What's the intention?

It’s been a long time. How have you been? Some magic made it so that you are subscribed to my journal; why don’t you hit reply and say hi?

Writing has been on my mind daily, yet I have almost not written anything since my initiation in January.

It feels like my life is “before” and “after” the Bwiti Iboga initiation; it is that powerful. My African friends said integration takes 6-12 months; I am in month 5.

What’s the intention?

This simple question was presented to me in a significant way during my initiation and stayed with me ever since.

Whenever an idea to do something arises, this quiet voice asks me, “What’s the intention?”

Let’s write a newsletter, for example.

Guess what comes next? I don’t write it. I don’t write it because I cannot find a good enough intention to justify my emailing you all.

Today, I found it. I intend to write for the pleasure of writing. Nothing more.

I could write it for myself in my private journal. Funny enough, after writing maybe 15 notebooks over the years, I don't write there anymore either. I have always liked sharing thoughts and ideas in public so why not continue as long as it’s not coming with the wrong intention (like building a following or ego stuff like that I was caught in the past in.)

“What’s the intention” being permanently on my mind, I think this question is very healthy to ask myself.

It puts me more in an observation mode before acting on anything, as I learned in meditation. Observe feelings, emotions, and sensations, positive and negative, pleasant and unpleasant. In this case, observe anything I want to do before doing it. Ideally, observe anything I’d like to say before saying it.

In other news… AI.

After five years away, I spent a few weeks in San Francisco and at the TED conference.

It's no surprise everyone is talking about AI or working on it. I asked my friend Jeremiah Owyang for a few pointers to check; here they are; feel free to suggest other AI newsletters or sources I should look at to educate myself.

• there is an ai for that, and its fabulous AI influencers chart (!)

• the Neuron

• Synthedia

• and of course anything Reid Hoffman puts in the world, that I already knew.

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