Are You Staring At Me?

As a digital nomad I get to work in public places a lot, especially coffee shops. Every once in a while I run into some mild problems, but, usually, nothing really serious. Until the other day. Sit down, relax, and make sure you don’t read this in a coffee shop too

The Premises

So, here I am, on a nice Monday morning, unpacking my laptop over a nice small table at my favorite Starbucks, arranging my cup of tea and plugging in the cable. Around, a few people at their own tables, most of them with their own laptops, tapping silently. Soft music, nice light, a perfect atmosphere for working.

I’m at the first floor (this Starbucks has two floors, and the top one is less crowded) and, at this exact moment, a young fellow, with a hoodie on, jumps over the stairs, looks at the toilet door (which was closed) and then turns at me. He smiles and waves, almost greeting me. A microsecond of browsing through my (I admit, quite large) database of persons that I know and a definitive result: I don’t know this guy. I politely look over him, while he came forward and take a sit on a bench just in front of me. 2-3 meters maximum. He must wait for the toilet, I presume.

Confusions happens, I tell to myself, then I start working. After a few minutes, a gentle sensation over my forehead interrupts me. I get this sometimes, when people are looking at me. I take my eyes out from the computer and, surprise, the young fellow is still there, staring at me. The toilet door was open, so he must’ve already been there, I think. I browse through my internal database again, only to get the same result: I definitely don’t know this guy. And yet there he is, smiling and looking at me. The hoodie is off, it’s getting warm.

I get back to my computer and continue to work. But not for long. My forehead sensation was still there. I take my eyes off from the laptop and this time I make eye contact. The same second he slips his look over me, avoiding eye contact. Hmm… I gently look around, take a tea sip and there it is again, with the corner of my eye I see him staring at me again. I try eye contact again and then he avoids it again.

Around, business as usual. Nobody seemed to perceive nothing strange. They either thought this guy is with me (somehow), or his behavior looked quite normal.

At this point, I started to identify the whole situation with some sort of a problem. I can’t really work when somebody is staring at me. So, I started to evaluate the possible reasons for this. After a few seconds, I identified 3 possible causes.

1. He’s probably gay. And really, really lonely.

Not much to do about this, I’m straight so I may just tell him that.

2. I’m on candid camera.

I’m turning around looking for places where they could hide a camera. Trying to figure out which of the people at the tables were accomplices. After a few minutes of gazing, I had to admit I wasn’t on candid camera. Nobody looked like a candid camera crew (I worked for a while in television, so I kinda sense this stuff). Also, on candid camera, at some point they come at you and tell: “Hey, man, you’re on candid camera!”. This guy didn’t. He just continued to look at me.

2. He must be on ecstasy.

As far as I could tell, his eyes were ok, didn’t notice any shaking or other strange movements, so he didn’t seem like he was on drugs. I’m not too experienced at this, though, so I didn’t rule it out completely.

As I was still trying to find out the number 4 reason, all of a sudden he gets out, turns on his heels and down he goes, over the stairs. He just left. I confess I had a huge relief breathe and gently came back to my work. Incidentally, it was one of those days when I had a full plate, so to speak, so there was a lot to be done.

After a few minutes, the foreground sensation again. Ok, somebody is looking at me again, I’m saying to myself. Who could it be? In front of me, the bench was empty. Another short relief breathe and then I turn to the right. And there he was again, the hoodie fellow, with a cup of tea and a sandwich, on the bench next to me. Not more than one meter between us now.

I felt a bit of an emptiness in my stomach and then instinctively looked to my screen, not understanding one thing of what I was looking at, but desperately trying to understand what was going on.

The Interaction

It must have been more than a half an hour since I was at that Starbucks, so I decided to tackle this somehow. I suddenly turn to the right, and this time he can’t avoid eye contact anymore.

“Can I help you?” I ask upfront. Trying not to be angry, just polite.

“Oh, no, not at all.” he shivers, looking surprised that I actually opened up a conversation with him. Like he didn’t expected this to happen. The he continues to stare at me.

“Are you sure?” I ask again, this time a little bit angry.

“Oh, yes! I’m absolutely sure.” he answers, somehow realizing that he must’ve been on some sort of a faux pax. And then he looks the other way. I stay turned for around 10 seconds and I make sure he won’t stare at me anymore. And, apparently, it worked.

I get back to my work, but only with half of my focus now. I still sense this guy, no more than one meter away from me, watching his cup of tea, eating his sandwich and staring randomly around. Every once in a while at me, too, but this time he looked a bit more controlled.

At this point, one of my partners in WPSumo came in (we had to finish something together) and, being already cautious, I invite him to sit down on my bench, between me and that guy. Of course, my partner has no idea about what’s going on and I decide not to tell.

We start working, but, after ten minutes or so, I suddenly see my partner’s eyes growing bigger and bigger behind his glasses. He elbows me pointing to that bench: “Have you seen this guy? He’s sleeping”. I lean forward and there he is, the hoodie guy, on his left side, one hand under his head, knees almost to the chest, in the embryo position. He didn’t look completely asleep, but hey, he was still lying down on a Starbucks bench.

The next second he rolls over his back, face up and then his hands are starting a strange dance in the air. Very, very slowly, he was picking objects and then rearranging them in other places. Invisible objects, of course. Think Tom Cruise in Minority Report, only sitting on his back. The other people on the room started to notice this. Some of theme were smiling, some of theme were pointing their fingers to the head: “he must be screwed up there”. But that didn’t seem to stop that slow, almost hypnotic dance.

At this point, a waitress came in, starting to clean up tables. As I know her (I do spend a lot of time there, so we kinda have small conversations every once in a while), I ask her upfront:

“What’s up with this guy?”

“Oh, I guess nothing”, she replies. After that, she leans forward to see the slow Minority Report dance and adds, just a bit worried: “Well, I hope nothing. It’s just… how he is. Does he bothers you?”

I decided to answer “no” to this question. We went on with our work, finished what we had to do like in 20 minutes and split. I could’ve stay longer, but, somehow, the staring guy, as inoffensive as he was, made me not to.

The Hoodie Guy And The Goals

As I was heading home, I tried to understand what was that bothered me so much about this encounter. After all, like the waitress pointed out, he was harmless. He was just staring at me. A simple presence, just a look, a harmless surveillance.

And the moment I found the word “surveillance”, it hit me: it was the pressure of the expectations. I didn’t know exactly what this guy was asking from me. But, somehow, I was afraid I couldn’t deliver. As simple as it was, that was the exact thing that made me feel so uncomfortable. If I wouldn’t feel that I had to do something in a certain way, I wouldn’t be bothered at all. I might’ve even look back at him for hours too. Or stare at the walls.

Almost frightened, as I was walking back home, I realized how many times I did this, not outside, with other people, but inside, in my own mind. How many times I created an observer, a person who was expecting me to act in a certain way, only to get completely stuck when he was staring at me too much.

How many times I created bold goals, literally creating dozens of hoodie guys, bringing them into my own room, and making them stare at me, until I was delivering. And celebrating big time after that.

There is a certain weight in establishing bold goals. There is a certain (unnecessary) pressure in creating bigger and bigger standards. The bigger the standard, the longer the gaze of the hoodie guy. At some point, you kinda get fed out with all that staring and just walk away.

Sometimes, we just need a balanced interaction between our goals and our resources. Too many hoodie guys in the room will make you feel uncomfortable. The pressure will be too big. And, at some point, you’ll give up.

It’s way better to negotiate your goals every once in a while. Like in telling the hoodie guy to just give you a break. And then secretly watch him arrange invisible objects with his hands while you get on with other stuff.

Now, quit staring at this blog post. It’s embarrassing

5 Good Reasons To Share Your Goals. And One Powerful Reason Not To

Goals are great. They are like lights on your path, marking with clarity various milestones one your journey. And goal setting, believe me, is an art. The art of properly setting course to your closest destination, making the best of your resources and with the greatest chances of success.

One of the most important chapters in any goal setting book would be about sharing. About making your goals visible. Making them public, verifiable, open. And since this is a very important part of the whole goal setting artistry, let’s talk about 5 reasons you should share your goals (once you have them clearly defined, of course). But I’ll also talk (at the end, of course, so don’t peek) about one reason you shouldn’t do this. Confused? Good. Because that will – hopefully – make you read on.

Let’s go.

1. Accountability

Sharing your goals helps big time with this. If you’re telling to a friend: “you know what, I will travel to Thailand this summer”, you can bet that the next time you see each other, he’ll ask: “hey, buddy, how’s your trip to Thailand going?”. Or something along those lines.

Accountability is a measure of your “stick-to-it-ness“ (and please do not complain that this is not a word, I had enough from my spell checker already). So, if you bring other people in your goal picture, you can bet that your overall involvement in that project will be considerably higher.

2. Clarity

Every time you tell the world about some of your goals, you modify them. You take something from a discussion, something from another one, until, out of this ping-pong game of sharing your plans back and forth, your goal will emerge in a new form. Most of the time, this form will be a much clearer one.

In fact, many of our goals are shaped by our interactions, by our conversations or by our encounters. So, the more we’re out there, sharing our visions and implementing our plans, the more those visions and plans are getting clearer, bigger and more structured.

3. Progress Measurement

Progress measurement is not really about being accountable, but more about metrics. As you get closer to your goal, you’d want to measure how long do you have until you reach it. That information can be precious in many contexts. For instance, you may want to set up a new goal or to evaluate the resources you already used.

And sharing your goals will make progress measurement easier. Sometimes you may even deliberately use your peers as guides or supervisors. When you want to give up smoking, for instance. Ask them to cheer you every day you didn’t smoke or every week.

4. Motivation

Suppose you want to visit Italy this summer. And you start telling people about your goal. At some point, something interesting will happen. The mere fact that you tell to somebody else, will act like an incentive. It’s not about accountability, but about being pumped up and ready to act.

There are many ways of motivation, of course, some of them better than others. I think it’s ok to “use” other people like an enhancer of your own willpower, as long as you don’t become too dependent on these “help links”.

5. Connection

Sharing your goals with like minded people may help you grow your social circle. Goals aside, the mere fact that you take the time to share something, to give details, to bring updates and keep in touch with other people, all these tiny actions will create a connection.

And connection, as opposed to competition, is always a better way to advance. And if not better, at least not as tiresome as fighting each and every day for the first place.

***

But, as important as it may be, sharing goals can go just as far in helping you reaching them. In other words, there is a limit over which you shouldn’t trespass.

I don’t know if you’re going to find this in any goal setting book, but I know for sure it comes from a real life experience. My real life experience. And it’s about obfuscating your goals. Hiding them. Keeping them close to your heart, but far from the curious eyes.

Sometimes, in certain circumstances, the best way to go is to hide what you really want from anyone else, except you. And here’s why:

They Don’t Know Shit About You

Yeap, that’s the reason. Because, the moment you take out your goal, the moment you’re sharing it with the whole world, you create a loop. People will start to hold you accountable, (and, most of the time, that’s a good thing, as we saw right from the point one above). But it’s a good thing only to some extent. If you reach the goal, they’ll cheer at you. If you don’t, they’ll point fingers at you. Either way, you’re gonna create a reaction.

And that reaction is based not on who you are, but on what you want to do. Even more than that, the reaction is based on what other people perceive from what you want to do. And here’s how, based on just some assumptions and affirmations, they’ll start seeing in you a person that you’re certainly not. They will only see some stuff that has been done, in fact, not even a person.

But, in your attempt to really stick to your path, you take those cheers or fingers pointed at you quite seriously. You start to believe them. If you succeed, you’re a star, because they cheer at you. If you fail, you’re a loser, because they point fingers at you.

Now you see it? As important as it may be for your accountability, clarity and so on and so forth, this sharing thing may be handled with care. And you know why?

Because the most important person in the world is you. The universe turns round and round because of you. Each person that enters into your life, each achievement, each tiny thing you learn, all these are about you. There’s a whole world inside you, and what you do, feel and create in the outside world is a mirror of this inner world. And all your goals are part of you, not of them. You know better than anyone else what you should do with your life. Not your mother, not your wife, not some bright but shallow self-improvement guru, not me, the author of this blog.

So, if you found something important, really important, something that will define your entire life, some incredibly rewarding goal, keep it to yourself. Grow it like you grow a plant, with care and attention.

Follow this inner light each and every morning, hope that it will be there each and every day and, the moment you finally reach it, just breathe.

How To Catch A Bee

When I was a kid, one of my favorite distractions was catching bees. Before jumping to any conclusions, let me give you a little bit of the context around this sentence.

I grew up in a communist country, in a small city near the mountains. You didn’t have much to do in a small city from Romania, especially under a communist regime. All kids had to go to the same state kindergarten because their parents didn’t have any time to spend with them. And that was because they had to be away all day to build socialism, of course.

Although a very rough place to be for a kid, with not much affection or tenderness around, (not to mention the strict discipline and the terror of not saying what you want, by fear of the political police) the communist kindergarten helped me a lot. I’m sure that my will to become self-supported immediately after high-school had a lot to do with that. Also, my ability to survive in difficult conditions must have been built up during those years. But I’m getting a little bit ahead here. Let’s get back to our bees.

Playing Around

So, under this rather gray background, any activity that stood up as being different, or at least colorful, left a very deep mark. Catching bees was one of these activities.

We used to take an empty plastic tube, the ones that were used to keep small pills of C vitamin, took out the small plastic top (the tube was closed by applying a little bit of pressure on it) did a small hole in the top and then went out hunting.

The outside playgrounds on the state kindergarten were surrounded by small bushes. I suppose the initial intention was to have a “live fence” around the playgrounds, but they were just bushes. We were slowly approaching those bushes, sensing the vibration of hundreds of small insects, slowly and gently, trying to spot a bee.

When we spotted it, we were carefully approaching from one part the top and from the other part the tube, trying to catch the bee in the middle, right into the tube.

If our moves were smooth, if we were close enough, if we were fast enough and, of course, lucky enough, every once in a while we ended up with a bee caught in our small vitamin C tube.

That moment was magic. I still remember the thrill of it. That small insect was caught only by our actions. We did this. I couldn’t find any comparison for that. I know it sounds dumb, but in our little grey universe, that dumb activity was the only way to prove our assertiveness. And, as incredible as it may sound, our capacity of enjoying life.

Releasing The Bee

We weren’t into killing insects. Hence the small hole in the tube, to keep the air flowing in. We were into catching up something difficult to catch. And potentially dangerous.

The bees were buzzing inside the tubes for a few minutes, just enough for us to show them up to our colleagues. Oh, the moments we were finding out someone did catch a bee. The sudden aggregation of a human circle around you, the joy and admiration on the childish faces, the yelling and the joy. For milliseconds each bee catcher became a local hero.

After that, the bee had to be released back into the open. Releasing the bee was a very important part of the game. You couldn’t hold a bee forever in your vitamin C tube. You just couldn’t do this, it was against the rules. You had to go out and catch a new bee every day.

There were some kids who wouldn’t obey that rule. They were carrying their bees in their vitamin C tubes each and every day. In all honesty, those kids weren’t very popular. As a matter of fact, we used to make fun of them. “Is that the 100 year old bee in your tube?”. “Still sleeping together?”. “Are you married already?” Eventually, they had to release their bees too and get back into the game.

The Adult Perspective

One day, our parents spotted this game.

“What are you doing there kids?”, they asked.

“We are catching bees”, we answered.

“Oh, I see that, but what is the benefit of this game? Are you building a house for those bees?”

“Nope, we’re just catching bees.”

“Are you killing the bees? Oh, you want to clean the fence from insects?”

“Nope, we’re just playing.”

After we went like this for like ten minutes, we realized that they just couldn’t understand the game. For them, that bee had to have a meaning. Do something with it. Use it somehow.

For us, just catching the bee and releasing it back into the open was enough.

Oh, the thrill when someone was catching a big one! The joy on our faces and then the smooth and necessary releasing of the bee back into the open. Those were magic moments. Did I say that already? Yes, I did. But that’s ok.

Today

I still catch bees these days. I still do things only for the thrill of it, without any immediate benefit. Or specific usage.

I support my friends if I can. I support other people if I can. I set up some goal and then reach it and then forget about it.

I make insane amounts of money and then release it back into the open, letting myself broke. And start again. And again.

Many of my friends don’t understand this. To be honest, I don’t really care. I may listen to their concerns, because, well, we’re friends, and that’s what friends are doing. But when it comes to that question: “So, you really don’t regret letting that bee fly away?”, I always answer “Nope, not a bit”.

Because I still have that thrill inside. I have my eagerness to pursue a new goal, I have the ability to reach it and the power to let it go after that.

Catching bees and releasing them back, as simple and dumb as it may seem, helped me not only to keep my mental health, but to act and react like any human being on this planet should.

Like a child.

Finding Your Inner Monkey

Following up my first post in 2011, in which I declared that all I want in 2011 is to tame twelve monkeys, a lot of friends or blog readers seemed to really pick up this notion. I received a lot of wishes in the form of “good luck with your monkeys” or something along those lines. People seemed to be nicely impressed with this approach.

But reading between the lines I realized that there might be a little bit of confusion surrounding this. As a matter of fact, I think there is a lot of confusion. People seem to think this is something rather funny. Well, it’s not something funny. It’s not like going to zoo on a Sunday afternoon. It’s a twelve months long challenge! Maybe using the word “monkey” made everybody think I’m just fooling around.

Well, I’m not. So I decided to write a separate blog post on this topic.

What Is A “Monkey”

An inner “monkey” is a drastically undeveloped part of yourself. You may think at it like a long term goal which was never attained. Or like a deeply buried dream you never dared to dream until the end. Or something you declared to yourself you’re going to follow up through, but never did.

A “monkey” is a goal frozen in its evolution. Like a genome which was never able to reach the human form. It was only strong enough to mimic its human shape but at the core level it’s just an unfinished project.

That’s the first part of a “monkey”. It’s about its lack of completion and unfinished nature. But there is more about it.

There is also this part which is wild and playful. Whenever you start dreaming at something you’re in a playful state. You don’t have constraints or deadlines. You’re just projecting a desired reality. You’re playing. Like a monkey jumping from one tree to another.

This wild nature of a monkey is something precious. In the first stages of any dream we have we’re enthusiastic and playful. Just like a monkey jumping around. That part is somehow lost until we eventually finish the project. Somewhere along the way we forget how to dream. We loose our initial enthusiasm. We may reach the human stage, but our inner “child” is dead.

Why Taming A “Monkey”

And here’s where my approach is different. I don’t want goals. Those goals will kill the initial playful phase. Will take away the enthusiasm. I don’t want to transform that monkey into a human being. All I want is to tame it. To make that monkey obey my wishes and commands. But at the same time to keep its playful nature and to fool around with it, if this is what I want. It’s like having a pet. A monkey pet.

Goals are ok. Reaching goals is a very fulfilling thing to do. I myself wrote dozens of posts on goal reaching. But taming monkeys is something completely different. It’s an attempt to complete and refine that underdeveloped part of yourself, but at the same time to keep its wild, playful and enthusiastic nature.

How To Identify A “Monkey”

Theory is nice, but let’s get practical. How to identify a monkey? Well, this is what I use. It’s just a list of 5 simple questions.

1. Is It Something That Is Dragging Around For A Long Time?

For instance, you cannot say you’re having a “monkey” if you just started a new, exciting project. That’s not a monkey because it’s too “young”. A monkey should have a long evolution within yourself.

2. Is It Something Inspiring?

It cannot be close to your real nature if it’s not inspiring you. Take the time to think at it for a while. If it’s a very precious dream you had, something that is making you smile when you think at it, then you’re on.

3. Is It Something That You’re Afraid To Take Action On?

Sometimes, those unfinished parts of ourselves seem to be suspended in a realm of non activity. It’s like you’re afraid to take action on it because it will break the pleasure of just dreaming about it. Well, if that’s the case, you got yourself a monkey.

4. Is It Something Personal?

It’s gotta be personal. It’s gotta be something that is somehow inside of you. Originated within your deepest, most personal layer. If it’s just a task you’re avoiding to do at your job, well, that’s not a monkey. It’s plain ol’ procrastination.

5. Is It Something That You’ll Still Enjoy Having After You’ll “Finish” It?

Remember that you’re going to manage that monkey. If it’s just something you want “now” and forget about it, well, this is not a “monkey”. It’s just a desire. But if you know you’ll enjoy having and playing with that thing, well, you got yourself a monkey.

How To Tame A Monkey

This paragraph is a work in progress. I don’t know now how to tame a monkey (yet) because I just started. All I know is that this month’s “monkey” is an app I wanted to publish on the AppStore for a long time.

I think there are at least 6 months since I decided I will publish it, but didn’t write a single line of code. So yes, question #1, “is it dragging for a long time”, the answer is “yes”. Also, it’s something that is very inspiring for me. It’s an app that will allow people to connect to each other in a completely new way (that was question #2).

For some reason, I was always afraid to take action on it. Because, at the technical level, there were some black spots on my knowledge map. And I was afraid to explore those spots. Question #3, of course.

As for questions #4 and #5, you can bet it’s a personal thing and it’s also something that I will have to manage for at least one year, if not more. So, my monkey was completely identified.

Back to the taming. I’m working on it and the monkey is starting to respond to some commands. But we’re far from having a complete response. I will update my status in a few days.

Also, the good thing is that I have a wonderful time doing it. This is a very playful monkey.

Taming Twelve Monkeys

This is my first post for 2011. It’s also the post that marks an entire new approach to my blog. And, generally speaking, to my life.

2010 was a very difficult year for me. If you’ve read my (already traditional) end year list about the things I did in 2010, you already know that. I had to face some of the most powerful challenges in my entire life. On all levels: personal relationships (ended my second marriage), financial (had to overcome some of the most profound and unexpected money problems I ever had), and also career (my non-compete agreement after selling my company in 2008 ended last year). But that is already in the past.

Having a lot of free time in the last few days, I reread some of my articles on this blog. I relived some of the situations I’ve been through. And, of course, experienced again the same type of emotions.

At some point, I just felt like I had enough. Like it was too much whining. Yes, it was difficult, but whining is not in my nature. Never was. And never will be. Letting off some steam, even in this highly camouflaged form of some methaphoric blog posts, is acceptable. But remaining in the same space of complaining is not. At least for me.

So, things are going to change around here. Less whining and more action. But even this action will be very different from what you’d expect from a New Year goals post. Just read on.

Twelve Monkeys

I’m not a big fan of New Year goals. I’m a huge fan of goals, but not during this particular time of the year. And that comes from a long experience of failing at New Year goals. Yeap, I epically blundered almost every time I made a list of things I want (or like, or dislike, or intend to change) around this time of the year.

So, as much as “counter hype” this will sound, I decided to ditch them altogether. No more New Year goals for me.

No more measurable improvements in my financial situation.

No more plans for a fulfilling personal relationship.

No more detailed action lists.

No more milestones for my businesses.

Nothing. Nada. Zero.

Instead, all I want from 2011 is to tame twelve monkeys.

What Monkeys?

Yeap, I saw that coming.  Good question.

First of all, yes, it’s a metaphor. Of course. I don’t intend to tame real monkeys.

And second, by “monkey” I understand a complete, easily describable, distinct and also, wild (as in an uncontrollable, erratic) situation about my life that will have to change.

We all have “monkeys” inside us. We all have these impulses, these habits or these unexplainable approaches that are making us behave below our true potential. A monkey is an underdeveloped part of myself which seems almost ok from the outside, but which isn’t. A part which mimics some human shapes, gestures or goals, but which never really reaches to them. Like a potential human being, stopped in the very process of evolution. You know, just monkeying around…

I find those monkeys highly uncomfortable. Because, as cute as they may be, they’re still monkeys. They’re still sketches of what I should be. Blueprints with just enough plaster on them to make them look real. Empty carcasses trying to fool everybody around that they’re the real thing. Annoying. Very annoying.

So I decided to tame them. To put them through some really tough times. Teach them to do stuff. Made them obey my own will.

That’s all I want from 2011.

Now you may somehow understand what I want, but you lack a clear image. In other words, you want some examples. Hang on in there, there will be some examples later on this post and they will also be as detailed as possible.

But don’t hold your breath. There won’t be high concepts or deep philosophical debates here. Those monkeys, those loose ends, are merely unfinished businesses. Promises I made to myself, but never lived up to them. And they are also coming from an incredible diverse field. There will be many areas in which those monkeys are going to show up. Business, social relationships, travels, to name a few that I already know.

Why Twelve Monkeys?

Because there are 12 months, of course. By the end of the year I’d like to have no more than 12 monkeys tamed. I think it’s a worthy enough challenge. I’ll consider myself happy if at the end of the year I will be able to put my finger on 12 monkeys from my life and be absolutely certain that I tamed them.

But even if there are exactly 12 monkeys, I don’t expect the taming to take only one month per monkey. Some months may fit in, one monkey per month, some may not. I may as well start on many monkeys at the same time, and follow through to see which one will be tamed first.

What I will share on this blog will be one monkey per month, though. The monkey of the month, so to speak.

I will also share in advance some of the monkeys I intend to tame, just to give you an idea about what this is going to be.

Managing Tamed Monkeys

This is one thing that I learned in my 10+ years of experience in the business world. Every project you launch must be managed afterwords. Getting out there, finishing your idea, being in the market, well, that’s just a fraction of the whole work. Once you’re outside with your new project, you’re going to manage it. Otherwise, it will die. You’ll have to monitor its progress, its behavior, its results to see of you’re on the right track.

The same thing with “monkeys”. I know there will be a lot of work after I’ll finish the taming, just to be sure the monkey won’t slip back to the same state, than it will be with the taming process itself. So, month by month, there will be a lot of managing time adding up, as more “monkeys” will be tamed.

Also, I don’t know from the start which monkey is assigned to what month. Or, to be more precise, I don’t know all the monkeys for all the months. I only know there will be twelve monkeys for the whole year. As a matter of fact, I don’t even know all the monkeys. Right now I have only 3 monkeys defined, but I know I’ll find the remaining 9 in no time.

So I’ll be picking the monkeys one by one, as time will unfold (the first three are already picked). I will announce them on the blog, of course. I will also update regularly on the progress. I am very aware of the fact that I may fail at taming some monkeys. That will be shared too, along with the reasons (as much as I will be able to tell) of the failure.

Wanna Monkey Around With Me?

The reason I’m sharing this in such a detail is because I wan you to join me. From my experience, when you have two or more people sharing and updating progress on some specific goal, things will accelerate tremendously. I still don’t know why, but I do know it just happens like this.

If you feel like you have your own “monkeys” to be tamed, join in and let’s start together. This time is as good as any other time. Don’t think at something complicated or too time consuming. As I said, this isn’t supposed to be philosophical, or spectacular. Just share it in the comments, write about it on your blog, if you have one, or just put it out in your own social media circle. Again, if you have one.

But there’s nothing compulsory about this sharing,  of course. You can start taming your monkeys without telling anyone.

The First Three Monkeys

I already picked the 3 monkeys that I will start working on. Here they are, in the intended order:

January: Get that app on the AppStore. What app? Oh, I forgot you don’t know my monkeys. It’s just this app that I’m playing with it in my mind for a few months now, and somehow, I’m not able to put it out there. It keeps slipping through my fingers, literally. I even have the name for it, but I don’t have anything written. I won’t share the name of it, instead, I will pick a code name. From now on, the app will be known, until it gets approved in the AppStore, as “33 steps”.

February: Put the New Zealand company on the track. It’s already there, functioning and making some money, but it’s not a sustainable process. In February I will be in New Zealand for a couple of weeks, so it’s a perfect time for making this happen. This monkey is one of the most delusive of all. I know I have everything I need to make things happening the way I want to, and still, somehow, this monkey insists on remaining just a monkey and not make the leap to a fully developed human being.

March: Launch this business project that I’ve already worked on for the last two months. It will be a Romanian based project and, since I don’t want to reveal much about it, I will also code name it. This will be known as “The Club”. This monkey has many, many implications on various levels. It’s primarily about my career, but it’s also about commitment and communication. It’s a whole new way to look at work for me, from a completely new position. Also, I’m sure this monkey will need a lot of management in the upcoming months.

As you can see, it’s mostly about loose ends in my work, so far. Nothing fancy. But as simple as it may look, this area is at the moment the most annonying, monkey-like, part of my life. There will be many other monkeys until the end of the year, in various areas, like relationships or health, but for start, I will focus on this work part.

So, from now on, this blog will be about taming monkeys. And although it sounds like a joke, I can assure it’s not. It may be the most important, profound and long personal challenge I ever started publicly. After all, there will be 365 days until I’ll finish this challenge.

Oh, and the most important thing about this “12 monkeys” project is that, during the entire process, I intend to have a life. A real life, with everything you would expect from it: working and having fun, watching my kids growing up and engaging myself in new personal relationships. If there will be anyone exciting enough to have me hooked. Which, to be honest, is highly unlikely at the moment.

And, of course, traveling.

You in

How Goal Setting Works (For Me)

Goals are just milestones. Places where you stop for a while and enjoy the scenery. The trip is what gives you the ultimate thrill, and it will always be like this.

But, as interesting as the trip may be, goals have their own importance. They can either add more awesomeness to the mix or make the whole experience dull and boring. It’s one thing to stop on the side of the road, eating some dust watching how others are passing you by, but it’s a completely different thing to stop at a 5 star hotel, relax, and get your strength together for the next part of the trip. As I said, both are just milestones within a bigger trip, but their quality is different.

Let me share a personal story with you about some goals I set a few years ago. Although these are material goals, closely linked to money, I’m using these examples because they can be easily measured. The same approach works in many other areas, like personal evolution, lifestyle, or relationships.

The Early Years

A few years ago I was spending the majority of my time trying to build an online publishing company. I had a considerable degree of success, some would say, but it involved a considerable degree of personal involvement and time spent making things happening.

At that time, I could barely afford my own car. I was driving a very old Dacia model (a local brand, based on a Renault chassis). It was a wreck. I remember that at times the engine would heat up to the point where it would let out waves of white steam from the hood. Often I had to pull over and replace the water from the expansion recipient. Before going to a meeting, I would always making sure I was carrying around at least 4 liters of water on the back seat. It wasn’t unusual to stop 2-3 times a day to watch the white steam and to replace the water.

So, eventually I decided that it was time to get a new car. A beautiful one. Of course, I couldn’t afford it. I was barely affording the maintenance expenses for my wreck. But I wanted a new, beautiful, and shiny car really bad. So, after browsing a little on the internet I decided I want a Volvo XC90. It was 6 years ago and the model hadn’t even been launched yet, but since one of my niche websites was the biggest car portal in Romania, I was wired to everything that was new in the car industry. I already had a few wallpapers for the upcoming Volvo XC90. Beautiful, shiny pictures.

I set up my computer wallpaper to the most beautiful picture in the whole album. Each morning, it was the first image I saw when I opened my computer. Each evening, before shutting down my laptop, I saw the same image. I had made a very strong commitment. I think I had that wallpaper for more than one year. One day, I decided it would be no more than 3 years until I would have that car.

Time passed and in the process I changed my wallpaper. I also changed my car, but not to a Volvo XC90. I started gradually with a Skoda, then an Opel. At some point, after 3 years of countless hours spent in the office with clients, partners and employees, I realized that I could finally afford a much better car than my Opel Astra.

So I bought an Infiniti FX 35, a huge, powerful and luxurious car, more expensive than a Volvo XC90. That Volvo disappeared from my goal horizon, but the associated lifestyle didn’t. In fact, the goal of having a big, shiny and powerful car (which could act more like a statement of what I was doing at that time), become even stronger.

The whole process took about 6 years. From the moment I set up a certain goal, to the moment that goal became reality, there were around 2100 days. How did I feel the day I drove my new Infiniti home? Exactly the same. I wasn’t different. The car was, but I wasn’t. However, the car was a very clear sign that my intention to change my mindset towards a much more abundant one was working really well. The trip was unfolding in the right direction and this milestone was a very rewarding one.

The Current Situation

Now, this may be an interesting story, but it happened 6 years ago. How about now? What is an easy to measure goal that I have right now, and what exactly am I’m doing to make it happen?

If you read my last post, you already know, but I’ll say it again anyway: I want a jet. A Learjet, to be more precise. I know, I know, it sounds crazy. It may even be crazy. But that won’t stop me from wanting it.

Can I afford a jet right now? You’re kidding me, right? Of course I can’t! Compared to my “car goal” situation, I don’t even have a wreck to call my “first jet”. I have nothing in this area and the financial difference between how I’m doing right now and how I would need to do in order to afford a 17.9 million dollar jet is enormous.

But I’m reading about it. I started to look around for flying courses. I’m enjoying its pictures. I don’t have a wallpaper with it, but one of the tabs of my browser is always opened with that image. I’m “soaking” myself with a jet the same way I soaked with the image of a Volvo XC90.

I want it in 5 years from now. And I’m working towards it.

The Three Stages Of Goal Setting

Those of you familiar with my ebook already know that I’m using a life management framework called “Assess – Decide – Do”. Of course, 6 years ago I didn’t know that I was using that framework in particular. At least, not consciously. But, on a very deep and hard to grasp level, I have always done stuff following this pattern. Now, how can this be related to goal setting?

First Stage: Assess

This is the stage in which you’re pondering how your goal should fit into your life. It’s the stage in which you are wondering, day dreaming, brainstorming, and drifting away in dreams about your goal. This is the part where you are making room to fit your goal into your current lifestyle.

That’s the stage from which I am slowly getting out of now, with my jet goal. I impregnated its image into my daily activity. I made it familiar. I found ways to integrate it into my lifestyle.

6 years ago, wanting a better car had a close relationship with my lifestyle. I had the biggest car portal in Romania, and having a state of the art car was somehow part of my image as an owner.

Right now, I want a location independent lifestyle. Having a jet to support it looks like a good fit.

Second Stage: Decide

This is the stage in which you are signing the contract with your goal. And you do this by placing it into a space/time continuum.

Speaking of my car goal, the decide stage was when I clearly stated that I want the car in a time frame of 3 years, here, in Bucharest.

And speaking of the jet goal, this is the stage where I am right now. I have a clear time/space context in which I can see this goal happening. In this case: I’ll have it in 5 years from now, when I’ll be fully location independent.

Third Stage: Do

This is the most confusing stage for people, because they think they should focus on the goal. There’s a very subtle difference here. And I guess this is the most important difference in my goal setting approach versus other techniques. I’m not advocating a “fixed eye” on the goal. On the contrary. If you start moving towards your goal, you start making it happen, and you don’t have to focus entirely on it. Instead, you should focus on the chosen lifestyle.

That’s a fundamental difference and here’s why.

Focusing on the goal will be like focusing on the hotel. Instead, your focus should be on the trip itself. A goal is just a milestone. The trip is the great thing, not the goal. If you focus on the hotel, you’ll get stuck on the hotel. You may get a nice room, but your trip will be over.

So, in my “goal car” example, once I assessed it (having its wallpaper on my computer for a year) and once I placed it in a time/space context (3 years) the things I did where not directly even really related to this goal. I just continued to work on my business. I constantly improved my lifestyle. I grew up. I just went on with my trip and enjoyed myself.

And, at some point, the goal was already there, on the side of the road, waiting for me to enjoy it.

The Quantum Element

One more thing: you may have noticed that there was a little bit of a difference between what I wanted as a car, and what I got. I wanted a Volvo XC90 and I got an Infiniti FX 35. In this case, I outgoaled myself. I did better than I thought I was able to.

Most of the time this is the case. I set up a certain goal, start working towards it, and then I wake up one day realizing that I have much more than I initially wanted.

I call this the “quantum element”. If you do your job properly, if you stay on the trip, the milestones will be much more rewarding than you can imagine. It’s like reality is suddenly activating some invisible triggers telling you “ok, I know you wanted this, but I’m going to give you that instead, because, well, it’s much more fun”.

But be aware that sometimes this “quantum element” may be working “against” you. You may get a lower vibration. For instance, I am fully aware that I may not get a jet, but only a regular, 4 seater plane. That may happen.

We may not get exactly what we want. Sometimes we get more, sometimes we get less. I think it’s part of a bigger process, which is tightly connected with acceptance and observation. This “quantum element” adds a certain degree of randomness to our trip. Maybe for preventing us from get too wired up in our own little wishes. If we would always get what we want, life would be pretty boring and predictable, isn’t it?

But that’s another story.

Well, 5 years is a lot of time. Since I’m finished with the Assess and Decide part of my jet goal, I’ll just continue to do my work here, on this blog.

And that’s how goal settings works. At least for me.

Can You Solve The Puzzle Of Your Life?

As Bianca, my 4 year old daughter, started to better understand images and shapes, as she started to talk more and to understand more, we slowly started to play more complicated games. Lately, she seems to develop a rather strong appeal for puzzle games. We solve at least one puzzle almost every day. We started with very simple games, with bigger parts, but soon she got bored. We had to find bigger puzzle games, with smaller (and more) pieces.

The other day, after we finished one of those games, just before she had to go to sleep, I had a short… let’s call it moment. A moment of clarity. I saw a few similarities between the puzzle games we played and some more “serious” situations like goal achievement, personal development or difficult life situations. Somehow, the games we played activated a switch. A very interesting one. After she went to sleep, I decided to write about this. By the way, it’s not the first time when Bianca is shedding some light on my path. Less than a month ago she let me see through her book of life, for instance (don’t be shy, take a look too).

Now, lets’ talk about how solving puzzles can help with your goal achievement strategies.

You Got All You Need

Every goal, every endeavor, every important achievement is made out of hundreds of little separate pieces. Goal achievement is just a matter of putting those pieces together. You take each and every bit, look at it, try to find its place in the bigger picture and then do your best to fit it in. That’s all there is to it, nothing more. Just a puzzle game.

And yet, we seem to struggle with our goals more than we should, or more than we expect in the beginning. And the most common roadblock of all is the feeling of “lacking”. I lack resources to make my life better. I lack the good looks I need to attract a better partner. I lack money. I lack a positive attitude. I lack luck.

Fact is we have it all. We just don’t see it. We have all the parts just in front of us, but we’re so early in the game that we just can’t understand them. We do have the resources, the looks and all the luck we need, but we don’t see them in the big picture. I realize this every time I shuffle the pieces for a new puzzle. When I look at them, they all seem so unrelated and distant. Not part of the same game. Totally different.

But as the game progresses, each and every piece find its place. All I need is just a single matching point, and from that matching point everything starts to link it up until the final image is complete.

But You Have To Stick To A Plan

And that calls for the second thing about puzzle and goal achievement: a plan. If you really want to solve the riddle you need a strategy. A roadmap. Some structured approach to reduce confusion up to the point the world becomes manageable again. It doesn’t have to be downright solvable, just manageable. As a matter of fact, if a puzzle is so easy that I can see through it from the beginning, I don’t feel any drive to even try it out.

But if the puzzle is so huge, so difficult and so complicated that I can barely think it’s doable, I need a strategy. Something that will give me hope to walk through it. Something that will make me understand the big picture. We all have our own specific strategy. For instance, my puzzle strategy is to find the corners and the edges. If I have a physically delimited portion of the image, I can easily find my way from there. I build from the edges to the core of the puzzle, ring by ring.

Bianca’s strategy is different: she looks for the first match she can find, regardless of the type of the piece (corner or edge). Once she found a match, she looks for the next one, and so on. All she needs is a starting point. She builds from there, in whatever direction she can find. That’s all we need to get the thing moving on. Until then, the puzzle game is nothing but a mess. Without a strategy, things looks like they’re impossible. But once you decide to bring the smallest amount of order into the chaos, you’re in fact creating a small crack, letting the light shine through.

Your puzzle solving strategy may be different. But as long as you have one, your puzzle will be finished. Just stick to it. All the unrelated parts will eventually fall into pieces.

Yes, It’s Confusing

Sometimes you’re wrong. Sometimes you spend days or months or years thinking how to get over your current situation. In other words, your puzzle game is frozen. You can’t advance anymore. There are no matching pieces that you can find. And still, you have to go through it. If you stop, you will never solve it.

We have moments when we seem to have no way to advance, me and Bianca, when we play our puzzles. Although we have all the pieces in front of us, something prevents us from seeing their role. We have no vision. No clarity. Bianca, as a kid, gets bored much more easily than I do. So I have to perform some special tricks in order to keep her focused.

And those are the moments when I realize I have to do the same tricks (or even come up with some better ones) if I want to solve the puzzles I choose. I need to find ways to remain in my life game even if it seems hopeless. I need some ways to overcome those situations in which I think there’s nothing more I can do. Because I can. All the pieces are there, I just can’t see them yet. But it’s my abandon which will actually make it meaningless. If I leave, the game will never be finished.

The game of life is confusing at times. And I think it’s confusing for a very good reason: to test your ability to stay on the path. Every puzzle is solvable, even if it seems it isn’t. Every life situation is solvable. As long as you don’t leave the game.

Putting Your Own Pieces Together

One of the nicest feelings you can have is to see a puzzle solved. And I’m not talking about the games I play with Bianca, (although creating a nice scene from Kung Fu Panda, for instance, can be funny at times). I’m talking about your life situation. I’m talking about your goals. Your dreams.

Maybe you had a dream of becoming somebody. An actor, a writer, or just a happy husband. Maybe you wanted to change the world. Or just to travel around it, while witnessing its beauty. This is your puzzle. This is the riddle you have to solve.

Even if it seems like you don’t have the resources, all the pieces of the puzzle are there. You just don’t see the big picture yet.

All you need is to set up a little plan and bring some light in. Most of the times, this little plan means just going along with the flow. Follow your intuition. Trust your heart. Remember, it’s just a puzzle. You picked it up and you do have all the necessary pieces to complete it.

Just stick with it.

And let me know when you finish, I’ll come over with Bianca to enjoy it together.

How To Defrag Your Mind In 5 Easy Steps

This is a follow up to my post: “Are You The Best Version Of Yourself?”. Specifically, that article used a geeky metaphor, comparing our own being with a computer. In order to be sure you run the best version of yourself, a certain number of maintenance tasks have to be performed, such as “updating your drivers” or “stay virus free”. In this post I’m going to detail on “Defrag your mind”.

Defrag Your Mind? What Exactly Is That?

For the non-geeky versions of my readers, I will briefly outline what a defragmentation is. Although it sounds pretty harsh, it’s nothing but an optimization process. The data on your computer hard-disk is not written and read in sequential order. It’s broken down into smaller pieces and written at arbitrary locations. Now, after a certain period, the effort for retrieving that information, scattered around your entire hard-disk, could become really time consuming.

This is where defragmentation comes in: it re-arranges the data on your hard-disk so it would be much more easier to access. The expected result of such a process is an increase in speed and a higher reliability of your equipment. In other words: you’re going to work not only faster, but also much safer.

Now, how can you do this to your mind? Here is my take on it, in 5 easy steps:

1. Chose Your Dominant Setup

Maybe you’ll be in travel mood for the next couple of weeks. Or maybe you’ll have to deliver something big at your job. Or maybe you’ll want to learn something new. Whatever the case, you’ll have to identify your major focus in the next few days or weeks. This is what I call your “dominant” setup. It will be your main concern, your essential duty.

Similarly, there are computer setups for video processing or for games.  There are setups for text or image processing. Depending on these setups, your hard-disk algorithms may change. This is why it’s important to do an assessment first and understand what are you going to perform in the next few weeks. You’re going to setup your mind exactly for that.

Based on this initial assessment, when you’ll chose a dominant configuration for the next period. try to identify it with a single word or a small sentence: “finish project”, “workout” or “visit Rocky Mountains”. Your whole defragmentation process will target this dominant setup.

2. Identify Necessary Information

Once you correctly identified the main concern for the next period, start to identify related areas. What information do you need to succeed? Are there any important actions you need to perform on a regular basis? Are there any specific attitudes you need to adopt? Any habits you need to implement? All these items are part of your main setup.

Identifying your necessary information should be done rather slowly but thoroughly, than quickly and fuzzy. If you’re going to establish a new algorithm for your main central unit, you’d better make sure you  won’t let out something important. That will only make the whole process slow if you’d have to go back and re-start it again.

One tip in this step would be to make a log of it. If it’s something about holiday, just write down the “cloud” of necessary information, actions and habits in a list format. Next time you go on a holiday, you’ll have the info available and spend less time on assessing it. Another tip that could significantly shorten this step is to use mind-mapping. A non-linear document would be more appropriate for this process than a sequential one.

3. Establish Priorities

You know the setup, you have the tools, now all you have to do is to establish priorities. If you ever witnessed a defragmentation, you saw that the most frequently accessed information is usually moved in the first sectors of your hard-disk. That would make it easier and faster to be accessed. And you’re going to do exactly that: make things easier to manage.

Identifying priorities is obviously closely related to the dominant setup. If you’re going to work more than usual, then one of your priorities would probably be to have your laptop charged as often as possible. If your main setup would be traveling related, maybe the tool which should be constantly charged is your mobile phone.

The easiest way to assess the priority is to use a scale from 1 to 5, 1 being the higher point of the scale. Take the previously gathered information and run it through this filter. Ok, this is a laptop, on a scale from 1 to 5 how important is that for my dominant setup? Ok, will give it a 2. Just start practicing and in time you’ll get better at it.

4. Ignore The Unimportant

One of the biggest clutter sources in our lives is the excess luggage we’re carrying around because we think it’s necessary. Or because somebody else has already decided for us it’s necessary. Or simply because we didn’t do any assessment whatsoever and we’re still carrying around those lose ends. Our focus is too loaded with too many lenses.

The 4th stage of your mind defragmentation should address exactly this question. If you moved all the important stuff closer to your core in the previous step, now you’re going to take the unnecessary bits and pieces and move them far away from your reach. Don’t get rid of them, of course, just offer them a well deserved break.

For instance, if you’re going to travel, you may totally ignore your office suits. Push them away, ignore. If you’re going to learn something new, decide you’re going to cut on your distractions: ignore watching TV or social activities. The most important function of this step is to actually write down what are you going to ignore. Don’t expect it to happen naturally.

5. Run A Dry Test

Once your dominant new setup is in place, try to run a dry test. It won’t have the benefits of actually implementing the whole things, but it will still be useful. Take 15 minutes to imagine a whole day, from the moment you wake up to the moment you get to bed. Every information you need is in place? Are your priorities well balanced? Is the clutter properly stowed away?

If you’re satisfied, congrats, you just had your first mind defragmentation.

A Real Life Example

1. The Dominant Setup

I do a little bit of defragmentation every time I enter a new milestone for my blog. One of the dominant setups this year would be “monetize my blog”. These are at least 3 main functions I should perform under this new setup:

• create new products
• identify markets for the products
• promote my new products
• increase blog traffic

2. Necessary Information, Actions and Habits

• focus on creating extra products (text, audio and video)
• focus on promoting my blog via social media
• allocate at least 2 extra hours each day for new products
• evaluate the promotion and generated income

3. Establish Priorities

• the most important thing: create products (priority 1)
• the second most important thing: promote the products (priority 1)
• the third most important thing: increase blog traffic (priority 2)

4. What To Ignore

• spend less time reading other blogs
• spend less time on other projects (workshops, for instance)
• ignore alternative monetization like display advertising

5. Run A Dry Test

As you may already know I already have 5 books published on Amazon and things are going pretty well on this direction. The dry-test started on early January and just finished a few days ago when my 5th book was approved. I know how my dominant setup will look like for the next few months.

Well this is how a basic mind defragmentation process looks like. This is really sketchy but I hope you got the idea.

How Often To Defrag?

Similar concepts in productivity metodologies (like GTD), suggests that a thorough review should be done weekly. In my experience, there’s no need for a weekly review in order to keep your mind defragged. It’s more about how often you will change your dominant setup, or your goals. This is also closely related to your own lifestyle.

For instance, I do think you should do a defrag every time you leave on holiday, but only if a holiday will mean a major shift in your regular lifestyle. If your current lifestyle is a nomadic one, living location independent, maybe you should do a defrag every time you check in to a new country.

***

What are your thoughts on this one? Do you see any more steps involved in the process? Do you see the process with even fewer steps? Would you try this? Did you already tried it but under a different name? Would love to hear from you in the comments.

Translations of this post: Spanish (Como desfragmentar tu cerebro).

55 Ways To Start Your New Year With a Bang!

This is a guest post from Mark Foo, a personal development blogger I’ve been following for some time now. This is also the first guest post on DragosRoua.com. So, please give him a warm welcome. Enjoy!

After the excesses of the holidays, most people use the New Year as an excuse to sit and take stock of priorities. There is no better time than now to get started on making positive steps forward in the upcoming months, from changes in your personal life to getting the ball rolling on professional endeavors both great and small. Starting the year off with a celebration of the possibilities that are available to you is a good way to get motivated.

So in the beginning of the New Year, when partying with friends and family, raise a glass of champagne to the holiday and all that it stands for. The following is a list of little ways I’ve found to help clear away past negativity and get back on track for a fresh start in the New Year.

1. Clean your house. Getting rid of clutter both physically and metaphorically is the best way to clear off space for new beginnings.

2. Take time to reflect on the past year. Think about what transpired last year, including both the positive and negative elements. What was it that made the negative parts negative? How can you move forward this year?

3. Write down goals for the upcoming year. With those reflections in mind, then make the infamous list of New Year’s resolutions. These could be small tasks or large. Because this is your personal list, it can be as ambitious as you want to make it.

4. Get rid of negative thoughts. As Winston Churchill once said, “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.”

5. Take a breather. After one less than great year, I found that I was literally holding my breath and forgetting to breathe at times. Sometimes consciously taking slow, deep breaths is the best way to revitalize energy levels.

6. Spend time with a pet. Animals help reduce stress levels and give us much-needed affection.

7. Call loved ones in far-off places. If you’ve been out of touch with friends or relatives who are in far-flung locations around the globe, there’s no better time than the beginning of a new year to reconnect. Phone cards or programs like Skype make it more affordable than ever.

8. Make a list of books to read in the upcoming year. Depending on your reading rate, this could range from 5-50 new books that you’ve always been interested in.

9. Find a new topic of interest. A new hobby can kick start the New Year with a burst of energy. A friend of mine decided to take up model airplane building this past year, and turned it into a pilot’s license eventually. You never know where your interest could lead.

10. Undergo a dietary cleanse. Eliminate waste products that have built up in your system and cut out the toxins that are a hallmark of the holiday season.

11. Choose one new place to visit. Travel is a great way to gain a fresh perspective on how the world works. If you’ve always dreamt of going to Morocco, why not make it happen this year?

12. Refresh your wardrobe. Throw out, mend, or donate old clothes you no longer wear and buy something new that makes you feel good about yourself. Make it flashy.

13. Get a haircut or new makeup look.

14. Purchase vitamins. Many of us are not eating a proper diet or getting enough nutrients from what we eat. This is a way of ensuring that happens.

15. Evaluate your skill set. Take some career assessment tests or simply make a list of everything you’re good at, and work what you have in your favor into your list of goals.

16. Rethink relationships. If someone is weighing you down or a relationship is simply not working and you know you can do better, have the strength and confidence to leave and start over again.

17. Set a budget. The beginning of the year is a good time to set a serious budget for the coming year and make some goal plans to save more money overall.

18. Have a dance party. This could be with friends or alone. One of my favorite ways to start the day is by cranking some tunes and dancing while brushing my teeth.

19. Take a comedy break. Go to a comedy club for stand-up, or watch some favorite classic comedies. Laughing counts as exercise.

20. Stretch tired muscles. Before and after exercising, be sure to stretch. Go get a massage to feel truly fresh and relaxed for the year ahead.

21. Find volunteer opportunities. Sign up to help those in need, and gain a new perspective on your own life in the process.

22. Revisit favorite albums. Dust off those old LP’s that you listened to as a teenager and give them a new listen. This is organized nostalgia.

23. Organize photos. If your home computer is full of downloaded pictures with no rhyme or reason, it can be a fun year-starting project to get those in order, and send the best to friends and relatives in organized albums.

24. Take in live music. Go out and see a band you’ve never heard of. Find out what’s going on in your own city.

25. Try a new cuisine. If you’ve never thought to try Indonesian food, why not do it today?

26. Set some mood lighting. Put in new flattering light fixtures in your home that will have you looking and feeling your best.

27. Reroute income. Set up a new bank account. Find new ways of making income, because if you can manage to have several different streams coming in at once, you’ll be firmly on the track to financial freedom in the New Year.

28. Think about new investments. My friend found that she had a little bit of money left over from relatives over the holidays, and decided to invest it to pump up her retirement fund.

29. Mend clothing. If you have holes in your clothing or your pants need to be taken in, take those items to a tailor for an instant wardrobe update.

30. Take the plunge and share your feelings. If there is a special someone you’ve been unable to tell how you feel about them, there is no better time than right now.

31. Donate to charity. Find a cause that you care about, and give away time or money to help support those in need.

32. Try out a new look. This could be literal or more metaphorical. A makeover can give you a fresh feeling for the New Year, or you could experiment with the way you look at other people.

33. Go outside. Get out there and breathe in some fresh air. Your lungs will thank you.

34. Clean out storage spaces. Attics and sheds are the places where we store life’s clutter. Get rid of items you don’t need. There’s no need to wait until spring to do a little bit of cleaning.

35. Take up a new hobby. New pathways for your energy to be channeled into can be relaxing and rewarding.

36. Try a DIY project. Have some friends over and give your bikes a makeover.

37. Set appointments you’ve been putting off. If you haven’t been to the dentist in years, go now so that you don’t have to spend thousands of dollars on dental implants down the road when your teeth fall out.

38. Take more naps. Getting enough sleep helps improve concentration, reduces stress, and gives you the energy you need to get through all of these goals you’ve set for the New Year.

39. Go for a walk or run without a destination. Meandering around town can lead you into unexpected conversations, unexpected situations, and great finds.

40. Throw a party with friends you haven’t seen in a long time. Get all your friends together for an informal gathering that allows you all to catch up on old times and new.

41. Spend more time with yourself. Learning to enjoy your own company is maybe the hidden secret to confidence. The Dalai Lama even recommends it, having said, “Spend some time alone every day.”

42. Talk to a stranger. Open yourself up to that person on the bus who strikes up a conversation. You never know what sort of story you’re going to hear, and what you might find yourself saying in return.

43. Go to a neighborhood in your own town you’ve never explored. If in the past year you have found yourself falling too much into a routine, this is a simple way to break it, by becoming an explorer at home. You don’t have to go far to find new hidden gems, be it a hole-in-the-wall restaurant or a quaintly situated park bench.

44. Go on a retreat. This could be a yoga retreat in India, or an Artist’s retreat in your hometown. Being among others who share your interests can be positive and inspiring.

45. Throw away old clutter from the home.

46. Overcome a fear that you’ve always had. I’ve always been terrified of heights, but this didn’t stop me from skydiving and bungee jumping when I was traveling in New Zealand, which turned out to be one of the most memorable experiences in my life.

47. Smile as much as possible. One day I tried an experiment and smiled at everyone I saw in a one-hour time span on the street. Every single person returned the smile, and it gave an overall boost to positivity levels.

48. Refresh your dating life, if single. There’s no better time than now to go to a speed-dating event or even join an online dating site that will help you meet new people.

49. Take a look at your resume and give it a facelift. Even if you are employed, chances are you could always move up. Get your resume in working order just in case the opportunity presents itself.

50. Go out in nature. This has a great revitalizing influence on many of us.

51. Purchase a new fragrance for personal or home use. Smell is closely tied to mood, so using an invigorating citrus scent, for example, can help improve concentration and put a spring in your step.

52. Move on from past mistakes and look to the future.

53.  Buy flowers for the home. This gives an instant feeling of positivity.

54. Be happy with yourself and celebrate new beginnings. The New Year is a time to start over, and realize that anything is possible if you will it to be so.

55. Set off firecrackers. Truly start the year off with a bang!

Do you have a tip that we can start the New Year with a bang? Please share with us in the comment section below.

About the author:

Mark Foo is a Personal Development Blogger @ TheBigDreamer.com where he writes about Success, Personal Finance, Wealth Creation and
Entrepreneurship. You can also check out his FREE eBook The 77 Traits of Highly Successful People at http://www.77SuccessTraits.com.

Goals and Mechanical Rabbits

When I turned 39, a few days ago, I wrote a list about 39 things I learned through experience. A few of them got picked up by my readers and broadcasted on Twitter. Being bitesized really helped this process, I don’t think any of those items were bigger than 140 characters. One of the most retweeted was number 8:

“Goals are good, but no better than the mechanical rabbit at a dog race. At the end of the race, they’re useless.”

Since that seemed to touch a lot of people, I thought it would be a good idea to write a full post about it. Which I am doing as right now.

The Promise of Goals

Everybody knows the power of goals. They light the path, throw away the fog and make your efforts worthwhile. Some of the most popular goals are:

• get out of debt
• get a compatible partner
• be your own boss
• get a promotion

Of course, there are other smaller goals like owning a specific house or car. Or even buying a specific computer. I want to have a Mac by Christmas. That’s a goal.

Usually, goals are good. But, once you reached your goal, what happens? Where is the drive to run? Where is the motivation? Gone, of course. You reached your goal. The race is over.

The only thing that would make you run again is another race. Another goal. Another mechanical rabbit running in front of you, close enough so you can tell it’s worthwhile, but far enough to be out of reach. In order to catch the rabbit, you have to stretch. To go over your limits. Usually, you do that.

But after the race you bump into that frustration again. What the hell is wrong with that rabbit? Where does it hides? Every time I think I caught it, it disappear. Damn you, rabbit!

Running in the Right Context

The problem is not the rabbit. The problem is the context. A dog race is a limited context. It’s a stupid competition, trying to establish a winner among a pack of dogs. A dog race stretches the animals until one has the power to reach out and become what we call “the winner”.

This is pretty much what happens in the real world of jobs and careers. This time the  mechanical rabbit is a certain lifestyle, a certain amount of money in the bank, a specific power position. A lot of dogs are running after that rabbit. One of them, after years of struggling and sacrifices, go in front of the others. The result: the dog who catch the rabbit is a winner. The rest are losers. They have to start the race again. And again. And again.

I think you can see now how a limited context can totally change the game. Imagine a dog in the wild. And wild here is not defined as a context with no rules, but with less limitations than a stupid dog race. Imagine a dog at wild, chasing real rabbits. Is there winner there? Barely. The natural context is so large that the chances that 2 dogs are chasing the same rabbit are pretty low. And when it happens, they usually share, somehow.

A dog chasing real rabbits will do it for the thrills and for survival. If it doesn’t catch the rabbit, his meal will be gone. There is no competition here other than continuing to live. The victory here will be life in itself, not the first place and a medal.

Choosing Your Race

Fact is goals are highly dependent on the context. If you chose to live your life in a limited context, chasing goals will feel as frustrating as running at a dog race. You won’t be living a real life. You would actually live a dog’s life, being enslaved for the benefit of others. Don’t blame the mechanical rabbit for that, as it does the best it can. It runs. That’s what a goal does, it runs before you until you reach it.

But was it worth the effort? The whole race was something that fulfilled you? Being “number one” is making you really happy? Most of the time, the answer to these questions is “No”. Running over and over trying to defeat other people with the stupid hope that being ahead of them in a limited context will make you happy, that, instead of being your source of happiness, as you expect, it will eat you up inside. The context in which you are running is limited. So are the goals.

But, what happens if you would chose a larger context? Avoid the dog race altogether, step out of it. Get rid of notions like “winner” or “loser”. Think in terms of living, not racing. Just being joyful for the run. And then chose a goal on which your entire life will depend. What if, instead of chasing a career or a political position, you would chase a life. A different life. Living in a certain way. Earning enough to travel the world, for instance, but not entering any Fortune 500 list. The difference is that once you reach this new goal, in this new context, you will feel alive and thrilling. Reaching that goal in this new context will make your life go on, instead of just preparing you for another race. It will leave you free and full of energy, not empty and frustrated. That goal will be the real rabbit. Instead of being just a mechanical impostor, it will actually give you the energy to go on. And continue to live as you chose.

I used to chase mechanical rabbits all the time. Being the first in my niche, with my business. Been there, done that, felt like crap. Maybe it was a necessary milestone for my personal evolution, but truth is I never truly enjoyed this type of competition. Once I stepped out of the context, everything changed. Once I left the dog race yard, with all those mechanical rabbits ready to run in front of me, something changed. The whole game, changed, in fact.

There is no victory and no first place when you chose to live your life. There is only life. Sometimes you catch the rabbit, sometimes not. But running after a real rabbit, after something on which your entire life depends, that is so amazingly different.

What type of rabbits are you chasing now? Are you in a dog race, following a stupid social device which will leave you empty inside once you complete the race? Or are you chasing out in the wild, with no limitations in a game with no victory or defeat?

It’s just a question of choice.

Building Self Discipline

If you have really high goals, chance are that you had to improve your self discipline at some point. You had to streamline your daily routine, to improve your skills, to become more effective, to achieve more in less time or with less energy. Although one of the most expensive tools in your personal development tool box, self discipline is by far the most useful. In today’s post I’ll talk about my experience with self discipline.

What Is Self Discipline?

In short, self discipline is the ability to follow a specific goal regardless of current environment. If you would live in a perfect world, everything you want would be achieved instantly and effortlessly. But if you’re reading this post you don’t live in a perfect world. You live in the same world I live, a world in which things are falling short sometimes, in which priorities overlap, in which your energy seems always to be under the required level. Like it or not, this is the world we live in. This is our environment. And self-discipline is the ability to overcome any setbacks your environment can place between you and your goals.

Building Self Discipline

Creating self discipline is a tedious task. Because self discipline is more than a habit, it’s an intrinsic quality of your being. You can’t “learn self discipline” in one area of your life and then apply it exactly in other areas. And still expect it to work.  It simply doesn’t work that way. You’re creating a habit, at best, not self discipline. For instance, if you’re a blogger, you can’t create self discipline in your writing, and apply the same pattern to your physical activities. It’s much more than that.

What you can do, is to develop a certain approach which gives you the ability to tackle any task in any given context. Self discipline is more of a lifestyle than an atomic activity. Is more like a personal attitude towards life than just a technique you can put on autopilot and then just watch the results.

During the years, I had my share of struggle with self discipline. I wasn’t a very disciplined guy, mostly because I always had this thing with authority. I mean challenging authority figures. Among other stuff, this was one of the reasons I ended up being my own boss. But besides that, I always had this challenging attitude towards what I felt like imposed tasks. And that certainly didn’t make things easier for me when I had to follow long term goals.

But at some point I succeeded. I had a business for 10 years and believe me, you do need a hell of a lot of discipline to keep an online business working for 10 years. If you’re reading this blog you may know that I’ve been on a raw food diet for more than 9 months. I also imposed to myself and successfully implemented a posting speed on this blog, which is live for more than 9 months. And as I write this, I am on a 30 days exercising challenge. These are pretty distinct goals: business, health, writing and fitness. But I made them happen.

Creating self discipline, in my experience, requires only 5 things: clear goals, incentives, assessment, interference management and opportunism. Let’s take those things one at a time.

Clear Goals

If you don’t know where you’re heading, you can’t go faster. That’s a fact. Keeping clear goals is fundamental for building self discipline. Make those goals crystal sharp and then stick with them. One of the most common pitfalls in maintaining a self-discipline is losing sight of what you’re doing. It happens more often than you think. At some point you become so involved in reaching that goal that you can’t seem to remember which goal was in the first place.

There is also another very important reason for having clear defined goals: each goal needs specific actions. You would act in a certain way if you’re trying to improve your health (by embracing a raw food diet, for instance) and completely different if you’re going to improve your writing. You will implement different strategies for different objectives. Self discipline will help you strengthen your overall strategy, but if you’re choosing the wrong one, you won’t get results. And if you don’t get results, you’re going to quit.

Incentives

Creating self discipline requires rewards. Little payments down the road, in order to keep you motivated. I do think rewards are necessary during the process, although they are not the main objective. The main goal is to create a swiss army knife tool that you can apply constantly in every area of your life, regardless of the specific actions needed or of the specific context. And if some rewards will speed up the process, why not? It surely works for me.

Most of the time, those rewards will come in the simple form of progress assessment (more on assessment in a moment) like looking at what you’ve done so far and feeling good about it. When I started the raw food diet I monitored my weight. In two months I lost about 7 kilos. Well, I allowed myself to be happy about that. It was like Dumbo’s magic feather: kept me flying. Of course, the main goal wasn’t weight loss, it just made me go further.

Progress Assessment

Self discipline needs adjustment. You can’t expect anything to go perfect from the first time. So, in order to see if things are going in the right direction, you need to assess your progress. Constant feedback is another fundamental ingredient for building self-discipline. You may find yourself too active on a very easy situation, or under acting on a very difficult one. For each of these situations you will need some form of adjustment. And those adjustments will create little by little that attitude you call self discipline.

Also, regardless of the specific goal you’re trying to reach, when you’re starting to develop self discipline, don’t expect to have result fast, just watch the progress. Keep a journal, write things on your room walls, put iPhone reminders, send yourself emails, whatever works for you. For instance, when I decided to implement a posting speed on my blog I also created a blog audit wordpress plugin which helped me track the progress.

Ignoring Interferences

If you’re heading for the right goal, with the proper incentives and you’re making good progress, chances are that you’re going to be distracted soon. I think it’s just human nature: every time we seem to reach a certain momentum we tend to lose it the very next second. I call those situations interferences. Every time you are attracted by something else than your main goal, you’re allowing some interference to play with your energy field.

Those interferences are not necessarily pleasant. You can also get unpleasant interferences if you’re on a fluctuating context. For instance, some old, unfinished tasks will strongly require your attention, or some job superior will try to impose a disruptive attitude on you. Those interferences will break your flow and put some more distance between your and your goals. Pleasant or not, you got to learn how to ignore those interferences for good. Set course for your goal and stay there.

Opportunism

Have you ever been struck with luck? When trying to reach a specific goal, I mean? Some unexpected help coming from an unexpected person? Some situation change which created an advantage for you? Well, that sort of things just happens. I won’t go into details about how you attracted those things, but I’ll tell you that I am very fond of these situations. I mean, every time I feel these “hidden” help hands, I reach out.

Implementing self discipline means taking advantage of everything useful around you. If there’s some luck around, go for it, it will make things better. If there’s some help coming from somebody, receive it, don’t reject it just because “I have to do it, by myself”. Sometimes the Universe is just lending us a helping hand. Even – or even more – when we’re trying to implement something as difficult as self discipline.

***

In the end, the real reward is not achieving your goal. But stretching your limits. Further and further. It’s not about having or getting more (like more money, more stuff, etc) but about the experience of different things. It’s all about enjoying more dimensions of yourself and of the world.