Sunday, 4 October 2026

The Sunday Reflection #100 - My formula for success in life


Ok, before we progress, I thought I'd take you on a little deviation, as to quote the late, great Nigel Kennedy (not the violin player, my mate), "we all enjoy a litte deviation now and then". This is the 100th blog in this series. Prior to this, Sunday was the day I did "The Tweets of the week in the London Borough of Barnet". I did the last one on 19th November 2023. I spent over a decade promoting Twitter, until I concluded that Elon Musk had ruined it and there was virtually no interesting local content. So I thought I'd do a quick trawl, nearly three years on. Has it improved. Although I spent over a decade plugging Twitter, it is now x.com, a different beast. Mr Musk and his platform decided that I am not a real person and banned my Barneteye account. There is no one to appeal to. They just have a robotic system. It doesn't tell you how or why it has banned you.  When I did the feature, I did a search on the following areas of the Borough. Mill Hill, Edgware, Burnt Oak, Finchley Barnet, Cricklewood, Hendon and Colindale, as well as tweets I'd tagged during the week. So I thought I'd just do it again for fun and see what I was missing

Mill Hill

Nothing of interest 

Edgware

Not last week, but a great tweet!

Burnt Oak

Nothing of interest

Finchley 

Barnet, 

Cricklewood, 

When I got to Hendon & Colindale, X.com informed me I'd used up all of my searches for the day!

It was a very depressing experience and it totally confirmed what I was feeling in 2023 when I stopped the feature. It reminded me of just how depressing and draining putting the feature together had become, in amongst all the slop that their system of paying 'verified customers' for engagement has created.
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I replaced the tweets of the week with my Sunday reflection. I think that this is now the series I most enjoy writing. It is where I can take my time and say things that interest me. I also feel I can say what I like. I am not overly concerned if people like what I say or agree with me. I do hope that on some level, you the reader finds it interesting.

The last few months has been really challenging. This week however, it appears to me that now I am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Bear with me on this. Why have things improved? Well, I was feeling very low earlier in the week. I did what I often do when I feel like this. I say a small prayer. Nothing complicated. "Dear Lord, please give me the strength and wisdom to get me through this". You may think it is coincidence, it may be that it is a false dawn, but it seems that the clouds have simply rolled away. The problems have not disappeared, but the solutions to many of them are clearer and I am feeling far more positive. Fixing the problems will require a lot of hard work, but they are surmountable. As I am polite by nature, this morning, I said "Thank you Lord for helping me get through this", as happens more than you might imagine, as I said that a ray of sunshine broke through the clouds for a few seconds.  It seemed to me as if my thanks had been acknowledged. I'm happy for you to feel it is a coincidence. but for me it is an affirmation. I think saying thank you and appreciating anyone or anything that helps you meet your goals is a good thing. Too many people tread on people to climb up the ladder and never thank those that assist them. Appreciation should always be shown. 

I believe that prayer only works in association with hard work, selflessness and an effort to make the world a slightly better place. If I bought a lottery ticket and prayed for a win so I could find a mistress and move to Bali, I suspect I'd fall under a bus. I believe all you ask for is the tools to do the right thing. 

I genuinely believe that doing things like running a music studio that provides facilities for artists is a good thing and I believe that my relative success in keeping it going for 47 years is a sign that I am doing something good. I also believe that my band and my music puts a smile on peoples face, brings people together at our gigs and provides a focus for me, helping keep me sane and happy. My songs enable me to say things and reach people in a very unique way. Many of the the people who like the band have become friends and we try really hard to speak to people and make them feel part of the gang when they come to gigs. I honestly believe that The False Dots are a pretty unique collective and what we do is special.

I have come to the conclusion that if you try and be ethical, thank people who help you, recognise that you are a small part of something bigger, then you have a key role in making things better for those around you, and good things will happen in your life. What brought this home to me is that one of the big challenges I have been struggling with has been caused by the retirement last year of someone I do business with. He has proven to be difficult to replace. He no longer lives locally.  As I said, I was reaching the end of my tether. Then I thought "Why don't I just ring up Dave (the retired person) and ask his advice". Although he can't fix it, he knows the issues and might give me some pointers. So I did and he was more than helpful. He then said "Look I'll do everything I can to assist, you guys really looked after me when I was working". It made me realise building good personal relationships and having trust is perhaps the real secret of success.

This brings me back to Twitter/X.com. It is a platform run by AI bots. I have no idea whether it is doing better financially now than it did before, but it has changed from being a source of fascinating information, to primarily being a forum for crackpots to post clickbait. There are still some great legacy posters out there, but the default "for you" posts they show are as dull as dishwater. I rarely look at it and when I do, it is only at people I've followed for over a decade, or when there is a specific news story that I need to research. I used to look at it all the time, because it was full of interesting posts.  It is another part of the equation for success in life. Don't waste time on stuff that you dont enjoy and don't have to do. I think X.com for me has become an interesting case study in how not to do things. But unlike Elon Musk, I've never really done anything to become mega rich or to hold sway over politicians. I recently wrote a song called "Moderately priced hedonism" which celebrates the joys of living life to the fullest on a budget. Therein lies the secret. Don't be too obsessed with piling up the cash in the bank. Enjoy life whilst you can and don't hurt other people in the process.

And finally, hangovers. Not just from alcohol. Don't do stuff that will screw up your ability to function when you have to be on your game. 

I promised you a formula for success. Here it is. 


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