Intentional: How to Live, Love, Work and Play Meaningfully by David Amerland

 Please welcome David Amerind author of Intentional: How to Live, Love, Work and Play Meaningfully

David Amerland will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

Intentional: How to Live, Love, Work and Play Meaningfully

by David Amerland

 

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GENRE: Non-fiction/smart book

 

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INTERVIEW:

1.    What or who inspired you to start writing?

 

A1: I had a fortunate upbringing when very young. I was surrounded by books and I was read to a lot and I started reading a lot the moment I could. Parental supervision in that department was a little scant so I ended up reading books that were meant for adults and I loved it. As I got a little older life became a little more challenging and books, then, provided for me the perfect form of escape. 

 

We now know, from neuroscience, and this is something I do cover in Intentional, that much of our character is formed in the years between the age of one and seven. What happens after that only amplifies or suppresses character traits and attributes we have managed to build already. 

 

This is a roundabout way of explaining that Intentionalis really about behavior. It answers the question we always ask ourselves when we are faced with a situation that demands we either make a decision or take action: “What do I do?”. Intentionalhelps us answer this by better understanding why we do some of the things we do and by allowing us to see just how we can control our behavior so we can get to more positive outcomes from our actions. 

2. What elements are necessary components for this genre?

 

A2: Every genre has its own genre-specific tropes. In a book like Intentional it is not enough to lay out complex ideas simply without losing the essence of the explanation, there also has to be solid research that supports each idea and each supposition. A non-fiction book of this type that doesn’t have at least some foundation in cutting-edge science risks losing a lot of its practical value.   

 

In direct juxtaposition a book like this also needs to have a high degree of relatedness. I have used countless examples in the book that illustrate some of the science or a lot of the intuitive truths we feel which now have experimental backing and they’re drawn from popular films, or well-known fiction books. It is this approach of combining cutting-edge, cognitive-focused material with popular films, books and anecdotes that makes Intentionalan accessible and down to Earth type of book.  

 

3. How did you come up with your idea for your book?

 

A3: Most of the books I write have an evolving theme that reflects the changes we experience in the fields of marketing and human behavior. So, in many ways, one book I write invariably leads to the next even though there is, often, no readily obvious link between them. Intentionalis no exception. It took me three years to research and write my last book The Sniper Mindand it took me down deep rabbit holes of cutting-edge neuroscience, cognitive psychology, social psychology and social anthropology. It opened up doors and raised questions which, once that book was over, became the springboard that became another three-year long journey that resulted in Intentional: How to Live, Love, Work and Play Meaningfully. 

4. What expertise did you bring to your writing?

 

A4: I have a scientific background. I trained as a Chemical Engineer and did my Masters on Quantum Dynamic Perturbations in Laminar Flow Processes. That background has helped me every time I go through scientific studies of any sort. I understand the process, the mathematics where math is involved (which is almost everywhere) and I can gauge the effectiveness of the protocols that have been put in place. On top of this, writing The Sniper MindI spent roughly 8,000 hours going through studies, making notes, asking questions of the researchers and so on. That gave me a sound basis for understanding a subject that was new to me and which is evolving constantly. Thankfully there are some thermodynamic processes and the math behind it that are constant here and these became my first in. I have since built my understanding of neuroscience extensively. Chemical Engineering, which is what I studied, is a field that brings together several distinct scientific disciplines: engineering, chemistry, physics and mathematics. It requires an approach that has served me well in my life as a writer as I can skip across scientific disciplines looking for patterns in their research findings which help me understand something better. The researchers of each discipline are usually deep in the weeds of their research which is how research gets done, so in many ways I am in a privileged position. I get to see what they find, I find correlated research findings in other disciplines and I can connect the dots for the reader much better.  

5. What would you want your readers to know about you that might not be in your bio?

 

A5: I am as uncertain about what I do and my ability to do it as any of them. This is part of the human condition. Each day, I find fresh ways to make me feel my responsibility to my readers that keeps me focused and productive. 

6. As far as your writing goes, what are your future plans?

 

A6: I am at the stage of my writing career now where each book I write adds to what I consider my mission to help the world be a better place. In truth, the world doesn’t care about any of us. It is a gigantic system that grinds up lives and carries on. When it becomes “better” or “worse” it’s because of something we did, in the former and something we failed to do in the latter, case. I have a few book ideas I am developing now which are intended to further help us understand how we can be better today than we were yesterday, in ourselves. That has a positive impact on the world around us. I can’t unfortunately, be very detailed about any of my next book ideas just yet, but I will give a small hint by saying that my next book is likely to be epic.  

7. If you could be one of the characters from this book, who would it be and why?

 

A7: Although I write non-fiction at the moment, my next book is more than likely to feature some extraordinary characters. If I had to choose which one of them I’d like to be, the answer is any of them. They are all equally inspiring and equally awesome both in what they did and the effect their actions had on us. 

8. Can you give us a sneak peek into this book?

 

A8: I can’t really, though I can drop a few small hints by posing a few questions such as: How do you know what “good” looks like? Are ethics something you learn or something you aspire to and is there a difference in the approach? How do we as ordinary people living our lives decide what constitutes a “good life”? These are all questions that my next book will cover in detail. I have already mentioned that I am developing more than one book idea so I can’t precisely predict which of them will make it to the publishing stage but all of them, right now, are examining these questions through different lens, so to speak.  

9. Do you belong to a critique group? If so how does this help or hinder your writing?

 

A9: No. Writers make terrible critics. When we read someone else’s work we should, really, only stick to assessing the quality of the writing and the suitability of the choices the writer made as they tried to communicate their idea. This is the same process for fiction as it is for non-fiction. Instead, we react to plots, ideas and suggestions based upon our own likes and dislikes so we become a diverse, learned but intensely biased audience that, in a critique circle, is more geared to make a writer feel bad about themselves and their writing than feel good. Back in 1991 I was part of such a group for a very brief period of time. The moment I realized the social dynamics that governed it I understood that its dysfunction was something I did not really need in my writing life. I have never belonged to a critique group or writing group since. If I want to test my ideas I share them directly with my readers through social media. Their response, suggestions and reactions allow me to judge much better whether I am on the right track of whether my writing has veered off and become self-indulgent. 

 

10. When did you first decide to submit your work? Please tell us what or who encouraged you to take this big step?

 

A10: My first non-fiction book of note was “SEO Help” and it came out in 2010. I was working, prior to that, as team leader on the search engine optimization team for a boutique web design studio. I was so convinced of the need for it that I simply wrote off an email with a two-page treatment to all suitable publishers at the time, I didn’t even have an agent. As it turned out I got an acceptance within three weeks. 

11. What is the best and worst advice you ever received? (regarding writing or publishing)

 

A11: The best advice I was ever told which I have applied to my writing came from a mentor in business at a time when I was working as a business journalist for one of the United Kingdom’s largest retailers. He told me at the time: “Take your work seriously. Never yourself”. I keep this firmly in mind because an occupational hazard with writing is to think yourself as a source of absolute truths. Nothing could be further from reality. The worst piece of advice about writing was when I was told to “write what you want to read”. Now, that might work for other writers but for me it doesn’t. My own interests in research and reading incline towards academic publications mostly and while I read a lot of fiction as well as non-fiction, the style of writing I am completely comfortable with is also dry and academic in style. This is not how I write, however. Nor do I write about subjects I would love to read about. Instead I choose subjects that I feel are still not clearly or well enough understood but which, nevertheless, affect our daily life and behavior and then I try to demystify them so that the reader feels knowledgeable and empowered to do something better in their lives. 

12. Do you outline your books or just start writing?

 

A12: All my books are research heavy. I can spend up to a year just doing research and making notes and these notes and that initial stage of research become the scaffolding around which the book takes shape. I plan each chapter carefully not just in terms of content but also its progression in respect to the chapters before and the chapters after. 

13. How do you maintain your creativity?

 

A13: The real world around us is full of problems. Those problems lead many of us to come up with solutions. Some of the solutions we implement are imperfect. Why am I stating something you intuitively know to be true? Because this sometimes looping web of interactions radiates an enormous amount of energy and effort, thoughts and ideas which arise from cultures and people. All of this makes a writer who’s attuned to his time never be short of ideas. 

 

Intentionalis case in point here. I was working on it, initially, alongside several other projects in 2018 and those projects were edging it out. I happened to come across a complex study that linked certain biochemical states with motivation and grit in a person. This made me maintain my work on it while I put most of my effort on the other idea. And then, the pandemic happened. And the pandemic made it clear that we would have to re-learn how to behave and that the behavior of the past that had got us to this point in time, was no longer good enough. So Intentionalsuddenly became my primary project and, here we are. 

 

I maintain my creativity by being fully plugged-in, in the world and constantly examining the nuances of global events to see if I can understand what is going to be the next, best thing to focus on.  

14. Anything else you might want to add?

 

A14: Intentionalhas the capacity to truly change a person’s life. The proviso however, and it is a serious one, is that the person needs to want the change to happen. Knowledge of how to do something and knowledge why it should be done are never enough. Think of, for instance, exercise. We all know we need to exercise more and we all know why but we are incredibly good at finding excuses not to do it. We change only when we truly feel that what we are doing is no longer enough. We are what we feel, not what we think. Our emotional state and emotional regulation are key to the success and balance we seek in life. 

BLURB:

 

Live your life the way you want to. Manage stress better. Be more resilient and enjoy meaningful relationships and better health. We all want that. Such life leads to better choices, better jobs, loving romantic partners, more rewarding careers and decisions that are fully aligned with our aims.

 

What stops us from getting all that is the complexity of our brain and the complicated way in which the external world comes together. The misalignment between the internal states we experience and the external circumstances we encounter often leads to confusion, a lack of clarity in our thinking and actions that are not consistent with our professed values.

 

Intentional is a gameplan. It helps us connect the pieces of our mind to the pieces of our life. It shows us how to map what we feel to what has caused those feelings, understand what affects us and what effects it has on us and determine what we want, why we want it and what we need to do to get it.

 

When we know what to do, we know how to behave. When we know how to behave we know how to act. When we know how to act, we know how to live. Our actions, each day, become our lives. Drawn from the latest research from the fields of neuroscience, behavioral and social psychology and evolutionary anthropology, Intentional shows you how to add meaning to your actions and lead a meaningful, happier, more fulfilling life on your terms.

 

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EXCERPT:

 

Whether we realize it or not, we all feel the need for this kind of guidance that gives us a deep sense of purpose. Because we are born physically helpless we have evolved to latch onto and work hard to understand our immediate environment and the people around us. This makes us, as we grow older, intensely pro-social. At the same time it provides us with a ready-made set of expectations, rules and guidelines to guide our behavior that arise from the collective behavior of those around us.

 

That behavior is the culture we experience and the traditions we abide by. The problem with this is that rather than defining for ourselves what is important to us we accept that which is given to us. That which is given to us is rarely what we want, but it can very easily become what we settle for.

 

Settling is an evolutionary-programmed trait. Let me explain: Life is hard. It really is. Even if we happen to have the extraordinary luck to be born into a very rich family whose legacy gives us everything we need to live comfortably for the rest of our life, maintaining that fortune and navigating through life is going to be fraught with risks, traps and constant upheavals.

 

We need other people. Other people need us. That is a truth. But the reasons for this mutual need are usually contradictory or, at the very least, sufficiently at odds with each other to make trust an issue and turn cooperation into a risk-assessment exercise.

 

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

 

David Amerland is a Chemical Engineer with an MSc. in quantum dynamics in laminar flow processes. He converted his knowledge of science and understanding of mathematics into a business writing career that's helped him demystify, for his readers, the complexity of subjects such as search engine optimization (SEO), search marketing, social media, decision-making, communication and personal development. The diversity of the subjects is held together by the underlying fundamental of human behavior and the way this is expressed online and offline. Intentional: How to Live, Love, Work and Play Meaningfully is the latest addition to a thread that explores what to do in order to thrive. A lifelong martial arts practitioner, David Amerland is found punching and kicking sparring dummies and punch bags when he's not behind his keyboard. 

 

Email & Social Media Accounts

Reach David via email: davidamerland@gmail.com 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/DavidAmerland

Medium: https://davidamerland.medium.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidamerland/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/DavidAmerland/about

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/david_amerland/

Represented by The Knight Agency

 

 

For Goodreads Reviews and where to buy the book follow this link: https://davidamerland.com/seo-blog/1429-where-you-can-buy-a-copy-of-intentional-how-to-live-love-work-and-play-meaningfully.html

 

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION and RAFFLECOPTER CODE

David Amerland will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN GC to a randomly drawn winner via rafflecopter during the tour.

 

RAFFLECOPTER: 

 

http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/28e4345f3923/