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Sir Keir Starmer must provide more clarity on his plans to improve the UK’s Brexit deal at a meeting next week with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen, diplomats and analysts have warned.

The UK prime minister will meet von der Leyen in Brussels on Wednesday nearly three months after taking office amid continued divisions in his cabinet over whether to agree a youth mobility deal with the EU. This would enable young people to work and travel more freely in the UK and across the bloc.

However, after a summer of summits, bilateral visits and warm words, senior EU diplomats have indicated they are growing impatient with what they see as the UK’s unwillingness to set out clear objectives for the relationship. 

“The melody is there, but now we have to start concentrating on writing the lyrics,” said one senior diplomat. A second was more direct: “The UK needs to tell us what they want,” they said.

Labour has said that it wants a deep rapprochement with the EU but has ruled out rejoining the single market or seeking a customs union with Europe, preferring to seek additions and improvements to the existing Trade and Co-operation Agreement.

These include a “veterinary agreement” to reduce trade barriers on agrifoods, easier access for service professionals and a deal to reduce paperwork for touring musicians and other artists.

Analysts said Wednesday’s meeting was being seen in Brussels as a significant stepping stone to more detailed negotiations beyond Starmer’s general expressions of a desire for deeper co-operation with the EU on security, policing and trade.

“Starmer has to use the meeting to provide a greater, concrete sense of what the government actually wants to do. It can’t be another ‘mood music’ meeting — that won’t land well in Brussels,” said Mujtaba Rahman of the Eurasia Group political risk consultancy.

The prime minister will also see the presidents of the other big EU institutions, Charles Michel of the European Council of national leaders, and Roberta Metsola of the European parliament.

Differences have emerged between the two sides over the question of a youth mobility deal. Brussels has prioritised it as an important first expression of warmer ties but a deal has been rejected in London as appearing to be too close to the “free movement” of people that was ended by Brexit.

This week Pedro Serrano, EU ambassador to the UK, played down the youth mobility issue ahead of the meeting, suggesting the scheme should resemble a “gap year” programme that would not grant European citizens the right to work in Britain. The commission proposal, now being revised by member states, suggested four years’ residence for the under-30s.

However, speaking after Serrano’s intervention, Starmer reiterated his position that he has “no plans for a youth mobility scheme” between the UK and EU. He added that he shared the view of Yvette Cooper, UK home secretary, that it risked undermining public perceptions of the government’s approach to immigration.

Cooper wants to cut down on legal migration and to focus on training young people in Britain to fill skills shortages.

Despite the differences, UK ministers say they believe “landing zones can be found” on the issue, while arguing it is important not to “lose sight of the big picture” as the EU and the UK jointly face the challenges of Russian leader Vladimir Putin, populism and irregular migration.

UK chancellor Rachel Reeves is also pushing for an ambitious deal to reduce trade barriers with the EU, including telling the Financial Times before the election that she was willing to sign up to the Brussels rule book in certain sectors, including chemicals.

“Rachel is relaxed about that,” said one ally of the chancellor. “She doesn’t see any problem with being a rule taker in established industries.” The Starmer government is, however, still attached to the idea of Britain having regulatory flexibility in emerging technologies.

Reeves’s role in the forthcoming talks with the EU will be vital, given the chancellor’s focus on delivering the government’s overarching mission: boosting growth.

Her allies say the chancellor believes a compromise can be reached with Brussels on a youth mobility scheme but she also supports Cooper’s position that it cannot look anything like the pre-Brexit free movement of people.

A MUM has urged shoppers to snap up free nappies “even if you don’t have kids” before Morrison’s shoppers issued a stark warning to parents.

Stephanie Pim shared a post on Facebook encouraging shoppers at the major supermarket chain to check the app to see if they’re eligible for free nappies.

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She wrote: “If you have a Morrisons card check your app. Free nappies.”

However, it’s not just those with children that can snap up the essential item.

The savvy mum added: “Even if you don’t have kids- grab them and pop in the food bank.”

Stephanie’s Facebook post received hundreds of likes and comments from fellow shoppers.

One user wrote: “Thank you for the heads up, it is on mine.”

“I got them a couple of weeks ago,” said another.

However, many shoppers commented that even after signing up for the Morrison’s card and baby club, they still weren’t eligible for the free nappies.

This user commented: “I’m in baby club and not on mine.”

Another added: “Not on mine.”

While a third explained: “Spoke to someone in Morrisons who said it’s potluck if you get them or not which seems silly as people who don’t have children get them and there are others out there with children who need this.”

Morrison shoppers have also complained about the lack of nappies in stock with many customers expressing frustration on social media.

One shopper wrote: “The problem is tons of people got this offer and my local Morrisons has never had the nappies in stock.”

It comes after several lucky shoppers were surprised to learn they could get free Pampers nappies from Tesco.

One excited shopper shared her Tesco receipt on Facebook, revealing that she could choose from either a pack of 55 size ones, a pack of 44 size twos, or a pack of 40 size threes.

The savvy mum, who posted the find on social media, urged parents to check their receipts to see if they’re eligible.

Those lucky enough to be selected get a pack of Pampers nappies for free.

The popular brand costs around £10 normally.

The mum’s Facebook post received numerous likes and comments with shoppers eager to get their hands on the free nappies.

One user commented: “If we go to Tesco. Always yes for a receipt.”

“Need to go to Tesco, worth seeing if we’re one of the lucky ones,” wrote another.

While a third said: “If anyone gets anything like this but doesn’t need them, put them in the Foodbank Collection boxes.”

Other ways to save money when you shop

Cashback sites have amazing freebies for new customers, such as a takeaway from Just Eat or a Benefit beauty product.

Free gifts can change regularly so do check online to see what is being offered before you sign up.

Look for cashback on everything

You can claim on things such as MOTs, insurance, train tickets and holidays.

It is worth looking around and what companies offer cashback schemes as you could be earning hundreds.

TopCashback reckons its average user makes £345 a year.

Save money at the supermarket

It’s a good idea to download apps Shopmium, Check-outSmart, Quidco ClickSnap, GreenJinn and TopCashback’s Snap and Save.

Check out what is available, pick it up in-store and upload a photo of the receipt to get your cashback.

Combine cashback offers with promotions

Double savings and maximise cashback by matching third-party offers from cashback sites with in-store and online promotions.

You can’t always use discount codes with cashback, but you can take advantage of sales and offers such as free gifts.

Download cashback notifiers

The website Honey has a great notifier.

It sits in your browser, pops up when you click on a website that offers cashback and searches for voucher codes.

Welcome back. No discussion of Europe’s future omits to place defence and security at or near the top of the list of policymakers’ priorities. For Nato’s European members, the aim is to deliver not just higher but better-quality defence expenditure.

Still, the obstacles to an integrated European defence effort are formidable — and the question of how far to involve the EU remains contested. I’m at tony.barber@ft.com.

A ‘true defence union’

In 2014, when Nato governments pledged to spend at least 2 per cent of GDP annually on defence, only three countries met the target. This year, 23 of the alliance’s 32 states will do so, according to Nato estimates.

In principle, then, there is progress. But the leaders who will run the EU’s Brussels-based institutions for the next five years say, correctly, that more needs to be done. They take the view that the EU can play a vital role in stimulating and co-ordinating an improved effort from national governments and defence industries.

Speaking at the European parliament in July, Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission president, said:

For the first time in decades our freedom is under threat . . . I believe now is therefore the time to build a true European defence union.

An early sign of her commitment was her nomination of former Lithuanian premier Andrius Kubilius as the EU’s first defence commissioner.

The EU legislature has still to confirm the appointment of Kubilius. But he has wasted no time in airing proposals that, if put into effect, would define his five-year term.

One is to make EU governments stockpile minimum levels of ammunition and other supplies. Another, more controversial idea is to draw on unused tens of billions of euros in the EU’s post-pandemic recovery fund to ramp up defence expenditure.

Vulnerable Europe

The sense of urgency is not misplaced.

Writing for the US Council on Foreign Relations, Thomas Graham puts matters bluntly:

Currently, Europe is in no position to defend itself. Comfortable in its reliance on the US as its security guarantor after the cold war, it allowed its military forces and defence industries to atrophy to devote greater resources to raising standards of living.

As a result, European military forces cannot effectively operate without direction and material support from the US.

Now, Graham says, Europe has been “shocked out of its geopolitical slumber” by two developments: Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and a possible second term in the White House for Donald Trump.

Legal and constitutional constraints

Various difficulties stand in the way of an EU-led defence effort. In this collection of articles for the EconPol Forum, a Germany-based research network, one essay highlights the problem of lack of co-ordination:

European states are not aligning their military spending priorities. For this reason, a simple increase in national defence spending does not automatically lead to a higher joint industrial and operational capacity of the EU but increases the risk of wasting the growing military resources.

Another article underlines the legal and constitutional constraints on the EU:

On the one hand, the EU treaties currently do not provide a fully fledged legal basis for a proper EU defence; on the other hand, several national constitutions (including the German, Italian, Irish and others) include clauses that limit what can be jointly achieved in terms of defence.

In this article for the UK in a Changing Europe think-tank, Delphine Deschaux-Dutard explains that, in spite of these constraints, the EU has launched some useful initiatives, mostly in response to Russia’s attack on Ukraine.

They include:

1.    The European Peace Facility, which finances the delivery of military equipment to Ukraine

2.    The Act in Support of Ammunition Production, which promotes collective European procurement of ammunitions

3.    The European Defence Industry Reinforcement through Common Procurement Act, which sets up a fund to assist weapons purchases

Where to get the weapons?

Defence procurement poses a particular challenge for Europe. According to the French Institute for International and Strategic Affairs, EU countries announced over €100bn of defence purchases in the 15 months after Russia’s attack on Ukraine in February 2022.

Of that sum, 78 per cent represented armaments from outside the EU. The major suppliers were the US (80 per cent of non-EU procurement), South Korea (13 per cent) and Israel and the UK (3 per cent each).

The EU has programmes in place for a more self-reliant, collaborative European defence effort, especially in research and development, but the sums of money involved are small.

Defence industry executives and specialists recently drafted a report that highlighted shortcomings in the EU effort. “Companies are worried their collaborative outputs will be put on the shelf, never again to be looked at once EU funding runs dry,” Aurélie Pugnet wrote for the Euractiv news site.

Who should run the show?

Not all EU governments are convinced that von der Leyen’s commission should be handed more control over European defence policy.

In this FT article, Paola Tamma and Henry Foy quoted a senior EU diplomat as saying: “We would not accept a power grab by the commission.”

For good measure, this unnamed policymaker dismissed the idea of commonly issued EU defence bonds as “pure fantasy”.

Where will the money come from?

This raises the question of how to maintain or increase defence expenditure when budget deficits and public debt are already high in many EU countries after the 2008 financial crisis, the Covid pandemic and the subsequent energy crisis.

In a survey published this week by the World Economic Forum, some 53 per cent of chief economists identified public debt as a major risk to the stability of advanced economies.

The fiscal pressures facing EU governments are outlined in this authoritative European Central Bank study, which highlights the huge costs involved in addressing defence and security, demographic ageing, digitalisation and climate change. These are depicted in the ECB chart below.

However, the ECB makes the point that, if skilfully managed, higher defence spending could be beneficial for European economies and the public finances:

Additional defence spending could potentially increase GDP growth in the EU, with positive implications for fiscal sustainability in the longer term, if it (i) is concentrated in R&D-intensive investment, (ii) does not crowd out other productive investment, and (iii) focuses on EU-based sources.

EU budget

The fiscal constraints on defence spending are linked to the question of the EU’s next long-term budget, due to run from 2028 to 2034.

Any hope that the EU’s 27 states will reach an early consensus on the budget has been complicated by the domestic political weakness of President Emmanuel Macron in France and the troubles of Germany’s three-party ruling coalition.

After conversations this month with high-level policymakers in Brussels, Mujtaba Rahman of the Eurasia Group consultancy concluded that the budget debate will be extremely fraught. An expansion of the EU’s Covid-era joint debt issuance is far from certain, he says:

Opposition to more common borrowing is now so entrenched that most senior EU officials do not believe it will happen in the short term.

The small window that existed to do something more quickly — essentially between now and Germany’s federal elections in September 2025 — has effectively been closed by . . . Macron’s early election gamble.

This both weakened Macron’s voice in Europe and arrested the momentum that was building behind the idea of more common financing for intra-EU security and defence.

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German blockage

To restore the momentum, there would need to be significant change in Germany, the EU’s largest economy.

After Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced the creation of a €100bn fund for modernising Germany’s armed forces. But Rafał Ulatowski, writing for the Washington Quarterly, contends that there are good reasons to doubt whether this initiative has really transformed the country’s defence policy.

It’s not that Germany lacks the money. Rather, as Markus Jaeger argues in the Internationale Politik Quarterly, the problem is twofold.

First, Germany’s constitutionally enshrined “debt brake” imposes restrictions on deficit spending that hinder investment in defence.

Second, there are political constraints — “less in the sense of a lack of public support and more in terms of a lack of political leadership”.

Scholz’s coalition is on the ropes amid a rise in support for radical parties of right and left that oppose both support for Ukraine and an expanded defence effort.

In conclusion, the outlook for European security will be shaped not only by November’s US election result. A great deal hangs, too, on Germany’s Bundestag election a year from now.

More on this topic

Power for progress: why the EU needs a new global strategy — an essay by Giovanni Grevi for the Centre for Security, Diplomacy and Strategy at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel

Tony’s picks of the week

• Chinese merchants have flooded online marketplaces to sell US presidential election merchandise, as Democrats and Republicans seek to promote locally made products in a campaign marked by hostility towards China, the FT’s Sun Yu reports from New York

• Tuvalu, the Pacific coral island chain state, hopes to establish a legal basis for its continued sovereignty even if it disappears beneath the waves because of climate change, Kirsty Needham reports for Reuters news agency

A RESTAURANT in Solihull less than a 10 minute drive away from Birmingham Airport has been crowned best ‘hidden gem’ restaurant in Britain.

Lavang restaurant was awarded the accolade for its rave reviews from customers and its out the way location – nestled in between an electrical shop and a Chinese takeaway on a residential estate.

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The award was given by Tripadvisor in its Travellers’ Choice Awards Best of the Best Restaurants 2024.

Winners of the awards were chosen by looking at the quality and quantity of reviews and ratings for restaurants from travellers over a 12-month period.

Lavang’s location may not be the most exotic, but its menu serves up a tonne of South East Asian delights.

There’s everything from flavourful tandoori dishes to delicious charcoal grills.

And the prices on the menu are cheap too – poppadoms, a starter, curry, rice, naan, and chips for two people will set you back around £40.

Lavang’s chic and sophisticated style is also realised once you step inside.

The decor includes a beautiful white blossom ceiling, and customers describe everything as looking very clean and well presented.

Diners have also commented on Lavang’s staff being extremely friendly and efficient, with dietary requests always accommodated.

The restaurant is even commended for having an “impeccable playlist”.

Mr Miah, Lavang’s owner, explained to Sun Travel why the restaurant is perfectly located for customers.

He said: “Being located in Solihull; we’re in close proximity to both the NEC and Birmingham Airport – this in turn allows us to invite customers that are both local, and that are visiting the region.”

He added: “We are incredibly honoured and thrilled to receive this award. It’s a testament to the hard work and dedication of our entire team, who strive every day to provide exceptional food and service to our guests.

“Winning this award reinforces our commitment to excellence and motivates us to continue elevating the dining experience at Lavang.

“We are extremely grateful to our loyal customers for their support, and we look forward to sharing many more memorable moments with them.”

One customer who visited the restaurant in August this year and shared their experience on Tripadvisor.

They wrote: “After finding this gem of a restaurant I haven’t dined anywhere else for the same type of cuisine! That’s saying something because I love going to different places.

“Starters often taste better than the mains in a lot of restaurants; possibly because when you first sit down you’re hungry. Not here! Starters and mains are perfectly prepared each and every time; you truly savour and enjoy the whole meal.

“The level of service attention, helpfulness and friendliness is at exactly the right level creating a relaxed ambience of a great evening out.”

Another offered a tip with their review: “Do book as it’s always busy but this does not detract from its quality – it just adds to the enjoyable buzz of the restaurant.”

Two restaurants that missed out on the top spot on Tripadvisor’s hidden gems list were Sotto Sotto in Bath and Coronation Curry House in Bristol.

Sotto Sotto is an Italian restaurant known for using high-quality ingredients and its romantic setting.

It’s located in a basement cellar with stone vaulted ceilings and bare brick walls, with candlelit tables. 

Coronation Curry House in Bristol has fun colourful decor and Indian artwork adorning the wall, and customers describe its chicken tikka as “comforting and tender”.

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The writer is the former UK ambassador to Lebanon and foreign policy adviser to three prime ministers. His latest novel is ‘The Assassin’

Hassan Nasrallah’s death is a seismic moment for the Middle East, increasing the danger of a conflict between Israel and Iran that would be devastating for civilians and send tremors far beyond the region.

For decades, the Hizbollah Secretary General may have been hidden from public view, but he was present in every discussion. As Ambassador in Beirut I remember many evenings gathered around the radio, waiting to hear whether his latest speech — in response to an assassination or military strike — would dial the danger up or down. It was often the latter, but always with the menace of violence to come. The most powerful man in the country relished the theatre of it, the ability to keep us all guessing. 

Nasrallah was a malign genius. He built a formidable fighting machine, backed by his sophisticated public communications skills and the soft power — schools, hospitals, social care, infrastructure — that meant that his control of southern Lebanon was not only based on fear. He was also able to ensure, through assassinations, street muscle and a deft ability to divide and rule, that no Lebanese government could survive without his acquiescence. And that most could barely function even with it.     

The region now braces itself for the next decisions made by the hardliners in Iran and Israel. Many are fighting for their own survival, not the interests of the people they claim to represent.

In New York last week, Iran had signalled hard to western diplomats that it did not want to escalate, leaving Hizbollah seething that they were being abandoned. Iran’s major strategic fear, of a wider normalisation between Israel and the Gulf, has for now been buried in the catastrophic conflict following Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7 last year. Some in Tehran think that they should not interrupt their enemy in the process of making a mistake, arguing that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has isolated his country for a decade and made inevitable the outcome he has fought throughout his turbulent career: a Palestinian state.  

Meanwhile, Israeli decisions will continue to be driven by internal politics rather than international pressure. Netanyahu has sought to move the story on from domestic and international criticism of the conduct of the Gaza war. Israel has hit Hizbollah very hard, physically and psychologically. Some in Tel Aviv are arguing that a ground invasion — what hardliners call “mowing the grass” — could further degrade or destroy Hizbollah. But calmer voices recognise the immense damage that more massive civilian casualties would do to Israel’s reputation. A ground invasion would allow Hizbollah to rebuild the popularity and confidence that has drained away because of their actions against critics in Lebanon and in propping up Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. 

For the Lebanese there will be mixed emotions. Parts of the community will celebrate the removal of a man who has for years kept a brutal grip on the country. But there is also widespread horror at the loss of civilian life, and trepidation at whether Hizbollah, which will not remain leaderless for long, now has no choice but to unleash whatever remains of its arsenal towards Israel, bringing a further bloody cycle of retribution. 

Diplomats have talked for months of the danger of war between Israel and Hizbollah. We are now past that point. There had been genuine confidence in New York this week, following the UK’s swift call for a ceasefire and the statement from US, European and Arab leaders pressing for a 21-day cessation of hostilities. But hope ebbed away as Netanyahu shook a public fist at the world from the UN podium, and then raised the stakes so dramatically. The mood is now despondent. 

Yet those working hardest to pull the region back from the brink know what is needed. First, the implementation of UN resolutions and consistent pressure to stop the escalation. Then to get the Lebanese army alongside the UN on the Israel/Lebanon border, and the return of Lebanese state — not Iran or Hizbollah — authority to south Lebanon. A Gaza ceasefire agreement that gets the Israeli hostages out and aid in remains critical: this could create the conditions for the two-state solution that Hamas, Hizbollah and Israeli hawks want to bury. Security, justice and opportunity can only be achieved through coexistence, not the zero sum cycle of fear and destruction of which Nasrallah was such a part.

Above all, despite the growing feeling of impotence and despair, the international community must now — unequivocally and consistently — put protection of civilians from death or displacement at the heart of its strategy. The casualty numbers are staggering. The humanitarian community is already underfunded, overstretched and under attack. 

Nasrallah lived by the sword. I have heard today from many friends across the region who lost relatives, friends or political leaders as a result of his decisions. The emotions, of those who mourn or celebrate, are raw. The fear of what lies ahead is real. In death as in life, Nasrallah keeps his enemies and allies guessing. 

Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

Rick Astley is famous for two things. His 1987 hit, “Never Gonna Give You Up”. And giving up.

At 27, Astley quit his lucrative pop career to look after his daughter, exchanging tour buses for the school run. He was brought back into the spotlight 20 years later by Rickrolling — a meme that tricked the user into clicking on a video of his famous song, which has amassed more than 1bn views. It shot the 1980s singer back to stadiums and festivals, notably last year’s Glastonbury, introducing him to a new generation. It appeared he had pulled off a masterstroke.

I’ve always considered Astley’s walk away from fame and success heroic. It seemed to contrast with many successful people in fields beyond music — business, finance or politics — who chase more money, another deal, a bigger role. How is it possible to make peace with a smaller life without nurturing resentment or desperation to recapture the early glories of a successful career? Could Astley teach us something about professional achievement and managing ego? 

Walking out

It turns out that in crediting him with sacrificing fame for family, I’d fallen for a myth. In his new autobiography, Never, Astley sets the record straight. “It’s a lovely idea, and because I’ve never talked much about what really happened, people think that’s what happened. But it wasn’t like that — at least, not at first. On the surface, I was hugely relieved to be shot of the whole thing. I felt as if I’d been let off the hook: thank fuck for that, I can just get on with being a dad for a while. Underneath that, though, I was miserable about the whole situation.”

Speaking this week, he tells me he had to walk away as he had reached a point when continuing would have made him miserable and ill. Records were not selling, and promotion felt pointless and exhausting. Flying had become a phobia (“It felt like life or death”).

He knew his career had a shelf life. “I was in the frothy end of pop music. Most people don’t get 25 years. It was the universe saying knock it on the head now.” He asked to leave his record label and they agreed.

Money makes all the difference

Of course, a significant amount of cash helped the transition. How much is enough to retire in your twenties? I’ve met many people whose goalposts shift as their lifestyle becomes more expensive. “I can’t convey to you the luxury of having enough money to redo the kitchen,” Astley tells me. The way he looks at his wealth is: “I’m not the richest guy in the neighbourhood but I live in a very nice neighbourhood.”

Money had always been about freedom, rather than extravagance. His autobiography describes him wanting to escape his volatile father whom he lived with in a portable cabin in a garden centre: “I wanted to be successful, to earn money . . . to answer my dad back: it would give me the ability to say ‘no’ when he told me what to do.”

Recognise the role of luck

Astley recognises that luck makes all the difference. “I’ve been unbelievably lucky,” he tells me. “You have to be prepared for that luck, you have to work with it. Without the luck no one gets anywhere. I’m very conscious of that.”

Appreciating the luck factor helps curb the potential for rampant egotism. “Don’t run away thinking how amazing you are. If I’d gone through a different door,” the outcome might have been very different.

Don’t fall for plaudits

Astley says fame and success have also taught him not to take compliments or criticism “so seriously”. “We live in a world where everyone can voice their opinion for the rest of the world, which is kind of an amazing thing. It teaches it, you, [to take it] with a pinch of salt.”

Rickrolling could have backfired — after all, it was a joke. In the book, he writes it “was the kind of thing that could turn really negative — people could get sick of it, particularly if you seemed to be milking it for all it was worth. It was best to just let it run its own course.”

Astley’s bemused wait-and-see reaction is refreshing in a world of media management. “Some artists would be devastated to become a meme,” he tells me.

Get perspective

Today, he is happy with his career arc. With his huge success in later life, releasing new material and doing nostalgia tours, how could he not be? Experience has given him perspective, which is that fame and success create “nonsense that messes with your ego, belief system”. But still, he probably wouldn’t advise someone to “quit completely”. “I would say take a year off.”