When I was at the age of 7 or 8, I was a big fan of  movies with actors like A. Schwarzenegger, J. C. Van Damme, S. Stallone, Bruce Lee and of course my favorite cartoon He-man (but then again at that time who wasn’t into these movies/cartoons ). Inspired by the movies I started to express my fascination by drawing masculine-muscle-Terminator-like, -Rambo-like guys within different combat environments. After a while, my drawing skills became a little bit more sophisticated, and then I noticed that there are even more challenging themes to draw. One of them was drawing face portraits, so I upgraded my mission and started with my first profile-portrait of my younger brother. After several failures of using the strategy trial-and-error I remember I finished my first successful profile portrait of my bro. The picture looked very much like him; even he was fascinated how I did that and proudly put the portrait on the wall of our room. With all the compliments received from my parents and fellow friends, I started to imagine that when I grow up, I will work for Walt Disney and draw cartoons :). I was totally fascinated by the idea of creation that touches other people. I still remember the smiled facial expression of my brother, staring at that picture.

Later on, my passion slightly turned direction toward more technical stuff after receiving a gift (a computer) for my 10^th birthday. At that age, besides for playing games (yes I played computer games for a while ), I noticed that the computer can be also useful for solving problems of different types. This idea of problem solving was so intriguing to me that I knew I wanted to learn more about it. The excitement became even stronger later in high school when we learned how to write simple programs for different mathematical calculations or organization of data.

To study Computer Science was the natural and next step for me. During the study we were introduced to many interesting approaches of problems solving, and one of them was the discipline of Artificial Intelligence (AI) which became the major of my study. Within this discipline I was impressed with the ability to build a solution to a certain problem, which reacts “intelligently” to noisy data and unforeseen situations.

During the process of gaining working experience as software developer/engineer/architect, I’ve started to notice that it wasn’t enough to have sound technical knowledge to be successful in IT, but it definitively offered many opportunities to be creative. The internet and technology have allowed even the single individuals to make an impact. Taking into consideration that in the last century there were more inventions than in the rest of the history altogether; it’s to be expected that in this century the innovation quantity will continue to grow. These days in order to put great ideas into practice it is important to have a team of enthusiastic people, not necessary a large one, but definitively a team of people passionate about their work, people with dreams. These days it is more important than ever to make remarkable products and not just an average ones, and for that a proper innovation and creativity is required. And these days more than ever before, it is necessary to share the learned knowledge, to motivate and lead people, and for that a proper vision, courage and leadership is required. Thus I set a GOAL for myself to improve my entrepreneurial skills (the ability to move resources from lower to higher yield), my leadership skills (the ability to inspire and motivate people to do great things, giving them responsibility make decisions on their own) as well as my innovation and contribution skills (the ability to create products/services or any value in general that other people/customers can benefit from).

Looking back to the university period, the most valuable knowledge I have obtained it is not the technical knowledge itself, since this knowledge obsoletes very fast in the never-ending change of technologies; but the ability to learn and that learning itself is a never-ending process. Taking this into account, I started my journey of personal development. I started to read books related to communication, human relations, influence, time management, productivity, creativity etc. from authors like Dale Carnegie, Robert B. Cialdini, Richard Koch, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Seth Godin, Malcom Gladwell, Ken Robinson and many more. Applying some of the principles learned in these books, helped me at first to start my blog and write about topics I was passionate about.

You only know something to the degree you are able to teach it to others ~ Brian Tracy

Sharing these principles with others resulted in better understanding them. I also started practicing what I was preaching (walking my talk). One of the results was starting my own company and doing work that was both more creative and fulfilling. My life became driven by curiosity and passion  and as a side-effect to these changes, I started to network and be surrounded with supporting and like-minded people. All this started with my dream as a child to work for Walt Disney. But someone could note: “Man, but you are not working for Walt Disney” … My reply would be:

Changing the plan is a part of the plan. ~ Unknown

Dreams can change and evolve, but it is important to have one.

How ’bout you? What’s your dream from childhood?

Nowadays, entrepreneurship seems to be pretty hot topic. It is often mentioned together with the term innovation. How do these two relate together is purpose of this post. I will also try to answer the following questions:

• What differentiates entrepreneurs from people striving for a career as employees of established companies?
• What are the characteristics explaining their willingness to become an entrepreneur?
• What abilities and skills are necessary to become a successful entrepreneur?

Before we go further let’s do some definitions first.

Entrepreneurship

According to the French economist J. B. Say: “The entrepreneur shifts economic resources out of an area of lower and into an area of higher productivity and greater yield”. This definition seem pretty reasonable and logical.

In classical economic we say that economies tend towards equilibrium – they “optimize”, which results in incremental growth over time (doing better what is already being done). Comparing that, On the other hand, the nature of the entrepreneur is to “upset and disorganize” (doing something differently).

According to the Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter, entrepreneurship is described as “creative destruction“.

Another Austrian economist Peter F. Drucker, also known as the father of management theory and author of the book “Innovation and Entrepreneurship”, says that the entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.

According to Drucker, entrepreneurship is not a “personality trait”; it is a feature to be observed in the actions of people or institutions. Entrepreneurs in health, education or business work basically the same way. Essentially, they do not just do something better, but do it differently. It is a misconception, Drucker says, to think that everyone who starts a new business is being entrepreneurial. People do take a risk in opening a shop or a franchise, but they are not really creating anything new, not creating a new type of value for the customer in a way that, say, as McDonald’s did (standardized quality of fast food meals).

Why does entrepreneurship have the reputation of being very risky, when its purpose is simply to shift resources from where they yield less, to where they yield more? In fact, it is less risky than just “doing the same thing better”; in following this course it is easy to totally miss out on new opportunities and run an enterprise into the shoals without noticing. Embracing change and assiduously trying out different things is actually the best way to invest resources. Entrepreneurship is “risky” mainly because so few of the so-called entrepreneurs know what they are doing. They lack the methodology. They violate elementary and well-known rules. This is particularly true of high-tech entrepreneurs. To be sure, high-tech entrepreneurship and innovation are intrinsically more difficult and more risky than innovation based on economics and market structure, on demographics, or even on something as seemingly nebulous and intangible as perceptions and moods. But even high-tech entrepreneurship need not be “high risk”, as Bell Lab, IMB and Apple prove. It does need, however, to be systematic. It needs to be managed. Above all, it needs to be based on purposeful innovation.

Innovation

Innovation is the specific tool of entrepreneurs, the means by which they exploit change as an opportunity for a different business or a different service. It is capable of being presented as a discipline, capable of being learned, capable of being practiced. Entrepreneurs need to search purposefully for the sources of innovation, the change and their symptoms that indicate opportunities for a successful innovation. And they need to know and to apply the principles of successful innovation.

A business opportunity, therefore, is the chance to do something differently and the better. An innovation is the way of doing something differently and better. Thus an innovation is the means of exploiting a business opportunity. Innovation has a different meaning in economics.

All goods (whether physical products or services) are regarded as being made up of three factors: nature raw materials, physical and mental labor and capital (money). An innovation is a new combination of these three things. Entrepreneurs, as innovators, are people who create new combinations of these factors and then present to the market for assessment by consumers. This is a technical conceptualization of what is innovation is about. It does not give the practicing entrepreneur much of a guide to what innovation to make, or how to make it, but it should warn that innovation is a much broader concept then just inventing new products. It also involves bringing them to market.

Innovation is the development process. It is the translation of an idea in to an application. It requires persistence in analytically working out the details of product design or service, to develop marketing, obtain finances, and plan operations. If the entrepreneur is going to manufacture a product, the process includes obtaining materials and technical manufacturing capabilities, staffing operations, and establishing an organization.

Sources of innovation

Peter Drucker proposed that those interested in starting an entrepreneurial venture – either within an established company or as independent small business – should monitor seven sources of innovative opportunity.

The first four exist within the industry itself, and the last three in the social environment.

1. The unexpected
   • the unexpected success,
   • the unexpected failure,
   • the unexpected outside event;
2. Incongruity
   • Incongruous economic realities,
   • An incongruity between the reality and the assumptions about it,
   • An incongruity between the perceived and actual customer values and expectations,
   • An internal incongruity within the rhythm or the logic of a process
3. Innovation based on process need
4. Changes in Industry or Market Structure – that catch everyone unawares;
5. Demographics (population changes);
6. Changes in perception, mood, and meaning;
7. New Knowledge, both scientific and nonscientific.

Entrepreneur vs. Employee

These are some of the major differences as behavior traits between a typical entrepreneur and a typical employee type of person:

• Employees are resource-oriented. Entrepreneurs are opportunity-oriented.
• Employees prefer to manage via hierarchical structures. Entrepreneurs manage via networks, utilizing the resources of other people and organizations.
• Entrepreneurs possess variety of skills; employees specialize certain skills only.
• Entrepreneurs are willing to risk it all, employees prefer to play it safe and stay off the radar.
• Entrepreneurs can’t adjust to what society dictates; employees flow right along with the mainstream.
• Entrepreneurs make the rules; employees follow rules.
• Entrepreneurs make the jobs that employees work at; employees work their job.
• Entrepreneurs want to affect/help people as much as possible; employees typically look out for themselves and what benefits them.
• Entrepreneurs make the jobs that employees run.
• Neither can exist without the other.

Benefits of becoming an Entrepreneur

• Entrepreneurship offers a greater possibility of achieving significant financial rewards than working for someone else.
• It provides the ability to be involved in the total operation of the business, from concept to design and creation, from sales to business operations and customer response.
• It offers the prestige of being the person in charge.
• It gives an individual the opportunity to build equity, which can be kept, sold, or passed on to the next generation.
• Entrepreneurship creates an opportunity for a person to make a contribution. Most new entrepreneurs help the local economy. A few – through their innovations – contribute to society as a whole (Steve Jobs).

What are the characteristics of successful Entrepreneurs?

• Personal characteristics (Optimism, Vision, Initiative, Desire for control, Drive and Persistence, Risk tolerance,  Resilience)
• Interpersonal skills (Leadership and motivation, Communication skills, Listening, Personal relations, Negotiation, Ethics)
• Critical and creative thinking skills (Creative thinking, Problem solving, Recognizing opportunities)
• Practical skills  (Goal setting, Planning and organizing, Decision making, Knowledge – Business knowledge, Entrepreneurial knowledge, Opportunity specific knowledge, Venture-specific knowledge)

Final words

The great contribution of P. Drucker is in that he provided a systematic approach to entrepreneurship and innovation. His major belief was that both can be learned and taught if approached systematically. In other words, innovations doesn’t have to happen only when the inventor is “kissed by a muse”. It can be looked for based on the 7 provided sources of innovation, it can be practiced and improved.

The same is true with entrepreneurship, whereat he believed that there is no entrepreneur type of personality, but entrepreneurship being more a behavior. It means that when the gear if thinking is shifted to “how can I create more/new value?”, persons with different personalities (introverted, extroverted etc) become entrepreneurs.

Finally, he strongly believed that we live in an era of entrepreneurship and innovation and that there never was a better time to start a new venture than today. The last century had more inventions than the whole history all-together.

Then the ultimate question becomes not can you, but will? What are you waiting for?

Drama is a pattern in communication which leads to constant switching between roles of the victim, the persecutor and the rescuer. First of all, lets explain these roles. A victim is a person that is being victimized by some persecutor and communicates helplessness (focus on necessity for external help). A persecutor is a person that uses some kind of power or skills to take advantage of the victim (focus on damaging other people). And finally comes the rescuer which defends the victim from the persecutor (focus on intervening for the victim).

Now that being said, imaging you are the manager in a company and one employee (lets call him employee1 – the victim) complains that he didn’t manage to do his job on time because some other employee (lets call him emloyee2 – the persecutor) is always late with preparing the necessary data for completing employee1’s job. In this scenario you show up as the rescuer and intervene by threatening the employee2 to start doing his job on time or else he will get fired. Now notice that suddenly you became the persecutor and the employee2 became a victim. This role switching can go on and on if for example the emplyee2 blames the emplyee1 for not providing a clear specification of what is required etc etc. These dynamics usually lead to time consumption, energy drainage and to creating even more problems. You want to avoid these dynamics if you want to be creative and productive, except if you are an actor and you are already being creative by playing in a drama screen-show.

What do these dynamics have to do with creativity?

Well, we slightly modify the drama roles from having a negative focus to something more positive. For example instead of the Victim being focused on needing something outside from him/her, to focus on having something to give, to inspire, to create to the external world – then the victim becomes a muse. Furthermore, if the persecutor’s role focus changes from using his/her power to damage others to using his/her power to execute, create and to do tasks productively – then the persecutor becomes a doer. And finally, if the rescuers focus changes from doing something for other people, to teaching and coaching others how to do that themselves – then the rescuer becomes a mentor.

Creativity strategy

To act creatively all of these roles are important. First we start in the muse position. Here we try to generate as much as possible ideas and write them all down (brain storming). In the muse role we don’t focus on generating necessarily qualitative ideas, but instead on the quantity of ideas (as much as possible). Next we switch to the mentor role. Here we try to filter the quality ones by verifying certain criteria based on experience, previous knowledge, logic, intuition etc. If for some reason none of the created ideas satisfy the criteria, we get back to the muse role. Once we have generated enough brilliant ideas, that at the same time satisfy all the validation criteria, now we switch to the doer role. Here we focus on technical details of implementing these ideas more effectively and more productively.

For example when I was trying to select a domain name for my blog, I applied this strategy. At first a have a brain storming session in which I wrote down all the key words that sounded cool to the topics I wanted to write about. I wrote:

• Body,
• Mind,
• Spirit,
• Development,
• Improvement,
• Identity,
• Character,
• Evolution,
• Dream,
• Life,
• Brain,
• Infinity,
• Destiny,
• Intelligence,
• Soul,
• …

Then I tried to combine these key words and got these:

• Body, Mind & Spirit
• Dream life
• Soul infinity
• Character infinity
• Evolved identity
• Destiny development
• …

Then I analyzed these combinations and investigated which ones are free as domain names by checking at my web host provider Arvixe. Also there was something special about the “Evolved identity” combination since it was internally totally congruent with my path, how I changed, evolved and started to notice the importance of my identity. I also tried to simplify it a little bit and got the combination “EvolvedID” which was luckily also available as domain name. Once I’ve identified that this name is totally congruent with the message I wanted to convey, I went into the doer mode. I undertook the technical steps necessary to register this the domain, make the payment, install wordpress on the server and started building up my blog.

This is only a simple example of how to use this creativity strategy. I’m also using it when writing blog posts, when I do software development etc.. I leave it up to you to use in more complex scenarios. I’m sure you will profit from it.

Do you ever wonder if there is a way how to increase your brain power? Your learning abilities, your long and short -term memory, your creativity, productivity, problem solving etc… And have you ever asked yourself how to do it legally without consuming any illegal substances, chemicals or whatsoever products offered on the market which preclude certain risk and side effects? I definitively wondered if there is a way to boost your brain naturally by understanding the biology and neurology of it. And then I came across to the materials from Dr. John Medina, which were so profound to me that simply have to share his observations and findings.

Dr. John Medina wrote a best selling book called “Brain rules“, in which his findings regarding all brain research done so far, sums up in 12 Brain rules, which can help us understand how the brain actually works and what can we do to boost its power.

1. Physical exercise – Exercise boosts brain power

By being physically active like moving or walking, the brain produces tiny proteins BDNF which act like miracle for our brain. The brain becomes electrified and in this state the potentiality of absorption of knowledge is significantly increased. One of the observations made in his book is that if we really consider how classrooms look like nowadays – students sitting in their chairs and desks and having 1 or more hours unbreakable lectures – leads often that students being bored during lectures, have issues paying attention and learning process is far from optimal. As oppose to that, student playing on the playgrounds, being physically active increases the natural brain ability. Another example to consider is the productivity in business, whereat a typical office worker sits for 8 or more hour in font of a computer and… I think you get the idea here… We really need to reconsider and redesign the education and working environments here…

Physical activity increases concentration, impulse control, foresight, problem solving ability etc. plus as a side effect would decrease the health care costs because the workers would be less often sick.

2. Survival – The human brain evolved, too

From the evolutionary perspective, we survived in the crude world of physically much stronger and much larger species (animals), because of our brain powers and the evolution of our brains. We learned how to cooperate. We learned how to negotiate. We’ve build alliances.

3. Wiring – Every brain is wired differently

This rule simply says for example that we all store learned languages on the left side of the brain, but no two brains store the knowledge on the same place of the brain.

4. Attention – We don’t pay attention to boring things

But we aready knew that, right? Also that we pay more attention to things that are emotional, that’s why “story telling” plays major role in successful communication.

Since paying attention is related to being focused on, he analyzed the myth of multitasking, and has come to the conclusion that our brains CAN’T MULTITASK guys! You can’t expect to be productive if while working, you are checking out your Facebook feeds, being on the telephone and writing IM messages. This simply doesn’t work because your brain in constantly switching attention between all these contexts. You become more destructed and less efficient. Your error rate increases by 50% and it takes you twice as much time to do the things in this manner as oppose to doing them sequentially.

 5. & 6. Long- and short -term memory – Repeat to remember

I already mentioned that often times in school lectures are an hour or more long, and additionally to that, knowledge is not repeated at intervals – this leads to being hard to memorize what has be taught. Doing homework is not a review. It is a new learning.

The brain can hold around 7 pieces of information for about 30 seconds. Like a telephone number for example. If we don’t repeat the information, it disappears from our memory. If we do repeat it after these 30 seconds, the will hold it for one or two hours. If not repeated again, the information is goes away. This time permanently.

An example of successfully applying this rule to learning a complex topic like foreign language, Paul Pimsleur has developed and pioneered a method for learning a language. In this method the student is slowly introduced with new words and phrases in regular intervals through audio pronunciation. Using this method I’ve learned of Spanish up from scratch to middle level within a very short period of time (2-3 Months). REPEAT TO REMEMBER GUYS!

7. Sleep – Sleep well, think well

After doing so many researches on this topic, we actually still don’t know why we sleep. One thing is for sure though, that when we sleep all our body functions lower and only the brain remains active. The assumption is that while we sleep the brain does offline-learning. In other words, while we sleep our brain strengthens and imprints the things we learned and experienced from that day. This could mean that if we are interrupted while we sleep, the information suffers.

Another interesting thing regarding sleep is the so called “3pm meetings” syndrome – the nap zone. Around 3pm we usually tend get a little bit sleepy and we tent to compensate this with a long amount of coffee. This is the natural, biological need of the brain to take a brake and process the learned things till that time. A study in NASA shows that a 26 min nap improved pilots performance by more than 34% and 45min nap resulted that the boost lasted more than 6 hours.

Finally, we know that some people are early risers (early chrono-types) and some of them are night owls (late chrono-types – I tend to be more in this category). It is estimated that 10-20% of people are early risers and also 10-20% of people are night owls. The rest of them are somewhere in the middle. This tendency could be embedded in in the DNA and by allowing the early risers to work in the morning and the night owls to work in the night, we can make people most productive and what is more important, happier.

8. Stress – Stressed brains don’t learn the same way

Imagine you are in a situation in which you fear of losing your job or not meeting expectations. Will you perform the same as if you were in totally calmed and relaxed state? I don’t think so…

Stress damages every kind of cognition, memory, executive function, creativity, motivation, productivity. It disrupts your immune system. You get sicker, more often. Increases health costs. Destroys your ability to get good sleep and increases your risk for depression.

The brain was never designed to run under long-term stress circumstances. Stress responses were built to solve problems that lasted about 30 seconds. You either were eaten by the tiger or ran away. It all lasted about 2-3 minutes. Now imagine you have a boss that stresses you the whole time 8 hours a day 5, days  a week. Or a spouse or relation that is stressful. Its like the tiger is in your bad. You will eventually deregulate.

9. Sensory integration – Stimulate more of the senses

Senses do not work in isolation, but actually work together. More senses included results in information rich experience for the brain. It laps it up like ice cream.

For example some of the regulations of Starbucks is that employes are not allow to have perfume or colon. Can you guess why?

10. Vision – Vision trumps all other senses

An experiment was made at the University of Bordeaux with some of the most famous wine tasting experts. They were given to taste a white wine in which a tasteless red drop was put into it, without letting them know. The results were astounding. Every wine expert thought it was a type of a red wine.

Thus, when you present something, like Powerpoint presentation, don’t just use textual bullet points. Put some pictures in there to transfer the message more effectively. It will increase the quality of communication by 65%.

Why is that visual sense trumps all other senses? Well, because of vision our ancestors survived out there in the past. They managed to apprehend major threads, found foods supplies and also the vision played and still plays major role in mating opportunities (you know what I mean here ).

11. Gender – Male and female brains are different

We already knew that there are some biological differences between males and females. After all, men are from Mars, women are from Venus, right?

With this rule we have to be careful how do we interpret it, since equality between men and women is always a charged topic and we don’t wanna be interpreted as being sexists. So basically, there is a biological difference in the males’ and females’ brain in how they process and store emotional experiences. Males’ brain handles emotional experience by firing up in the amygdala in the right hemisphere of the brain. And the right side of the brain is responsible for remembering the gist (the big picture – the point) of the emotional experience. On the other side, females’ brain is involved in firing up in the amygdala in the left side of the brain, whereat this part is responsible for storing the details of emotional experiences. Their response to traumatic event is exactly the opposite as the males’ response. Of course we need both, the gist and the details.

12. Exploration – We are powerful and natural explorers

This rule is about curiosity. We all have this naturally in us. I remember when I was a kid, I was constantly bothering my mom with so many questions like:

“How deep is the river?”,

“How fast is that car?”,

“How many stars are there on the sky?”

and on and on with so many questions. My mom did really had some hard time with me back then. You can notice that all kids are perfectly curious, but as we grow up, we kinda start losing this and accepting things without questioning. We accept the STATUS QUO.

Discovery is as important as creation.

Thus stay in touch with your curiosity. It’s important!

I’m always amazed by the people that are leaders in something. I’m curious about their mindset, beliefs and behavior, thus I always observe such people and try to model them and learn from them. It’s actually very natural to get drawn by these people because of their energy, their passion, their beliefs, their vision or simply to say their charisma. So my observation led with asking myself questions like what is the difference between people that lead and the people that comply to the people that lead. Is it that leaders are born with such abilities and such skills and that the followers, or better to say the compliant people simply lack this abilities? Can leadership skills be learn and by learning these skills to become one of them? Is it actually only a matter of skills and learning them or there is something more?

First of all, let see what is a leader?

Mistaken thoughts

Many people have mistaken the person that manages (manager) with the person that leads (leader), but actually there is a huge difference between these two persons.

Manager is only a person that obeys the rules of some other superior person or system and uses fear and/or authority position to compel inferior people (people with lower hierarchy position) to execute requirements of the rules.

Leader is a person that becomes committed to step up out of a crowd or system, challenge the STATUS QUO, strive to break the rules by expressing an idea, finding like-minded or people with common interests related to this idea and leading them towards implementation of the idea. He or she also genuinely cares about the people that follow and allows them to communicate with each other and contribute together. Even though often gets criticized by others for challenging the STATUS QUO, because of his/her commitment to make things happen for some greater good (greater then him/her self), this criticism doesn’t prevent him/her to achieve it. Leaders don’t care about reputation and taking credit for what they are doing. They aren’t ego centric about their work. They care more about the members they lead and achieving their common-interests goal.

Examples

To this conclusion I come mostly from my professional life working as a software engineer, whereas I worked on many projects under supervision of executives (managers), that were only obeying the rules of the company, coordinating projects, managing inferior employees to achieve certain clients requirement. A good colleague of mine, who’s name I won’t mention here, once in discussion said to me that his goal is to get to a position to lead a team, because he finds that he has enough knowledge and experience and that he is ready for such responsibility. But I’m sure what he meant was that he has enough knowledge to and experience to manage a team. In other words, he wanted to find another system (in this case company) that will allow him to perform tasks (in this case client’s requirements) by managing inferior people (in this case people with less knowledge and experience). That is called management and it has nothing to do with leadership.

As oppose to that, when I was finishing my study in Zagreb (Croatia), I got interested in seduction and communication in general and through an online search for people with interests in the same topic I ran into Vedran, now a good friend and later to his friend Kondrad. Now, during this time of learning about how to seduce girls, as it has become a huge industry, I met many people with these interests, but none of them was like Vedran and Konrad. Not only they were really good in the field and developed such a life-style, but they also had a vision and genuine desire to help other guys who had challenges with approaching girls and building relationships with them. Their vision was, in society of developing country like Croatia is, to build a community around controversial topic like seduction is, for guys that will share ideas, knowledge and experience and help each other. At first they have build a forum and later their web site Become Social and financed all by their selves to develop such a community. On the way of doing that, they had many obstacles and didn’t got approval from the public as it was a TABOO TOPIC. This didn’t prevent them to keep on going. They wrote a book and even went on public television to promote this community. Even though controversial, the community started to grow. To make long story short. They made it happen!

Analysis

A short analysis of  the previous story:

They didn’t manage anyone. They didn’t compelled other guys to follow. They decided to communicate clear idea about their vision and found like-minded people, created a communication platform (in this case the forum and the web site) and lead the guys to implementing this vision by everyone contributing to it. Note, the guys that were following didn’t obey the requirements of Vedran and Konrad, they contributed together. A huge difference here. It reminds me to the following quote:

“Managers need knowledge, whereas leaders need imagination.” ~ Seth Godin

Also as Einstein once said:

“With logic you can get from point A to point B, but with imagination you can get anywhere.” ~ Alber Einstein

Conclusion

But then again, what was different about two these guys? Were they born with these leadership abilities? Perhaps they have genetic predispositions, perhaps not. But one thing is for sure. They didn’t become leaders because of their charisma. It was more like the other way around. They’ve become charismatic because of their decision to step up and lead. Many people have mistaken this order and often use it as an excuse for not leading.

E.g. “I was never a charismatic person, therefore I can’t lead, so I better settle for following others”

If we all have the ability to lead, then what are the requirements for that?

Well, here is what I think is necessary to have in order to lead:

• A clear and passionate idea or a vision if you will, for a better future (different than the current situation) genuine enough that relates to other people,
• A decision and commitment to take action and making it happen,
• Communication platform that will allow the followers to communicate, support each other and spread the idea and therefore to contribute together.

If anyone can do it, why aren’t all people doing it?

Well a good question. I’m glad you asked and I think you already know the magic answer – because of fear:

FEAR OF FAILURE – FEAR OF REJECTION – FEAR OF CRITICISM

Inner voice with questions like this pops up:

– “what if I fail to change the status quo?”,

– “what if other people don’t support me or even worse I don’t get an approval from them or even much worse than that I get criticized by the others?”,

The pattern is: “what if and then some worst-case scenario“. But the fact is that this worst-case scenario is only a probability and not a certainty. Therefore, if there is only a probability to fail, there must be a probability to succeed too. Thus, what makes a difference in people that decide to lead and those that shrink and obey to the system, is that the leaders focus on what they can gain and not to what they can lose by leading and making it happen. And usually the things that can be gained are much much more and greater in comparison to what can be lost.

To get back to the story of Vedran and Konrad, what they’ve gained is doing what they love, contributing to society and gaining a sense of fulfillment and purpose in life, which in comparison to what they could lose is disregardful.

Once more to resume, my belief is that anyone can be a leader as long as he/she has:

• a passionate idea and clear vision about contributing to a greater good,
• a commitment to take action,
• a focus on what can be gained versus what can be lost by implementing this idea,
• like-minded people to contribute,
• and communication platform to allow the contribution together with the followers

Thus don’t settle for less, don’t shrink and don’t comply to a system if it doesn’t satisfy your true needs, beliefs and core values. Step up, decide to do something about it and act upon it. The benefits of doing it will lead to a sense of fulfillment and happiness in general.

How many times you found yourself  in situation of hearing about some conflict between two persons and when hearing the first person’s version it seems like this person is right. Also then when hearing the version of the second person seems that this person is right too.

How come? How is it possible that both persons are right and yet still in conflict? In reality there should be only one truth, right? But actually what is reality? Is there a such thing as reality at all? And if so, how do we perceive reality?

Well, if there is such thing as reality, we only perceive it through our 5 senses:

• we see,
• we hear,
• we smell,
• we taste and
• we touch (feel).

Through these senses the information gets into our brain and because it’s a huge amount of information our brain constantly performs deletion, distortion and generalization. Finally before the brain makes a perception of reality, it taps into all our “maps” or models of the world and memories of previous experiences. After the received information being compared to all these maps, models and memories, our brain creates an image of reality we call perception. Thus we only experience our perception of reality not the reality itself.

Now, lets describe the processes of transforming information.

Deletion means even though we get certain information, our brain discards it because we simply aren’t focused onto the content of the information. For example, have you ever found yourself in a situation where you were looking for something e.g. the salt and you couldn’t find it. And then your wife/husband came and found it right in front of your eyes on the shelf. If the salt was there the whole time and you were looking at it, how come you haven’t noticed it? Your brain received information, but it deleted it right the way, because you weren’t focused on it.

A good example of distortion is when you saw a tree branch or a stick on street and you thought it was a snake. What happened actually is that your brain received the information, but it tweaked (distorted) it based on comparison with previous experiences, maps or models of the world.

Generalization is related to extending a meaning as conclusion. An example of generalization is if you wait for a person and he/she doesn’t come on time (is late) you conclude or generalize that it means that this person doesn’t respect you. This conclusion might not necessary be true, but you still generalize based on you experiences, memories, maps and models and you become convinces as if it was true.

All this said means that everyone has it’s own model of the world or a map of reality which is only a perception of reality.

Map is not the territory ~ NLP

No matter how good or how detailed this model is, it’s still a model.

Having all that on mind allows us also to respect other people’s model of the world. By doing so not only that we understand other peoples behavior and reaction, but it also allows us to be more flexible in our relationships and therefore have more quality ones. Respecting other people’s model of reality doesn’t mean approving it and agreeing with it. It only means accepting their perspective and point of view of the world.

Stepping out your box of your own perception and stepping into other peoples perspective is a part of Evolution of Identity and becoming extraordinary. Practice this and you will notice how your identity shifts and evolves.

They say it’s important that other people like you. It’s important to be recognized by others. It’s important to get approval from others. It’s important to pay attention to what other people think of you. They say YOUR REPUTATION IS IMPORTANT. Better take care of it.

Is it really?

Well, lets see! First of all, what is reputation?

Good question. I’m glad you ask!

Reputation is a set of other-people’s opinions of you. Thus having on mind that these opinions belong to the other people, it is out side of your control. You simply can not control what other people think of you and whether they like you or not. For instance, if you hold a speech today in front of 200 people, then 200 different opinions of you are formed over which you have no control. A person from the audience forms his or her opinion about you, about the stuff that you’re presenting only partially based on what you are and how you’re presenting. Basically it depends on how this person perceives it through his “filters”. And his/her filters are based on his/her experience, believes, values, focus etc etc… Many other parameters are included. Thus worrying about reputation (other people’s opinions) makes no sense at all. It’s like Don Quixote fights against the windmills.

Hmmm… Does that mean that you should not care about your reputation?

Not at all! It only means that you don’t have direct control of it. That’s all it means!

But how do I get reputation? How do I get recognized?

Well, my friend, so far I’m really proud of you. You are asking really good questions!

As oppose to the your reputation, you have total control of your character. Character is the uniqueness in each of us. It’s something deeper than our body. It’s even deeper than our mind and our thoughts. It’s beyond any form and yet is very firm. Character is something that is built and developed during whole life and yet is the only certainty that we have in life. Character is your identity followed by a sense of purpose. Character is your destiny!

People that express their character are usually called charismatic because of their presence. They attract people with their awareness about themselves and everything around them. Other people tend to either love them or hate them, but either way they admire them. People with character tend to sacrifice instant gratification over long term gain. They don’t look for quick fixes. They work hard. Their character is something that guides them when they don’t get support or are not recognized by others or even when they don’t produce visible results. They are not afraid to fail, because for them failure is an opportunity to learn and grow.

Does this mean that if you follow your character it will bring you more reputation?

No, not at all! In fact, often times if you do things that are in alignment with your character, you will get disapproval from other people. You will get bad reputation! Many great minds of the time had the issue of not getting approval from others when they started to express their character. Giordano Bruno was an example of that. Due to expressing his character through his beliefs about the Earth having spherical form (not being a plate) and not getting recognition by the church inquisition, he ended up burned. He died for his character.

If you are different than others you are labeled either as “Devil” or “God” ~ Eckhart Tolle

So what is here to conclude?

If you work on your reputation, you are most likely you won’t get any. Even if you get recognition, you will still not have any sense of fulfillment only from your reputation. If you work on your character, you are also likely to get reputation (good or bad), but for sure you are going to get fulfillment. Thus if something makes sense to you internally, it doesn’t matter if other people approve it or not it something YOU GOTTA DO!

Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are. ~ Dale Carnegie

I wanted to summarize and share the major changes that contributed to my complete turn-around. There are three major changes I made, that brought me rapid results in contexts of life like health, relationships, business and fulfillment in general. Those are the following:

• Rising my standards
• Doing the most “unpleasant” tasks first
• Modeling the best

Rising my standards

First and by far the most important thing I did was I ROSE MY STANDARDS. Rising your standards means rising the expectation from you and what you deserve to achieve. The fact is that most of the people decides to settle for less and do not dream big, just because of fear, discomfort or beliefs that they don’t deserve it.

You would like to have that gorgeous girl you think it is hard to get, but you are too afraid to approach her, so you settle for less and approach less attractive ones or if some at all. The fact is that most people are terrified to approach such girls and don’t realize that actually is easier to get the one rated as 10 on a scale 1 to 10 than two rated as 6 on the same scale, just because of the fact that most people dare to approach 6’s rather than 10’s.

The same is true with other persons you admire. You are afraid to send an email to the person you admire whether in business or sport or music, to ask them for advice, because of assuming that he or she is too good to communicate with you and therefore they will turn your request down or ignore it. You will be amazed how many people are willing to help you as they will admire your courage and honesty about that.

Also if someone around you is behaving not in accordance to your standards, then you don’t have to tolerate that. For instance someone says something you don’t find funny and that person expects you to laugh just to get your approval, rising your standards means not accepting such behavior and not giving approval to it. What an option? Many people know that, only few of them do what they know.

When I started to learn this stuff, I decided to feed my mind only with stuff that help me acquire and keep my mental state. So I decided to eliminate contact with low energy or negative people that were just complaining about everything. Many such friends on Facebook, that were constantly posting depressions, complains or any statements not in alignment with standards, ended up deleted. The same happen in real life relations. That’s part of the standard now and my decision to feed my mind properly!

So rise your standards! Expect from you a lot and don’t settle for less. Step up and dream big!

Doing the most “unpleasant” tasks first

This one is related to time management or better to say life management, because the quality of life depends on the quality of time spent. So the key is when you start to organize and plan your life, you always do first things that you fear most, that seem most difficult or simply are the “unpleasant” in any sense. Brian Tracy called this to “Eat the frog” first and also gave a scientific background for the benefits of doing this. If you start your day by “eating a frog” (doing the hardest, most fearful, unpleasant etc etc thing), that’s actually the worst thing that could happen to you and because it is the “worst” thing, there is most testosterone released and therefore when this thing is accomplished most joy and fulfillment is felt and thus self-confidence is built.

Also it’s important from perspective of the 80/20 (Pareto) principle, which says that there are 20% of things we do or invest, that give us the 80% results. In other words if we have 10 tasks to do for today, there are 2 tasks, that are so important that would bring us 4 times more more results than other 8 tasks together. So usually these “unpleasant” things are between these 20%, which bring us the most results.

Doing the most “unpleasant” things first always, leads to developing a habit and therefore we becoming addictive to productivity, which again leads to success, fulfillment and self-confidence. Most people avoid starting with the “hardest” things and always start up with the “easiest” ones, never getting to the most “unpleasant”, so they end up being too busy with the other 80% of unproductive things, constantly wining, bitching and complaining about lacking time and never achieving something of satisfaction. You don’t wanna end up there!

Now I know, if something makes me fearful or seems hard or unpleasant to do, then this is the thing I HAVE TO DO!

When I was struggling with my digestive problems, one of the I decisions I made was to get healthy again and thus health became pretty important on my list of TODO’s. This task at first wasn’t an easy task. I was 12kg over-weighed, in no shape at all, didn’t had the knowledge nor the equipment. So this was a huge, ugly frog that I had to eat. But the decision was made so it was a “must eat” frog. I started with running in the park only for 10-15 minutes and through one month I was able to run for half an hour, which was a major achievement for me. It made me keeping on. With time and practice after 4 months I participated on a relay marathon (16 km) and the results I achieved gave me even more self-confidence. I was feeling much better with my health, I lost 10kg and had an enviable results on the marathon. To make long story short, doing this at first glance “unpleasant” task brought me the health I desired, more self-confidence and also projected positively on the other things I was doing. It was definitively in those 2% of important things (not 20%).

Practice this, develop a habit of doing whats important and watch how your productivity increases, your self-esteem grows and you feel more fulfilled!

Modeling the best

You don’t have to “reinvent the wheel”. You don’t always have to do the process of trial and error, before becoming good at something. If you want to be good at something, find the people that are already good at that, find the best ones and learn their behavior, their beliefs and model their mental state. Whether you are aware or not, you are always modeling someone. Maybe your parents, maybe your music idol, maybe a friend or a movie star, you are always modeling someone. Take a look around the people you are surrounded with, people you admire and ask yourself, are these people helping to get me to where I want to go, what I want to learn, what I want to be or not. If the answer is not a 100% YES, then my friend, it’s time for you to find better models!

The reason I’ve seen further is because I stand on shoulder of giants ~ Isaac Newton

So modeling is a process of building a model of a person that already does that you want to do. Often the model is not build through one try, but though a process of tweaks, changes and/or redesigns.

Don’t forget, usually is not enough to learn the behavior from the person you are modeling. It is important to learn their mental state and their beliefs too. Modeling implies doing thing not only physically, but mentally and emotionally too. Thus, don’t just learn the steps they are making. Learn their mindset, their emotions in each step. That’s the key of successful modeling.

Additionally, when you’ve built a model of someone, that you have tested for a while and worked for you, the key thing is that you start adding features of your own to it and make it unique. So the purpose of modeling is evolution which is done by extending the model to something more than it was initially designed (you add your uniqueness).

Many famous people modeled someone else when they were starting. It is well known that Bill Gates modeled Napoleon. He read every possible book about Napoleon. Madonna modeled Samantha Fox. Elvis Presley modeled the blues bands before his time. Etc Etc…

For instance, when I became totally into long-distance running, I decided to take it to the next level and learn from the best. One of the persons I admire in this discipline most is Stu Mittleman, the man who holds a record in running 3000 miles in 56 day. So I decided to follow his blog, read his book and even ask him advices privately per email. The value of information that I learned is tremendous. It would took me years of trial and error to learn this by myself. After acquiring this precious knowledge, my running performance increased, my training lasted less and I felt even better about running.

So go out. Find someone who can teach you. Ask him or her for advice. And watch how you grow rapidly. Make it fun!

Upon request on some of you who noticed the CHANGE in me I’ve decided to share my story of transformation. Although hasn’t ended yet, this year was amazing for me and really transformational.

• I became a “Personal development  junkie” and started to read (hear) as many as I could books (audio) about personal development, spirituality and fitness & health using technology (my IPhone) and low-activity or idle time (going to or back from work, waiting for someone or something).
• I started running and I participated on two half marathon and two short runs (16km and 4.5km)  – next year my goal is to run a full marathon on Vienna City Marathon.
• I started training (going to the gym).
• I started experimenting with my nutrition (fasting,  Lactose-free diet, Gluten-free diet, Paleo diet,..)
• I’ve lost 12 kg and got in physical shape (lost fat and gained muscles).
• I’ve started blogging whereat I started to talk about and share things that excite me.
• I had one of the most amazing road trip in the USA whereat I visited NYC, Washington D.C., Boston, San Diego, LA, Hollywood, San Pedro, Santa Monica, Grand Canyon and Las Vegas.
• I started to attract and meet quality and high-energy people from whom I’ve learned a lot and built great relationships.
• I became very confident and self-aware and I simply have pushed my beliefs about what is possible and within my reach of achieving.

Now you ask yourself what was the melting point for this transformation? How I reached my 100 degrees Celsius?

Well not that long ago, last year and almost the whole year I spent literally on the toilette … At first I was diagnosed with Helicobacter Pylori infection, the mean bacteria that settles in the stomach and is able to survive in these high-acidity conditions. As an effect can cause many discomforts like nausea, bloating, vomiting, and frequent complaints about pain in the abdomen. Now to leave the technical vocabulary aside and use more descriptive language, I was constantly farting and I was forced to visit the toilette as often as 8-9 times a day. How discomfortable is that (Figure 1)?

Figure 1: Melting point

Getting this bacteria made me really consider my lifestyle and made me wonder how did I got it. Well, after a short analysis of what I was doing wrong I figured that maybe some of my following routines had to do with it:

• drinking 3 coffees and 2 red bulls a day,
• eating frozen food warmed up in the microwave as it was the easiest to prepare,
• eating sweets, chocolates between and after meals,
• drinking alcohol almost every day with friends when going out or alone while watching TV,
• my highest physical activity was going to and coming back from work.

Hmmm… I guess something from these could have something to do with it

Anyway, the doctor prescribed me some antibiotics and said after the dosage is finished we should do another test and this test shall show if it’s necessary to prescribe another one, but that in the most cases it’s usually enough one dosage. So I didn’t change much my lifestyle, expecting that the “magic pills” to deal with my problem. As it usually it goes, after the dosage, I wasn’t feeling any better and the damn bacteria was still here.

After searching on the internet for information about this bacteria and people that had similar experience, I remember reading somewhere that the problem is not the bacteria itself, but the low immune-system and that because of it a perfect environment is created for the bacteria to survive. In other words, one of the body’s purpose is to heal itself and that is done only when the immune system is highly functional. What a revelation! At this moment I decided to change my lifestyle. I stopped drinking coffee, red bull and alcohol I stopped eating any crappy food and started running in the park. My next results were negative. The test has shown that there was no bacteria! But somehow I still wasn’t feeling much better. I still had the same problems.

I also did food allergy tests and found out that I was allergic to lactose (milk sugar), apple, soy, peanuts and garlic. Moreover I was also diagnosed to have Irritated Bowel Syndrome. WTF, man? Ok God, so it really is that serious, a? This remembered me on the quote from Anthony Robbins: “Nothing tastes so good, like being healthy feels“, so I removed all products that contain anything that can cause the mentioned allergies. I also continued with my healthy lifestyle I started to train and run more intensively and more often. There was an improvement, but from time to time I still had the same discomfort. By chance I found out that my ex boss had the same problem couple of years ago and in discussion with him he suggested to me to fast for 7 days and gave me a book about how to do it. I was so desperate that I decided to give it a try. After fasting for 11 days and feeding myself only with fresh soups, vegetables and fruits and rice, I lost 9 kg and was feeling much better and relieved…

In the meanwhile, I stopped watching TV and news and I started to feed my mind with books about personal development, self improvement, NLP and spirituality. The transformation was almost immediate (“When the mind is at peace, everything else falls into its place“). The information I was learning was amazing, so I decided to start to blog about it. Sharing this gave me even greater joy, as there were many people, just like I was, that had same issues and didn’t knew what to do about it. My awareness about myself, my actions, the environment and people around me rose from day to day.

Figure 2: Complete turn-around

To make long story short, that wasn’t the end, but the beginning of the journey of exploring (Figure 2):

• I became aware that this experience was actually a blessing, not a curse.
• I learned that not necessarily all “bad” events are bad. In other words, even in the unpleasant experiences there is hidden message to be learned and it’s up to us to find it out what that is.
• Through this process of trying to fix myself I learned to be more aware of myself, of my actions and to be more present.
• I started to pay attention of what I was eating and how and how much was I eating.
• I started to eat slower and paying attention to chewing the food enough before swallowing.
• I started to practice fasting more often to clean and rest my digestion system.
• Food became to me only a source of energy, not a replacement for bad feelings like bad mood.
• I became aware of my breathing and started to practice slower and deeper breathing.
• Running long distances became a passion rather than doing something that I have to do, as it was very good way to practice all that I’ve learned (being in the moment, breathing, being patient and not looking for quick fix, …).
• I learned that my body is meant to heal itself, if I don’t distract the immune system.
• I’ve balanced of the body, mind and spirit.
• I learned that stress played huge role in this problem.
• I learned to concentrate on the things that are really important to me, disregarding unnecessary daily distraction and interruptions that seem to be urgent, but are actually not important (e.g. emails, phone calls, etc…).
• I’ve started practicing single-tasking versus multi-tasking, doing one thing at a time and really being 100% concentrated on this single thing (e.g. not eating and watching TV at the same time).
• I’ve developed curiosity and learning habits, and realized the importance of the process of never-ending improvement.
• I’ve learned how to center myself as my center is source of calmness, security, relaxation and infinite intelligence.
• I became more flexible and have evolved as a person.
• …

Do I still have the same problem?

Well, although very rarely, I still do, but for me it’s not a problem anymore. The purpose of evolution is not to solve the problems, but to overgrown them. Nowadays when I get this “problem” I simply get the message that I got off the track a little bit and that is time to get back to my center, clear the noise around me and concentrate on the things that really matter to me.

Are you a person that hasn’t really defined clearly what bothers you and you accept pretty much any behavior from others as long as you get approval from them? Or you have defined boundary around things that you want and you don’t want to accept from others, but you don’t express and defend that very much and you expect others to figure out whether they’ve crossed your boundary and if they cross it you get angry and mad at them, blaming them for crossing your boundary? Or you have clearly defined boundaries around about the things you allow, but you get very emotional when your boundaries get crossed? All these examples lead to not having a personal boundary (a healthy one).

What does it mean to have personal boundaries? How to have personal boundaries that are also healthy? Why it is important to have healthy personal boundaries within different context of your life (relationships, family, business, etc). These are some of the questions that I want to cover and provide some answers.

Not having a clear boundary

Here is an example of a person that doesn’t have defined a clear personal boundary or a person that has holes in his/her boundary. A person is easily vulnerable and there are many holes through which someone can intrude their personal “territory”. Usually people with such boundaries are “approval seekers”, who tend to lower their standards or to not have any just to get a piece of acknowledgment by others, a piece of recognition, a piece of attention …

In addition, in this category belong persons that have boundaries, but they don’t defend them enough and allow other people to cross them easily. When that happens they don’t take responsibility for it and they blame others for crossing their boundary. An example would be a female person that doesn’t want to be abused in a relationship, yet allowing that to happen repeatedly 

Getting too emotional about your boundaries

Other type of person are persons that have a huge concentration of negative emotions around their boundaries and get easily emotional (angry, mad, frustrated, depressed, etc etc) when their boundaries are crossed. The problem with such people is that they react with negative emotions to the persons crossing their boundaries and by doing that they tent to attract more of these person that will try to cross their boundary. This is simply because of the principle of FOCUS which says that what ever we focus on, we tend to get more of that!

Having healthy personal boundary

To have a healthy personal boundary means to have clearly defined standard about what you accept from others, what kind of behavior and to not allow second class behavior bellow that standard. Also when someone crosses your boundary you let them know that this is not allowed by you, that you won’t tolerate it and you also don’t get to emotional about it, which means you keep concentrating on the things you want, not on the thing you don’t want as in this case someone crossing your boundary. As simple as it sounds still many people don’t quite get it, especially the communicating part where they have to communicate to others when their boundary has been crossed.

The communication doesn’t have to be verbal. It’s well known that the content of the communication (verbal) brings only 7% of the whole communication. The 38% is the auditive part, the tonality of the voice of the communicator. And 55% is the kinestetic part, the body language, the posture, the facial expression etc. This means that in order to communicate sometimes it’s enough to send A LOOK   which communicates: “Hey, that’s not allowed”. Or even not giving any approval by ignoring the person that just crossed your boundaries with certain statement. Remember, even when you don’t communicate, you communicate that you don’t communicate So you are always communicating!!!

Having boundary doesn’t mean having EGO

Another problem people have is thinking that having a boundary implies having EGO. Well, in a certain way, they are right. By setting some boundaries we define a certain EGO, we define a certain ‘I’ or ‘Me’ and everything else or ‘Not I’ or ‘Not Me’. But still to have boundary doesn’t imply to be EGOIST or EGOCENTRIC. Even if we define boundary we have to respect other people’s boundaries too and to not allow ourselves to cross their boundaries. We also have to be aware that sometime our boundary will get crossed by other people intentionally or not and to not take that personally when it happens, being aware that people do make mistakes as well as you do and that mistakes are to be taken as feedback or correction for the next time. This implies forgiveness to yourself and others (no negative emotions).

Conclusion

Define healthy personal boundary, have standards in your life and you will tend to attract only people that correspond to these standards!

Also give what you want to receive:

“Be the change you want to see in others” ~ Mahatma Gandhi