Apr

13

What a week (or weeks ..)

Filed Under execution, failure, fear, goal setting, perseverance, quotes, things to ponder about, things to remind myself | 2 Comments

Wow, this is the longest lull in my blog since a long time. I have been sooooo busy. I know I’m always busy, but this week was my worse ever.

This past week has just been absolutely surreal for me. Been hit with so many things, in so many dimensions of my life that I’m just sitting here trying to figure out where I am right now. This week is also one where I had really high ups, and also extremely low downs. Standard deviation? Off the charts!

Seems like every time I double down and set my sights on something important, stuff just gets in the way to stop me short. Life has a funny way of messing with me like that. Everything I have ever wanted, I’ve always had to put up a fight for, and .. pay the price. Life has just never has been a walk in the park for me. This week I got slammed with so much madness, even from all the people I care about who cares for me.

Anyways. I can’t stop moving, I have to keep moving to stay alive. Keep my eye on the prize, and off all attractive distractions.

In fact, the more push back I get from seemingly random curve balls that life throws at me .. just gets me even more riled up and want to double down more on my commitment to executing my plans. All is fair in love and war. Life’s a game and I choose to play–even if given the option to observe and not participate. I know I will prevail, because I gots strategy. I recoup, plan, and execute. Bring on the problems!

A warrior of the light studies very carefully the position he wishes to conquer. However difficult his objective may be, there is always a way to overcome the obstacles. He verifies the alternative routes, sharpens his sword, and seeks to fill his heart with the perseverance necessary to face the challenge. But, as he advances, the warrior realizes there are difficulties he had not foreseen at the outset. If he waits for the ideal moment, he will never move from his position; he sees that a little madness is needed for the next step. The warrior uses a little madness. Because - in war and in love - one cannot foresee everything.

On a more positive note .. earlier this year I made a resolution to put myself out there and open myself up to the possibility of getting hurt. No pain no gains. Looks like I can mark that off my checklist now! That was fun. Fill ‘er up again!

A person can stand for the rest of his days facing one of the many doors he should go through, but he must understand that he has only truly lived up to that point. He may continue to breathe, walk, sleep and eat - but with less and less pleasure, because he is already spiritually dead and does not know it. Until one day when, as well as his spiritual death, physical death appears; at that moment God will ask: “what did you do with your life?” We must all answer this question, and woe betide those who answer: “I remained standing at the door.”

Thank you, Dr. Randy Pausch.

-If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself. The dreams will come to you.

-We can’t change the cards we’re dealt, just how we play the hand.

-Brick walls are there for a reason. They are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. The brick walls are there to stop people who don’t want it badly enough.

Apr

8

Lessons from the Warrior of the Light

Filed Under changing the world, entrepreneurship, execution, failure, fear, goal setting, passion, perseverance, quotes, regular reads, self improvement, startup, strategy, things to ponder about, things to remind myself, values | Leave a Comment

I’m definitely a fan of Paulo Coelho, the renowned Brazillian author. He has a unique way of teaching the lessons in life that he has learned through storytelling.

A few lessons from the Warrior of the Light.

Using one’s own madness

A warrior of the light studies very carefully the position he wishes to conquer.

However difficult his objective may be, there is always a way to overcome the obstacles. He verifies the alternative routes, sharpens his sword, and seeks to fill his heart with the perseverance necessary to face the challenge.

But, as he advances, the warrior realizes there are difficulties he had not foreseen at the outset.

If he waits for the ideal moment, he will never move from his position; he sees that a little madness is needed for the next step.

The warrior uses a little madness. Because - in war and in love - one cannot foresee everything.

Life is such that if you wait to gather 100% of every single detail before you can make a decision, others would have surpassed you. If you waited for the fog to clear, then what you see is what everyone else will also see. Given the perfect picture, anyone sane would make the same correct, best choice. This is exactly how *not* to beat the market.

CEOs often make decisions with incomplete data–and that takes a little madness. It’s about making decisions with the best information possible available at that time. Standing still through inaction is waiting to fail–and I’ll fail from action than inaction.

So when do you put yourself out there and wear your heart on your sleeve?
Read more

Feb

20

Ridiculously sick work ethic

Filed Under career, changing the world, did you know, execution, goal setting, passion, people i like, perseverance, things to remind myself, values | Leave a Comment

I’ve never really viewed myself as particularly talented. I’ve viewed myself as slightly above average in talent. And where I excel is ridiculous, sickening, work ethic. You know, while the other guy’s sleeping? I’m working. While the other guy’s eatin’? I’m working. While the other guy’s making love, I mean, I’m making love, too. But I’m working really hard at it.

You can look at the first six episodes of the Fresh Prince and I was so hell bent on not failing that I memorized the entire script. And you can see in certain shots they try to cut around it as much as they can, but I am mouthing the other actor’s lines.

Nuff said, this guy is my hero and role model.

More from CBS.

Feb

17

At which mile do most people quit in a marathon?

Filed Under execution, failure, goal setting, perseverance, things to remind myself | 2 Comments

In a 26-mile marathon (or 41.8 km), at which mile do most people (statistically) quit? Probably at the mile where life is the most difficult, right? Let’s say, about the last few miles in the marathon?

Most runners don’t quit during the 26th mile because they have a vision of where they are going. They see the end in sight so they keep striving for it. Sure they are physically exhausted but their vision fuels them and tells them to keep going to reach their destination.

Most runners quit a marathon at the 20th mile because this is when they lose sight of their vision. This is when they are both physically exhausted and mentally drained. This is when runners feel they have come so far and yet still have so far to go. This is when their goal fades away and their mental power dissipates. Where there is no vision the people perish.

Aaah, the power of mind over body.

After all, there will be days when our bodies say no and we need our mind to say yes. There will be times when it seems that everything in life conspires to sabotage our goals and dreams. And there will be weeks or even months when we feel like we are hitting the 20th mile. The answer is to maintain your vision and focus on it. Keep your vision alive and it will keep you alive. Don’t give up. Keep striving towards the vision planted in your mind and heart

“90% of the game is half mental.” -Yogi Berra

Original post.

Feb

8

The 3 kinds of people

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There are three kinds of people. Those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened.
– Author unknown

Awesome actionable quote, makes you want to spring into action, does it not?

The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now.
– Author unknown

Feb

3

A focus on human potential

Filed Under execution, goal setting, perseverance, quotes, things to remind myself | Leave a Comment

The human potential doesn’t really hit its highest mark unless it becomes just excruciatingly focused.
– Geoffrey Moore, Silicon Valley high tech consultant and author of Crossing the Chasm

Dec

23

Persistence and keeping your eye on the prize

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Looks like Marc Andreessen has been sharing a lot on the books he has been reading. Which is great, because he’s filtering out the less interesting stuff and only sharing the good stuff! :)

This story on persistence inspires me. I’ve quoted Vinod Khosla a lot on this already, but I’ll write it to remind myself: Part of entrepreneurship is persistence. When you run into an obstacle, you either plough through it or you give up (and do something else).
Read more

Dec

13

You must want a big success and then beat it into submission

Filed Under business, career, changing the world, goal setting, passion, people i like, perseverance, quotes, regular reads, things to remind myself | Leave a Comment

I love quotes! And here’s a good one I picked up today from Marc Andreessen’s blog post today:

Marcus Loew, founding father of the motion picture industry and founder of Loews Theatres and MGM:

Ambition!

You must want a big success and then beat it into submission; you must be as ravenous to reach it as the wolf who licks his teeth behind a fleeing rabbit; you must be as mad to win as the man who, with one hand growing cold on the revolver in his pocket, with the other hand pushes his last gold piece on the ‘Double-O’ at Monte Carlo.

As quoted in Neal Gabler’s outstanding An Empire of Their Own.

On another note, today I learned that OLPC’s Linux-based operating system was available for download, and so I wanted to check it out for myself. It’s pretty neat. Now I know what my blog looks like when rendered on an OLPC:

times-jliew-olpc
Also interestingly enough, when I uploaded the above screenshot on Flickr, the admin of a group (on Flickr) for the OLPC: One Laptop Per Child group asked if I could use this picture, to which I said yes. Do check out their gallery for more pictures of this laptop.

Dec

11

Commiting to execution and excusitis

Filed Under career, execution, goal setting, perseverance, self improvement, things to remind myself | 1 Comment

The secret to success boils down to three simple words: Dream. Plan. Execute. It’s in committing to that last part–executing–where people often fall short. You could spend hours and hours envisioning a glorious life for yourself. You could outline on paper every single step you need to get there and every person who can help. But if you can’t commit to working the plan, regardless of how long it takes, you may as well take that piece of paper, crumple it up, and throw it in the recycle-bin.
– Nicholas Aretakis, author of No More Ramen

Love that quote. This resonates with me. Reminds me of Guy Kawasaki’s term for this: people suffering from “excusitis”. Don’t you just love people who talk and talk but *never* frigging deliver (but continue to paint their bold and supposedly forward thinking vision)?

I know I suffer from mild excusitis sometimes–so I’m putting this out here for everyone to see. You can call me out on this if you see me talking but not delivering (tell me to STFU). I’m doing this because I never want to be like that.

Dec

1

Self-discipline and getting a grip on growing to-do list

Filed Under execution, goal setting, perseverance, regular reads, self improvement, things to remind myself, time management | Leave a Comment

As I was taking a break from studying at a coffee shop today, I was *productively* wasting time by burning through the pile of magazines that I subscribed to when I found this gem from Entrepreneur magazine written by Romanus Wolter. He listed 4 points that hit me hard on all four counts.

1. Establish an affirmative mind-set by giving yourself a reason to become more disciplined. Just as everyone has different muscular strength, we all possess different levels of self-discipline. State three positive outcomes associated with becoming more disciplined, and give your subconscious direction by integrating your business goals into your daily routine. Having an overall view of your objectives and progress keeps you motivated to take action even when there are distractions.

I fight distractions a lot, and self-discipline is a challenge as well. This past week I did pretty well, digging myself out of bed early to go jog (to get blood pumping into my brain) and then going to work early to get a head start. I recently asked for feedback on myself from a certain few people and one of the criticisms I got was that I was too “corporate”. I think Romanus brought up a good point here; that integrating some business goals into your daily routine helps keep you more focused on your personal end goal. If the end goal is something large, this will obviously require some effort and consist of more than just a few steps. Some “corporate” grown-up-ness helps in reminding me of what I am working towards and not losing sight of my goal even if it’s distant.

In fact, just this past week I tried something new that worked well. I called a good friend Monday night, told him my entire to-do list (my desired objectives that I wanted to hit) for the next day, and told him that if I fail to achieve even one, I would buy him lunch. The list ranged from “not pressing the snooze button at 6 am more than once” (first thing when I wake up) to “studying for my test” (last thing before I go to bed). And I hit it all! Had it not been for this, I think I would have hit the snooze button more than once.
Read more

Sep

19

Roadtrip Nation

Filed Under execution, failure, fear, goal setting, passion, self improvement, things to remind myself | Leave a Comment

I just discovered this thing called Roadtrip Nation today, and it’s actually pretty cool — a bunch of kids going around the country interviewing successful people and learning from them.

Key takeaways from just these four video clips,

  • You have to be prepared to die trying (as 50 cent would say, “get rich or die trying”)
  • You have to be OK with failing
  • Be true to yourself, find your passion. You may not see the immediate impact, so it’s a matter of staying focused, searching inside of yourself, and believing in yourself that you can do it
  • Leaps of faith and terrifying, but you have got to leap
  • Ask yourself what is the worse that could happen — more often than not your world will not come to an end like you thought it would
  • Worrying about the future won’t help. Find your calling, and just do it. Don’t overanalyze.
  • Use your time to make mistakes while you are young, the world is your oyster. The key is to learn from your previous successes and mistakes, and taking those experiences to your next challenge
  • Make the most with what you have, you are ultimately accountable for your own success

Plenty of good ol’ advice from all these video clips. Unfortunately I don’t have the luxury to watch them all at the moment, I got a tonne of stuff to wrap up before my upcoming backpacking trip to Europe

Aug

25

Inbox Zero

Filed Under execution, geeky, goal setting, google, hacks, time management | Leave a Comment

Merlin Mann of 43folders fame presented a talk at Google titled Inbox Zero, a productivity hack/treatment for people who live out of their inboxes. The talk is about an hour long, so I’ve written up here some of the points I feel are important and works for me.

Disclaimer: This is _obvious_ stuff, but sometimes we forget, and a reminder is always nice.

Respect yourself, spend time and attention wisely

For knowledge workers like myself, we don’t create value by the number of bricks we can carry with our arms. We process knowledge/information, and that’s how we create value for our companies. The two things that knowledge workers must understand and appreciate is time and attention. Both of which we only have a finite amount of, and both of which are our constraints to our productivity. The goal is to separate the wheat from the chaff, saying NO to the low value work so that we can say YES to the high value work. Procrastination and frittering time away in email, surfing the web and flipping TV channels aimlessly would be “low value” work (more like almost no value work).

Email is a communication medium, just like the telephone. Don’t focus on email itself, focus on the information in the email and process it. Hitting the send/receive button all day is “busy work”, made to think that you are doing work, but you’re not actually doing any real work.

Process information in email
Don’t read the email and do nothing! Do something about it. Process it when you check it. Mine the gold from your inbox, and throw away the empty husk.

Processing actions:

  • Delete (consume) or archive it (save for historical records)
  • Delegate or forward it to someone else (stuff that don’t apply to you, or better handled by someone else)
  • Respond now, or do that work now!
  • Defer (perhaps replying requires more time, or requires some work first)

Having a productivity system in place is important (and so is sticking to it)

We are what we frequently do
– Aristotle

Don’t leave email open the entire time, with distracting pop-up notifications. Check once every hour or few hours, live outside of email. *This doesn’t apply to customer service reps

Use a tool/system that just stops short of being fun to use, so that you don’t end up fiddling with it. Remember that the tool/system has to be good at capturing information, and recalling information.

Aug

16

Points of responsibility

Filed Under business, execution, goal setting | Leave a Comment

Funny, I was reading this month’s Entrepreneur magazine, when I read about Guy Kawasaki’s column titled The Art of Execution — which when I googled, resulted in the same exact post on his blog a year and a half ago. Repackaging old content as new content, are we?

Anyway, the advice is still worth the entrepreneur’s time to read. My favorite was #6:

Establish a single point of responsibility. If you ask your employees who is responsible for a goal, and no one can answer you in ten seconds, then it means that there’s not enough accountability. If more than one person is responsible for the achievement of a goal, then no one is responsible. Good employees accept responsibility. Great employees seek responsibility. Lousy employees avoid responsibility.

Which kind of employee are you?

Aug

1

Why not now?

Filed Under execution, fear, goal setting, things to ponder about, things to remind myself | Leave a Comment

I’ve written about procrastination lately and this article I read today struck a chord inside of me on multiple points. It’s titled “Why Not Now? Waiting for Someday”. Don’t you from time to time say to yourself, “someday, I’ll do this, or that”, or say “someday, when this happens, I’ll do this or that”? I know I do. All the time! The most recent one of mine is “Someday, when I have both time AND money, I will visit Europe.” But now I know, sometimes I am just too shortsighted and although I am good at keeping my short term commitments, I am not great at keeping my long term commitments. Read “See the world, but never forget the drops of oil on the spoon.”

The time we are blessed with is limited and tends to be used up all too quickly. How we utilize that time is consequently one of the most important decisions we make. Yet it is far too easy to put off until tomorrow what we are dreaming of today. The hectic pace of modern existence affords us an easy out; we shelve our aspirations so we can cope more effectively with the challenges of the present, ostensibly to have more time and leisure to realize our purpose in the future. Or we tell ourselves that we will chase our dreams someday once we have accomplished other lesser goals. In truth, it is our fear that keeps us from seeking fulfillment in the here and now because we view failure as a possibility, our reasons for delaying our inevitable success seem sound and rational. If we ask ourselves what we are really waiting for, however, we discover that there is no truly compelling reason why we should put off the pursuit of the dreams that sustain us.

Ouch, that hurts my feelings because I know its true. “Shelve my aspirations to cope today, ostensibly to have more time in future”? Guilty as charged. My ex-gf will testify. “Tell myself I’ll chase a dream once I’ve accomplished a lesser goal”? Guilty. Again. If I ask myself what the hell have I been waiting for, it’s true that I don’t have any compelling reason to put off the pursuit of things that would sustain me. I’ve actually realized this recently and have made attempts to amend this. In other words, yes I’m guilty on this count too.

When regarded as a question, “Why not now?” drains us of our power to realize our ambitions. We are so concerned with the notion that we are somehow undeserving of happiness that we cannot see that there is much we can do in the present to begin courting it. Yet when we look decisively at our existence and state, “Why not now, indeed!” we are empowered to begin changing our lives this very moment. We procrastinate for many reasons, from a perceived lack of time to a legitimate lack of self-belief, but the truth of the matter is that there is no time like the present and no time but the present. Whatever we aim to accomplish, we will achieve it more quickly and with a greater degree of efficiency when we seize the day and make the most of the resources we have at our disposal presently.

All the joy, passion, and contentment you can envision can be yours right now, rather than in some far-flung point in time. You need only remind yourself that there is nothing standing between you and fulfillment. If you decide that today is the day you will take your destiny into your hands, you will soon discover that you hold the keys of fate.

“procrastinate for many reasons, from a perceived lack of time to a legitimate lack of self-belief”. Yup, I’m guilty of both and everything in between. Seize the day and capitalize on all opportunities, today.

So it turns out, I’ve learned a very valuable lesson about myself today. “In truth, it is our fear that keeps us from seeking fulfillment in the here and now because we view failure as a possibility, our reasons for delaying our inevitable success seem sound and rational”. I am still afraid of failure. GUILTY as charged. I hereby sentence myself to rehab.

There is no time like the present and no time but the present.

I should have known better. Just two days ago when I wrote about the book, The Alchemist, I found this quote from it:

There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.
– The Alchemist

Jul

29

See the world, but never forget the drops of oil on the spoon

Filed Under goal setting, quotes, strategy, things to ponder about, things to remind myself, time management | Leave a Comment

“The secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world, and never to forget the drops of oil on the spoon”.

Yeah, me too. Never forget the what?

I got this quote from Wikipedia’s entry on the book titled “The Alchemist”. First of all, I’m pretty much a straight up technology nerd/geek/whatever-they-call-it-these-days. I don’t pretend to be a domain expert on chemistry or biology. Sure, I took some classes in college, but it never really interested me as much as all things technology did, or even math. Matter of fact, I hated math when I was a kid. My parents and high school math teachers will testify how much I failed at the subject, hated the subject, and faked liking the subject (I sort of faked liking school too, but that’s a different story altogether to tell another time). I’ll bet that my teachers then will be shocked to hear today, that not only did I get a minor in math, published an original research paper in math, but actually like and appreciate math.

That being said, during my geeky nerd years doing my B.S. (ha-ha) in C.S., I pretty much thought of chemistry and biology as an “overhead cost” to getting my degree. It just wasn’t that much related to tech or math (sure I understand that CPU’s need electrons for the transistors and logic gates, but outside of that .. ?), and it was pretty much required if I wanted to graduate, so I knew that this isn’t something I could walk around and forget. When I graduated, a good friend of mine who graduated with me gave me a graduation/parting gift. It was a book titled “The Alchemist”. Now that you know my love-hate relationship with all-things chemistry at that time, I naturally thought to myself, “uhh .. what on earth were you thinking?” Nevertheless, I accepted the gift with a smile, thanked her for it, and well .. chucked it a side.

Just to put things in perspective, back then, I only read stuff like Slashdot, Onlamp and O’Reilly. Back then, there was no Digg or Reddit, but if there was, I would be reading that. I hung on on mailing lists, like for FreeBSD. I wouldn’t even touch business. Today, I read lots of business. So back then, if it wasn’t tech, I pretty much didn’t care. Ok, I read a little bit of national news. A little international news too, but 95% was tech, tech, and tech.

Many times when ridding my garage of bloat, I thought of ridding myself of a book that I knew I would never read, but it reminded me of the moments I had with Amira in the computer science lab, hacking away at programming assignments, logic problems, the late nights studying in the library (with coffee we quietly snuck past the pesky librarians), cramming for a test and stressing out over math and physics homework assignments. To date, I still have the book with me. Recently, I read the book mentioned somewhere and decided that well, I will at least devote enough time to read the summary of the book — which is when I looked up it’s Wikipedia entry and got that quote.

So anyway, following this trail led me to another interesting discovery. (Be warned, this is going to be a long blog post)

I googled for that exact quote and the first result was this blog post, by someone from Kerala, India. Here’s the story behind that quote, it’s worth the read I promise.

A certain shopkeeper sent his son to learn about the secret of happiness from the wisest man in the world. The lad wandered through the desert for 40 days, and finally came upon a beautiful castle, high atop a mountain. It was there that the wise man lived.

Rather than finding a saintly man, though, our hero, on entering the main room of the castle, saw a hive of activity: tradesmen came and went, people were conversing in the corners, a small orchestra was playing soft music, and there was a table covered with platters of the most delicious food in that part of the world. The wise man conversed with everyone, and the boy had to wait for two hours before it was his turn to be given the man’s attention.

The wise man listened attentively to the boy’s explanation of why he had come, but told him that he didn’t have time just then to explain the secret of happiness. He suggested that the boy look around the palace and return in two hours.

“Meanwhile, I want to ask you to do something”, said the wise man, handing the boy a teaspoon that held two drops of oil. “As you wander around, carry this spoon with you without allowing the oil to spill”.

The boy began climbing and descending the many stairways of the palace, keeping his eyes fixed on the spoon. After two hours, he returned to the room where the wise man was.

“Well”, asked the wise man, “Did you see the Persian tapestries that are hanging in my dining hall? Did you see the garden that it took the master gardener ten years to create? Did you notice the beautiful parchments in my library?”

The boy was embarrassed, and confessed that he had observed nothing. His only concern had been not to spill the oil that the wise man had entrusted to him.

“Then go back and observe the marvels of my world”, said the wise man. “You cannot trust a man if you don’t know his house”.

Relieved, the boy picked up the spoon and returned to his exploration of the palace, this time observing all of the works of art on the ceilings and the walls. He saw the gardens, the mountains all around him, the beauty of the flowers, and the taste with which everything had been selected. Upon returning to the wise man, he related in detail everything he had seen.

“But where are the drops of oil I entrusted to you?” asked the wise man. Looking down at the spoon he held, the boy saw that the oil was gone.

“Well, there is only one piece of advice I can give you”, said the wisest of wise men. “The secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world and never to forget the drops of oil on the spoon”.

This makes sense to me. I know and realize that I sometimes am like that boy. I focus all my energy on the day-to-day important stuff, but I miss the long term important stuff. This is a great example of the phrase “penny wise, pound foolish”. I sweat the stuff that is urgently needed within the next 24 hours and strive the hardest to hit my mark, which I do — but I miss my mark in meeting my long term, broader 5 year goal. I attribute this to not aligning my daily goals to my 5 year goals — something I MUST remedy soon.

A perfect example of this is my not taking a vacation off ever since I began working right after college. Today, I’m what you corporate folks diagnose as “bleeding vacation time”, that is, my vacation time accrues, but is capped off at a certain amount. Short term: there’s _always_ something important and/or urgent at work, such that I just cannot afford to not go to work. Long term: I lose my sanity and burn out from working so hard. I’m only human after all.

Before the end of this year, I will go for a vacation. I have nothing solid planned, but I know I must take a vacation if I am to become a better employee. It’s really better for my company anyway. I never thought I’d say that, but I am now. By the end of this year, if I still haven’t taken a vacation, I will be truly SORRY and DISAPPOINTED with myself. My ex-girlfriend actually predicted that I’m the “bleeding vacation time” type of person. And she predicted that when I was still in college. Multiple part time jobs while getting a degree, why would she ever say something like that? :/ I remember thinking to myself, “that’s because you Europeans take it too damn easy”. Which in my defense, is true. American workers put in more hours than their European counterparts, last I remember from reading a world labor stats report. Thus, I shrugged off her comments as irrelevant and inherently biased, based upon unreasonable metrics.

My fear is that I’m driving on the road in high gear, in pitch black darkness with my headlights shining no farther than 30 feet. I can easily avoid small objects lying on the road and remain on the path, but I may not see the brick wall standing 31 feet in front of me. Or stop in time before it’s too late.

I have since lost touch with Amira since she moved back to Bosnia and Herzegovina after graduation (little over 3 years now at time of writing). Nevertheless, in the age of the wonderful internets, with search engines, e-mail, instant messengers, social-networks, and the good old telephone, there really is no excuse for not staying in touch. I hope she will drop me an e-mail if she reads this. I know (and she knows), and now you know, what a heartless prick I can be sometimes (see “what the hell were you thinking?” above). I’m sorry :(

The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream

The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dream

Jun

17

When paralyzed with procrastination, just build momentum

Filed Under execution, goal setting, self improvement | Leave a Comment

I read this great post about getting projects off the ground. Sometimes the only way to get a project started, is to go ahead and begin, and do the groundwork .. despite knowing that you might fail miserably at it.

After starting, then just iterate and improve, and the sheer hard work will pay off. I’ve learned that it’s not always beneficial to be a perfectionist. It’s tough to imagine how in life you can get many things the first time right. Kind of like ice hockey, I had to learn how to skate and fall over a million times. I’ve found the following so applicable to myself.

Gretchen writes,

  • Because you’re racing, you don’t have time to listen to your internal editor criticize every move. You just put something on the page and keep moving, instead of sitting, paralyzed.
  • Progress itself is reassuring and inspiring. Panic tends to set in when you find yourself getting nothing done, day after day.
  • Because you’re so focused on your project, you begin to make deeper connections and to see more possibilities, instead of being constantly distracted by outside concerns.
  • Because of the intensity, you can hop in and out of the project, without having to take time to acclimate yourself. I have a writer friend who’s married to a painter, and she says their test for working well is when they can sit down and work if they have a spare ten minutes.
  • You lower your standards. If you’re producing a page a week, or one blog post a week, or one sketch a week, you expect it to be pretty darned good, and you fret and fuss about quality. Often, however, folks get their best work from grinding out the product.
  • Practice, practice, practice. My novel was terrible, but I think the sheer doing of it helped my writing, just the way practicing scales helps a pianist. The more you practice, the better you’ll become.
  • Because you have a voracious need for material, you become hyper-aware of everything happening around you — and ideas begin to flood your mind.
  • You can use this approach even if you’re working on a creative project on the side, with all the pressing obligations of a job, family, etc. Instead of feeling perpetually frustrated that you don’t have any time for your project, you MAKE yourself make time — for a specific period.
  • It’s fun! I don’t have the urge to climb mountains or run marathons, but I got the same thrill of exertion from writing a novel in a month.

May

2

Task(s) + Vision

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A vision without a task is but a dream
A task without a vision is drudgery
A task with a vision is the hope of the world
– Inscription on a church in Sussex 1730

I’ve seen plenty who talk and talk and do nothing — what I like to call “all bark and no bite”. For some reason, this all bark and no bite attitude annoys the hell FUCK out of me. For those who don’t understand me, it’s the equivalent of nail screeching on glass, or that annoying person you dread running into by accident, <insert something really annoying to you here>. I differentiate myself from all-bark-and-no-bites by being the complete opposite — I favor a man of action and if I must, would want to fail because of action, not inaction. Do hold me to my words here, if I ever become what I swore I would never become.

By the same token, doing the same thing over and over without learning, improving, or worse *gasp* no vision, is settling for mediocrity — another sworn enemy of mine. If you don’t know where you want to go, then it won’t matter where you end up. And I know if I let that happen, odds are that I will end up somewhere I won’t like.

A vision, along with execution, is the perfect combination.

Apr

29

Why limit your own thinking?

Filed Under goal setting, google, innovation, passion, people i like, quotes, self improvement, startup, things to ponder about, things to remind myself | 1 Comment

Paul Buchheit brings up a very valid point about visionary super-achievers, that when it comes to possibilities–it’s not about belief but disbelief.

If you think about it, a vision is by definition, something that is a little farther ahead than the current state of things. It wouldn’t be a vision if it was already achieved, would it? By the same token, if a vision is too far fetched, would we label the person championing it as a psychopath who doesn’t understand reality?

I think the important lesson to be learned here is that when imagining the world of possibilities, as long as you ground yourself in reality, do not fear society disbelieving you. Let’s look at the opposite case: If everyone absolutely believes your vision in its entirety — wouldn’t that just really indicate that your vision isn’t really that visionary after all? At the very minimum, a vision would require a small leap of faith. Leap of faith equals risk, and we all know risk is proportional to reward.

Holding back when imagining the world of possibilities while in search for a solution to a problem is counter-productive, you’re just fighting this internal battle — and the only person that really loses is yourself. I have felt like that at times, and now when I notice myself running in such loops, I quickly disengage from such irrational fears.

In his presentation at Startup School 2007, Paul reminded us that when someone tells you, “That’s impossible” it should be translated as “According to my very limed experience and narrow understanding of reality, that’s very unlikely.” Everyone continuously builds a different set of experiences in their respective lives, and therefore everyone’s understanding of reality is fundamentally different.

Reality is larger than we can possibly comprehend. Are you certain of something? If so, is it possible that you aren’t seeing the big picture? Perhaps you would change your mind if your understanding were a little broader. Maybe invention is a simple matter of observing what has always existed, and change happens when you notice parts of your self that were there all along.

I met Paul last year at Stanford. Paul is Google employee #23, and among other things, creator of Gmail, and the “Don’t be evil” motto.

Maybe big ideas are only impractical for those who lack vision and imagination.

Apr

19

“Next Action”: Identifying the next step

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If you work on multiple projects at work, you will realize that it’s pretty similar to juggling balls in the air with your two hands. You might be thrown a new ball in addition to what you already have in the air (new project), you might be trying to place a ball on the ground without dropping the other balls currently in the air (tying up any open ends left on a mostly finished project), and perhaps you might also have your eyes peeled for the next ball you want to juggle (perhaps you have a semi-vivid vision of a project that will positively impact your team/dept/company’s bottom line).

If the above sounds familiar to you, then perhaps the phrase “analysis paralysis” would also ring a bell. Analysis paralysis is described in Wikipedia as an informal phrase applied to when the opportunity cost of decision analysis exceeds the benefits. In other words, too much planning or a discussion that goes nowhere, and no execution. Also known as “all talk and no bite”. I really hate that.

I’m a fan of David Allen’s GTD book and it has helped me manage my work flow better. In it, he talks about the “next action”, and I have come to realize how much important it is just being able to identify what to do next, without actually doing it yet. I’m trying to emphasize the value of planning without executing immediately which I have discovered by experience, speaking as a guy who likes to execute immediately after planning, and doesn’t really care about planning right away, after executing.

When multi-tasking and switching between tasks so often, it is easy to lose track of the end goal of each individual project. This is especially true when operating in an R&D environment where you are pushing the limits — so by definition, your end-goal cannot be rigidly specific. I found that planning the current project’s next step before temporarily halting it to work on another project to be a huge load off my shoulders. Allow me to illustrate.

My work queue would look similar to an old-skool single core processor (with no hyper-threading) such that at any given time, I am focused on a single project. Each project (because they are large), are broken up into smaller bite-size chunks.

Time t1=0 t2=t1+n t3=t2+m t4=t3+x t5=t4+y
Project A
(step 1) 		Project B
(step 1) 		Project C
(step 1) 		Project A
(step 2) 		Project B
(step 2)

After step 1 in project A and before step 1 in project B, I first identify the next step (as step 2) for project A, with the understanding that I’m just merely identifying the next step towards project A’s goal, but I will not actually do it yet. Then, I move on to execute step 1 of project B. Likewise with the end of project A, after step 1 of project B, I quickly determine project B’s step 2 before moving on to step 1 of project C.

What’s nice about this is that after I am done with step 1 of project C, when going into step 2 of project A, I no longer have to dig up my recollection of where I last left project A. I don’t have to ask myself, “alright, where did I last leave this project?”, and “Okay, now what was that next incremental step that I had meant to take again?”. I had already thought out the “next actions”, as Dave Allen would call it, and I can jump right into execution mode!

On the flip side, what I did before was that I would jump into execution right after planning a next action, resulting in me spending too much time on a single project, and neglecting other projects. In operating systems theory, that would be the equivalent of thread starvation because another thread is hogging all of the CPU. Also, from a psychological perspective, the longer you have neglected a project, the harder it is for you to jump back in it. Why? Because so much has happened since then, and now it’s way more difficult to remember where you last left it.

In addition, while working on my current project, my mind will often worry and think about that other neglected project — which is really unnecessary and just eats up memory and brain power, causing severe inability to focus on the current issues at hand.

I’m an advocate of action and don’t like worrying, so I prefer to act on a worry, than to worry. Acting on a worry gives me a peace of mind.

The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.
– Mark Twain


Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

Dec

31

Happy New Year — 2007 !!

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Wishing all my readers a very happy new year. What are your new year resolutions? Vague goals (like “oh, to be better than last year”) never happens; so write it down this year, and see how much you manage to accomplish at the end of the year. Holding yourself accountable by writing it down is important so that you can measure how well you do. We all have a picture of where we want to be next, so start setting some goals/milestones towards that path today. Or another year will pass, and you will _still_ not be any closer.

I found this clip on YouTube. I like his quote just before he puts down his cuppa coffee and runs off jogging, “Why not start today, eh? Happy new year.” Start today! =]