Blogging With An iPhone, An iPad And iAdd

(Every once in a while I have this urge to write a shiny, picture-rich blog post. The following post is one of those.)

The other day, after the storm passed away, I surprised myself thinking at how my digital nomad life has changed completely the way I work. I don’t have an office anymore – and I do enjoy this every minute, after more than 10 years of working for my own company, in my own office – and that means I work pretty much everywhere. The distinction between work and regular life slowly faded away. It’s not like I’m working anymore. I spend quality time in a coffee shop for a few hours, but at the same time (and in the same place) I do write blog posts, write code or do consulting.

Although it may seem like a very comfortable way of living, it’s not even remotely like this. It’s very easy to get distracted and stop creating value. As you may imagine, is very important to keep things under control.

So, how I manage to actually run a fairly popular blog, do consulting on a regular basis, create iPhone apps and self-publish my ebooks? The short answer: I keep myslef organized. The long answer: you just started to read it . What follows is a very accurate reconstruction of what it takes for me to write a blog post, from idea to publishing. Sepcifically, this very blog post.

On the technical side, it involves and iPhone, and iPad and iAdd. Of course, a Mac is necessary for publishing too. As you may know, I am the creater of iAdd, so I am definitely biased here. It’s not like you can’t use something else, it’s just that iAdd really works for me.

Capturing Blog Post Ideas

Being on the run pretty much anytime, I started to capture my ideas using my iPhone. In the beginning I used a mind-mapping software, but now I use iAdd. iAdd let me save in it 4 types of information: tasks, projects, ideas and events. Every time I have a blog post idea, I fire up iAdd and quickly jot the title of the post:

A blog post is more likely to be created as a project. After I added the project, I start to add short tasks to it. They are more like the building blocks of the entire blog writing process, not only paragraph sketches or ideas.

Once I feel I’m ok with it, I sync my app to Dropbox. The newly added project will be safe and, more than that, it will be available next time when I sync with my iPad too.

Managing The Actual Process

Now, suppose I’m back to a more comfortable place and I have a little bit of time. I take my iPad, fire up iAdd and do a sync. After the sync, my project from iPhone will be magically available on iPad. (Just click on the following screenshots to enlarge them).

The first thing I do once the project is available on my iPad is re-ordering tasks (I can reorder tasks on the iPhone too, but usually I don’t have time for this, plus, on the iPad is more space).

After reordering, I quickly peruse the tasks and if I feel the need to enhance or complete any one of them, i do it.

Of course, now it’s time to add more details, so on the iPad I add the more complex tasks to the project.

At some point, the blog post project will be finished. From this point, it takes two different routes. First of all, the entire project gets sent by email (you can do that from inside iAdd). Like that, I will have all the ideas on my Mac too. I usually copy and paste the email message in my blogging setup.

But moving the work completely on the iMac will undermine the power of iAdd. So, the second route the project takes is to be sent to Decide. This is how it looks when it’s sent to Decide.

As I already told you, not all the tasks are involving writing. Some of them are atomic actions which can be performed anytime. For instance, in this specific project, I have to make screenshots. This can be done anytime. It’s an atomic task that can be performed any time I have 15 minutes free. So, I start to add contexts to all the tasks in the project.

And also I add due dates to each task.

After I finished, all the tasks are ordered ascending by time, giving me quite a clear idea about what I have to do.

One more thing. I may keep the project in Decide for as long as I want. And usually I do. I don’t write all the blog posts at once. I have other projects too. But once I’m committed to a project, I move it to Do. All the tasks that have been added in Assess, completed with contexts and due dates in Decide, will show up in my time based views in Do. Meaning that if one of the tasks is due Today, I will have it under my Today tab in iAdd. Along with the project title too. Once done, the task can be crossed off.

But if I feel a little bit lost, I can also look at the entire project in Do. I can see all the remaining tasks, and, if I want to edit their due dates, I send the entire project back to Decide.

Well, that’s pretty much it. Expected more? Sorry to tell you that I like things simple and effective

Conclusions

So, I capture all the ideas on my iPhone, I manage the entire project on my iPad and then I publish on my Mac. If I add together all the tasks involved in creating a blog post, I think I am somewhere between 1 and 3 hours for any of the blog posts I manage like this. It doesn’t happen in one chunk, as I told you, because my work time is unusually fractured, but the good thing is that it does happen in a consistent way.

iAdd version 1.3 Live In AppStore

After only 5 days of waiting, iAdd version 1.3 is live in AppStore. As I already wrote, this version features a complete redesign of the iPad version and a lot of small usability improvements, as well as numerous bug fixes. If you don’t know what iAdd is, I will briefly tell you that it’s my iOS implementation of my own Assess – Decide – Do framework. If you want to know more about the framework, feel free to visit its (brand new) homepage at Assess-Decide-Do. And if you want to know more about iAdd, the app, of course, there’s a site for that too, iAdd.

They say an image is worth a thousand words, so, as I planned to write a few thousands words blog post today, I will only share a few screenshots.

Oh, and one more thing: the book that started all is now available on Kindle. That means you can read it on your iPhone, on your iPad, on your Mac, or even on your Android powered device. In short, pretty much everywhere. And, to make things even spicier, the Kindle version is only 9.99 USD, compared with the regular price of 27 USD. Here’s a screenshot of what the ebook looks like on my iPad, using the Kindle app for iPad.

You can get the Kindle version of Natural Productivity: Assess, Decide, Do for your Kindle by clicking here.

How An iPhone, An iPad And A Mac Are Shaping My Digital Life

As a digital nomad, I do spend a lot of time processing and evaluating information. But the “nomad” part of being a digital nomad means I do it mostly when I’m on the road. I do not have a fixed office space. I work in a variety of places, from shared offices to coffee shops (most of the time), my own home or even parks (when weather allows me, that is). I did have an office for more than 10 years, but got rid of it after selling my company, two years ago.

To make a long story short, due to the fact that I work pretty much everywhere, I realized that my digital life has certain particularities. I’m using only 3 devices: an iPhone, an iPad and a MacBookPro. Each of them has its own usage pattern and I find it increasingly interesting to try to understand them. Since I’m a digital value creator myself, I am also interested in other people digital habits, especially what type of activity is spread over what type of device. But more on that in the end. For now, let’s start with the iPhone.

iPhone Usage Patterns

I own an iPhone for about 3 years, since the initial version. Didn’t buy an iPhone 4 yet, mostly because I don’t have any FaceTime counter parts (at least that I am aware of) to make it worth. For development I can get along pretty ok with a 3GS. I can safely ignore the retina display and the speed, I’m ok with the 3GS and I will not get rid of it until the next iteration (iPhone 5, most likely).

Emergency Info Check

I keep a number of notifications alive, like new friendship requests from Facebook, replies form Twitter and PayPal (yeah, I do love those daily tiny alerts telling me that people are still buying my books or that I just received some affiliate payment). I try to keep the number of these notifications relatively low in order to preserve battery life.

Email

I seldom answer emails on my iPhone. If I do, it means I place a really high priority on the person that sent that message (so if you get a “sent from my iPhone” signature in my email messages, be happy, I really value our relationship. Or the message was really burning, make your pick ). I have only 3 main email accounts and I’m using the iPhone unified Inbox to scan them a few times a day. Especially at red lights (if I’m driving), or while exercising. I eliminate the vast majority of garbage and leave the rest for further processing.

Facebook

I do answer Facebook friendship requests using my iPhone. The Facebook app in the iPhone is (now) pretty stable and relatively easy to use. I still hate the fact that I can’t unfriend somebody using it, but that’s it. I also answer emergency messages, sent using Facebook messaging system, if any.

Twitter

I’m only responding to push notifications like direct messages an replies. From time to time I do some impulse tweeting. Lately, I drastically downshifted my Twitter presence.

iAdd

I manage my tasks and projects with my own iOS app, called iAdd. It’s a universal app, which means I can use it both on my iPhone and my iPad. On the iPhone I stay mostly in Do. Meaning I just see what’s the next task or event and process it (either reDecide it or mark it as Done). Every once in a while, especially since I’m hit with some sudden inspiration (which tends to happen at least once a day) I use it to quickly brainstorm some ideas in Assess. It’s not uncommon also to send the freshly brainstormed idea to my own email from within iAdd.

If you’re not familiar with the terms Assess, Decide or Do, I recommend you to have a look at the ebook which outlines the productivity framework on which iAdd is based.

StumbleUpon

I’m still an active user in StumbleUpon (you can friend / follow me here) which means I get a considerably high number of shares each day. Until SU launched they iPhone app it was a real chore to empty my StumbleUpon toolbar. Today I’m using their iPhone app. It’s fast and (again, now) pretty stable.

iPad Usage Patterns

I own an iPad for about six months and no, I do not have any regrets that I didn’t wait to get an iPad 2 directly. I’m very satisfied with my current 32G 3G. Ironically, the 3G part of it it’s something I didn’t use yet, to be honest, since I already have a data plan on my iPhone. I don’t see any reason to pay twice for the same service. Oh, and I’m also going to tell you upfront that the term “couch computing” is very appropriate for the iPad. Meaning I’m using it mostly on my couch. I’m pretty sure that the location is also shaping a lot of its usage patterns.

Facebook

Since Facebook doesn’t have yet an iPad app (and third party apps are still pretty rough on the edges) I use it in Safari. I do all my Facebook activity (as sparse as it is nowadays) from within my iPad, in Safari. I interact, answer to event or app invitations (if anyone is looking interesting enough for me) and follow my friends activity.

Twitter

I use my iPad for consuming timelines. I do like the official app for Twitter, especially the user interface paradigm. I do think they created something really valuable with those panes and I find it difficult to imagine other ways of consuming Twitter. I also engage in conversations or follow links, the webView implementation in Twitter client is relatively comfortable.

Email

I do answer my emergency messages (which are not answered already on my iPhone, that is) using the iPad email app. I also use it to clean up if there are any leftovers from my previous iPhone sessions, or if I didn’t have the time to use my iPhone for email at all. So, if you get a signature like “sent using my iDevice” in my emails, do know that it was sent from my couch. If that matters for you, of course.

iAdd

Almost my entire assessing and deciding are taking place in the iPad. Meaning I do organize my entire activity using the iPad. This may be due to the fact that the Mac version of iAdd is still in its very early stage, but also to the fact that the iPad is simply a very suitable device for that kind of activity. Once the planning is done I just do a sync with Dropbox. Next morning I sync my iPhone with Dropbox too and voila, my day is literally at my fingertips.

MacBook Pro Usage Patterns

I’m using a Mac for more than 4 years now. One of the oldest posts on this blog is witnessing the very moment of my conversion from a 10 years long Linux citizen to what others may call “an Apple fanboy”. I don’t consider myself an Apple fanboy, I just use the most appropriate tools for my tasks. It just happen to be a 17 inch MacBook Pro.

Email

I do all the heavy processing on my Mac. Meaning I follow conversations and I also try to keep a relatively organized Inbox. Gave up to Inbox zero, because it conflicts with my ADD framework.So I do keep messages in my Inbox, which is assimilated to my Assess realm. Every time a message will trigger an action, I will process it with iAdd and then delete the message. Basically, it means that if I don’t have any more messages in my inbox, I either finished every imaginable thing I may do with my life, or I’m dead. Again, if you want to know more about my happy separation from the “Inbox zero” concept, with all its pressures, go ahead and read my ebook.

Writing

All the articles for this blog (and every other activity related to writing, like presentations for conferences or courses) are written on the Mac. I created more than 2 years ago a blogging setup that makes me keep my blogging under a relaxed control, using MacJournal smart journals feature. Also, all the image processing is taking place on the Mac.

Coding

It goes without even saying that I code my projects on the Mac, although I admit I played a little bit with the idea of having a (very) striped down version of XCode (or anything like that) on my iPad. But I do realize this is pretty much impossible.

Twitter and Facebook

Every once in a while I fire up Firefox and leave two tabs open: one in Twitter and the other one in Facebook. But this is relatively uncommon since I do avoid any type of interaction when I’m working (writing or coding).

Conclusions

iPhone – emergency and impulse reactions

iPad – consuming information and planning (tasks, time, projects)

MacBook Pro – producing, evaluating and distributing digital value

***

What are your digital habits? Do you have / use more than one device to manage them? Please share your experience in the comments, I’m really looking forward to it.

The Utterly Incomplete Guide On Monetizing Your Blog

Half of my life I lived under a communist regime. Among other funny things under a communist regime, money, or, to be more precise, the lack of it, was something pretty common. So, I started to learn the value of money very early, mainly by the absence of it. Why am I telling you that? Well, because this particular context of my life created a very interesting situation. Namely, the ability to create money out of any imaginable situation. When you live under pressure, you learn how to breathe differently.

Years later, this very ability, which is more on the survival side, to be honest, than on the corporate, “let’s conquer the world” side, served me really well. Not only was I able to create and sustain for more than 10 years my own online publishing company and successfully sell it once I decided to start something new, but also helped me when I started this very blog. Which finally brings us to the point of today’s article.

Which is part of a brilliant series, ignited by my fellow blogger (and upcoming A-lister) Mars Dorian. The idea was to bring together a pack of internet rock-stars and squeeze the hell out of their knowledge and expertise. As you may see, we have even a visual identity for this series (which I think it’s a very cool idea).

The articles were sequential, meaning at the end of one article the author had to introduce the next blogger and topic. Well, since I’m the last one in this series, I can only have the honor of mentioning the previous articles, as follows.

The Guerrilla’s Guide To Attracting Your “Right” Audience – by Mars Dorian

“Less Followers” Is The New “More Followers” – by Francisco Rosales

The Art of (Online) Seduction (And Why You Need It To Make Money) – by Ashley Ambirge

How to Join Forces with Other Bloggers and Grow Your Audience Together – by Corbett Barr

Networking Awesomely, Kissing Digital Babies and The Lifeblood of the Blogosphere – by Srinivas Rao

Now, let’s get back to the topic. Which is, as you already know, monetization. I will skip the parts related to writing and traffic building, as I expect you to have a lot of know-how, after the first articles. I will also suppose that you have enough traffic to start monetizing. That specific threshold varies a lot depending on your niche, writing style and overall goals with the blog, but as a rule of thumb, I think that from the magical “1000 unique visitors / day” milestone you can start to apply some of the following strategies.

So let’s see what exactly can you sell from your blog in order to make some money.

Selling Real Estate – Advertising

The most affordable way to monetize your blog is advertising. It’s also the most inefficient one. You need huge traffic in order to make some decent money and you also need a LOT of real estate (or, in other terms, a pretty big, in terms of space) blog. Because you will have to have enough space to accommodate your advertiser’s exposure, without alienating your audience.

I used advertising extensively on my network of websites and tried a lot of approaches: automating it with very affordable, ready to buy online packages, selling it with my own sales force or delegating it to an agency. While I did have some positive results over the years, I have to say that this activity is both time and resources consuming.

It’s good if you want to get your feet wet in the monetization world, and learn some stuff, but in the long run it won’t pay for your jet. Unless you’re Mashable and you don’t know that yet, of course.

Selling Interactions – Affiliate Marketing

The next thing you can do after advertising is affiliate marketing. This is a very different technique and it’s also enormously diverse. You can start doing affiliate marketing on your blog with only one client, or you can sign up to dozens of affiliate programs. There are tons of affiliate marketing strategies and many of them are really working well. If you’re new to this world, I highly recommend this course Affiliate Marketing For Beginners (by Corbett Barr). And yes, that link is an affiliate link.

In my experience, no matter what strategy you choose, there are a few things which are always standing up. Those things are the cornerstone of any affiliate activity.

1. Be Honest

Clearly state the fact that you’re doing affiliate marketing. Let people know that by buying the products you’re recommending you will get some money. Many readers will choose to reward you this way, if they find the products appealing.

Also, try as much as possible to recommend only what you’re using. In fact, do recommend only what you’re using, otherwise your credibility will decline in time.

2. Be Consistent

If you started to do something in this area, continue. Affiliate marketing is not an instant business. Sure, you can have spikes and wake up one day to realize that you’ve done over 1000 USD in sales, but that won’t happen in the first day.

Also, be consistent in your niche and product choices. If you’re trying to associate yourself with too many products, or try to cover a way too broader niche, your own brand will weaken.

3. Be Useful

Think at your readers. Think at their needs. Just because you’re excited about some product or service which has an affiliate program, it doesn’t mean your readers will be too.

Selling Your Own Information Products

After you did some advertising and affiliate, it’s time to go to the real stuff: creating and selling your own information products. I consider this to be by far the most profitable and resource effective way of monetizing your blog. No matter your topic, your biggest slice of money may come from the thing you’re already doing on your blog: creating useful information.

There are many ways to create information products and I think a course on this will cover at least several hours. But let’s assume for the moment that you’re just creating ebooks. Ebooks are very appealing to your users, because they’re already consuming your content in the form of articles. They may find the whole buying process very natural. They’re already reading you for free, so if you create some premium content, they’ll be most likely willing to pay for it.

There are also a few things you may want to know about information products:

• their lifespan is relatively short. Unless you’re creating a huge hit, they’re last only a few months. After that, you can bet that all your audience already knows what the ebook is about. If they really want it, they buy it in the first few weeks.
• they must bring in something completely different from what your blog brings, but at the same time carry your own personal mark. So, packaging your blog in the form of an ebook may not create as much buzz as you think. People want something different.
• there are a few psychological levels related to pricing (and the way people are perceiving products, generally). A small but useful ebook will be priced between 10-20 USD. A relatively premium ebook will be priced between 20-40 USD. And from that mark up, you can start thinking at creating series or even more complex products, like webinars or online courses. These as well can go anywhere between 50 and 250 USD, depending on the value you put in and your niche.

Other Media Declinations

This is very similar to the one above, only it happens on other channels. It’s still selling your own products, only you take a lateral step and go into a somehow different way of packaging the information. The closest example is a podcast. It’s very similar with what you do in your blog, but it’s really different. There are a few significant examples of successful commercial podcasts on the internet, galadarling.com being one of them, for instance.

But you can also do something different than a podcast. Package your blog posts as audiobooks. This is what I did with one of my post (after this was suggested by a fellow blogger) and, believe it or not, I do sell that 2.99 USD audio file.

Imagination is the only limit here. I remember that a few years ago, when I had my car portal (the biggest in Romania at that time) I started a small radio show (3-5 minutes daily) and tried to sell advertising on that radio show. Go figure…

Real Life Interactions

This is a very interesting way to make money. In fact, many people who are already making money in the offline world are turning to the online world in order to support their offline business (that sounded a lot more complicated than I wanted to). To keep it simple, it’s about coaching, consulting, workshops or even webinars.

In this case, your blog will be a vehicle for your offline business. Although I think there is a scalability problem here (namely, how high can you go, how many workshops can you deliver, etc) there is something that attracts me a lot to this. I think it’s about the real energy exchange that takes place in these workshops. I went to Steve Pavlina workshop last year and I felt incredibly. Not because the concepts Steve taught us (many of them being around the common sense threshold) but because of the energy that emerged out of the group.

After I started to do my own workshops (on business and blogging) I got the same feedback from my attendees. “It was wonderful, but the most important thing was that we felt good together”.

So, if you reach a certain level of popularity, don’t be afraid to go out in the wild, and try some public speaking and some workshops. It may not work from the first time, it may not bring as much money as your ebook going viral may do, but boy, you’ll feel good.

iPhone / iPad / Android apps

This is a relatively new way to monetize your blog. Because this media is quite new. When I started blogging, iPhone wasn’t invented yet (I’m having a hard time to realize this, to be honest). Anyway, the fact that our content has become available and it’s consumed on an increasing number of devices creates a little bit of opportunity.

One thing you can do is to package your blog into a “hidden column” type of iPhone/iPad app. The “hidden column” is another name I give to the freemium model. You package your blog in that app along with something unique, that is meant to be available (and consumed) only through that app. That unique thing is your “hidden column”, something that people would be happy to pay for.

Or you can try to implement some of the concepts you have into an iPhone app. This is exactly what I did a few months ago. I created an ebook about my productivity framework “Assess – Decide – Do”, and I also created an iPhone app, iAdd, which implements this framework. The app is available in the AppStore and it does sell pretty well. And so does the ebook.

***

Well, that was it for now. I don’t know why, but I have a very distinct feeling that I only scratched the surface with it. Honestly, this is why I changed the title of the post too. There’s so much to be said on this topic, but I already have more than 1800 words written on this.

So, if you want to know more, just kick me up in the comments, I’d be happy to talk more.

Assess – Decide – Do: Natural Productivity

More than a year ago, I was traveling to Thailand. It was my first trip to South-East Asia. I clearly remember the colors, the smells, the images and the overall excitement mixed with curiosity. I had an incredible time during that trip. I don’t know if it was the visual shock or the cultural difference, the jetlag or my raw food diet (at that time) fact is, at some point during that trip, I had a sort of a revelation. It came in the form of three words: Assess – Decide – Do.

During the trip, those words repeatedly came into my mind until I realized they were my unconscious response to a lot of questions. How do you get up in the morning? How do I get to that place I want to visit? How do I get to the airport? How do I manage to write the blog posts I planned to write on this trip? All those questions stacked up somewhere in a darker corner of my mind, until they got a sudden and unexpected response. Assess, Decide, Do. While my conscious mind was busy absorbing all the fresh experiences, my unconscious mind had to come up with an answer to all those questions.

During that trip, I started to follow that short sequence of activities more and more, hour after hour, each and every day. I started to calm down and assess what I want to do, then decide if, when and where I want to do that, and then do it. I practically started to slice up my reaction to outside stimuli following this pattern. First assess, then decide, then do. Somehow, it seemed to work. The events were flowing down easily, I was focusing exactly on what I wanted to focus, while still maintaining a high degree of awareness. As I told you, I still remember the colors, the smells and even the noises.

After I got home, I put those words apart. There were things that needed to be done, bills to pay, meetings to attend to and so on. But somehow, the words kept popping out in my head. And somehow, I started to apply that sequence to other parts of my life. I started with work. In a matter of days, I started to experience a smooth flow and a surprising increase in my productivity. I said surprising because I’m not a lazy person. And then tried to apply it in my personal life. And then in my relationships. The more I practiced it, the better I became at. Eventually, I took this to a whole new and bigger level. After a few months of trials and errors, I was sure that I was into something really good. And by lack of any other name, I named this a “life management framework”.

What’s This Ebook About?

After I realized that I finally discovered something, I started to write about it. There were a few articles on the blog, all of them very well received. I started to incorporate feedback from my readers in it and also started to share these ideas with my friends. Basically, everybody who was exposed to the ideas seemed to “click” with the approach. At some point, when all the structure of the framework was clear, I started to build an app for it. Exactly, an iPhone app. There must be an app for everything, right?

During the app building process, I applied the same framework rules: I assessed, I decided than I did what seemed to be necessary to move the app forward. It took me roughly 30 days to build that app, without any prior knowledge of Objective C. It took me roughly 30 days to build that app, without any prior knowledge of Objective C. (No, this was not a mistake, I deliberately wrote that twice. Just to get it right.)

Now, the app is in the AppStore for more than 2 months, the latest version syncs your data with Dropbox, there is also an iPad version and so on. It may look like I started a business on this idea and to a certain degree, that’s right. But this perception of business will have to stop at the level of employees, though, because I don’t have any. I did everything by myself. Everything. The app, the blog, the promotion. Everything. Oh, and in the process, I had to handle the reconnection with my 13 year old son, I had to take care of my 4 year old daughter and also manage the separation details from my ex-wife. Just in case you’re thinking I had nothing else to do than to write on the blog, on the ebook or write Objective C code.

And still, every morning when I look in the mirror I see a healthy man, doing what he loves to do and enjoying a life of balance and fulfillment. This is what this ebook is about.

Let’s Get Practical Here

Now, if you made it till here, you must need some real life data, not some motivational stories. You’re right. I have what you need.

The ebook is structured in 3 levels: the conceptual one, the practical exercises and the tutorial for the iPhone/iPad app.

You start by learning from a very high perspective what Assess, Decide, Do means, how your being is acting on each realm and how you can identify your life imbalances using only the 3 aforementioned realms This will sound more like what I write on my blog on a regular basis. Many chapters are sharing large parts with the articles already published.

Then, in the second part, you take the framework to a real life ride. You start to apply it to relationships, to personal crisis management or to strategies for dealing with interruptions. This is the practical stuff. Once you have the concepts clear, you start to apply them to various areas of your day to day life.

And finally, in the 3rd part, you actually see, screenshot by screenshot, how to use iAdd for iPhone. This is the “tutorial” part of the ebook. I felt like a practical section was not enough. I needed something very “in your face”. Step by step. That’s what the third part is.

That’s it. This is the ebook.

I said it before, I will say it again: I suck at writing long, boring and deceiving sales pages. I simply can’t afford to insult your intelligence with all kind of cheap incentives, when I know that you know better than me if you need this ebook.

What Others Are Saying About It

As you may already know, the ebook was on pre-order for 48 hours on my blog. Since I wanted to have some feed-back, I kindly asked some of the people who read it to give me some impressions. These are real people, with real blogs and real lives. And, to my surprise (well, not quite ) they gave me feedback for both the ebook and the app.

Ian Peatey – QuantumLearning.pl

You will like the book if you:

• want to know how Dragos is so damn productive
• want a method to help you get productive yourself
• want to know how Dragos is so damn laid back AND productive at the same time.

You will be wasting your money if you:

• hate Dragos and wish him to live in poverty for the rest of his days
• are perfectly content with both your productivity and level of laid-back-ness.

Lyman Reed – LymanReed.com (iTunes feedback)

iAdd is an excellent app if you want to get out of the “add things to a list and then cross them off” world of productivity. It incorporates much from the GTD world (such as Contexts), but really shines in the area where GTD leaves off – where we assess what’s important to us and make decisions based on what we want to do.

The app is based on Dragos Roua’s Assess-Decide-Do framework – without an understanding of this framework, it could easily be mistaken for just another to do list with what seem like some extra useless steps. I strongly suggest that the user takes the time to learn the framework (links are in the app) to get the most from it.

It’s now my go-to iPhone app for productivity, especially when it comes to using the Assess realm for idea collection. It may even have convinced me that purchasing an iPad would be worth it – unless of course Dragos is planning on creating a version for Windows.  Or even better, a Google Chrome extension (hint, hint…)

Eric – EdenJournal.com

Assess Decide Do is a revolutionary way of approaching Life Management.  It’s more than managing productivity, it’s a framework to underlie day to day decision management.  Assess Decide Do clearly organizes the pre-decision, the decision, and the post decision (or doing.)   Decision making can be a challenge, but Dragos makes it easier by creating a process that allows for all the information gathering to happen first, and then the decision follows a simple go/no-go format.  I have struggled with many forms of organization, and I despise task lists.  Assess Decide Do is a great alternative to the task list, and is really a much more comprehensive solution to organize my life.  It really is a Life Management Framework.

Ruben Berenguel MostlyMaths.net

When I read about the ADD framework in Dragos’ blog, or about the iADD application, I wasn’t impressed. Maybe it was not the correct time, or I just didn’t get it at the moment. Then, I was offered to review the ebook, and reading chapter 3 opened my eyes. I definitely needed to buy that app: it was my workflow. Said and done, I bought it a few hours ago and can’t stop thinking about how much attention to usefulness Dragos put in it. If you have found other to-do apps useless, this is for you.

Pat Flynn – SmartPassiveIncome.com (iTunes feedback)

I agree with one of the other commenters. This really helps take the GTD mindset to a whole new productivity level. Understanding which tasks are most important to us is key, and I’m really glad I have an app to help me with this now, because I often lose my way throughout the day. Thank you!

***

The ebook is only 27 USD and you can buy it by clicking here.

I do hope it will give you at least a fraction of the benefits I had from creating it.

iAdd For iPhone / iPad Now Syncs With Dropbox

It has been a very exciting time for me in the last few weeks. Not only I finished another ebook, one that is very close to me, called “Assess – Decide – Do: Natural Productivity” but I also finished a brand new version of iAdd, my iPhone / iPad implementation for the ADD framework. As a matter of fact, I’m still in the “eye of the hurricane” as we speak. The ebook is currently on pre-order now (for the next 20 hours and something) which means you can still get it at a discounted price and the latest version of iAdd for iPhone / iPad, 1.2,  is live on the AppStore. So, I’m right in the middle of action, knowing that the actual launch of the ebook will happen only after a few hours.

Yes, We Run On iPad Too

Noticed how I silently added the iPad suffix too? Well, that’s because iAdd is now natively working on the iPad too. The good news is that you don’t have to pay extra bucks for it. iAdd is a Universal app. You pay only once (and you pay 3.99 USD, for a limited period of time) and you get 2 apps. If we take into account the iPod users, well, you get 3 apps in only one.

That’s one of the most important features of the latest version of iAdd. It’s not an app running in compatibility mode, it’s specifically designed for iPad. You will notice that all the main interface elements have been designed specifically for iPad, and the data enter workflow has been completely rewritten (click to see full size).

Look, I’m A Landscape!

Another new feature of the version 1.2 will be autorotation. Any data input app should have this, especially on smaller devices like the iPhone. It’s much more comfortable to type, or even to read your tasks while your device is on landscape. As many of you noticed this was an important oversight of the first version of iAdd. Well, it’s fixed now.

Send Anything By Email

Another common suggestion from iAdd customer was a way to make the data accessible in many ways. Everybody agreed that the app is easy to use, but not having a way to share your data outside the device was perceived like an important limitation. Well, starting with version 1.2 you can send any information via email. You can send tasks, you can send events, you can send even projects or ideas and all the contained tasks / details within the projects or ideas will be automatically added. All you have to do is to add an email address and hit send.

Cloud Syncing Is The New Black

As useful as it may be, email is kinda obsolete. I mean it’s a very good back-up solution, but the nicest thing of all is to have cloud syncing. Well, you asked for it, you got it. iAdd version 1.2 sync your data completely with Dropbox via Edge, #g or WiFi. You can now have access to all your tasks, projects or ideas from anywhere. Dropbox released an API for interacting with its widely popular cloud storage service only a few weeks ago but when I saw the press release, I knew I had to work with it.

The API is really fresh, so there might be some inconsistencies. I took all the measures I could think of to ensure a proper backup and syncing of your data, but as always, bad things may happen. Please use the support page listed in iTunes to give me a very thorough description of what wen bad. I’ll fix it.

The most common use case for syncing is when you have 2 devices: an iPhone that goes with you everywhere and an iPad which is more static. You can also have any combination of iPod, iPhone and iPad, of course. That’s one of the main reasons we have an iPad version too. You can use iAdd on any device, with its local database and once you hit sync, your information will be updated. As in most common syncing algorithms, I used the “most recent wins” approach. There are many ways in which you can sync your data, but for a sequential use case (not a concurrent access) this one seemed the most appropriate.

Workflow Improvements And Bug Fixes

There are also tons of bugfixes in this release and I won’t stop to mention each and every one of them. Maybe the most important one is the date selection mechanism which has been drastically improved. There are also a lot of new workflow enhancements and here is just a short list of what are the most important ones:

• a new context based view in the Decide realm
• now you can send a task back to Decide even before you finished it
• a task can be detached from a project, becoming a single task
• a task can be assigned to another idea
• a single task can be promoted to a project

You can see a full list of what’s new in the iTunes listing page.

It’s All Part Of The Framework

But the biggest competitive advantage of all would be of course the fact that iAdd implements the Assess-Decide-Do framework in a very handy and easy to use application. It’s part of the bigger framework, one that could allegedly be used not only for life management, but also for simpler and more mundane tasks like blogging or shopping. That’s right, you can use iAdd to plan your next blog post, or your next shopping session. There are even 2 sample chapters in the ebook which are talking specifically about that: how to use iAdd for blogging and for shopping. Not to mention that one third of the ebook is a very comprehensive manual of iAdd.

So, if you like iAdd, I strongly recommend getting the ebook “Assess – Decide – Do: Natural Productivity” which is, as I already said, on pre-order until tomorrow at 7 AM, Bucharest time. The price is 27 USD, but you can get it at 20 USD while on pre-order. Not to mention that I’ve also thrown in 30 promo codes for the new version of iAdd (of which I have less than 10 now, so you should really hurry up).

You get both the ebook and the app on a very good deal. The bad part of the deal is that will expire in less than 24 hours.

Assess – Decide – Do In Under 2 Minutes

Well, since things are going on just well with my iPhone app, which, by the way, is called iAdd, and can be seen directly in iTunes here, I thought it would be about time to make a short video explaining what’s the thing with this Assess – Decide – Do framework.

Without further ado, go on and watch this (very) short video. I suggest you see it in full screen, since I fiddled a little with the app, and it would be a little difficult to see all the things in just one tiny window.

Now, you know. Hopefully.

As you can see, it’s not very difficult. And I never claimed ADD would be something difficult, on the contrary, it’s simplicity at its best.

I did this video after I started to receive the first round of feed-back form my very first customers. Without exception, all were attracted by the “clean” interface and the apparent lack of complexity in the app. While the lack of complexity is a deliberate act, the clean interface is just the result of enforcing the Assess – Decide – Do framework. The information is the same in every productivity methodology, it’s how you look at it that differs. And, for what matters, what really makes a difference.

One more thing. Before posting the video on my blog, I shared it on twitter and facebook. Apparently, people loved it. So, I think I’m not too far from the truth when I’m saying that I will do more of these in the very near future. I already got some ideas about some very, very short tutorials, under 1 minute, which will fit great in this video scaffold.

Until then, remember that iAdd is still in its very first stage, in what I call MPD, or Minimum Product Demo. In this state, the app is only enforcing the framework, making you the obey some simple rules, like

• you cannot edit a piece of information if you’re not in Assess
• you don’t have to “sign the contract”, to actually commit for a task, unless you really send it to Do. The task can stay in the Decide realm for as long as you want, and you can select different contexts or deadlines for it as you see fit
• on the Do realm you’re only doing, there’s nothing more to distract your focus from that. You can only see the tasks from whatever perspective you want: time (today, soon or overdue) or space (meaning the contexts you assign in Decide).
• you can only add information in the Assess realm, in Decide and Do, you are performing completely different. Some clients suggested that I should add the possibility to add tasks from Decide or Do. That is very unlikely to happen.

Well, that’s it. If you have the app, just let me know in the comments and also feel free to give suggestions, critiques or any type of feedback you want. If you didn’t buy the app yet, you can do it by clicking here, for just 2.99 USD.

Or, at least, you can start assessing the possibility.

Natural Productivity – Introducing iAdd for iPhone

I’m really excited as I write this: iAdd for iPhone is live on the App Store [and that's an iTunes link for the impatient one]. It’s been a long journey, but I’m finally there.

Why is this so important for me? Why is this not just another product launch in the day to day routine of launching products? Because this is what you’re supposed to do if you’re running (even a very small) software company, right? You’re releasing products.

Well, iAdd is special. iAdd is part of a bigger personal breakthrough. If you’re just an iPhone app junkie (which means we’re sharing a big common interest here) go ahead and click on the iTunes link, buy the app, (it’s only 2.99 USD) and start using it. It will change your life.

But if you’re a little bit curious about how I came up with this productivity app, take 7 to 10 minutes off from your regular duties and start reading, I promise it won’t take more than that.

Being A Productivity Junkie

I had my share of GTD from its early days, back in 2005-2006. I was fascinated by the system, excited by its promise (“mind like water”) and extremely enthusiast by the actual implementation. I started to GTD in 2006 and I was an evangelist until 2008. But at some point, something started to feel a little bit wrong.

I was still doing incredibly more “stuff” than before using GTD and I also was pretty balanced when it came to personal / professional life. But then again, something was out of sync with the bigger picture. In a few months I had to admit that I was over GTD. Precisely, over the GTD hype. Just click on that link and you’ll find out more about what I kept and what I threw out form my GTD experiment.

This was the beginning of a long and somehow confusing process. There were many situations in which I needed the power of GTD, but then again there were situations in which GTD as a framework seemed inflexible and downright awkward. I fell off the GTD wagon and didn’t embarked on a new train.

Even more, the whole productivity thing started to feel artificial and unnatural. That was the time when I discovered what I still call the productivity trap. Just read the article and you’ll know what I mean.

Natural Productivity – What The Frack Is This?

Sometimes more than a year ago, during one of my trips to Thailand, I suddenly discovered something so simple, yet so powerful, that left me puzzled for a few weeks. Please stop smiling and don’t even think to write some smart comments about what people are usually discovering in Thailand, because I know what you mean . Right now I’m talking about productivity, ok?

So, I discovered that we’re not always in the same state. We, as human beings, are not designed only to get things done. We’re not made only to Do. We’re also made to Assess our environment and to Decide whether or not we’re going to do something. Some of you may say that this is a very simple discovery. And they’ll be perfectly right, by the way. I told you it was something really, really simple.

A few weeks later, my own life management workflow, called Assess – Decide – Do was ready. From that point, several approaches were made, including ADD for programming and ADD for relationships. Feel free to dig into these articles if you wanna know more about the framework.

Right now, just for the sake of the presentation, I will rehash some of the concepts, just to give you a short heads up:

Assessment is the state in which you analyze, compare, learn and store your experiences.

Decision is the state in which you project your next reality. You’re coming to this stage after finishing an assessment session completely.

Doing is the state in which you’re using focus to create your next reality. You’re doing only after you have a clear decision to follow.

Each of these states are maintained by your focus and you’re shifting from one state to another by being in flow.

Flow is not a measurable concept although we can refer to it as bigger, lower or we can define some quality of it. Flow is usually perceived as your capacity of enjoying and alignment with your current context. Most of what we call joy, happiness or exhilaration is in one way or another a variation of a great flow we’re experiencing.

If focus will be the main tool for creating your reality we may refer to the flow as the master glue for keeping the pieces together. A healthy flow will allow you to go from a complete assessment to an atomic decision and that will lead to a totally immersed activity of doing.

Well, that’s what I call natural productivity.

iAdd WorkFlow

Now back to the iPhone app. How do you implement this workflow using the iPhone app?

First of all, the app only has 3 tabs, each one corresponding to a specific realm. They’re even named like that: “Assess”, “Decide” and “Do”. Also, each tab has an icon which will intuitively let you know what you’re allowed to do in that specific realm.

Assess has a “+” sign as an icon, meaning that’s the place where you add stuff to your plate. This is where you overload your system with data. The theme color is red, which means: “stop and empty your brain” before moving further.

Decide has a “?” sign as an icon, meaning that’s the place where you decide if, when and where are you going to perform a certain task or to attend to a specific event. The theme color of this realm is orange, which means: “pay attention and be prepared”.

Do has a “-” sign as an icon, meaning that’s the place where you actually take out stuff from your system, by doing it. You cross of things as you do them. The theme color of this realm is green, which means: “you’re good to go”.

Pretty simple, right? Exactly, that’s the ideas behind the whole framework. Now, what happens after you add something to the system, after you’re using your “+”?

Well, you can edit that piece of information, right in the Assess realm, choosing what type of info is: task, idea, event or project.

Once you’re ready, you can either send it to Decide, in case you wanna decide when and where are you going to do it, either assign it to a collection, meaning you’re going to decide about it later.

Once in the Decide realm, all you have to do is to set a date, a place (most of the time you’re going to use a previously defined Context for the place) and a priority. After you assigned that, you’re ready to send it to Do. You won’t be able to send a task without a due date. Simply because a task without a due date is a task upon you didn’t decided yet.

From here, you can either do that task, and delete it after that, either skip it, in which case the task will appear as overdue. Only if the task is overdue, you can start the reverse process, sending the task back to Decide and from Decide to Assess, if you want. Most of the time you will only send it back to Decide, to assign a new due date.

That’s all there is to it. Really.

Before launching it I used the app for more than 2 months. One thing I noticed is that my overall state was significantly steadier than before using it. Not too much inner pressure for doing certain things, not too much anxiety. I still had a lot to do during those 2 months. And I’m a really focused guy and I do like to do my stuff, so it wasn’t about me becoming lazy. It really had something to do with the way I structured my activities. I won’t say that iAdd for iPhone will completely eliminate anxiety from your life, but it will certainly give you a much steadier structure. Why?

Tasks in Assess aren’t going to be done. Not yet. And that’s ok. You don’t really have to. Even more, they’re not even tasks, until you “sign a contract” to do them. They’re just things you’re assessing. You can modify them, you can even delete them, you can store them in a collection for further reference.

In Decide, you set the context and time for a certain task. At that moment, the piece of information from Assess becomes an actionable entity. A task or an event. You’re not assessing it anymore, you’re making a decision. But that’s all there is to it, only a decision. Until you actually send it to the Do realm, the task can stay in the Decide realm for as long as you’re comfortable with.

And in Do, you don’t have to focus on how or why (it’s been done in Assess), nor on when and when (it’s been done in Decide), all you have to do is… well, doing it.

This approach fits really well in your daily routine. You may have hours (or even days) in which you love to be a doer. Focus on the Do and start crossing off tasks. Sometimes, you’re in a planning mood. Just go in Decide and start allocate tasks and events to specific contexts and days. You don’t have to do them, just sign the contract that you’re going to do them at some point. And sometimes you’re just brainstorming (that’s the professional term for daydreaming, by the way). That too is perfectly ok. You are allowed to do this. Just write it down in the Assess realm and enjoy the process. You may turn those ideas into projects later if you really want to.

The Upcoming Ebook On ADD

But wait. There’s more. While I was working on all of these ADD related tasks (like the blog posts above, the app, etc) I realized there’s need for an organized way to put all these concepts together.

So, I started to write an ebook which will deal exclusively with this ADD framework. I’m over half way to it, and I expect it to be ready in a few weeks. I don’t know the exact date (I’m still assessing it), but I’m confident that it will be ready soon. Confident enough to give you a small teaser here, that is.

You may even consider this a soft pre-launch. I know there’s quite a hype on the blogs lately with these soft launches. Well, now I have mine too.

iAdd On The App Store

Now, that was really all about the app. You can go to the App Store now, by clicking this link and buy it. 2.99 USD is a really small price to be paid for putting your life together. Wow, sometimes I feel like the worst salesman in the world, you know?

The price will stay at 2.99 USD for a while, but as I will roll out the next features (because there is a roadmap which will include a lot of amazingly interesting features, and I mean it) well, as I will roll out these features, I may shift it up a little. I’m not sure yet, I’m still assessing it, so when I’ll make a decision about it, you’ll know.

Until then, enjoy it.

Inhale. Exhale

For the last 40 days my work routine was completely messed up. Some of you noticed it by the number of guest posts on the blog, which was really high lately (and for that I am thankful to all my dear friends and contributors here). Some of you noticed it by my (highly unusual) low presence on social media, on twitter and facebook. And some of you noticed it when I kindly asked you a small favor: helping me test one of the most interesting things I done lately: an iPhone app based on my Assess – Decide – Do life management framework.

Why iPhone Programming?

I can hear you, guys. Loud and clear: “what are you trying to prove with this iPhone stuff? I mean this is hundreds of miles away from being a blogger. I’m confused: what are you? What do you do?“ Well, I can understand your confusion. It may sound a little bit off the track, but it isn’t. This whole 40 days trial had very serious reasons. Here they are:

1. I Love To Make My Ideas Real

Number one reason is: making my ideas come true is one of my biggest sources of fulfillment. I live for this. I don’t have any other satisfaction bigger than that. I mean we all have brilliant ideas. I know some people who can have at least 6 brilliant ideas before breakfast (that would be a hook to a very interesting book, let me know in the comments if you guessed what’s the book I’m hinting at). But an idea is just an idea, an exercise of the brain. Putting all the pieces together, making it all work in the real life, just in front of your eyes, here’s from where the real satisfaction comes.

2. Self-Improvement Is Not About Writing A Self-Improvement Blog

Self-Improvement is about getting better and better at what you choose to do. Writing a blog about it can make a you a very respected blogger but it won’t automatically make you a better person. There are certain skills required to create and maintain a successful blog, I agree, but that has little to do with self-improvement. It’s just a blog. Self-improvement means challenging yourself into more and more difficult ventures, and overcome all the obstacles. This is where the real fun is.

3. I Truly Believe in My Life Management Framework

It’s been almost a year since the first draft of my ADD life management framework. A lot of stuff happened since them. I wrote 4 ebooks (all of them with printed versions published on Amazon too) and started 2 live workshops, one on online business and the other one in professional blogging. None of this could happen if I didn’t consciously apply all the rules in my life management framework. In other words: this just works. It made me far more productive than I was even when I had my online publishing company (and I was somehow forced to be productive). So, knowing that the system has been tested for almost a year on my self, I had no reason NOT to make it available to a wider audience.

The Whole Picture

But wait, there’s more. Yes, of course if is The iPhone app is just a part. The product I’ve been working on includes much more than that. I already have an ebook describing the ADD life management framework in a very advanced stage. I hope it will be ready by the end of this month. Think at the ebook as of a companion for the iPhone app (there will be a whole chapter dedicated to it anyway). And there will also be a series of podcasts on how to use this life management framework, along with the iPhone app (or even separately, if you want, ADD is a very flexible framework, it downs’t tie you down to a certain setup).

So, please keep in mind there will be some buzz again on this blog and make sure you subscribe, because in the next few weeks I’ll be writing far more than usual. Or at least in a different manner than you’re used to.

But until then, here are a few screenshots of the iPhone app. The interface may change a little bit in the near future, but basically this is how it looks:

The Growing Process

After 40 days of totally immersing in a completely new area, I feel incredibly fresh. Yes, there were a lot of roadblocks and frustrations along the way. At some points I felt lost. I also felt like I was going nowhere: what am I doing here in the middle of the night trying to understand a stupid thing like a UIPickerDateDelegate? Why am I doing this instead of sleeping or staying in the backyard listening to some music or just going out to some party?

Well, I did it because this is what I usually do: I try to get better at stuff. I try to overcome my own limitations. I try to discover new things. And I enjoy this far more than sitting outside in the backyard doing nothing or banging my head at some dull party. I love to be challenged. And learning Objective C from scratch in one month looked like one hell of a challenge.

Now, don’t get too excited. Learning Objective C in one month if you’ve never been exposed to programming might be almost impossible. I don’t claim I did this. I am a seasoned programmer (I think I wrote more than 100.000 lines of PHP code back while I had my online publishing company).

And I also did something to soften a potential crash: a dry run using a low effort project, just to get a glimpse of what should I expect. It was what I call “calibration”: do something small just to see exactly what steps do you have to take. So, three months ago I created a small game using a third party SDK, Corona, which allows you to build iPhone, iPad and Android apps. It didn’t took me more than a week. The game, called iFlipEm Lite, was written in lua, a very easy to learn programming language. iFlipEm Lite ( iTunes link) is in the AppStore for more than 2 months now and it had around 1000 downloads. Not to mention the Android version which had around 100 installations.

Once I understood the whole process of app submission and logistic requirements for deploying an iPhone app at a more professional level, I totally immersed into it. I started to daily log my progress (or, for what it matters, my frustrations) and I committed to it totally. I plan to write a very detailed post on how to tackle such a job so for those of you keen on technical details maybe there will be something more.

Now, this whole adventure backfired at me in a number of ways. First of all, the blog suffered a little bit. I didn’t wrote as much as I usually do and I didn’t promote it (or engage in cross-promotions) as often as I usually do. I ran much more guest posts than usual. The subscribers number remained basically the same but the in the blog business, if you don’t grow, you don’t exist. Just being there means nothing, you gotta move. So, my blog was stalled for a little while.

But while my blog was stalled, something else was growing: my personal experience in implementing an iPhone app, based on my own ideas. And even if this wasn’t very obvious (or at least very public) it counts. And it counts a lot. Maybe some of my readers got a little bit confused by the fact I didn’t wrote as often as I usually do. They shouldn’t. It’s normal. I’m not a writing machine, nor do I intend to become one. I’m enjoying the process as much (if not more) as I enjoy the destination. So every detour on my road is part of the journey. And I enjoy it a lot.

Now, since everybody knows now what I was doing lately, a short explanation of the title.

Inhale. Exhale

Every time we’re immersing in something new, we’re inhaling. We’re incorporating skills, information, knowledge, experience. We’re totally immersed in this process. And this is how it should be, anyway. And every time we’re sharing or applying what we learned, we’re exhaling. We’re pushing away our know-how, enriched with our personal experience.

Our entire life process is unfolding like this. There is this game of pushing back and forth that makes the journey worthwhile.

If we’re too much into inhaling (acquiring skills, knowledge or money) we’re going to implode, sooner or later. If we’re too much into exhaling (sharing skills or knowledge) we’re going to dry ourselves out: we’re going to run out of experiences to share.

So, the growth process is nothing more than this simple, fundamental process of respiration.

Inhale. Exhale.

How To Train Your Brain

You’d better relax and set aside some time for yourself, because this post is going to be rather long. And it will also be something different from what you’d expect from me. One could argue that this will be a tutorial for rewiring your brain, while others may think that this will be just a review for a product I like. No one would be right, of course. It will be something in between.

Without further ado, ladies and gents, let’s talk about how to keep your brain in good shape. There has been a lot of research conducted in educational psychology on learning in the classroom; here I will talk about how to keep your brain in good shape outside of traditional learning settings.  And, with your permission, let’s talk first about why you need to keep your brain in good shape.

Your Brain Is Your Main World Interface

Some of you may remember the series of posts in which I made a comparison between a human being and a computer, and I’m talking specifically about how to keep the best version of yourself. For the sake of the game, let’s pretend again you’re like a computer. In this case, your brain will be your main world interface. (It’s not the CPU, as some of you may think. The CPU is just processing information, and that is only one cognitive function among many others the brain has, like attention, flexibility and so on).

So, everything you feel, think, imagine and create, everything would go through this interface. If this interface will be broken, your sensations, thoughts and memories would be severely affected. If this interface will become faster, wider and slimmer, your sensations will be more vivid, your thoughts will be more complex and your memories will be accessible much easier.

Now, let’s take this a little further. Let’s pretend you’re much more than a computer. You’re an airport. Thousands of planes are going in and out to this airport. Some of the planes are carrying sensations, some of them are carrying information and some of them are carrying thoughts or memories. Some of the planes you send out are carrying words or gestures, and they land on other airports.

In this case, your brain is your main control tower. It dispatches sensations, thoughts and memories and creates complicated storage structures and algorithms. It keeps all the traffic going on in good conditions. And it does that by constantly monitoring the incoming flow of planes, the available departure lanes, the weather, the remote airports availability, the flight schedule and maybe a thousand of other parameters.

Imagine what happens if this control tower fails at some point. Plane crashes. Colliding sensations. Erratic words going out to other airports. Missing pieces of information from other airports, because their planes will never land. Total damage. And you don’t need a severe failure to observe a significant decrease in brain performance. It suffices to have just a lazy control tower operator and you’ll start noticing delayed responses, crowded landing lanes, rushing takes-off and so on. I’m sure you’ve been there: saying what you didn’t want to say, remembering stuff when you don’t need it anymore or experiencing sudden talking blocks.

Hopefully, you have a better idea now about how important your brain is for your overall functionality as a human being. And still, this metaphor is just a feeble image of what your brain does. It also monitors your energy levels sending stimuli of hunger (that would be the equivalent of re-fueling the planes), it does long-term planning (equivalent of upgrading the equipments and planes) or makes estimations (learning by example, for instance, after a plane collision).

OK, I get the feeling that you know why you need to keep your brain in good shape. Let’s start talking about the how.

How To Train Your Brain

First of all, let me tell you that I was in search for something similar to Lumosity for a long time. When Lucaino Passuelo posted a tweet about how cool Lumosity is, I clicked to see what it’s all about. (It’s not the first time when Luciano, who blogs brilliantly at litemind.com, is pushing my limits. Last time he did it, I ended up on the first page of Delicious, Digg and a few other social media outlets, after I wrote my first huge list post: 100 Ways To Live A Better Life).

After a few clicks (or touches, since I was more attracted by the iPhone version) I confess I was totally sold out. Lumosity is a collection of scientifically designed “brain games”, which are challenging various areas of your cognitive process: from flexibility to attention, and from speed to memory. The best way to explain Lumosity is “fitness for your brain”. If you exercise regularly you already know all the benefits: your body tends to be slimmer, you walk steadier, you’re more aware, your muscles are always ready to act, you detox faster and so on. Well, those are the exact benefits you should expect from a brain exercising routine too. You’ll think faster, you’ll increase your attention and memory, you’ll be more flexible, reacting better to environmental changes, and so on.

These brain games I’m going to talk about are hosted at Lumosity.com but there is also an iPhone version. I personally prefer the iPhone version and I think that being a digital nomad plays a huge role in this decision. Games are also structured as courses, or series of various games mixed together in sessions. The iPhone version features such a course with 35 sessions. One neat thing about the iPhone version is that you can set up alerts and you’ll be notified at the time of the next session. Total time spent on such a session is between 4 and 7 minutes. Of course, you can play the games individually and I do this all the time. But I would recommend doing the session first, it seems there is a certain progression which will tune in your brain faster if you that.

Another cool thing about Lumosity is that you can evaluate your progress, by using a proprietary metric, the so called BPI, or Brain Power Index. Citing from Lumosity website, “Brain Performance Index (BPI) is a measure of your performance in a given cognitive function. You can use BPI to track your performance, and compare your ability in one cognitive area to another. An increase in BPI indicates improvement. An increase of more than 200 points represents a substantial improvement of about 1 standard deviation.”

If you wonder how this BPI is calculated (I know I did), there’s an answer for that too: “The BPI scales are based on an analysis and ranking of over 13,000,000 real game results. We used these game results to create a distribution of scores for each activity so we know how an individual score stacks up to all others. We then evaluate your game scores and use a proprietary algorithm to derive your BPI. Each time you play, we update your BPI to accurately reflect your current brain performance.”

But that’s not all. You can track your BPI in various cognitive functions (by playing the associated games) over time with some nice looking graphs.

Now, let’s talk about the most important games in the pack (I won’t spoil the surprise for you by talking about ALL the games).

Brain Exercises

Just like physical exercise, brain training must be performed in a balanced way. Excelling only at one cognitive function of your brain wouldn’t give you any big advantage. Yes, you may have a fantastic memory, but if you lack attention or flexibility, it wouldn’t make you perform better overall. So, if at the gym you’re doing intervals, weight lifting and running, in a brain training workout you’ll do memory, attention, speed and flexibility.

Train Brain for Attention: Lost In Migration

Apparently, this was the most difficult game for me. You have to spot the center bird in a group, without getting distracted by the other birds. Once you saw its direction, do a swipe confirming it (left, right, up or down). If you got it right, you get points (and a bonus if you do it really fast). If you got it wrong, your iPhone will vibrate and you won’t get points. Each session lasts about 45 seconds. The goal is to keep your attention steady, without being distracted.

The game features several backgrounds (balloons, desert, city) and I suspect there’s a different difficulty level in each of them. It can get really frustrated in the beginning, if you’re getting 2-3 vibrates in a row, but it surely becomes better as you practice. I still find it very difficult to pass over a certain physical limit: there are a few milliseconds between the visual identification and the finger gesture. This gap is very hard to minimize. In other words, the brain-finger muscle cooperation must be enhanced too.

Train Brain for Memory: Memory Matrix

By far, my favorite game. You get a matrix of cells (growing from 3×3 up to 8×8), in which you are presented with a random model of colored cells. The model stays around a second, then it disappears. Your job is to re-create the model by touching the corresponding cells. If you got it right, the matrix advances to the next level and you get points. If it doesn’t, you get a nasty iPhone vibration and have to start over from the previous level (for instance, if you screw it at the 7 cells level, you gotta start again by doing the 6 cells level).

There are 15 turns, starting from 3 cells models, which means the maximum you can go is up to 17 cells models. In my experience, around 9-12 cells there’s a threshold. If you get over these levels, you’ll find it surprisingly easier to solve a matrix with 14 or 15 cells. This game was the first one in which I got a BPI higher than 500 (a part from the Chalkboard Challenge where I got the maximum after the first game, but more on that in a minute).

Train Brain for Speed: Circles

I picked up Circles for this short presentation, but there are a few other variations of this in the package, feel free to get the app and look it up for yourself. In this game, you’re presented with a circle in a certain shape, you have to memorize it and then the first one disappear and another one comes to the screen. Your job is to see if the previous circle matches the current one, by pressing the corresponding buttons. If you got it right, you get points, if not, yes, you’re right, the iPhone will vibrate and you won’t get points.

I find this type of game very challenging, because it forces you to stay alert AND keep your short term memory in good shape. Also, you gotta have a pretty good reaction speed.

Train Brain for Flexibility: Color Match

That was a real challenge for me and I’ll explain you why a little later. It’s a nice little game in which you get a two areas zone: in the upper area you get a word designating a color: red, blue, yellow or black, and in the lower area you get another word designating a color, which, attention, must MATCH the upper word color. So, if the upper word is “red” the lower word must by in a red color, regardless of its meaning, which could be “yellow”. That’s tricky.

I’m not an English native speaker, so I had a little overhead in this game because I had to perform 2 more translations: one for the upper color and one for the lower color. In the beginning I was a catastrophe at this game. But after a few days I got better. Which means nothing, but nothing, but nothing that these games are really working.

Train Brain for Problem Solving: Chalkboard Challenge

Now, last but not least, the game in which I surprisingly got the highest possible score from the first time. In this one, you get a two area zone, only this time on an horizontal split. The left and right areas are holding numbers, or various operations with numbers and you gotta pick the highest result. For instance, if on the right area you got number 9, and in the left area you got (6 + 3) * 2, the right area is the correct one: 18 > 9. The operations can get really complex.

At some point, the areas are starting to shake, making the identification of symbols pretty difficult (not to mention the actual computations). As I told you, I got the highest score at this from the first time, meaning 1700. I had a few blunders along the line but overall I am at the same level – 1698 – 1700 – during the last month. It took me a while to understand why I got the highest score so fast but I think I finally got it: as on online entrepreneur[ I exercised this estimation function on a daily basis. Especially in the online business, where everything is so volatile, making accurate estimations is a key process. So I was already there, so to speak.

My Brain Training Personal Experience

Now, I have more than one month since I practice this. And I must say that it was quite an interesting experience. First of all, I took all the 35 sessions from the iPhone introductory course. I didn’t take them one per day, as they recommend, but rather 2-3 in a row. Meanwhile, I did a lot of other exercises separately and closely watched my BPI. I was able to go from 1100 BPI to 1500 BPI in around 30 days. According to Lumosity terms, I had at least 2 standard deviations (one increase in 200 BPI being considered 1 standard deviation).

Physical Sensations

I am a true believer in neuro-plasticity, which is the ability of brain to re-organize itself, or even to re-create new cells as they are required. Not long ago, the large majority of brain scientists believed that we are basically limited by birth conditions to the number of neurons we have, hence our brain performance was something “frozen” or at least highly predictable and limited. I don’t believe this. I think we can reshape our brain the same way we are “sculpting” our bodies at the gym.

During the first part of my 30 days experience with Lumosity I experienced some mild headaches. I couldn’t even describe them as headaches, but more like an inside pressure or some increased awareness of some of my brain areas. Something very close to the sore body you get after a good workout.

I also felt more alert and ready to start or to finish things. It wasn’t about motivation per se, but more about my presence in the moment.

I also had more intense hunger feelings and I clearly felt the need to eat differently. I know there is a link between proteins and our nervous system, but I don’t know exactly what it is. I can only tell you that I felt the need to eat more proteins as usual (beans, for instance).

I continued to drink around 3-4 liters of green tea per day (I gave up coffee a year ago) and I also observed some subtle correspondence between the level of liquids and my overall state. Clearly better when I stick to my regular tea routine.

Some Visible Improvements

In the last 30 days I was invited to 3 public events where I talked about entrepreneurship and lifestyle design. I never was afraid to talk in public, but these last 3 times I felt really great. In two cases I didn’t had any written presentation and I spoke freely to an audience of about 30-50 persons. I surprised myself being coherent and catching the flow even without a pre-established structure or plan. At one event I was on the board of advisers, in front of a 120 persons audience for 9 hours straight and I never had any drifting away moment. I consider this to be a direct consequence of exercising my brain.

In the last 30 days I also launched the website of my New Zealand company along with my first public product. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that my first app in the App Store was a little cute memory game. The game was developed in about 10 days and it features both iPhone and Android versions.

Another area in which I clearly saw a visible improvement was my learning ability. I was able to finally freeze my long time postponed company products roadmap for the next 9 months, including some old, dusted projects, and to bring to alpha version a few new apps. Being busy, so to speak. What’s interesting is that I noticed an increased ability to juggle with different programming environments and languages, switching easily from Objective C (yes, I finally become a friend of Xcode) and Lua (using a somehow exotic SDK for cross-platform game development).

But the most visible improvement was in awareness.

In less than a week since I started this brain exercising routine, I observed an increased capacity to focus and to remain focused for larger chunks of time. I don’t think many of the so-called social media enthusiasts will like what I’m going to say now, but this 30 days trial made me reconsider my social media approach. I’ve been extremely quiet on Twitter and only at the minimal level in Facebook. I do think social media is making us prone to attention disorder and it highly affects our ability to stay focused. Toldya you ain’t gonna like this.

Another visible improvement was on the analytical side, especially on the relationships side. We all have our own idiosyncrasies and we tend to react the same way to the same social stimuli. Some persons are making us angry and other are making us happy. We’re reacting to them on autopilot. I noticed that I have an increased attention to my reaction to relationships, giving them much more attention and weight that I did previously. For instance, I avoided a few fights just by being able to see more clearly what the point of the discussion was, and I also was able to start a few fresh contacts with persons I wasn’t usually very attracted to (there were business contacts, mainly).

Tips For A Better Brain Fitness

Now, if you’re going to start your own brain exercising routine (which I believe you’ll do, judging from the fact that you’ve been curious enough to get to this point of the article ), here are a few tips and tricks from my personal experience.

- don’t do attention games after 20:00 in the evening (or with less than 2 hours before going to sleep). It will create an unneeded state of awareness. I couldn’t sleep for hours until i realized that I just challenged my brain attention function and it will stay alert for the next few hours.

- do some brain games before meetings: memory games when you’re doing some public speaking, especially if you’re talking freely, without a written presentation. Do some flexibility games before a negotiation, it will make easier for you to see the opportunities in the discussion. If you’re planning something, do some problem solving exercises and strengthen your forecasting abilities.

- to improve your memory matrix results: try to create stories associated to the the images. I saw that if I give names to some of the shapes, I can solve the matrix faster.

- in attention games is more important to give accurate results than to be faster. The goal is to train your ability to stick with the correct situation than to do it faster. You can become faster in speed games.

- don’t let a gap bigger than 100 BPI between your various cognitive areas, otherwise it will be pretty difficult to advance. Even if you score the highest score on Estimations, for instance, it will be pretty difficult to increase your overall BPI.

The Brain Training Price

Initially, this last paragraph was meant to give you a short overview of the prices for this product. But as the article unfold, I realized that there is really a price you pay if you DON’T enhance your brain. Of course, Lumosity isn’t the only method to train your brain, it’s not the greatest miracle in human evolution, nor even the best thing since the sliced bread (I think the Internet could easily win this one). But it’s a solid service and it does a very interesting thing from a business perspective: it finds a good opportunity and exploits it. The price is affordable, the service is solid, the results are unquestionable (again, at least for me) so it does what every business should do: sell something valuable at an affordable price.

Now, let’s talk about the real prices. The iPhone app is free, and so are the first 20 training sessions. After that, you subscribe using InApp Purchase (meaning you’re buying a subscription from within the iPhone, using the credit card you use for buying stuff on iTunes and App Store). The most affordable yearly plan is 7.99 USD. Please keep in mind that you can play the games for as long as you want without paying, the subscription will only give access to your BPI and tracking statistics. Also, on the iPhone some of the games are sold separately for prices from 0.99 and 1.99. The individual apps offers statistics only for the BPI associated with the game (i.e. only memory BPI if you’re buying the Memory Matrix game).

On the website, the monthly subscription costs 14.99 USD, but there are a few yearly packages which can drop this as low as 4.99 USD for a two years subscription. Keep in mind that when you sign up to Lumosity.com you can use all the features in the website for a limited time. There’s no associated fee for creating an account. You pay this subscription only if you want to access your BPI all the time, access personalized courses and see how you compare with other Lumosity users. Speaking of which, there is also a ”friend this user“ option, so you can get in touch really easily with other guys. If you want to befriend me on Lumosity, my nickname there is edragonu. As for paying the subscription, just keep an eye on your mailbox, because I saw that Lumosity is pushing some special offers and discounts pretty every now and then, so you can get even better than 4.99 USD/month.

So, go ahead: sign up at Lumosity.com (even if you plan to use only the iPhone version, you gotta have an account at Lumosity, your BPI score and evolution are stored remotely on the server).

Start playing, befriend me and let me know how you feel about that.

Happy brain fitness

The Morning Phrase

What’s the first thing you hear in the morning? What’s the first thing you read in the morning? What’s the first thing yo do in the morning? I ask because this very first thing will shape your whole day. If it’s something that plays on the radio, you’ll hear that tune all day long. If it’s something that you hear form your room mate (or your spouse, or your kid) it will circle in your mind all day long. If it’s something you’re doing with good results it will influence your entire day. With good results, of course.

I call this specific piece of action, this day igniter: “the morning phrase”. The morning phrase is something very important and I don’t mean only at a symbolical, metaphorical level. We’re functioning with two minds: one conscious and the other one subconscious. Like it or not, a huge part of your being is driven by your subconscious mind. And one of the first things your subconscious will receive daily will be this morning phrase. And guess what: your subconscious mind is a very obedient friend: it will do exactly what you tell to it.

This apparently insignificant thing is like a powerful switch for a better mood during the day. Once you activated it, chances that your daily behavior will change – without a significant conscious intervention from your part – are really big. In fact, you’re still experiencing those changes, only at a subconscious level. In today’s post I’ll try to take the morning phrase out from your subconscious mind and make it a little bit more manageable.

Why Having A Morning Phrase

To unleash your energy in a specific task.
To keep a positive attitude during the day.
To implement a specific habit.
To fixate something in a longer learning process.
To keep you motivated towards a specific goal.

And you can add your very own reasons here….

What A Morning Phrase Is Made Of

I started to experience my morning phrase more than 2 years ago. I had several morning phrases and I learned some important things about the effectiveness of a morning phrase. Here’s the detailed list.

True

First of all, the morning phrase must be true. If it’s something that you perceive as a lie, it will not work. Remember, you subconscious mind is not easy to challenge, it will eat whatever you feed it, so if you feed ti with lies, it will get back to you with lies.

A true morning phrase is something that is very close to your own personality, your environment, you general life context. If the morning phrase is something like: “It’s so hot today in Antarctica” I don’t think you’ll hook your subconscious up into something useful.

Simple

It must be simple and understandable. When you wake up, your brain is trying to adjust from sleeping patterns, specifically delta / theta frequencies, to the awake state, typically alpha frequencies. During this adjustment period, nothing too complicated will really get through, so it better be simple. As in not complicated.

Realistic

It must be something you are able to do it. Like during that specific day, not in a week, or month. Using your immediate resources, not something you may have in a month or two.

Empowering

That morning phrase must motivate you in some form. It may refer to things you are attracted to, or it may be formulated in some familiar and pleasant way. Whatever the form, the morning phrase will unleash something from you, so be careful at what you want to let out.

Easy To Remember

If you really want to make things smoother, chose an easy to remember phrase. Don’t go out rhyming, if you’re not comfortable with it, but chose something easy to memorize. That way you conscious mind will be attracted in the game too.

How To Create A Morning Phrase

The most effective moment for the morning phrase is at or shortly after the alarm clock. If you use an alarm clock, of course. If you can get up in the morning without an alarm clock, you would have to create a separate habit for the morning phrase. I already wrote an article about how to create a habit in 15 days, so feel free to read it if you want to create this new habit.

My alarm clock is in fact my iPhone, which makes things a little simpler. An alarm set up in the iPhone clock’s application can also have a short description. Which is in fact my morning phrase. So, I’m set.

But you may not be an iPhone person, so you must chose other insertion points. You can have it written on a post-it on your bathroom mirror, for instance, or clipped with a magnet on your fridge. You can have it on your wardrobe, or on your car’s dashboard. It’s really a matter of what you think it’s a good insertion point for this type of messages.

In fact, you will find the best insertion point once you start assessing the results. Depending on the specific content of that phrase, the results may be extremely diverse, but there are some common points you could be able to identify.

Better Sleeping

I noticed that after a few days of having this morning phrase, my sleeping patterns are starting to improve slightly. Might be associated with the fact that my stress level is lowered by using a morning phrase.

Better Mood During The Day

Regardless of the specific goal set in the morning phrase, you should be able to experience better moods during your day. Or at least a more energetic attitude. Or you are smiling more often.

Effectiveness

That should be the most important assessment. If you’re experiencing a higher level of effectiveness – independent of the specific task you’re doing – the morning phrase is working.

The “Night Before” Trick

Ok, this is a trick, because is not happening in the morning, but it makes it works better. Read that phrase just before you go to sleep. Again, having it written in my iPhone makes it easier for me to have it close just before getting asleep. I noticed that when I read my phrase before going to sleep, in the morning I have a familiar feeling. Anyway, it works better like this.

Do you have a morning phrase? If not, ever thought to start having one? Do you think it’s beneficial or placebo? Would love to hear your comments on that.