The Tools of Excellence

Number 32: The 99 Ice-Cream.

The 99-ice cream is time for a break.

A 99 ice-cream clearly isn’t a Tool of Excellence for nutrition: it’s one for joy. Sometimes excellence means allowing yourself to experience such moments without justification or guilt.

A good ice cream is a sensory delight: cold, sweet, creamy, melting on your tongue. It triggers endorphins, makes hot days bearable, and good days better. The British “99” with its soft-serve vanilla topped with a crumbly Flake is the classic example. Simple, affordable, and universally loved, it’s an iconic symbol of childhood holidays, beachfront promenades, and everyday indulgence.

The ritual matters as much as the ice cream itself. Walking to the local shop on a summer evening, choosing your flavour, and sitting on a bench watching the world while you eat slowly. A deliberate pause, a moment of presence and pleasure. I’m a rare ice-cream eater, and that’s what makes it an occasional, incredible pleasure especially after a hike.

Excellence isn’t relentless optimisation. It’s knowing when to stop and enjoy something delightful. Not every day. Not as a coping mechanism. But regularly enough to remember that life includes pleasure for its own sake.

One scoop. Pure enjoyment. Zero justification.

The other sixty-nine tools of excellence are here.

Uncertain Times

Never go away. Control what you can. Read widely the best literature for wisdom and comfort. Listen to the best music for mood management. Shop locally, enjoy cooking and eat well. Spend time with those who listen, support and create.

And walk daily, the greatest distance you can.

On Writing

I receive a lot of questions about writing: the craft, the source of ideas, getting it into a good state. So….

As with any craft there are many, many books out there which will guide you with the process. If I had to name one I would suggest Stephen King, On Writing. In that he gives you the key: you must practise your craft by writing, by writing regularly and writing a lot.

If you are serious about become a good writer, you must write every day. No excuses. Get up and write.

Ideas come from observation. I write fiction. An idea for my spy story Bram came when I was in a coffee shop and someone near me was spreading their papers and I could see that several were marked confidential. What if? What if he were doing it deliberately? That became a chapter in Bram.

I write non-fiction. Those ideas come from my own challenges on productivity or AI or the expressed concerns of my audience.

In either case, observe and note. Not every idea is a novel or a book. But it might be.

My non-fiction has a precise structure. My fiction has a loose structure as I know that as I write ideas will come .

For both the idea is to generate quantity and then edit to produce quality. My experience is that the process of producing the error free text is very much a long tail. Do not ignore it.

And AI? Do not use it to write for you; you will lose your voice, your soul and your magic. But by all means get it to do some research for you.

I hope that helps. Go write.

The Tools of Excellence

Number 24: The Personal Compass Review

All of us seek direction, and that needs a compass.

My Personal Compass considers six life dimensions: career, health, money, relationships, fun, and contribution to assess whether you are heading in the direction and enjoying the balance you seek.

Each month, rate each dimension on a scale of 1-10. Imbalances become at once obvious. This prevents the common mistake of excelling in one area while neglecting others. Brilliant career but deteriorating health? The compass shows it. Strong relationships but financial chaos? Visible at once. Excellent money and career, but zero fun? Your analysis does not lie.

The six dimensions are comprehensive:

Career: work satisfaction, progress and purpose. Health: physical fitness, nutrition, sleep and mental well-being. Money: income adequacy, savings, debt management and financial security. Relationships: family, friends, romantic partner and community. Fun: hobbies, play, adventure and enjoyment. Contribution: helping others, meaningful impact and legacy.

Rate yourself honestly as any discomfort is the point; it forces acknowledgement of a neglected area before it becomes a crisis. Review monthly and adjust your focus as necessary.

I’ve been running my own personal compass personally now for a couple of decades; you will see the results within a couple of weeks.

Six dimensions. Monthly check. Complete life overview.

The other sixty-nine are right here. Instant. Kindle. Budget. Worldwide.

The Tools of Excellence

Number 18: The Playlist

Music changes brain chemistry: a well-crafted playlist puts mood management in your pocket.

Feeling down? Queue up your “Energy Boost” playlist, a choice of upbeat tracks. Anxious before a presentation? Your “Calm Focus” playlist settles your nervous system. Need creative inspiration? Your “Flow State” playlist has the wordless soundscapes that let ideas appear. Celebrating? Your “Dance Like Nobody’s Watching” playlist demands movement.

The magic is having pre-built mood tools ready when you need them. Building playlists when you’re already in a bad mood usually doesn’t work; your brain wants to wallow. Build them in advance, during neutral moments, deliberately curating the tracks that reliably shift your state.

Over the years, I’ve have built many useful playlists, and in the car, I’m often old-school, with five reliable CDs that make any journey, any jam, easier.

And be willing to get up and dance. Moving to music compounds the effect. Three minutes of dancing to the right song can reset an entire afternoon’s mood. It feels ridiculous until it works, and then it feels essential.

One playlist. Three minutes. Transformed mood. Mood management made effortless.

The other sixty-nine Tools of Excellence.

Dario Amodei

is an American AI researcher and entrepreneur best known as the co-founder and CEO of Anthropic. He previously worked at OpenAI, where he played a significant role in the development of large language models. I am following him closely as he is particularly known for his focus on AI safety and alignment, attempting to ensure advanced AI systems behave in ways that are beneficial and predictable for humans. At Anthropic, he has championed ideas such as “constitutional AI,” which aims to embed ethical principles directly into AI training; the latter is well worth a read. His work places long-term responsibility and risk reduction at the centre of AI progress.

This is his latest essay which-might I suggest-is essential reading.

Go read. Go study.

And here is my contribution to the topic.

How to Beat ChatGPT.

Release it Clean

Regular readers of this blog will know that I am a fan of self-publishing (for two main reasons: control over your MS and short time to market). Such readers will also know that I believe your book needs to be delivered with perfect text i.e. error free. Many readers have written to ask about my approach to ensuring errors are close to zero. Tomorrow we’ll look at that but first it’s useful to understand a little terminology as there are different levels of editing or preparation.

There is line editing Aide-mémoire: “How does it sound?” → Improves flow, voice, rhythm, style (sentence by sentence)

There is copy editing Aide-mémoire: “Does it make sense?” → Fixes clarity, grammar, consistency, logic

There is Proofreading Aide-mémoire: “Is it clean?” → Catches typos, spelling, punctuation, formatting

And the order is Line edit → Copy edit → Proofread or Sound → Sense → Spots

TBC

The Tools of Excellence

Number 13: Blackboard Paint

This paint will transform any wall into a canvas for thought. Two coats of blackboard paint-matte black, slightly textured-and suddenly you have unlimited space for ideas, lists, diagrams, quotes, and calculations.

Quality chalk on that black density feels satisfying in a way that dry-erase markers never do. The slight resistance as you write, the clean lines, it’s visceral. And unlike those whiteboard pens that dry out, squeak annoyingly, or leave ghost images, chalk is simple: it writes, or it doesn’t. When it’s done, you grab another piece.

The blackboard wall becomes your external brain. Priorities are captured, executed, and erased. Project timelines span a metre of wall space. Brainstorming sessions are filled with possibilities. Inspirational quotes stay up for weeks. Shopping lists can be started. I love a blackboard wall. Most surfaces will take the paint, and the ability to think big is liberating. I can list, mind-map, sketch, timeline or create a matrix. All my writing starts here.

Unlike small whiteboards, a painted wall gives you room to think big. Ideas spread out, connect, breathe. You can step back and see the whole picture.

Productivity made visible. Creativity given space. Immediate overview.

The other sixty-nine tools of excellence are here.