The blog this month is going to be about a return to minimalism and focus.

But an administrative note first. I have migrated this blog site to a different hosting service and to WordPress format. Well. I paid someone to do it. 😊. Part of the simplification process I discuss below. SquareSpace is pretty expensive for not using 80% of what it can do. If anyone has any comments or sees problems with the site please email me at aarcis.drift083@passmail.net

Minimalism

I’ve started to watch a new series on minimalism by a Finnish guy. See link below. Very nice. I like his tone and approach. Makes me want to visit Finland again 😊.

https://youtube.com/@sunnykindjourney?si=MvHGN1EMRsbJnkXa

First observation: It does not hurt to go back to the minimalism concept once in a while just to remind oneself about what it is all about. And then use that to refocus oneself on doing that. I stopped watching the minimalism stuff some years ago and since then I seem to go through phases where I buy a lot of gadgets, then think about minimalism, then go back to trying to declutter myself.

Moving from the Philippines to Thailand permanently is a very good way to declutter my life yet again. I am moving into a smaller living space. It is only 100 m² and that includes the balcony so really the living space is probably closer to 80 m². Versus about 140 m² in the Clark house. I am only moving whatever can be moved in my checked baggage. All the big stuff in the Philippines, such as the vehicle, sauna, treadmill, furniture, etcetera will either be sold or given away. I estimate that with one more trip, using my business class baggage allowance of 2 @ 32Kg bags, plus having my housekeeper do a trip and going back with 3 @ 20Kg bags, I will be done with the stuff that I want to move. And everything else? Out of my life. 😊

Focus

Another thing that I’m rediscovering is that focus is super important.

On numerous fronts, this is turning into a very busy year for me. There is an entire laundry list of things that I need to do in order to be able to close down my household in the Philippines and ramp up the one in Thailand.

But in addition to that, I am finding in various areas of my life; personal, relationships, learning languages, learning other things, like the Python programming language and AI, I have taken more than I can handle. Especially with my energy levels being the way they are.

So, I am appreciating more and more that I need to focus more on being focused and being more organized 😊.

Thai Language Update

With the Thai language, I find myself dithering considerably around the edges and not really GETTING IT DONE. I have started my plan that I spoke about earlier. I now have 4 hours of one-on-one classes every week, plus I am probably studying an additional two to three hours lightly during the week.

This Australian guy that I found, Stuart Jay Raj, has been a real help. This guy is, in my opinion, something like a polymath genius with a specialization in tech and linguistics. How arrogant of me to even try to label him🤣. But he seriously impresses me. In some ways he’s not terribly organized, but he has multiple businesses, has written an extremely good book on how to learn Thai, and put so much stuff online about how to learn Thai as well as other languages. I’m seriously impressed. I also have seen him use AI in a way that really streamlines the ability to organize your tools for being able to learn languages. Parenthetically, I have to add that this has also been part of what is overwhelming me right now on the focus front. I find myself going down the rabbit hole so much on trying to get stuff organized in order to learn Thai that I’m not actually learning Thai.

Incredible AI Example

But let me give an example of how he used AI:

Jay had access to a list of some 4000 Thai phrases and sentences that are in the vernacular, the way that Thai people really speak. The list had the original Thai script, the Romanized version of the script which shows what tones are on which words, and the colloquial English translation for those sentences.

I was in an online Mind Kraft session with him (this is a group that he does intermittently on Zoom that basically talks about the linguistics and how to learn languages). I watched him for about 10 minutes doing various things on his laptop in a command terminal:

• He used AI to go through the 4000 example sentences
• Specify to the AI engine that he wanted it modified so that it was being spoken by somebody between 40 and 60 years old generally speaking to younger people (which is important when you are speaking why because it changes the types of words that are used and the way that the phrases are done)
• Then the AI gave him the 50 most important phrases to know.

I am sketching over some of the details here, but it blew me away. In the space of 10 to 15 minutes he had generated a list of 50 sentences which were the most useful. And as he went through and read them and we could see them scrolling past on the screen I was amazed. It really works.

But, of course, in order to do that, there’s so much foundational stuff that is necessary.

• You need to understand which AI engine to use.
• You’ve got to learn how to use that AI engine and do the correct prompt engineering
• You have to have access to the resources.

The confusing thing about working with Stuart is that he has so much knowledge in his brain and when I joined him it’s like jumping into a raging river torrent and not being able to swim. At the moment I am struggling just to keep my head above water so that I can figure out how to begin to learn to drink from the fire hose of knowledge that he is dispensing.

I will say that his book, Cracking Thai Fundamentals, which I bought, did one thing for me that I thought I would never grasp. It allowed me to understand tones in Thai. I.e. I can look at a Thai word and figure out what tone it should have based on the spelling and tone marks. I can’t do it fast, but I can do it. And I never could before. Amazing! 😊

Kitchen Remodel

And now for something completely different … 😊 I am planning on doing a remodel of my kitchen here in the condominium. Why do if renting? If I plan to live here for a long time, I decided that it’s better to do it sooner rather than later. The kitchen is designed quite badly, it’s 15 years old, and it just really needs to be reworked. The cabinets are old, the shelves are all bowed, they have the wrong things in the wrong places so you’re doing so much work going back and forth back and forth between an appliance, the cutlery drawer, and the sink, etc. I believe that it will not be that expensive to remodel so this week I am having the initial consultation with somebody about how to do that. Below is the existing kitchen.

Simplify

Actually, doing this blog post has helped me look at an outline of what I need to do to focus on for the various projects that I have going on. But moving away from the Philippines is going to be a huge portion of simplifying my life this year to a huge extent.

I remember in the past, I used to think that it would be an OK thing to have two households. And had multiple households several times. Recently I talked to a good friend of mine in Hong Kong, quite well off, and he was talking to me about how they have their house and several rental properties in Hong Kong, they just bought a small house in London, and they have a house in the Bahamas… 🤪. I said to him that just hearing about it made me absolutely exhausted to think about everything that was involved in trying to maintain all of those properties. He did admit it was a bit over the top and they are trying to downsize 😊.

SIMPLIFY, SIMPLIFY, SIMPLIFY. Smaller footprint, simpler life, less impact on the world, less worries.

And a final link worth watching and then share it as wide and as far as you can … 😊