupid on the Internet, and doesn’t demand a salary increase. There are no secure jobs in an age of accelerating progress.
The individual strategies I see are the following:
a) Development of unique skills that will be the last to be robotized.
b) Having an investment or business that will grow with the overall economy.
c) Living in a country that will take care of the unemployed, and provide them with social housing, benefits, etc.
And former poker players in the general mass of unemployed will be no better and no worse than others.
Your vote in elections is insignificant, whether it is a fair election or not. If you want to make an impact, you can do much more: tens, hundreds, or even thousands of times more. Then at least you'll have some bragging rights. But on a national scale, we are still grains of sand, this needs to be understood and accepted.
When people say: “Okay, what to do now?”, “How to change the situation?”, “How to save the country?”, then the only honest answer is nothing. You are not the main characters of this story and you do not determine the outcome. The country is falling into the abyss and neither you nor I can save it.
But every person is the hero of their own story, and if you have a civic duty, it is not to vote, but to take care of yourself and your loved ones.
Politics is a killer of the mind, truly I tell you.
By the way, I wanted to say that instead of throwing fists at each other, I recommend taking examples:
For Ukrainians – with Romeopro, who does not swear, but grinds and donates both on Ukrainian issues and on global ones.
For Belarusians – from Tyler, who, again, instead of scolding the Russians for supporting Lukashenko (President of Belarus), actively donates to the Russian opposition and the beginnings of the Belarusian one. Because he understands the connection between the situation in Russia and the situation in Belarus. By the way, he also donated to global issues.
Russians – from me. I donated mainly to global things, but I could not calmly look at what was happening in my homeland and found additional funds to support changes here, not to mention educational work.
So that's it. Peace for everyone.
I cannot get rid of the thought that every day thousands of people die in the world, many in terrible agony, but this does not attract public attention, because they do not die in one place, but spread out all over the world, and not from one cause, but from many different ones. Well, it’s clear why this is so. This is how our brain works. But this is an obvious bug. Bug of our consciousness. And we can and should talk about it.
Why don't people spit in the faces of tobacco company employees? Because deaths from cigarettes are spread out in space and time. Why does everyone worry about those killed in disasters, but not about the millions of man-years lost by theft from the budget? Unbuilt hospitals, undelivered medicines, uncarried out inspections, non-functioning courts, and police. All this is killing many more people, and it is known who is responsible for it.
We do not know how to feel all this emotionally, but at least we can recognize the problem with the help of our minds. The structure of society is deeply inadequate.
We all really want to live in a world where we don’t have to be afraid to let our child go to school, our wife alone in the evening, and in general anyone on the street or in a public place can feel safe. This is a completely obvious value, and any form of violence should be condemned by society and suppressed by the state.
Therefore, the attitude towards all football hooligans should be this: rejection and condemnation. Yes, today they beat up someone else, in a foreign city or perhaps country. But tomorrow they will return home and beat people under other pretexts. Some are too smart, some are of the wrong nationality, and some just fall into place. All this talk that hooligans don’t beat up ordinary people, but only fight with their own kind is complete nonsense. When a person is used to beating people up in crowds, it is naive to think that in his free time, he will behave politely and calmly.
Do not sympathize with violence, even if it is against “outsiders”, be smarter.
About Bortik
I wanted a dog for a very long time, but while it was unclear where I would live, it was, of course, impossible to get one. I lived between Germany and Russia and did 50 flights a year. During my first year in London, I was constantly thinking about having a dog, but a penthouse in Chelsea (sorry) wasn't very suitable as a home for a dog. In the summer of 2013, I realized that the time had come and began looking for a house to move to. In addition, I started reading books about raising dogs.
As a result, we managed to find a good house right on the banks of the Thames and gain a good theoretical base. All that remained was to choose a breed and find a puppy. I had the following requirements for the breed: smart, beautiful, kind, woolly, large, and not very slobbery. Given these parameters, a golden retriever was an ideal candidate. But then an unexpected difficulty arose. In England, there is a registration and control system for dog breeders. And this is a very important and correct system. Because in order for a puppy to adapt to a new home, it is necessary that in the first months of its life, it is accustomed to the sounds and smells of home, proximity, and contact with people, as well as games and socialization with other puppies. Certified breeders must provide all of this. I decided right away that I would only take a puppy from a good place where he was loved, cared for, and raised. The problem turned out to be that there was a huge demand for certified retrievers and there were waiting lists almost from birth. While the puppy should be picked up at about 7-8 weeks of age.
I found a dog specialist and agreed with her that she would call all the offers throughout the country and find a puppy. Two days later she called and said that the previous buyer had lost his job and could no longer afford the dog, so the puppy became available and was already 9 weeks old. And she sent me this photo.
The problem was that the puppy was on the other side of England – Wales, and I did not have a car. But these are technical details, of course. I found a taxi in Wales that agreed to take us to London and took a train ticket there.
The breeders turned out to be wonderful people who loved their pets dearly. When I got into the taxi, the hostess carried Bortik out in her arms and sat him next to me. There were tears in her eyes. After 4 hours, Bortik and I were home.
Now he is a big fluffy happy dog.
The science of dog training has come quite far in the USA and South Caucasus. Almost all the dogs I knew in Russia were horribly trained and had some kind of problem (barking, biting, whining, gnawing, afraid of noises, etc.). This was due to the fact that there was no correct information about why dogs have problems and how to prevent them. With the right approach, the animal grows up calm, quiet, and obedient. The main idea is that instead of punishing something, you simply reward the right behavior and it will crowd out the wrong behavior.
If every time a dog asks to go outside for an errand, he is given a reward, very soon he will stop doing errands at home since this is strictly -EV.
If you get a dog, be responsible and study the theory and techniques of positive reinforcement in advance.
I posted Bortik and couldn’t stand it – I went to pet him.
About deception and scammers
I believe that people who try to deceive me, first of all, make things worse for themselves, not for me. For me, this money is an insignificant change, and for the sake of money, they stain their souls with petty meanness. Naturally, they are the losers, not me. However, my philosophical worldview does not prevent me in most cases from tracking such scams and stopping them. Especially with taxi drivers in Russia, you need to act strictly – they are absolutely shameless bastards. Every second person tries to cheat.
Any person is capable of cheating, but it’s not so much about the amount of money, but about the circumstances, psychological state, etc.
The only question is how easily a person can be placed in such circumstances.
Almost all “personal growth trainings” are fraudulent and, as a result, have very low efficiency. The small percentage of “success” is due to the personal qualities of the students and luck. So, in order to justify the lack of results, it is necessary to shift the blame from yourself to the student, creating in him a feeling of his own insignificance and inferiority. To do this, it is enough to give an inadequate and complex task but act as if it is super simple and only a complete imbecile can not complete it.
Needless to say, scammers of a higher rank can cause much more serious damage, especially if they work with you personally. Therefore, to protect ourselves, we all need to become smarter and stronger. Having resources increases risks and increases them significantly, but this does not mean that lack of resources gives you any protection. After all, there are manipulators who are not averse to using your time and health if you have nothing else. There are too many threats to be fully protected.
But we have to work, we have to work. The feeling of resentment or shame from being deceived is quite unpleasant in itself. But if there's one good thing about it, it's that it gives you the impetus to become smarter. So that this doesn't happen again. Because if no one has deceived you for a long time, then you may have the illusion that nothing really threatens you. This means there is no need to work on yourself.
About working on yourself
Information processing skills are key in this world. Before listening to someone, before making any serious decisions, study the issue, listen to the pros and cons, and look for criticism of those views that at first glance seem correct to you. Applies to all issues – politics, religion, nutrition, sports, gambling.
If you have no skills, you will be lost for a penny.
About the English language.
This is very, very important. Get started on this as soon as possible, if you haven't already. And if you have already, then intensify your efforts. The good news is that you don't have to know the language perfectly. Quite moderate knowledge already yields significant results. There are a lot of simple texts, videos, songs, films, interviews, games, aphorisms, etc., for which a basic level is suitable.
The bad news is that learning a foreign language perfectly is almost impossible.
The absolutely key idea in learning a language, in my opinion, is that the process should be interesting. Textbooks, lessons, homework, and learning dialogues in groups are boring. Reading blogs, books, watching movies, and talking with English-speaking friends is interesting. If you've had a bad learning experience, trust that it doesn't have to be like that. Don't limit yourself, look for the format of classes that interests you. Personally, I hate translations and have completely switched to reading and watching the originals. Words cannot express how much this has increased my enjoyment of books and films.
By the way, about computer games. You shouldn’t perceive everything in a binary way: only good or only bad. Games are a normal part of life and it’s stupid to give them up completely. However, it is important to understand and remember their addictive nature and the dangers associated with it. Too many people play in ways that make their lives worse because they have no control over the process.
Personally, I immediately decided that I would play Pokemon GO in a very relaxed mode, without chasing results. The big advantage of the game is that it gives you motivation to walk more. Walking in the fresh air is extremely beneficial, so playing in walking mode is a great idea. In order not to just go for a walk, I always take Vitya or Bortik, thereby adding a decent amount of efficiency to this activity.
In addition, I have made it a rule that before I start Pokemon, I always turn on the audiobook. As a rule, audiobooks are difficult for me, but with this psychological technique, I was able to overcome my laziness and create a positive connection in my brain. In general, if you think about it, games can bring not only pleasure but also benefit.
Ferwell, what do you think is the best way to develop your general outlook?
A glass of motherwort (a natural supplement) before bed.
By the way, I had never thought before that the habit of refreshing a page (or application) is based on the same addictive mechanism as gambling. Over and over again we make an action (or a bet) in vain until finally we get unlucky and see an interesting message, letter, or some kind of intermediate jackpot. The problem with this addictive mechanism is that in order to hope for a random win, we are willing to spend an irrationally large amount of resources. For example, spend an hour updating a news site that has stopped providing updates.
I always understood that casino games were evil and avoided them completely. But there were times when I spent a lot of time refreshing all sorts of nonsense. We obviously need to pay closer attention to these things.
A separate category is people who say “I will behave as nature intended. If I’m built this way, then I’ll do it this way, I’ll be natural. If nature wants me to mate, I will mate. He wants me to fill my belly, so I’ll fill it. If he wants to tear up strangers, then I will.” For such people, I have two bits of bad news.
Firstly, all of our firmware is hopelessly outdated. We are tailored to a completely different structure of society and different living conditions. Nature makes updates very slowly. Our software still thinks that we are running naked on the savannah. Second, nature is not interested in the happiness of individuals. She strictly doesn't care. All she needs is for you to produce offspring and generate resources for them.
Therefore, any person who wants to be happy must challenge nature to one degree or another.
About charity
I haven't done charity work for a long time. And one of the main reasons for this was that I had reasonable doubts about the effectiveness of charities. They often spend money senselessly and ineptly. And there is no special mechanism for monitoring your donations.
But in recent years I have read a lot about effective altruism and realized that the situation has changed. There are objective scientific studies that can identify the most effective non-profit organizations in the world. By giving your money to them, you can be sure that your money will do good and truly make the world a better place.
In addition, I was influenced by other people's examples. (Igor) Kurganov and Liv (Boeree), who made REG. The Romeopro marathon, which was joined by other poker players. Mark Zuckerberg recently announced that he is going to give away 99% of his fortune to improve our lives.
In general, I also want to help save the world.
Each of us, during our lifetime, can have a significant impact, if not on the fate of humanity, then at least on hundreds of human lives. It is necessary to approach the selection of charitable or non-profit organizations scientifically and systematically. You cannot trust emotions in this matter; they lead to extremely ineffective or even harmful decisions. Requires calculations and mathematics.
It is impossible to say unequivocally which goal (climate, disease, hunger, poverty, disasters) is most important. Therefore, it is good if a broad range of effective initiatives is supported. The problem of existential catastrophes, particularly the problem of creating artificial intelligence, are the closest and most understandable to me. I think this is a priority, but in practice, some other things may be more important.
Make a commitment to yourself to donate a small percentage of your future income to these causes. You don’t need to take a lot, 2-5% of your annual or monthly income will help you get involved without actually affecting your quality of life. Consistency and consistency are more important than a single act of kindness.
About literature, art, and literacy
For a person, refusing to read is like a tiger giving up its claws and fangs.
One of the things that I fortunately realized quite early on is that you need to watch and read what you really like, and not pretend. This doesn't mean you shouldn't experiment or grow as a reader (viewer), just that the process should be organic and honest. I read a lot and I think that my level as a reader is quite high. But what's the difference? There is no need to compare yourself with others here. You just have to choose what you like and enjoy it.
If you are passionate about Russian classics, great, I’m happy for you. On the other hand, many people read it under the influence of social authority; to appear smarter in the eyes of others or your own. This is stupid and harmful. This is also hardly optimal, given how many millions of books there are in the world and the fact that modern authors are, by default, culturally and mentally closer to you.
Many people don't read at all because they've made too many bad choices and eventually given up. It's in vain. Be honest with yourself and experiment, it is very likely that sooner or later you will discover a wonderful, wondrous world.
This is what I really hate.
When in the theater people give a standing ovation to a successful performance. When you look at the snob in a museum with a smart look. I only write about what I honestly like. I show off sometimes, maybe. But I'm not lying, neither to myself nor to you.
If I say that a book is cool, it means that I really experienced strong emotions while reading it. What I really liked.
A person can say “coffee” as he pleases, it doesn’t matter, and if it’s so important to you, then it says more about you.
For me personally, the level of literacy is certainly an indicator that determines the attitude towards a person, but I try not to take this to the extreme. The ability to express yourself clearly and beautifully is priceless. And knowing how to place commas according to the crazy rules of Russian punctuation costs quite a bit.
Being proud of the fact that you know how to spell “nothing to do with it” or “pre-heart attack” is about the same thing as being proud of serving in the army. A meaningless process is given unjustified significance because it is difficult for a person to realize that he has wasted so much time.
About income, spending, and pleasures
Still, it seems to me that I am a rare example of a person who did not do something very stupid when, within two years, his income grew from thousands of dollars to millions. I didn’t invest in shady business projects, didn’t create enemies and debtors among my friends, and didn’t buy any crazy things. Instead, I was creating capital for the future with an eye toward eventual retirement.
However, my current expenses have reached such a level that it would be impossible to squeeze it down to 5k a month. This is the case when I can afford to spend a lot on what I consider important. Living in London is very expensive, but in my opinion it is worth it.
One of the little things that gives me pleasure is that I usually don’t look at the price tags in the supermarket. And when I want to buy something expensive (not too often), I just buy it.
Paradox. I have a bad credit history because I have never taken out a loan in my life.
There are two features in the new house that I just can’t help but brag about.
The first is a crazy view of the river, and not just a view, but the house is right next to the Thames. The second is a hot jacuzzi on the roof terrace. These are the mega nuts. It's simply unrealistic. We were very lucky that we found such a house, but on the other hand, we approached it responsibly.
Can money and education compensate for arrogance and lack of self-irony in a person?
You say that as if arrogance is a bad thing.
About competition
Life and relationships are a non-zero-sum game. By helping each other, you can increase the overall welfare of all participants in the process. Raising the intelligence of the entire population of the earth will have a very positive impact on all humanity. I can compete with someone for some resources, but if we both invest in life extension technology, for example, then that’s not bad.
Cooperation of highly developed beings is a path to success that is much greater than trying to keep anyone out of your clearing.
Can you predict when you will be promoted from the poker Olympus and you will start pouring in? Can you stop?
Never. Over the last four months, I’ve actually had a downswing of $2 million, but this is nonsense, I’m just unlucky. By the way, I can’t answer any more questions, I have to run to recoup.