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Goncharenko centre Kremenchuk, 2026-1-29 and 2026-1-30: Analysis and using your time effectively

Prepared intoduction for meetings in Kremenchuk on 2026-1-29 and 2026-1-30

I found the text again, at least of the later part of some texts that I prepared to continue various topics, but in a different way. So I suggested the administrator for a dual meeting to deal with quite a few interesting topics. First on Thursday 12:30-14:30, then Friday 13:00-16:00. After that I will think on how and when to continue.

2026-1-29 (Thursday)

This meeting will be about:

• 1) proper arguing,
• 2) analysing anything,
• 3) knowing when arguing with people is pointless,
• 4) dealing with criticism when arguing or making comments on a website, on youtube, anywhere.

This is something very useful and interesting that everyone can use in their personal life, in study, or at work. I will discuss things you won't find elsewhere.

2026-1-30 (Friday)

This meeting I selected to be longer because many people come later or leave earlier and it gives a bit more time for a very useful topic:

• 1) making changes in your life to make yourself more happy or achieve more of what you want, including time management, and I will deal with self-help/self-analysis and books and videos that supposedly can help you improve yourself. What is really useful in your life? Can you let worries go? Why do most people not try to follow suggestions to improve their lives? I will give an example of people blaming others and not grabbing opportunities for their own happiness and will explain why this happens. I will also give an example of someone who did follow advice, but didn't try hard enough.

In both meetings I will go also spend time to discuss various expressions in English that I collected that are used frequently in everyday English as you will encounter in articles, in videos on youtube, etc., so which you should know.

There will be a section with an experiment. Possibly in the 1st, otherwise in the 2nd meeting.

Further some interesting and funny stories from Lviv.

Preparations for these meetings

Preparation for meeting 1 of 2026 (Thursday, 2026-1-29)

Watch these videos:

• "Learn to argue effectively (1951)"
• "The single reason why socialism doesn't work"
• "The modesty paradox: How we know revealing clothes are wrong"

== NOTE: While watching, think about what makes sense and what doesn't make sense, and try to find arguments or examples that show that the narrator is right or wrong or that his statements are only about a part of what really goes on.
== Write down your thoughts to use in the meeting.

Additional preparation 1, for meeting 1 of 2026

If you want to do more, analyse this video too:

• "How to learn so fast it's almost unfair"

Additional preparation 2, for meeting 1 of 2026

And if you want to do even more, watch the following 2 videos of a piece of classical music which I will use in one of the parts about analysis. You can watch them already, but I will play them partly in the meeting:

Here are 2 videos of the Bach Goldberg variations, Aria, BWV988:

• Maximianno Cobra edition: https://youtu.be/bGuMvbwKrQE [ 6:39 ]
• Vikingur Olafsson: https://youtu.be/LcJBKZqb-68 [ 4:20 ]

Which do you prefer? What are the differences that stand out to you?

Preparation for meeting 2 (Friday):

• Read the pages about the talks/discussions in the Goncharenko centre in Lviv: Goncharenko centre meetings Kremenchuk/Lviv.
• Read at least 30 pages from the book "Atomic habits", by James Clear. [ read it in any language you want ]
  == NOTE: While reading, think about what you agree or disagree with, and what makes sense and what does not. Can you find arguments or examples that show problems in the book?
  == write down your thoughts, to talk about in the meeting.
  
  You can also place your bets on whether I think the book is good or bad! ;-)
  
  [ This book was recommended by attendees at the first meeting in Lviv where I wanted to deal with "doing effort" and "no procrastination". So, is it useful? My sister also mentioned this book recently, she recounted a quote from the book that showed that it seemed that it could be useful for many people. So after that talk recently I finally started to read that book. I read about 30 pages so far. ]

The effort you do is for yourself...

I want to remind everyone that doing effort to read these texts and to watch these videos, and to think about what in them makes sense and what in them does not make sense, improves your ability to analyse which will be useful for yourself in many situations, it can be applied anywhere, such as in school, at university, at work, and to help you understand the behaviour of people and know better how to respond to people.

Meeting organisation:

1. As usual everyone can help each other to deal with translation issues.
2. Regarding power outages, I will take with me:
   • lights and spare batteries.
   • 3 thermos bottles with hot water for tea, should be enough for 1 cup for everyone but if anyone else has a thermos bottle it would be nice to take it filled with boiling water so we have enough, for more than 1 cup each.

Addition: The best way to learn (from the outline for meeting 6 in Lviv)

The 6th meeting in Lviv didn't go through, but the following outline that I prepared for that meeting is useful to read, as it is related to the above topics.

The plan/outline for meeting 6 in Lviv

This is the topic/plan:

• prepare this before the meeting: Think about what issues in life do you or people you know have, or would you like something in your life to be different? Could be in dating, with family, in work, anything.
• prepare: what do you think could be a solution?
• the group can discuss how to deal with such issues, whether your solution makes sense.

Then after that I explain my methods, ways, to deal with the situation from experiences, and from logic.

Note that the best way to learn is this:

• it should be interesting, then you want to do effort.
• do effort to discover, experiment, to figure out how something works.
• while doing that: See problems as challenges, as puzzles, to solve.

This way you understand and remember far better how something works.

If people do not do the above effort, so they did not prepare, then start the first 20 minutes as follows:
- let everyone write down their thoughts, then 15 minutes of the group discussing options, then go over it with my ideas.

As an example of craziness in the USA in society, and thus about behaviour of people, we could talk about this video about dating: Taylor the fiend: cuffing season. I had never heard of this nor of the expression 'cuffing season' before, but what would you do if someone behaved like that? (btw this guy is not very insightful but this video is about something that is so strange that it could be interesting to discuss).

Copyright W.H.Scholten, 2025. To contact me you can email or send a message via telegram (via phone +31648816383), or via vk.com (https://vk.com/w.h.scholten, which I don't really use but I will get notified of messages from there). I don't use: facebook, linkedin, twitter.