Steve's Booknotes

Infosense: Turning Information into Knowledge
© 2001 by Keith Devlin

The value of information lies in knowledge of information that a person possesses in the form in which he or she can make immediate use. In our daily handling of information we need to progress from innocence to Infosense. The value of information lies in its potential to be turned into knowledge and the value of information depends upon the value of the knowledge for which it can lead. The majority of communication related problems in business can be traced back to an inadequate understanding of the nature of information. One quarter of the US GNP is linked solely to persuasion.
There are distinctions between data information and knowledge. Data is what newspapers report and computer information systems provide us with. For example list of stock prices. When people acquire data and fill into an overall framework of previously acquired information that data becomes information. Information equals data plus meaning. When a person internalizes information to a degree she can make use of it we call it knowledge. In organizations it often becomes embedded not only in document or repository but also in organizational routines, prophecies and practices and norms. Knowledge equals internalized information plus the ability to utilize the information. Information can be regarded as a substance that can be acquired, stored and transmitted. Knowledge on the other hand exists in the individual minds of people. Knowledge is harder to pin down than information. Knowledge exists within people part and parcel of human complexity and unpredictability. We think of information being stored in books and computer databases. During the course of a normal day we acquire information from a variety of physical objects and from the environment. One-way information can arise by virtue of systematic regularities in the world. The fact is anything can be used to store information. The thing to remember about information is that to recover information from a stored representation you need to know the rules of the encoding. Information equals representation plus procedure for encoding. The cost of information equals the cost of representation plus the cost of procedure for encoding. Human beings are type recognizers. Types are the regularities or commonalities shared by objects or situations. In general an object or situation represents information by being of a particular type. How to avoid contextual misunderstanding? How can you make sure that costly misunderstandings do not arise? How can you avoid your own equivalent of the disastrous charge of life brigade? The simple answer is you can’t.
Whenever you have two or more people communicating or one or more people communicating there are two contacts. What you can’t do is minimize the likelihood that it occurs. In the case of communication that is not face-to-face you can try to ensure that there are feedback possibilities built into the network. In a typical business meeting it is good to recap at periodic intervals and it’s good to summarize what has been agreed in writing and circulate to everyone else who is involved in the meeting. Your summary does not have to be long. You are just trying to summarize what was agreed as a result of the meeting. Make your notes informal. Information equals representation plus constraints. Constraints can be human made laws, rules, conventions, natural and physical laws, and so on. Information is always information about something. Information tells us something about something some object is of some type.
It is more likely for misunderstandings to arise when there are more than three people involved. The larger the group the more common is such lack of agreement but it happens whenever three or more people meet. The possibilities of error are reduced if one person in the meeting is declared the Chair‑in-charge with reporting what has been agreed. The wise chair pauses at various stages to summarize what has been agreed upon. Two and three person conversations are better than meetings involving larger groups. Mainly the likelihood that the group will exchange some new information rather than simply go over facts that was already familiar to all. Once participants have lost track of the common ground they lose the entire remainder of the conversation. They can neither fully contribute nor will they likely to understand correctly later contributions by others. In theory it can help to minimize the effects of different backgrounds and cultures if the meeting starts by having everyone contributed brief introduction to themselves. Write the purpose.
An analyst would say that the whiteboard is an example of a common artifact. Common artifacts provide information in such a way that it readily becomes common knowledge to everybody having simultaneous access to it. It is a public display. It is to keep distinction between a common artifact and a private source of information. In the absence of common artifact such as whiteboard this communication is highly likely in a meeting of more than three people.
The larger the group the greater proportion of time that will be spent discussing information already known to most or all of the participants. There are several facts that contribute to the tendency for a group to concentrate on information or rating them in for most or all. One is the physiological factor. Many people simply find it difficult to introduce any items into a group. The bigger the group the greater will be the disparity. Participants could be asked to write down prior to the meeting those points they think that should to be raised. The meetings could follow a round robin format. The major goals for individual are to bring new information to the group’s attention and to repeat to see instructions from time to time during the course of the meeting. Get participants to submit in advance the points they wish to raise about the round robin format list each new item introduced from the flip chart. Build up the team over time for everyone to be familiar with one another’s area of expertise and with their strengths and weaknesses.
What was different was that the members of the second group had been visited two weeks previously by a different volunteer worker who had come to their doors to ask them to display a small sign that read be a safe driver. It was such a small request that most people complied willingly without giving matter much thought. By accepting their displaying of sign the homeowners have accepted the role of a public-spirited citizen which supports safe driving. A new contact has just been established. As a result two weeks later some three quarters of them were willing to comply with the truly preposterous request. Simply signing the petition made a huge difference roughly half of them subsequently agreed to have the large billboards erected on their front lawn. They now saw themselves as public-spirited citizens. Since they acquired a commitment and that commitment provided a powerful contact for future actions. Contacts provide some very powerful influence on most of our actions.
A very minor act can cause someone to make a commitment to a cause. The plain fact is we are social creatures and we live in a culture in which we communicate. One would typically say that you have the time you wonder that to respond in such a way would be both inappropriate and very impolite. Why do we say can we pass this all after all we know that they can? It’s a concept called social equity, a balance that members of society strive to maintain. The participants in a conversation will go to some length to ensure that nothing is said that would imply authority and be taken as aggressive. Research have shown just how well-established are these pro forma request and how uncomfortable most people feel when confronted with more direct mode of speech. Try the Colombo technique. Colombo questioning the suspect is first of all just an ordinary guy doing his job approach. Second he spends most of the conversation talking about general matters and then he brings the key issue in the same absentminded manner usually oh I almost forgot there is just one more think I want to ask. Specific expertise could be acquired with comparative use whenever new circumstances demand change. In contrast culture tends to endure and to resist change. Culture is the key to an efficient working infrastructure. Culture endures and resists change if specific expertise could be acquired. The wise person can turn information into knowledge most efficiently. People do all three deskwork, knowledge acquisition and creation and knowledge transfer. Deskwork is regular work knowledge acquisition is reading, watching a video, attending a workshop and knowledge transfer is gossiping. A number of companies have gone to engineer water cooler meeting talk rooms. What does it take to turn information into knowledge or what is required to transfer information for since that is required to transfer knowledge. Knowledge results when a person internalizes information to the degree that he or she can make use of it. Though information only arises as a result of human generated constraints it is somehow outside of the human. Knowledge on the other hand is fundamentally intrinsically inside people. Knowledge implies that there is a knower. The power of knowledge to organize, select, learn and judge comes from values and beliefs. Knowledge of information possessed in a form that makes it available for immediate use. Information can usefully be measured in volume. When we turn information into knowledge we add value to it and make it more expensive. Who knows you still think not many things is why.
Knowsmosis - by talking with observing or working alongside an existing expert or by repeatedly trying to perform some task a human can acquire knowledge and expertise by a process reminiscent of osmosis the biological process whereby a cell absorbs nutrients through the cell wall. I like to refer to the acquisition of knowledge in this matter as knowsmosis. Rather it is the very human process of absorbing and interacting with the photo analyzer that led to the knowledge transfer. Most successful managers know instinctively that the most effective way to acquire knowledge is by interaction with another person. Computers have little to do with increasing knowledge or knowledge flow. For instance taking together the video, the owner’s photographs and a 360-degree workplace photograph provides human and social information that enables a PIF user to fill the mental aliments of the page owner as a person. If HP knew what HP knows we would be three times as profitable. Knowledge transfer via documentation that is via information failed in large part because the tumblers did not work in a culture where knowledge came from manual. The first obstacle is the question of who benefits from that knowledge. Set up this system whereby new ideas are evaluated by a team that is not informed of the source they are called blind evaluation. Knowledge creation and knowledge transfer can take place only in a supportive culture and in a manner with which the participants are familiar. For some groups face-to-face contact may be the only means to achieve effective knowledge transfer. The best way to support knowledge transfer is to develop a strong institutional culture knowledge sharing supported by a good knowledge sharing infrastructure of meeting, knowledge fairs retreat and a tolerance of mistakes. How do you train your employees to become experts in performing their duty. The five stages of skill acquisition - Stage 1 is novice stage. A novice approaches the activity by following rules which he or she follows in an unquestioned and concept free fashion. Stage 2 is called advanced beginner. They modified some of the rules according to contact. Stage 3 is confidence. The confident performer still follows rules but does so in fairly fluid fashion. Stage 4 is proficiency. The proficient performer does not select and follow rules. He is able to recognize situation as being very familiar to ones he encountered many times before and react accordingly by what has become an effective trade reflects quite unconscious instinct based on past experience of similar circumstances. Stage 5 is expert. Performs smoothly, effortlessly, and subconsciously. The expert performer does not make decisions, follow rules or solve problems she simply does what normally works. Thus an expert is not following rules at all not even subconsciously. Rules are like training wheels we use to help young children learn how to use a bicycle. Stage 1 is data. Stage 2 and 3 is information. Stage 4 and 5 is knowledge. Sheer expertise is not rule based. Genuine expertise arises when the rules are discussed with and such behavior cannot be encoded into a program computer program. Sheer expertise only and comes through experience. An observation reflected in the common view of the word expert and experience.
Reading books are valuable but they could only take you so far that is why there is an extensive internship for physicians where they practice medicine on real patients. Likewise airline pilots conduct many hours of practice in the flight. Many professions require a period of on the job training prior to certification. The greater the variety of circumstances that are provided in the initial on the job training period the more likely the individual would be able to cope with new situations. This is why businesses are increasingly turning to various kinds of stimulation to train their manager. Expertise consists primarily of ability to recognize type. We must get the right information from the right people at the right time in the right form context matters. Thus the company culture encourages support value reward innovation and knowledge sharing. A picture is worth a thousand words.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0716741644

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
By Benjamin Franklin.

Introduction:
The fabulous versatility, the unfailing competence, the zeal for self improvement and for social improvement, the shrewdness and amiability, the happy fact to have been at use in any company, the cheerful acquiescence in mediocrity, the talent for compromise and the genius for opportunism, the deceptive simplicity, the slightly co-indulgence in politics, the commonsense practicality and the inexhaustible resourcefulness, the rationalism that was always willing to take account of human nature, the sharp satire and the deadpan humor, these are Franklin’s characteristics and they have been for two centuries, American characteristics. There are no pains without gain. The autobiography celebrates virtues honesty, sobriety, industry, moderation, frugality and points the moral that those who practice these virtues are bound to have success in life.
The ultimate goal in life is not a grand monument when eloquent the task but to live on in the heart of those still alive. Martin Luther King Jr. said, “We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tides with single garment of destiny.” If someone did this to you would you think it was fair? Would you be comfortable if you were to appear on the front page of your home Sunday’s paper? Would you like your parents to see do this. Gandhi said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.” “Sentiment without action is the ruin of the soul,” said Edward Abbey. As the years go by I find myself paying less and less attention to what people say or think or wish instead I notice what they do what I feel from them and what they are working to become. Aristotle said, “Time does not exist except for change.” The origin of the word change is the old English cambium which means to become. In my hands is a small leather pocket folio my grandfather Downing carried to medical school. In one of the pockets keep a note that says I am nothing but dust and ashes. In the other pocket keep a note that says, “For me the world was created.” Write a one-page message for the coffee table or kitchen counter. If you knew that you would then go home and place this note on the coffee table for future generations to read and you would never be seen again what would you write down? I have undertaken this exercise on a number of occasions through the years. I write something different each time. With pen in hand I am just doing something of my life’s meaning and message. When Abraham Lincoln was asked how long it took him to write the single page in the Gettysburg address he replies all my life.

Autobiography:
Imagining it may be equally agreeable to you to know the circumstances of my life, many of which you are yet unacquainted with, and expecting the enjoyment of a week's uninterrupted leisure in my present country retirement, I sit down to write them for you.
From a Child I was fond of reading, and all the little money that came into my hands was ever laid out in Books. My Father's little library consisted chiefly of books in polemic divinity, most of which I read, and have since often regretted that at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more proper books had not fallen in my way, since it was now resolved I should not be a clergyman. Plutarch's Lives there was, in which I read abundantly, and I still think that time spent to great advantage, perhaps gave me a turn of thinking that had an influence on some of the principal future events in my life. I now had access to better Books. An acquaintance with the apprentices of booksellers, enabled me sometimes to borrow a small one, which I was careful to return soon & clean. Often I sat up in my room reading the greatest part of the night, when the book was borrowed in the evening & to be returned early in the morning lest it should be missed or wanted. I fell far short in elegance of expression, in method and in perspicuity, of which he convinced me by several Instances.
Thus refreshed, I walked again up the street, which by this time had many clean-dressed people in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined them, and thereby was led into the great meeting house of the Quakers near the market. I sat down among them and after looking round awhile and hearing nothing said, being very drowsy through labor and want of rest the preceding night, I fell fast asleep, and continued so till the meeting broke up, when one was kind enough to rouse me. This was, therefore, the first house I was in, or slept in, in Philadelphia.
But Sir William, on reading his letter, said he was too prudent. There was great difference in persons; and discretion did not always accompany years, nor was youth always without it. He drank on however, and had 4 or 5 shillings to pay out of his wages every Saturday night for that muddling liquor an expense I was free from. And thus these poor devils keep themselves always under. We sailed from Gravesend on the 23d of July, 1726. For the incidents of the voyage, I refer you to my journal, where you will find them all minutely related. Perhaps the most important part of that journal is the plan to be found in it, which I formed at sea, for regulating my future conduct in life. It is the more remarkable, as being formed when I was so young, and yet being pretty faithfully adhered to quite through to old age, as I found them disputed in the different books I read, I began to doubt of revelation itself. Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle's lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough deist. I grew convinced that truth, sincerity and integrity in dealings between man and man were of the utmost importance to the felicity of life; and I formed written resolutions, which still remain in my journal book, to practice them ever while I lived. Revelation had indeed no weight with me, as such; but I entertained an opinion that, though certain actions might not be bad because they were forbidden by it, or good because it commanded them, yet probably these actions might be forbidden because they were bad for us, or commanded because they were beneficial to us, in their own natures, all the circumstances of things considered.
I should have mentioned before that in the autumn of the preceding year, I had formed most of my ingenious acquaintance into a club of mutual improvement, which we called the Junto; we met on Friday evenings. The rules that I drew up required that every member, in his turn, should produce one or more queries on any point of Morals, Politics, or Natural Philosophy, to be discussed by the company; and once in three months produce and read an essay of his own writing, on any subject he pleased. Our debates were to be under the direction of a president, and to be conducted in the sincere spirit of inquiry after truth, without fondness for dispute or desire of victory; and to prevent warmth, all expressions of positiveness in opinions, or direct contradiction, were after some time made contraband, and prohibited under small pecuniary penalties. Our friendship continued without interruption to his death, upwards of forty years; and the club continued almost as long, and was the best school of philosophy, morality, and politics that then existed in the province; for our queries, which were read the week preceding their discussion, put us upon reading with attention on the several subjects, that we might speak more to the purpose; and here, too, we acquired better habits of conversation, everything being studied in our rules which might prevent our disgusting each other. Hence the long continuance of the club, which I shall have frequent occasion to speak further of hereafter.
And now I set on foot my first project of a public nature, that for a subscription library. I drew up the proposals, got them put into form by our great scrivener, Brockden, and, by the help of my friends in the Junto, procured fifty subscribers of forty shillings each to begin with, and ten shillings a year for fifty years, the term our company was to continue. We afterwards obtained a charter, the company being increased to one hundred. This was the mother of all the North American subscription libraries, now so numerous. It is become a great thing itself, and continually increasing.
Your discovery that the thing is in many a man's private power will be invaluable. Influence upon the private character late in life is not only an influence late in life, but a weak influence. It is in youth that we plant our chief habits and prejudices; it is in youth that we take our party as to profession, pursuits, and matrimony. The objections and reluctances I met with in soliciting the subscriptions made me soon feel the impropriety of presenting one's self as the proposer of any useful project that might be supposed to raise one's reputation in the smallest degree above that of one's neighbors, when one has need of their assistance to accomplish that project. I therefore put myself as much as I could out of sight, and stated it as a scheme of a number of friends, who had requested me to go about and propose it to such as they thought lovers of reading. In this way my affair went on more smoothly. The present little sacrifice of your vanity will afterwards be amply repaid.
Reading was the only amusement I allowed myself. I spent no time in taverns, games, or frolics of any kind; and my industry in my business continued as indefatigable as it was necessary. It was about this time I conceived the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection; as I knew what thought I knew what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other. But I soon found I had undertaken a task of more difficulty than I had imagined. While my care was employed in guarding against one fault, I was often surprised by another; habit took the advantage of inattention; inclination was sometimes too strong for reason. I concluded, at length, that the mere speculative conviction that it was our interest to be completely virtuous, was not sufficient to prevent our slipping; and that the contrary habits must be broken, and good ones acquired and established, before we can have any dependence on a steady, uniform rectitude of conduct.
For this purpose I therefore contrived the following method. In the various enumerations of the moral virtues I had met with in my reading, I found the catalogue more or less numerous, as different writers included more or fewer ideas under the same name. Temperance, for example, was by some confined to eating and drinking, while by others it was extended to mean the moderating every other pleasure, appetite, inclination, or passion, bodily or mental, even to our avarice and ambition. I proposed to myself, for the sake of clearness, to use rather more names, with fewer ideas than a few names with more ideas and I included under thirteen names of virtues all that at that time occurred to me as necessary or desirable, and annexed to each a short precept, which fully expressed the extent I gave to its meaning.

These names of virtues, with their precepts, were:

1. TEMPERANCE. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2. SILENCE. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3. ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4. RESOLUTION. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. FRUGALITY. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e., waste nothing.
6. INDUSTRY. Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. SINCERITY. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. JUSTICE. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that are your duty.
9. MODERATION. Avoid extremes; forbear resenting injuries so much as you think they deserve.
10. CLEANLINESS. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, clothes, or habitation.
11. TRANQUILLITY. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. CHASTITY. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dullness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
13. HUMILITY. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.

My intention being to acquire the habitude of all these virtues, I judged it would be well not to distract my attention by attempting the whole at once, but to fix it on one of them at a time, and, when I should be master of that, then to proceed to another, and so on, till I should have gone through the thirteen; and, as the previous acquisition of some might facilitate the acquisition of certain others, I arranged them with that view, as they stand above. Conceiving, then, that, agreeably to the advice of Pythagoras in his Garden Verses, daily examination would be necessary, I contrived the following method for conducting that examination, one of the pages.
I made a little book, in which I allotted a page for each of the virtues. I ruled each page with red ink, so as to have seven columns, one for each day of the week, marking each column with a letter for the day, from Sunday through Saturday. I crossed these columns with thirteen red lines, marking the beginning of each line with the first letter of one of the virtues, on which line, and in its proper column, I might mark, by a little black spot, every fault I found upon examination to have been committed respecting that virtue upon that day. I determined to give a week's strict attention to each of the virtues successively. I determined to give a week's strict attention to each of the virtues successively. Thus in the first week my great guard was to avoid every the least offense against temperance, leaving the other virtues to their ordinary chance, only marking every evening the faults of the day. Proceeding thus to the last, I could go through a course complete in thirteen weeks, and four courses in a year. And like him who having a garden to weed, does not attempt to eradicate all the bad herbs at once, which would exceed his reach and his strength, but works on one of the beds at a time, & having accomplished the first proceeds to a second; so I should have, I hoped the encouraging pleasure of seeing on my pages the progress I made in virtue, by clearing successively my lines of their spots, till in the end by a number of courses, I should be happy in viewing a clean book after a thirteen weeks, daily examination. I formed the following little prayer, which was prefixed to my tables of examination, for daily use:”O powerful Goodness! Bountiful Father! Merciful Guide! Increase in me that wisdom which discovers my truest interest. Strengthen my resolutions to perform what that wisdom dictates. Accept my kind offices to thy other children as the only return in my power for thy continual favors to me.”

The precept of order requiring that every part of my business should have its allotted time, one page in my little book contained the following scheme of employment for the 24 hours of a natural day:

The morning question, what good shall I do this day?

5:00 - Rise, wash, and address Powerful Goodness; contrive day's business, and take the resolution of the day; prosecute the present study: and breakfast.

8:00 to 12:00 – Work.

12:00 to 2:00 - Read or overlook my accounts, and dine.

2:00 to 6:00 – Work.

Evening question, what good have I done today?

6:00 to 10:00 – Put things in their places, supper, music, or diversion, or conversation, examination of the day.

10:00 to 5:00 – Sleep.

My scheme of order gave me the most trouble; and I found that, though it might be practical where a man's business was such as to leave him order, too, with regard to places for things, papers, etc., I found extremely difficult to acquire. I had not been early accustomed to it, and, having an exceeding good memory, I was not so sensible of the inconvenience attending want of method. In truth, I myself incorrigible with respect to Order; and now I am grown old, and my memory bad, I feel very sensibly the want of it. But, on the whole, though I never arrived at the perfection I had been so ambitious of obtaining, but fell far short of it, yet I was, by the endeavor, a better and a happier man than I otherwise should have been if I had not attempted it; as those who aim at perfect writing by imitating the engraved copies, though they never reach the wished-for excellence of those copies, their hand is mended by the endeavor, and tolerable, while it continues fair and legible.

My list of virtues contained at first but twelve. But a Quaker friend having kindly informed me that I was generally thought proud, that my pride showed itself frequently in conversation, that I was not content with being in the right when discussing any point, but was overbearing and rather insolent of which he convinced me by mentioning several instances, I determined endeavoring to cure myself, if I could, of this vice of falling among the rest, and I added humility to my list, giving an extensive meaning to the word. I cannot boast of much success in acquiring the reality of this virtue, but I had a good deal with regard to the appearance of it. In reality, there is, perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive, and will every now and then peep out and show itself; you will see it, perhaps, often in this history; for, even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility. Our club, the Junto, was, so useful, and afforded such satisfaction to the members, that several were desirous of introducing their friends, which could not well be done without exceeded what we had settled as a convenient number, viz., twelve. We had from the beginning made it a rule to keep our institution a secret, which was pretty well observed.

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0486290735

The Other 90% - How to Unlock Your Vast Untapped Potential
© 2002 by Robert K. Cooper

Give the world the best you have and the best would come back to you. I was thinking about the most exceptional people I have known. They were the ones who kept going when others quit. The ones who found ways to do when everyone else thought couldn’t be done. I remember my parents and other adults in my hometown saying study hard and work hard. There is no passion to be found playing the small and settling for life that is less than the one you are capable of living - Nelson Mandela.
If everyone else is doing it, I don’t. That is one of the unwritten quotes I came to believe in. When we suppress our originality we lose touch with the source of our vitality and initiative. You need to regularly ask two questions. 1. What’s the most exceptional thing you have done this week? 2. What’s the most exceptional thing you will do next week? What did you do this week that made you proudest? What can you do that no one else will expect from you?
If you ask yourself right now what you did last week that was exceptional you probably have to think a while. When you establish the asking of the two questions as an integral part of you life it can change your approach to everything you do. It steadily raises your sights about what you are capable of. Every contact with life creates a gut feeling. Whenever you noticed you are comparing yourself to others change the view. How about comparing yourself to the best in yourself? In excelling you save time and energy that would have been sent comparing yourself to others and fighting others and you apply that time and energy to be your best. Your main task in life is to do what you could do best and become what you can potentially be - Eric Frost.
She listed her 5 top value words in the left margin of the page and marked the days of the week across the top of the page and she rate herself during the week by how well she lived each value that day. She noticed here reactions and observations.
Trust is an emotional strength that begins with the feeling of self-worth and purpose. We trust others when two crucial qualities are present in the relationship. First we must feel that they understand us and that they know who we really are and what really matters to us. Second we must feel that they care about us. Notice what truly matters to others.
Every human being has greatness inside somewhere, no exceptions. There are two primary energy states - tense energy and calm energy.
By sipping extra water every 20 to 30 minutes during the day you not only improve your overall health and resistance to illness but also provide a process to keep your energy and alertness levels higher. Drink ice cold water because as it reaches the stomach it stimulates increased energy production and raises alertness in brain and senses. A gallon of ice cold water requires 100 of calories of heat energy to blend with body temperature.
His number one focus was what he called Golden Greats. He realized that everyday most of us are robbed of energy and resourcefulness by chronic frustrations and small yet unresolved irritations. It’s the unattended little things that over time bring out the worst in us and drive our relationships to ruin. Begin to notice which little things really matter. Develop a similar listing to identify the little things that annoy the individual’s important to well being and future and then don’t do those things anymore.
“Nothing can bring you peace but yourself” - Ralph Waldorf Emerson.
When something is grinding you down you have to know when to pull the plug. What do your loved ones make the most about you in recent years? What part of you isn’t coming home at the end of the day? It is likely to be something small but significant. Put more life in your days.

1. Synchronized calendars.
2. Call home at teatime.
3. Come home first in minds and heart.
4. Change the way you walk through the door.
5. Eat a snack before you eat dinner.
6. Get up and move after the evening meal.
7. Remember the funniest thing that happened today.

When we over schedule family time or keep asking loved ones to defer the pleasures of daily living or their own aspirations until we make it in the work world. It assumes that the loads of our work will justify the neglected self and family.
Early evening is the time when energy plummets and vulnerability, detention and tiredness is especially high. Over half of the most damaging arguments are started or magnified within 15 minutes of people greeting each other at the end of the day.
Eat a snack before you eat dinner. It is essential to eat before you eat. It’s a good idea to choose the beverage such as hot tea, juice or healthy ice cream and then enjoy a small low fat appetizer such as vegetable pieces with cream cheese etc.
Get up and move after the evening meal. A few minutes of live physical activity at this time of the day elevates your energy level and metabolic rates just as it’s winding down.
In one study of 50 married couples by cultures found that humor accounts for 70% of the difference in happiness between couples who enjoyed life and those that didn’t.
Which of your dreams are so big that only your heart and not your head can hold them? Which of your dreams are so big that only your heart and not your head can hold them?
All of your unfinished obligations, concerns and upcoming needs must be recorded in some trusted way outside of your head so they can’t keep distracting you. Jot them down in a list leaving writing space to the right of each item to clarify your exact commitment. Is this truly important? And if so what can you do to finish it in day one. Something can be delegated or left out. By putting these things in writing you free yourself to keep your psycho what is most important of all.
We must be dreamers as well as doers. At the top of the left column write ‘My biggest boldest wish is’, your answer maybe as wild or far fetched as you can imagine. Then at the top of the right column put the heading ‘I can’t because’ and now list the reasons you won’t be able make this biggest boldest wish come true. What’s in the way and why? When I imagine making the two greatest contributions to my family, they are, when I imagined my two greatest contributions to the neighborhood or the community they are, my skills and passions could change the world if. Think about the people closest to you. Whatever they say is impossible, how do you respond to their doubts. A big dream awakens hidden capacity and drive. What’s your story or what gets you the most excited about life these days?
As Tom Keator puts it “I don’t want an epitaph on my grave stone that says ‘He would have pursued some big dreams in his life, but other people would not let him’.
We are designed to last a remarkable 120 years. Most of us die in late middle age, around age 75. I suggest that 0-20 is childhood, 20-60 is youth, 60-80 is middle age and 80 plus is senior. Every moment of our lives we are either growing or dying and it’s largely a choice not fate.
Increase your sensory awareness. Become the most curious person you know, do some things just for the fun of it, go play scrabble. You open yourself to precisely the kind of play that is led to broadened horizons, fresh perspectives, unexpected joys, some discoveries and advance learning. Post nuggets of wisdom and playful phrases on your refrigerator. Ease off on the guilt of not getting everything done. Spice the puree beans with humor. Know what makes your loved ones laugh the hardest to make it a point to keep doing those things.
We should consider every day lost in which we have not danced at least once. Start a humor library. Champion lost causes.
Stand beside a big pile of unopened mail. Decide to get some breathing space instead of opening any of it. You are feeling one of the most powerful pulls of all, the doing instinct. Next spend some time watching a cat. Cats know almost everything there is about lounging and doing nothing. Emulate what you see. Sink way into the easy chair. No sudden moves. Stretch before you jump up. Notice small things a cat would see that you would never notice before.
How about napping. Take a nap. Just for ten minutes. Let go off time, take off your watch and look at it. Decide when you want to return from getting gone. Switch off the outside world. Consider how everything you see here smell taste and touched throughout the day bombards your mind with stimulation. Come up for air, think of some thing funny. Imagine being at your favorite hideout doing nothing at all. Get the big picture. Take a few seconds to acknowledge by getting gone really matters. “You can’t have everything, where would you put it?” - Mark Twain.
As aged men put it, life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage. We must understand that there could be no life without risk. My grandfather said great trees grow strongest when it’s exposed to powerful winds from time to time.
When learning about life and people make no more assumptions than are absolutely necessary. Don’t take things personally – someone is always going to be mad at you and that’s okay. What other people convey is really about you instead it’s almost always about them. Don’t gossip about others. Talk straighter than you have to, if you believe in something do it, don’t just say it. Ban gossip beginning with you, when you hear yourself or others talking about individuals who are not present take your full attention. I like to not talk about anyone who is not here. I am concerned with making faulty assumptions. If you are concerned about another person’s motives or intentions I want to ask them directly before we talk about it.
Angels don’t worry about you they believe in you. Angels don’t try to fix everything particularly life’s lessons. Angelic things I have done, angels I have encountered. Make unreasonable requests of yourself. Say no to the drug of gradualness. It was Martin Luther King, Jr. who spoke out strongly against making slow changes either we risk or we don’t get that, either we change or we don’t. There is no acceptable middle ground because it rolls into complacency.
Lasting changes rarely occur when we ease our way into the future. They come when we leap. The leaps themselves could be small or large. Once we take action we see things differently and for many of us there is no going back, when you find a back door that’s open close it.
Use the rocking chair image. Whenever you would notice that I was balky at taking some relatively small risks, my grandfather used to say “Robert, imagine you are 95 years old and sitting in a rocking chair looking back across your life. How would you want others to remember you for ignoring or accepting what’s in front of you right now today? Do you have the guts to keep challenging your edges? The ultimate goal in life is not a grand monument or eloquent epitaph but to live on in the hearts of those still alive.”

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The Little Guide to Happiness - How to Smile Again
© 2002 by Michael Kevin Naselli

Negativity is a cancer.

Here are five misconceptions to happiness - Hoping, making a lot of money, other people, obtaining goals, positive thinking.

You brainwashed yourself to think you are unhappy; you change yourself to focus on the negative and ignore the positive. You lack peace of mind. Those darned tapes in your head keep looping back all those ingrained messages of gloom. You are focused on the bad and that takes away your ability to see the good. Your mind is like that. It is a video camcorder. It records what you focus on. What negative thoughts are making me unhappy or afraid? Better to ask right questions that have proactive answer, don’t you think? Ask questions like how can I succeed? But if you think how I can win, or if I was a winner what would be some of the reasons.

Remember your brain is a search engine. Ask it why am I happy and it will find reasons. In other words, always pick out positives; never dwell in the negative. Hatred and revenge are also horrible paths to unhappiness. When you were constantly plotting on getting back at the person who wronged, what are you thinking about most? You are thinking about the wrong they did of course. You are also making a list in your head of ways to get them. People, who hold grudges and cannot forgive, cannot be happy. When you hold grudges and do not forgive it hurts you or you are constantly focused on how terrible your dad was to you when you were a child and how you will never ever forgive him. You are forcing your mind to relive it over and over again. This is why forgiveness is the key to inner peace.

Stay away from negative people. Also, in regards to physiology, exercise makes you feel better. It raises endurance in the body that makes us feel good. You are more energetic and competent. Eating right also plays a role in this. Drink plenty of water. Winston Churchill said never, never, never, never, ever give up.

Stop worrying about what others think about you. Start concentrating on what parts of them you do like. This focuses your mind on the positive and takes your worry off of you. Do not over analyze things. Take life at face value. Be grateful. Always be grateful. Have you ever heard the saying count your blessings? Well do it, literally. Everyday make a list of ten things you are grateful for. Don’t you realize the power you have? You can create anything you want in your mind. You can make a heaven into hell or hell into heaven depending on how you perceive it in your mind.

Don’t complain or look for sympathy. Nobody likes a whiner. Focusing on the negatives makes you miserable. You can find something good that you can focus on. You know the type; my father was verbally abusive and it ruined my life. They are like 30 now and still whining and still unhappy. Don’t blame others. In fact dwelling on what others did to you will only make you miserable because you are focusing on that and know this, ultimately when it comes to being unhappy you put it there and it wasn’t them. You are in control of your mind and not them. Holding grudges only makes you dwell on bad and dwelling on bad makes you focus on bad.

You are miserable because your view of people is so judgmental and critical. All you see is flaws. Not being able to look in the mirror and say I like this person, I am a good person and I am proud of myself is the nail on the coffin to a fulfilling life. Liking yourself is a prerequisite to happiness. Be good to yourself. Never seek out the sympathy of others. Don’t be throwing any more pitty parties. Jealousy stinks. Start envying someone. Here is a great way to drop your mood into the toilet. Start concentrating on how much better off that person is than you, “I wish I had his house, his wife, his car, his luck, his fortune, his money, his popularity”. It always says not to covet. When you start wanting you are forcing your mind through a search engine to think up all the things you don’t have. That in turn makes you feel horrible.

Worry is waste.

Whenever you find yourself worrying catch yourself and ask your mind what solutions are there to this temporary glitch. When you start concentrating on solution the voice starts to dwindle. Sometimes we get so blinded in our quest for the holy glow of joy that when it is staring us in the face we miss it literally. The secret of happiness is this – let your interests be wide as possible and let your reaction to the things in persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile. People are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Be happy with what you have and are; be generous with both and you won’t have to hunt for happiness. Happiness depends upon us. When one door of happiness closes another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. The happy man is not he who seems best to others but who seems best to himself - the art of being happy in life and the power of extracting happiness from common things. The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet.

For every minute you are angry you lose 60 seconds of happiness.
Happiness consists not of having but of being; not of possessing but of enjoying. It is the warm glow of a heart at peace with its self.
Happiness, it lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.
The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thought.
A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.
The human being still needs to accomplish, to achieve, and to triumph to be happy.
If you want happiness for an hour take a nap; if you want happiness for the day go fishing; if you want happiness for a year inherit a fortune; if you want happiness for lifetime help somebody.
It is the cheapest point of happiness that a man is willing to be what he is.
I have learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our disposition and not on our circumstances.
Pleasure comes from without and joy comes from within.
The place to be happy is here; the time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so.
Nobody really cares if you are miserable so you might as well be happy.
Simply put, you believe that things or people make you unhappy but this is not accurate.
You make yourself unhappy.
Smiling is infectious; you catch it like the flu. A single smile just like mine could travel around the earth. Let’s starts an epidemic quick and get the world infected.
There are hundreds of languages in the world but a smile speaks them all.
There is only one way to happiness and that is quit worrying about things, which are beyond the power of our will.
Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.
Cancel all negative, destructive, fearful, and unhappy thoughts.
These two types of thoughts cannot coexist if you want to share in the abundance that surrounds us all.
True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done and the zest of creating things new.
True happiness is to enjoy the present without anxious dependence upon the future.
Try to make at least one person happy every day.
Count off if you can the treasure of happiness that you would dispense in a week, in a year, in a lifetime.
The word happiness would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.
We are happy when we are growing.
The secret of happiness is freedom. The secret of freedom is courage.
Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one’s values. The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.
Happiness depends upon ourselves.
Happiness is when you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
Remember happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have; it depends only on what you think. If your happiness depends on what somebody else does, I guess you do have a problem.
They all attain perfection when they find joy in their work.
A cheerful heart is good medicine. Fallen leaves lying on the grass in the November sun brings more happiness than the daffodil.
The most unhappy of all man is he who believes himself to be so.
I can sympathize with people’s pain but not with their pleasures.
There is something curiously boring about somebody else’s happiness.
The happiest people seem to be those who have no particular cause for being happy except that they are so.
Happiness to some elation is to others mere stagnation.
Ask yourself whether you are happy and you cease to be so.
There is no cure for births and deaths save to enjoy the interval.
A lifetime of happiness - no man alive could bear it. It would be hell on earth.
We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it.
Ignorance is blessed.
I don’t what this means but I am happy.
To me every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.
The mind has its own place and in itself you can make heaven of hell and hell of heaven.
The happiness of this life depends less on what befalls you, but on the way in which you take it.
Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the night.
A man who has the physical being is always turn toward the outside think that his happiness lies outside him, finally turns inward and discovers that the source is within him.

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Focal Point
© 2001 by Brian Tracy

The sun’s ray focused through a magnifying glass can create intense heat and fire your intelligence and ability focused and concentrated on a few key activities can enable you to accomplish much more than the average person can and in far less time.
You must develop clarity about who you are and what you really want.
There are only four things you can do to improve the quality of your life and work. You can do more of certain things; you can do lots of certain things. You can start to do things that you are not doing and you can stop doing certain things all together. All you need is the desire to change, the desire to take action, the discipline to practice the new behaviors you have chosen and the determination to persist until you get the results you want.
He made a list of everything he was doing and then be applied the zero base thinking question to each activity. Knowing what I know now if I were not doing this now would I start it up again today? He decides to do more of some things and less of other things and to start doing certain things and stop other activities all together. He began reducing and cutting back on the amount of time he was spending with the 80% of his clients who contributed only 20% of his revenues. Do you want to double your income first identify the things you do that contribute the greatest value to you and your company. Resolve to spend more of your time doing more of the tasks by contributing greatest value. Identify the activities in the bottom 80% contribute very little to your results.
From now on no matter what happens say to yourself “I am responsible”. Life is the study of attention, where your attention goes your heart goes also. The very active observing of behavior tends to change that behavior for the better. The law of increasing return so that the more you focus on doing the few things that represent the most valuable use of your time the better you become at those activities and the less time it takes you to accomplish each one.
Almost everything you do is determined by your habits. Your habits largely control and dictate the words you say, the things you do and the ways you react and respond. All habits are learned and learnable. Everything is hard before is it easy.
The grand slam formula is simplification, leveraging, acceleration and multiplication. Simplify everything you do, continually reduce and eliminate the activities, stop doing as many of things of low value as possible. Is there anything I am doing right now knowing what I know now? I would have got into again if I were starting over again. Is there any relationship personal or business that you wouldn’t get into again stay if you do it over? How do I get out of this situation and how fast. Using leverage, using other peoples knowledge, other peoples energy, other peoples money, other peoples successes, other peoples failures, other peoples ideas, other peoples contacts, accelerate. Anyone who can act quickly to satisfy the needs of other people can move rapidly to the front of the line. Always keep looking for ways to do things faster for the key people and customers in your life. Multiply your ability do a simple team of excellent people and then help your team accomplish important tasks is essential to your long-term success. It is the key to multiplying yourself and your ability.
He would not be in exaggeration to assert that as much as 80% of the persons time at work is spend in activities that contribute very little to the work the person is paid to do. Identify the few tasks that contribute the greatest value to your work. Identify the routine tasks and activities that consumes so much time but contribute little or nothing to your long-term goals of work. Use the grand slam formula to dramatically increase your output and your results. Decide today if you take at least one full day each week off to spend exclusively on your personal pursuits. Start today and pay closer attention to the things you do. Think about your tasks before you begin.
The first requisite of success is the ability to apply your physical and mental energies to one problem without growing weary - Thomas Edison. Perform more and more tasks of higher value and delicately outsource the main tasks with lower value.

1. What am I trying to do?
2. How am I trying to do it?
3. What are my functions?
4. What if my functions are wrong?
5. What would I have to do differently if my clear functions were wrong?

Increase your productivity with clear goals, clear and written plans of action every minute you spend in planning will save you as many ten minutes in execution. Always work from the list. Think on paper. Third, set priorities on each list. Use the A B C D in your daily A is for important B is for should do C is for nice D is for delicate use E is for eliminate.
The more time you spent on tasks that are important though not urgent the more effective in productivity you become in the longer term. Most people spend an enormous amount of time doing things that are urgent but not important.
You can reduce the amount of time you spend on each task by as much as 80% simply by refusing to do anything else until that task is complete. Compete against yourself to feel how much you can get out of the high value each day or project out four or five years and imagine that you are now one of the most productive people in your field.
My sacred organizing principal for high productivity is single handling in which you concentrate single mindedly on one thing the most important thing all day long. Once your program is for confidence yourself you will be amazed that how much you get done.
The starting point of simplifications for you to use the number of things you do in your work and in your personal life. Consolidate several tasks into one task. Assign several tasks to a single person. Outsource particular tasks. Delegate task eliminate. Change the order in which tasks are done to reduce time on that. Practice idealization and all the time think back to the happiest times in your personal life from the most organized and pleasant times in your work life and imagine how you can recreate those times in your future. If I only had six months to live how would I change my life, clean up the clutter in your life? Go through your stack of brief material to get important things away. Please carry some silence in your life. Many people had gotten rid of their television sets. Go through your party and closets, and get rid of everything. Practice solitude on a daily basis. Make a specific action commitment based on what have you learnt in this chapter. Do something, do anything. Some people are more successful than others. You can be, have or do anything you want in life but you simply find out how other people achieved it before you and then do the same things yourself. Thoughts are causes and conditions are effects. You can change your life because you can change the way you think. Successful people think differently from unsuccessful people.
You become what you think about most of the time. Over the years thousands of successful people have been asked what you think about most of the time. Successful people think about what they want and how they get it most of the time. Unsuccessful people on the other hand tend to think and talk about what they don’t want most of the time. They think and talk about who they are mad at and who is to blame for their problems most of the time. Successful people are far more optimistic most of the time than average people. They have a positive mental attitude towards themselves and others. People do mental exercises to become a more positive confident and optimistic person. Think about the future. In 3,300 studies of leadership found that the one quality all the studies have in common was vision. Leaders have vision. They then worked to make it a reality in the present. Future oriented people think about the future most of the time. They think about where they are going rather that where they have been. They think about what is possible in the months and years ahead rather than about the past which cannot be changed.
Clarity is terribly important. Successful people have tremendous clarity about who they are, what they want and how they are going to get it. In idealization we continually imagine the perfect outcome or solution for any situation in the life. We project forward three to five years and create a mental picture of dependent life and clear that would be ideal for you in every respect. Imagine that you have all the knowledge and experience you need. Imagine that you have all the money and resources you need. Imagine that you have all the friends and contacts you want. Imagine that all opportunities and possibilities are open to you. Imagine that if you can dream it you can do it. Develop a dream list. If you are married sit down with your spouse to make up this dream list. Create a five-year vision. How this company would be described if it was the very best company of its kind in the entire industry. We then begin to set strategy by asking how. How is one of the most important powerful words you can learn or apply to every situation in your life. How do I achieve it? Asking how for since you to be both positive and future oriented.
The second attitude of highly successful people is goal orientation. 3% that is about how many people actually put their goals into writing. The other 97% have wishes hopes and fantasies. People without goals are doomed to work forever for people who do have goals. The key to goal setting is for you to think on paper. When you write things down you crystallize them right before your eyes. They become tangling concrete. They become subjects of positive manipulation and definite action. Written goals are accurate to give you a positive mind and energize you. The act of running and down increases enormously the lightweight and exactly what achieve your goal. Decide exactly what you want in each area of your life most people never do this. The third attitude for great successful excellence orientation is when it becomes excellent of what you do your life will change completely. But once carefully developed and doing in excellent fashion would help you to boost in your career. The fit attitude for optimism and high performances, solution orientation in which you think about the solution to the problem most of the time.
A truly effective person is one who has developed a wonderful ability to respond constructively to the inevitable problems and difficulties in day-to-day life. This must be your goals as well. Think about solutions all day long. The sixth attitude is growth orientation. The three keys to growth orientation are simple. The first read one or more hour each day in your chosen field. They keep audio tapes in their car attend every helpful course and seminar you found. Seventh attitude is action orientation. 2% of working adults have the sense of urgency. People often equate speed with quality. If you act fast when they have need or question they automatically assume that your work is better in a prior value. The faster you need the more energy you have. Nothing can add your work power to your life and concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets. The most human activity follow is called the sigmoid curve. What business am I in, what business are you really in, what you do for your customer or your company.
Before you can do something new you have to stop doing something old. What are the activities that I should reduce, discontinue or avoid all together? What are the 10% to 20% of my activities that could account for 80% to 90% of my results. The sixth question is what are the critical constraints on my abilities to achieve my goals? I will contend that fully 80% of all the constraints that are holding you back are inside you. What is specific action or actions that I am going to take immediately based on my response? Sharpen your focus. Design your perfect life style. Create your perfect calendar. How would you change your life if you receive one million dollars cash trust for you today? What is the first thing you would do? What parts of your work do you enjoy the most and do the best. Where do you excel. What sort of activities make you happiest? If you learn today that you have only six months left to live, what would you do?
What are the values to achieve that are most important to you? What is your vision, what are your goals, what are your knowledge and skills, habits, daily activities, actions? The better questions you ask to yourself the better answers you will elicit. George Marshall gave the following orders to Eisenhower – proceed to London invade Europe defeats the Germans.
Specialization is your ability to channel your talents and abilities into a vital area that is of the measurable value to your company or customers. Differentiation is how you keep yourself apart from others on the basis of your superior performance in one or more areas. Segmentation is the ability to determine the people and organization from your work life that most benefit from your performance in a particular area. Concentration is your ability to focus single mindedly on serving your specific market segment with product that are excellent.
Your job is to develop habits in each area of your life that make it progressively easier that yields better and better in that area. If you act as if you already have what you desire the action itself repeated often and often develops within you the habits consistent with it. To develop the habits you desire you need to only act on every occasion as if you already have the habit. Your job is to select the one behavior that is consistent with the most important habit you develop and practice it every single day until it becomes natural to you. There’s always one activity to practice that is more valuable than anything else.
The happiest people spend a lot of time thinking about what they want. How satisfied are you with household finances? How secure is your family with regards to the insurance? Time is the critical success factor in all relationships. The quality of any relationship is directly related to the amount of time you invest in that relationship. You demonstrate a person’s importance to you by spending time with him or her. You can dramatically improve the quality of a relationship by investing more and more time in that relationship. How often do you have dinner with your entire family? How often do you start the day with your family members? Select a single daily activity where by you are going to practice to improve your personal relationship. Is there anything I am doing today that you would like me to do more of or less of or start or stop doing? When you are at work spend your time working; don’t waste time. There is work time there is personal time. Remember that watching television, reading the newspaper; working on your computer does not constitute spending time with your loved ones. Deliberately create chunks of time with your loved ones. Plan vacations in advance. The most financially successful people in every society are based with a long-term perspective.
Imagine that you have achieved a net worth of $10,000,000.00. Make up a dream list of every single thing you would want in your lifetime. For financial goals earn as much as you can and spend as little as you can. Saving as best as and as much as possible and protect yourself against unexpected reversals. Determine how much money you will need each month to live comfortably and calculate how long you could sustain your current life style on your current savings which is called your run rate. The average self-made millionaires spend 20 to 30 hours per month studying the subject of money and carefully managing finances. On the other hand, the average person spends only about a tenth of that time each month. Financially successful people enjoy the acts of saving and investing. It makes them happy to refrain from spending and instead put their money away for the long term. One of the smartest things you can do right now is to stop doing anything that may interfere with your living a long healthy life. People who were fit and healthy think about fitness and health most of the time. Happiness, energy, beauty, discipline, self control, personal mastery, persistence and fitness, how much would you weigh, how much would you exercise, how many hours per night would you sleep, from which side of bed you wake up, what sort of activities which you indulge in, what would be your waist size. They drink a lot of water. You need about one gallon of water per day to flush toxins from your body.
Set a goal to exercise 200 to 300 minutes per week. The more you exercise the less sleep you need the brighter and sharper you are when you work and the more productive you are at everything you do. Project forward five or ten years and imagine that you are developed fully in every important part of your life. Idealize and see yourself as outstanding in every respect. Refuse to compromise on your personal training. Take out a piece of paper and write down ten goals that you would like to achieve in that area, personal and professional development in a month and years ahead. A single quality for success is self-discipline, it is the master key to victory.
You must develop 7 disciplines: Daily goal study, every morning take three to five minutes to write up your top ten goals in the present time. Daily planning and organizing the night before, daily priority setting, concentrate on your highest value activity, exercise and proper nutrition, earning and growth, time for the most important people in your life.
The 1000% formula is based on a law of incremental change on improved time. It is possible for you to increase your overall activity performance and output by 0.1% in the next 24 hours. This will add up to 26% per year compounded over 10 years for result in your own increase of 1000%. In every case they were astonished as how quickly they have moved to the top of their field by the simple act of making small incremental improvement each day. Arise two hours before your first appointment and read one hour in your field. This is called the golden hour, set the term. Leave the T.V. off, set the newspaper aside and invest the first 60 minutes in yourself in your mind. Rewrite and revive your major goals each day before you start of, plan each day in advance, always concentrate on the most valuable use of your time, listen to educational audio programs in your car. Ask two questions after every experience - what could I do right what would I do differently.
Whatever you dwell upon grows in your experience, whatever you pay attention to, increases in your life. Whatever you focus on you need to do better. When you analyze each experience by asking what I did right and what would I do differently you program yourself to perform even better in each subsequent experience.
Treat every one you meet like a million dollar customer, treat the people you work with the same way you would treat a valuable customer of your firm. Treat each prospect or customer as if that person had already purchased one million dollars of your company’s product or service and was thinking of doing it again. Also treat the people at home as if they were the most valuable people in the world to you because they are.
One more thing, the most driving force in the human psyche is the need for meaning and purpose of being committed to something bigger than oneself. John Rockefeller when he was 52 two years old was also extremely sick and the doctors told him that he would die within a year. The more money he gave away the better he felt. His health improved he went on to live to age 91 in excellent health. Every human action is stimulated by a self-dissatisfaction of some kind. The result is without self-dissatisfaction no action takes place. Some primary driving forces of human behavior begins with discontent, dissatisfaction, discomfort, or unhappiness.
Think back over the happiest moments of your life. Think about the times when you felt the greatest joy and inner peace, what was going on, who you with were, what were you doing, what was the most joyous experience.
Seven lessons for the 21st century:

1. You life only gets better when you get better.
2. It doesn’t matter where you are coming from all that matters is where you are going.
3. Any thing you are doing well is worth doing poorly at first.
4. You are only as free as your options, a well developed alternative that you have available to you.
5. With every problem or difficulty or experience there is a greater advantage or benefit.
6. You can learn anything you need to learn to achieve any goal you can set yourself
7. The only real limits on what you can do or be are the limits that you set in your own mind.

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Girls Will be Girls: Raising Confident and Courageous Daughters
© 2003 by JoAnn Deak and Teresa Barker

Use both “what do you think and what do you feel “ when discussing things.
Girls in their teens have told me that they have been playing the part for so long they have lost sense of who they really are and what they really believe in. As one 15‑year-old girl said, “I don’t know if I like myself or not anymore, I don’t even know who myself is? Am I this person who pretends this and acts that? Where is the real me? Who am I?”
Girls, they say used to talk a lot about family events and travel. The girls place family in the top three categories of what is important. One seventh-grade girl said, “I wish my parents would spend more time with me. I know they love me but they are so busy and we hardly ever get to do things together.” There is no substitute for quantity. Family that spend a lot of time together bond, know one another, are able to see and predict when issues arrive and they have better communication. Meaningful relationships take time and emotional investment. The more time you spend with them and the more opportunity you have to get to know him or her better and to share moments that create closeness, underscores caring. Delay your twin daughters’ dating as long as you can. Sitting in a dark movie theatre or putting bodies together at a dance is not an effective way getting to know the other gender. It is an effective way to facilitate a physical relationship and physical relationships are too complicated and too costly at this young age. Dating and dances can wait until later high school years.
Groups of girls and boys interacting around some kind of activity are the healthiest relationship mode for this age range.
I always ask the women how many of them would want to be in middle school again. Over the years out of thousands of women, a total three have raised their hand. Your teen will believe you have no wisdom but keep acting like you do. Your daughter will pretend she isn’t listening to a word you are saying but keep talking because she is listening. Help prolong the part of her that is a child. Tuck her in at night like she is a little girl but treat her as a semi-adult during the day especially when others are present. Try desperately hard not to embarrass her in public but know you will be somewhat of a failure at this. Late teens or young adults call a halt to the building of the core when it is almost finished but they don’t dismantle the wall. Instead they drop the façade for many years, virtually forgetting about the core and how it differs from the façade. I can’t tell you the number of women hovering around the age of 50 who have said things like ‘I only wear comfortable shoes now’, ‘I can’t be bothered’, ‘I don’t go to cocktail parties anymore. My time is too precious’, ‘my husband says I have changed. I used to be so agreeable, so easy to get along with. Now I say what’s on my mind’.
What a teen tells her friend and the adults in her life may be, and usually is, quite different from what her core is all about. As parents and teachers we want to inspect the façade when it serves to protect the girl as she continues her core building behind it. We also want to create environments in which girls feel safe enough for them to be stepping clear of the façade and showing this core self in action. When the core is out in the open it is easier to help at how she should grow. Every girl has to deal with the fact that boys her age are primed by nature and not by culture to assume girls are or want to be completely sexually active. Every girl has to deal with the realities of sexual culture and its consequences whether she likes it or not. Sex is without a doubt a key crucible event of adolescence. How it is handled shapes and molds a girl’s reputation, social needs, and style of handling relationships in life. You can make your point that you value abstinence during these teen years without closing the door on discussions of what life is like for her and how she feels and what her moral code is becoming. Investing your energy in creating a relationship with your daughter in which sexuality is a comfortable topic of conversation will ensure your continued participation in her thought processes and your influence will be much more powerful.
Whenever I have a chance to talk with a group of high school girls one of the questions I ask them, “What percentage of the girls in your school do you believe are virgins when they graduate”. Usually they guess around ten percent and what girls believe to be true influences their decision-making attitude and behavior. But for many teen girls it is the extension of the dating and their expectations of being with a boy for more than a few days. In some ways the pressure experienced in middle school to dress like and talk like and follows the group only now ratchets up several notches into the sexual world. Teen and screen media screamed to girls that having sex is fun, is expected and cool. Combine immature frontal lobes with hormones that affect body sensations, hormones and social pressure say yes but the frontal lobes are not strong enough to resist or wise enough to argue.
Just leave me alone, but don’t leave me alone tug‑of‑war happens so frequently with adolescent girls that it is a dizzying experience. In hindsight, and I think unpremeditated by my parents the core building part was the conversation at the dinner table. During and after dinner we shared our stories of the day. To this day it bothers me if someone jumps up after dinner to start doing the dishes or to pick up the phone. I still like to sit at the table after dinner and talk. One of the hardest challenges in parenting teens today is to have enough with them and enough conversation that occurs in the crises moment. A certain day or time is sacrosanct for the family like Sunday morning breakfast or the first two week of August for family vacations.
Ask, listen, discuss and decide together on as many issues as possible. Especially when you feel a knee jerk reaction coming on.
What do I love most about my mom? I just wanted to see her positive outlook on life. Her cup is always half-full if not full to the brim. She is usually able to find something positive in every situation. Reach for the stars and for the moon and remember that my heart will always be with you. In a very high percentage of cases the girls talked about their fathers’ sense of humor and how that helped them cope with life and also helped keep the father-daughter relationship healthy. When asked what they would change about their mothers a high percentage talked about such things as nagging less, worrying less, and mothers’ habit of focusing on every little mistake.
The hard part was keeping mothers’ from taking over the discussion by correcting the girls, interrupting them or getting heavily handed and trying to lead the discussion to the moral of the story they wanted to pound in. Some think that they cannot let their daughters express a thought without jumping. Once I heard that and became sensitized to it I realized how much I do it in everyday conversation in our home and I started trying harder to shut up and listen. Temperament is somewhat generic and is recognized almost from birth and is very resistant to change. The best way to analyze personality is on a typical day with the standard tasks - homework, cooking, shopping, discussing plans for the weekend or an upcoming event.
Some people are just born seeing the possibility when others see problems. Carol’s mother was a screamer and a harsh critic. Even when her temper was under control it was to hard watch their interaction. You could always when Carol’s mother was in the vicinity because Carol’s back would become very rigid. When she sat up straight she seemed to physically brace herself for her mother’s presence. How can I help you? My dad would fly home from business trips early just to be at my sporting event. I always look for him in the crowd until I saw his face I was not ready to play just knowing he was there made everything all right. Yes my Mom was there too but it was extra important to have my Dad there. I don’t really know why. Clinical observations and studies indicate that girls and women who have experienced highly critical fathers are very unlikely to have high self-esteem. It can take most of their lifetime for a woman to overcome the emotional scars and handicap to behavior achievement and life choices resulting from a domineering or critical father.
The thing I loved most about my father is he is always willing to help me. I like when he makes jokes. If there is something is bothering then he will me a hug and find a solution. My Dad is like one of my best friends; he watches TV with me, plays sports and helps me with my homework. If I could change one thing about my father I would change his temper. Sometimes he gets upset about things that are just not worth an argument. In general fathers do the active things with their children; playing, building things, and going to events. Generally mothers talked or read with their children. Girls and the women talk about how they did things with their fathers, how their father gave them the feeling that they could do anything. Schoolgirls frequently report that their fathers care about their grades, how well they do in sport. She talked about making a bookcase with her father in their garage when she was a preteen. Her father had matter-of-factly expected to be equal partner in building it and she had surprised herself by being just that. In both stories the fathers communicated inferentially not just high expectations that their daughter is competent and able to get the job done with an underlying high regard. Everything about the way they approached these girls assumed competence and communicated respect and the girls got the message. I will tell you why daughters drive father nuts because most men have never figured grown women out and here is this girl child and no matter how plain your policy was when she was little, suddenly one day she becomes one of them.
A father communicates a great deal in the way he responds the gender difference. He can use his daughter’s otherness as an excuse to distance himself from her; leave her to her mother; treat her as a why can’t a women be more like a makeover project or in another words criticize her way of knowing and being or he treat can her as an invitation to learn, be open about his ignorance and communicate a desire to understand and appreciate the female experience, most important her female experience. This connection is synergy investment. She is kind, interesting, fun to be around, and talented.
Hang in there even when a daughter says, “Oh, Dad!” with that tone, don’t let it push you away too far. Sometimes you have to blow ground but always come back and always keep talking and always keep doing things with her. For those fathers there is often a hard moment when they recognize their own patterns in their own complexity and see a daughter’s personality and temperament more objectively. Most girls can describe their own personality type and their father’s as well. I love how my father always says the wrong thing because he is my Dad and always makes me feel better. The fact that he is trying to help me lets me know how much he loves. He gives me advice on subjects that I know he could do nothing about and even if I don’t listen to what he says I know he is trying to help me. I talk with my daughter way more than I would think of doing with anyone else under ordinary circumstances because I know it is important to her; that’s her learning style.
Many fathers are still protective of their daughters. This can translate into controlling, critical, or driving behavior or daughters often perceive it to be that way. The older and more beautiful his daughter become more protective a father is because it is daughter becomes the more protective a father is because he knows what can happen as boys and girls enter puberty. He can force his daughter to react by taking dangerous risks and exercising poor judgment. A father’s seemingly minor critical or competitive comments which may have been meant as constructive and positive are often heard by daughters as more negative and deceptively critical. I see the deep hurting feeling of betrayal that girls have when fathers don’t show an interest in their lives or when they are unreliable.

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Hoover’s Vision

© 2001 by Gary Hoover

I found that copying the current leader is not the formula for success. Success is based not on thinking like today’s winner but on thinking differently, thinking in original and creative way. Vision must stand on four pillars: clarity, consistency, uniqueness and service. The result is what I call the essence of the enterprise. Essence must come from within.
What distinguishes the great entrepreneurs? It all starts with curiosity. They were the most curious people we had ever worked with. They ask questions about anything and everything, you simply could not stop the flow. In his book “Living To 100” Harvard researched with Thomas Perls reports on what he has learned from people. He stresses the importance of mental exercise of working the brain. “Wisdom begins in Wonder” said Socrates. We must recapture the ability and the willingness to be amazed. When was the last time some new creative knowledge took your breath away? After opening our minds to wonder the next thing we have to do is ponder. We need to think before we speak, before we act and most important before we conclude.
The more we think about our ideas the more we bounce them off people the stronger the ideas become even if we find that everyone disagrees with us. When you read something, pass it on to at least one person who would find it interesting. Speak out to the eccentrics around you. Find out what drives their passion. When you run into someone like this take them out for lunch. “What are the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World” is a great book. “How to think like Leonardo Da Vinci” by Michael Gelb and “Flatman” by A. E Abbot. Every evening ask yourself “what have I learned today?”
As we form our understanding that the subjects were part of the world we begin to see how things relate to one another. One way to do this is to think of how your industry whether education, religion or making pencils that would gain. In a new industry what are the chance of cards, what are the penalties, who are the players, how can they help you or hurt you, what are the defining moves, the moves that determine the outcome of the game, what is the full house in your industry, what is Boardwalk on your industry’s monopoly board? Even if you don’t think through the complete game at least diagram your business on a piece of paper. Old ideas come back again and again. One way to start connecting things is by understanding the chain that the thing you are studying is harder. Common chain to keep an eye out for include the time from past or future, age from old to young, passed from source to destination, price from low to high, hierarchies from chief to subordinate.

www.ideastation.com is a computer thesaurus.

www.inspiration.com is an idea processor.

Europe is not a continent. It is a peninsula on the continent of Asia.

The two things that booksellers really sell are information and entertainment. Aristotle Onassis said, “The secret of success is knowing something nobody else knows. The secret of success is seeing something nobody else sees”. Why did no one in the industry see what was coming? They never got out of the stores, they never looked to other types of retailing. All of us tend to think in a familiar channel. We all get interrupted. We never venture outside of our own industry. Doctors do not go to lawyer’s convention, hardware store owners don’t go to restaurant convention because the basic road to discovery is that nothing has ever been discovered by looking in the same place and in the same way as everyone else. You must look at the same things as everyone else, wear color glasses or stand on your head. Everyday when we get out of bed most of us are on the track, our old habits, our usual way of thinking, our comfortable routine.
Only by thinking about the unexpected, by looking for the undone thing we really jump the track and create a whole new vision. We initially only consider a tiny fraction of the possibilities available to us. At any given moment we should be doing any one of millions of different things. Open your minds to the possibilities. Go to a large newsstand and select $15.00 worth of magazines you have never heard of, take them home and scan them. Think about the people who read these magazines. Contact some living famous person in the area that interests you. Many are more accessible than you might think. When you go to the city there are places that sell the item. This exercise may take you to a neighborhood you have never even heard of.
It is difficult to exaggerate the power of serendipity. In the early 1950s George Mestral went for a walk in the Splits Wood and came home with bores in the socks. He invented Velcro. Percy Spencer was working on the microwave lab sat waiting on him in 1946 and the Hershey’s bar in his pocket melted. He invented the microwave oven. Listen to every kind of music, try every type of food, and go to a variety of movies, read books from every shelf in your local bookstore or library. Go to another industry’s invention. Play a game with yourself. I call it toss it up. Break out of your normal patterns of living and thinking.
Jack Watts of General Electric calls this phenomena pushing the peanut. If you have budgeted 6.9% of sales for customer service then you will probably going to consider going to 6.6% or 7.2% but you will never ever think about what would happen should business be slashed, service spending to 3% or raised it to 12%. Realistic graphs are so powerful we don’t even know we are in them. The best sources of financing are your customers and your suppliers. Perpendicular ways of thinking, finding strangeness in the familiar, your way of thinking, your friend’s way of thinking, and opposition way of thinking are parallel. Think perpendicular.
When Allen Newhart dreamed that America needed a national daily newspaper especially one in color, everyone laughed. Everyday entrepreneurs and other dreamers confront the impossible. If you look at the great enterprise builders, the people who have made a difference you find that breakthroughs are usually made by people with a broad view of the world. They make use of the tools of science, long sight tools of social studies and humanity. The more we see the things the way others see them, the more we can build a comprehensive view of what matters.
People that will make you think for the Nonzero The Logic of Human Destiny and The Modern Mind: An Intellectual History of the 20th Century, also the Collapse of Complex Societies. There will be dramatic expansion of four key industries because of the baby boom: aging - health, education, travel and financial services.
As recently as 1980 people of Hispanic origin was only 6% of the U.S. population, by 2000 12%, by 2025 18%. Asian-American has risen from 1.6% in 1980 to 4.2 in 2000. It is expected to cross 10% in the second half of the 21st century. Islam is the fastest growing religion in America with estimates of four to seven million adherents.

Another book Time for Life: The Surprising Ways American Use Their Time.” “The further backward you look, the further forward you can see” Winston Churchill. “History may be divided into three movements: “What moves rapidly, what moves slowly and what appears not to move at all” Fernand Braduel.
Thinking about the same through time, what’s different, what is the same, how do we get where we are today, can we get ancient ideas from the past? Think about a world in which the United States is no longer the world’s most powerful nation. Think about the world when its power is in increasingly centered in China. Avoid chronocentricity. In only ten years America crossed the magic 50% participation line in cars, electric lighting and indoor plumbing. Just one year later radio crossed the same line.
Hilton Grand Hotels, Ralph Fitz born in 1891 whose crowning achievement was opening the Hotel New Yorker, Manhattan’s largest hotel with 2,500 rooms, ten weeks after the stock market crash. How did Fitz do it? The May 1937 issue of Fortune talked about it. Fitz’s team tracked every regular customer. If they didn’t hear from that particular patron for few months they send a letter asking if anything was wrong. He would ask the little boy when his birthday was. A birthday card would follow. Hotel management knew the preferences of every regular guest. Teams of clerks kept track of all this information before computerized databases.
Whenever I meet the high school senior planning on college I am tempted to suggest that they would learn more if they went to college for two or three years then traveled the world for another year or two. This is one of the best investments a young person can make.
If you want to see people of all the races living together in harmony go see it in Singapore and Malaysia. Malaysia has roughly 60% Malaya, 30% Chinese and 10% India.
The single most critical ingredient of enterprise success is having a clear vision. The vision tells us why the enterprise exists. An enterprise without set purposes is like a ship without rudder. Next the vision should be informed. Hand in hand with being informed comes forward thinking. The vision is not intended to reflect whatever flaws your enterprise may have today. It should reflect what you expect and hope your enterprise will become. Your vision is by definition of statement of ambition. A forward-looking statement of purpose informs everyone of the direction the enterprise is moving. But the clear vision always lets everyone know what direction you want to be moving in. All priorities flow from a clear vision. Instead of vision that should be highly customized vision that could only come from your enterprise. Uniqueness and differentiation are crucial to a great vision. What adjectives and phrases would you use to describe that? Every enterprise has a personality. Inevitably the vision of an enterprise reflects its personality.
A vision inspires. A vision is an anchoring hard time from times to change. A vision is a potent, competitive tool. A vision builds community, clear, consistent, unique and serving. A third grade vision. Any third grader could understand it. While hidden values and a clear vision is there to confuse the enemy. People love complex stories and conspiracies. Simple stories seem less interesting and many people find it hard to accept that the truth can be still straightforward. Anything you can do to streamline your vision to simplify your story is a step in the right direction.
The part of an enterprise that does not change is the essence. Everything else, every aspect of the execution of the idea, every strategy and tactic every product and every price is subject to change, sometimes frequent change. Your customers change annually, monthly, weekly, daily even hourly. To serve them well your enterprise must also be able to change. At the same time fair consistent priorities the heart of vision must be in place if leaders and followers are to know what to change and what not to change. In real estate it is location, location, location, in business it is differentiate, differentiate, and differentiate. The reality is that most successful enterprises do one thing and do it extremely well.
When you are pursuing opportunities do not lose too much sleep if the single best part is already taken, take a really excellent alternate spot and pursue with all your heart. You should try to own a word in the customer’s mind. Each enterprise has a personality. The first question I ask the leaders of any enterprise is why does this enterprise exist? The only valid reason to the existence of any enterprise, for profit or non, is to provide products or services to people, to somehow make the world a better place. The only rule is that customers always get what they want and it is just a matter of who gives it to them and when. You will find workers to believe and it is a great privilege to have the opportunity to serve others. Service oriented people understand that serving is the priority. These people care. They get genuine satisfaction from helping others achieve their goals.
One solution is every week they invite applicants to a meeting at their offices and they put them all in a room with application forms. They then say our chief of recruiting is a little late please make yourself at home for a while. Then they watch the people who fill up their forms and then sit quietly awaiting the recruiter are not hired. The people who finish their forms then turn to the stranger next to them and start talking to them asking about them are taken to the next level of interview. Central market first looks for people who care then looks at résumé. Shared value defeats shared experience.
The most direct reach for prosperity is by asking our existing customers what else could I do for you, what else do you need, what do we right and how can we do it even better? Just most companies merely took their present customer base and focused on them, looked at how to serve them better, and attract more customers. Most companies would not have to look elsewhere for business. Customer acquisition cost has become one of the most closely watched statistics at any company. These new customers are the expensive ones. Once you have a customer and it is worth your while to do everything you can to keep them to make them even happier, how much you might spend during the rest of your life if they keep you happy. Whenever you get confused go to the store the customer has all the answers.
Microsoft person ask how we should fly? Is the hotel okay? What did you think of the alarm clock? Microsoft asks questions like this one because they want to know if you pay attention to details. Do these things matter to you? Are you willing to make sacrifices for the benefit of the customer? Value equals quality plus other factors divided by price.
First when you come up with a whole new idea there is no way someone else can visualize it like you can, not even your mom. Second customers do not always consciously know what they want. Streamlining, redefining and subdividing, any step towards simplicity is worth taking always these steps streamline your enterprise.

The truth is that many of the leading Internet companies of 2010 have yet to be founded.

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