tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57959813112022291152024-03-27T06:35:30.711-04:00Better and HigherLearn new skills and gain perspective. Be better than you were yesterday.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.comBlogger21125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-13380228835679195692016-08-17T08:33:00.001-04:002016-08-23T12:50:29.737-04:00You Will Suck at First, but Don’t Give Up<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I have a confession to make.</div>
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In the quiet of the night, I sometimes watch things my friends don’t I watch.</div>
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Watch this <a class="markup--anchor markup--p-anchor" data-href="https://youtu.be/IChJ6eO3k48" href="https://youtu.be/IChJ6eO3k48" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.439216); background-color: transparent; background-image: linear-gradient(rgba(0, 0, 0, 0) 50%, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6) 50%); background-position: 0px 1.05em; background-repeat: repeat-x; background-size: 2px 0.1em; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">tear jerker of a video</span></a>.</div>
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Don’t worry. It’s Alice Fredenham singing for a Britain’s Got Talent audition.</div>
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She’s talented. She’s mesmerizing. Was she born with that talent?</div>
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It’s Easy to Watch, Hard to Try</h3>
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Why do I share this with you? Try this one.</div>
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A few weeks ago, I lead a small introductory JavaScript class.</div>
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I encouraged everyone to follow along on their laptops, but instead everyone just watched me.</div>
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I stopped, and told them, learning to program is like <span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">learning by debugging</span>(meaning you learn by fixing things that are broken).</div>
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I got blank stares.</div>
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Last week, I encouraged everyone to improve their product management game by <span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">building things</span>.</div>
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Thinking about these stories made me realize that this advice was not very helpful, because there is a huge inertia to starting.</div>
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The root cause of the inertia is <span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">fear</span>.</div>
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Fear of failing. Fear of imperfection. Fear of embarrassment.</div>
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Standing on the Shoulders of …</h4>
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Thankfully, you don’t have to be afraid. Just as I could secretly shed a tear watching Britain’s Got Talent, you can start using a secret technique.</div>
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The technique is simple.</div>
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Smart people think of original ideas. Smarter people borrow (or steal) the idea of smart people.</div>
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Then, just add a little bit of your own idea to the base. Your own little spice to the base soup; it’s your secret sauce, magic dust.</div>
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Seriously. I was reading an interview of John Clark in <span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="background-color: transparent; background-image: linear-gradient(rgba(0, 0, 0, 0) 50%, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6) 50%); background-position: 0px 1.05em; background-repeat: repeat-x; background-size: 2px 0.1em; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none;"><a class="markup--anchor markup--p-anchor" data-href="https://blogs.balsamiq.com/product/2012/02/15/ebook/" href="https://blogs.balsamiq.com/product/2012/02/15/ebook/" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.439216); background-color: transparent; background-image: linear-gradient(rgba(0, 0, 0, 0) 50%, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6) 50%); background-position: 0px 1.05em; background-repeat: repeat-x; background-size: 2px 0.1em; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Balsamiq Interviews</a> </span>(go ahead, it’s a FREE e-book. Download it.) He said something that perfectly illustrates this.</div>
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<span class="markup--em markup--blockquote-em" style="font-feature-settings: 'liga' 1, 'salt' 1; font-style: normal;">“I saw something like User Testing and thought, “That’s quite good. It’s a good idea that delivers a lot of value,” but I felt that there were things it didn’t do. I don’t like to knock a competitor, but I had my own view of how it could work. They’ve proven the market, clearly. They’ve been going a few years now. So rather than taking on a very risky and completely new type of application, I thought …”</span></blockquote>
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Well, there are a lot of gems there in that short interview passage. I leave it to you to dig them out and apply them in your life.</div>
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Change Your Attitude</h4>
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So, there you go. You have to let go of your fear of starting, and get excited. And by not having to start from scratch, you get an easy win to start. From what I’ve seen, it’s a big mind shift for many folks.</div>
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The technical term for this is <span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">metanoia</span>, which means a shift of mind. The non-technical term is something like “think outside the box.” (Please stop saying that.)</div>
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And it’s not just you. If you’re a product manager or a team leader, perhaps you need to instill this new attitude in your team. Somehow!</div>
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I recently read a book that develops some of these ideas more expansively, and I think you’ll enjoy reading it.</div>
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<a class="markup--anchor markup--p-anchor" data-href="http://amzn.to/2bisCPH" href="http://amzn.to/2bisCPH" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.439216); background-color: transparent; background-image: linear-gradient(rgba(0, 0, 0, 0) 50%, rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6) 50%); background-position: 0px 1.05em; background-repeat: repeat-x; background-size: 2px 0.1em; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><span class="markup--strong markup--p-strong" style="font-weight: 700;">The 5 Elements of Effective Thinking</span></a></div>
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<figcaption class="imageCaption" style="color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.6); font-family: medium-content-sans-serif-font, "Lucida Grande", "Lucida Sans Unicode", "Lucida Sans", Geneva, Arial, sans-serif; font-feature-settings: 'liga' 1, 'lnum' 1; font-size: 14px; left: 0px; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 1.4; margin-top: 10px; outline: 0px; position: relative; text-align: center; top: 0px; width: 700px; z-index: 300;"><span class="markup--em markup--figure-em" style="font-feature-settings: 'liga' 1, 'salt' 1;">by authors whose last names make me hungry and want to read Moby Dick again</span>.</figcaption></figure><br />
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Happy building!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-26985184465939011492016-03-13T21:57:00.001-04:002016-03-14T17:47:14.266-04:00How we made a grand in one day teaching what we know<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, likes to call out false choices.<br />
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Do you eat or do you exercise? You do both. Do you network outside of your company or do you work hard for a promotion where you are? Well, actually, you do both! It's an AND.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Talking and Doing</span></b><br />
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<b><br /></b></div>
Notice, I didn't say talking vs. hustling. It's talking AND doing.<br />
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I regularly meet aspiring startup founders. They have great ideas. For some reason, their actual business falls short. It's a common problem. I ran into someone who had a great staffing business idea. But, what she does day to day is like a traditional recruiting business. Hard work.<br />
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I'm guilty of this myself. I have lots of great ideas. A year later, I don't have a single dollar to show for the ideas. Big problem. You can sympathize.<br />
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I wonder why. It could be that,<br />
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>You struggle to start. There's a saying: <b>perfect is the enemy of good</b>. You know, sometimes you spend too much time on the drawing board, and the game is over by the time you start. That same Reid Hoffman said: "if you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you've launched too late."</li>
<li>You didn't get right people and mentor to help you. I wrote before about <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/five-people-you-meet-and-power-of.html" target="_blank">the power of context</a> and how people around you make you. If you don't learn from other people, then you end up reinventing the wheel. Don't do that. Just ask someone who knows what she's doing what you should do.</li>
<li>But, at the end of the day, you just gotta embrace the pain. Don't be afraid to fail, because failing is part of succeeding. <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/08/dont-step-back-step-forward-why-pain-is.html" target="_blank">Don't step back, step forward</a>.</li>
</ul>
<em style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Georgia, Times, sans-serif; font-size: 19px; line-height: 28.5px;">If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.</em><br />
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Wasn't this post about making a thousand bucks? In a day?<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Fast Prototyping</b></span><br />
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This reminds me of the time that some acquaintances and I tested an idea with ultra low cost and cleared a grand in a day.<br />
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We were all in San Francisco at the time. We had an idea. Lot of people wanted to get tech jobs. There are SAT prep courses, but there were no interview prep program for technical folks. We all happened to know startups and tech companies in the area, and we always heard them complaining about how hard it is to find engineers.<br />
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So, we thought, why not connect all these people who want the tech jobs, make sure they know what they are doing, and connect them to the companies?<br />
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We could have written an elaborate business plan, and talked to dozens of companies, and reached out to potential recruits to validate our idea. It could have taken weeks. Instead, we said: okay, if there really is money to be made, then let's test it. Let's see if we can get a small group of people to pay money to show up to learn a little bit about technical interview. (One of the group was a technical interview expert, so we already had the content taken care of.)<br />
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So, we set a date.<br />
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We asked around and found a company that let us use their classroom for free one Saturday.<br />
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We sent around some word, and got a group of about 20 - 25 folks to pay $50 - $100 each to show up and learn for a day. It was a few years ago, so I don't remember the exact figures.<br />
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Here's the proof of what we did - <a href="http://www.eventbrite.com/e/interview-bootcake-sf-registration-12768289297" target="_blank">Interview Bootcake SF 2014</a>. (Name takes after Parker's <a href="https://www.interviewcake.com/" target="_blank">Interviewcake</a>, a site to help engineers prepare for technical interviews.)<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyYrwZ9OjAipp0ZPJQj0iIYfkoWXC4oJiafWsQbaZWv__6E5J9oMfcEwR3uz9sEh4TP6NStCfXRO7DebYEnH5o5lWoHBEmuhqRPfTovIVXJa7Mr2sLRo9loqrDrICnyocbi3GWYY9ILwqP/s1600/bootcake1.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="251" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyYrwZ9OjAipp0ZPJQj0iIYfkoWXC4oJiafWsQbaZWv__6E5J9oMfcEwR3uz9sEh4TP6NStCfXRO7DebYEnH5o5lWoHBEmuhqRPfTovIVXJa7Mr2sLRo9loqrDrICnyocbi3GWYY9ILwqP/s400/bootcake1.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Parker Teaching Stuff. Parker is a technical interview expert.</td></tr>
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If you still don't believe me, some pics.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6wQ8UwlyEfrn9zODf9VRqZwCN9n5bEWwlu1ieDA39502MWkv56hld-ZiuBzjPYz-U96qD58ZguW4985oGFYb2fHg3T9Cb6bu3zn7kGuzOWHLtuipZLQryZGnBC2FKaiPphFEq0gfYbSpM/s1600/bootcake2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="261" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6wQ8UwlyEfrn9zODf9VRqZwCN9n5bEWwlu1ieDA39502MWkv56hld-ZiuBzjPYz-U96qD58ZguW4985oGFYb2fHg3T9Cb6bu3zn7kGuzOWHLtuipZLQryZGnBC2FKaiPphFEq0gfYbSpM/s400/bootcake2.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Parker Teaching More Stuff. Parker found <a href="https://www.interviewcake.com/">https://www.interviewcake.com/</a>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Business Model and Startup</b><br />
<br />
From there, we could have taken the business further. We could have focused on creating on-line content and selling that. Or we could have focused on the in-person business and taught more classes and gathered more people paying tickets. Or we could have become a recruiting business, and charged the companies to hire the talented engineers we were finding through the class.<br />
<br />
This is how startups work. You build something fast, test your assumptions, and then build on the lessons to move forward.<br />
<br />
As I said, some of you struggle to get started because you're spending too much time talking and talking and talking and designing, but not doing. At the same time, it's no good to just do things without thinking about the bigger picture and your plan. You have got to do both.<br />
<br />
My challenge to you is, think about how you can take this lesson to help you improve something you are working on. It doesn't have to be a business idea. Maybe it's a personal project. Maybe it's a personal goal. You can break out the core issues, set up a quick experiment, and test it out.<br />
<br />
Once you succeed small, you can build on that success and dream bigger. Onward, upward!<br />
<br />
<b>Further Reading</b><br />
<br />
Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-12894273959681994682016-02-16T14:44:00.000-05:002016-03-14T16:38:35.549-04:00Announcing pre-orders for Save Money, Get Rich: the Low Tax, Low Cost Way<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
A few months ago, a friend asked me about my work. I work in finance. After a few questions about what I do, she mentioned that she knew nothing about retirement investing.<br />
<br />
I asked her if she had 403(b) at work (she works for a non-profit). She said she did, and that her employer automatically contributes a small amount to the account. Other than that, she didn't really know much about investing. She said she wished she knew more.<br />
<br />
I remembered other young professionals who either knew little about investing, or knew about it but had been unable to get started. So, I thought I would write a brief book about tax-advantaged accounts that can help young professionals save for the future.<br />
<br />
Of course, getting rich isn't just about money. Our wealth consists of our relationships, our happiness, health, and other intangible things that matter to us. Still, a firm financial foundation is an important driver of happiness. So, I worked on a brief book.<br />
<br />
The book will be released on Amazon on Monday, February 22, and I wanted to tell you about it. I hope you'll consider checking out the book (even if just the free sample) and leave a positive review for the book.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Save Money Get Rich</b></span><br />
Book link - <a href="http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BCET3LE/" target="_blank">http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01BCET3LE/</a><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="http://amzn.to/1QVwCT0" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBF2NugVTU3vyRKFuJo5G2y6ju77XqeAYpFYVstAiWruRwHZU0nhKcSW9u4qwiV7zVJbB9njKi4bbe41rCTq1OCfHKtpxMUeyo7bWDmzcCAHLIUpCwmFC4RIbBO7UpFMeKSzGgRJ1a1gqS/s400/05+SaveMoneyGetRich_200x320.jpg" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
(Please excuse the draft cover - it is getting finalized this week.)</div>
<br />
These are the topics the book will contain:<br />
1. Rules of Wealth Building<br />
2. myRa, IRA and Taxes<br />
3. Health Savings Accounts<br />
4. 529 College Savings Plans<br />
5. 401(k), Solo 401(k), SEP and Qualified Plans<br />
6. Time, DRIPs<br />
7. Robo Advisors and FeeX<br />
8. How You Can Save More, plus Free Bonus<br />
9. FAQ and Further Reading<br />
10. Living a Richer Life<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Stay Tuned</b></span><br />
<br />
In the coming weeks, I'd love to share some book recommendations to help you lead a happier life. I'll also work on some ideas to help you connect with colleagues at work.<br />
<br />
Please stay tuned.<br />
<br />
<b>Further Reading</b><br />
<br />
Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com42tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-64792558459828950762016-02-07T12:35:00.000-05:002016-03-14T16:38:47.365-04:00How to reinvent yourself<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
An end is a new beginning.<br />
<br />
In today's fast and volatile economy, you have to know how to reinvent yourself, and be comfortable doing it.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfRtmmTNR5CMjqBxcQjC4vwBzPRUK5PDawKwh_EhRYBzFfGlV0TfRQIBPLnM8aYBqO4L-G1NNAgIFz7eQEjBSgb9y7GPzx55t7440ljvIJEoaigUiB1ZlickSuM7nfDPwCrWOPjesRAS9i/s1600/How-To-Save-Polar-Bears.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="291" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfRtmmTNR5CMjqBxcQjC4vwBzPRUK5PDawKwh_EhRYBzFfGlV0TfRQIBPLnM8aYBqO4L-G1NNAgIFz7eQEjBSgb9y7GPzx55t7440ljvIJEoaigUiB1ZlickSuM7nfDPwCrWOPjesRAS9i/s400/How-To-Save-Polar-Bears.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>How did you end up here?</b></span><br />
<br />
There can be many reasons why you came to feel like you hit a dead end. It's life.<br />
<br />
Maybe you got passed over for a promotion, and now you feel stuck. Or worse, you got fired from your job. Even a successful professional might be yearning for meaning, asking if she chose the right profession.<br />
<br />
Maybe you are turning a new chapter in your personal life. Are you going through a separation? Or did you lose someone you love? You can't help but think of those missed moments for a deeper connection.<br />
<br />
You know that dwelling on the past won't change the present, but you can't help it. It hurts. It's life. But, how can you move past the struggle in your life, stronger and better?<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Coming to America</b></span><br />
<br />
We have different expectations about what living well means today than generations before. Only about a century ago, millions of immigrants were coming to America to start over. Correction. Millions are still coming to America to start a new job, new life, new culture, new family.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_w8NrPRx5CVulDIzfp1JAks9fuwyG6kmBjFtnbdu9Aiv75Y9yguEfQhRVZOHqt23uLRAL4akjP4Iww27z1BaMe7W5391mvnlN4j98-fu6-J8RHBU4W5_WYTzdierhi5sOF9wCXhAEjBL/s1600/photo-a.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi_w8NrPRx5CVulDIzfp1JAks9fuwyG6kmBjFtnbdu9Aiv75Y9yguEfQhRVZOHqt23uLRAL4akjP4Iww27z1BaMe7W5391mvnlN4j98-fu6-J8RHBU4W5_WYTzdierhi5sOF9wCXhAEjBL/s400/photo-a.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<br />
When my parents came to America (from Korea), they didn't really know how the future would turn out. They settled in, learned the language, and continued their self-education to provide a better life for the family.<br />
<br />
My mom didn't have a college degree when she came to America (she had dropped out to raise us in Korea). But, she worked during the day, drove us to sports and music, and then attended evening classes. She eventually got a master's degree in education. Today, she teaches ESL kids who are near and dear to her heart. I still don't know how she did it, but she did it.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">So How?</span></b><br />
<br />
<b>Have No Regrets</b><br />
<br />
When I moved to Silicon Valley and started hustling for startups, I was a fish out of water. I'd trained as a corporate middle management, and had a freshly minted MBA. It was little (i.e. no) help in freelancing. I had to try new things, fail a lot, and learn how to <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/05/how-i-sold-my-first-lemonade-and-made.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: blue;">sell something to make a buck</span></a>.<br />
<br />
More than once, I wondered: what the hell am I doing? Why didn't I stay in my corporate gig complete with a six figure salary and plenty of upside? I had plenty of reasons (boredom, stagnation, people, etc).<br />
<br />
But, the point is, I left because I wanted to be something else. How am I doing on that path?<br />
<br />
I can choose to dwell on the past, or I can focus on thinking of what I am trying to become. It's a simple choice. So, no regrets.<br />
<br />
<b>Nothing Is Wasted: You're Just Training</b><br />
<br />
No regrets. Easier said than done, right? One thing that might help you is to think of any setback as training in progress. It's like the old saying, if it doesn't kill you, it only makes you stronger. Why is that? It's because you're learning, and you're experiencing something that will help you be more mature or more skilled next time you encounter a challenge.<br />
<br />
You see this all the time with little children. Today they fall. Tomorrow they walk a little better. Today they struggle with words. Tomorrow they are pointing and talking non-stop. (I have a cute niece who's now going through this phase.)<br />
<br />
You're the same. You're just being put through a trial so you can get better. Practice makes perfect. (So many cliches. Want one more? <i>No pain, no gain</i>.) Take things in stride, and think of how you can best take advantage to improve as much as possible this go around.<br />
<br />
After he had invented the first phonograph and the lasting lightbulb, Thomas Edison became a national sensation. But, Edison lost the electricity battle (AC/DC), and then Edison went into mining. Mining turned out to be a disaster. But, that didn't stop Edison. He put the different experiences together - the light, the phonograph that recorded sound - and he put together what was the first motion picture camera in the world. He was a master at reinventing himself, because he was always learning. (Found a Kindle <a href="http://amzn.to/1NYvgEN" target="_blank"><span style="color: blue;">bio of Edison</span></a> for free at the time of this post.)<br />
<br />
<b>Learn and Invest</b><br />
<br />
I know I focus on this a lot, but it's true. Learning and adapting is what makes us human. If you don't learn from your failures, then that really is regrettable.<br />
<br />
It's about building self-awareness to learn what works and what doesn't work for <u>you</u>. How can you do it better next time?<br />
<br />
You know how in stock market they say, <i>buy low and sell high</i>?<br />
<br />
Well, if you are in a low, then perhaps it's a great time to invest for the future. What new skills could you pick up?<br />
<br />
Going back to my story, I'm now back in a corporate workplace. The time I spent hustling taught me so much about how to build something new and create value. In my work today, I have to know both finance and sales. Thanks to the different experiences I've had, I know how to do both (otherwise, I'd only know accounting).<br />
<br />
<b>Treat Yourself</b><br />
<br />
Reinventing yourself, becoming something better, is all about a mindset. If you resist and moan about changing, you'll be miserable. You'll become grumpy and stressed out. Instead, if you take new challenges and competition as a way to learn and improve, you'll derive a new sense of purpose.<br />
<br />
Staying healthy helps. I take health for granted. But, whenever I'm down with a migraine, I realize just how lucky I am to be physically healthy. Physical and mental health go hand in hand. Make sure you are taking care of yourself physically so you can stay mentally focused, and vice versa.<br />
<br />
You know best how to get fit. It might involve going out for a long run. It might be eating less sugar and healthier fare. Or it might be things you don't do, like eating ice cream and watching TV till 2 AM.<br />
<br />
<b>It Takes a Village</b><br />
<br />
This can be hard, because whatever you are going through feels very personal. It's your own cross to bear, and no one understands you. Except, it's not true. You'll be so much happier if you can share your troubles with a close friend.<br />
<br />
In a professional setting, you don't even have to disclose your feelings. Just be honest about challenges you are facing and your desire to overcome them. Enlist your manager and your teammates help you get through the situation. If you approach it in a mature fashion no one will shy away from helping you. It's practically their job to help you.<br />
<br />
Speak up and don't be shy to share that you want help. People love working in teams and helping others. Give them a chance to step up.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">Conclusion</span></b><br />
<br />
A lot of this is just a mind game. That's the battle you have to win first. If you can get comfortable with looking forward rather than back, and taking a learning attitude and invest in yourself, then you'll become a master at reinventing yourself.<br />
<br />
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: black; line-height: normal;">
Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-26838626476240699142016-01-28T22:45:00.000-05:002016-03-14T16:38:58.753-04:005 Ways to Have More Fun at Work (and Life)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
If you'd ever struggled to find happiness or purpose in your life, you might have asked yourself: "what would I do if I never had to worry about money again?" or "what makes me happiest?" (Did you win PowerBall?)<br />
<br />
The problem with such thoughts experiments is that they tell you nothing new.<br />
<br />
You only know what you like or dislike by trying it out. And unless you tried cocaine, you just don't know what it's like (I never tried it). As you experience new sensations and pick up new ideas, you have both the experiential and mental assets to imagine new possibilities.<br />
<br />
There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens.<br />
<br />
And if you want to know what matters most to you, then there's no time like today to DO. And rather than get bogged down with weighty topics like meaning of life or finding happiness, why not start with some practical ways to have more fun tomorrow at work?<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">1. Organize.</span></b><br />
<br />
I know that this doesn't come naturally to everyone. But, it is deceptively simple and deeply powerful. Marie Kondo's "<a href="http://amzn.to/1SN4LtA" target="_blank">The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up</a>" is an international phenomenon. I naturally like to fold clothes and tidy up my surroundings. I know people who don't. What I see is that the physical surrounding has a mental and spiritual impact.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyZ7vtnGN6TUlNzeSpCOG7TBXfYCMIQ1viG5pU2rk7tSvDPndn_yk59Ii49u-dz3dr47-VoZnlW5kJz84kQ1t1juCQ4_eedvHGmSjzfs0-1mk_g_4zOTNo84CfMXETDE3iAK3J9WupaDiA/s1600/fold.PNG" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="224" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyZ7vtnGN6TUlNzeSpCOG7TBXfYCMIQ1viG5pU2rk7tSvDPndn_yk59Ii49u-dz3dr47-VoZnlW5kJz84kQ1t1juCQ4_eedvHGmSjzfs0-1mk_g_4zOTNo84CfMXETDE3iAK3J9WupaDiA/s320/fold.PNG" width="320" /></a></div>
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Something as trivial as messy dishes lying around or clothes on the floor affect your mental state. Does it say you are above appearances? Does it say that it's okay to let things slide, that you are indifferent? I don't know. </div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
But, I do know that the very act of cleaning or organizing can be mentally soothing, and help you be happier. Before you can flow, you have to remove the clutter.</div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOVbO7qUhQL302FuifwD0SsKWut5BAeKe1iUkpv-tNScz9saaDd-lyBVpGYb_DxL7EBwgIoP0Xgc4eU-JiP35ALvz0_ETtsvEqVhGEbhCYNZgKyj8GWKwZYIoGyjRY3dxKRDNIKiKnjPJX/s1600/flow.PNG" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="139" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOVbO7qUhQL302FuifwD0SsKWut5BAeKe1iUkpv-tNScz9saaDd-lyBVpGYb_DxL7EBwgIoP0Xgc4eU-JiP35ALvz0_ETtsvEqVhGEbhCYNZgKyj8GWKwZYIoGyjRY3dxKRDNIKiKnjPJX/s320/flow.PNG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">2. Teach.</span></b><br />
<br />
You often experience unhappiness at work, because something is out of your control. An example could be the pointy-haired boss telling you to do something in a way that feels stupid to you. Except you can't say so without getting fired.<br />
<br />
It's true. I know you're smarter than your boss. But sadly, you're not the boss. So, you feel frustrated. How can you gain more control over this twisted situation?<br />
<br />
Well, in today's collaborative world, the only way you can do this is to teach. Do you think a process is "stupid" and you could do it better? Okay, show me. Then, teach others. Teach your colleagues. Teach your managers. Teach the masses by writing about it.<br />
<br />
Teaching creates opportunities for conversations. Teaching is teamwork. Teaching is a tool to gain control over the problem. It takes time, but you'll learn and grow in the process. Teaching relieves the pressure, and will help you have more fun.<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span> <b><span style="font-size: large;">3. Forgive. </span></b><br />
<br />
You're not having fun, because you're holding a grudge. You still remember that time she slighted you with her criticism, when she crapped all over your report. Or when your manager passed you over for a promotion, you took it personally.<br />
<br />
Get over it, you're not that special. They probably do the same to others. And they probably did it out of habit and knew no better. It wasn't because they hate you. Everyone is just trying their best. Smile and help people do better instead of holding a grudge. Water under the bridge, as they say.<br />
<br />
I remember, one time, one of my coworkers always seemed to contradict everything I said in meetings. It felt blatant. It felt personal. It made me upset to the point of nausea. I would avoid her in the hallways. Everytime I had to talk to her, my blood would boil and I dreamed about the day I would become CEO and fire her. Then, one day, I decided maybe I should listen to her. Maybe I should smile and ask her why she thinks my ideas are bad. She's human. I'm human.<br />
<br />
Forgive others, and take a deep breath, and go about your day. And you'll have more fun.<br />
<br />
And forgive yourself. We are all learning. No child is born who can add and subtract straight out of the womb. There's no child who never falls and cries. Just like that, we all make mistakes. Making mistakes is just part of who we are. So, for those times that you have hurt others or hurt yourself, forgive yourself. Then, you won't feel so bad about laughing at jokes. Heck, maybe you'll start making jokes yourself!<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">4. Work More.</span></b><br />
<br />
Seriously. Work more, not less. More is more. You're not having fun at work, because it's hard. Work would be more fun if you were better at it. You would go into a flow. And it's awesome.<br />
<br />
When I was young, I played the violin. It was a drudge practicing those scales and stretching my fingers up and down a small wooden fingerboard. Plus, it wasn't really cool. But, once I got good, it became fun to see what kinds of sounds I could produce, or how smooth a tone I could draw out of the instrument.<br />
<br />
In high school, I swam. At first, I drank a lot of the pool water. I competed in swim meets and would finish dead last at every single time. It was no fun. That summer, I resolved that I would practice inordinately until I became fast. I learned proper strokes from swim coaches, swam with faster people on a swim team, and then hit the pool on my own. I would swim every day for miles. I would pay attention to my arm and feet movement in the water, and perfected the feel for the flow.<br />
<br />
I became one with the water.<br />
<br />
The following summer, I dominated my regional league in most of the events. The high school coach wanted me very badly on her team. Everyone on the team knew of me. I was a celebrity. Sort of.<br />
<br />
It's harder to get good in intellectual pursuits, because you have less tangible feedback loops. You can race and see how fast your time is. You can't do that when you're working on a board presentation or working on a spreadsheet model. It's hard to know how good you are at giving advice to a junior banker or to startup founders. Still, you get the idea. The more you are doing your chosen work with attention to what you're doing, the better you're going to be at your work.<br />
<br />
At first it might suck, but eventually, it'll help you have a lot more fun and gratification.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">5. Play More Ping Pong.</span></b><br />
<br />
Sometimes, I literally play a game of ping pong with colleagues at work. I'm lucky; we have a ping pong table, and the company doesn't mind. We have a good culture; as I said, I'm lucky.<br />
<br />
But, I see others take a quick break to walk about the grounds before returning to work. In my previous work, I would go join a yoga class during lunch.<br />
<br />
It doesn't matter. The point is, if you're not having fun, you can literally take a moment to do something that actually is fun. You could even drive to daycare and see your son or daughter play with other kids for 30 minutes.<br />
<br />
Sometimes, you want to do this even if you are enjoying your work. Changing the physical context helps your brain juices flow and helps you generate new ideas. You'll have even more fun in your day job. This is why you feel so refreshed after going away on a vacation. You've changed contexts and stimulated your mind (read more about <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/five-people-you-meet-and-power-of.html" target="_blank">the power of context</a>).<br />
<br />
I remember calling a big city lawyer friend at 11pm. She was still in the office. She said she was there by herself. I asked her, why don't you go home? She said she couldn't. She said she was miserable, but she had work she had to do before the next morning.<br />
<br />
Really? If you're miserable, why don't you change something about it? I know the money might be good. I know the company culture may not support going home before midnight. I know. I get it. But, really. Why can't you go home?<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPuAaaswqoMEhVY6cQjDVo-8XdrNyCxyyOtWsgx22NOyzfgcgv2X3LWO3iV20tg0MIMFfjOdqycSYf-KtBxYF8-53lRc8mfN84EFNtl5QJzTXX3xLsY9YaEzbMr2Rjyarc4ba_HKiop0_g/s1600/pong.PNG" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="199" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPuAaaswqoMEhVY6cQjDVo-8XdrNyCxyyOtWsgx22NOyzfgcgv2X3LWO3iV20tg0MIMFfjOdqycSYf-KtBxYF8-53lRc8mfN84EFNtl5QJzTXX3xLsY9YaEzbMr2Rjyarc4ba_HKiop0_g/s320/pong.PNG" width="320" /></a><br />
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Enough for now. I need to go crush Joe in a game of ping pong. Then, I'm going home.</div>
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This story is also <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/5-ways-have-more-fun-work-life-david-kim" target="_blank">posted on LinkedIn</a>. If you're a professional who found this post useful, please like and share the story on LinkedIn.<br />
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-9160071630069260162015-11-08T20:11:00.002-05:002015-11-08T20:11:47.459-05:00What are your values? And how do you find them?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>What happened to you?</b></span><br />
<b><br /></b>
How have you been? So a friend wrote me this week and asked why he hasn't seen any posts from me recently. We'll call him Evan, even though his real name is Bryan. So, do you know what I told Bryan?<br />
<br />
I basically said: "Well, I like writing and all, but I really want to prioritize my career. Maybe if I found a way to make some money writing, I'd do more of it." Something like that.<br />
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Pretty uninspiring. Then, I felt bad I actually replied that way. A money-grubbing, whiny way. Well, that made me pause and think about why I do what I do, and why I write? Certainly, pragmatism goes a long way in life, but have you thought about what motivates your actions? <br />
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Why you do certain things in life? And if you dug into those motivations for your actions, you get into <u><b>incentives and into beliefs</b></u>. <br />
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You work because you're paid to work. That's an incentive. You want to make money. And maybe if someone offers you a bonus, you work a little harder. That's incentive. It makes people do good things and bad things. The lure of profit incents a drug trafficker to smuggle illegal drugs across the border, even though it's dangerous and could land you in jail (to say nothing of the potential harm to user).<br />
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As for beliefs, if you think you're going to die next month, you'll act very differently from you are today (when most you think you'll be alive for many more decades). People save money for retirement because they think the world will be similar to what we know today, and they want to have the means to live into old age. You'd stop saving your money if the doctor told you you have malignant cancer that may be fatal. I don't know. Maybe you'll live it up more today instead of deferring living life until retirement.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>Ancient Story of Values</b></span><br />
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Most people know who Adam and Eve are; the first couple in the creation story of the Bible. Their first two children were sons named Cain and Abel. Cain was a farmer and Abel tended to flocks (livestock). Both make offerings to God. While God accepts Abel's offerings, God rejects Cain's offerings. Cain becomes angry, and out of jealousy, strikes and kills Abel. First murder is a fraternicide. <br />
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Does God seem unfair?<br />
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I once read a speculation by the famous philosopher <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant" target="_blank">Immanuel Kant</a>. He mused that perhaps this episode represented the conflict of values between a nomadic society transitioning to to an agrarian one. Those who tended to livestock moved around and lived in the field. They were closer to the stars, nature, and to God. Farming, on the other hand, demanded people settle down and construct infrastructure. Over time, farming cultures build sophisticated civilizations. They grow distant from God.<br />
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Instead of this analysis, I heard a values-based analysis. The story is in Bible's Genesis chapter 4. It makes an interesting qualitative difference between Abel's and Cain's offerings.<br />
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verse 3 - "In the <u>course of time</u> Cain brought <b><u>some</u></b> of the fruits of the soil as an offering to the Lord."<br />
verse 4 - "And Abel also brought an offering - fat portions from some of the <b><u>firstborn</u></b> of his flock. The Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering."<br />
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The theological reading is that intentions are different from someone who gives the first stock versus someone who brings something in the course of time. The latter is merely giving a budget line item. Like a tax. It's not just that the first fruit is better, as wine connoiseurs would know. The one who gives the firstborn knows he may not have more, but gives it all the same. Huge difference.<br />
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So that was very interesting. What are your intentions? And your intentions really reflect your values - what you fundamentally believe is important in your life. And it is influenced (guided or misguided) by incentives in your life.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><b>How do you dig deeper?</b></span><br /><br />
Finding what's important to you isn't simple. So, to close the loop on this rant, I told Bryan I wanted to write for money, but that's not true. Clearly, money was on my mind at the time, but I write for the joy of connecting with ideas and with people. If the only one person got something out of this piece, then it was a worthwhile activity. And even if no one read it, it gave me a chance to struggle with an important idea for myself. That's worthwhile. Nevermind the dollars and cents.<br />
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So, what can you do to connect with your own values and discover them further? What do you love?<br />
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In <a href="http://amzn.to/1kEjecU" target="_blank">Hackers and Painters</a>, technologist and writer Paul Graham suggests a heuristic for discovering what you love in life. He suggests simply: "<b>always be producing</b>." What he means is that if you are always doing something you think is useful, you'll do so until you get bored and start doing something else. If you don't get bored and keep doing that thing because you love it, well, you've discovered your passion. In the process, you'll discover something about yourself and what you treasure.<br />
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Science supports this idea. Contrary to what many believe, there is evidence that what you think and believe is affected by what you do. As we all know, what we think or believe affects how we live. Which is to say, what you do changes who you become.<br />
<br />
I don't think I helped anyone solve her problems this week, but I hope you'll forgive me for the rant while I get back into the habit of writing more regularly. See you soon!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-34800268203109097282015-08-09T10:37:00.000-04:002016-03-14T16:39:12.538-04:00How to set your mind to achieve anything - 5 techniques<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Last week, I broke down </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">3 types of organizational tasks</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> to help you understand how you can be better positioned to be outstanding in what you do. Building on that, I want to focus on shifting your mindset for achievement.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-62f16b23-b632-e5b5-908e-e20bb34a7e4b" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<b><span style="font-size: large;">Just a Thought</span></b><br />
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s the big deal about your frame of mind? Isn’t it all about the technique or about having the right resource to achieve your goals? Or what about connections you may or may not have?</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I hear you. Hey, remember that scene from Men in Black, where Will Smith’s character, agent J, complains to agent K that it is no time to keep their special weapons hidden (because there are alien battle cruisers approaching earth). Agent K responds:</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 31.5pt; margin-right: 45pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“There’s always an Arquillian Battle Cruiser, or a Corillan Death Ray, or an intergalatic plague that is about to wipe out all life on this miserable little planet, and the only way these people can get on with their happy lives is that they DO NOT KNOW ABOUT IT!”</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="261px;" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/RVH90zmRA4nMfAD8hiSdqjdXByD1Xoft2sVachQgdkx2l8tS2OGEcNo-8iIJKwKk7rIk3ZHH1dKUnrfI0-OFHjVCl6fhXc6xMFSfZuyyFVO7AG4zX_dYcSm44AJLTCMeKP0tgcY" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="480px;" /></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Ignorance is bliss? Not really. So, let’s get on with it and lift ourselves out of ignorance and get our minds working for us.</span></div>
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<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mind Aid Techniques</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">1. Use the mental shelf</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sometimes, you can’t help it. It’s not your fault. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Life is good. You’re enjoying the sun. Then, suddenly thoughts of your ex pop into your head. Maybe you had associated sun with your ex (or some other thought trigger). Either way, you’re suddenly feeling regret and remorse. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You now have a choice. You can dwell or pass on that thought. You can have a pity party for yourself, or you can choose to be strong and move on.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I call this two shelves, but it could be two paths. Either way, you can go one way or the other, but not both. It just takes a split second decision, and then you’re on that path.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="228px;" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/Nt2JB2FjH-Z7qpjCTRFyVKrF-otXZXAW1YNo3MphOAG6lzBk2t2HuphyB7fLnGCQgiHrEfoStIDB-fm-FVoUS1UgVtG4WGb6ZD93mGrHQfGo0F9xnJr-d_qLYHeBxfDksPE91nI" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="341px;" /></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Use the mental image of the two paths or two shelves. Good thought? Add it to the positive shelf. Crappy thought? Just chuck it to the discard bin.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">2. Finite resource reminder</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I don’t exactly know how many heart beats my heart will beat, but I know it’s not infinite. Remembering that helps me apply </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">rule #1</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> with consistency and urgency.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Those finite heartbeats mean that you’ll also have a finite number of thoughts in your life. So, remember not to waste it on past too much. Sure, you may have to reflect on your failures to learn from it, but like the multiplication table, knowing it once will be enough. You don’t need study it over and over.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Or in the context of work, leave no room for negative thoughts. You can either choose to say ‘that’s hard, I can’t do it’ or ‘yes I can, now how shall I go about it’? </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Very different thoughts, and very different outcomes. And it depends on how you view that limited resource called your energy and thoughts. Make the right choice, and it will grow.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">3. Positive Affirmation</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Hey Siri, who’s the fairest of them all? (Try, “tell me I’m good looking.”)</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Well, there are many scientific and non-scientific writings about the physical impact of a mantra. It is mind over matter stuff. I won’t go deep into it, but I’m sure you’ve experienced the feel-good of someone giving you a compliment.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The neat thing is you can compliment yourself.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Suffice it to say that successful people apply their personal mantras of success and happiness: people like </span><a href="https://www.tonyrobbins.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tony Robbins</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> (the motivation and performance guru) and </span><a href="http://www.oprah.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Oraph Winfrey</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. They believed in themselves even when others didn’t. They kept on believing in themselves until everyone else did, too.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You can do it, too. Believe in yourself, and not only that, say it out aloud.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">4. Make it incremental and automate it</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Cool. #1 - #3 are basically exhortations to positive thinking. But, you know that things are easier said than done. It’s stuff that you already knew, but it still doesn’t translate into results. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What gives?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the messages that I keep iterating is that you want to find ways to break your goals down into small steps, and then make an incremental progress (like the turtle in the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/tortoise-and-hare-how-to-save-2-mil.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">tortoise and hare story</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">). For example, if you know that there is an environmental trigger that starts you down a negative path, take steps to begin to dull that trigger, however small the step.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Another message is to save yourself from yourself. I mean, automate things when you can. How? For example, I wrote about how you’re a product of the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/five-people-you-meet-and-power-of.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">five people you surround yourself</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> with. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you stick with good budgeters, you’ll become a good budgeter, even if you naturally suck. If you stick around vegetarians, then you’ll suddenly find yourself killing less cattle. It just works. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(And the ultimate ways to get automation working for you is to build good habits. People like </span><a href="http://jamesclear.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">James Clear</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and Tim Ferriss - in his </span><a href="http://fourhourworkweek.com/blog/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">4 Hour Work Week blog</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> - write extensively about this.)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">5. Dig deep, and remember that day</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There’s no doubt that in difficult times, it makes the world of difference to have a strong anchor. Often, when things aren’t going well, we can rely on a trusted friend or advisor or family. We can whine, we can vent, we can seek counsel.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At other times though, you’ll want to keep in your mental reserves those times when you were superb. Whatever it was. Maybe the time you won your high school sprint. Or the time you made someone’s day. Whatever is meaningful to you. You can draw on these memories when you are down to turn things around from I can’t to I can mindset.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Next</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Honestly, I’m no Oprah or Tony Robbins. And I don’t want to be. So, I won’t quit my day job. But, I hope you’ll experiment with these and other mindset techniques to help yourself into the path of achievement. Good luck!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As I mentioned previously, starting next week, I want to start writing more concrete stories, specifically reflecting on my own career.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I first want to reflect a little bit about power and presence with a post about </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">that time I thought an intern was a VP</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and the </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>story of David and Goliath</b></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> as my dad told me. Then, I want to talk about taking the </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">long-view</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">taking incremental steps</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and how to do it. I’ll also tell you about that time that </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I thought I needed to learn to code</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and why I was wrong.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Till then, may the Force be with You!</span><br />
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-48124563248719688332015-08-02T11:00:00.000-04:002015-08-02T11:00:00.852-04:00Three kinds of learning for a team player<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/07/be-best-you-can-be-however-small.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do the best you can be</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">in small things. While it is a powerful advice, it is one of those things that sound good to say, but is really hard to do. </span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-64628f2c-9871-d751-6513-670493778604" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Your intentions are good, but the reality often falls short.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In this post, I want to help you with that. If you’re busy, feel free to skip ahead to “possibility thinking” section at the bottom. I really want to know your take on it.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">First, about doing the best, what was Lyndon Johnson’s approach to it? He believed that if he did “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">everything</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> that you can do, then you will win.” And by everything, he meant the brute force way, knocking on more doors, calling on more people, campaigning in more cities, and so forth. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sadly, I don’t think that’s a plausible strategy for the majority of people. It certainly isn’t for me: I get too tired to do </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">everything</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. I’m sorry, but I’m lazy.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If I get in the ring with Mike Tyson, I’m going to lose. Every single time.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I think the trick is instead to figure out where and how you can do your best work. Where can you apply leverage? In an organization, it takes some reflection to figure out where that is. Let’s put it into the context of different types of tasks and see how you can approach them.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">3 Task Types and Your Role</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Simple Sequential</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">During Renaissance, a master painter often painted only the faces and hands in a large fresco. His apprentices would paint the backgrounds and clothing of characters. Those objects were easier to paint. Faces and the emotional expressions are exceedingly hard to paint well. Only a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">master </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">could do them well.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But for the master to put his finishing touch, the painting had to be outlined and painted first. An art masterpiece took shape in a sequence.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img alt="544px-Ford_assembly_line_-_1913.jpg" height="368px;" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/TB3mRP0FdmAw-7t5V5OxQP-fDyiL4gp3afVw7OcnM2VxRtJx8gGuspGgmXDYGaZZ6goei1iqmDC1JJYLAns768u6RK3E8Y4svuNj3BHMtRoCbMtPC3FS8b_ddb8VASw6DvpIPIA" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="416px;" /></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In an industrial age, </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assembly_line" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the assembly line</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> has replaced the craftsman master’s studio. But, the idea is similar.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In this context, you have a tool and a specific tasks you are expected to do a well. But, like the mechanical pieces in the assembly line, you’re an interchangeable part. If you get sick (or defective), they can bring in another part (faster, younger, cheaper).</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don’t dwell here. If this is all your skills allow you to do, work hard to add a layer to your skills.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Layered Sequential</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Take a child who is learning to play the violin. In the beginning, the child plays simple scales to build and associate muscle memory with musical notes. Scales can seem repetitive and boring. That’s by design. Without these foundational exercises, a violinist will be unable to handle more complex passages.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Once a violinist masters the basic mechanical aspects of playing, she can focus on nuances of interpretation. Where should the sound rise and fall to elicit the proper emotional response? What is the </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">texture</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> of the sound that she should produce here or there?</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In reality, the foundational layer and more complex layer improve in tandem, and not in sequence. The more she practices, the more she appreciates the finer distinctions of both the difficult and easy portions of a musical passage. She will notice new faults and opportunities that she had not appreciated before.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The musician makes time for these exercises (etudes). The runner puts in the mileage. The boxer spars and punches the punching bag. The firefighters drill. This is the way of things.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Complex Network</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Finally, as you master sets of simple skills through practice and exposure, you can begin to formulate more complex skills. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Using the musical analogy, you can think of the conductor’s skills. The conductor must listen to the many different lines of music simultaneously. She will craft textures of sounds of music and draw out colors from the orchestra. Doing so without a foundational knowledge of melodies and and harmonies would be impossible.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You probably are in a profession where complex problem solving skills are important. Often, you do not have pre-defined parameters or solutions. Rather, drawing on your knowledge of your environment, and using a deep experience, you can craft a unique solution to a problem.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">Possibility Thinking</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Sequential thinking is thinking inside the walls. The walls are the rules and expectations imposed by those around you. It is the violinist who plays only the notes she sees on the paper.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Complex and network thinking helps you transcend such boundaries of social convention. It helps you break down the wall of “this is how we have always done things.”</span></div>
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<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I still meet many people who are locked into sequential thinking. One college graduate I met talked about how competitive a graduate program is, citing admission statistics and average test scores of the entering class. However, the reality is that standardized admission processes exist as much for reasons of fairness as they are for convenience. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For those inventive enough to get to know the admissions officers in person and prove to them their capabilities, the application process becomes a mere formality.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Next week, I’d like to dwell more on positive thinking, specifically outlining some techniques you can use to talk your mind into helping you see possibilities and achieve big things. In everything, those </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/tortoise-and-hare-how-to-save-2-mil.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">incremental small efforts will pay off</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, but understanding the larger context will ensure that you will be more successful.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Then, in the following weeks, I’d like to reflect on some stories about advancing your career. I mean, I’ll talk about my own experiences, because that’s what I know. Some will be tactical, some strategic, and I hope they will be helpful.</span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-75817365905086880702015-07-26T11:00:00.000-04:002015-07-26T11:00:03.556-04:00I want to get to know you<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A few months ago, a friend of mine told me about a former naval academy grad who is writing full-time.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-ad754a47-a245-7f8e-00b4-be61ab53dfb5" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">I am not the best</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I went to Dave Booda’s site and subscribed to his </span><a href="http://boodaism.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Boodaism</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dave is full of wisdom and insight about everyday living as an ordinary American. How can you draw meaning from your work and life when you seemingly can’t be one of those uber-successful billionaires on TV? We aren’t all Tony Stark of Ironman: rich, brilliant, confident, good looking, and seemingly invincible. It’s okay, Dave shows you </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">how to be cool as you are</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dave is a better writer than I am. He is clearer and more insightful in what he writes.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">I don’t know much</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nor do I have some special knowledge that can help you. James Clear. He’s a local North Carolinian. And on his site </span><a href="http://jamesclear.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">JamesClear.com</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, James uses science to help you do more with less. His insights can help you form habits to make you into a mean, lean, </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">git ‘er done</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> machine.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nope, I don’t know much about scientification.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So, why do I bother writing?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">If I had a special power</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For one thing, I like writing. And while my audience may be small, I am happy speaking to a small group of friends. Plus, it’s therapeutic for me. And if I had to dig a little deeper, I can say I enjoy hearing out a friend about her problem and doing something small to help.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For another, it’s like life. Just ‘cause you’re no Shakespeare, doesn’t mean you should stop writing. Just ‘cause you’re not Einstein doesn’t mean you should drop out of school (he did his best thinking while a patent office clerk, anyway). You have to start somewhere. And like the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/tortoise-and-hare-how-to-save-2-mil.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">tortoise, if you keep going, you’ll reach the finish line</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But, if I had a special power, it’s helping a friend. I’m a good advisor, a Spock to a Kirk.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://amzn.to/1JZ2RCx" target="_blank"><img height="208px;" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/LvtuOKd87X3ykHQA__4fz-3isuQVcz5_CCn1m6TJmcz5tLdKKcp0Wmem3jFwqmiDGD23yc_g4pKK6A619sNKRs9DK52Lz6j3tOnBaihcktVlsV7Vnahe-qBdEv4tx8niU9snR2s" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0rad);" width="500px;" /></a></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://amzn.to/1JZ2RCx" style="text-decoration: none;" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Star Trek movie</span></a></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And that brings me to say: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I want to get to know you</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What’s on your mind? What’s keeping you up at night these days?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you think I could research and write about a topic of interest to you, would you please reply and let me know? What can I do to help you? What would you like to know more about?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As always, thank you for your time.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">Check them out</span></span></div>
<ul style="margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">James Clear on </span><a href="http://jamesclear.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">JamesClear.com</span></a></div>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Dave Booda on </span><a href="http://boodaism.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Boodaism</span></a></div>
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</ul>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-78633570070878451912015-07-19T11:00:00.000-04:002015-07-19T11:00:03.882-04:00What would you do if your colleague's dad died?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m sure you’ve lost someone close to you. Whether to time or to disease, no one is free from the grips of death.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-31263b60-a36e-daed-8cde-1c5153778f3e" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In my book on </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1KdEzSA" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">12 Steps on How to be Happy</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, I related a story about how a young, non-smoker friend passed away after a fight with lung cancer. To me, that story was a reminder to say hello to those around you. They may not always be around.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">What would you do?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At my department, a co-worker was missing from work for a few days. Through the grapevine, I learned that his dad had passed away.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It’s tragic. He’s about my age. And I’m visiting my parents this weekend in High Point, NC. I have been sharing meals with my mom and dad this weekend.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If a friend’s unexpected death was a reminder to connect with those around you now, I wondered what exactly “to connect” means. It’s one thing to feel sorry for someone and to empathize with them. But, what can you do?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do you leave a card with a message of condolence?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do you bring some food to their house with kind words?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do you give them a big hug with the conviction that life will go on?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What would you do?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is so easy to get caught up in the daily business of our lives to pause and sympathize with someone who's life has suddenly been disrupted. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If it had been your family who passed away, what words and actions would you like to receive from your friends and your colleagues?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What would you do?</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-25391069513775156702015-07-12T12:00:00.000-04:002016-03-14T16:36:47.176-04:00Be the Best You Can Be - However Small<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I previously reflected on the story of the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/tortoise-and-hare-how-to-save-2-mil.html" style="line-height: 1.38; text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">tortoise and hare</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, and how incremental progress can accomplish big goals. Just as with the post about </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/small-gesture-big-impact.html" style="line-height: 1.38; text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">small gestures with big impact</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, I want to be better about making small changes to be more effective and happy.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-28f5a8fd-4f5e-efee-f78b-8bd010377a34" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 18.666666666666664px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Go to work every day and make getting better your North Star. Aim at that every day,” - Jim Collins</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Reality vs. Fantasy</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It’s fun to look for small things in my life to improve. Why? </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Because, in the past, I often thought about big dreams, but realized looking back, I accomplished very little of those dreams. When I was younger, I had no context to evaluate the link between planning and outcomes. Now, looking back over the years, I can see the impact not only in my own life, but in the life of those I know.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">More to point, I’d like to harness the power of building on success to continue to grow and develop.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="347px;" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/XFkqUGlzkU8qmuQpJR69bgLnUSuYxvP7F03xGK9-6QftmA7zTydwx9WC7pmW_5RaZwGUVJcidBYVkwMkiXMYMAYuormdaSaUsehuRiHpyMJiMDYvWDKzeKSBK9_py8bRqZTYBW4" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="466px;" /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(Fantasy v Reality - These used to popular on Facebook last year)</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Two Bios - Bezos and LBJ</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are two stories that come to mind about this. One is of Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com. The other is of Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ).</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is a famous story of an early Amazon days. The young and inexperienced CEO Jeff Bezos asked the famous business author Jim Collins for advice. Bezos admitted in front of his team that he felt was was something “less than a Level 5 Leader.”</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(“Level 5 leader” is a leader who has mastered and combined personal humility and will to being a great leader. Jim Collins wrote many business classics like </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1LtU5vt" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Good to Great</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1LA3C55" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Built to Last</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.)</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Collins advised Bezos: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“Go to work everyday and make getting better your North Star: Aim at that every day.”</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One can argue, Bezos took the advice to heart, and has been doing better everyday for a long time now.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">LBJ</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I came across another interesting example of taking small tasks seriously by another famous figure: LBJ.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">While a young man in college, LBJ took a temporary teaching job in Cotulla, Texas to earn money to pay for his tuition at San Marcos. The school was for Mexican students whose parents were mostly workers for the white business owners in that southern corner of Texas. Other teachers took the job with disdain, and treated Mexican children like something less than people who needed education.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Not so Lyndon Johnson. He put his heart and soul into the school, getting to work before anyone and leaving after everyone left. Where the school had no extracurricular activities, he devised new ones and connected with nearby schools to give the kids something to do. Where the children had no transportation to get to events, he’d call on parents with cars (only few had cars) to get the kids to places.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What struck me was that he did all of this not only because he cared about the job and the kids (he did), but because he understood getting a stellar recommendation from this small gig would help him land other positions thereafter.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What You Can Do</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You might be working on a boring task right now in a job that feels static. Just as LBJ did, understand that how you approach a small task will define the opportunities you are given later. (In the Bible, there’s a story in the book of Matthew about servants to whom talents are given to invest and grow. In this story, Jesus rebukes the lazy servant who hid the one talent and did nothing with that talent.)</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Or, you might be excited about the challenging task you have. But, you’re stressed because the goal seems insurmountable. You understand that this big challenge is like finishing a marathon. You will complete the 26.2 mile-long race one step at a time. One step.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Focus on getting better everyday.</span></div>
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<b style="line-height: normal;">Further Reading</b></div>
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<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><a href="https://hbr.org/2005/07/level-5-leadership-the-triumph-of-humility-and-fierce-resolve" style="line-height: 1.38; text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Level 5 Leadership: The Triumph of Humility and Fierce Resolve</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. HBR, Jim Collins.</span></li>
<li><a href="http://amzn.to/1LFQXg5" style="line-height: 1.38; text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Robert A. Caro.</span></li>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">
<a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0679729453/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=0679729453&linkCode=as2&tag=bhigher-20&linkId=B2E3OEWO6KS7YB6B" target="_out"><img border="0" src="http://ws-na.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?_encoding=UTF8&ASIN=0679729453&Format=_SL110_&ID=AsinImage&MarketPlace=US&ServiceVersion=20070822&WS=1&tag=bhigher-20" /></a><img alt="" border="0" src="http://ir-na.amazon-adsystem.com/e/ir?t=bhigher-20&l=as2&o=1&a=0679729453" height="1" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important;" width="1" />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-62844769186037849192015-07-05T14:15:00.000-04:002015-07-05T14:15:00.814-04:00Remembering Independence<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A Little History</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-1b292a1f-5c6e-c01f-d18b-d139c9b62392" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Happy Fourth of July to everyone! And if you’re not American, then you’ll note that we are celebrating the independence day of United States of America.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Those who enjoy history, may recall that the day that the continental congress representing thirteen colonies declared their independence from the British crown. (And yes, it was also a blockbuster movie starring Will Smith.)</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I happen to live in one of the thirteen colonies, North Carolina. I’m visiting my parents just outside of </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greensboro,_North_Carolina" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Greensboro</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Greensboro was named after general Nathaneal Greene. Greene was one of George Washington’s major generals, and drove Britain’s Lord Cornwallis out of Carolinas into Virginia [</span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathanael_Greene" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">thanks Wikipedia</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">].</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img alt="360px-Writing_the_Declaration_of_Independence_1776_cph.3g09904.jpg" height="421px;" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/6g1LZ61XbXhrfGpNGelmJ5ncmcRFEld0Ij3RvIlPAFxw4vfSTTdmyhwPqEErm0vmzAznvISYBs19wLPEcN_PIy1sIlxmbqcU4jtoOQC8su1dhnwrjfW8F5UioSBCJQP0nFC-Q0g" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="315px;" /></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A Little Fresh Spirit in Life</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The lesson that I can take away today is that there’s value in independent thinking, even though doing so may end up upsetting the powers. You know from your experience that once you get used to something, you tend to go on an auto-pilot. The technical term for this is sensory or </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neural_adaptation" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">neural adaptation</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Foreign things are foreign only the first time. Once you start seeing something new again and again, or smell that smell every day, you get used to things. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It’s a simple concept. In a way, this biological reality is the cornerstone of forming habits. As you know, habits can be good or bad.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">When you get used to doing your work well, or you get used to getting something from others, you might be excited and grateful at first. But, after a while, you begin to take things for granted. Or perhaps you started a new role, and attacked problems with fresh eyes. But, after losing yourself in the details for a while, you lose independence of thought.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You become part of the problem.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How can you keep your mind sharp and fresh? Well, here are a few things to remember:</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Change your setting - Something as simple as standing up or taking your papers to a different desk could stimulate new thoughts.</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Take your vacations - I still can’t believe some people don’t take vacations. Get away from your desk a while. Your company will still be there when you get back.</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Take a walk - One of my favorite techniques. Whether it’s walking or using the opposite hand to write (try left handed doodling if you’re a right-hander). The unusual act will stimulate new thoughts. Even random thoughts are a positive.</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Practice opposites - Like anything, you get good at being a contrarian by practicing it. When you come up with a new idea, don’t stop there. Play the devil’s advocate and try to come up with reasons why the idea is not a good one.</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Empathize - If you’re working with a team, then pause to think about what your counterparts are thinking. It will help you get out of your head, and enhance how you communicate. </span></div>
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</ul>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Okay, so fresh thinking may not have stopped the War of Independence. But, I suspect it will help you stay more focused and more energetic in your endeavors.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A Little Family Time</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">That said, as I was wrapping up my mundane finance work Friday afternoon, I saw how everyone seemed to file out early. They were thinking about the family and friends they were going to see for this holiday.</span></div>
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<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you’re like me, then I’m sure you’ve noticed that things “feel” different around holiday time. You and others around you become more relaxed. You take work a little less seriously and think about the fun trip you have planned, or look forward to the grill you’ll break out with family and friends.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And that’s the most important thing. Why did our Founding Fathers declare their independence? So, you can enjoy a cold beer and admire your green lawn with friends? Damn right.</span></div>
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<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Of all the things that you could get used to and take for granted, remember not to take your family and friends for granted. Take a fresh look at each time you see them and remember how important they are.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Happy July Fourth!</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-68722312450822721732015-06-28T11:30:00.000-04:002016-03-14T16:37:16.314-04:00The tortoise and the hare, or how to save 2 million bucks<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I hope you’re doing well! Last week, I shared how </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/small-gesture-big-impact.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">small things can mean a lot in personal relationships</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. This is just as true in a professional context. The key is to move forward little by little. Rick, a personal role model, who often talks about the power of incrementalism. Small steps can be powerful.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-f6732ca7-21a4-3038-1f22-eb4384715a85" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Let me share a story, then suggest </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">concrete steps</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> you can take to achieve seemingly impossible goals. (And a story of small, big investing.)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Fable of the Tortoise and the Hare</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Consider Aesop’s story of </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tortoise_and_the_Hare" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">the tortoise and the hare</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. In the Wikipedia synopsis:</span></div>
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<i><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-family: "times new roman"; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tired of the Hare’s boastful behaviour, the Tortoise challenges him to a race. The hare soon leaves the tortoise behind and, confident of winning, takes a nap midway through the race. When the Hare awakes however, he finds that his competitor, crawling slowly but steadily, has arrived before him.”</span></i></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What lessons can you draw from this story?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you’re the rabbit,</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don’t be an ass (or hare)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don’t slack off</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Pride can lead to self-destructive behavior</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you’re the turtle (or more generally in life):</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Be relentless in pursuit of your goal</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Show up consistently, every day</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Small steps applied consistently can lead to big outcomes</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don’t be afraid of tackling big challenges, even if you don’t have a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">natural</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> talent for it (whatever you assume that to be)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 17.333333333333332px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="309px;" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/c7rJiW1XlGFgJbeCCTWFsGV0t8VzpFtyRscgBbxq03CYKpWgVc2xDXak9-3cd5U9GJ8hGhLC6oqSY8AHjgFMN0hf0QcSBRuCY-F5A6vIcE72bGrdM12xDnZfpb7_CvbKMOnj6Fk" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="372px;" /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Life Application</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I can share a telling example of how this story plays out in life.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In 2007, I started reading a blog by an anonymous IT engineer at IBM who wrote about his goal of saving $2 million for retirement. His blog is called </span><a href="http://www.2millionblog.com/" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">2MillionBlog</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The engineer had only a modest income, earning around $50,000 working full-time for a big company (decent salary in 2007). At the time, he had saved over $350,000, so I imagined he had been saving for a while. Gains in stock market and his employer stock options helped him get to that point.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I then stopped following his net wealth updates as I went back to school, and then had a career roller coaster for several years. Basically, I had better things to do.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Fast forward to 2015, and I check in on this personal finance blog. As of May 2015, this engineer now has a networth of around $1.3 Million, including equity built up on 4 houses! </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">His salary had not changed much, and he did not have a side income to supplement his paycheck. Plus, he had gotten married and had a child, and his wife does not work (she had worked for a while as a pre-K teacher, earning a modest salary).</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 17.333333333333332px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="369px;" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/5tH8ZcnrohrCmC7M8V_SQOyNF7CorCpP6BG36VtH-V-edVo7wXZHTwoV_P1zCaHdSlCNgBn8nn9L0c6ZKm-zCqCW_JrXYHmK0_9yJjPx6oDvzo3asS46fxYbXq11sFgph-_p6OE" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="429px;" /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So, how did he do this? I gathered these key points:</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">First, he had a </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">goal</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">; he wanted $2 million. “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If you don’t know where you are going, any road’ll take lead there.</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">” (Lewis Carroll)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Next, he </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">measured</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Unlike the tortoise, navigating most modern endeavors is more complex than walking. Measuring the right things is a prerequisite to the behaviors that will help you achieve your goals.</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Third, he </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">learned</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. This engineer didn’t start with a master plan. Hell, he probably didn’t even know about investing basics when he started with his desire to save up for retirement. But, he learned well, and applied the lessons. He learned to buy and manage multiple properties. He learned about retirement savings. He took advantage of credit card promotions, traveled cheap on reward points, and a host of other techniques. “</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.” (Dwight Eisenhower)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Finally, </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">be the tortoise</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Don’t snooze. I acted like the hare. In the intervening years, I lived like how most Americans live. Working, saving a little, spending more. While the IT engineer tortoise inched along, I took this detour and that detour, and took long naps.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Behind the simple story, you can see many texts between the lines. The first three steps don’t lead to big outcomes on their own, but the fourth (be the tortoise) is like the magic recipe. By sticking to the daily behavior toward the goal, this IT engineer let powerful forces of compounding do the heavy lifting. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At first, he despaired that he may never get to $2 million. But, after a while, the monthly gains from dividends and rising asset prices helped him add to his wealth far beyond his monthly income.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(By the way, there’s a great book about this kind of small things leading to big savings in a book called </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1IwTgwx" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Millionaire Next Door</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, by Thomas Stanley.)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Counterpoint</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Of course, there’s no sure thing. The markets could come tumbling down. This post isn’t a howto on getting wealthy. Rather, I wanted a reminder of the power of consistent and properly directed small effort.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How can I work so that I am a little better than I was yesterday? And how can I let that build on itself?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And all of this should be done with a degree of humility about the bigger forces (beware of hubris). I found this captured in ancient wisdom from Ecclesiastes 9:11 (King James translation):</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I returned, and saw under the sun, </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">that the race is not to the swift, </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">nor the battle to the strong, </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">neither yet bread to the wise, </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">nor yet riches to men of understanding, </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">nor yet favour to men of skill; </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">but </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">t</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">ime and chance happeneth to them all.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: large; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Exercise</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Think of a big goal you had struggled to achieve in the past. Break it down:</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Write down the goal</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Take a stab at what you want to measure to ensure you’re moving toward the goal</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Resolve to learn from the journey so you can be better than you were yesterday</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Stick with it; don’t give up!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Perhaps you’ll want to pick up this FREE Kindle copy of </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1IwTu6V" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Aesop’s Fables</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">.</span></div>
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<b>Further Reading</b><br />
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Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-26788333748966008582015-06-21T14:02:00.000-04:002016-03-14T16:37:49.031-04:00Small gesture, big impact<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I hope you’re doing well! Last week, I shared the importance of </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/five-people-you-meet-and-power-of.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">surrounding yourself with great people</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. You are the product of the five people you spend the most time with. So, I have been thinking about how to be nice to people around me, and to be remembered for being good. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Do you ever think back to a co-worker or a classmate from many years ago? Or do they just fade into dark corners of forgotten memory?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">On the Road to Work</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I drive on a two lane road with a wide median to work. This morning, I saw a man crossing the street to get to a bus stop. He had crossed half way and stood at the median as a long row of cars kept driving. This man stood in the middle looking both ways, apparently dazed by the passing cars. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I stopped to let him walk the remaining half to the bus stop. At first, he hesitated and then looked my way. After waving a hand, he started to walk. As he walked, he first pointed a finger at me in recognition, then gave a double thumbs up, arms raised high.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="297px;" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/jefPx2AFbS_OxcR8-7LGHDHSRJ0LwTqic3Fd5wJFITs_ofbt60w5B9mtJ7_BN46p_KsRkhrAQnv5z7ljssReHxHl8lVH_tWFZl20JboXxQ9dh5lA0tzOiVLwJtde8H3ZhU721Gc" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="474px;" /></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Was he really that excited and surprised that someone had stopped to let him pass? (Apparently, people in my city don’t know the rules of right of way for pedestrians. Sadly, South tends to be rather regressive when it comes to things like this.)</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A small gesture can make someone’s day. This gleeful pedestrian made me think about how just few, small things can make the difference between happiness and misery, whether in public or private life. Small big things.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Be Memorable, Be Vulnerable</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In my book </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1e323yS" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How to be Happy: 12 Powerful Steps</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, I talked about a Daily Values List. Unlike the todo list, this list does not get crossed off. Rather, it’s an aspirational list, a list of reminders to help me be a better person. An item on that list is “be vulnerable.” Another item is “be better than yesterday.”</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of my goals at my new work is to be genuinely good to people around me. Of course, I’m always courteous. But, do I really care about people who are basically strangers outside of work? The other day, I was talking to “V,” who is a summer intern in our marketing group. It turns out she got married the prior weekend. As far as I could tell, there was no group celebration about this news. The next day, I grabbed a little card and wrote a congratulatory message and shared how glad I was that she was on the team.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Her response: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Thank you SO MUCH for the card! That was amazingly sweet and I love the stationary.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What small item on your list will give you a big return? What small gesture you make will make someone smile? I believe in making someone else smile, you will, too. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Much of what we think about career accomplishments tends to be focused on skills or tasks. You often find tips about how to be more productive. Certainly, today’s dynamic and complex economy demands high skills and productivity. Still, beyond the techniques and processes, all work is done with and through people.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Exercise</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What small action can you take today to make someone’s day? (And in turn make yours.)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’d love to hear about your little big thing.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-16231106121468309242015-06-14T13:48:00.000-04:002016-03-14T16:37:31.274-04:00Five People You Meet and Power of Context<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I hope you’re doing well! Last week, I shared the importance of assuming the right attitude and thinking about the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/what-is-your-favorite-story-of-new.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">type of story you want to live out</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> in your new role. During this past week, I thought about the people I joined in doing the work.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-bcbbbbfd-de04-0492-b727-570f4fb4d5f6" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">Five People</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1e2Rr37" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Five People You Meet in Heaven</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, the author Mitch Albom imagines that heaven consists of the five people who most influenced you on this earth.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A brief Wikipedia synopsis: “Eddie is killed and sent to heaven, where he encounters five people who significantly impacted him while he was alive.”</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I find this to be an interesting metaphor for life. The world you create in life is the world you’ll know in afterlife. If we choose to be happy and surround ourselves with happy people, we will find that happiness beyond today. It’s been a few months since I released </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1e323yS" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">How to be Happy: 12 Powerful Steps</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Yet, the daily practice goes on. Who we choose to be around has a profound impact on our own happiness.</span></div>
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<span id="docs-internal-guid-173c29c7-e2ea-ff40-329b-5e2817731c7f"><span style="font-size: 16px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="276px;" src="https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/D-Qtb9Yky6VheVQJHofFiH-9kgOBunr1-ULLnKMRco1GE-U8BpmwIeGKsURUW0Ec1aUpU16JFwuyX2qBvlsFArLgBQxVz16UvGKJvvggVaUYZvnGznaDbUUsIUNXxuJ_oAqfpHE" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0rad);" width="400px;" /></span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And it’s not just happiness. I’ve once heard that we become the five people you spend the most time with (choose your friends wisely)! Spend all your waking hours around drinkers, and you’ll find yourself drinking more. If all your friends become vegetarians, you’ll find yourself eating less meat. (You know this to be true. When you join a company where everyone works late, you find it hard to go home on your own. Choose your careers wisely!)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This is profound.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As much as you like to think you control your habits, you’re at the mercy of the environment you live in. And that environment has a surprisingly narrow definition: the five people you spend most time with.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This is also empowering. Your own habits and attitudes will influence those around you.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Old and the New</span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">As I mentioned in </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2015/06/what-is-your-favorite-story-of-new.html" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">previous post</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, I recently started a new job. With that, I have the pleasant opportunity to connect with new kinds of people and to make new friends. </span></div>
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<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The old me thought about how I could get ahead. The new me wonders what I can do to help others get ahead. The old me thought about how much money I could make in such and such a role. The new me wants to be content with work as its own reward. The old me focused on me. The new me catches myself doing that, and remembers to look around. The old me worked hard to give all the answers, pleased to think of my own brilliance. The new me seeks to ask questions so I can learn.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The old me was young and immature, but had no idea about how immature I was. The new me at least recognizes I’m immature and knows nothing.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Choice and Power Are Yours</span></span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One of the new people I recently met at work is a young fellow named Phil. He sits by himself quietly for the most part. He sits little bit apart from the team in a corner, and I thought he was one of the analysts who’d been with the company for a while. I started talking to him and learned that he’s an intern. That explained why he sat quietly by himself and no one seemed to talk to him regularly.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I’m pretty sure the old me would have thought to myself: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">interns … what do they know?</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Turns out, Phil knows quite a bit! He apparently runs a laundry concierge service at his college, and the business rakes in six figures net income! He’s exactly the kind of entrepreneurial and energetic people I wanted to surround myself with. Yet, I’m curious how many other people know this about Phil.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You have the power to surround yourself with good people, happy people, fun people. You also have the power to be good, be happy, and have fun with your life. And the process of choosing is a daily practice. Choose wisely each day.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span>
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I help people and businesses grow at <a href="http://betterandhigher.com/">betterandhigher.com</a>. Please subscribe and share!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-19968602096743679192015-06-07T18:18:00.000-04:002015-06-07T18:18:00.907-04:00What is your favorite story of a new beginning?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">A New Hope</span></span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-5fbd5ffd-d018-f717-3962-a21a74d2f527" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Recently, I started a new job. I’ve done this many times in the last few years. Maybe too much. Along with the usual experiences of a new start - excitement, curiosity, even fatigue - I thought about how I might make this particular beginning memorable and meaningful. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">(I experienced many new starts. As a young college graduate in a post-dotcom bubble economy, I had a job offer rescinded. It was my first taste of how callous and impersonal the business world can be underneath the smiles. As a young auditor at a Big Four accountancy, I felt I found a good job, but not one I found interesting. And when I found something that was fun and interesting, I struggled to balance it with financial payoff. All this to say that I’ve experienced many ups and downs, and I’m still here!)</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><img height="240px;" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/heghZlDcxiMNGVoxU1JXojrAXu2Ef8GzMoHqVAD1YTrfbiDMq2O_jJZiUqevuouBumd7_4NJvxkrsDgjm9jZirHxWV9FSE4cZN-YqlMFduG8Ly84O6ixdPOFoCQVP7CPMY3O7Lg" style="-webkit-transform: rotate(0.00rad); border: none; transform: rotate(0.00rad);" width="360px;" /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Source: <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leiadeathstar.jpg">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Leiadeathstar.jpg</a></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In this new start, I got to thinking about what kind of story I want to tell of this period in my life when I look back. For me, the story as told in the movie starring Robert Redford, </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1KVrUq2" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Natural</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, comes to mind. In that movie, Roy Hobbs is a baseball phenom with a complicated history. His talents as a young baseball player lead to hubris. That prides leads to a fatal mistake that derails his career before it starts. Years later, many years after the world has forgotten him, Roy returns to the baseball he loves and starts over. He is an old, 30-something rookie. He swallows his pride and others’ skepticism and shows up for practice every day. He works hard to prove himself. He is human. He stumbles with the new-found fame, but remembers his old self and gets back on track. Rather than taking a bribe to throw the pennant game for big payoff, he stays true to himself and does his best with what he has. </span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Roy’s story resonates with me. Rather than dwelling on the past, the right attitude is to assume humility, and be curious like a newcomer should be. A new player should be deferential to the team, and work hard to prove himself. Certainly, some work will be menial, but I can use all things as an opportunity to learn. I hope that I can look back years from now and be proud of how I worked hard regardless of my age. I hope that I can take pride in serving my team and my customers faithfully, and growing as a leader.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">Narrative Arc: What’s your story?</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Which makes me curious. What kind of narrative are you writing with your life or with your career? If you started something new recently (a new job or new family or new location), then what kind of story would you like to be able to tell about it when you look back? Were you beaten down, but picked yourself back up and persevered? Were you faced with evil (or difficult) forces, but kept your integrity and won with patience and love?</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This isn’t about legacy. It is about how you make sense of your world. What kind of experience do you want to have in your life? Thinking about the right narrative arc can help. In his book </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1GtFsI6" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Seven Basic Plots</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">, the author Christopher Booker outlines seven narrative archetypes:</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Overcoming the monster</span></div>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Rags to riches</span></div>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The quest</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Voyage and return</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Comedy</span></div>
</li>
<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Tragedy</span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Rebirth</span></div>
</li>
</ol>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I think my story will be a mix of these. What I do know is that I want to be more mindful about writing a plot and working hard to follow the plot this time around. I wonder what kind of story you’re excited about living out.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: bold; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: large;">Exercise</span></span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Think about the narrative arc you would like to live out. How would you work to build that story into an aspect of your life today?</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You may want to check out the book </span><a href="http://amzn.to/1GtFsI6" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #1155cc; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Seven Basic Plots</span></a><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> by Christopher Booker.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-18335316097628847332013-08-04T20:42:00.000-04:002016-03-13T21:06:34.677-04:00Don't step back, step forward - why pain is good<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
First posted on Medium under similar title: <a href="https://medium.com/better-humans/d8f93537218d" target="_blank">don't step back, step forward</a>.<br />
<br />
<i>When you come to a fork in the road, take it.</i> - Yogi Berra<br />
<br />
<b>Our fears and our views</b><br />
<br />
I love running hilly courses. I find it odd that even those who run regularly often express fear of running uphill. And those who don’t run assume that I prefer to run flat surfaces: “Oh, so many hills in that neighborhood! Where do you run?”<br />
<br />
<b>Why is that?</b><br />
<br />
It is as if people retain the memory of the pain. The pain of huffing and puffing up a hill, the muscle in the legs tingling with unpleasant soreness as the lactic acid builds up. The burn in the leg. The burn in the lungs. Pain leaves an impression. It is nature’s signaling mechanism, a coping mechanism intended to preserve us from future harm. And we project this memory of pain. “You are running up the hill?” Implication of thought: ‘ouch, that sounds painful.’<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
“Your new idea is failing?” … ‘ouch, that sounds painful.’</blockquote>
Why do I like running hills? It is because of the perspective: literally and figuratively. As you rise up the hill, you can see more. There is a vista of the city or the valley below. And as you inch toward the pinnacle, there is an inner transformation that hints at other things in life like accomplishment, possibilities, pinnacles. (I suspect that such feelings echo what mountaineers feel, when they undertake to bag an untamed peak.)<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvWmluz1VRTm9TY_RMfNHxenrby4zPwMObOTiKs5cjh_VSXnWZCzYz3hrfBy_uhwWPafTB0aIbcHksNAbzzqQnr2i3RueYmlzocaIf9ey7gqO2I931PGWe3P19U8vQ_rlKxry6kMHTIWE/s1600/farseeing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvWmluz1VRTm9TY_RMfNHxenrby4zPwMObOTiKs5cjh_VSXnWZCzYz3hrfBy_uhwWPafTB0aIbcHksNAbzzqQnr2i3RueYmlzocaIf9ey7gqO2I931PGWe3P19U8vQ_rlKxry6kMHTIWE/s400/farseeing.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #666665; font-family: , "georgia" , "cambria" , "times new roman" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: italic; line-height: 19px; text-align: right;">View atop Pyramid Peak. Lake Tahoe to left.</span></td></tr>
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<br />
<b>On perspectives</b><br />
<br />
In business school, we adopted certain common phrases that spoke to a position befitting a leader. Chief among these:<br />
<div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Let’s take a step back.</b></blockquote>
I am often heard giving advice to people: “take a step back” or “let’s look at the big picture” or “take a 50,000 feet view from the top.” Or some such platitude. Why? Because you feel that is what you need when you feel bogged down in the mud of conflicting stakeholders, or lost in the darkness of uncertainty. How often had I really given thought to what I was saying from the perspective of the person receiving that comment from me?<br />
<br />
Then, recently, I had the experience of hearing it as an advice offered to me. I have many different thoughts in my head and trying numerous projects. I should perhaps step back and gain perspective on what I really want.<br />
<br />
It stopped me. It really made me think. Is that true? What is my next step? What does it actually mean for me? Step back to what? Does it mean putting my different efforts on hold so that I can focus? But, that’s more like stepping forward, rather than backward. Is it to spend a few days not thinking about the current problems to let the mind tie the pieces together?<br />
<br />
In his book <a href="http://amzn.to/1XoAFeN" target="_blank">Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation</a>, Steve Johnson suggests a technique for stepping back by recalling Poincare’s description of a “eureka” moment.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>I felt them collide until pairs interlocked, so to speak … by the next morning I had established the existence of a class of Fuchsian functions …</i></blockquote>
Henri Poincare had been stuck on a problem. According to Johnson, one evening Poincare took a break from the routine to go for a walk. It had apparently loosened the ideas that existed in Poincare’s head, literally let them shake in the head and bump into each other. That’s the process of serendipity.<br />
<br />
<b>Step Forward, not Backward</b><br />
<br />
But both my reflection on words from a friend, and reading of Johnson’s book reminds me that there is actually no stepping back. Just as you go for a walk to let ideas progress, so you don’t step back. Instead, you step forward. For entrepreneurs, that might mean more focus, more persistence; not relenting to take in a bigger picture, but rather to dive deeper in search of new truths. It sounds painful.<br />
<br />
When you are at a wall, and banging your head, it is painful. We are conditioned to avoid pain. Step back. Look where the fires are with a bird’s eye view. Maybe you should avoid it. Or maybe you should walk through the fire and see what’s on the other side. If only you’ll walk forward.<br />
<br />
I have the experience of giving up on something. There was a mobile application I built with a friend called Voicegram. It was sort of a non-starter idea, and neither of us were mature or experienced to know it. Now we know. But, I remember saying of that particular project:<br />
“Never give in, never!”<br />
<br />
… citing Winston Churchill’s exhortation to the Britons under existential German attack. Never give in. But I did. We did. We gave up. And yet I never did. I am still learning and growing. And that pain of failing, of letting go of an idea and learning… of climbing a hill, feeling the burn … that pain is useful and vital for progress. It is the only way out of mud and out of darkness.<br />
<br />
I love running hills. Maybe I’m dumb. But I love the perspective.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNS02UFiJxspthGp7GRlZGvDZbEnTJcW2lH8Fg_6ba4Ojw8ekjgGqU3gJLGlmR_KvxyGjNzYcBMT_FJIcOxcUHIZzD8qc_wuCNnW6s4C__YAe6Bqbzg-83bhT4lFizdgiMAl6iu6RP2ow/s1600/stepForward.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="390" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNS02UFiJxspthGp7GRlZGvDZbEnTJcW2lH8Fg_6ba4Ojw8ekjgGqU3gJLGlmR_KvxyGjNzYcBMT_FJIcOxcUHIZzD8qc_wuCNnW6s4C__YAe6Bqbzg-83bhT4lFizdgiMAl6iu6RP2ow/s400/stepForward.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #666665; font-family: , "georgia" , "cambria" , "times new roman" , "times" , serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: italic; line-height: 19px; text-align: right;">Chasing sunset</span></td></tr>
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<br />
<b>Of faith</b><br />
<br />
Many things in life, as in entrepreneurship take faith. To trust that there is a better future, to have faith that our efforts will bear fruit. We fear pain and failure, but faith would tell us to be resourceful and look beyond the pain. Anything is possible, even for <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/07/how-does-mba-break-into-high-tech-my.html" target="_blank">an MBA to break into tech as a programmer</a>.<br />
<br />
Important thing is to keep doing, to keep an open mind and not label and dismiss others, but to always learn and grow. And that growth is not always linear. Just like life, one takes interesting turns and forks in the road. I never thought I'd publish a <a href="http://amzn.to/1XoAZu9" target="_blank">book on Happiness</a>, but I did.<br />
<br />
Don't lose faith. Step forward.<br />
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<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I write about personal and business growth at <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://www.betterandhigher.com/</a>. Please check it out and subscribe!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-58989905605781306252013-07-20T20:36:00.000-04:002016-03-13T21:06:27.193-04:00How does a MBA break into high tech? My story<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">I quit a nice corporate job, and moved to San Francisco, I started more or less from scratch, No one cared about my MBA degree. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br npdkey="hjdfawuf0.agkvcozy09vygb9" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'helvetica neue', helvetica, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" /></span> <b><span style="font-size: large;">So Many Resources, If Only You Look</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">I wanted to break into the </span><b npdkey="hjdfawuf0.hfp607tlmto11yvi" style="color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">San Francisco Tech community</b><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">, and quickly learned that programming skills were valued above all; and MBA degree per se had limited appeal. There was no way to learn to program quickly, but that did not stop me from building a network. Specifically, I began appearing at local evening meetups through groups like </span><a class="qlink" data-link-delete="SFRuby.info" href="http://sfruby.info/" id="qlink_k0" npdkey="hjdfawuf0.kkvg3bzz7fn1m7vi" style="color: #19558d; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;">SFRuby</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">, and in the course of a few weeks, begin to see the same faces and make friends with developers. Soon, I learned that there is a thriving community of people helping people learn, through workshops such as </span><a class="qlink" data-link-delete="workshops.railsbridge.org" href="http://workshops.railsbridge.org/" id="qlink_k1" npdkey="hjdfawuf0.ygmatp13qda0dx6r" style="color: #19558d; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;">Railsbridge.org - workshops for women and their friends</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">. It did not take much more than some courage and willingness to learn to become a volunteer and gain visibility. (Hackathons are another great place to see/meet tech-minded people: why you should go to a hackathon today.)</span></span><br />
<br npdkey="hjdfawuf0.esfn3r6hzwfusor" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'helvetica neue', helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;" />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">How Rookies Got Started</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">I was hooked. Tech was not as scary as I had imagined. All it took was willingness to learn, to pitch in what I could, and not be ashamed of being a rookie who may not have all the answers (unlike an MBA who would be expected to have ALL the answers). These experiences helped me become more aware about the importance of learning in my own life; I persisted in coding. I soon met others in my position - those new to city or new to programming. Then, it occurred to me that I could help in a new way: why not form a small group and create a co-learning experience, and give each other support? Thus was born </span>RubyRookies<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;">. I had done some volunteering in politics before: canvasing, voter registration, etc. But, this was my real first experience in building a grassroots effort. I made many new friends through these gatherings. One of my big fears as a newbie in town was where I might find a community to plug into. It turns out, I was lucky enough to be fitting into my very own! We had a lot of fun - including hosting some panel events and lots of fun programming meetups:</span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Lot of fun coding away at night</td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 15.3594px;">Long story short, there are plenty of ways to build a network like the one you might find in a MBA Program. What I would recommend is that you keep these basic human principles in mind:</span><br />
<ul npdkey="hjdfawua0.iladvhic6l0afw29" style="color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px; margin: 5px 0px 0px 1.6em; padding: 0px;">
<li npdkey="hjdfawub0.ap2joz8c15rk9" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawub0.7ez8ghcy13lyp66r" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Ask what you can contribute</b> - You have some skill here and now, even if it's not the one you want, that will allow you to add value. I can recommend a really good book on this topic for people of all stripes - a classic by Peter Drucker, called The Effective Executive.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawub0.3ktqwp5xam6g8pvi" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawub0.dft3efzwlf0tfbt9" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Focus on and measure outcome</b> - If your contribution is not valued, it is a signal to you to re-articulate or to re-frame ... until you begin producing outcome. It's not an easy process. You just have to chip away at it.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawub0.ccx63pja3c6av2t9" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawub0.tp09aqe3766r" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">It's about them, not you</b> - If you take the self-centered approach, I think you might find your world to be a very small one indeed. Look around you, there is so much need and so much opportunity! Network starts there.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawub0.1vrn8xmbirbv5cdi" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawub0.i93vadb2ko7gmn29" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Learn, learn, learn</b> - That's my mantra, anyway. If I am not learning, I am dying. I am not sticking around a place where I am stagnating. Only by learning can one grow, and only by growing, can one branch out and help others.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawua0.m84m22j456ogvi" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawub0.u06gsxa6o7z4zpvi" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Do what you love</b> - I wasn't getting paid to organize events or create venues, nor was I charging to hear people out or give them coaching. It was just what I enjoyed doing. The gratification I received from those who attended my gathering thank me was <b npdkey="hjdfawub0.l91pihz0rrpe3ik9" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">enormous</b>. And that joy spilled over into introductions and to positive brand. It helped me in so many ways in the local community.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawua0.em1tu4xp2xzuxr" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawua0.t5b38vs84y47k3xr" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Have faith. Have courage</b> - Whether you are an MBA or not, you really have to get comfortable being uncomfortable. Step out of the comfort zone until it feels natural. Sometimes it's painful. But, that's okay - <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/08/dont-step-back-step-forward-why-pain-is.html" target="_blank">step forward</a>. You can do it!</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawua0.em1tu4xp2xzuxr" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b>Persist</b> - Similar to last point, but don't give up. Never give up (even though you may pivot). The luck favors the prepared. It also favors the one that's around ... and if you gave up, well, you're not around anymore.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawua0.g3nv2p2t021brzfr" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b npdkey="hjdfawua0.5g9kgvq58b0uow29" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Be human </b>- At the end of the day, you learn that life is joyful; life is short. Don't use people. Instead help people and be who you are. Be genuine and just enjoy the process of connecting with new minds and new skills. Do it because it's fun, not to fatten your rolodex. People are human beings, not stream of revenues.</span></li>
<li npdkey="hjdfawua0.g3nv2p2t021brzfr" style="margin: 0px 0px 5px; padding: 0px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b>Sell</b> - As IBM's Tom Watson said, "nothing happens until you make a sale." Learn to sell yourself, learn to sell for someone. Sales is truly valuable to anyone. You do that, and people will listen to you. I share my experience of starting with small in <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/05/how-i-sold-my-first-lemonade-and-made.html" target="_blank">How I sold my first lemonade</a>.</span></li>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-size: large; line-height: 15.3594px;"><b>Other Thoughts</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 15.3594px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 15.3594px;">I will add that another way to build a network is to attend an intense, brief learning community, like a Programming Course. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></span></span> <span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 15.3594px;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">For those set on attending MBA, consider the </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/04/roi-on-mba-vs-coding-schools-which-is.html" style="font-family: times, 'times new roman', serif;" target="_blank">ROI relative to alternatives</a><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">. Now, learn to code - it is a truly useful skill to learn for our age. See the entry: </span><a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2012/12/soon-your-taxi-driver-may-know-more.html" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">soon your taxi driver may know more R</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">uby than you do</span></a><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">. Finally, yes, it is scary, and you may fail, and failure can be painful. But, sometimes, pain can be good - <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/08/dont-step-back-step-forward-why-pain-is.html" target="_blank">instead of stepping back, consider stepping forward</a>.</span></span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Help others and they help you<br />
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I write about personal and business growth at <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://www.betterandhigher.com/</a>. Please check it out and subscribe!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-46586699827471723802013-05-31T20:28:00.000-04:002016-03-13T21:06:04.417-04:00How I sold my first lemonade and made a buck<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-size: 15.4px; line-height: 1.4;">I sold my first lemonade. This is a personal story of creating (tiny) wealth and earning (tiny amount of) money on my own. The amount is not so important as is the illustrative value of the process.</span></h3>
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<b>Flavor of the lemonade</b><br />
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Not lemonade. Rather I sold tickets to an event. An event I organized. In short: 1) I had a customer in mind. 2) I used resources I had to create value from thin air to serve those customers. 3) Then, I monetized the value I created.<br />
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The value I created was a panel talk geared to educating community members. It included product managers from well-known companies like <a href="http://www.facebook.com/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Facebook</a>, <a href="http://www.indiegogo.com/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Indiegogo</a>, and Snapfish. It was titled <a href="http://www.meetup.com/ProductLovers/events/112682302/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">What do product managers really do</a>?<br />
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<b>1) Customer in mind & value proposition</b><br />
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It starts with the customer and their needs. In this particular case, we had a strong hunch (from other validations) that people are interested in learning about product management and willing to pay to network with product managers. Bringing that to the customer would be a valuable service to them.<br />
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Demand as manifested in pricing was unclear to us, but I knew that a hypothetical customer would pay something. In this case, we priced the tickets at around $15 - 20.<br />
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Demand as manifested in headcount was also unclear. We knew that some would be interested at the above price range - just not sure exactly how many. You can see that headcount and pricing points are opposite sides of demand for the service in question.<br />
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<b>2) Using resources to create something from nothing</b><br />
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As a former B-school student, I must say that this is a technique that absolutely should be discussed, yet not included in the curriculum. MBA programs should have a class called "creating something from nothing." How do you create this event? You need a venue, you need speakers, you need to market/distribute to customers. You need team hours to make all those things happen. How did we do it?<br />
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<ul style="line-height: 1.4; margin: 0.5em 0px; padding: 0px 2.5em;">
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;"><b><i>venue</i></b> - we had spoken to many startups in San Francisco in our prior work. We decided to host the event in the evening (when the work places are empty anyway) and pitched the value of exposure to prospective startups. We sold the value as a concept, and came out with several venue choices for free.</li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;"><b><i>speakers</i></b> - this was all about gaining traction. Again, we knew that some people love sharing and teaching (just as we do) and are eager to connect with crowds. After 'signing' that first person, the next ones become easier. We used this technique to find four high caliber product managers, including a director-level product manager and a PM from Facebook.</li>
<li style="margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;"><b>distribution/marketing to customers</b> - in our case, this was done in the course of validating the customer needs. In particular, we built an educational meetup community centered around the product management vertical. So, we cheated on this one. And I love the fact that we cheated legal and square. That should be another MBA class: how to stack the odds in your favor to win.</li>
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<b>3) Monetization</b><br />
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Well, the three bullet points above outline a value creation for potential people interested in this sort of thing. Being the first of its type of service, we had no idea how much to charge (in retrospect, we could have benchmarked from similar events in other arenas). So we experimented. Let's price at $15 and see if we can fill the seats. Then we hustled, and over-filled. We planned for 55 people, but over 120 people signed up to go and begged us to let them in: "pleeeaaase!" Lesson learned! Next time, we should find a bigger venue or charge more.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjj9s8mtwIEj57vpzqVJUg0nhpYBSA8138Bv7NBzGVj-f6qii2_8P7Ow7nY3LF1aHO_yRWgPOdj619T0bRB9GDWmVY2bt6dd1bgYrJRmLls7iZuB1usB83ZPo_91p7vU2uNtDFeHjH4YaI/s1600/PMevent.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="color: #888888; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" height="297" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjj9s8mtwIEj57vpzqVJUg0nhpYBSA8138Bv7NBzGVj-f6qii2_8P7Ow7nY3LF1aHO_yRWgPOdj619T0bRB9GDWmVY2bt6dd1bgYrJRmLls7iZuB1usB83ZPo_91p7vU2uNtDFeHjH4YaI/s400/PMevent.jpeg" style="background: transparent; border: none; box-shadow: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.0980392) 0px 0px 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.32px;">The lucky few who were able to get in - and were happy to pay money to do so ...</td></tr>
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Was this bit of profiteering? No, not really? We have done other events free out of love of the work. We are involved in building a community. But time is not free. To create a sustainable enterprise, you should charge. You should charge fairly, but you should charge money. That is the clearest indication that you have indeed created wealth - that customers are willing to give you something back in return for the wealth you created.<br />
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There you have it.<br />
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"<span style="font-family: "verdana";"><i>The people most likely to grasp that wealth can be created are the ones who are good at making things, the craftsmen.</i></span>" - Paul Graham essay: "<a href="http://paulgraham.com/wealth.html" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">How to Make Wealth</a>"<br />
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<b>Other tidbits</b><br />
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And we are in the golden age of doing things that make you happy AND make you money. Have you considered <a href="http://findinbay.blogspot.com/2013/07/solo-oh-no-get-friend-and-publish-book.html" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">writing your own book to a market that needs your knowledge and experience</a>? Or have you wondered about the story before this story - of how <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/07/how-does-mba-break-into-high-tech-my.html" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">I am getting started in tech in the first place</a>?<br />
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And as much as I wish I could figure out how to make more wealth, I realized it's all about first finding a good intersection of interest (or passion) and solving a problem (or capitalizing on market inefficiency). I have learned that this is not something one can intuit or think about - you have to learn by doing, and tinker your way to the answers.<br />
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<b>Further Reading</b></div>
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Did you enjoy this post? I write about personal and business growth at <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/" style="color: #888888; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">http://www.betterandhigher.com/</a>. Please check it out and subscribe!</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-43362009434275723522013-04-30T20:46:00.000-04:002016-08-14T21:08:16.472-04:00ROI on MBA vs Coding Schools - which is better?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<b style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;"><u>What is ROI?</u></b></h3>
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ROI is a plain and simple concept that both prospective engineers and business students can understand. It is <u>Return on Investment</u>. We will keep things as apples-to-apples as possible by using annual salary and normalizing class time period - 2 years for MBA. We do gross (before-tax) salary and expenses. Basically, cash in and cash out. We will leave the discussion about <i>the intangible things like network or personal growth, etc</i>. It's definitely a separate debate.</div>
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<i>(In full-disclosure, I attended Darden MBA - campus was beautiful, and I loved it!)</i></div>
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFNvW8bozERk5d79twsrXmxclk-BsxzBFkOWSZBG-YtSIUafg8nS48tWVW81MWWmEvo7O6Q_Fe5xoEvkPKFm1x6B0OWjU4whqNzXcelHGCtQHh4VjsfPL0EBaH4ff28Xo7O1BMlMOX0KI/s1600/Darden_Tulips.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="color: #6699cc; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-decoration: none;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFNvW8bozERk5d79twsrXmxclk-BsxzBFkOWSZBG-YtSIUafg8nS48tWVW81MWWmEvo7O6Q_Fe5xoEvkPKFm1x6B0OWjU4whqNzXcelHGCtQHh4VjsfPL0EBaH4ff28Xo7O1BMlMOX0KI/s400/Darden_Tulips.jpg" style="border: none; position: relative;" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12px;">Beautiful Darden Campus - we lived under TJ's shadows and among giant tulips</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
<b><u>Should You Get an MBA?</u></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
See related post <a href="http://dklounge.github.io/advice-for-a-young-man-going-to-business-school/" target="_blank">Advice for a young man going to b-school</a>.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
Let's take a premier Business Schools - Harvard Business School (HBS)</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Investment</b> -</div>
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Per <a href="http://www.hbs.edu/mba/financial-aid/Pages/cost-summary.aspx" style="color: #6699cc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">HBS cost summary page</a>.</div>
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<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 1 - Fully loaded cost - $87k/year for single person</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 2 - Repeat at $87k/yr =&gt; let's round down to $170k for two years</li>
</ul>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Return</b> -</div>
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Salary depends on the industry/company, but let's take highest median, which is private equity/LBO per <a href="http://www.hbs.edu/recruiting/mba/data-and-statistics/employment-statistics.html" style="color: #6699cc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">HBS Employment Report</a>.</div>
<ul style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4; margin: 0.5em 0px; padding: 0px 2.5em;">
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">Summer internship salary for LBO/private equity (assume 3 months) - $24k</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">Yr 3 - median LBO/private equity salary year 1 - $150k</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">Yr 4 - let's assume 10% bump with good performance in year 2 - $165k</li>
</ul>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
<u>So, here you are, 4 years after you first attended business school</u>.</div>
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<b>ROI</b> = $339k / $170k = 1.994 or basically <b>200%</b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><u>Should You Attend a Full-Time Programming Course?</u></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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There's not a strong or widely publicized salary data around this yet (so this is slightly an orange), and so I use a well-recognized industry report from Riviera Partners - a San Francisco-based placement firm for tech talent. I can corroborate these figures based on indeed.com postings and also local tech group mailing lists where salary figures are thrown around ... so it's reasonable.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<b>Investment</b> -</div>
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This varies by program from around $10k to $20k, but let's use an approximate mid-point at $15k for the program duration, which is generally about 3 months. You can read more about the schools and coding in a prior post - <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2012/12/soon-your-taxi-driver-may-know-more.html" style="color: #6699cc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Soon your taxi driver may know more Ruby than you do</a>.</div>
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<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 0.25 - $15k</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">rest of year 1 - 0, you're making money</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">rest of year 2 - 0, you're making money</li>
</ul>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
<b>Return</b> -</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
Salary figures, as noted are from <a href="http://rivierapartners.com/2013/02/12/2012-engineering-salaries-in-review/" style="color: #6699cc; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">Riviera Partners 2012 engineering salary review</a>. Let's use JavaScript.</div>
<ul style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4; margin: 0.5em 0px; padding: 0px 2.5em;">
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 0.75 - junior dev: $83k * 0.75 = $62k</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 2 - $91k (after 10% raise)</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 3 - $100k (after 10% raise)</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">(junior dev is 0 - 3 according to this report, so afterward you're a midlevel*)</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">yr 4 - $132k ($120k in 2012 reasonably adjusted for inflation - but likely higher)</li>
</ul>
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* <i>The reality is, many graduates from the 3-month program are hired directly out as non-junior devs and after 3 years, may work as senior developer</i>.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
<u>So, here you are, 4 years after you write your first lines of code at a school</u>.<br />
<b>ROI</b> = $385k / $15k = 25.66 or basically, <b>holy crap!</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><u>Pay off debt first</u></b><br />
<br />
By the way, if you have student loans, pay it off first. That's a <u>guaranteed return</u>! Guaranty is a hard thing to come by these days. As a side note, being laid back about debt is a relatively modern, American phenomenon. For most of history, debt was not a good thing; it's something that was considered to be at least undesirable, and at worst, a sin.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDeN-AzU5WK0sKM1SXXFy8NQ25qHjIpNOzbFMsg_0FT-rGn5gfXV_wCCusi0N-tIhnjJgRLWP4rq2sAwUuslZKTQdi4yFgKOEIyyFgnXZ_dtfVjlIk7q042VaSJqgMttVXwoFvjrDHj8sB/s1600/earnest.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDeN-AzU5WK0sKM1SXXFy8NQ25qHjIpNOzbFMsg_0FT-rGn5gfXV_wCCusi0N-tIhnjJgRLWP4rq2sAwUuslZKTQdi4yFgKOEIyyFgnXZ_dtfVjlIk7q042VaSJqgMttVXwoFvjrDHj8sB/s320/earnest.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Of course, you may not be able to pay off a big lump sum. In that case, consider refinancing your loan with <a href="https://www.earnest.com/invite/david491" target="_blank">low-interest rate loan from Earnest</a>. Check out the current rates (as low as 2.2% variable at the time of this writing, 3.5% fixed rate). And by following this link, get a $200 refinance bonus! <a href="https://www.earnest.com/invite/david491" target="_blank">www.earnest.com/invite/david491</a>.<br />
<b><br /></b><b><u>Conclusion/Summary</u></b><br />
<ul style="line-height: 1.4; list-style-image: initial; list-style-position: initial; margin: 0.5em 0px; padding: 0px 2.5em;">
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">So which would you rather have? 200% or OMG%?</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">Food for thought. Isn't this damning for the traditional education? Is your MBA or other diplomas worth the cost? </li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">If you are a consumer, it's got to be a no-brainer from a financial perspective (of course, don't do it for the money, do it for interest/passion, etc. But I mean, who has a passion for MBA? That was for money, too, right? Apples to apples.)</li>
<li style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px;">Traditional schools/companies - please wake up and smell the competition.</li>
</ul>
<div>
<br />
The Truth is that life and career are about more than money. A happy career is doing things you love doing, and about working with people you enjoy working with. Neither coding school nor MBA will bring you happiness, but avoiding unnecessary debt is a virtue.<br />
<br />
<b>Further Reading</b></div>
</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
<br />
Maybe you are considering a Programming School. If so, consider making a small investment to purchase and read this guide I wrote just for folks like you: <a href="http://amzn.to/1PjP0cn" target="_blank">Choosing the Best Coding Bootcamp for You</a>.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
Related Books:</div>
<div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><span style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;"><a href="http://amzn.to/2bgyV9z" target="_blank">Choosing the Best Coding Bootcamp for You</a> if you are considering coding.</span></span></li>
<li><span style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;"><a href="http://amzn.to/2b7YecK" target="_blank">Ahead of the Curve: Two Years at HBS</a> for those considering MBA.</span></span></li>
</ul>
</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 1.4;">
Be sure to subscribe to <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/" target="_blank">http://www.betterandhigher.com/</a>.</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17641820415419583954noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5795981311202229115.post-33683302372236242462012-12-10T20:40:00.000-05:002016-08-14T21:18:47.556-04:00Soon, your taxi driver may know more Ruby than you do!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<b>Saturday picnic in Coding-land</b><br />
<br />
A few weeks ago, I attended <a href="http://workshops.railsbridge.org/" target="_blank">RailsBridge</a> as a teaching volunteer. According to its website, <a href="http://workshops.railsbridge.org/about/" target="_blank">RailsBrige</a> was first organized by two ladies named Sarah &amp; friends to help other ladies become Ruby developers in the San Francisco area. <a href="http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/" target="_blank">Ruby</a> is a programming language. RailsBridge is free. It is a safe and fun learning community. It is awesome.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio2MkAoK0z1XzYyHjURe6SpgfxSJ1MIBTAq72fhFt3qxiM3MHWdToqppW22HjM6jtJZGUlCjFVahYjo7ccrCkbEgvhG5CNcfOIhhZ2Zlxr9r8CTsWiIb3x2Vwz6ztygETks6bWFoL-Uw0/s1600/RailsBridge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio2MkAoK0z1XzYyHjURe6SpgfxSJ1MIBTAq72fhFt3qxiM3MHWdToqppW22HjM6jtJZGUlCjFVahYjo7ccrCkbEgvhG5CNcfOIhhZ2Zlxr9r8CTsWiIb3x2Vwz6ztygETks6bWFoL-Uw0/s320/RailsBridge.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Eager students (from all walks) learn Ruby on Rails, taught by volunteers</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<b>Coding for the masses</b><br />
<br />
What I experienced there forced me to think more critically about a changing world. Increasingly, so-called "non-technical" folks are migrating to the Coding-land, popular among them Ruby, Python, and Javascript. (By the way, don't you love these language names?) And the next batch of young students will know increasingly more than you. Does that excite you or alarm you?<br />
<br />
Almost every night around San Francisco, you can find a hack night, where developers and non-developers show up to code or learn to code. (Tip: they are often sponsored by some tech company, and come with free food and beer.) Further, batches of new online startups have started teaching programming to the masses, to anyone who wants to learn and has a computer.<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>These include video streams of real courses taught by University professors such as <a href="http://www.coursera.org/" target="_blank">coursera.org,</a> <a href="http://udacity.com/" target="_blank">udacity.com</a>, and <a href="http://edx.org/" target="_blank">edX.org</a>.</li>
<li>Also relatively new are batches of startups that are teaching the same material in a more modern DIY way through a mix of coding exercises and how-to videos. <a href="http://codecademy.com/" target="_blank">Codecademy.com</a> and <a href="https://www.codeschool.com/" target="_blank">Code School</a> are among those with the greatest momentum and funding.</li>
<li>Finally, some shops are mixing the face-to-face element with online resources through extended workshops. They are essentially semester schools, full with Ivy-esque tuition. You may have heard of Hack Reactor, <a href="http://devbootcamp.com/" target="_blank">Devbootcamp</a> ($12k over 9 weeks), or <a href="http://www.bloc.io/" target="_blank">Bloc</a> ($5k over 12 weeks), or <a href="http://www.appacademy.io/?davidkim" target="_blank">App Academy</a> (no upfront pay, but 12.5% of your starting salary for first 6 months). (Check out <a href="http://amzn.to/2bgG3nt" target="_blank">Choosing the Best Coding Bootcamp for You</a>.)</li>
</ul>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSz_VdsyGuxxJQ8aT2azsbELusxPYCK0nU15DTHaW2ueER97gvj7j2sFVxO4ubxs2ZjI9bwHib1Z_bovkXbe-P4I8gW544RRTqvTALCtkh3hyphenhyphenNOF8kmVQi1irTcesy2kAQGXHoBT0Ja0M/s1600/DSC09729.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Hack Reactor" border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSz_VdsyGuxxJQ8aT2azsbELusxPYCK0nU15DTHaW2ueER97gvj7j2sFVxO4ubxs2ZjI9bwHib1Z_bovkXbe-P4I8gW544RRTqvTALCtkh3hyphenhyphenNOF8kmVQi1irTcesy2kAQGXHoBT0Ja0M/s400/DSC09729.JPG" title="Hack Reactor" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px;">Whiz kids at Hack Reactor</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<a href="http://www.blogger.com/"></a></div>
<div>
<b>Hiring pipelines and future of learning</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
While it's not certain you may get a job after taking <a href="http://coursera.org/" target="_blank">Coursera</a> courses, Dev Bootcamp or App Academy practically have become hiring/recruiting pipelines to sexy San Francisco area startups (check out their websites to see for yourself). And you can see that these organizations represent varying degrees of <u>experimentation with the knowledge <b>format, delivery and pricing</b></u>. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Chew on those thoughts for a moment. It represents the future of learning. And for a change, it's not an academic debate, but a real-time empirical experiment for all of us to watch. And it is liberally available to the masses - even those with lower SAT scores than you have.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Brave new world: now what?</b></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
I'm pretty sure that a short two years ago (when I was coming out of <a href="http://www.darden.virginia.edu/web/mba/" target="_blank">Darden MBA</a>), these resources didn't exist. How quickly the world changes! So, does this mean you should learn to code? Or why should you care? I enjoy sharing my story about how I started learning to code, and how it allowed me to <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/07/how-does-mba-break-into-high-tech-my.html" target="_blank">break into tech even as a MBA grad</a>.<br />
<br />
And the truth is, trying something so distant from core competency is scary and painful. Listen to that fear, and embrace that pain - it might be <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/08/dont-step-back-step-forward-why-pain-is.html" target="_blank">time for you to step forward, rather than step back</a>.<br />
<br />
For now, I am excited that for those who love learning, this is a great time to be alive!<br />
<br />
<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
<b>Further Reading</b></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
Is Coding Bootcamp worth the cost? Check out the <a href="http://www.betterandhigher.com/2013/04/roi-on-mba-vs-coding-schools-which-is.html" target="_blank">coding bootcamp vs. MBA ROI post</a>.</div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: arial, tahoma, helvetica, freesans, sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 21px;">
Some good books to get you started in programming:</div>
<br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><a href="http://amzn.to/2aSQ3yj" target="_blank">Learn to Program</a> by Chris Pine (Ruby)</li>
<li><a href="http://amzn.to/2aSQfh5" target="_blank">Automate the Boring Stuff with Python: Practical Programming for Total Beginners</a></li>
</ul>
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