If you operate in more than one country, converting revenues and costs to a standard currency is a necessity.

In this exercise, we will convert sales in GBP (British Pounds) and CAD (Canadian Dollars) to our standard base currency: USD (US Dollars).

A Rookie Mistake
It’s important to not convert historical amounts with current-day conversion rates. Historical rates should be used to maintain accuracy (unless otherwise requested, of course)!

How granular should you get?
I personally find daily conversion rates to be great, but others may think monthly are sufficient. In this example we will get daily rates.

Let’s begin!

Requirements

• Google Account
• Power BI Pro Account (to use in distributed reports)

First, set up the Google Sheet

1. Create a new, blank spreadsheet (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/u/create)
2. In cell A1, enter the very first date you need for the conversions

In this example, we want everything beginning Jan 1, 2017.

3. Under your date, enter the following formula in cell A2:

=GOOGLEFINANCE("CURRENCY:CADUSD","CLOSE", DATEVALUE(A1), TODAY() + 1, "DAILY")


// Choose whichever currency conversion you want! 
        e.g.) from USD to GBP = USDGBP

// Syntax
=GOOGLEFINANCE(ticker, [attribute], [start_date], [end_date|num_days], [interval])

This will populate an array of dates with a Date column and a Close column, with the Close column being your conversion rate for that day.

4. Right above the ‘Close’ column in cell B1, type the currency you converted to USD.
   • This comes in handy later on in Power BI’s Dataflows.
5. Repeat Steps 3 and 4 for however many currencies you need.

Here’s the completed sheet for CAD and GBP currency conversions, but you can add however many you want!

6. Name the sheet and ensure it’s saved to your Google Drive.

Next, set up the Dataflow

1. Open a Power BI workspace.
   • This cannot be your personal workspace (“My workspace”).
   • It must be an existing or newly created workspace besides your own.
2. Click New
3. Select Dataflow

4. Select “Add new tables (Define new tables)”

5. Search Google Sheets
6. Find and Select the Google Sheets connector
7. Copy & paste the URL of the Google sheet
8. Create a new connection
   • Choose no gateway
9. Sign into your Google Account

10. Click Next
11. In the Google Sheets folder, select the Sheet1 table (or select the sheet containing the FX conversions)

12. Click “Transform Data”
13. Remove the 3rd column (aka the 2nd ‘Date’ column)
14. Remove all other empty columns as well

15. Promote/use the 1st row as Headers
16. Rename the first column to ‘Date’
17. Remove the Top 1 Row (aka the [“Date”,”Close”,”Close”] row)

You should be left with something like this

18. Transform the Date column into an actual Date column
19. Convert your Currency columns to decimal

20. Click Save & close
21. You will be prompted to name & describe your dataflow

Congrats! You just set up your Dataflow!

Last, configure any refreshes

1. Head to the Settings of the Dataflow you just created

2. Find the ‘Refresh’ section and configure your daily refreshes!

Boom! Your daily currency exchange rates are ready for conversions.

It’s that easy.

I created an interactive Power BI report to showcase these conversions.

Here are some AI-generated images of various aspects about the book I found interesting. It could represent an actual story plot line, character, or be a higher level interpretation about themes, etc.

Ideas

• Generational trauma is real
  • The Bible contains some fundamental stories that capture our humanity
  • These stories are felt within each of us even today
• Life, like war, is full of deception
  • Malicious deception (a lie)
  • “Benevolent” deception (a story)
• Truth is the ultimate ideal, though rarely practiced
  • Feelings > Rationality
  • An unsaid truth can lead to worse outcomes than a bitter truth
• Family need not be bound by blood
• Life outcomes need to be bound by blood
• Order and Chaos > Contentment and Change
  • Some are bound to either one
• All humans are capable of redemption – through choice, through action, through will – given to us.
  • We are not ‘enforced’ to do good through virtue or guilt.
  • Timshel – ‘thou mayest’
  • Capacity for evil is inversely proportional to the present good.
  • Likewise, capacity for good is inversely proportional to the present evil.
    • But neither is ever 100% and 0%.

Quotes

And it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years, and during the wet years they lost all memory of the dry years. It was always that way.

The early settlers took up land they didn’t need and couldn’t use; they took up worthless land just to own it. And all proportions changed. A man who might have been well-to-do on ten acres in Europe was rat-poor on two thousand in California.

But I think that because they trusted themselves and respected themselves as individuals, because they knew beyond doubt that they were valuable and potentially moral units—because of this they could give God their own courage and dignity and then receive it back. Such things have disappeared perhaps because men do not trust themselves any more, and when that happens there is nothing left except perhaps to find some strong sure man, even though he may be wrong, and to dangle from his coattails.

When a child first catches adults out—when it first walks into his grave little head that adults do not have divine intelligence, that their judgments are not always wise, their thinking true, their sentences just—his world falls into panic desolation. The gods are fallen and all safety gone. And there is one sure thing about the fall of gods: they do not fall a little; they crash and shatter or sink deeply into green muck. It is a tedious job to build them up again; they never quite shine. And the child’s world is never quite whole again. It is an aching kind of growing.

The techniques and training were not designed for the boys at all but only to make Cyrus a great man. And the same click in the brain told Adam that his father was not a great man, that he was, indeed, a very strong-willed and concentrated little man wearing a huge busby. Who knows what causes this—a look in the eye, a lie found out, a moment of hesitation?—then god comes crashing down in a child’s brain.

And out of the long tunnels of his eyes Adam saw his half-brother Charles as a bright being of another species, gifted with muscle and bone, speed and alertness, quite on a different plane, to be admired as one admires the sleek lazy danger of a black leopard, not by any chance to be compared with one’s self. And it would no more have occurred to Adam to confide in his brother—to tell him the hunger, the gray dreams, the plans and silent pleasures that lay at the back of the tunneled eyes—than to share his thoughts with a lovely tree or a pheasant in flight. Adam was glad of Charles the way a woman is glad of a fat diamond, and he depended on his brother in the way that same woman depends on the diamond’s glitter and the self-security tied up in its worth; but love, affection, empathy, were beyond conception.

“I’ll have you know that a soldier is the most holy of all humans because he is the most tested—most tested of all. I’ll try to tell you. Look now—in all of history men have been taught that killing of men is an evil thing not to be countenanced. Any man who kills must be destroyed because this is a great sin, maybe the worst sin we know. And then we take a soldier and put murder in his hands and we say to him, ‘Use it well, use it wisely.’ We put no checks on him. Go out and kill as many of a certain kind or classification of your brothers as you can. And we will reward you for it because it is a violation of your early training.”

They’ll first strip off your clothes, but they’ll go deeper than that. They’ll shuck off any little dignity you have—you’ll lose what you think of as your decent right to live and to be let alone to live. They’ll make you live and eat and sleep and shit close to other men. And when they dress you up again you’ll not be able to tell yourself from the others. You can’t even wear a scrap or pin a note on your breast to say, ‘This is me—separate from the rest.’ ”

A thing so triumphantly illogical, so beautifully senseless as an army can’t allow a question to weaken it.

If you can go down so low, you will be able to rise higher than you can conceive, and you will know a holy joy, a companionship almost like that of a heavenly company of angels. Then you will know the quality of men even if they are inarticulate. But until you have gone way down you can never know this.”

You can drive a human too far. I wouldn’t do that. Always you must leave a man one escape before death. Remember that!

From the day of a child’s birth he is taught by every circumstance, by every law and rule and right, to protect his own life. He starts with that great instinct, and everything confirms it. And then he is a soldier and he must learn to violate all of this—he must learn coldly to put himself in the way of losing his own life without going mad. And if you can do that—and, mind you, some can’t—then you will have the greatest gift of all. Look, son,” Cyrus said earnestly, “nearly all men are afraid, and they don’t even know what causes their fear—shadows, perplexities, dangers without names or numbers, fear of a faceless death. But if you can bring yourself to face not shadows but real death, described and recognizable, by bullet or saber, arrow or lance, then you need never be afraid again, at least not the same way you were before. Then you will be a man set apart from other men, safe where other men may cry in terror. This is the great reward. Maybe this is the only reward. Maybe this is the final purity all ringed with filth.

The direction of a big act will warp history, but probably all acts do the same in their degree, down to a stone stepped over in the path or a breath caught at sight of a pretty girl or a fingernail nicked in the garden soil.

They weren’t afraid of him any more, for he did not seduce their wives or lure them out of sweet mediocrity.

Her total intellectual association was the Bible, except the talk of Samuel and her children, and to them she did not listen. In that one book she had her history and her poetry, her knowledge of peoples and things, her ethics, her morals, and her salvation. She never studied the Bible or inspected it; she just read it. The many places where it seems to refute itself did not confuse her in the least. And finally she came to a point where she knew it so well that she went right on reading it without listening.

It is a hard thing to leave any deeply routined life, even if you hate it.

A farmer cannot think too much evil of a good farmer.

A time splashed with interest, wounded with tragedy, crevassed with joy—that’s the time that seems long in the memory. And this is right when you think about it. Eventlessness has no posts to drape duration on. From nothing to nothing is no time at all.

When two events have something in common, in their natures or in time or place, we leap happily to the conclusion that they are similar and from this tendency we create magics and store them for retelling.

“Let me tell you. The proofs that God does not exist are very strong, but in lots of people they are not as strong as the feeling that He does.”

And just as there are physical monsters, can there not be mental or psychic monsters born? The face and body may be perfect, but if a twisted gene or a malformed egg can produce physical monsters, may not the same process produce a malformed soul?

You must not forget that a monster is only a variation, and that to a monster the norm is monstrous.

I think the difference between a lie and a story is that a story utilizes the trappings and appearance of truth for the interest of the listener as well as of the teller. A story has in it neither gain nor loss. But a lie is a device for profit or escape. I suppose if that definition is strictly held to, then a writer of stories is a liar—if he is financially fortunate.

If one is accused of a lie and it turns out to be the truth, there is a backlog that will last a long time and protect a number of untruths.

What freedom men and women could have, were they not constantly tricked and trapped and enslaved and tortured by their sexuality! The only drawback in that freedom is that without it one would not be a human. One would be a monster.

She had never been so afraid before in her life, but she had learned fear now.

Another hundred years were ground up and churned, and what had happened was all muddied by the way folks wanted it to be—more rich and meaningful the farther back it was.

A man may have lived all of his life in the gray, and the land and trees of him dark and somber. The events, even the important ones, may have trooped by faceless and pale. And then—the glory—so that a cricket song sweetens his ears, the smell of the earth rises chanting to his nose, and dappling light under a tree blesses his eyes. Then a man pours outward, a torrent of him, and yet he is not diminished. And I guess a man’s importance in the world can be measured by the quality and number of his glories. It is a lonely thing but it relates us to the world. It is the mother of all creativeness, and it sets each man separate from all other men.

When our food and clothing and housing all are born in the complication of mass production, mass method is bound to get into our thinking and to eliminate all other thinking. In our time mass or collective production has entered our economics, our politics, and even our religion, so that some nations have substituted the idea collective for the idea God. This in my time is the danger. There is great tension in the world, tension toward a breaking point, and men are unhappy and confused.

Our species is the only creative species, and it has only one creative instrument, the individual mind and spirit of a man. Nothing was ever created by two men. There are no good collaborations, whether in music, in art, in poetry, in mathematics, in philosophy. Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man. And now the forces marshaled around the concept of the group have declared a war of extermination on that preciousness, the mind of man. By disparagement, by starvation, by repressions, forced direction, and the stunning hammerblows of conditioning, the free, roving mind is being pursued, roped, blunted, drugged. It is a sad suicidal course our species seems to have taken. And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual.

we are capable of many things in all directions, of great virtues and great sins. And who in his mind has not probed the black water?

He took no rest, no recreation, and he became rich without pleasure and respected without friends.

It must be a hard thing to kill a man you don’t know and don’t hate.” “Maybe that makes it easier,” said Louis. “You have a point, Louis. But some men are friends with the whole world in their hearts, and there are others that hate themselves and spread their hatred around like butter on hot bread.”

“He always tells what it will be like someday,” Louis threw in. “Well, a man’s mind can’t stay in time the way his body does.”

“That’s why I’m talking to you. You are one of the rare people who can separate your observation from your preconception. You see what is, where most people see what they expect.”

I write a great deal to keep my English up. Hearing and reading aren’t the same as speaking and writing.”

There are no ugly questions except those clothed in condescension.

He had an idea that even when beaten he could steal a little victory by laughing at defeat.

The Lord in his wisdom gave money to very curious people, perhaps because they’d starve without.

“Act out being alive, like a play. And after a while, a long while, it will be true.”

A new country seems to follow a pattern. First come the openers, strong and brave and rather childlike. They can take care of themselves in a wilderness, but they are naïve and helpless against men, and perhaps that is why they went out in the first place.

In human affairs of danger and delicacy successful conclusion is sharply limited by hurry. So often men trip by being in a rush. If one were properly to perform a difficult and subtle act, he should first inspect the end to be achieved and then, once he had accepted the end as desirable, he should forget it completely and concentrate solely on the means. By this method he would not be moved to false action by anxiety or hurry or fear. Very few people learn this.

She was capable of complete relaxation between the times for action. Also, she was mistress of a technique which is the basis of good wrestling—that of letting your opponent do the heavy work toward his own defeat, or of guiding his strength toward his weaknesses.

“I don’t very much believe in blood,” said Samuel. “I think when a man finds good or bad in his children he is seeing only what he planted in them after they cleared the womb.”

Names are a great mystery. I’ve never known whether the name is molded by the child or the child changed to fit the name. But you can be sure of this—whenever a human has a nickname it is a proof that the name given him was wrong.

An unbelieved truth can hurt a man much more than a lie. It takes great courage to back truth unacceptable to our times. There’s a punishment for it, and it’s usually crucifixion. I haven’t the courage for that.”

But it’s nice for a mediocre man to know that greatness must be the loneliest state in the world.”

“I’d think there are degrees of greatness,” Adam said. “I don’t think so,” said Samuel. “That would be like saying there is a little bigness. No. I believe when you come to that responsibility the hugeness and you are alone to make your choice. On one side you have warmth and companionship and sweet understanding, and on the other—cold, lonely greatness. There you make your choice. I’m glad I chose mediocrity, but how am I to say what reward might have come with the other? None of my children will be great either, except perhaps Tom. He’s suffering over the choosing right now. It’s a painful thing to watch. And somewhere in me I want him to say yes. Isn’t that strange? A father to want his son condemned to greatness! What selfishness that must be.”

He looked up at the sky. “Lord, how the day passes! It’s like a life—so quickly when we don’t watch it and so slowly when we do. No,” he said, “I’m having enjoyment. And I made a promise to myself that I would not consider enjoyment a sin. I take a pleasure in inquiring into things. I’ve never been content to pass a stone without looking under it. And it is a black disappointment to me that I can never see the far side of the moon.”

“No story has power, nor will it last, unless we feel in ourselves that it is true and true of us. What a great burden of guilt men have!”

If a story is not about the hearer he will not listen. And I here make a rule—a great and lasting story is about everyone or it will not last. The strange and foreign is not interesting—only the deeply personal and familiar.”

The greatest terror a child can have is that he is not loved, and rejection is the hell he fears. I think everyone in the world to a large or small extent has felt rejection. And with rejection comes anger, and with anger some kind of crime in revenge for the rejection, and with the crime guilt—and there is the story of mankind.

I think that if rejection could be amputated, the human would not be what he is. Maybe there would be fewer crazy people. I am sure in myself there would not be many jails. It is all there—the start, the beginning. One child, refused the love he craves, kicks the cat and hides his secret guilt; and another steals so that money will make him loved; and a third conquers the world—and always the guilt and revenge and more guilt. The human is the only guilty animal. Now wait! Therefore I think this old and terrible story [Cain and Abel] is important because it is a chart of the soul—the secret, rejected, guilty soul.

“Sometimes a man wants to be stupid if it lets him do a thing his cleverness forbids.

Liza accepted the world as she accepted the Bible, with all of its paradoxes and its reverses. She did not like death but she knew it existed, and when it came it did not surprise her.

“Do you take pride in your hurt?” Samuel asked. “Does it make you seem large and tragic?” “I don’t know.” “Well, think about it. Maybe you’re playing a part on a great stage with only yourself as audience.”

I am myself sifting my memories, the way men pan the dirt under a barroom floor for the bits of gold dust that fall between the cracks. It’s small mining—small mining. You’re too young a man to be panning memories, Adam. You should be getting yourself some new ones, so that the mining will be richer when you come to age.”

When you say I deserve a rest, you are saying that my life is over.”

I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed—because ‘Thou mayest.’ ”

I believe there are techniques of the human mind whereby, in its dark deep, problems are examined, rejected or accepted. Such activities sometimes concern facets a man does not know he has. How often one goes to sleep troubled and full of pain, not knowing what causes the travail, and in the morning a whole new direction and a clearness is there, maybe the result of the black reasoning. And again there are mornings when ecstasy bubbles in the blood, and the stomach and chest are tight and electric with joy, and nothing in the thoughts to justify it or cause it.

“My wish isn’t as strong as it once was. I’m afraid I could be talked out of it or, what would be worse, I could be held back just by being needed. Please try not to need me. That’s the worst bait of all to a lonely man.”

I believe a strong woman may be stronger than a man, particularly if she happens to have love in her heart. I guess a loving woman is almost indestructible.”

There’s more beauty in the truth even if it is dreadful beauty.

The house was clean, scrubbed and immaculate, curtains washed, windows polished, but all as a man does it—the ironed curtains did not hang quite straight and there were streaks on the windows and a square showed on the table when a book was moved.

And in our time, when a man dies—if he has had wealth and influence and power and all the vestments that arouse envy, and after the living take stock of the dead man’s property and his eminence and works and monuments—the question is still there: Was his life good or was it evil?—which is another way of putting Croesus’s question. Envies are gone, and the measuring stick is: “Was he loved or was he hated? Is his death felt as a loss or does a kind of joy come of it?”

no gift will ever buy back a man’s love when you have removed his self-love.

I am certain that underneath their topmost layers of frailty men want to be good and want to be loved. Indeed, most of their vices are attempted short cuts to love. When a man comes to die, no matter what his talents and influence and genius, if he dies unloved his life must be a failure to him and his dying a cold horror. It seems to me that if you or I must choose between two courses of thought or action, we should remember our dying and try so to live that our death brings no pleasure to the world

We have only one story. All novels, all poetry, are built on the never-ending contest in ourselves of good and evil. And it occurs to me that evil must constantly respawn, while good, while virtue, is immortal. Vice has always a new fresh young face, while virtue is venerable as nothing else in the world is.

whereas a puppy will cringe away or roll on its back, groveling, a little boy may cover his shyness with nonchalance, with bravado, or with secrecy. And once a boy has suffered rejection, he will find rejection even where it does not exist—or, worse, will draw it forth from people simply by expecting it.

whereas a puppy will cringe away or roll on its back, groveling, a little boy may cover his shyness with nonchalance, with bravado, or with secrecy. And once a boy has suffered rejection, he will find rejection even where it does not exist—or, worse, will draw it forth from people simply by expecting it.

It is one of the triumphs of the human that he can know a thing and still not believe it.

“I don’t think the light hurts your eyes. I think you’re afraid.”

Then she built the lean-to and had it painted gray. She said it was because the light troubled her eyes, and gradually she began to believe the light did trouble her eyes. Her eyes burned after a trip to the town. She spent more and more time in her little room.

“Sometimes I think the world tests us most sharply then, and we turn inward and watch ourselves with horror. But that’s not the worst. We think everybody is seeing into us. Then dirt is very dirty and purity is shining white. Aron, it will be over. Wait only a little while and it will be over. That’s not much relief to you because you don’t believe it, but it’s the best I can do for you. Try to believe that things are neither so good nor so bad as they seem to you now.

“Laughter comes later, like wisdom teeth, and laughter at yourself comes last of all in a mad race with death, and sometimes it isn’t in time.”

There is no dignity in death in battle. Mostly that is a splashing about of human meat and fluid, and the result is filthy, but there is a great and almost sweet dignity in the sorrow, the helpless, the hopeless sorrow, that comes down over a family with the telegram. Nothing to say, nothing to do, and only one hope—I hope he didn’t suffer—and what a forlorn and last-choice hope that is. And it is true that there were some people who, when their sorrow was beginning to lose its savor, gently edged it toward pride and felt increasingly important because of their loss. Some of these even made a good thing of it after the war was over. That is only natural, just as it is natural for a man whose life function is the making of money to make money out of a war. No one blamed a man for that, but it was expected that he should invest a part of his loot in war bonds.

“Timshel—and you said—” “I said that word carried a man’s greatness if he wanted to take advantage of it.” “I remember Sam Hamilton felt good about it.” “It set him free,” said Lee. “It gave him the right to be a man, separate from every other man.” “That’s lonely.” “All great and precious things are lonely.” “What is the word again?” “Timshel—thou mayest.”

“Timshel—and you said—” “I said that word carried a man’s greatness if he wanted to take advantage of it.” “I remember Sam Hamilton felt good about it.” “It set him free,” said Lee. “It gave him the right to be a man, separate from every other man.” “That’s lonely.” “All great and precious things are lonely.” “What is the word again?” “Timshel—thou mayest.”

By whipping himself he protected himself against whipping by someone else.

“Old Sam Hamilton saw this coming. He said there couldn’t be any more universal philosophers. The weight of knowledge is too great for one mind to absorb. He saw a time when one man would know only one little fragment, but he would know it well.”

“Maybe the knowledge is too great and maybe men are growing too small,” said Lee. “Maybe, kneeling down to atoms, they’re becoming atom-sized in their souls. Maybe a specialist is only a coward, afraid to look out of his little cage. And think what any specialist misses—the whole world over his fence.”

“Everything is only for a day, both that which remembers and that which is remembered.

“Thou wilt die soon and thou are not yet simple nor free from perturbations, nor without suspicion of being hurt by external things, nor kindly disposed towards all; nor dost thou yet place wisdom only in acting justly.”

“We’re a violent people, Cal. Does it seem strange to you that I include myself? Maybe it’s true that we are all descended from the restless, the nervous, the criminals, the arguers and brawlers, but also the brave and independent and generous. If our ancestors had not been that, they would have stayed in their home plots in the other world and starved over the squeezed-out soil.”

We all have that heritage, no matter what old land our fathers left. All colors and blends of Americans have somewhat the same tendencies. It’s a breed—selected out by accident. And so we’re overbrave and overfearful—we’re kind and cruel as children. We’re overfriendly and at the same time frightened of strangers. We boast and are impressed. We’re oversentimental and realistic. We are mundane and materialistic—and do you know of any other nation that acts for ideals? We eat too much. We have no taste, no sense of proportion. We throw our energy about like waste. In the old lands they say of us that we go from barbarism to decadence without an intervening culture. Can it be that our critics have not the key or the language of our culture? That’s what we are, Cal—all of us. You aren’t very different.”

[The doctor said, “He] knows more about the pathology of cerebral hemorrhage than I do, and I bet as much as you do.” He spoke with a kind of affectionate anger that this should be so. The medical profession is unconsciously irritated by lay knowledge.

• Chris Webb’s BI blog: https://blog.crossjoin.co.uk/category/power-bi
• Radacad: https://radacad.com
• Power Query Microsoft reference: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/powerquery-m/power-query-m-function-reference
• Power BI DAX reference: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dax/dax-function-reference

Formatting

Non-alphanumeric characters are helpful for moving around data tables via the naming structure (to be sorted together when sorted alphabetically). Here’s a character sort order from smallest to largest:

• _-,;:!?.'”()@*/\&#%`^<>|~$

Most people tend to think procrastination is a malpractice. But, I’m here to tell you that it’s not all bad. Being a procrastinator, I tend to perform tasks quicker. And being a perfectionist, I try to perform tasks with the highest quality and effort. I am not saying this to boost my ego or tell you to be the same. What I will tell you are the benefits of being a procrastinator and a perfectionist at the same time. Here are a few things I learned by doing my best work at the last minute.

1. Plan to procrastinate

When I procrastinate, I know that I am. It is not because I forgot to do something. It is simply a decision to perform the work in full–usually with minimum lapses in time. For me, I am able to focus wholly on one thing without distractions (another thing to avoid). Nevertheless, I make sure that when I procrastinate, there will be enough time to complete the task. As a perfectionist, I also consider the time to cover the relevant material. Some people who focus on quality waste time on irrelevant information. Using prior knowledge can be useful as well (I rely a lot on logic for more basic assignments). Overall, planning for quality is just as important as completion.

2. It’s all in the details

For a teacher, it is probably easy to tell whether a student procrastinated or not. Though procrastinating itself won’t affect your grade, the level of quality may be a consequence of putting it off. That is why instead of painting a big, sweeping picture of what’s expected, show proof in the details. I take time to reference specific quotes or small bits of information in my papers. I consider this a form of evidence–evidence that I looked more into the material, analyzed it, and can recall specific examples. Never–ever–forget about the details.

3. Find your zen

We all know studying can be hard. But, we sometimes try to study in environments that don’t foster the creativity and critical thinking we need. Where you procrastinate is just as important as when. Think about it: some people try to study at work or during other classes. Are you really focused at these places? Coffee shops are a common locale to study–but it’s not for everyone. People are distractions. Music and sounds are distractions. But, for some people, this can catalyze their focus. Take a step back and think about what makes you focus. For me, it is a warmly-lit room with nice décor and non-vocal music. But, what if this perfect place doesn’t exist?! MAKE IT EXIST! I transformed my room into this zen. You can do the same.

4. The first step is the hardest

How many times have you gone through the “homework routine”? You get your backpack, some paper, something to write with, your laptop… and the first thing you do? Scan your email. Open Facebook. Check Twitter. We LOVE to prepare, but not execute. One thing I’ve found helpful is to do the first step–AND ONLY THE FIRST STEP–before you get distracted. For a paper, this could be formatting it with your headers, title, page numbers, etc. For a project, it could be outlining everything and its due date. Whatever it may be, just starting it will encourage you to complete it. Our brains aren’t wired to do everything at once. So, make it a priority to begin and the rest will flow.

These are just a few ways I’ve been efficient at procrastinating, yet still producing high-quality work. These methods aren’t for everyone, but I believe they can be used to improve areas that you might struggle in. Since high school, I’ve found ways to manage my responsibilities and tasks in a condensed, structured, and standardized manner. You’d be surprised–some of your best work comes from your level of focus, not the amount of time spent doing it.

However, there’s a huge caveat to this type of learning–technical skill can be programmed. To take things further, ArtNet reported that AI and neural networking is allowing computers to produce art on an abstract scale. The image featured in this post was a by-product of Google’s AI project, Magenta.

For historical context, consider this: the Renaissance was a prime era for hyper-realistic paintings. It was a superb moment in art’s history. However, this era of painting wasn’t just aesthetically pleasing–it was for documenting various events and people. Without any development in photography, people have used paintings to depict certain people and themes in history. Often times, these paintings can employ meaning, motives, and emotion.

Check out this Renaissance painting The School of Athens (1509) by Rafael.

The beauty of Athens, detailed architecture, and iconic philosophers are all included in this painting. With its realism, viewers can be “taken” back to the time when Plato and communal discussions existing.

AI’s development into producing highly-aesthetic and abstract art poses some problems. For one, art will lose value due to original work being produced on a massive scale. Another gray area is deciding on what AI art is “original.” If a computer code made the painting, then is the programmer the artist? Is it the computer? Who gets paid when this art is bought? There are also implications for real artists to create as an occupation. If there is a computer that can produce quicker, larger, and more art, will there be a need for an actual artist?

These are some important questions we must address as AI continues to evolve. America and the rest of the world has built culture and meaning on various forms of art. Whether it’s music, design, or architecture–I’m sure painting is just the beginning in implementing AI into human culture.