It’s likely that if you come to my parents house for dinner and are a fan of Indian food, you’ll be eager to return over and over again.  My mother is an incredible cook and no matter how much I have tried to replicate what she does I’ll never able to. My best friend has had the same experience with his mother.

No Recipes:

If you went into the kitchen at my parents’ house and you looked for recipes, you wouldn’t find any.  There are no cabinets full of recipe cards or anything of the sort. There are no rules, except that the kitchen will be cleaner than Buckingham Palace after you are done. However you would find all the ingredients that eventually result in very tasty dishes. Ask for a recipe and you’ll receive some sort of vague and frustrating answer that will leave you endlessly trying to replicate my mom’s cooking abilities. I would imagine if you are Indian and your mom can cook, it’s the same way.

No Measurements:

My best friend said that he once stood next to his mother copying everything she did on the stove. The food she made was a thousand times better. If you ask an Indian mother for measurements, you’ll get yet another vague instruction like “just put a little bit of this, and a little bit of that.”  Well, to my mother, I have tried that and your food is much better than mine, so for the time being I’ll stop by every other weekend and pick up food.


Just Instinct:

What amazes me is that even when my mom makes something she has never made before, it still turns out awesome. Sometimes she even makes food that she doesn’t like herself, but it’s still perfect.  And still there are no measurements, no recipes or anything of the sort. You might call it guesswork. I think it’s just instinct.

So, what does this have to do with you? There’s formulas and measurements for everything in our lives. I know because I’ve tried to create them:

• How to get free drinks and get treated like a VIP everywhere you go
• How to write a blog post in 20 minutes or less

Maybe it’s time to just go with instinct.

For over a year now I’ve been a member of a tribe. As a member, I’ve met other members, learned about them,  become friends with some of them and spent absurd amounts of time around them. In fact in order to be a member of this tribe, one of the requirements is spending absurd amounts of time with other members of the tribe.

Initiation through Intoxication

Initiation into this tribe begins with the injection of a substance known to have such addictive qualities that for most members the addiction to this substance, pursuit of it and membership in this tribe end up becoming a lifelong journey.  It’s hard to determine the right time for initiation. I guess in some ways it just happens when it’s supposed to.  It’s been said by some that membership  is something that can’t be canceled. Once a member, you will always be a member. For each and every member, the meaning of their membership is something different.

The Members

Members of the tribe include men, women, and even children. Often the only thing that members have in common is their membership. However membership is a tie that binds the members so strongly that mere mention of your membership to another member will almost instantly result in a connection regardless of race, creed, color, social status or any other classification system reserved for the masses.  Sometimes members can identify each other just by the attire another member is wearing. That was my recent experience when I ran into another member of this tribe on my cruise to Mexico.

If one parent is a member, then it’s almost a certainty that membership will be passed on to  the child, and likely through multiple generations. Occasionally you will find members who have been in this tribe for multiple decades. One member has already told me of his plans for his unborn child to become a member.  The women who are members often tend to be beautiful and for some male members those female members make the only potential lifelong companions if they intend to have a healthy marriage. For many there even seems to come a point in their lives at which membership defines them and is a significant part of who they are.

Members of this tribe for the most part are among the happiest people I’ve come across on the planet. They are also for the most part welcoming. However  there are members of this tribe that do not take kindly to newer members. Some of these older members have laid claims to certain territory and newer members, regardless of their membership are not welcome in these territories. To the best of my understanding access to these territories can be earned by putting in your time as a member of the tribe.

Weather Patterns

Weather patterns seem to be something that members of this tribe seem to study almost obsessively. A study of storms, wind and all of the other various mood swings of mother nature are at the forefront of a tribe member’s mind. Members will see the wind blowing by observing leaves in trees and will wonder how it will impact their participation in the tribe that day. Members anticipate the mood swings of mother nature with child like curiosity and excitement.

Chiefs

The chiefs in this tribe are revered by everybody. They have mental and physical capabilities and courage that defy law. Members of the tribe who are initiated as children seem to be the rare few who do achieve this status later in life. These “chiefs” are known to put their lives at risk on a regular basis, and most tribe members would never dare take these kinds of risks because it would virtually guarantee death

Language, Terminology, and Communication

Along with the sub culture comes words and a language that while accepted by the outside world is really only understood by the members of this tribe.  The “lingo” of this tribe is something I’ve come to know really well in the last year and is now a large part of my life.

Non-members view of the members

Non-members don’t quite understand the members of this tribe. They seem to be full of stereotypes and labels that are rarely fitting. Dave Doolin calls non-members “The Smoke and Mirrors Brigade.” But, it’s safe to say as a member I feel somewhat super human when I’m placed next to a non-member. The truth is until a non-member has been dosed with the addictive substance that causes a member’s lifelong journey, they will never really understand.

This tribe of people around the world are known as surfers. The above ideas are just a few of the conclusions that I have come to after my first full year as a surfer.

How can I make a million dollars? is a question that most people will ask at least once in their lifetime. And unless a person currently has an annual salary of $100,000 for the next 10 years, making a million dollars is pretty tough and also a seriously long process. Instead, what most people will do is get out a piece of paper and start brainstorming the different ways to make a million dollars. Ideas like creating a product for $10 and selling this product to 100,000 people, or doing some type of service for $50 and repeating it 20,000 times come up. Before we start, I kind of just want to share with you a fundamental rule that I live by.

Thoughts are Real

Being a sufferer of OCD, I know of this. It doesn’t matter if the thoughts don’t make sense or are irrational; if they are images that are constantly played over and over again, they will affect you in real ways. That’s why I prefer the phrase thoughts are real over the phrase thoughts are things as described in the classic book, Think and Grow Rich.

So if a person was starting out and they were to tell themselves, oh, there’s nothing I can do. Everything’s already been done out there, then they would end up creating this reality for them from the get-go. This is what I think what most people do before they even begin. They stop themselves from trying because they create thoughts for themselves from only their individual perspective , a perspective that is vastly limited from the perspective of the whole.

The reality is that although selling a product for 10 bucks to 100,000 people or doing a type of service for 50 bucks 20,000 times are 2 ways of making a million dollars, there are really more than 2 ways to make a million dollars. In fact, there is an infinite.

And having this mindset that there are an infinite amount of ways to make a million dollars gives a person not so much hope, but a burning desire to figure out how it can be done. Its like finding the right combination to a lock of a safe that contains a million dollars. If you think that there’s no way to do it, then you’re going to stop. But if you think that by trying every combination that you can possibly imagine, and one of those combinations will open the chest, then you will give it a try.

This is what I mean by thoughts are real. They affect our actions, so always keep that in mind. If someone believes that making a million dollars is possible, they will find a way to make it happen.

Social Value

Although analyzing numbers will show a person how to reach a million dollars, thinking like that is sort of thinking in one dimension. Instead of thinking about a million dollars in terms of a number, thinking of it in terms of what it really represents would be better suited for getting there. Remember whether its one dollar or one million dollars, they are still forms of money. But money itself, in the most basic sense, is just another form of social value.

If society thinks that something is valuable, then its going worth a lot of money. You can sort of see this with the example of how some people produce the finest works of art or writings in the world, but are still poor; while others get paid millions of dollars for simply playing a baseball or basketball game out in the field or on the court.

Think about it would you pay $1000.00 to watch people play a game of basketball for a total 48 minutes? Most of you guys would probably say no, but I would, and so would thousands of other people because we know that the people we are watching are valuable. And there’s enough of us people on a consistent basis that contribute to making these players millionaires.

I know it sounds contradictory and makes no sense at first glance, but it makes perfect sense when you apply it to how our society works. Money isn’t always rewarded to people who have hard work ethic; it is rewarded to people that can provide real value to as many people as possible. So when you think of money, don’t just think of pieces of paper. Think of social value.

Think Outside the Box

Now, what if you’re not somebody that’s not seen as socially valuable? Well you have to realize that most people aren’t. We are coming close to 7,000,000,000 people in this planet and I wouldn’t even say with all the celebrities, writers, presidents, or people coined as famous combined together would occupy 1% of this population.

So if you’re not socially valuable, you’ll have to think of a way to provides value to as many people as you can which creates social value which creates money. How to do this? I don’t know the answer to this question, but I have something that I want to tell you that you may have overlooked. If you are reading this right now, you have access to the most powerful resource in history other than the human mind; and that is the internet.

This is a wake-up call! We are in the information age right now, an age where we can share and connect with people from all over the world within seconds. Most people take this idea for granted, but realize that this was not anywhere close to being possible a decade ago. The internet provides free information beyond the scope of human imagination. With enough searching around, anybody could collect free data and organize it in a way that is of value to other people. We all have access to a source that is almost infinite, and to say that it is impossible to find information and create it in a few ways to provide value that people might find valuable would be an insult to one’s imagination.

You’re probably wondering what about thinking outside the box? Thinking outside the box means thinking in ways that don’t follow what everybody else is thinking. Doing this only leads to mediocrity and wont get you far. If you’re gathering information from the internet, take a look at what things already work and reinvent it in your own creative way that’s different. You know that  of your idea already works and the other will bring uniqueness to it. Hold onto these ideas and you can work sculpting other ideas together with it to make it into something big. Remember not too take in too much information though. Being creative is good, but if you go over your limits, you might go crazy.

Experience Passion in Life

Finally, you have to go an experience whatever plan you set out for yourself and be passionate about it. You will never know whether you can provide something of high value if you never try. What most people do is they will hear people say ideas, but they just remain ideas. Unless you actually go and try it, you wont be able to get into the persons mind and figure out why they say ìwhatî they said.

For example, the experienced writer here, Srinivas, talks about surfing in his blog a lot. He puts it in words from his personal experiences that wow the reader.

After resetting myself mentally I started to paddle for the next wave that came through and I caught it perfectly. In that moment I realized that it all came down to one thing, wave selection. I paddle out and catch a second and yet another long, perfect, smooth ride.

From this I can kind of visualize what he is going through in my mind; but still, I will have no idea what the water really feels like. I have never surfed before in my life.

This is what most people who begin the idea of making a million dollars do. They let other people’s words tell them that this way is right or this way is wrong. When you hear people say this, they are describing to others their thoughts; and to them, their thoughts are real, but they may not be real to you.

Don’t wait. Most of the people in the world are too busy focusing on others to bring the answers for them. Instead of letting others finding the answer for us, we must go out and discover the answers ourselves. To discover the answers, you must go out and experience whatever it is your mind.

You see, even though you still can, this wasn’t a blog post really about how to make a million dollars. It was more about finding the truth. Most of us are scared of chasing the answers of our biggest questions, because we are overrun by fear. But in a universe where this is an infinite amount of possibilities, fear should be the last thing that stops you. If you have enough faith in yourself and go out an experience life with passion, eventually the answers will naturally come to you, and you will discover the truth in its own time.

This has been a guest post by Hulbert Lee. He writes about the rising stories of influential people at his blog, †FromBottomUp. If you haven’t had the chance already, be sure to subscribe to his RSS feed for future updates or follow him on Twitter.

Last Thursday I had one o the most productive days of of bogging/social media work that I’ve ever had. I commented on about 20+ blogs, responded to comments on my own site, wrote 3 guest posts, and did a few other things. I did this all in about 2 hours. In case you’re wondering whether I’m on a performance enhancing drug, the answer is no.  I just took advantage of laser like focus.  Let’s look at how you can do replicate this.

Make your list: One thing I learned from a quick study of the things that Robert Granholm does at the Life Design Project was that you need to know your daily routine. If you look closely at your daily routine, you’ll start to notice that it is quite repetitive. The good thing about this is you can get to a very high level of efficiency once you know that routine. I broke down my list as follows:

• Read and comment on blog posts
• Write new posts and guest posts
• Respond to comments on my blogs
• Hang out on Twitter and chat
• Email

Prioritize: After I made my list I decided to prioritize.  A while back I wrote about the one question time management method. My order of operations goes something like this:

1. Read and comment on blog posts: You might wonder why I would actually put this before writing my own posts. The main reason is that I often will get ideas for my own content from something I read at a particular blog. Sometimes those ideas will come from somebody’s post or from some commenter’s post.
2. Write new posts/Guests Posts: A few weeks back I talked about how to consistently write a blog post in 20 minutes or less. I can still do it, but I’m focusing on longer posts at this point, so I’d say add about 5 minutes.  When I write  I prefer a distraction free writing tool called Mac Journal.
3. Respond to comments: This seems like the next logical step  when you think about tasks that are of high value. Responding to comments is necessary, but not a super high value task.
4. Twitter/Social Media: This is kind of my coffee break. I get on Twitter for about 20 mins and I see what’s going on. I retweet articles and join a few conversations.
5. Email: I decided to see if I could check email only twice that day. That was actually fundamental to my increase in productivity. I also setup some filters so all newsletters went into separate folders and the only things that came into my inbox were emails from people that I could respond to right away. I recommend you don’t check email first thing in the morning. Some of you might disagree, but I say shut it off for at least 2 hours and see what happens.

Turn off Distractions: The ultimate irony of all this efficiency increasing technology that we have created is that we’ve created so much of it that we’ve made ourselves less efficient because of it.  In this short period of time I decided to shut off everything. No email, no Chat, no Tweetdeck. You’d be amazed at how much little distractions will throw off your flow. The reason I can write so quickly is I’m not distracted by the sound of emails in my inbox and Tweetdeck notifications.

Batch Process/Uni-Task: I’m not the first person to say this, so it’s nothing original. But, if you work on one thing at at time you’ll be amazed at how much faster you’ll get each thing done. For me, ADHD gives me a fair amount of challenges with this, so I have to take advantage of a flow state when I  hit it and use it to do only one thing.  Batch processing allows me to get so much more done when I hit a flow state.

Use Music: Depending on the type of person you are, music can help you get into a rhythm when you are doing your work. I prefer using techno music because lyrics of music seem to clutter my mind a bit.  But, throw on some headphones during this period and you’ll see a nice little increase in productivity.

Everybody has different ways of being productive so I’m  not saying this will be  the perfect solution. In fact it can probably be made even more efficient.  I’d love to hear your thoughts on how you get the most out of your time.

Sometime in college a good friend of mine told me “You shouldn’t trust people who don’t like chocolate, that’s just weird.” I thought it was pretty funny and at the same time agreed. It seemed like great advice for life. No offense to those of you who don’t like chocolate, but I probably won’t trust you because I do think it’s weird. I decided to Google  these untrustworthy individuals who don’t like chocolate and these are the things I found:

• The Guy Who’s worried that his girlfriend doesn’t like chocolate
• The person advised to see a hypnotherapist to fix this “disorder”
• Blogger who doesn’t like chocolate

My Confession: I have had two friends in my life who don’t like chocolate. One was my roommate who was allergic to chocolate(so I can let that slide). The other was  another friend I had when I was living in Brazil. Yes dude, I think you’re weird as shit for not liking chocolate. If you read this on Facebook you know who you are.

The Family Sweet Tooth: My dad is diabetic. That must be torture. He loves sweets. In fact the day he went the doctor to get his diagnosis he suspected that the doctor was going to tell him he was diabetic, so he loaded up on all his favorite sweets for one last time. I think I’d do the same.

Chocolate to Ice Cream Ratio Problems with my Favorite Desserts

Mcdonald’s Hot Fudge Sundae

I love Mcdonalds hot fudge sundaes but the bastards always stiff you on the hot fudge. The fudge to ice cream ratio sucks. Fix this shit Mcdonalds. Give us extra fudge and don’t charge 20 cents. Fudge to ice cream ratio is the downfall of many hot fudge sundae makers. (Denny’s, Ghiradelli, you’re on this list too).

Brownies with Vanilla Ice Cream

This is yet another one of my favorite forms of chocolate. I know I just bitched at Mcdonalds for not getting it right, but even I can’t seem to perfect this. There’s never enough ice cream to eat with the brownie that’s left or vice versa. Maybe I should just keep the ice cream near me to solve this problem. I’m all ears for suggestions.

Trader Joe’s Chocolate Lava Cake

I love, love, love these cakes. They only give you two of them in a box, and they are ready in 2 mins. They are decadent as hell and I could probably eat one every single day.  Of all desserts that suffer from the chocolate to ice cream ratio issue, this is the one that actually does the best. Perhaps balancing out with the molten chocolate lava is the reason that it balances out properly.

What about you? Do you trust people who don’t like chocolate? Do you think it’s weird if they don’t?

Next Week: Ice cream and Pancakes (My Dad’s version of making the kids Breakfast)

Practice

It’s been said before and I’ll say it again. Repetition is the mother of skill. This last 10 days I’ve been really fortunate in that I’ve been able to surf every single day. While I’m getting a few shades darker thanks to the California sunshine (yes, you should hate me if you leave somewhere cold), my wave riding skills are increasing exponentially every day. If you do anything on a daily basis you will get better it.

In fact there will be a point at which you don’t really have to think about how to do it anymore. Think about the things in your life that you do on a daily basis. Assuming you are not a 16 year old, (no offense to teen bloggers) chances are you drive your car every single day. Almost everything you do in your car happens on a subconscious level. If I told you to break down every step from the time you left your door till the time you arrived at your destination, you’d be amazed at how complex what you are doing actually is. But you’ve done it so much and so many times that you really don’t  have to think about it at all. Anything you do on a daily basis will eventually become that way. Many of who you read this blog have probably read Malcom Gladwell’s book Outliers and know about the 10,000 hours rule. If not, let me summarize it for you.

Anybody who has achieved mastery of their craft (examples in this book include Bill Gates, The Beatles, professional athletes, and more) has had 10,000 hours of practice time. That works out to 20 hours a week for about 10 years.

Progress

It’s a great argument for the fact that natural talent might not be natural and with the right amount of practice anyone can be on this level. I will say this. I have  no natural athletic ability. In 7th grade I was ranked most improved player on the basketball team. In other words, I was the shittiest player on the team. When I played football, I got the living daylights beat out of me on a regular basis and was more like a tackling dummy for those Texans in College Station.  I would probably think it’s safe to say I broke the 1,000 hour mark for surfing a few months back. It literally took me going 10 times before I could even stand up. As Ian from Leash Optional so eloquently said a days ago: The hardest part of riding a wave is standing up on your board.  But I’ve persisted through it and it’s a different experience for me now. I think brute force and stubborn persistence played a role in this. It doesn’t hurt that I love the ocean and how I feel after I get done.  I think it’s worth thinking about the fact that there is a natural progression that occurs as we develop any skill.

Peaks

The next phase in the developing any skill or goal (blog traffic, athletic ability, etc) is getting to a point of peak performance. Technically, this is performing at the best of your current abilities. What’s strange is that whatever skill it is you are developing, you will experience a series of peaks. In each peak you will gain one or two profound insights that cause that exponential increase in your abilities.  In fact you’ll in each peak you’ll realize that one small adjustment can make a big difference. In these peaks you also have to be very careful to be aware of that 6 signs that you are too attached to success because you will not get the most out of your peaks if you fall into a trap where you can’t identify the difference between success and perfection.

Plateaus

Plateaus are interesting and frustrating all at the same time. In a plateau we often find ourselves wanting to give up because we are seemingly  not making progress. The fundamental difference between those who make it and those who don’t is persisting through something when you want to give up the most. What’s strange is that a plateau on the surface is a time in which you are making no progress. Most of you have may not be aware of this, but growth here at The Skool of Life has been somewhat slow over the last 2 months. Traffic is actually down a certain percentage from the last few months and it’s feeling like a plateau.  But it’s during a plateau that you get to hone the skills you’ve developed during a peak.  While on the surface it might appear that you are making no progress, in all reality you are actually just moving more towards mastery during a plateau.

I think by nature we are fairly impatient. We want everything faster. We want to be successful sooner rather than later. We want it today. But, at the end of the day success achieved through instant gratification is nothing but a house of cards.

For those of you who have forgotten, just eight short weeks ago we were all talk about everything we were going to accomplish in 2010. I don’t want to fall victim to the New Year’s syndrome and I don’t want any of my readers to either. So, I figured it was time for a wake up call and a personal check in. First I have to give a shout out to Sara Davidson at WalkTalkChewGum because she commented on my Q1 Marketing plan which forced me to get off my ass a bit and get more serious about making all of these things happen. Below I’ve listed my main goals and where I am at in terms of progress towards them.

2010 Goal Review #1:

Q1  MARKETING PLAN PERFORMANCE REPORT

Guest posts/Content: When I created the plan for Q1 I had this really aggressive goal to write 2-4 guest posts per week and post several times a week here. As you’ll see I’m more or less on track. I’m not outperforming expectations quite yet, but having a plan has kept me consistent. In terms of my own content, a few conversations with A-list bloggers such as Jonathan Mead made me shift of my focus from quantity to quality. Below you’ll find a list of all of the guest post that I’ve written in the first 2 months of 2010.

• True Success: Finding Your Perfect Wave-@Serenity Hacker
• Faith, Patience, and Your moment in the Sun@QuestforBalance
• Using a MindMap to Dissect Your Goals@LifescapeArtists
• Why Networking Doesn’t end When Your Job Search Does@Under30CEO
• 7 ways that a slight tweak will dramatically change your life@DumbLittleMan
• 7 Personal Traits for Effective Lifestyle Design@LifestyleDesignForYou
• How to Work the Room at a Networking Event@WasabiBurger
• The First Year of a Surfer’s Journey- A  Look Back @StokedforLife
• Carrots, Sticks and True Motivation@LifestyleDesignForYou
• How to monetize your blog without advertising, affiliate products or any other products@Under30CEO
• The Difference Between Success and Perfection@MsCareerGirl
• 8 Essential Business and Careers Skills Developed from Blogging@LifeWIthoutPants
• 7 Reasons a blog is a Phenomenal Personal Development Tool@TheChangeblog
• Pending posts submitted to Blogussion,Daily Blog Tips, and a few others
  

Total Guest Posts Published: 14

Reader Growth: I set an extremely aggressive readership goal to go from roughly 500 to 1000 readers in Q1. Barring some sort of serious spike in the month of March, it’s probably not going to happen. But I’m ok with that and I don’t intend to change that goal. Focusing on a goal that is higher than what you’ll probably achieve will make it that much more likely to get you closer to the original goal. As the quote says “shoot for the moon and you’ll land among the stars.”

Unexpected Twists and Turns: Part of what slowed my aggressive growth plans for the Skool of Life was the launch of BlogcastFM. It was something that was completely unplanned and unexpected. However, I think it as actually a really good thing even if it meant slowing down my efforts here at The Skool of Life.  I think my future success is going to be largely due to the work I’m doing at BlogcastFM. As a byproduct,  I’ll probably see some growth here at The Skool of Life.

Other (email, affiliates, etc): I have not put nearly as much effort into developing  a more substantial newsletter as I should have. I can’t really think of any excuse other than laziness or lack of ideas. But I think it’s something that will become more of a priority to me over the next month. I finally have started to understand how to promote affiliate products. I realized that I could be an affiliate for anything that I use on a daily basis. This is because these are products I truly believe in. Take a look at my Skool Supplies page and you’ll see a list of everything I endorse and has been essential in my growth here at The Skool of Life. If you have questions about any of those products, feel free to email me. I have a generated a whopping $8.64 in affiliate commissions because of a friend purchasing his newest domain through me.  But it’s a start.

Income Goals Report:

I set a goal of earning 5000 dollars a month from the work I do here at The Skool of Life. I’m pretty far off and some of you might think I’m out of my mind, but that’s the number I’m aiming for first.  Last week I told you about How I made my first 700 dollars online, so I’m not going to go into too much detail, but below I’ll share all of my Q1 income streams that are a result of this blog. For the purposes of this exercise I’ve left out the revenue I generate from my paycheck at my full time job since I don’t consider it a direct byproduct of this blog.

Advertising Revenue/Building a Client Blog: Below is the snapshot of income earned from the last 2 months

Part Time Consultant for Bio Ionic Haircare: $1000.00

Total Income Generated:  $1273.30

Personal/Miscellaneous/Un-categorized(Goals and Accomplishments)

• Read The following Seth Godin Books: Tribes, Purple Cow, Linchpin (done)
• Surfed as much as possible and graduated to a shorter board (done)
• Read at least 3 books every month
  
• Costa Rica Surf Trip (a work in progress)
• Start Identifying more passive income streams (in progress)
  
• Borrow a page from The Life Design Project and Hire a Virtual Assistant to find freelance work for me
• Clear credit card debt and utilities from my previous apartment (in progress)
• Setup my ING direct savings account (done)
  

How to Conduct your own review (condensed version):

• Break your goals into three categories (personal, financial, professional)
  
• Write down your goals
  
• Write down where you are at in terms of accomplishing them
  
• Write down actions you can take towards each goal
• Publish it on your blog
• Rinse, Wash, Repeat every month
  

I decided to write this post for a few reasons. After writing a post about why a blog is a personal development tool, I realized it gives you a great place to review and track progress towards your goals. It also gives you a great way to get feedback from like minded individuals. I plan to conduct this goal review at the end of every month because I’ve just realized how useful this exercise is. How are you doing with your 2010 goals? Did you fall victim to the New Year’s Syndrome? If so, how do you plan to get back on track?

Today’s guest post is by Nicole Crimaldi, founder of MsCareerGirl.com: a career and self-improvement blog for ambitious young professionals.

I loved college. It changed my life.

College had such a great impact on my life, that I created Ms. Career Girl, in part, to help young professionals transition to life after college. At the time of this post, I’ve been out of college for about four years. A lot has happened in my personal and professional life in four years: 3 jobs, a few failed relationships, several moves, financial ups and downs, and a hell of a lot of learning.

The five most important things I learned since graduating college

1. You don’t need to know every detail to succeed.

My first job out of college was selling sub-prime mortgages. I had to call prospects and try to sell them on improving their financial situation by re-structuring their debt. Before I picked up the phone, I always wanted to use my handy mortgage calculator to analyze the prospect’s current situation and provide several possible solutions. Take a wild guess what would happen after spending at least 10 minutes running numbers? I’d get the prospect’s voicemail.

My manager sat me down and told me that while he appreciated my attention to detail and love for my calculator, I didn’t need to know every detail to close a sale. He said that it’s easy to spew out all the details at once, overwhelm the customer, and lose the sale (or get hung up on!). Or even worse, you spend all that time worrying and preparing, only to have no one answer the phone.

Why live in the future before you’ve even experienced the present?

2. Stop living in the future.

In high school you’re trying to get to a great college. In college, you’re trying to get a great job. You graduate and realize you don’t really like that first job so you try to get promoted or get out. Then maybe you think grad school is the answer. Or moving in with your boyfriend. Or getting engaged. Or starting a business. What happens when you get there?

There will always be something else to chase.

As you get to these supposed “landmark moments,” you may experience disappointment or maybe even failure because you didn’t…

3. Stop setting unrealistic expectations.

New Years Eve is a simple example: You spend tons of money on a new outfit, buy a $150 ticket to a swanky party and talk about it with your friends for 2 weeks. You get there and realize that it’s just another night out, but 4 times as expensive.

Same applies for dating, jobs and people.

* You will not meet your dream guy/girl out every time you go out.
* Not every job is what you thought it would be during the interview.
* Every rose has thorns.
* People WILL disappoint you: co-workers will suck, family may not approve of everything you are doing.

Setting too high of expectations only leads you to feel disappointed at the end of the day. You probably set unrealistic expectations because you failed to accept that…

4. There are several ways to skin a cat.

When I first graduated college, I had it in my head that being successful at age 22 was working for a huge company in a skyscraper, living in a swanky apartment downtown Chicago, and making at least $X per year. Maybe it was my school, or the crowd I hung out with, but anything other than that just didn’t seem cool. Success looked only ONE way to me.

When I graduated, I did work for a huge company. In a suburban industrial park. At half the salary that I expected to make. While I lived w/ my parents….

If I would’ve been more open-minded, I would’ve been a lot more comfortable in my skin. I would’ve been able to focus on learning, growing, taking risks, finding myself, enjoying my co-workers, etc. I needed to learn to….

5. STOP all or nothing thinking.

I remember the summer after graduation where I sat down with my Mom in tears and told her I was frustrated because I wasn’t a blonde or a brunette. I wasn’t a republican or a democrat. I liked corporate America but I also liked the idea of starting my own business. I felt so torn that I wasn’t able to put my identity and values into one box.

I laugh now, because I think my ability to see both sides of things and embrace change will be more valuable.

“All or nothing thinking” includes thoughts like:

* You’re successful or you’re a failure.
* You’re skinny or you’re fat.
* It is only Black or white.
* If you don’t follow this path, you are wrong.
* If I quit my job because I hate it, I’m a failure.
* Drink too much or don’t drink at all.
* If you make a mistake, you’re out of my life.
* If they don’t do this, I’m quitting.
* I have to make $X per year, or I am not successful.

Your Turn

* How can you relate to these five lessons?
* What lessons have YOU learned since graduating college?
* What advice would you give to those who are about to graduate?

A while back Srini talked about the magical, deep meaning that surfing brings to his life and it really resonated with me. I started thinking that a similar kind of feeling can be felt by bloggers if they are as passionate about writing, creating and connecting as he is about surfing.

As I thought about it more, I noticed there were correlations between surfing and blogging that I wanted to point out and hopefully allow up and coming bloggers to benefit from the power of catching their first “wave”.

So without further ado, here is my 6 step guide for getting up on your board. Enjoy!

1. Get a basic grasp of what you want to do. If it’s surfing, you need to learn how to paddle out, how to pop up and where to place your feet. For bloggers and internet marketers you would need a basic Wordpress set up, a mind full of content on a passionate topic and the patience to build a community slowly. Too many people spend too much time learning the theory of how to do something. Knowledge is not knowledge if it cannot be applied. Stop wasting time with theory and focus instead on application.
2. Practice out of the water. When you first learn to surf, a lot of coaches will have you practice “the pop” on the beach first before you get anywhere near the water. This is to train your body and mind to do the right thing when you are in the water. The same can be applied to blogging. You have to practice your writing, your networking, your design and HTML skills before you can begin to be successful and sell products. Practice makes perfect, so don’t get frustrated if you think you are falling behind others. Baz Luhrmann said, “The race is long. And in the end, it is only with yourself.“
3. Take it slowly. Once you’re out into the open water you don’t head straight for the pipe unless you want your head to be bashed against the reef again and again and again. You start slowly over in the small waves with all the other rookie surfers. Don’t try and crack into the big crowd of “authorities” in your niche. You’ll get overwhelmed, ignored and will feel like you can’t do this. Learn and grow with other newcomers and you’ll find a sense of camaraderie that is rarely found in the self flagulating, back slapping and ego boosting world of “big names” in your market.
4. Fall with confidence. You won’t be able to stand up on your board right away. Balance, nerves and the occasional gust of wind will be enough to knock you off your path. Take the wipeouts proudly. Fall with the confidence of a person who knows that they will get back up and succeed eventually. In blogging, you will publish new posts that receive minimal views, no comments and don’t seem to excite anybody – including yourself. Have the confidence to know that your true vision will become more clear and focused every time you fall.
5. Hone your skills. In order to become a more proficient surfer you will need to hone your skills. You can do this by finding a mentor, a friend, a hired coach or simply by learning for yourself. I am a huge advocate of learning yourself. I have paid thousands of dollars from internet marketing courses, ebooks and membership forums and you know what? The information is all the same. It’s just written in a different way. Let someone teach you the basics, but tread your own path and learn to surf on your own.
6. Ride the wave. Once you have the basics covered, you have practiced, gone slowly, fallen and honed your skills – stand up on your board. When you start to receive traffic to your blog, get subscribers and contributors giving you feedback and you begin to see trickles of affiliate income: savor the moment. Feel the cool spray splash against your face and inhale the fresh, chilled air. Take in the beauty and power that comes with achieving something you’re passionate about. Congratulations – you’re surfing.

Will you get up on your board and ride the wave today?

Ian Nuttall is the author of Leash Optional, a blog dedicated to small ideas that get you up on the board and deliver big results in love, life, and business. Subscribe to the feed and add him on Twitter.

6 months ago I never thought I’d be writing this post. But, it actually happened.  Yesterday I spoke with Johnny B. Truant (who is awesome), about how he made his first 100 dollars online and thought I’d write a post about how I made my first 700 dollars online. In January of 2010 I went from making absolutely nothing to 700 dollars in one month as a byproduct of this blog. It’s not huge, but it’s a milestone.

Many interesting and unexpected things have happened as a result of this blog. If you stick it out those kinds of things will probably happen to you too.  The interview series which I ran here for a few months has spun out into a new joint venture called BlogcastFM. You can’t always predict what any of your ideas can do even if they are really simple, so just do them and worry about the results later. A few weeks back I wrote a post at under30CEO titled “How to monetize your blog without selling advertising, affiliate products or any other products.” A more appropriate title was probably ”How to use your blog as a platform for revenue.

Some guidelines:

It takes time, but it doesn’t have to. It’s taken me a while to get to this point but it didn’t have to. There are people who make a ton more money and do it much faster. It all comes down to planning for it which takes me to my next point.

Marketing Plans Actually Work. You don’t need anything fancy as you’ll see from my Q1 marketing plan.   It’s not anything complicated, but it’s an outline and something to aim for. Will everything happen exactly as planned if you do that? No. But it gives you a direction to go in. Putting that plan together was what allowed me to figure out that craigslist could lead me to some cash if I posted a freelance ad.

It’s going to be really hard with advertising. I’ve never made much with advertising. I have some text links on the side and they make my blog look kind of weird, but it’s 25 bucks every month for nothing.  But there’s no way I could make 700 bucks from ads even with a ton of traffic. Besides, Larry and Sergei already have enough money to last a few generations.

Write Down Your Goals: This kind of goes along with a marketing plan. But, since this is a personal development blog, I always incorporate many personal development concepts into accomplishing my goals for my blog. I’m a big believer in goals, autosuggestion, commitment, and consistency.

Use your Blog as a Platform. Once you start to realize your blog even with a few hundred readers is a great platform to test ideas, there’s no limits to what you can do. The interview series was nothing more than an idea I tested and it turned into a project of its own. Let’s say you have an idea to do something with video.  Just do it. Who cares if it fails? You’ll gain feedback and you’ll gain new insights which might lead you to your next idea.

You don’t need a shitload of traffic. I honestly don’t have boatloads of traffic. There are days when even less than 100 people visit my site. But it doesn’t matter because I’ve found a form of generating income that doesn’t depend on traffic. Freelance work can’t possibly be the only thing that doesn’t depend on traffic. I’d love to get more ideas from you guys about other revenue generation methods that don’t count on traffic.

The Income Streams

Built a blog for a client($200.00): Through a simple ad on craigslist, I got hired to build a very simple Wordpress blog for a client. You may not realize it, but if you’ve run your blog for about 3 or 4 months you already have a skill set that you can cash in on. There are so many new blogs launched every day and plenty of people who are willing to pay you for this.

Social Media Consultant($500.00): This is also a part time gig that I landed through craigslist. It’s a recurring revenue stream. The client is called Bio Ionic Haircare.  What I do for them? I maintain their Facebook fan page, run their promotions and contests and give them ideas for how to grow their fan base.  Basically, I get paid 500 bucks to do for them what I do for my blog.

There is however one major flaw in the way I’m generating revenue. It doesn’t scale and it isn’t very well suited for lifestyle design. The income is not passive so it doesn’t set up my life so I can get paid while I hang out at the beach and surf. So, my next goal is to do more work on identifying passive income streams.