The Nooby Book Writer

I truly believe that we all win when each of us wins. That the world is better when each of us reaches our full potential. When each of us feels like we can pursue our biggest dreams. I was glad to explore and learn from this book. Even though the book is geared towards work places and managers and leaders I think we can all benefit from this book. I will be making notes that can be applied to everyday life not just work life. How can I bring out the best in myself and others? The book I got was a signed copy from 1995 for a manager at National Flour Mills in Trinidad. The author notes that his mother always brought out the best in him, at the beginning of the book. What works for one person may not work for someone else. We have to recognize someone's individuality. How much do we know about the science of human behavior? How can we apply data driven decision making to our everyday lives? If you are a parent (for example) read more on the topic of parenting and seek out methods th

Lawrence (the writer) described the adventure as both physical and spiritual. This story takes place in majestic Africa. South Africa to be exact. The writer described elephants as the planets most powerful animal. I asked my friend Bard and was told that the African bush elephants are the largest land mammals, and they can weigh up to 12,000 pounds. They are also incredibly strong, and they can lift up to 9,000 pounds with their trunks. The writer mentioned "the magic of Africa" and I smiled because this fits with my feelings about the beautiful continent. There was drama with the elephants from the get go when the elephants escaped. It kept me interested but I knew that this would not be the end for the elephants else the book would not be three hundred some pages and there would be no story to tell. I was engrossed in the story and I was deep into a world that was foreign to me. It was surely an adventure. When I reached the middle of chapter five by the time the animal ps

I came across a proverb today that says, "He who plants a tree today, plants hope". I found that it came from a poem by Lucy Larcom and I was motivated to write about hope. The proverb can be taken literally and figuratively. This is encouraging us to take action today for a brighter future. Trees take time to grow. Sometimes we have to have patience. There is another proverb that goes, "Take a step without seeing the entire staircase". Have faith and hope for the best. Have good intentions and hope for good outcomes. Sometimes it is easy to become hopeless. To feel despair. To give up on our dreams. Don't give up. Don't lose hope. A breakthrough might be right around the corner. We have to think of things that within our control and take action accordingly and hope for the best. There is a growing body of research on the power of hope. For example, studies have shown that people who are more hopeful are more likely to achieve their goals, live longer, and b

It took two days to complete reading this book. My review is really from my notes as I read the book. I read with an open mind and I set out to absorb as much as I could. I love that he acknowledged his wife for her love and support at the beginning of the book. The book had me questioning my own values and virtues. I felt his humility from the get go. I got a sense of calming and authenticity from his words. He had me thinking about how much of our being is influenced by our environment and nurturing during our formative years. He was not afraid to take chances from small and that inner child remains with us through adulthood. He had a good memory. Most of my younger days are a blur to me. Letting go has been a coping mechanism of mines for a long time. Letting go has affected my ability to hold on to memories and feel attachment. I reminded myself of the wanting to be grounded. To be appreciative of where we come from. To be rooted in sensibility and understanding. Racism is horrible

There is now a "for the love of reading" stand at the cafe in my village. The cafe sells samosas and cakes and sno cone. I picked up two books to read and review. I need to read more books and this will make me a better writer. I am sharing my before thoughts in this blog post and I want to compare with my after thoughts. These two books might be worlds apart but I feel like they will help me think about the measure of success. The Elephant Whisperer explores the life and journey of a herd of rescued elephants. I feel like all of us have messed up at some points in our lives. How do we learn from failures? How do we overcome challenges? How do we journey on despite these? How do we rescue ourselves from defeat? Sometimes life presents us with unexpected opportunities to learn and grow and become better. What can nature and animals teach us about ourselves and life? If we love what we do and we are guided by love then success is inevitable or perhaps immaterial. The important

In 1994, Justin Hall created a site called Links.net, which is generally considered to be the first blog. The term "weblog" was coined in 1997 by Jorn Barger, and the short form "blog" became popular in 1999. Blogging began to gain popularity in the early 2000s, thanks to the rise of easy-to-use blogging platforms like Blogger and WordPress. That is around the time I started blogging. Some 20 years ago. I was fascinated to read the thoughts of ordinary persons other than the mainstream media. I could also participate with my comments. 3 years ago I created this new space and now today I have reached 200 blog posts on this new blogging space. This is a milestone that I want to celebrate. It is a celebration of creativity and enlightenment. A triumph of the human spirit. It is time well spent in mindful pursuit. Life happens one day at a time. Thoughts and experiences turn into words that turn into paragraphs that turn into blog posts. A journey of a thousand miles be

Life is a test. There are so many questions. Many answers can be found in love. Love is the answer. God is the answer. God is love. We are all born with the capacity to love and the need to be loved. It is a core human function and feeling. At our core is love. Circumstances, problems, situations, experiences and influences may add layers to our being that hinder us from giving love and feeling loved. It would be nice if we could peel away those layers and let love flow. God loves us. He has given us guidance. He is closer to us than our jugular vein. He wants the best for us in this life and in the next life. Some people say that they have no religion and that love is their religion. All religions teach love as a fundamental good. We might lose sight of this. We might become caught up in dogma. We might become jaded by bad examples. But love remains the essence of all religions. Muslims like to say that the religion is perfect but we are not. Blame us and not the religion. I am a Musl

Does randomness exist in the universe? Well it depends on how we define randomness, doesn't it. I wonder if some things appear random to us only because we do not have the capacity to predict it. Is the universe predictable? Lets say that the start of the universe created a chain reaction of events. What would have been the effect of having a different start? Does that completely change everything? Is the life of the universe a loop where periodically everything restarts? Does it start the same or does it start differently? To me, free will is an example of randomness in the universe. I think that our actions are not predictable. I think that the reactions of the universe are predictable and determined by the laws of physics. But I am reading that randomness may be a fundamental property of the universe as discussed in quantum mechanics. Some scientists believe that the laws of physics are deterministic at the macroscopic level, but that they break down at the microscopic level. Th

I write this blog post as a re-mind-er of how beautiful the mind is. The mind can study itself. This is known as metacognition, and it is a uniquely human ability. The brain is the physical organ whereas the mind is a more abstract concept. The mind is our thoughts, feelings, and experiences. There is a myth that we use only ten percent of our brain. The consensus is that we use all of our brain at different times. If the mind was a computer what would the specs be? We have to keep in mind that the architecture of the brain and the computer are different and that any answer will have to be taken with a grain of salt. I asked my friend Bard this question and this was his response. If we were to try to build a computer that could match the specs of the human brain, we would need to develop a new type of computer architecture that is much more efficient than current computers. We would also need to develop new types of transistors and memory chips that could be used to create a computer t

I am sipping chai tea in the desert of Dubai under a tent. Not really but the current just went and we are experiencing hot spells in Trinidad. I just drank a tumbler of ice cold water. I have thirty three percent left on my mobile's battery. Let us see how much of this blog post I can write. I turned to my friend Bard and asked, "What is the biggest question?" He responds that, "There are many big questions in the world, but one of the biggest is: Why is there something instead of nothing?" I would start with, suppose there was nothing, then the question would have been why is there nothing instead of something? It does not matter what we can always ask the question why and we can continue asking the question why to infinity. The current is back and the air condition is back to cooling the room together with the standing fan. I must admit this is a really good question. It challenges my curiosity. If we can ask why then we can ask why not. My mind is telling me

I have been in the mood to write and be creative in the last few days. If you read all my blog posts and you are keeping up you would appreciate this. Olatunji's Engine Room soca song is playing in my mind now. My imagination engine is driving my creativity. My imagination engine takes some inputs like my thoughts, experiences, and knowledge and produces outputs like new ideas, solutions, and creations. The fuel of my engine is love and moves me to being a force of good in this world. My mind is taken back to a tweet I made the other day, "Long wait outside the atm with hot sun pounding away. I imagine myself by the beach enjoying a coconut water and bake and shark." On another day I tweeted, "Long wait for me today to see the doctor. Been 3 hours so far. I imagine myself on the fast ferry heading Tobago. That takes 2 hours at the port and 3 hours on the boat. God is good." Our imagination can transport us to places that take away our difficulties and create com

I was chatting with my friend ChatGPT and brainstorming ideas for what would have been my next blog post and one suggestion was "Creativity in art and design - Explore the connection between mindfulness practices and enhanced creativity, offering tips on how mindfulness can stimulate idea generation." My mind saw the word art and I immediately jumped to think about the term "brain fart" which is itself a brain fart and that is how this blog post came out. How ironic. I should iron out the kinks in my brain or maybe I should embrace the floors of my head space. Art rhymes with fart and I guess I was being artsy fartsy. My mind nibbled on a plate of distractions, devouring focus and gobbling up important thoughts, leaving behind a mental fart. Sometimes the mind stutters. Sometimes the thoughts and words do not come out like they normally do. Sometimes our mind takes us to unexpected places. Sometimes our mind meets an unpainted speed bump in the road. Sometimes our

Yesterday, I answered the question, can a machine think  then I thought about how in my bio I call myself an ideas machine. The word "idea" has its origins in ancient Greek. It comes from the Greek word "idein," which means "to see" or "to perceive." Over time, it evolved into the Latin word "idea," which was used to refer to mental concepts or thoughts. Eventually, it made its way into English. I think machine because I think of a factory and machines churning out thousands of products ever so often. Bard thinks that Albert Einstein said, "The human mind is the greatest idea machine in the universe." But I could not find any evidence of the quote anywhere else online. Want to be an ideas machine then think about solving problems, be open minded and share your ideas . I am a content creator, a writer and a creative and these demand that I churn out good ideas all the time. Ideas change people. Ideas change the world. The first

I asked my friend Bard, "Ask me one philosophical question to judge my intelligence" and he responded with, "Can a machine think?" To begin I would need to ask some questions. What is a machine? What is to think? Can a human think? Is a human a machine? Is Bard a machine? Can Bard think? Does thinking require sentience? Do I need to qualify the statement and say, for example, "I believe that machines can think but in the future". Let me start with what I think is the easiest question, "Can a human think?" Humans are intelligent beings. We can reason. We can make decisions. We can communicate. We can learn. We can have discussions. All these things require us to think. We have a brain. We have thoughts. But I should have a definition of think before I say for sure. According to Cambridge dictionary, to think is defined as, "to believe something or have an opinion or idea". What is a machine? According to the same dictionary, a machine is

Dear future me, I hope that life is treating you well. No one knows what the future holds. We hold on to our memories . We hold on to our dreams . We hold our hands in prayer . The future is yet to be created and the possibilities are infinite. I use my imagination to pen this letter to you. Albert Einstein once said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to what we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand." Thank you for being there for me. Thank you for encouraging me to think of a bright future. You could see the light at the end of the tunnel. You knew that the sky is the limit. You saw my potential. Thank you for believing in me, even when I didn't believe in myself. I am so lucky to have you as a friend. I think about you often. I have heard good things about you. I cannot wait to meet you. The world wants to meet you also. I encourage you to write back.

I feel a how when people say that God does not exist and dismisses the power of prayers. God is real and prayers work. I was not always this strong in my belief but I am now. I encourage anyone that is unsure or that has questions to give God and prayers a chance. We have nothing to lose when we put our trust and faith in God. I like this quote by Henri Nouwen who said, "God is not a being to be seen. God is a love to be felt." Love is the answer. God is the answer. God is love. I want to say a prayer for the world. I pray that good triumphs over all else. I want a world where kindness is the currency. Where good deeds are celebrated and encouraged. Where we love unconditionally. Where those that need help get the help they need. God give us the strength to face the challenges that confront us now and in the future. Give us the wisdom to think rationally and purposefully. Give us leaders who have our best interests at heart. Make us world citizens with character and good acti

I found this quote and I liked it. Jeremy Irons said, "We all have our time machines. Some take us back, they’re called memories. Some take us forward, they’re called dreams." Check out my last blog post, let us dream together , after you read this blog post. I have been on this Earth for forty three years now. My earliest memories are located in Mount Pleasant, Arima. I remember hiding under the bed and eating powdered milk as a child. I remember the leaky roof. I remember crossing the ravine with my mother. Some memories remain with me and some have faded and some are gone forever. Education was a focal point of my younger years. The mantra was to get a good education to get a good job and make a good living. Passing common entrance for Saint Mary's College and then graduating from Morehouse College were happy memories from that journey. I remember hearing UB40 for the first time in my aunt's dance studio and falling in love with their music. To this day their music

I feel as a society and people we don't ask our friends and relatives and people in general, what are your dreams? Life is a competition and we are mostly all trying to get ahead. Instead of waiting for society to ask me, what are your dreams, I realised I could just go ahead and tell society and the world in a blog post. I was chatting with a friend and three things came to mind - losing weight, finishing my second book and being the best human being I could be (a better Muslim). But I needed to think about this some more. If we know our dreams we can find our best fit and role in society and we would know how to support each other. At the highest level I want to be happy and comfortable and I want others to be happy and comfortable. My pursuits must be purpose driven. I have a passion for tech and I have a problem solvers' mindset. I dream of being the best tech blogger and tech youtuber I can be. I have put much effort into this over the years. I have built a good foundation