Here are some notes I jotted down this morning on how to be an independent thinker. P.S. It is almost Christmas and I shall take off the next few days from blogging. Happy Holidays!
Month: December 2022
Day 169: Dividends, You Are Pretty Cool.
Over the past week or so, I’ve been like a kid waiting for Santa. The cause of my anticipation? No, not Christmas. Instead, it’s the arrival of year-end dividends from our investments. Ironically, when I started investing, I didn’t know what dividends were. I basically thought of investing as buying and hoping that the price will rise. Like a lot of people, I focused on price appreciation. This is the glamorous poster-child of investing that gets all the attention. You read stories of people who bought Tesla at $13, for…
Day 168: Letting It Evolve Naturally
So I have been composing daily since the beginning of June. That’s almost seven months of daily composing. I have written a ton of new music, gotten a lot of experience using Logic Pro, and done more orchestrating than I ever have before. Orchestrating is something I have dreamt of doing for many years, this year was the first time I really sunk my teeth into it. So it’s been a blast. A little while ago I started to realize, “Hmm, maybe I’m ready for more than just being in…
Day 167: Attracting “Having” Versus “Lacking”
I write a lot on this blog about thoughts. As I continue exploring this topic, I am realizing more and more how completely our life is a reflection of, nay, the product of our thoughts (!). It’s like we play the movie in our minds, and then our lives ultimately reflect that.”You become what you think about” is a phrase I have often heard in Law of Attraction circles, places like “The Secret” and “Think and Grow Rich.” The trick is to think about a wanted subject without actually activating…
Day 166: Most Satisfying Experiences of 2022
I love making appreciation lists 🙂 I do it all the time when I write at the cafe, and I have recently blogged them here and here. Today I would like to list some of the most satisfying experiences of my 2022 and why they were especially satisfying. Here goes: My Most Satisfying Experiences of 2022
Day 165: Thoughts On Looking Forward
I have been reminded again and again recently of the importance of looking forward. I want to be a master of manifesting what I want in life. What I hear again and again from Abraham-Hicks is that you cannot manifest what you want if you are too focused on what you already got. If you want to create something new, magical, exciting, life-changing in your life, it is so important to look forward, to be focused on what you want to create, instead of looking back into the past. The…
Day 164: “Ungraceful Exit” (Original Music)
Here’s a lively, emotional piece I wrote today. I loved creating the rock-ish vibe with the electric guitar, bass, and drums. I also really enjoyed doing the solos with the synthesizers, especially the one that explodes in after the first 12 seconds.
Day 163: Reflections on 2022 Market Volatility
I heard a podcast, Ben Carlson’s “Portfolio Rescue,” discussing the frequency of high-volatility days in the market this year. I don’t remember the exact stats, but basically, there have been a lot of days this year–a lot more than usual– where the market gained or lost 2% or more. This squares with my experience: since I started investing in 2015, the only other time I remember so many swings was during the beginning of the Pandemic in early 2020. Anyway, I found it helpful hearing about this aspect of the…
Day 162: Getting What You Want (Personal Case Study)
We know what we want because life experience causes us to know what we don’t want, which therefore helps us know what we DO want. And so the key is to focus our thoughts into harmony with what we want, until our thoughts and beliefs coincide with what we want, therefore attracting it to us. Yeah, simple, right? Ha. Since I have been thinking a lot about my running life recently, I’ll use that area as a way to try this idea out. Now that I am on the other…
Day 161: “Winter White” (Original Music)
For this piece I was trying to create the feel of the cold during winter months. Rather than trying to write a melody with a chord progression, I kept things simple: a few melodic elements in the piano that repeat, some piano accompaniment, and some strings to add to the drama.