First of all, welcome one and all to my blog.

I’ve finally lifted the silk curtains to my wonderful creation, my baby… my professional portfolio. But now you are here, what can you expect?

Well, first up this is going to be a blog from the man himself. Will it have personal stuff? Of course. Professional talks? Hopefully. Ramblings of a mad man? A bit.

I’ll try and keep the blog updates regular but they will be coming as and when I feel the need to exhale my thoughts into the wide world of the web. Seeing as this is the first one, the pressure is definitely here to make sure it’s not an embarrassing one I look back on and cringe at. So here goes nothing.

Carpe Diem

Why do you have Carpe Diem as the first thing you see when stumbling about my website?

Well. I’ll fill you in on a secret of mine, it’s the motto I live and swear by. Translated directly, Carpe Diem basically means ‘seize the moment’ in Latin (I believe). I take it to mean the following:

When opportunities arise, take them. Plunge yourself in to the most uncertain of scenarios, be the person that says ‘Yes’ and you will see you life change significantly for the better. I’m talking everything from deciding to start your own business all the way to trying a mushy pea for the first time. Trust me.

How did ‘your mantra’ come about?

Bizarrely enough, my memory is vivid about the moment my eyes were opened as to what I had been missing out on. It came from a close friend of mine who was being paid to travel Australia for a year. From someone I’d never expect to be seen out of the town they group up in too! I was in awe when I met them in a London pub and they had all of these wonderful experiences to share. They chose to make that leap out of their comfort zone after watching a film. Yes Man (you know, the one with Jim Carrey in it).

I’ll let you in to another secret of mine. I haven’t watched the film, on purpose. That film alone and the very idea of transforming yourself from someone who has been wasting opportunities all these years because of money, time or other commitments (like work) into a Yes Man is too overwhelming for me to sit down and watch. The day I watch Yes Man won’t be for many years yet.

How it has changed my life.

The very concept of Carpe Diem took me to America three times, won a load of competitions, started a casino website, it got me to try a wide variety of foods, go on spontaneous dates, start a YouTube channel, a podcast, travel the breadth of the UK and most recently, I’m about to publish a book.

Now on to what I missed from that list – this very website itself. #InceptionMoment right!? I wanted somewhere I could put my name to the work I create over what is to be the span of my career. I had to start somewhere for both a personal blog and professional portfolio so I ‘seized’ (see what I did there?) the URL under my own name. andrewwaterhouse.com is going to be my risk.

More on the #InceptionMoment thing, who do I expect to be visiting? Well to start with, the extended network of social media once I put word out. As time goes by, traffic will perhaps be minimal to passing employees, future employers and the like. Occasionally though, someone outside of the circle will stumble upon here. Who will these people be?

I’ll name one very small group – other Andrew Waterhouse’s… #InceptionMoment.

They supposedly do exist in the wild so I have heard, other people with my name. From time to time, a bit of googling will perhaps evoke their envy at missing out on a domain with their name on. Does this make me ‘the official one’? Maybe that’s for a later blog.

People think of me as being lucky. They’re wrong. I seize opportunities.

Leave a comment