I think I already overshared about 2023 on a previous text, but let’s have a overview of the year here as well.
Career
This year I left my first international job, at WEX, which was not an easy decision, since it is a great company, where I had all the support, but I didn’t want to work solely with UiPath anymore and more opportunities for Python freelancing arose – which ends up the flexibility was also a best fit for my personal life at the moment.
The freelancing world came with big challenges, for the first time, I managed to build a Python automation framework from scratch without a senior supervisor. This was incredibly enriching.
Also, 2023 makes five years that I’ve been officially on the IT job market! By the second half of 2019, I got a job as a trainee for Deloitte, where they sent me to the automations area and I’ve been in the field ever since.
Continuous Learning
Urban Planning Bachelor’s degree:
There is only the Macro and Meso Regional Planning Workshop, the Metropolitan Planning and Governance Workshop, and the Undergraduate Thesis left to complete for my diploma. However, due to challenging personal life changes this year, I haven’t made progress on these. The only task I managed to complete was delivering my research.
It focused on the Extraction of built area in satellite image time series Landsat of the city of Santarém – PA – 2012 -2002. The outcome wasn’t as good as I expected, since I decided to explore not with QGIS as we learned in class, but with javascript on google earth platform. Despite this, I learned a lot.
I also managed to attend two conferences with the research team, SBSR (Brazilian Symposium on Remote Sensing) and ENANPUR (The National Meetings of the National Postgraduate and Research in Urban and Regional Planning) – traveling is great, but doing so with academic purpose and cool people is even more fun.
Yoga Teacher Training 500hours:
I’m still surfing Yogic Studies world, 50% on my way to complete the Yogic Studies Advanced Certificate Program (YSACP).
My favorite module this year was the one about The Amṛtasiddhi, Haṭha Yoga’s First Text with professor James Mallinson, rich on medieval alchemy and the basis of yoga powerful bandhas.
Also the one about Women and Gender in Hindu Tantra with professor Sravana Borkataky-Varma from Harvard Divinity School opened my mind to a whole new world about transgenders and religion in India.
Life
I’ve shared this before, but in a nutshell, I became “unpartnered.” How do we navigate discussions about modern couples who cohabit after 30, without the traditional marriage ceremony, yet face a complex web of shared responsibilities, from bill payments to dividing house plants and kitchenware upon separation?
In the midst of this, I relocated to a new neighborhood, my psychologist went on maternity leave, I renovated my new apartment, a tragic death occurred in my family, also a cancer removal on another family member and another loved one came close to death but is now in a rehabilitation clinic. On top of this, after nearly a decade of living independently, I moved to a location right next to my blood relatives.
To say 2023 has been a challenging year would be an understatement.
On the other hand, living close to my family again has been an enlightening experience. It has offered me a deeper understanding of my roots and myself. While it presents its own set of challenges, I find great joy in spending time with my elderly relatives. My regular visits to my nearly 90-year-old grandmother, filled with card games and her life stories, have been particularly rewarding.
About my new neighborhood, it offers a stark contrast to downtown São Paulo. The sense of safety is palpable, allowing me to stroll at night with my phone in hand, a luxury I could not afford before. Yet, I find myself yearning for the familiar hipster vibes, the freedom of cycling at Minhocão, and the weekend breakfasts at TAKKO coffee shop, surrounded by fellow tattooed people.
Nowadays, my daily view is filled with wealthy individuals in gym clothes. The coffee shops, once my go-to spots for a change of scenery while working, are now mostly frequented by retired flâneurs. So, I prefer to stay at home, which led me to overthink my setup, so I bought myself a standing desk—fancy.
On the flip side, I’m a mere 10-minute walk from the indoor climbing gym and a 20-minute stroll from São Paulo’s “Central Park,” Ibirapuera Park. This proximity has significantly boosted my climbing skills and provided me with much-needed nature time.
After the initial tumult of the first semester, I’ve been channeling my energy into establishing new routines, strengthening my social and familial ties, and seeking stability. As I look ahead, I’m optimistic that 2024 will be a year of fewer disruptions and more tranquility.
GYM
I lost 7 kilos total and gained 3 kilos of muscle mass this year! Climbing definitely helped, but I’m also consistently going to the gym and applied Huberman’s Lab 3-5 protocol, which I found gave me the most strength I have ever had so far.
Squats: 40kg – 50kg
Rowing: 30kg – 40kg
Shoulder Press: 10kg
Chest: 15kg
Unilateral deadlift: 14kg
Bulgarian split squat: 16kg
You know, people say after 40’s we lose 1% of muscle mass per year by default, so I have 7 years ahead to build more consistent muscles, or “a health savings”
In conclusion
2023 has been the most challenging year of my life, yet it was also a time of great energy and new opportunities. I had the chance to meet new people and acquire a wealth of knowledge.
My life now feels like it’s in a transitional phase, laying the groundwork for something new. This period of change is refreshing and filled with potential, despite the sense of loss and the numerous changes I’ve faced this year. Here’s to a fantastic 2024 for us all. See you around!
Quitting everything and going to meditate seems like something a slacker would do. To go on a meditation retreat, we have to justify ourselves by saying it’s self-care, and we have to use words carefully so people don’t think you just dove into this because you were at your worst.
“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly alone in a room*” I really like this phrase, supposedly said by the mathematician, Pascal.
I don’t agree that we will have all of humanity’s problems resolved. I don’t believe in world peace, complete happiness, let alone reversing global warming. However, I believe that, even doomed to defeat, we can indeed imagine these utopias and choose at least one or another unattainable collective goal to put into practice.
I don’t fight to win, I know I will lose. If I don’t fail in this system, it’s because I’ve adhered to it. – Padre Julio Lancellotti, o melhor que temos.
My most ancient personal-collective-utopian battle is meditation. Actually, last month I went to a silent retreat. I confess that I had a pretty shitty year, but that’s not why I went, this is something I’ve been doing for several years, in good times and bad times.
However, I think when Pascal said that phrase, he wasn’t exactly suggesting “to sit quietly and alone” sitting on the ground, meditating more than 5 hours a day, for 10 consecutive days, eating only 2 meals a day, without being able to read, write or even exercise. But that’s exactly what the retreat I went to at the end of the year proposes.
If you want to avoid falling into this trap, the name of the retreat is Vipassana. If you are precisely looking for this type of self-flagellation, the name of the retreat is Vipassana too. According to the nightly classes of the retreat, this is a meditation technique that Buddha himself practiced to enlighten himself, but who can guarantee? Indians love using this marketing technique of “it’s traditional”, “it’s ancient” to shove their ideologies down the world’s throat.
Let’s lower all this possible fiction behind what actually exists:
A free retreat, which has been happening exactly in the same model, for decades, in various countries around the world. And thousands, if not millions of people, have already participated in it.
cabem 8mil pessoas no maior centro de vipassana do mundo (pensa nessa galera toda em silêncio)
If you go to the Dhamma site, you can find dates to submit to live this experience. There is a center in Santana de Parnaíba, close to São Paulo, but the one I went to is in Miguel Pereira, in the interior of Rio de Janeiro. The rooms are comfortable, the food is tasty, and the shower is hot. The system is very organized and exactly the same, without adding or subtracting: absolute silence, a bit of fasting, and meditation for hours on end.
Despite the fugere urben and basic comforts, it doesn’t seem relaxing, right? In general, it’s not. But it’s worth it.
Facing responsibilities head on
I confess that I am unemployed, I pick up a freelance job here and there, but I no longer have time to manage, nor pair code reviews to do. However, I work in IT, the freelances pay well and I have some flexibility of time and money, but it didn’t seem bad at all to spend 10 days without having to cook, without spending anything and without looking at a screen.
The issue of cooking didn’t weigh so heavily, this year I prepared so many little lunches that I got used to it. I lost 7 kilos and gained 3 kilos of muscle! I also thought long-term in several other areas of life: I saved money, I challenged myself in my career, I was present in social circles even when I wanted to be crying in a corner, I didn’t take it out on food or alcohol… but of course, this mechanical self-care is just damage control, the problem is much deeper.
I did the whole damn thing, meditated, yet in 2023 I maintained a constant feeling of anguish and helplessness in the face of personal and global problems.
In the world, as you already know, end of the year with this global warming banging in our heads, environmental disasters here and there, another war broke out, inflation high up there, artificial intelligence expanding its skills more and more, an uncertain job market for most professions, extreme right-wing caricature political leaders taking power, Lula not delivering much…
On a personal level, I separated, changed houses and neighborhoods, my psychologist went on maternity leave, I renovated, an aunt died tragically, another loved one almost passed away but ended up in a rehabilitation clinic, my mother had cancer removed… besides that, after almost 10 years living away, I moved wall-to-wall with my blood relatives.
Even so, I didn’t run away from any trouble. Quite the contrary, I was patient and fulfilled my obligations, something that seems minimal, but we know it’s not. Maybe I made things a bit harder for myself with this “long-term thinking” attitude, but this year would have been sad anyway, it turned out I just embraced the hardship and maintained a boring and pondered life.
The size of my problems doesn’t matter, what really matters is the size of my butt. The size of my butt eases my problems – for times i embraced Bruna Rotta’s life philosophy to survive.
There are days, weeks, months, and years in life that are like this: made up of hard facts, decisions that require constant discipline. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s not morally superior to sustain constant euphoria, but I found it hard to support this against-our-culture position of always dancing, regardless of. In 2024 I’ll dance more.
Anyway, I paid the bills in advance, sent a message to some contacts so they wouldn’t think I blocked them, and headed to Vipassana in Miguel Pereira –
I went without expecting much.
Disconnect from the world
Even though I went without expectations of becoming happier, finding answers, or becoming another person after the retreat, in other words, without seeking a specific result, I went with the hope that during the retreat I could disconnect a bit from the world.
I spent the year fueled by caffeine and wanted to go to a place where I didn’t need fuel to exist, plan, solve, or direct anything. With this in mind, I went on a delivery to what Mr. Goenka – the man who spread the practice around the world – says is like a mind surgery. Still in his words:
“Vipassana is a science of mind and matterHow the mind is influencing the bodyAnd later, how the body is influencing the mind”
Vipassana is the science of mind and matter. How the mind influences the body and, later, how the body influences the mind. This little snippet of teaching I got from the song “Vipassana”, which has a wonderful lyrics:
I found this song when I came back from my first vipassana retreat, I was 19 and I just wanted more a place away from social pressures to think better about my life choices, kinda like Arnold says
“When you set aside time to be alone with your thoughts, you can discover who you want to be; not who your parents want you to be, not who your friends want you to be, and definitely not who some Instagram or TikTok scammer wants you to be.“
If in 2010, without a smartphone and tiktok, it was already hard to disconnect from the world, imagine today. There’s so much information, we have less and less space just to breathe – but maybe we increasingly forget that this is possible, or see any value in doing it.
Not seeking to be “a better person”
Having said that I didn’t get into a silence retreat to escape from some summons telegram, I also want to say that I didn’t go to enlighten myself.
My family is made up of esoteric, syncretic and mystic people.
One grandfather materialized crystals with the White Brotherhood of Archangel Michael, the other followed a macrobiotic diet since the 80s and my grandmother had yoga classes with De Rose when he didn’t have a sect yet, he just taught asanas in a garage.
My mother thinks reading Sonia Café’s little angel book is essential for day-to-day life and my father spends hours a week at Mahikari, purifying and passing positive light to people, a type of Reiki – my stepmother even went to Japan to do a higher seminar of this religion.
Thanks to all of them I am quite skeptical – and I will not dwell on this, as almost everything revolves around it. If you want to know more, lose the sparkle in your eyes, and then get it back, subscribe to this newsletter and stay longer.
So I didn’t go to enlighten myself, find an answer, let alone become a better person.
If by any chance you feel inadequate all the time in pursuit of an unreachable better person, I want to remind you that it’s okay, you’re not missing anything.
You are probably just increasingly undermined by the excess of colonial-digital-capitalist stimuli and, when you want to get rid of it, you seek Eastern philosophies that preach such enlightenment, which is also unattainable and, within the context we are already living in, it is just the same kind of demand under a new guise.
Opening mental spaces
There’s no need to put a mystique into things for them to have some value.
Another good way to justify think about meditation or withdrawal into retreat comes in the form of scientific discourse, which is how I discovered Vipassana, through Sam Harris, a neuroscientist who at the time was somewhat a fugitive, lived in hiding, because he wrote (concise) books against the world’s major religions, such as Christianity, Islam, and American scientific academia.
Today, the handsome one overcame this phase, came back with us here in the ritualistic round dance of capital – get paid instead of getting mad – made a podcast that blew up and recently was in the hand-in-hand circle with his hot famous professional colleague, Huberman:
The interview topics are the same that he has been working on since he was persecuted, but he had a makeover in his speech. For example, he still talks about meditation, but no longer mentions that he sat in various vipassana retreats. If you want the correct scientific explanation about meditation-mind, watch the video. My lame summary is more or less this:
When we always do the same things, the neurons of those functions connect stronger and faster, the synapses of these things get stronger, our hormones start to be governed by an entire chain of the same stimuli.
It’s like re-educating my body and mind not to react to any thought, not to click a button whenever I want to research something, not to call someone whenever I want to talk to her and so many other little things, from the simplest to the most complex ones.
Being in isolation increases this self-training, to stay seated in a room, without being able to read, write or even watch anything, is to let the body naturally regulate the hormones related to stress and reeducate the brain to function in a different way.
Going to a retreat weakens the brain’s synapses. Staying silent, with closed eyes, for hours and days on end, is to drastically reduce the dopaminergic stimuli in the brain. A vipassana retreat is like a dopamine reset.
Perhaps by sitting in Vipassana I would throw out the bathwater with the baby inside, that is, I would also return with my good habits weakened, but I thought it would be worth it.
And, to tell the truth, I am somewhat lazy.
I wanted a bit of fugere urben yes, to see the mountains of Miguel Pereira again, I missed it. The Fran Lebowitzes of life will disagree with me, but getting out of the city chaos is always a blessing.
This is the view – image taken from Google Maps – to untouched mountains that are not a forest reserve, just a farm, really. (hello agrarian reform)
And that’s where all my criticism to Mr. Goenka begins.
Stressful days and weeks are something we all encounter, yet we often find ourselves without a clear vision of what truly constitutes a fulfilling day or week. Daily planning can be a daunting task. You’re faced with the challenge of fitting work, family, self-care, and countless other obligations into a mere 24 hours span. It’s like trying to solve a puzzle with pieces that never quite fit. The pressure of making every moment count can be overwhelming and one unfinished task can feel like a failure.
Changes in circumstances, work, and personal goals necessitate a regular reassessment of your ideal day. That’s why idealizing a whole nice week might be a better alternative. By managing your activities across a week, you can achieve a more realistic and balanced routine.
For me, this shift in my approach to planning has truly been a game changer. If, for any reason, I miss going to the gym on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, it’s no cause for despair. I remind myself that there are still four more days in the week for me to reach my goal of working out three times a week.
In essence, adopting a weekly perspective is a form of self-respect and self-care. The rigid structure of working hours, based on clock time, was originally devised for industrial purposes to regulate workers, a construct far removed from the natural rhythms that have shaped our bodies over hundreds of thousands of years as hunter-gatherers. Embracing this critial thinking empowers you, whenever your routine shifts, to adjust the weight of societal expectations in your life, reconsider what your ideal week and day look like, and fine-tune your own priorities.
Let’s move from macro to micro:
The Ideal Week
When embarking on the “Ideal Week” planning process, begin by determining how you want to feel at the week’s end:
Relaxed
Smart
Abundant
Productive
Creative
Successful
Select the emotions and qualities that resonate most with your outlook on life and align with your current life phase.
2 options so you can pin your favorite design 🙂
2 options so you can pin your favorite design 🙂
With that in mind, start by considering the habits you aim to cultivate and the obligations awaiting your attention within your backlog of tasks.
This varies greatly from person to person, spanning a diverse spectrum, including parents, the elderly, nurses, and attorneys.
Instead of attempting to conform to the mold of productivity gurus, celebrate your individuality and embrace your uniqueness.
Each individual brings their unique set of familial responsibilities, specific tax regulations, cultural priorities, and varying income levels into the equation. Take the time to identify the variables that create your ideal, fulfilling week. The “ideal week” is a highly personal concept, far removed from a one-size-fits-all template.
Weekly planning vs. Weekly Ideation
While it can be applied to almost any aspect of life organization, remember weekly ideation is not about wishful thinking but rather connecting with your emotions, analyzing your reality and prioritizing, so you can find ways to make your week more peaceful – but it’s not entirely a weekly plan yet, with all minuntia.
A weekly planning is something you have to do everyweek to follow life changes, the weekly ideation is something you do every quarter, its an overall framework of everything you wanted to do independently of the variable tasks. What if there is a chill week where you have plenty of time? Go to your ideal week! What if you have to prioritize some tasks? Go to your ideal week!
Apps for weekly planning
You can always put your google/apple calendar into weekly view and go from there.
One tool that I’ve valued for years is Notion, renowned for its ability to adapt to these diverse variables. It allows you to commence with a template but offers the flexibility to evolve beyond the confines of a rigid PDF. Notion’s structured framework assists in identifying patterns and automating repetitive tasks, providing valuable mental space. Here are some ideas on how to structure it:
You can employ a template without a complex database, instead utilizing practical automation via buttons;
Start from a simple Kanban mode;
In addition to the kanban, you can opt for a robust database and use the weekly calendar view.
And a similar, but free, version of it is the (so cute) tweek.so:
Another option is to configure a Trello for weekdays. There are numerous other apps available to explore and discover what works best for you – after all, you know your needs better than I do. (:
One more thing, I love that this concept of week span can even be safely applied to diet, as you can see on this section of video of the fitness specialist Thomas DeLauer:
Crafting My Ideal Week – Late 2023
Emotionally, I’m currently on a recovery journey after a challenging year. My main goal is to feel rested by the end of the week while also maintaining a sense of productivity. After months of unpredictability, having a sense of “control” over my life is crucial (but not the unhealthy kind of control – I’m sure you understand).
As for my default activities, many aspects of my life are in autopilot mode right now, including investments, my home cleaning and beauty routines, and my gym regimen, to name a few. I’ve already integrated these into my weekly plan and feel confident about managing them.
In terms of changing environments, my current situation is different from the past. I’m not formally employed by a company, nor am I freelancing as frequently as before. My family’s needs, covering financial, organizational, and health-related aspects, have undergone a significant shift. Balancing these demands with my minimum requirements for financial stability, maintaining my routines, and advancing my career presents a unique challenge.
I’ve adopted a slower routine, with no pressure to achieve grandiose goals.
In the past, I’ve experienced various life phases, each accompanied by distinct responsibilities. These ranged from
having a chill college student life
to caring for my grandmother as a young adult
to pursuing corporate success on my late 20s
or even globe-trotting while working as a web developer.
Currently, in addition to the family responsibilities and typical everyday activities I’ve already mentioned, my more demanding personal priorities encompass:
Hitting the gym at least 4x a week – up from 3x I could manage for most of the year;
Publishing 4 blog post a week, which involves creating Pinterest images and tackling several challenging aspects, adds an exciting and fulfilling dimension to this introspective phase;
Decluttering and selling items to achieve my new minimalist goals – this entails lots of back-and-forth messaging, photo-taking, and measurements;
Progressing in my software architecture post-graduate studies.
The Ideal Day
Well, as you might be familiar, the ideal day planning or ideation (as you prefer to call it) usually consists in stacking the habits you want to fullfill, with a block of working and another block for studying and hopefully basic hygiene and hobbies.
What I want to add for discussion is not blocking huge activities simply, as “8 hour day working”, but realisticaly considering our attention span, biological needs and just mind cleaning and social healthy flexibility. Calendar block is cool, but its not a imperial order, remeber it!
So, usually it makes sense to block the day in 2 ou3-hours blocks:
8am-10am
10am-12am
12pm-2pm
2pm-4pm
4pm-6pm
6pm-8pm
8pm-10pm
10pm-12am
12am – 8am
simple breakfast idea (usually my go-to)
Within it you will also find the minimum viable daily, keep in mind the20/80 Pareto Principle, also known as the “80/20 rule,” that suggests that approximately 20% of your efforts or inputs lead to about 80% of your results or outputs.
Within it you will also find the minimum viable daily, keep in mind the20/80 Pareto Principle, also known as the “80/20 rule,” that suggests that approximately 20% of your efforts or inputs lead to about 80% of your results or outputs.
Typically, factors like regular exercise, dedicating at least one deep focus block, maintaining a healthy diet, and nurturing positive relationships encompass a solid 20% of what constitutes a fulfilling day, with long-term life in mind.
A habit tracker can be quite handy. But, you know, the real challenge with habit tracking is, who’s keeping track of the tracker? Haha I personally use Habitify, and I’ve found that it works best for me on my desktop. After struggling with it on my phone for years, it’s pretty cool to see how much better I track my habits on my computer.
Crafting My Ideal Day – Late 2023
I prefer the weekly view, but for the purpose of providing an example here, my ideal day looks something like this:
7 am – 8 am: Slow morning routine including self-care, reading, writing, tidying up, and delaying caffeine intake.
8:30 am – 10 am: Enjoy coffee, hit the gym, have breakfast, and take a shower.
10 am – 12 pm: Deep work.
12 pm – 2 pm: Light administrative work or cooking and lunch, often with family.
2 pm – 4 pm: Deep work.
4 pm – 6 pm: Engage in creative activities for work, manage tasks, or attend personal/family appointments.
6 pm – 7 pm: Dinner.
7 pm – 9 pm: Deep work.
9 pm – 10 pm: Screen time off.
10 pm – 12 am : Night routine and bedtime.
The goal is to work on content creation from 2 to 6 hours a day and allocate at least 2 hours to post-graduate studies. I typically maintain this routine on weekends as well, and I plan to continue doing so until the end of 2023. Occasionally, I might spend time at the park or attend a music show with a friend, but I generally stick to most of this block time schedule.
One more thing, it’s really interesting to try out different approaches and see how your ‘ideal day’ works in real life. For instance, this year, I tried incorporating more outdoor activities as a weekly park visit for reading and experimented with replacing my gym routine with indoor climbing twice a week.
Through experience, I discovered that it didn’t quite suit me, at least not at this phase of my life. YouTuber Lefie also attempted a similar experiment. You can check it out here, her planning phase:
Have you ever found yourself pondering, “Are there any English errors in this sentence?” If so, you’re not alone. Navigating the intricacies of the English language can be challenging, even for native speakers. In this blog post, I will show you real examples of how I’ve been using AI as a non-native English speaker who dares to maintain humor while refining my language skills.
Here is my main simple-yet-effective prompt:
Are there any English errors in this sentence? What are the errors, and why?
Let’s dive deep on a real example:
My initial phrase was:
“a life is a huge broaden THING, so this post will be big. guide yourself by the table of contents.”
You can see I had an overall idea of what I wanted to say, but I didn’t want to sound weird or, worse, not be comprehended. At the same time, I didn’t want to loose the sense of humor expressed on my phrase. Given that, that’s how I analyse the chatGPT answer:
The first tip was extremely necessary, I learned something;
The second point was exactly the thing that, if I used, I would loose the human and funny part of my sentence, so I understood AI’s tip, but I choosed not to use it;
On the third bullet, it said that it would be awkward to use the sentence that way, that’s valuable, it means that people would understand it, but would find it a weird colocation. The sentence construction could make sense in portuguese, but not in english. Or maybe I tried to sound natural, but I didn’t succeded on it.
That is the main thing I’m trying to spot when taking the next step in communicating in english, how to ‘sound more natural’.
So in the end, I wrote the phrase like this:
Life is a huge broad THING, so this post will be substantial. Navigate through it using the table of contents. (through the post, I mean)
Simple Tweak of Words
If you think that’s a very time-consuming way of learning, it’s because maybe it is, at least when compared with talking to a person.
If I had the money right now, I would just hire a native English teacher; it could also be more fun. I would collect my doubts during the week and present them to my teacher in class. It would be faster to talk instead of typing. The conversation would probably go this way:
‘Have you ever heard ‘substantial’ used to mean ‘big?’
‘Yes! It didn’t occur to me; that’s a great improvement to the phrase. Thanks!’
Then we could skip to the next.
The AI corrections are not always that long, though. Sometimes the sentence is just almost correct:
I love when it says it’s just a ‘minor error’ 😮💨
Also, sometimes I just want to find a better phrasing, so instead of googling ‘synonyms for …,’ I can just ask AI:
‘I don’t want to repeat “during” in the same sentence: ‘I would collect my doubts during the week and show them to my teacher during the class.’
With which it would respond:
‘Certainly, you can rephrase the sentence to avoid repeating “during.” Here’s an alternative way to say it:
‘I would collect my doubts during the week and present them to my teacher in class.’
Simple Text Correction
Sometimes my doubts revolve around simple things like ‘should I use ‘in’ or ‘at,’ ‘on’ or ‘in,’ and this is something I can ask AI to ‘correct the phrase’ simply or, if I have the time, ‘explain why this phrase is incorrect.’
If most of your English mistakes are in this area, you might already know the right way to say things, but even after years, it’s totally normal for non-native speakers like us to slip up, and it’s usually no big deal during casual chats.
However, when it comes to writing, correction becomes necessary. Hiring an editor to correct texts in bulk can also be more practical and safer, since ChatGPT can sometimes change phrases (even when we BEG it not to do so) and spotting these changes can be challenging and tiresome during lengthy text corrections.
Whether we opt to learn from AI suggestions, hire a human professional or decide to go for any other method, our primary objective when learning a new language remains clear: to be understood. Our secondary aim is to ‘sound more natural.’
After all, even in our native language, we occasionally grapple with this aspect, depending on the context — be it work-related, interactions with customer service representatives, or in between different social circles. At times, we’re all susceptible to coming across as a bit unusual.
Nevertheless, there are moments when our expressions hit the mark perfectly:
Find out how to make your note-taking system in Obsidian even more efficient with the Smart Connections plugin. This plugin uses artificial intelligence to help you find more related information among your notes in the same vault and allows you to “chat” with it.
[ez-toc]
How the Smart Connections Plugin Works
Once installed, simply open any note in your Obsidian. When you open the right-side menu, the plugin will display notes that are more relevant based on identified connections.
menu lateral direito com notas relacionadas e suas porcentagens de relação
For example, in the image above, you can see that the plugin on the right-side menu indicates the percentage of relevance that the currently open note has with others in my vault.
Chatting with the Plugin
Another useful feature of “Smart Connections” is its chat capability, similar to how we chat with ChatGPT. However, it responds based on the content of your notes. For example, in the image below, you can see that I ask it to summarize a note.
menu lateral direito com chat para consultar suas notas
This feature is handy for handling private information that hasn’t been shared online yet. It’s also more reliable because the information comes from your own notes. As many of us have noticed, ChatGPT can occasionally give inaccurate responses, so searching within your own notes seems like a more dependable approach.
How to Install the Smart Connections Plugin
Access Obsidian settings > “Plugin Community.”
Search for “Smart Connections” and click to install.
To use the plugin, you’ll need an OpenAI API key to configure it. You can obtain this key on the OpenAI website and input it in the plugin settings in Obsidian.
Creating a Password and Adding Credit
Go to https://platform.openai.com/ and click on API. After logging in, in the upper-right corner, click “View API keys,” as shown in the adjacent image. Then, in the left-side menu, go to “Create new secret key.”
🚨 The API only works if you add credit to your account.
To add credit, go to Billing. The amount will be charged in dollars to your card, so I recommend using a global card with lower fees, like Nomad, which I discuss in my travel posts.
How does the cost work?
The plugin consumes tokens based on the number of processed words. So, every time you “chat with your notes,” as seen above, it counts the characters in the response as processed words. Depending on your usage, costs may vary, but they are generally affordable, and more importantly:
🚨 You can set usage limits to avoid surprises on your bill.
To set spending limits, go to Rate limits. I set a limit of $1 per month, which I found sufficient for around 100 searches in my notes. When you reach half of your monthly usage, you receive an email alert, which I found very secure.
email que recebi quando cheguei a metade do uso dos créditos do mies
Custom Settings
After entering your API key, you can test it, but it will only work if you have credit.
Additionally, the plugin offers various customizable settings, such as language model selection, file exclusions, and display options. You can tailor the plugin to your specific needs for a personalized experience.
Language Model: I use the “3.5 Turbo 16K” model for fast performance. However, it also offers the GPT-4 model.
Exclusions: You can specify which files or pages to exclude from the plugin’s processing. I included the plugin’s own created file in the exclusion list.
Display: You can choose to have an expanded view of all notes, but I prefer the simple view with just the current note and the plugin chat open.
You can adjust these settings according to your preferences and requirements. Below is a screenshot of my settings:
menu de configurações do plugin no obsidan
Finally, after testing Notion’s AI, ChatGPT, and Smart Connections from OpenAI, which is a different product from ChatGPT, I dare say I prefer Smart Connections, both in terms of cost-effectiveness and the quality of generated content. Of course, this is only possible when you have notes you can trust.
