Category Archives: Success

Essential Planning for 2017

It often seems like we don’t have the time to pause and lay out a plan. But I have found this to be super valuable. It is time well spent and actually reduces the time it takes to get to your goals.

A 12 Week Plan

One of books that I read/listened to last year was called the 12 week year and described a method to essentially get a year’s worth of work done in 12 weeks.

I don’t know if this is entirely possible, but I did find that having a set of goals for the whole year was not ideal. Also, writing a post to review them every month was probably not a best use of writing time. Twelve weeks seems like a pretty good number for a set of goals and then reviewing them afterwards.

Major Goals

Part of the 12 week year planning process is setting a larger goal that is to be reached in about 3 years. This is the vision of what you want your life to be like in 3 years.

You then set smaller goals to be accomplished in the next 12 weeks that will move you closer to the 3 year vision. These goals should be a little bit of a stretch for you. They should not be impossible, but also not super easy.

Finally you breakdown the actions you are going to take each week to accomplish your 12 week goal.

Applying the Process

I have decided to give this planning method a try in the first quarter of 2017 to see how I like it. The vision part is a mix of personal and business goals so I will not be sharing that here, but I will be tracking my 12 week goals.

Goals for the 12 Weeks

You should probably have no more than 3 major goals for each 12 week stretch. Otherwise you will not be focused and probably won’t come close to any of them.

My goals for the next 12 weeks are:

Finish the Making Your First Game with Monkey-X tutorial series and turn it into a short E-book: Although the Monkey community is not all that large, it is a great little framework and perfect for beginners. I am still learning a lot writing this tutorial although I have decided to switch target frameworks as a specialty.
Clean up and release Prism Ship to Android with 2 versions, 1 paid with no ads and 1 free with ads. This will be hooked up to Google’s service that tracks high score: I really liked getting a game out to Android last year and I want one that could start a small revenue stream. Not looking to make tons of money with this, but I already have the code and want more practice with releasing things to Android.
Begin specializing in Xamarin: one of the key concepts I learned last year was the importance of specialization. It is tough. There are so many cool things to learn. But if I want to actually achieve success, I will need to start by focusing on a niche. One of the reasons I like Monkey is because it allows cross platform deploys. Xamarin does the same thing for cross platform mobile app development. The overall focus will be on doing cross platform development and deployments. I will still be making games, just not writing about it as much in the first quarter. Additionally if I don’t like Xamarin at all after 3 months, I will pick something different.

So lots of changes coming up, but ultimately a clearer focus. Looking forward to an awesome 2017.

Secret of Success: Get Enough Sleep

This past week I traveled for work and somewhat disrupted my regular sleep and work schedule. I ended up staying up a little later but still getting up at the same time.

To cap it off, Friday I stayed up until about 1 A.M. and then got up at 6 A.M. to drive home. On Monday when it was time to go back to work, I was feeling exhausted all day and had significant trouble getting work done for my job and got zero writing and programming done for myself.

Thankfully by Tuesday, I was feeling much more rested (in spite of getting up at 5:15 A.M.).

Some People Don’t Do Well Because They Don’t Feel Well

If you are tired and not feeling 100%, you usually do not do your best work.

You probably do not feeling like working either.

It is hard to be creative and solve problems if you are exhausted.

Sleep Tips

Here are a few tips that are likely to be relevant to you, especially if you are into programming and/or video games like me.
You might already know some of these, but a reminder is always good.

Exercise: Getting some exercise in everyday will help you sleep better at night.
Get Sunlight: Going outside and allowing your eyes to have natural lighting will help you sleep better at night. In some places and for some professions that don’t get sunlight much, a special kind of light for therapy is often used to help.
Avoid Screen Time Near Bed Time: Many studies have shown that we have trouble falling asleep and getting good quality of sleep if we are using screens that shine light directly into our eyes before we try to sleep.
Mind the Caffeine: Personally I usually try to avoid caffeine because I can be a little sensitive to its effects and I am not a big fan of the crash that comes a day or two later. Even if you only start the day with coffee or some other caffeinated beverage, it can still effect your sleep that evening.
Cool It Down: Cooling the temperature in the room will help your body relax and fall asleep easier.

How Do You Feel?

One of the key indicators for whether or not you are getting enough high quality sleep is how you feel in the morning.

Do you wake up ready to get out of bed or are you hitting the snooze button 7 times?

If its the later, try some of the tips above and even search for other ways to get the sleep you need.

Success Is Difficult If You Don’t Have The Energy

Fear

As I sit to write this post, I feel small twinges of exactly what I am writing about. Fear that it is pointless to write this and that it is a waste of time. But it needs to be written because Fear is exactly what will keep you from making a great game or doing anything great.

Another Name

Another name for Fear that has been given is the Resistance. Most of the people I have heard use this term reference a book called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. I have written a little about this Resistance before, but I think it is such a major factor in holding people back, myself included, that it needs to be readdressed occasionally.

Common Fears

In one of the classic books on success titled Think and Grow Rich, the author list 6 categories of fear that most fears can be grouped under.

Fear of Poverty
Fear of Criticism
Fear of Ill Health
Fear of Loss of Love
Fear of Old Age
Fear of Death

Today we will look at the fears of poverty and criticism because they seem to be the most likely culprits in keeping creative people from doing great things.

Poverty

Fear of poverty is characterized by things that keep you poor such as worry, doubt, indecision, and procrastination. It makes you overcautious and unwilling to take the risks which you need to take to become richer. And often the risks are not really risky at all. It turns out it is usually more risky to keep the status quo than to make the changes necessary to achieve success.

Criticism

For writing and making games especially this is a big one. I think it is the one that keeps me from wanting to hit the publish button every time I write a post and that keeps me from wanting to show someone a rough version of a game.

You are not likely to become poor from writing for free on the Internet or from showing people the games you are making. However, you are likely to receive some criticism, especially if you have any sort of audience. It is impossible to make everybody happy. But often the criticism comes from people whose opinion of us does not matter. As far as games are concerned, criticism is exactly what we need. We need fresh eyes to take a critical look at our games and we need the criticism and insight that they offer.

There is a fairly well known quote from Theodore Roosevelt that says

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

What Do We Do?

There are a couple of ways to get past the fears. One is to talk about them, they hate that. The part of your brain that likes to bring up fears does not like you to look at them directly and consider the worst outcomes and the likely outcomes.

Another way is to ask good questions. What is the likely outcome of performing this action? What is the worst outcome? Who might criticize me and do I care that they do? Who am I helping by doing this? Start asking yourself questions about why you don’t want to do something.

A final way of getting past fear is just make what you want to do a must and turn it into a habit. Every day you will do this thing. It helps to make it the first thing you do when you get up.

I hope this help you get past some of your fears that are preventing you from writing that blog post or showing someone the game your are working on.

Game Devs Like You

One of the many things that my studies in success have consistently directed me towards is forming a Mastermind. The word may sound fancy but it is simply the idea of 2 or more people who meet together to share advice and ideas.

In game development especially, a mastermind would be extremely helpful. Sharing resources, pitfalls, and ideas in something so complicated is extremely beneficial to all involved.

So a few months ago I started looking into this a little more seriously. I have not found or formed a mastermind as yet, but I did find an opportunity to join one remotely.

Gamekedo

Gamekedo is a game development club organized by Chris DeLeon. They work mostly in Unity and work together to make games.

The club has monthly dues but for someone just starting out in game development it sounds like a great opportunity (especially if you are interested in Unity).

Game Devs Like You

In addition to the club, Chris also runs the Game Devs Like You podcast in which he interviews people in game development. I have only listened to the first couple episodes so far but they are fantastic. The first episode is with a game dev who is only 12 years old (what’s your excuse?).

It is an encouraging and informative podcast and I will be adding it to my Ultimate List of Game Development Podcasts

If you don’t already have a group to discuss games and game design with, consider looking for one in your area or online.

Secrets To Success: Get Moving

Its story time.

I was working on my current game and had just fixed a bug with the controls and realized I didnt know what to work on next. It was late in the afternoon and I had already worked my day job for 8 hours and spent some time and brainpower fixing this issue. I wanted to keep working but was feeling mentally exhausted.

I figured I was just done for the day and decided to go for a run. Normally I like to go on runs outside, get some fresh air and sun, but this day it was raining so I hopped on the treadmill.

Three miles and 27 minutes later my brain was filled with ideas for what to work on next in the game and how to do implement them. I couldn’t wait to get back in front of my computer and start putting them in place.

Why This Works

Short answer, we don’t know why for sure. I looked at several articles and there are a few commonly held theories such as increased blood flow to the brain improves performance and the areas of the brain that are active during exercise are the ones used for learning and critical thinking. If you are interested in the studies you can search for ones like this one from Harvard. Regular Exercise Changes Brain, Improve Memory Thinking Skills

But just because we are not sure why or how something works, doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. We know it works. So when you are feeling a little burnt out in the brain, get up out of you chair and go for a quick walk (or run if you are so inclined). You might get some of your best ideas yet.

A Few Steps Further

One of the ways that I learn new technologies or programming languages is by getting an idea for a simple app that I want to write and then finding a tutorial on that makes a simple app and sort of following along with it but modifying it to be the app that I want to make. In the process, if there is something extra I want to add that is not in the tutorial I am following I will look up how to do that specific thing.

A few days ago, I wrote about the dangers of using experimental technology for things you plan on releasing to the wild. After I figured out a less than ideal workaround for my problem, I went a little further along in the Meteor/Angular2 tutorial and discovered that the solution to my problem was there.

The Solution (I Think)

On step 11 of the tutorial, they have you build the app to mobile. Android or iPhone, it doesn’t really matter. And this is where I was running into a blank white screen. Several of the next few steps did not apply to the app design, so I skipped ahead. On step 21, the tutorial has you split the logins for the browser version of the app and the mobile version of the app into separate packages.

A little bit of persistence paid off and now I have a way to get what I want working in my app. Remember when you run into an issue you can’t figure out, don’t just give up. Look around for the answer, try to figure it out. Don’t stop just a few steps from your goal.

Sprint at the Finish Line

My goal was to have this game built and released to the Google Play store by the last day of March which is tomorrow. Looks like this is going to join the ranks of most programming projects and go over time. After I release it I will do a post mortem and go over what I learned from the release process.

Don’t stop too soon.

What I Learned From Making Breakfast

My wife likes eggs over easy. When we first got married, all I knew how to do was make scrambled eggs. But I like breakfast and like doing things for my wife so I determined to learn how to make eggs over easy the way she liked.

In case you don’t know what I mean by eggs over easy, it is an egg where the yolk is not cooked but pretty much all the white of the egg is and the yolk is sort of enclosed in a pocket. If you only cook it on one side it is called sunny side up.

The hardest part about cooking eggs over easy is making sure you don’t break the yolk when you flip it over.

Cooking Eggs Is Harder Than It Looks

Many of my first attempts at making eggs over easy were complete failures. I broke yokes left and right. Sometimes the yokes broke as I cracked the egg into the skillet. Other times they broke as I was putting the eggs onto the plate to serve. Not only did I break yokes, but often I undercooked one of the sides because you can’t see it. Eventually I started getting better though.

When I first started, maybe 1 in 3 or 4 eggs would turn out right. But soon I noticed that I was only breaking 1 out of every 2 yokes, then 2 out of 3 and at least 1 of them was cooked thoroughly, now I can get about 9 out of 10 cooked all the way without breaking the yokes. This took a lot of broken eggs though.

Failure Is the Way to Success

Cooking eggs is just an example. Most things in life worth learning how to do will require you to fail multiple times before you become good at them.

Making games is no exception. The common wisdom that I have heard in several places is you will probably make at least 10 bad games before you make a good one. That does not mean you intentionally make bad games. What it means is you make those games as best you can but don’t worry about them being good or popular. They probably won’t be.

Fear of Failure

This is what stops most people. They are afraid to fail so they don’t even try. If you won’t try then you can’t ever succeed.

I struggle with this myself. Many times I write these posts to myself because I need the reminder to just do the thing and not worry about success. Success for you when you are learning is to get something done, not to have it be perfect.

So get out there, break some eggs, and fail just as hard as you can so you can succeed.

Why Are You Hesitating To Invest In Yourself?

This past weekend I went to my local bookstore that lets you buy, sell, and trade. I really like to read and had a few fictional books that weren’t that great so I traded them in and went looking for some new reading material.

There were several books on the shelf that many of the successful people I follow have recommended. These books were not all that expensive, many of them less than $10. But for some reason, I found myself hesitating to buy them.

My hesitation was not because I have 4 or 5 books on my desk that are only half read (because there are). The hesitation came because of the price.

Should I spend $30 or $40 on these books?

The problem begins with the wording of that sentence. It should read – Why am I hesitating to invest $30 or $40 dollars in myself?

I was reminded of this video by John Sonmez of SimpleProgrammer.com

As soon as I realized how completely stupid I was being worrying about a few dollars when the information in the books is probably worth hundreds and thousands over the course of my life, I bought the 2 books I thought would be most useful right now and will be back for the others later.

Why do we not blink when we spend $3-$5 on a coffee, $10-$20 on a meal, but stop short when preparing to shell out a measly $6-$12 for a book that could change your life? Skip a meal, buy a book.

What would you pay for information that could make you a fortune, improve you relationships, give you more health and energy? The information is out there.

In fact it is really, really cheap. There is this amazing thing called a library that exists in most towns and cities. Its a super inexpensive way to get access to almost any book ever written. So if you want to be cheap with your money, don’t be cheap with your time. Invest the time to find your local library, get a library card, checkout a book and read it.

What book? Glad you asked. Here are a couple that I can recommend as starters.

Think and Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill
This book is all about the mindset and practices it takes to become successful. You will find that many successful people, and those who teach success, recommend this book. It has a few odd things in it, especially in the later chapters, but it is still a great book to start with.

How to Win Friends and Influence People – Dale Carnegie
I read this book for the first time a few weeks ago. I then read through it 3 more times in the next 2 weeks. The wisdom contained in this book on how to deal with people and get along with them is phenomenal. Since almost all of life is dealing with people, highly recommend this book.

After these 2, find one in a field you are interested in (and if you are reading this blog I am guessing that is game design or programming) and read it. Take some notes. If it was really good, read it again.

Whatever you do, don’t be hesitant about investing your time and your money into self improvement. Whether it is courses or conferences, books or seminars, invest in yourself.

You are your most valuable asset, don’t be cheap with yourself.

Your Best Year Ever – Part 2

This is a continuation of the last post of my notes on this talk by Jim Rohn.

Personal Development – Continued

The 5 Abilities

#1 Absorb – be like a sponge, don’t miss anything

Learn to get from the day, not through the day.
Wherever you are, be there. Let your heart, mind and soul take “pictures”.

Pay attention.

#2 Respond – let life touch you

Don’t let it kill you, but let it touch you.
Give in to emotion.

Your emotion needs to be as educated as your intellect.
Need to know how to respond to life, to people.

#3 Reflect – go back over, study it again, remember

Go back over books, notes, your day.

Good times to reflect:

At the end of the day for 1 hour
At the end of the week for a few hours
At the end of the month for half a day
At the end of the year take a weekend

Solitude when you reflect is important. You can reflect with your spouse, your family, or your colleagues, but it is important to spend some time to reflect with yourself.

Reflection makes the past more valuable for the future. Gather up the past and invest it in the next day, the next week, the next year.

Self development earns respect, makes you better for others.

#4 Act – take action, don’t be hasty, but don’t waste much time

Act when the idea is hot and the emotion is strong. Otherwise you fall prey to the Law of Diminishing intent.

All disciplines affect each other.

Everything affects everything else

Every let down in discipline affects the rest of your performance.
Every new discipline affects the rest of your performance. That is why action is so important.

Greatest value of discipline: Self Worth or Self Esteem. Lack of discipline erodes the psyche, affects your philosophy. One neglect leads to another. Just start the smallest of disciplines and watch how it grows into another and another.

Walk away from the 97% who won’t do what they can. Don’t talk like they talk, don’t read what they read, don’t watch what they watch, don’t use their excuses and their blame list.

Affirmation without discipline is the beginning of delusion.

Labor well, learn well, discipline yourself well. Take charge of your own retirement, life, day, family, possibilities. Join the 3% of people who are doers.

Do what you can. Do the Best you can. And Rest very little.

Make rest a necessity not an objective. The objective of life is to act

#5 Share – pass along to someone else

If you share with 10 people, they get to hear the idea once and you get to hear it 10 times. You will get more out of it.

Everybody wins when somebody shares.

Sharing helps you, helps the person you share with. Sharing makes you bigger than you are. Increases your capacity. So you can hold more of the next experience.

Some people can’t be happy and can’t be wealthy because they aren’t big enough.

Setting Goals

Goals are your vision of the future.

You can either face the future with apprehension or with anticipation. Most face it with apprehension.

If you don’t make plans of your own, you will fall into someone else’s plan.

Need to make a “Not Much” list. If economy improves, if taxes get a little smaller, if you get a small raise at your job, if your negative relatives become positive, if the “right” political party got in power, etc, it would not do much for you. And too many people are counting on this list.

Count on your ability to design the future. If the promise of the future is clear and powerful, the price is easy to pay. The price is a few small disciplines practiced every day.

Get a handle on the future, set your own goals.

It is this simple: Decide what you want and write it down. Thats it.
It is your own private list so write whatever you want on it, no matter how small or silly.
Keep your list year after year so you can go back and look at it.
Get together with your spouse, your kids, your colleagues and come up with some goals.

Put “Become a Millionaire” on your list, for what it will make of you to achieve it.

The greatest value in life is not what you get, it is what you become.

Major question to ask on the job is not “What am I getting here?”. The major question to ask is “What am I becoming here?”.

When you have become a millionaire, what is important is not the money, you can give that away. What is important is the kind of person you have become.

Set the kind of goals that will make something of you to achieve them.

Don’t set goals to low. Don’t join the easy crowd. Go where demand to grow is high, where expectations of excellence are strong.
Don’t compromise. Don’t sell out. Count the cost.
Judas got the money, success? NO.

Greatest source of unhappiness is self unhappiness. Starts with being a little less than you can be. Beware of this.

Financial Independence

What should a child (or an adult) do with a dollar?

Don’t spend more than $0.70 of every dollar.

If your outgo exceeds your income, your upkeep will be your downfall.

What to do with the other $0.30?

$0.10 – Charity: Helping people who can’t help themselves. Nothing teaches character better than generosity. Best to start with small amounts. Easier to give $0.10 out of a $1 than to give $100,000 out of a million.
$0.10 – Active Capital: Try to make a profit yourself. Profits are better than wages.

Wages will make you a living. Profits will make you a fortune.

There are many ways to show a profit. Leave things better than you found them. Become a person who leaves a profit. Profit has potential to make a fortune.
#0.10 – Passive Capital: Interest bearing investment. Loan it out (stocks, bonds, etc.). “The borrower is servant to the lender.” Be the lender.

This is an ideal. Set it up and work towards it. It’s not the amount that counts, it is the plan. You can start with 97/1/1/1. The numbers will change. It is just a good sample philosophy.

Keep strict accounts. Now where your money is going. Don’t let it “just get away from you.”

Get a new attitude.
“Hate to pay my taxes,” get past this. Taxes help pay for democracy, liberty, and freedom that is the goose that lays the golden eggs.
“Hate to pay my bills,” get beyond this. Bills reduce your liability and increase your assets.
Everybody must pay, even if its only pennies.

Spend, invest, show a profit, help others.

Communication

Effective communication is how to affect people with words.

Words can work miracles. They are powerful and can have dramatic effects.

Have Something Good to Say, Be Prepared

Interest

Show interest in the subject.
Then go beyond that and show fascination. Turn frustration into fascination if you can.

Sensitivity

Understand other people. You have to be touched and moved by the drama in other peoples lives so you connect with them where they are. This involves emotion.

Knowledge

Take notes. Gather knowledge. Don’t be lazy in learning.

Say It Well

Sincerity
Repetition – Mother of Skill
Brevity – sometimes you don’t need many words
Vocabulary – There is a relationship between vocabulary and behavior. Words are a way of seeing and expressing. Stretch your vocabulary

Read Your Audience

What your see – body language
What you hear – kids will tell you
What you feel – emotional signals (women naturally better at this than men)

Intensity

Your words need to be mixed with emotion. It has an incredible effect. Put more of you into what you say.

Don’t be casual in communication.
Emotions must be measured. “Don’t shoot a cannon at a rabbit.”

You need well chosen words mixed with measured emotion. The more you care, the stronger you can be.

The Negative and the Positive

Negative

There is a time to laugh and a time to cry. Life is not all positive.

Negative is normal, it is a normal part of life. It should not be ignored because it needs to be mastered.

Need the ant philosophy. Never quit and think winter all summer.

Positive

The day that turns your life around.

Things that turn your life around:

Disgust – normally associated as negative, but can be positive. It is when you say, “I’ve had it. No more. Enough is enough.” If you can add an act to it, that helps.
Decision – you can make a decision that turns your life around.
Desire – wanting to bad enough. Sometimes desire waits for a trigger (like meeting someone, or not being able to do something that you want). Welcome all experiences because you never know which one will turn everything on.
Resolve – saying “I will.” Do or Die. Promising yourself you will never give up. “Until,” do it until you succeed.

Final Thoughts

Learn to help people with their lives. Touch people with a book, with words. Help them with their goals and dreams.

If you work on your gifts, they will make room for you.

Conclusion

Great advice. Take charge of your own future. Make plans, set goals, and act on them.

If you will change, everything will change for you

Your Best Year Ever – by Jim Rohn: Part 1

Just to show you how good I think this is and how much value you can get out of it, this talk by Jim Rohn is 4.5 hours long and I have listened to it at least 5 times (probably 7).

And I will listen to it again.

This last time I took 15 pages of notes which I am posting here. After you are finished reading them, go listen to the talk for yourself.

Jim Rohn on How to Have Your Best Year Ever

Some do and some don’t. Why? We don’t know.

Sincerity is not a measure of truth.

3 Ways to Get the Most Out of This Talk

Be Thankful – for what we already have, it opens up. Cynicism locks the doors.
Listen Well
Take Good Notes – be a good student

Don’t be a follower, be a student.

Make sure what you do is a product of your own conclusions.

5 Major Pieces – the Fundamentals

#1 Philosophy – the major determining factor

It is what we know and think.

Got to think and process ideas.

The set of the sail. Can’t change the wind so change the sail.

Don’t blame all you got to work with.

Start with your mind, your thinking, your philosophy.

Failure is a few errors in judgment repeated every day. It is accumulated disaster.

Success is a few simple disciplines practiced every day.

#2 Attitude

It is how we feel, about the past, about the future. The promise of the future is an awesome force.

How we feel about everybody else – appreciation
How you feel about yourself – self worth
Place high value on yourself. If somebody else can do it, I can do it.

Life change starts with education, not inspiration. “If a guy is an idiot and you motivate him, now you’ve got a motivated idiot.”

Get educated to the point where you messed up.

#3 Activity – the work, the labor

If you will plant the seed, God will make the tree. Give God the tough end of the deal.

Invest philosophy and attitude into action and you get a miracle. Turn wisdom, faith, and discipline into action to perform a miracle.

Do what you can.
Do the best you can.

Could change, should change, won’t change = Disaster
Could change, should change, will change = Miracle belongs to you

Just because you don’t understand something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. Get a list of the things you should be doing and clean it up (do them).

Don’t postpone like other people postpone (procrastinate).

Take action on neglect in disciplines. Start forming disciplines.

Do the best you can. Your philosophy on activity will determine you next years.

#4 Results – gotta measure every once in a while

Don’t let too much time go by without checking the results. See if you got the wrong plan.

How many books have your read, how many classes have you taken, what does your bank balance look like?

Results is the name of the game.

Life only asks that we make measurable progress in reasonable time.

Some things you got to check everyday, others weekly.

Got to be honest with yourself. The Truth will set you free.
The Truth is for amending our errors and finding new disciplines.

Don’t curse what is available and start amending what is possible to get the results you want and you will have great personal change.

Success is a numbers game.

How many pounds overweight should you be at 50 years old? Start checking your own numbers.

#5 Lifestyle – learning how to live well

Ultimate challenge of life after applying philosophy, attitude, and action to get results is how to fashion for yourself a good life.

If you wish to be wealthy, study wealth.

If you were to show me your current economic plan, would it excite me so much that I would want to travel across the country teaching it to others? Why not?

If you wish to be happy, study happiness.

Happiness is something you design, not an accident. Happiness is within the grasp of all of us.

Happiness is a study. Wealth is a study. Don’t be lazy in learning. Learn how to do well and learn how to live well.

If 2 tip amounts come into your mind, always go with the higher amount. Become the higher thinking person. Money doesn’t make you happy.

Personal Development

It is hard to give up blaming everything but yourself for your current economic, social, and emotional woes. But it is not what happens that determines the major part of your future. What happens happens to us all. The key is what you do about it.

If you will start the process of change, even a small one, everything will change.

What you have at the moment, you have attracted by the person you’ve become. You got to transition to taking responsibility for where you are in life.

If you will change, everything will change for you. To have more, you have to become more.

Don’t wish it were easier, wish you were better.

Start with money. It is not the only value but it is easy to count and measure.

We get paid for bringing value to the marketplace. It takes time to bring value, but we don’t get paid for time. We get paid for value.

Is is possible to becomes 2x, 3x as valuable and make 2x, 3x the money in the same amount of time? Of course. Simply become more valuable.

The facts: If you are not very valuable, you won’t get much money. You can’t get rich by demand.
Become more valuable.

Learn to work harder on yourself than you do on your job!

If you work hard on your job you will make a living. If you work hard on yourself you will make a fortune.

Develop the skills. Can’t change the world and how it works, so work on yourself.

Life and business is like the seasons. You cannot change the seasons, but you can change yourself.

Things are not going to change. The next 10 years will be pretty much like the last 10 years.
Short description of human history: Opportunity mixed with difficulty.

If you change though, everything will change for you.

Learn how to handle the Winters (they come after Fall) – emotional, social, economic, personal. What do you do about them? Get wiser, stronger, better. Wiser – read more, listen, watch. Stronger – workout, practice. Better – develop the skills.
Learn how to take advantage of the Springs (they follow winter) – Spring = Opportunity. Got to take advantage. The key is to plant in the spring. Seize the day. Life is brief.
In the Summer, nourish and protect – become capable and powerful. Bugs and weeds will take the garden unless you protect it. Nourish the garden and kill the weeds. Summer is a scenario of opportunity and threat. If you just think positive that is too naive, got to think negative too. Deal with your enemies in the summer.
Reap in the harvest (Fall) without complaint or apology – must take personal responsibility. No apology for doing well and no complaint for doing poorly.

Physical Personal Development – take care of yourself

Treat your body like a temple, not a woodshed.

Some people don’t do well because they don’t feel well.

Vitality is a major part of success.

Some people take better care of their pets, take more care in what they feed their animals than they do of themselves.

You never have a second chance to make a first impression with you appearance.

God may look on the inside, but people look on the outside. Its the world we live in.

After people get to know you they will start to judge the substance, but they see the outside first. So make sure the outside is a major reflection of what is going on inside.

Spiritual – study it and if you are a believer, practice it

Mental – learn, study, grow, change

Human development takes time. Wildebeest only have a few minutes after birth to learn to run because of the lions. A human baby, after 16 years we are not sure if ready to survive.

Feeding and nourishing the mind takes time. Get ready to debate great life issues. Got to be able to defend your philosophy, virtues, and values.

Need a good library. Most homes over $250,000 have a library.
Your library needs to show you are a serious student. Can’t live on mental candy.

Some recommended books.

Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill – great book, has some weird stuff in it.
Richest Man in Babylon – good book on wealth fundamentals
How to Read a Book – has list of “best writings ever written”

Your library needs to be balanced. Some sections for your library.

History – recommends Lessons of History by Durant
Philosophy – recommends Story of Philosophy also by Durant. Don’t just read the easy stuff, you won’t grow.
Novels – philosophy often interwoven into the story. Skip the trash
Biographies – stories of both successful and unsuccessful people, examples and warnings, good and evil
Accounting – at least a primary understanding
Law – need to know what to sign and what not to sign, don’t need to be a lawyer but knowing a little law will protect you
Economics – how to become financially independent
Culture and Sophistication – it is part of the fabric of the nation, be a student of dance, art, music
Spirituality – study it, and if you are a believer, study and practice

Keep a Journal – don’t trust your memory.

If you hear something or come across something important, write it down.

Buy empty books and fill them with valuable notes. Go back over them and let it instruct you and feed your mind and soul again.

3 Treasures that you leave behind

Pictures – take a lot of pictures
Library – books that taught you to become healthy, wealthy, powerful
Your Journals – the ideas you picked up, be student enough to write things down

Part 2 to Come

I just realized that this post was over 1500 words and I am only about half way through my notes. That is a lot for one post so I will be breaking these notes into 2 parts. Tons of value here and while you wait on the second part you can go watch the talk for yourself.

Don’t wish it were easier, wish you were better (and get better).