photo credit: lecates

I’ve been thinking about what I should write next. It can be my argument with a friend last week, my experience in networking with some friends, my tendency to rush things or put too many things together, my book that I read, or the thing that has bugged my mind the most recently.

Writing is a good opportunity for me to reflect and learn. I’m happy that the past month I can be productive again. I can actually blog much more often, faster, and easier. It is the big lesson I learned during the past month. I wish I can make it as a reason to stay writing, unfortunately it does not go along with the lesson I want to learn this month.

I am coping rather than producing. Writing is good habit, and unless I can put more commitment into both networking and writing, I may not go far. It’s good to have it as journal, but I don’t want it to distract what I’m pursuing this month. It’s the first reason I decided to go on hiatus (a new word I’m learning online), an inactive state of blogging temporarily, while I focus on some other thing in my life.

Do I stop learning as well?

No, of course not. Our life is called the school of life. And I have to learn to go to the next class. I was thinking to use this blog to share the journey I’m taking as well. Unfortunately, the lesson I want to learn is also not something I can comfortably share in this blog. That is the second reason why I decided not to blog for this moment. Unless I have passed this lesson and get something from it, I will not be able to share with you.

For the very least, I’ll be on hiatus this July. I’m taking holiday in the middle of the month as well. And I still have no idea what will August hold. Maybe I’ll continue writing, maybe not. Maybe I’ll create something, and in the due time, I’ll tell you guys. For this July, it’s action time!

Hope to see you again when I come back.

All the best,
Robert

photo credit: Veyis Polat

Who is Larry Wall? Many of you may not know who he is.

He is the father of Perl, a programming language that is more popular among system administrators. He created Perl in mid-1980s. You may never hear his work, but there is something we can learn from his life as a programmer and innovator.

Today I want to share the three attributes of innovators, inspired by Larry Wall as he is mentioned and described in the book Learning Perl, by Randal L. Schwartz, Tom Phoenix, & brian d foy (I don’t have any idea why the last name is written in lower case).

1) Be Lazy

Some people are so diligent working on the same thing over and over. Larry is not following that status quo, he is lazy. Larry was trying to produce some reports from a Usenet news (some kind of discussion forum which is a precursor of different web forums available nowadays). Being the lazy programmer as he is, he decided to overkill the problem with a generic solution, where he can also use it in at least one other place. This is the laziness that he also puts in the three virtues of programmers.

Laziness - The quality that makes you go to great effort to reduce overall energy expenditure. It makes you write labor-saving programs that other people will find useful, and document what you wrote so you don’t have to answer so many questions about it.
Larry Wall, Randal L. Schwartz and Tom Christiansen (Programming Perl)

2) Be Greedy

Larry created Perl because he wanted the advantages of both sides of programming language. On one side, it’s the low level programming (C or C++) which is hard to write, but fast and unlimited. On the other side, it’s high level programming (”shell” programming) that slow and limited but easier to code. Larry is not satisfied with either one of them. He chose to create something that will incorporate the strength of those two. And Perl is born, easy, nearly unlimited, mostly fast and kind of ugly.

3) Be Ugly

Larry knew very well what he want to create through Perl. He chose to trade off certain thing for the goal he pursued. He knew that he could not please all people. When he had to make a trade off between features that make programmer’s life easier but make it more difficult for student to learn, he will pick the programmer’s side.

Perl has many conveniences that let programmers save time. And that results in how Perl looks ugly for the beginners. If you’re not an experienced Perl programmer, you will need some time to understand all the code and shortcuts. Perl is symbolized as a camel. Camel is kind of ugly too, but they work hard. Camel gets the job done even in a tough conditions like the desert, even if it looks ugly and smells worse, or sometimes even spit at you.

Concluding Thought

The three virtues of programmers (laziness, pride, and hubris/excessive pride) have the similar characteristics to those I’m sharing above.

Yes, it’s not all the attributes needed as an innovator, but they exactly represent the  attributes that not many people consider as virtue. Larry has turned the limitations to advantages. They have become something beneficial to Larry’s life as programmer and innovator.

Despite of the laziness, Larry took pride and believed in his solution. He worked hard at it. He introduced the Perl to the community of users. And that is followed by a number of feedbacks and questions. Larry did not grow weary on responding but he consistently grew his work on Perl.

Now Perl is widely recognize, installed in nearly every system in use today, thousands of pages of online documentation, dozens of books and several main streams of newsgroups and discussions. It’s the fruit of what Larry Wall has worked in.

Innovating,
Robert

photo credit: kevindooley

Do you know what surprised me recently? It’s the number of my RSS subscribers. I couldn’t believe it that in two weeks after I re-launched the new theme, the subscribers number goes from below 200 to 253 the day I wrote this article.

I’ve secretly made a goal of reaching 200 subscribers by the end of last year. But as you know, I didn’t make it. The number is fluctuating around 180-190. It’s hardly increased, and new subscribers are almost always accompanied by other unsubscribed readers. So it’s indeed really surprised me that the number jumped so high. I even thought that it might have been some technical glitch, or changes in how Feedburner counts the subscribers.

What else surprised me? It’s the ‘churning’. I mentioned ‘churning’ during the theme re-launch a few weeks ago. It’s how I wanted to reduce the ‘quality’ to increase quantity and creativity. It really works.

I posted my recent articles earlier than usual. I’ve already scheduled the post one to two days earlier. It has never happened before. I’ve always rushed to finish my article on the day I’m publishing my article. This time I really made some difference. I’m less stressed and not rushed for the deadline. Instead of a burden, I found blogging as opportunity. Each post is an opportunity. What opportunity?

1. Opportunity for a table topic session

If you know Toastmasters, you should have known table topic. It’s the impromptu speech. With a random topic given, you have to give a short speech 1-2 minutes long. It’s a short speech, so it has to have opening, body, and conclusion.

More or less, it’s the way I wrote down most of my articles I wrote recently. With an instant topic at hand, I was trying to come out with a short article. It’s the room rearrangement, for example. Or how I spent my traveling time thinking of my next speech. It’s something I never thought that it can become an article by itself.

I must thank Scott H Young for the ‘churning’. In a way, it’s also a table topic practice for me. Of course I have more time in writing than giving a speech, but at least it’s getting faster for me to think and form my thought into words. Even more, organizing them into a useful message.

2. Opportunity to let go perfectionism

It’s the tendency I have, to come back at what I have written and edit. The motive behind is looking for perfection. Most of the articles I’m writing the past 1-2 weeks are those that I wrote not with my computer, but with pen and paper. It’s a new experience for me.

I used to write only the main points with pen and paper. But nowadays, I tried to push myself to write out the whole paragraph; exactly those I wanted to share with you in this blog. I still need to edit, but at least I edited less, and I tried to become more satisfied with what I have written.

Writing with pen and paper has its advantage. First, you write faster. Second, I can write anywhere. Often I write while traveling, hence I will have little distraction. And third, you don’t have much choice to edit what you have written. It’s exactly what I needed, to write more and edit less.

In a way, writing with pen and paper has taught me to let go perfectionism. I don’t have to be a perfect writer after all. In fact I can be human.

The minute you start being more of a person and less of a knowledgeable robot, the easier it will be for your audience to find you, trust you, and like you.
~Johnny Truant (Copyblogger) - The Real Secret to Becoming a Popular Blogger

3. Opportunity to tell story

Did you watch the movie Ghost of Girlfriends Past? I like the movie. It’s fun and it taught me something. It inspired me that love takes courage. I think I have known the principle all along, but there is one element that makes it more impressive, it’s the story.

I believe story can teach us better than mere principles. And yes, story-telling needs some skill and confidence. In Toastmasters, there is a project on story-telling. It’s quite an advanced project, and I seldom used it in my speech. At least for me, story-telling needs practice. And I do find that an article can become a story-telling project.

I have started telling you a bit of my story and my activities. In a way it also surprised me that I can put morale and inspiration that might be useful for you. While writing about them, I can also reflect on the decisions I took and be thankful for them. It’s rather important to me as I could be quite critical with my own decisions and mistakes. It may not be the perfect ones, but at the very least I can be happy with it, learn from them, see the future rather than the past.

Concluding thought

You can say I’m an opportunist.

I’m taking even the writing experience in this blog as opportunities to grow and stretch myself. You can say that the posts I recently wrote are speech-like articles. One with a short opening, few pointers of main message, and a closing thought. At least for now, I enjoy them as opportunities, to improve my thinking, expression, and story-telling skill.

Now it’s your turn, have you turned your mundane activities into something useful? Put some meaning, or maybe do something differently. Look at the other aspect of your life, and see if that can be helpful. Maybe there are some hidden opportunities waiting for you.

All the best,
Robert

photo credit: arquera

I am preparing for another Toastmaster (public speaking) project on 30th of June. And this time, the project is about Persuading with Power. I was thinking about a topic to share about in my next speech, and GTD came out.

Getting Things Done is the topic I have shared earlier in my previous project. This time I am going to repeat the same message with different structure and purpose. Basically, I’m integrating the lessons I have learned from the earlier speech. These are some of them.

1. Simplify

Recently, while searching for a quote from Timothy Ferris on Four-Hour Work Week, I came across the comparison between the two productivity teachings from Clay Collins. Over there GTD sounded like the one disadvantaged. Look at the diagram provided there and you can see how complicated it is.

The lost faces, that’s what I saw from the audience while presenting GTD. Partly, it was the problem with the visual aid I brought. But I believe that the bigger part of the reason was the topic itself. GTD surely seems to be much more complicated for those who know about it for the first time. My earlier speech was built with a purpose to teach them GTD, every steps of it, even more with some software tips for them to start with.

I aimed for too many things for a speech delivered only within 5-7 minutes. Eventually I got none of them. This time, I have to simplify my speech. Accepting the time limitations that I have, I have to focus on one purpose. As this speech is about persuading with power, I’ll simplify my purpose not to teach GTD, but to get them interested in GTD.

2. Justify

If you watch the video of my earlier speech here, you’ll see that my audiences are pretty excited with the jump I make at the end of my speech. That is to emphasize the “Just Do It” part. The fun part of all, but it’s actually not my main message. My evaluator, Risyad pointed out that I should have got my audience excited much earlier in the message. It’s a good point, and this time I’ll use the idea.

I’ll start with the fun part, the “Just Do It”, a concept that is much more familiar to my audience. From there, I will need to appeal for the need of structure in spontaneity. It’s actually an idea from the book “Blink” from Malcolm Gladwell. “Just Do It”, no matter how fun it could be, it needs a structure to ensure that the “It” is the right thing. It’s not any “It” but the task that you have identified as the most appropriate next action you’ve got to make.

Why am I sharing this strategy to you?

First of all, I’d like to thank Michael Chang, one experienced Toastmasters from NTU Alumni Club that has ever evaluated my speech. He didn’t only observe the speech I presented that day, he read through my history and pointed me my repetitive mistakes. It’s really an extra mile that not many evaluators will do.

Do you know what did he point out? It’s the tendency of putting too many messages in my speech. I have too much to tell in such a short speech. He asked me to simplify my message. And for that he asked me to focus on the purpose of my speech.

How will it apply to you? I hope that this will teach you one thing or two if you have a habit of giving speech. Find a Toastmasters Club near you if you’d like to improve your communication skill.

But more than that, I hope it will also appeal to you to simplify your life message. You can say it’s the focus in life, but you can also call it the serenity in life. If you’re not perfect in anything, it’s okay. You don’t have to. You’ve just got to simplify, because each of us has something to teach and share.

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Simplifying,
Robert

photo credit: MaZzuk

Last weekend, my room taught me a number of lessons. It all started with my old wardrobe, a fabric wardrobe (the first picture in the gallery below). Over 5 years of usage, it has degraded. The fabric is torn here and there, it is not zipped properly, slanted and it cannot stand properly. I’ve been hesitating to replace it until now. As I just renewed my room rental contract, I thought this is a good time to get me new furniture and rearrange my room. And more than a new room, the experience taught me a number of lessons. I’ll share three of them in this post.

1) It taught me to spoil myself

I’ve always been hesitating to buy new furniture. I only rent a room here in Singapore. Even though I’ve been staying in the same place for almost 5 years, I know that one day I will have to move. And I prefer not to have many furniture to bring.

One earlier example was my mattress. I replaced my old one a year ago. I’ve been using it for close to 7 years. It’s no longer comfortable yet I didn’t want to replace it. It took me my sister’s advice before I went and bought a new one. Otherwise, I might still persist on to sleep on my old mattress.

“For the world to treat you well, you have to treat yourself well.” That’s how a chapter on spoiling yourself started in Andrew Matthews’ book, Follow Your Heart (review). No one sees my room so I thought it should not be in the priority. I thought that I can live with it, so why bother spending. Even more, I dislike and worry with the idea of moving and bringing them around, which is actually still uncertain and it could be many years down the road.

If you have been saving too much, or getting worry of uncertain matters in the future, let’s evaluate them again. If you’ve been telling yourself to enjoy later, why can’t we enjoy our life now. You can feel the prosperity now, because…

Prosperity is not necessarily a money thing, it is a lifestyle thing.
~Andrew Matthews (Follow Your Heart (review))

2) It taught me to be creative

I went to IKEA last Saturday, a Swedish-origin furniture retailer, looking for a wardrobe. I decided that it had to be a common wardrobe, a wooden one with at least three doors. I don’t care if it’s hard to bring if I need to move, but I’m just tired of having a fabric wardrobe and I really need to get a wooden one.

“Unfortunately“, IKEA is not only a furniture store. It’s a place of ideas, hundreds or maybe thousands of them. They offer you opportunity to be as creative as you can in organizing your house and office.

Its catalog introduced me with the open concept wardrobe, with no walls nor doors. It interested me. At least it has wooden base which is much stronger than fabric. It’s not too heavy if I need to move from my rented apartment. The concept comes with boxes as well. I can put all my clothes there and they will save me from the hassle of packing and unpacking if one day I need to move.

The idea excited me to find more items that I can use together with the open-concept wardrobe. I was looking for a possibility to use curtain, boxes that I can hang freely, and also some companion shelves.

My need brought me creativity. A limited budget, limited space, and limited weight that I prefer has taught me to find a number of items that I can put together for my desired piece of wardrobe.

Now let’s talk about our life. I believe it must come with both goals and limitations. They seem to be contradictory, but I believe they can complement each other. Your limitations might be there for a lesson. They have some lessons to teach, and you might take them as opportunities to be creative and overcome them.

God doesn’t give an overcoming life, God gives life as we overcome.
~Elder Barney Lau (CEFC), former Microsoft’s MD in Singapore

3) It taught me to let go perfectionism

I rented a study room here in Singapore. Now you know why I need to get my own wardrobe and mattress. But worse, it is actually a small room, smaller than a common room.

The new wardrobe I got is bigger than my old one, so I have to learn to fit it into my room. It took me a long time. I adjusted the position of my stuffs many times before I settled with one arrangement. Even then, now I also realized that I’m still not satisfied with it.

The experience taught me a number of lessons about my perfectionism. I desired too much structure and comfort that it steals me a lot of my time. I thought too much of the pro and cons when I put thing in a certain place. I changed my mind a lot. I confused myself and undo my decision pretty soon.

It took me some time before I realized that no matter how hard I tried, my room size is still a small one. I’ve got to live with it, at least for now.

Eventually I have to let go of some of my desires. My decision will always have trade-ins and I have to prioritize. I can’t get everything right in one shot, but I can stick longer with the decision I made, and as the time pass by, I can evaluate them again.

In software development, there is a concept of recursive development model. It’s development in a cycle. Briefly, it goes from requirement gathering, design, implementation, testing, user evaluation, and back to the first phase again.

The phases are repeated as we don’t expect to get everything right in one cycle. More importantly, the model gets the development going. It saves us time. Even better, with the constant evaluation, we can provide what our client really need.

Let’s talk about our life now. With the limitations you have, I believe the decision is not always the right one. They have flaws, but as you move, you will see how it progress. From there, you may need to re-evaluate your decision. A mistake will help you to learn better than fear and worry.

Ask forgiveness, not permission.
~Timothy Ferris (Four-Hour Work Week)

Concluding thought

Let’s now imagine the room is your life. How has it teach you?

Let’s talk about the first lesson above. Have you treated yourself well all along? Have you loved yourself enough so that you can love others? Or did you throw in more critics and disappointments all the time?

And now, if you have needs, dreams and desires, have you worked on them? Have you used your creativity? You may not come out with the perfect one, but have you started with some actions?

Yes, it could be a struggle, like the cat in the following video (All Tangled Up video). Yet the struggle can bring a little piece of happiness. The ball of yarn you’re struggling with right now can become a piece of clothes that can put a smile on your face.

So don’t give up!
Robert

Oh, and by the way, these are some pictures of my wardrobe and room =).

photo credit: Crystl

There is one event I was invited, a farewell for a minister in a campus organization I was actively involved before. I am not sure if I will come to the farewell party, as I do not know him very well. So I went to the Facebook event where I’m asked to RSVP. And I’m the first person who put it neither “Attending” nor “Not Attending”. I put my answer as “Maybe Attending”.

Maybe? That sounds like a lame response. It’s so uncertain, so irresponsible, so uncommitted. People say that it’s not good to say I try, you better say I will or I won’t. If earlier I was reading that consistency is overrated, today I also want to say certainty is overrated.

Why is that okay for you to say “Maybe”?

1) Say “maybe” for its possibility

When you become comfortable with uncertainty, infinite possibilities open up in your life.
~Eckhart Tolle - A New Earth (review)

Even GTD has a “maybe/someday” category. Why does that matters? It’s for your benefit. The possibility that it brings may benefit you. The category is useful for the things you want to reassess in the future. Having the list is very useful. First, it frees up your mind on the things that you don’t know or not sure how to decide right now. Second, filling up the list with your ideas and wish list you can think of will bring much wider possibility. Even David Allen in his book, Getting Things Done (review), mentioned that the list can add wonderful adventure in our life and work.

2) Say “maybe” for upcoming opportunity

I had another invitation coming, slightly earlier than the farewell party. It’s an invitation to become a speech evaluator at IPA (Indonesian Professional Association) Toastmaster meeting. It will be difficult for me to accept the invitation if I have committed to the party earlier. I decided to went for the Toastmaster meeting, as I think I can do something better there. With the opportunity, I’d like to build relationship and network with other Indonesian people that have similar interest, building communication and leadership skill.

That’s exactly my point. With a maybe list, you can open your schedule for upcoming opportunity, and it gives you the freedom to choose and prioritize. Learn to live with a buffer. If you have too much commitment, you will not be able to stay open with more important thing that may come out later.

3) Say “maybe” for your productivity

I have been interested with many productivity books. The Now Habit by Neil Fiore (review) and The Power of Less by Leo Babauta (review) are some of them. Both of them emphasizes that we works best when we work in the flow condition. Neil Fiore said that it’s the time when we’re working more with right brain rather than left brain, the place where your creativity and imagination flows.

It’s true, when I work in flow condition (like right now when I’m writing this article), your idea flows, and you seems to be able to do more than you think. Often the issue is to start, often it’s the hard part, but once you’re in the flow condition, it’s hard to stop. Okay, I’m sure you got the point, but how is that related with the “maybe”?

Leo takes a further step to ensure that he makes the full use of his flow condition. He suggested to make as few appointments as possible. The fewer commitment you have, the more you have time for the more important thing that matters to you. And that means the more you have opportunity to work on them in ‘flow’ mode.

Concluding Thought

Decide well, what do you want? Don’t say maybe for the things that matter to you more. Put the whole commitment into it, but not for other possible distraction. Remember, you cannot please everyone! You can always deny them, but consider the maybe if you can reassess in the future. Even more if you think it’ll bring possibility in your life. Answering “maybe”, despite of all the limitation it seems, may have advantage that you will see. The above are some of them.

Do you have any thought? Maybe you want to share them?

I will try to respond to them,
Robert

photo credit: lepiaf.geo

Why only three? Okay, it seems to be much fewer than many list of productivity in the blogosphere. I can always come out with more but a list article has not always been my favorite. And more than that it’s exactly relevant to the first point I want to share.

1. Less quality

Or in a better word, change your perspective of the quality standard that you need.

I’m taking an example of how I wrote this article. Who said that only a list with a lot of points is a better article? Fewer points per article can help me to generate more articles. It is churning as what Scott H Young called it.

If your quality threshold is too high, you’ll kill many great solutions before they have time to incubate. Sometimes an idea takes time to develop, before it can become an adequate solution. Churning allows those ideas to grow for a time before they are prematurely stopped.
~Scott H Young (How to Increase Your Creative Output)

More than that, Toastmasters International has taught me to stay with a maximum of 3 points per message I deliver. Why? With the limited time that it gives (approximately 5-7 minutes for most speech), it’s the number of points you can deliver effectively. And more importantly, your audience must be able to grab the message, to digest them, and even better, to persuade/inspire them to make actions.

2. Less quantity

If you’ve been wondering where I’ve been missing last month, I’m practicing an idea that Leo Babauta shared in his book The Power of Less (review). It’s called the 3 projects rule. List 3 of your most important projects and do them. Don’t add any more projects before you finish ALL of them.

Why only 3 projects? Again it’s the power of less quantity; the idea helps you to focus. Taking on too many projects will be useless if you end up starting but not finishing most of them. Leo also emphasized on finishing all three projects before you can take up another one. You can take any exception, and the best, you can’t keep on procrastinating the project that you dislike.

In my case, that project was my Java certification that I’ve been procrastinating for almost a year. Once I made the step to seriously working on them, focusing my time on them, I can actually complete them in only two weeks. Even more I can take the next step in the certification.

When you have no choice but doing them, you’ll be amazed that things that what you’ve been procrastinating for can actually be completed in less time than you’ve always thought of.

3. Less brainy

If this is really the brain of Homer Simpson, no wonder he makes so much action. Often, they are silly and stupid, but the point is that he’s doing it.

I was presenting on GTD (Getting Things Done) last weekend. My purpose was to introduce and persuade my audience to practice GTD. You can watch it here. Warning: Reading the next paragraph may spoil the fun of watching.

The message did not come across pretty well, the power point was not clear enough and the worst, I was nervous. I lost confidence in my message as I thought that my audience was thinking that GTD is too complicated. I was getting too brainy in thinking that my subject is too brainy for my audience.

Thankfully, I included the last step, the “Just Do It” step. I jumped and caught the attention of my audience more than the other. And at the end, I got the best prepared speech speaker award for the evening.

I don’t despise GTD. It’s been very helpful to me, especially GTD inbox for Gmail that I’ve been using. My problem is the paralysis of analysis. Often there comes a time to be confident with the decision you picked earlier and just do it. Even if sometimes it may make you look stupid like Homer Simpson.

Concluding thought

Here they are, the three “less” for more productivity:  less-quality to generate more, less-quantity to focus on things that matter more, and less-brainy to do what you have decided to do. Again, it’s turning limitation into advantages. Less is not always less, less has its power, and often, less is more!

For more things about the power of less… read The Power of Less by Leo Babauta (review).

Less-ing for more,
Robert

photo credit: mike138

A year ago, I’m writing with a theme for introvert. The tagline called “Turning limitation into advantages, helping introverts to be successful.” Time went on and I changed to another theme, “The happiness in success journey”. I switched because I felt that it’s an excuse for me to stay with limitations.

Yet, in the past one year, I’ve been secretly regretting the decision. A desire to share more related with introversion and limitation are still there. Maybe you can say that I want to be a friend for the weak. Things related with some limitation that is turned into something useful always attracts my attention.

Today, 8th of June 2009, I’m launching a new theme for Reason-4-Smile, a subject back to the Turning Limitation into Advantages. What limitation? Maybe it’s introversion, but I guess it’ll be more than that. Right now the one that changed is only the blog banner. I’ll still have more things to do for the rebranding, like my about page and twitter page.

The Consistency…

How about consistency? I guess it’s the big flaw of this blog and its writer =). I’ve not been very consistent in themes, for both web design and its content. Until recently I read about one article from Scott H Young (again) titled ‘Consistency is an Overrated Virtue‘. There are advantages in inconsistency, so I’ll just follow what my heart says right now. If there is something I want to be consistent of, it’s to grow, even if sometimes, that requires inconsistency.

A more worthwhile form of consistency is striving to be internally consistent. This is where your actions match your deeper values. This is the consistency which discipline, persistence and integrity are derived from.
~Scott H Young (Consistency is an Overrated Virtue)

The Commitment…

If you want to grow, observe not your greatest failure, but your most frequent failure. One that often troubled me is my tendency for perfection. I set my aim for a very high quality of article. And this… has always become a hurdle for me to generate more articles.

One moment, one inspiration, and it took me three to four days to make the article. It occupied my mind, it troubled me, it stopped me from learning and the worst, it made me unable to create more articles for this blog. So I want to create more, pardon me if some of them sounds garbage to you. But I believe it can unleash a better idea I have in mind.

The fastest way to increase your creative output is simply to lower your quality threshold. If you allow yourself to produce garbage, you’ll create a lot more. Churning is an excellent strategy for boosting output, especially when you get frequently stuck.
~Scott H Young (How to Increase Your Creative Output)

Two articles that influence me yesterday…

• Consistency is an Overrated Virtue - http://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2009/05/25/consistency-is-an-overrated-virtue/
• How to Increase Your Creative Output - http://www.scotthyoung.com/blog/2009/05/19/how-to-increase-your-creative-output/

So… what’s inside the book?

Sales are about personal growth. This is what Corinne is emphasizing in her book. Any human relationship involves sales. All of us are salesmen. From finding a job to parenting, you will need influencing and sales skill. This personal growth is what Corinne presented in her book.

In summary, these are the chapters in the book…

One  -        Loving the People
Two  -       Scared to Death and Ready to Go
Three -      Change – Is It Time?
Four -        Appreciation
Five -        Complaints
Six -         The Crazies
Seven -     Argument For One – How to Win
Eight -      Got A Minute?
Nine -       The Hot Button?
Ten -         Closing the Deal
Eleven -    Let the Cat Come to You
Twelve -   The Blahs – Business Burnout
Thirteen -  Client Profiles – Secret Tips
Fourteen - Writing Your Way to a Decision
Fifteen -   Looking for a Job?
Sixteen -    Just Shut Up! (for a while)
Seventeen - Ask for the Money
Eighteen - The Big Idea – When to Bail out
Nineteen - What else do you want to do when you grow up?
Twenty -   When You‘ve Lost Your Job

The book has chapters on variety of topics. It’s a compilation of short essays on tips and tricks; suggestions to improve your relationships especially towards sales and selling. Some chapters are helpful to find jobs, some others in dealing with difficult people (such as the crazies). Some deals with pushing the sales, while some deals with personal growth and better attitude towards people.

Corinne has been trained for many years in sales. She is a sales trainer for fifteen years, and she has travelled several life paths - from business owner to sales trainer, author, lecturer, poet, TV producer, media coach, and blogger. The variety of experiences she had can be seen through the variety of topics she is presenting. I’m glad she is writing this book, sharing her collective wisdom from her life and career. I hope you can enjoy them as well. Here is the link to get the book… Sales Lies and Naked Truths.

Selling Corinne’s book,
Robert

photo credit: kwerfeldein

What if we can turn our limitation into advantages?

For readers that have been following me long enough will know that I used to have “turning limitation into advantages” as the big theme of this blog.

Today, I want to share something along that line, especially in relation to productivity tricks. The tricks are mostly inspired by the book The Now Habit by Neil Fiore (review). This article will cover three limitations that we might always tell ourselves regarding productivity, and how we can use them for our advantages. Let’s start with the first one…

1. I don’t like to work, I like to play…

Do you always wait for Friday? TGIF is always on your mind when it’s Friday. If work seems to be a burden to you and you like to play, here is the good news. Productivity is not always about work, but it’s also about play. Yes, you don’t get me wrong. Guilt-free play is an important aspect of productivity suggested by Neil Fiore.  Not only to have balance, but as a reward.

We procrastinate when we think we don’t have time to play. In result, we play to procrastinate. Now, the trick is simple, you play and you must tell yourself that you will play. The play should not come before your work as a reason to procrastinate, but as a reward after completing some non-distracted works.

2. I don’t like structure or schedule, I like to cheat rules…

It’s exactly the idea behind the trick Neil recommends, The Unschedule. Most people can’t stick with many productivity tips because they can’t stick long enough with the habit or rules they are creating. Let’s imagine… what if the one we are breaking is our play time and we use it for our work?

Neil is using that inclination as a reverse psychology to boost our productivity. The trick is called The Unschedule. It works by scheduling your play time first while limiting your work time. Later on, we just have to focus on starting our work whenever we have free time. Neil suggested that it has to be at least 30-minutes blocks of non-distracted time. It’s not too short to complete something, but not too long to discourage us to start.

This trick is aimed to put more time into your leisure and more quality into your work. But more than that, it also builds up a subconscious desire to work more and play less.

3. I’m good at starting, but not good at finishing…

Are you good at starting and not good at finishing? It could be the problem of will and persistence. It could also be fear of completing with mistakes, failures, and imperfection. So, maybe we also have to change our perspective from finishing into starting, just like what I quoted from Neil below…

Finishing will take care of itself. When it is time to start the last thirty minutes that will finish the project, that too will be an act of starting-the start of the conclusion of your current project, as well as the beginning of your next. So forget about finishing. If you must worry, worry about starting. In order to finish, all you have to do is to just keep starting.
~Neil Fiore, Ph.D. - The Now Habit (review)

It’s not the matter of finishing, but the matter of starting. If your life has become a series of starting, the completion of the project will come eventually.

What if I have failed before….

photo credit: TheGiantVermin

If I had to live my life again, I’d make the same mistakes, only sooner.
– Tallulah Bankhead

A journey to productivity is not an easy journey. Setbacks and disappointments are something we will normally face in life, but that should not be the excuse not to start and procrastinate further. You’ve got to be fearless to make mistakes, and even more to pick yourself up…

A mistake will not be the end of the world because I won’t let it be. I will pick myself up and will try again-regardless of how embarrassed or hurt I feel.
~Successful people according to Neil Fiore, Ph.D.

It may seem to be a long way to go, but you can always start, you can always focus on one step at a time…

If I think too much about reaching the finish line I lose speed, whether I’m ahead or behind. I’ve had to train myself to turn my attention away from finishing and toward the next step, the process of staying in the race.
~an Olympic runner mentioned by Neil Fiore, Ph.D. (The Now Habit)

If you are afraid of completing, then tell yourself to start again… it’s just another 30 minutes. The art of completing is just starting… when you start, you break the inertia, and you will flow.

Keep starting,
Robert

And lastly, a gift for you, here is a wonderful song from Jordin Sparks: One Step at A Time (buy CD)