Birthday update on my existence

Thanks for all the great birthday wishes. Rather than superficial responses to each of you, here's an in-depth update on where I'm at.

I moved to St. John's NL, this summer and spent 3 months fixing up the place. The room in this photo was a disaster, so you can see my handywork.

It's been fun. I can do an ok job with drywall, paint, electrical, plumbing, and managing rot wood; plus I love my power tools and even blowtorch. My father is an excellent DIY consultant and teacher.?Maybe it's time to start AlterSpark Renovating.

However, my need to fix up a home was part of my bigger scheme--to create a stable home base from which I can leave the rat race, setup a financially self-sustaining property, and give myself a sabbatical runway.?

I also downsized AlterSpark and the Behavioural Design Academy, so I have a lighter training/teaching load.?

With some extra time, I'm teaching at Memorial University for social enterprise marketing this term and qualitative research methods next term. I may also teach impact measurement.??

I'm also training government agencies, and working with an amazing startup on the next generation of AI, which we'll interact with, just like humans. I'm under NDA, so that's all I can say.??

I feel tremendous pressure to convert my entire training system to a series of books.?

The first book is on the psychology color. Some of the science is game-changing, and inspiring, but it also brings some scary AI super powers. This book is close to first full draft, after a year of development.?

My second book is my entire training system in a narrative book format. The first draft is about 70% complete.??

Along with my two books, are a series of scientific papers and software that implement most of the ideas.?

However, I'm fighting one poisonous distraction--which I've allowed some indulgence.?

When is a distraction toxic or nurturing for you? When should you avoid it (like a self-destructive meth addiction) or follow it like a passion that leads to a life of fulfillment??

Only you can judge.?

But in psychology, the line between a psychological disorder and normality is whether you experience harmful disruption. So there's a fuzzy line between normal/abnormal, healthy/unhealthy, wise/foolish.?

I've always followed my motivation and built my life on the things that motivate me. Unfortunately, the things that inspire us sometimes make no practical sense, and drain our money.?

My PhD is an example. I quit a high-paying (tax free) job in the United Nations, with 30-40 holiday days per year, an amazing pension, lots of social status, travel, and amazing people. My office window view was of a castle overlooking the Rhine River in Bonn, German.?

I quit to complete a PhD. It was irrational and done in fear because I knew what I was giving up. But the alternative was a life of regret--something I was unwilling to accept.?

This was an irrational decision, but a good one. I have no regrets.

For me, important decisions are usually forged in fear, because you're gambling on losing what you have, to get what you want.?

My life became interesting at the age of 27, when I told myself, "Jump and a net will appear".?

This quote may sound insane, but the idea's best summed up by the quote, "Burn the boats". It's not boats you're burning; it's boat-bridges, used to cross from Africa to Spain for military conquest. The idea was that if you burned the boat bridge that led back to Africa from Spain, the soldiers only had one option, to fight forward for glory or die in humiliation.

Loss aversion is the most powerful motivator. Superfillay, we discuss it as a simple loss-framing technique to make nudges more nudgeworthy.

But at a biological level, it's full threat avoidance, which ranges from trivial to life-threatening levels levels of stress.?

The whole nudge is mislabled. It's not a loss that we avoid more than a gain, but a threat we avoid more than an opportunity. It's far deeper.?

Stress is the loudest emotional signal. But it's one that our brain has adapted from physical threats to social threats.

For this reason, the fear of failure, and especially public humiliation, can feel like a life-or-death struggle. Look at what humans do to avoid the emotional punishments that come with public humiliation. Look at what they do to feel the emotional reward of public honor.?

When I want to achieve something in life, I remove my safety and channel the ensuing stress, to energize and focus on the priorities.?

My life has been a series of suicidal jumps, where I dive into the deep-end, and learn what works. I'm usually stupid enough to jump in, and smart enough to swim.?

I'm explaining this psychological existentialism because my move to St. John's was not just physical--it was psychological too, a boat-burning move.

The whole point of buying property in a beautiful part of Canada with a good university was to get some long-term security, while also allowing me to burn my boats and focus on some of the things that motivate me.?

My move to St. John's and months of home DIY was to create a financially sustainable property that allows me to do less rat-racing and more of the writing and engineering I enjoy.

Now with the worst home projects done, I'm back to the behavioural science.?

I feel pressure to get my books published--so those are priority number one.?

But second, I'm only allowing light indulgence in my biggest interest, on fusing psychometrics with neuroscience to build technologies that can connect human nervous systems.?

In the last decade, I became more drawn to neuroscience, computer science, and electrical engineering.?

At heart, I'm a maker. All my behavioral science publications focus on practical applications of blending psychology into digital marketing and technologies.?

But I get bored easily, and so my ADHD mind shifted away from using neuroscience to make digital products more persuasive, to building technologies that are neuroscience.?

I use biology to inspire how I build software, and see the fusion of technology and the human mind as the most interesting of all subjects.?

I'm way beyond the subject for which I'm known, and make my income. I've been moving to the next level for some time, but haven't financially been able to do it...yet.?

The future rarley pays the bills, and innovators who are too far ahead usually discover that the market punishes them quite violently rather than embrace the future--especially if you're a Canadian.?

During COVID, something profound happened. I developed a protocol for connecting nervous systems, allowing direct brain-to-brain communication.?

To put it another way, consider application interfaces for human-centered tech. Mobile phones communicate with visual, auditory, and haptic signals.?

We mediate the communication with sensory signals that move from source, to medium, to the receiver--and vice versa.?

But during COVID, I developed a framework and signal processing protocol that goes beyond the standard mediated communication.

?It's a system for non-invasive brain-to-brain communication that I believe could be used to link nervous systems without surgery.?

The first brain-to-brain message over the Internet already happened years ago, so this is old news. But my idea is on the user interface and protocol that we use to connect consciousness. It's more about the interfaces to our sensory systems and signal processing.

Rather than look at external objects that produce indirect signals (like apps and web pages), why not communicate directly with consciousness??It seems much more accessible to me.

It's not as crazy as it sounds.?You'd just need to understand neuroscience. And I'm not the only person on this.

My problem is that the existing technology is all proprietary or of such low quality it's unusable. The problem with inventing something that may work, which does not exist, is that you must build it to test it. So my MVP threshold is painfully high.?

I started teaching myself electrical engineering, C++, and purchasing all the building blocks for my platform. I don't need a full product, but just the ability to test the basic concepts on my own, before engaging others. I'd rather be certain it works before trying to raise funds and find my Wozniak.

I made progress but had to pull out because of the high costs. The only obstacle for me is money. Otherwise, this is all I would do.?

So I resolved to put it on a slow cook while managing my school, publishing my books, and then setting up a home that would give me the time to roll out my various projects.

With the home mainly in order, my plans are as follows:

First, finish the color psychology book and educational resources.?

Second, publish my book on applied behavioral design.?

Third, dive into bio-medical engineering, focusing on technologies that allow us to link human consciousness as a platform.?

Finally, I also need to build a healthier work-life balance.

That's my birthday update.??

If you're in St. John's, reach out.

It's a fun town.?

Brian