As a teenager, I used to be very introvert. I didn't have a lot of friends, I didn't need a lot of friends, most kids didn't really seem worth spending time with to be honest. They didn't share my interests, they were immature and very fickle, there were a lot of phonies out there. Meanwhile, I was content to be on my own, I played computer games (to the point of addiction), I played with computers and I loved to play sports (but strictly the sports aspect of it, I never felt like part of a team, they were just people interested in playing the same sport and so we came together for that purpose only). I also played the violin for a while, but again I never bonded with anyone at orchestra or any of the social gatherings. Was I happy? I didn't ask myself that question at the time, I was content to be on my own and do my own thing, nothing felt more natural and right for me.

Then came the internet. I won't say that it was a big change, that my world was transformed overnight, nothing like that. In fact, it's only now in the last few years that I understand what a big impact it has had on my life, but the seed was planted some 10 years ago. As I try to remember how it all started, it's a foggy recollection, but one of the first things for me was trying to put up my own website. This was very fashionable in 1996, those of us who did felt like we had established ourselves on a level that most people didn't even know existed. Seeing those websites today would trigger some serious booing, by today's standards those personal websites were of stone age quality. Hell, animated gifs were all the rage back then. This was back when Netscape 4 was "the browser" (although since there was just one we didn't call it a browser), IE was somewhere in v2-3, email was huge and things like gopher and bbs were just becoming artifacts.

Right from the start, email became a really exciting new channel of communication for me. I didn't have a lot of people to email, most people weren't online then, but in 1997 I signed up on the ISFA Juventus mailing list. I think that's when email was really established as a technology for me, I would get daily updates about the club, I became friends with one of the people on that list (I even tracked her down some 9 years later, by which time she had moved across the Atlantic, married and settled down) and I would read opinions of people who shared my interest. A second communication tool was icq. I knew about irc, I wasn't a big fan, but icq was great. It had everything msn has today (and more), only it worked better and was far less intrusive and annoying. (May I remind you this was almost 10 years ago.) Again, I didn't know a lot of people on icq, so I didn't use it that much, but from time to time when some friends were online, it was really fun.

Why is it that email and icq was so much better than face-to-face contact? For one thing, once you start talking to someone you have something in common with, you may actually find the conversation stimulating. But crucially, the online channel would bypass all the bs of the real world. Everytime you talk to someone in person, you will have moments where the conversation runs short, where you don't know what to say, where it gets awkward, where you're wondering "is this over or should I try and change the subject?". The signal-to-noise ratio can be appalling at times. Especially if you're both awkward teenagers with little to say in the first place. When you meet someone online, you don't have to say "how are you", "what are you doing here", exchange troubled looks, no you just dive in and start a subject with no qualms. *That's* what makes online communication so great.

And that's where it all started, learning that there was a channel of communication greatly superior to real life, where I could encounter interesting people and enjoy myself. That's not how I looked at it back then, to me the internet was mostly about technology, about building websites and such, but the social aspect, as a digression, was there to stay. And it was a lot more rewarding than social interaction at school.

A few years down the road, after experimenting a great deal with web sites in various forms, I decided I wanted to consolidate two of my interests and build a website about Juventus. I had the experience to do a decent job and eventually Juventuz became the biggest English language Juventus fansite known to me. It was mostly about technology, but a bit about sports as well. Then something pretty insignificant happened, which would come to make a big difference in the long run - I started reading Xtratime. I was still on the mailing list at the time (in fact I only quit it last year, after 8 years), but the online forum, that was new to me, new and appealing. Here's a new way of talking to people that is more interactive than email, because on the forum people would often stay online for a while to read replies to their posts. And at the same time it didn't require the commitment of icq, of adding all these people to your list, then they would see you online and you would in some way be obliged to talk to them. But more importantly, the conversations developed in a different way than they would on icq or the mailing list, it would be an ongoing exchange of opinions that could go on for days. I didn't dive into forum life, I started gently and I was mostly just reading at first. But it appealed to me, mostly in a way of bringing more people to my website, so I decided to start a forum on Juventuz.

This was the start of something big. I didn't know it at the time, but the forum was about to engulf me. All I really wanted was people to come to the forum and keep coming back, I had no real vision about building a community out of it. That is, not at first. But once people did start to visit (and I basically spammed Xtratime, the mailing, bigsoccer and any other source I could think of on opening day to attract people), it became apparent that I would have to develop some philosophy. It didn't happen in the way that I describe it, as a necessity, it just felt natural for me to start thinking about what kind of forum I wanted to run. As much as I had never before done anything like this - keeping people together, encouraging them to get along, reprimand them on bad behavior - I got right into it as if I were destined to do this all my life. People did start to gather and pretty soon our small, tight knit community showed signs of anarchy. It was time to go beyond the case-by-case intervention, I wrote a set of rules for the forum. These rules stood for 5 years with a handful of tweaks along the way, I had captured my philosophy quite well. I really lived the forum, I knew everything that was going on, I knew everyone, every conversation, every problem. My goal was to keep the level of interaction at a high level of respect, to promote intelligent discussion, to eliminate juvenile behavior (from which I knew the road to taking liberties wasn't a long one).

It was just before I started the forum that I met Lisa, and we both played the role of moderators in that community. I was the host, the founder, the boss, I made all the decisions. But I wanted to consult with her as much as possible, her opinion meant more to me than anyone else's. For some reason or another, she was fine knowing that whatever I said was final, we always agreed on everything anyway, but what I posted was official policy. At the same time, I wanted to be a friend to everyone on the forum and I think I succeeded in that quite well, although people knew my word was law, I never abused that, I never made it personal, I got along with everyone. Well, inevitably, there were a couple of exceptions, but my success rate was very high. It was quite empowering for a 18-year-old, socially awkward high school kid to be *the* authority among say 50 or so regular visitors of all ages. But it was never about power, it was a passion for me to keep the forum friendly, respectful and above all, classy. It wasn't a VIP club, everyone was welcome to join us, but I made it quite clear what was frowned upon. And more than my influence, after being around for a while, people would embrace that culture and perpetuate it themselves. It was about getting the best out of people. It was a community where we all knew that although we could choose to "let ourselves go", it would be disrespectful to everyone else, and so noone did. At the time, I was so into this that I felt I could write a book about how to run a community, how to interact with people and influence them to give their best and how to handle and prevent conflict.

Of course, there was occasional dissent, people trying to rebel just to see if they could beat the system, there's always an instinct of anarchy found in us all, even if the moderators did a great job in keeping people happy, keeping them from seeking rebellion. But the rebels were never successful, we saw right through their actions and when you confront a troll, make the person aware that you know their game and talk to them intelligently, most people respect themselves enough not to perpetuate very juvenile behavior knowing that everyone knows what they're up to, it's no longer clever, it just looks dumb.

There is a lot to be said about years spent in a community, where I lived and breathed forum life, but this is all I will say. Lisa was the first person I really learnt to trust, I felt like I could tell her anything, and that was a magnificent change from my life before I met her. I was 18, she was 27, bright and classy, everyone respected her greatly, both on Juventuz (where she was authority) and on Xtratime. We really clicked. Before knowing her I wouldn't spill a word of my personal affairs to anyone, I was a master at keeping people from knowing me. Then she gave me a confidence to confide in her, made me feel comfortable and convinced me she could appreciate my problems. In the end, we parted on bad terms, but knowing her was an experience (quite aside from my forum life at the time), which changed how I looked at my life. I won't overstate the importance of knowing someone for about 2 years, but a lot of processes were set in motion in that period. And after Lisa, I found a replacement confidant, several in fact. This was effectively how I learnt to trust people with my innermost problems. Problems which were no greater in the scheme of things than anyone else's, but being so adamant about keeping my affairs strictly private, it was a monumental step for me. It was also a great relief to find that someone I *could* share with, feeling safe that she would understand and that noone else would know.

I made a lot friends through the forum, most of which have moved on, and as that became more important to me, my passion for running the forum was on the wane. After 2-3 years, I came to a point where I didn't care much about how things were in the community, the dozen or so people who really cared about the forum had all practically left. And since I couldn't find anyone passionate enough to take my role, noone really cared anymore. That was the beginning of the forum's decline and if you ask me what I think of the quality of the community today, it's shit. But I was entering a new phase of my life, I was seeking online relationships which surpassed the forum, real friendships. I was ready to trust people, to be open about myself, I had tried it several times and it was working. This was the point in my life when I had the most faith in online relations, I now actively pursued them. I also made an effort to meet some of these people in real life, to bridge the virtual/real gap and make the friendship more "authentic". My success there varied, it certainly was nice to meet the people I had spent hours engrossed in discussion with, but the fact is that they aren't the same people, online they will show you a different side of themselves than they will in real life, you're not meeting the exact same person.

But after doing this a few times, and notably one historical meeting in Stockholm, I stepped onto a path of gaining confidence in my social being. It was the first time I really felt socially capable and successful. Coupled with my addiction to stand-up comedy (and thus being able to recite quite a few bits, matched with a given situation), I realized that I was starting to become capable socially in real life, gradually to the extent that I had been online. To this day, I still am better at online relations than real ones, due to the mentioned 'no-bs effect', but I no longer stray from meeting people in real life and in fact I enjoy doing so. Which 10 years ago would be inconceivable.

What I have described, of course, is not the full story, merely bits and pieces of the most crucial factors which have led me to whom I am today. So what is the problem? Well, if you really take to something, you may realize that you come to depend on it. The social part of life has become so valuable that there are moments when I wish I could have the best of both worlds, where I could go back to being content being by myself, rather than wishing I had plans to meet someone and thus feeling unfulfilled. And what do I blame this on? The internet. :D

Yet another report from the world of the weird and wonderful. A friend of mine is a big rugby fan, so sometimes I end up watching rugby with him. While he assures me that the sport abounds in complicated rules, after watching a few games, I think I can narrow it down to two fundamental concepts.

First of all, my friend tells me that most professional rugby players start playing early. And not because the sport is so difficult to master, but because if you're going to play rugby for real, it's a good thing to get used to getting knocked around as a kid, that way your body will resist injury much better. In fact, I'm told, it can be quite hazardous to start playing rugby late, in your teens or in adulthood. And when I watch rugby, that makes perfect sense to me. It does look like a game that kids would play. "If you don't give me the ball, I'm going to chase you and take it from you." The only anomaly with that parallell is how to explain the team aspect of it, because it is indeed a team sport, they all help each other out. Well, if you imagine kids from two different families who are hostile to each other, then we're getting there. "Don't let him through, get him, get him!!"

Then there's the issue of running across a line on the grass, at which point the whole caramba suddenly ends. What does this remind you of? Remember one of those old movies where the criminal is chased by the police and he's trying to flee across the border to Canada or Mexico? It's a bit like rugby isn't it, running for the border? Once you get there, you're safe, but the closer you come to the border, the more dangerous it is for you and the more anxious people are to stop you.

I'm sorry, but squash (also known as racket ball I believe) is a silly sport. I played it once with a person who also hadn't played before and we didn't know what the hell we were doing. We didn't know the rules (are there any?), we were just running around the court like headless chickens, with no purpose to it. Naturally, I thought we were totally messing it up, it's probably nothing like that really. Well, it is. I went to the gym today, and they have squash courts right next to the gym, so I went over there to see how people play squash. Some of them were clearly beginners, some were more advanced. But the way they played was exactly the same as we did. It doesn't look any more clever, it's really just running all around the court. Now tennis, that's different, because it actually makes a lot of sense, there are rules to adhere to and it takes skill to play tennis, it's not merely hitting the ball. But as a kid playing tennis, sometimes I wish I could hit the ball as hard as I possibly could, just for the hell of it. Well, that's squash. But when there isn't much else to the game, it doesn't offer much at all.

I resent going to the post office, something comes up regularly which makes me have to go there and I always hate the thought of going, it's such a pointless chore. Over the years I've had a lot of computer equipment sent to my address, some of it was broken, I had to send it back, I've bought stuff on ebay, I've sold stuff there, I've gotten packages from friends, I've sent out packages, I've gotten letters I've had to sign for a few times, I've picked up stuff for other people, and for all of this the common denominator is the post office. I used to have a post office right near my house, next to the supermarket, but they closed that branch to save money.. :( So I had to go twice as far, to the next post office in reach, at the shopping center. This made me resent going there, it felt like an unnecessary obstacle.

Then I get to the post office and there's _always_ a line. I would actually plan on when to go so I wouldn't have to stand in line with my number on a piece of paper, waiting for my turn. I would go early, I would go at 10, just before closing, I tried various strategies. And I realized that it's actually quite random when people show up, it's hard to find a formula that would guarantee no waiting. I could get there at noon on a Saturday and walk right up to the window, then just as I was being expedited, seven people would walk in in the meantime and a line would form. Of course, waiting at the post office would be less of a problem if the postal workers were more efficient. No matter what your business is at the post office, there is a lower boundary of about 3 minutes, there's nothing you can get done in less time. These people really take their time and I imagine they do quite a good job since they never rush. I know I always get good service at the post office.

But, there is a certain phenomenon I started to notice after years of going to the same post office. I would pretty much recognize everyone who worked there. And for some reason, I felt kinda sick of seeing the same people again and again. I felt resentment for them and I can't explain why. I would notice that at the supermarket too, "oh it's you again". As if by going there, I knew I couldn't escape those people. Even though I didn't know them at all.

Today I started thinking about a rather more significant issue than the everyday blog ramblings. Why is it that I do what I do, why is it that I fail to do what I set out to do? I can trace a lot of action back to enthusiasm, it's a very powerful force.

I don't know about you, but I think that I have good ideas. Not good ideas about how to achieve affordable nuclear fusion for the household, I mean good ideas about things I can do, things perhaps I should do. But it's mostly about things I can do, because once the question of conscience and guilt comes into it, it's hard to summon any enthusiasm for what needs to be done. These ideas don't come to me on an everyday basis, they appear more on a monthly span of time. Quite often I will think of something that I could be doing, other than what I'm currently doing, at a time where I'm unable to do what I just thought of doing. Sometimes, in fact often, these ideas become little projects. And I like projects, so it's a good way of thinking about the issue at hand.

Inevitably, I produce more ideas for projects than I could realistically undertake, so there has to be a screening process. Since I'm both lazy and rigorous about what I want to spend time on, I never select ideas that are completely pointless and would lead me to think it was a total waste of time once the project is done. In fact, those never make it into a project at all. So I know that I'm left with a few meaningful projects, and it's a question of choosing among them. This is where enthusiasm comes in. I don't select the project which seems to give the biggest pay off, long term benefit or is the most important, I choose the one that I'm most enthusiastic about. And this is a creative process, so enthusiasm is helping me to accomplish something that I conceived on my own, which gives me a sense of accomplishment. Among recent projects I listed on a piece of paper, there was:

• swimming at the pool (to get in shape),
• making another Juventus video compilation (I made one before),
• starting a software project (and finishing),
• learning Italian.

There were others, but I don't remember them now. From the top; I did swim, but not as much as I set out to do and I didn't do it enough to feel that my shape had improved. I decided against doing another compilation, simply because I knew my expectations to it would be too high to ever be happy with anything I could make. I did start a coding project and I finished it, I consider that idea quite successful. I did make a bit of an effort to learn Italian, without really getting into any kind of productive routine, but my motivation was thwarted and now I don't consider it much of a goal anymore (there were external factors at play here).

And that doesn't illustrate an especially successful nor unsuccessful outcome, it's pretty much an average result. Except for the fact that I had about 8-10 projects in all and it was too much at once. From that little example, one can see that a project has promise if it has a clearly defined beginning and end. Swimming and learning a language have no precise goals, one can do it forever. Launching a project that has a definite end is different, however, there I know where I am in the project, how far I am from the beginning and from the end. The two other examples are like this, one was successful, the other was never undertaken. Similarly, there are lots more other projects I have not verbalized and written down anywhere, which I've completed and lots more projects I've abandoned. A project also has a lot of promise if it can sustain my enthusiasm all the way through.

Enthusiasm, there it is again. The point of taking this long route is to underline how useful enthusiasm is in small accomplishments. But ultimately, we are still left with the major issues in life; education, career, health etc. And enthusiasm is much tougher to spot there, because these things have no effect of being novel, of being exciting. They also have no trace of being something you can complete fairly quickly, like a project. So it's not new and the pay off, the moment of accomplishment, is very far away.

How then to mobilize enthusiasm for the big issues? I had an idea today. I remembered that a few years ago I made a policy decision to be nice to people. I'm not really nice by nature and it opened my eyes to see some people being really nice and I realized that my life would be both easier and more pleasant if I could do the same. And being nice doesn't mean being nice when you want to anyway, it means being nice when you don't want to. I somehow told myself that from now I would make this my goal, I would strive for it. Lo and behold, people started being nicer to me, my relations with a lot of people improved from neutral/resentful to good. And I did that because I believed in the idea, being nice is a good thing, it makes sense. I must say that I have neglected that principle recently, because I also need to strive for confidence and confidence requires confrontation sometimes, so striking a balance between the two has proven a challenge.

So if I could go from indifferent to nice, why not enthusiastic? Well, it's not straightforward. False enthusiasm is good for 5 minutes and doesn't solve anything. To be enthusiastic, I really have to believe in what I'm doing, it can't be based on a total spur of the moment notion. Inducing enthusiasm doesn't work either, when someone is trying to make me enthusiastic based on their values, which I don't happen to share. But, just as being nice is a state of mind, a starting point from where to make decisions on a case-by-case basis, perhaps enthusiasm could be as well? I don't know if this is going to work, but this is my idea today, to think of enthusiasm as a starting point. I've already been doing this for a while with happiness, sometimes when I'm not terribly cheery, I can rationalize the reasons I have for being down and conclude that I really should be happy. And from there on, a feeling of happiness grows in me, it may take 30m or an hour before I get there, but it works.

This is important, because enthusiasm is a catalyst for what gets done and what doesn't. Whether it be a "small idea" or a "big issue", the ultimate reason why I do or don't decide on something is based on how enthusiastic I am about it at the time. So if I could be more enthusiastic by definition, maybe I could get more done? Well, if it were easy I wouldn't have to think about it in such complicated terms. There is something about the nature of enthusiasm that demands reciprocity. If I'm really excited about something and I try to get you excited about it and you're indifferent no matter how hard I try, my enthusiasm wanes. And so to sustain it, it has to be reciprocal in some sense. When it comes to things I do on my own, there has to be positive feedback to fuel further enthusiasm. If my goal was to dig a hole and I could see that with every shovel it got deeper, it would make me happy to see that I'm getting somewhere. In practice, this positive feedback is not always there. Some things require enough determination to keep at it for weeks only to learn of the result at the end. But this is now the joining of two issues, one is "by default" enthusiasm to get started, the other is positive feedback (which must be truthful) to sustain enthusiasm. What I'm shooting for is the first one.