Kourosh Dini's Blog, page 21

Delighted – Aerial View

More on the Completable List

An engine in productivity is a completable list. If a list is sensed as completable within a certain time frame, it tends to be more motivating. That workable time frame may depend on the individual, the type of work, and general circumstances.

To this end, consider reviewing your system and determine which of your lists:

Are completable and In what time frames are they completable?

Examples are:

Today – over a single day Communications – over a single session, maybe twice daily Projects to review – daily or weekly Inbox – cleared daily or weekly Filin...

How I Write a Synthwave Piece From Start to First Draft – “Ztir”

Much of how I write appears improvisational, but… well everything is improvisational. Really, I focus on the parameters that create structure in song, and follow them for the most part. So long as I remain in practice with that, exercising short term memory as well, I can create a piece fairly quickly. Here I show the process I go through.

Ztir was done written and recorded live as I performed at Nitida Ridge in Second Life – 2019-10-12.

If I decide to publish the piece, I’ll need to go through and clean it up...

On The Importance of Thinking Small

“Envision your goals.” “Think big.” “Dream!” Such are the refrains we often come across in some motivational lecture, speech, or blurb.

And, there is truth to these ideas. After all, our visions do inform our actions. Our actions, in turn, build our visions.

But I think it is equally important to dream small. Now when I say this, I do not mean we should aim for low accomplishments. And perhaps to some extent I do mean we should consider the smaller steps that build our larger goals.

But more to my point, what I...

Buddy Rich – Amazing Drummer

If you’ve never seen him or heard of him, Buddy Rich is simply an amazing drummer. This is just one of those instances where my jaw drops:

Valve – Aerial View – Piano Performance

How Often Should I Clear the Inbox?

It all depends on the granularity of the decisions you are setting aside.

If you are in the middle of writing a report and you notice out of the corner of your eye that someone is texting you, you can write a task to respond in the Inbox. But that won’t mean much unless you have a habit of clearing the Inbox at the end of a session.

If you like to set aside ideas for the work you are in the middle of and return to them before wrapping up, a regularly cleared Inbox can again be very helpful.

However, you may be qui...

The Herd (Piano – Overhead Camera)

Sunny Outside – Bird’s Eye View Piano Series

Success vs Improvement

When first doing something well, we may believe ourselves to be good at that thing. However, this is often untrue.

As an example, when I am able to play a new piano piece well for the first time, I’m excited. I believe I have it down. However, I try again and the very next time, things go poorly. Sometimes even worse than it had been several weeks earlier.

But that only means a new phase of the journey has begun. Getting something right once is not enough. Doing something correctly regularly is a much bette...