I like finance and learning about it, used to write about this topic here as well. I was thinking about getting back into the topic when I stumbled upon substack. Which is a platform for writers. I thought I might try this out and start a little experiment.
My real long term investment plan is really simple, buy an index fund and hold it. The main goal for my investment is to work on my pension. Long term boring stuff, which to my mind is a good thing.
On the other hand, a more active approach can ben fun as well, and very hard to do. As well as the fact most people with an active approach lose money or underperform a simple index fund.
But I am going to test this myself with paper short term (day)trading. And to give Substack a go I set it up there.
Researching the topic of day trading this reddit came up, and made a lot of sense. So I took this as a starting point for my own adventures.
Keep in mind that nothing on here or on my Substack should be taken as investment advice, please do your own research and due diligence, or consult a professional.
With this warning out of the way, I will outline the idea. The credit card hedgefund is an experiment to see if I can make a profit while actively trading my portfolio. The name comes from the budget I set myself to start out with, my credit card limit of € 3500.
It’s all done on paper, no real trades or real money is at stake. I might do that later on or try other strategies but time will tell.
I need to trade 3 months and make 100 trades and be profitable. There are some more specifications, but read all about it on my Substack.
Author: Cornerman
Max MSP a learning journey
As some older followers of this blog know I have been learning Max MSP. Which now has more focus since I can work on projects without sound. I have been looking at various ways to keep it going and not having to stop due to insufficient cognitive energy.
I have been working on a new way of daily planning which involves shorter time frames and more of them, which has some advantages and disadvantages. The biggest advantage is the continuous workflow. The short instances the biggest drawdown.
Max MSP itself for me has a steep learning curve, although the help files and the various books on it are great, I am going to try and fund some one on one teaching to get up to speed. Hopefully this will help.
I have dusted off an old looper project, my first idea for building tracks based on loops recorded from a Eurorack system. It was a pretty big system I had in mind which I now scaled down to make it functional as soon as possible.
Momentum is key now, otherwise I will keep trying to bite off more than I can chew. I will also try and compose and share some stuff from this setup.
Less is more
The larger the setup the more options I have. Which I absolutely love. However this also has a time implication, more of my limited time and energy will go into setting up and learning how to use it. I have tried to use a limited set of tools before which quickly escalated into much larger setups.
I am not very good in keeping a small setup and focussing on just that setup. Which is a bit weird as my discipline is pretty good. I can keep to my planning. I suppose this is because I love my toys. I am like a little kid in a toy store which is allowed to play with anything. And this does not yield any result. Just a lot of unfinished sketches.
So this time I absolutely need to keep my setup small and learn it inside out. which will be my focus the coming month. I keep my timelines a bit wider as last time I got frustrated with not achieving my goals. In retrospect I had too many things I wanted to get done in too little time.
This time that has to change. There is a lot to do which will take time. That’s just how it is.
Slowly back at it.
It has been a while and I have been thinking about how to make this blog an interesting place again for people to visit and keep it fun for me to get some writing out there.
This has always been just a personal page, simply sharing whatever I wanted on the subjects I am interested in. Which are music, running (and other sports), finance and all sorts of other things.
I also shared some of my more personal things such as my brain damage. I mostly struggle with on a day to day basis. This also being the reason for my absence of late.
Been dabbling in music and keeping you updated om my progress or lack thereof has helped me greatly, It was a structured endeavor which really helps me.
Unfortunately I struggled with sound and processing sound in my brain a lot and my appetite for doing music and keeping up this blog faded rapidly.
I am slowly getting back to working on music again, and I will have a go at blogging as well. I might just write on lots of other subjects as well. Just to keep the blog momentum going. Let’s see how this all goes. For now I am, be it cautious, back.
Forced break from music & blogging
It has been a while, due to some unforeseen issues with my brain damage resulting in a intolerance for sound I had to step away from music, and blogging fell to the side as well. They’re just wasn’t enough I wanted to talk about or get out there.
Brain damage is a fickle partner to live with. No matter how hard you work at maintaining your balance, sometimes out of nowhere problems arise. And you never know when they end and how long the good streak lasts.
In order to maintain some rhythm of work going I read more and got my exercise up. Mostly this leads to improvements on the long run. I am currently on the way back and try and listen to music and went out to the cinema for some non action movies on downtimes.
I have also written down lots of ideas which I can incorporate into my music. Which will be soon I hope.
Music gear favorites – Elektron Machinedrum
I really like musical gear, and I must admit I buy stuff too frequently and don’t take enough time to get into the newly acquired tools. Sometimes I postpone buying things for a long time due to the fact I am well aware of this behavior.
I have always wanted a Elektron Machinedrum since it’s release back in , it was an expensive machine and looked pretty complicated to me. So it was easier leaving it alone a.k.a. not buying it.
Around 2016 or thereabouts there was a moment you could buy it at a discounted price from Elektron as it was going out of production. That was the moment I snapped one up.
Then it pretty much disappeared in a cupboard after my initial attempts at getting aquatinted with it. I simply didn’t get it. The thing I was afraid of in the first place. Every once in a while I got it out and forced myself learning the machine. And at some point it started to make sense, very slow and with intervals.
Now I regularly get it out and learn more about working with it. I think its an underrated drummachine and the range of sounds you can get out of it is vast. Also the Elektron sequencer adds to the versatility of the machine and range of options.
It should be on everyones wish list just like the classic drummachines like the 808 & 909. Why ? Because the whole machine was a totally different take on drum synthesis and sequencing drummachines which was not done before. If this would’ve appeared at the time of the 808 & 909 it would result in bringing it’s own landmark stamp on music, just like those classis machines.
We all too often compare alle drummachines after those 2 classis which gave birth to electro , house & techno and shaped dance music for decades. But this machine deserves being viewed as an dare I say independent machine with its own purpose in making futuristic music.
I think it’s time for the Machinedrum to take a more central role as the drummachine to shape future sounds. It’s very capable of doing this.
Embracing imperfection
Perfection is something we all strive for, yet a lot of beauty can be found in imperfection. Perfection is a never ending story, and in pursuing perfection you can get paralyzed and not finish anything.
Finishing and letting go is one of the most important things in life, whether it is in life, work and art. At some point things are finished, as close to perfect as it can be at that moment in time. It deserves to be out there.
What is perfection anyway? Isn’t there always something to strife for? Sharpening your skills and growing into a better artist, person , or professional ?
Imperfection is a beautiful thing, just like happy accidents, or random occurrences. It’s everyday life. Embracing imperfection is embracing life. Everything needs an end, a finish.
Letting go of perfection is letting go of parts of uncertainty, self-doubt and insecurities. It takes more than striving for perfection and never releasing things.
The finish line will be pushed further everyday anyway, and releasing your art into the world will contribute to your growth as an artist in pursuit of the ultimate piece of art. Your perception of perfection, and once it’s there, you will find new goals and pursue your newly minted definition of perfection.
Which does not mean I am there yet, this just hot me when reading and studying psychological reactions on uncertainty, self-doubt and setting high standards for oneself. So I got to work on how I can release my own music faster and with less discomfort about my own skills and my own fight with perfection. And as I am writing this I am still a bit on the fence about the whole thing, while I know I need to do it to get things out there.
Practically this means setting certain deadlines for myself. Limiting the amount of time spent on a piece of art, resources and ideas I incorporate.
For example, and I will take a framework for music as I know this area better than let’s say writing a novel. Take just a few instruments , or even just one. Give yourself a framework in which you will finish the track. Tempo, length, genre maybe and set a limit , let’s say 14 days. Divide this 14 days into a few blocks. A few days for Sound design, recording, arranging, mixing and administrative tasks. Then after you have done all those things, release it. And don’t look back.
See if this framework needs any updates in it’s parameters. Adjust and move onto the next project. In this way you will learn to embrace imperfections and letting go. And you will learn a lot about your creative process as well. Above all you will learn too see the beauty in imperfection. And thus see the beauty in life.
Cultivating ideas and creative resources in music making
As soon as inspiration hits, you want to make sure the idea doesn’t evaporate into thin air. I have talked about working on your skills routinely which will lead to periods of inspiration and productiveness. Everything feels like its effortless.
Make no mistakes, this is the direct result of all the hard work and sharpening your skills. Showing up regularly and putting in the time. As with anything you will get better with practice.
A lot of ideas get left behind. You simply don’t have time finalizing all these great ideas. It therefore makes sense making notes and sketches of all these ideas in a way they form the future working stock. For all the days things don’t flow effortlessly.
There are a lot of ways of locking in ideas for future use. You can write them down, record them on your phone, sketch the essence. The most important thing is that you can remember the initial idea and work on it later on.
I have had a lot of failures in getting a structure set up for getting ideas down for future reference. I settled for pen & paper, advantages over digital forms are the physical actions and ingraining it in the brain.
But when reading it weeks or months later a lot of the time I could not make out what I originally set out to do. Not a big problem as it always has a starting point in it somewhere. But it kind of took away the enthusiasm.
So I opted for a format, a standardized way of writing ideas down and making sure I knew what I had set out to do. I start with giving the idea a title. Then I write down the concept, and the technical side of things. Which tools to use and how to use them. Then I set the length , speed and other characteristics of the song. Last but not least I draw the song in a time line fashion, breaks drops and other things.
In that way I have way more detail and I can work on the idea while writing it down. I can then do preparations and recording later on with more focus.
It has greatly helped my creative proces, as with anything, this way of doing things suits my personality and workflow. It’s just to give you an idea what might work. It took a while for me to get there, bit experimentation will get you there and is half the fun.
Book review – The Tao of Wu
For anyone with a love for 90’s hip hop the Wu-Tang Clan is at the forefront of that decade. Took the world by storm with a unique sound, unique crew off battle hardened Shaolin warriors. Each with there own unique style.
This book by the RZA is part biography, life philosophy and some music and business advice all rolled in one. It’s written from his personal perspective and talking about the various lessons in life, the highs and lows. Especially the combination of various religions, philosophical thinking, lessons learned on the streets and years of honing a craft makes for an especially interesting book.
For some the introduction might be a little too much in terms of philosophical explanations. But once the book gets started with his life story in focus all things flow together.
One of the more interesting things is the way he carved out his set of rules too live by, and ability to changes his views towards himself as he made mistakes along the way.
Its one of those books you will learn a lot from while reading and especially while not reading and digesting the content. You might not see a direct link with your own set of rules but the way of thinking and how his life progressed and lessons learned certainly will make you think about everything he has written in this book. Recommended reading, even if you never heard of the Wu tang.
Wu-tang Forever.
Focus your planning on building habits and routines
Last time I wrote about ways to get insight in how your time is really spent on a weekly basis and how you can get some breathing room into your week. However I did not go into the actual making of the planning itself. This week I will talk about building the planning and what should be the main focus when planning. And no it’s not (always) about efficiency.
Plan with consistency in mind.
We have 1 new goal in mind, something we want to do more and achieve a certain goal in. To get good at something we need consistency in the time we spent on it. So much so that it becomes a habit and is part of our weekly routine. Before it’s a habit , something we do almost automatically, it needs time to first become a consistent part of our planning. And we have to be able to execute a planning.
To make sure this is feasible our planning needs room to breath, not just in time but also purposefully with breaks, rest and recovery space. Only then will we be able to fully work trough our planning. So it’s not about doing as much as possible, but we need to plan for longevity. We need to be able to keep up with ourselves. Consistency is key. It’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon.
How do we achieve consistency in a planning ?
We know how much time we spent on things, we also made some changes. Dropped some activities from the list and limited time spent on certain activities. So how do we fit in our new goal ? We have some room, now we partly fill this in with activities towards our new goal. Make sure you choose 3 moments in the week. 3 is the minimum for making something a habit over the long run. Don’t overdo it in hours especially in the beginning. It’s hard work starting something new and will take a lot of energy. So start modest. Let’s say 2 sessions of 1 hour and 1 session of 1,5 hours. Take 5 to 10 minutes break between each 30 minutes. Plan those as well. So how does that look ?
| Time | Activity | Duration |
|---|---|---|
| 8:00 - 8:45 | Meeting | 0:45 |
| 8:45 - 8:55 | Break | 0:10 |
| 9:00 - 9:30 | Focus work | 0:30 |
| 9:30 - 9:35 | Break | 0:05 |
| 9:35 - 10:05 | Focus work | 0:30 |
| 10:05 - 10:15 | Break | 0:10 |
| 10:15 - 10:30 | Emails | 0:15 |
Why do we need breaks in our planning ?
We need breaks not just to take a rest and recover, but the most important thing, we need it to let our mind process and digest the things we learned. Rest gives our brain the ability to remember and preserve.
Everyone has a limited amount of energy for doing high cognitive tasks a day. Things like reading a difficult book (or manual), working on solutions to complicated problems and so on.
If you trained yourself very well in these tasks and your environment is at its best (more on this later) this is 4 hours a day. Really focussed work. That takes a lot of energy. To recuperate it means you can’t do this for 4 hours straight without breaks. you need breaks to maintain a high level of focus. And to get out of that chair. So to make those hours count, breaks are essential.
But I work 8 hours a day ?
Yes most people do, and not included time spent traveling. Luckily a lot of work related tasks are not high cognitive tasks. A lot of things are low cognitive tasks preceding the high cognitive tasks. Simply the hours it takes to get a job done.
Finding a solution to the problem is the high cognitive taks, getting the tools out and spending the hours is less cognitive demanding. Yet can still exhaust you without breaks. So when you work, maintain the breaks. Take less meetings. Make sure the meetings you take are to the point, and are not back to back. You need time to process what is said in that meeting and distill the work that comes out of it for you. It might be counter intuitive to say no to people more often. But it will free up your work calendar and it will improve the quality of your output. Thus making you more efficient. See, there is some efficiency to be gained as well.
So in order to save up some energy for your after work activities and your new goal, go and take the same approach for your work planning as well. Take the breaks, don’t overflow your calendar, make sure you focus on what’s important and block time for high cognitive tasks.
High cognitive tasks & their environment.
Things that take a lot of brain power, finding solutions to problems. Learning new skills. Doing the hard things basically, need a certain setting for your brain to be able to focus. the first one being, no distractions. So no phones, no interruptions and ideally no screens. Or no internet connected screens.
Make sure the desk is clean, with just the things you need, and a pen and some paper for taking notes. Yes paper notes, by writing your brain remembers things better. So take any preferred notebook, blank sheets of paper, and start writing. Draw things. Any way that helps you remember the things you want too learn or work out the solution to a problem. And be able to reproduce them.
Set a clock and take a break of 5 or 10 minutes every half hour. You need to practice this. We live in a world of distraction and its not easy staying focused. It takes time. First few attempts might exhaust you.
Weekly planning
Your weekly planning is an overview of important tasks and activities. More importantly plan your rest and preferable take one or two moments in your week doing nothing, making sure you have playtime or just hanging around. The most important thing is breathing room and consistency. Yielding results is far more about continuing working that it is about short periods of hard work on your passion project and then months of no work at all.
And last but not least, have fun !