10 Books That Changed My Life
I’m going to tell you about 10 books that changed my life, which is tricky for me, right now. Most of the books that changed my life are not currently in my possession. My library is in storage in the United States, the last 1000 books I could not bear to part with when we moved to New Zealand, so the interesting part of this exercise is — I have to see what really sticks. In selecting my top 10, I want to scan my eyes lovingly over my bookshelves, [...]
Natural Healing Remedies
As it turns out, working 60 hours a week for 9 months is not good for the body. I developed some startling symptoms recently, right about the same time I resigned from my day job, and decided to go back to running my business full time. To cure my symptoms, I used the natural healing remedies that have worked best for me: Qi GongNutritionBaths and SweatPositive ThinkingLaughter TherapyGratitude PracticesThe Naturopathic Principles The Healing Art of Qi Gong Qi Gong is an ancient Chinese moving meditation, and it has been used [...]
One year in New Zealand
I've been extraordinarily busy over the past year. Today is the one-year anniversary of putting in our 30-day notice on the house we were renting in Portland. Within the past year, the Huntress Clan has: Packed all of our worldly possessions into a storage unit Moved temporarily into my father-in-law's house Planted the Fairy Godmother, a dogwood tree that has the placentas of all three of my children in its roots Separated for 2 months while I came to New Zealand to search for a job Attained a full-time job [...]
10 Daily Tools For Positive Thinking
By nature, I am not a positive thinker. I have to work at it. Positive thinking will not do anything by itself, but as Zig Ziglar said, “Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will.” The success or failure of many things you do in life depends on how well you do those things - and if a few simple tricks can put you in a positive frame of mind, it can increase your effectiveness, as well as amplify your enjoyment of life. “We do not [...]
My favourite quote of all time is a misattribution.
When I was a young scholar, my life changed when I read this quote: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” I thought that Aristotle said this. For years, I ended my newsletters with this marvellous line, attributing it to the Ancient Greek philosopher and scientist. For a time, I even titled my newsletter ‘Habits of Excellence.’ I’ve been championing this quote because I admire both the content, and the poetic cadence, of the words. It was this very cadence should have [...]
My First Trip to New Zealand
It all started with LookSee Wellington. This program offered all-expense-paid trips for 100 people working in the Tech industry to come and visit Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. 48,000 people applied. Only 0.2% of those who applied were invited, and I was not one of them. Still, applying for a trip to New Zealand got us thinking about that place. And right now, the country I am in is a mess. We had some family members interested in leaving the US, and since the Huntress Clan has expatriated before, we [...]
Ten Things I Really Miss About Living In Costa Rica
It’s been more than a year since I left tropical paradise, and wrote about the Ten Things I Will Not Miss About Living In Costa Rica. As absence makes the heart grow fonder, now I’m homesick for that wonderful place. Here are the ten things that I miss the most. 1. Wearing Tank Tops All The Time It’s sunny and bright in Costa Rica before 2pm nearly every day of the year. If it happens to be the rainy season, you might get a downpour for a couple of hours [...]
The Breath of the Neutral Mask
Who are we before we become the character? That is the question that the Neutral Mask seeks to answer. "There are three masks: the one we think we are, the one we really are, and the one we have in common." - Jacques Lecoq It has been years since I have studied the deep and subtle foundations of the theatrical art, and returning to its arcane depths has given me a creative revitalization that I desperately needed. Last week I went to a Neutral Mask workshop, taught by Sarah Liane [...]
10 Lessons From 10 Years of Marriage
My wife and I formalized our fairy tale romance and married each other ten years ago, on a Tuesday morning. There was no one else present; we rented a penthouse suite in downtown Portland, dressed in our sacred garb, and at the appointed hour, friends and family around the globe lit the candles we had sent to them, and wished us well as we said our vows to each other in solitude. From that day to this, over the past ten years, I have enjoyed a deep and meaningful connection with [...]
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The OpenClaw moment 🦞
AI is having a moment right now, and it's because of OpenClaw. OpenClaw is an AI Agent that controls its own computer. This open-source AI agent can run on an old laptop, or a Mac mini, or a VPS, a Virtual Private Server. With its own hardware, email accounts, and web browser, its own memory and soul, installing OpenClaw creates a 24/7 AI assistant working on whatever you want. You don't want to run OpenClaw on your own machine - that's [...]
The Evaluation Loop: How AI Improves Its Own Output
AI is better at evaluating content than generating content. This makes sense, when you stop to think about it. For a large language model to interpret your instructions, and create output, all in the same step, it dilutes the same token budget over two requests. But if you have ask AI to evaluate its own outputs, it can focus all its attention on identifying how to improve. Then it can rewrite, separately. Here’s a simple copy/paste [...]
What’s working now with AI Enablement?
Giving your team Copilot licenses will not magically create AI transformation. That mindset is treating AI as a technology problem, when it is actually an operator problem. Most leaders I meet don't have a clear idea about what AI could do for their organization, or how to embed change at this scale. So they give new tools to untrained operators, and they just sit there, full of untapped potential. What I find works best is when people have three things: Sandbox: Create [...]
How to Coach Your AI (So It Actually Improves)
After 4 weeks of hosting AI Coaching Power Hours in my new community, the Ai Coaching Academy, we've uncovered some best practices: Provide specific feedback when responses aren’t satisfactory, guiding the AI to refine its output. Break down complex requests into smaller, more manageable steps. Use probing questions to help the AI dig deeper or explore alternative perspectives. Be patient and iterative, treating the AI interaction like a collaborative coaching conversation. Clearly articulate expectations and the measure of success for the task. [...]
The Ai Coaching Academy is live!
📊 Build the capability of the future, together. If you've been following me for a while, you know my story. If not, here's the TL;DR - I ran away and joined the circus, and lived as a street performer, hitchhiking across the United States. I settled down and had kids, moved to Costa Rica, and started my own digital marketing agency. My family moved to New Zealand, where there are no natural predators. I wrote a book called Marketing Yourself, which helped thousands of [...]
Claude’s New Updates are Killing My Busywork
If you haven't been using Claude, it might be time to give it a try. Anthropic has released a bunch of new Claude features recently. Claude Code has Twitter in a tizzy the last couple of weeks, especially after somebody released the Ralph Wiggum plugin. Here's a 10-minute video overview by Alex Finn. TL;DW - the Simpson's character Ralph Wiggum (ha! ha! I'm in danger!) revises your output until it meets goals. I've been playing around with the Claude Chrome browser extension, and it has [...]
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