Think You Very Much

Author: Karol

  • The Psychology of Influence, Saying Yes More, Hustle, How To Send Email Pitches, and Other Ramblings

    It’s no secret that we’re heavily influenced by what and who we surround ourselves with. Go to church? Your thoughts will be based on that church’s teachings and closed to others. Hang out with entrepreneurs? You’re likely an entrepreneur, or on that path. Travel a lot? Your friends probably do too.

    Here’s an interesting example from the October 2008 issue of Science:

    … we hypothesized that experiences of physical warmth (or coldness) would increase feelings of interpersonal warmth (or coldness), without the person’s awareness of this influence. In study 1, participants who briefly held a cup of hot (versus iced) coffee judged a target person as having a “warmer” personality (generous, caring); in study 2, participants holding a hot (versus cold) therapeutic pad were more likely to choose a gift for a friend instead of for themselves.

    We don’t even always realize how our surroundings are influencing us. (Which can be scary.)

    Over the past year or so I’ve been consciously influenced by something and someone in particular.

    See, I feel like I did parts of my life “wrong.” Meaning that, when I was younger I didn’t want to get a job or “work for someone else” so badly that I didn’t even take opportunities to learn closely with other smart people.

    I preferred to stay in my own little bubble and figure things out on my own.

    Which, I guess, is admirable. A lot of people I’ve spoken to have told me, “Karol, you’ve done so much!” From my perspective that’s not true.

    Sure, I’ve worked on a lot of great projects, made some money along the way, and generally been able to live the life I’ve wanted to live.

    But I’ve yet to build or work on anything I’m truly proud of. Something I would be happy to show my non-existent-never-gonna-have-them children. It’s sad to admit that.

    The way I see it is I’ve been floundering, living by the seat of my pants so to say, for my whole adult life.

    Maybe one could argue that’s the Hustle. Maybe.

    Or maybe it’s some kind of mental delusion. Maybe.

    Or maybe I’m too hard on myself. Maybe.

    Which brings me back to my point. How what we consume, what we experience, and those we surround ourselves with influences us.

    One of my favorite people-I-don’t-personally-know is Henry Rollins. I don’t agree with him on a lot of things, but if there’s one thing I’ve taken away from his life is that he doesn’t let up. He works hard and doesn’t apologize for it.

    When someone asks him to do a gig, he takes it. Hosting a radio show. Entertaining troops via USO. Talking shows. (His term for his spoken word tours.) Writing a newspaper column. Hosting a TV show. Acting. He’s everywhere.

    He has said as much: “I’m always kind of doing something — there’s never really any downtime,” he said. “And I’m not trying to impress you with my workload.” This was in the midst of a 150 show speaking tour.

    Sometime last year I wondered to myself, “Why don’t I do that? Why don’t I seek out gigs for things that interest me?”

    Which is exactly what I started to do. I began reading about how and why people got interesting gigs. (The Ask The Headhunter email newsletter is great for short tidbits of stuff like this.) I didn’t start accepting gigs yet, but I started looking for them while taking breaks from my own work.

    I also began proactively emailing people who were in my network (even just on the fringe of my network) who I wanted to learn from.

    It’s really simple to do that. Here’s part of an actual email I sent to someone I wanted to work with:

    I like what you’re doing. I like the way you think. And I want to help you.

    My pitch: I’d like to work with you – for free for 4 weeks – on the new direction
    you’re taking your business.

    What I bring to the table: [insert stuff]

    What you get out of it: [insert stuff]

    What I get out of it: [insert stuff]

    Most of this type of thing ended in nothing, but I still kept my eyes open for opportunities. I knew they wouldn’t fall into my lap overnight.

    Then last month Derek Sivers announced he was hiring a manager for his new company Wood Egg.

    I read the email on Saturday the 10th of June. An hour later (at 10:09pm) I sent him a short email with subject “I found your Wood Egg manager” with my proposal and a link to a private YouTube video I created. (Video was me talking for less than a minute, nothing fancy.) Monday morning he responded, “yes!”

    And so, I’ve been working with Derek and Wood Egg since that time. For the first few weeks it was ~60 hours/week. I literally lived and breathed Wood Egg. I even woke up early (for me) because there was so much to do. (We were hiring for 48 research positions and I did skype interviews with over 100 people.)

    Some people would probably balk at that. But some people are also stuck in lives and jobs they hate.

    On one hand you can look at it like the more work you take on the more you’re stuck. Which is maybe true. Maybe if you fill your life with work you’ll have no time for anything else. And maybe you’ll be exhausted, or burn yourself out. Maybe.

    But I think the more you fill your life with work the quicker you’ll recognize what you’re good at and what you want to do. You’ll gain new experiences that can lead to other new experiences. You’ll build a network of interesting people who influence you (hopefully in positive ways).

    When all is said and done then maybe, just maybe, you’ll have done something you can be proud of.

  • The Karol Gajda Weight Loss Method

    Here is how to lose weight. It’s very simple, it works 100% of the time, and it doesn’t involve a diet.

    1) Stop eating when you’re walking.

    2) Stop eating when you’re shopping.

    3) Stop eating at the movies.

    4) Stop eating in the car.

    5) Stop eating on the couch.

    6) Stop eating while watching TV.

    7) Stop watching TV.

    8) Stop eating while reading.

    9) Read more.

    10) Stop eating unless it’s breakfast, lunch, or dinner.

    (“Eating” also includes drinking anything other than water.)

    That’s it. End of fucking list. You’re goddamn welcome.

  • Learn The Boring

    Years ago I did a lot of pay per click affiliate sales using Google Adwords.

    For reference, the most I ever spent in one day on ads was nearly $10,000 (something like $9,800; Jan/Feb 2008 Adwords screenshot for just 2 campaigns during this time) and I always had a daily positive return on investment. If you weren’t profitable day-to-day then you weren’t doing it right.

    I wasn’t the best – most of the game was simply testing a lot of offers and related ad, keyword, and landing page combinations – but I was pretty good.

    Getting to that level (“pretty good”) was straightforward. It was all based on a few years I spent learning boring stuff. How to edit an image in Photoshop. How to create a landing page. How to make a website do this or that. How to do keyword research. How to do market research. How to write a good autoresponder e-mail sequence.

    In those days I got lots of e-mails from people asking how to do what I did.

    • “Can you teach me?”
    • “What do I do?”
    • “If you had to start from scratch, where would you start?”

    I was always happy to answer these e-mails, because the beginning was to learn the fundamentals, learn the boring, and I was well-versed in that. This was the stuff most people wouldn’t learn because they expected to jump right into huge ad spends and profits like it was some kind of magic.

    The way to learn the boring for this particular business was to go through Google’s own free Adwords training. It was long and thorough and it gave newbies a perfect framework to build off of if they were willing to take the time to learn.

    This was the great filter. (I love filters. This whole website is a filter.) I could legitimately help everybody who asked (“Learn this and e-mail me for Step 2 when you’re done.”) while simultaneously not waste my time helping people who didn’t want to help themselves. The magic bullet golden ticket types.

    This Adwords training – which could quite literally change a person’s whole economic future – could be completed in a focused weekend, with a little time left over for watching cartoons and slacking off on facebook.

    I recommended this training to dozens of people. I can’t even imagine how many because I didn’t keep track. I knew I’d never hear from most of them again.

    Do you want to guess how many people went through and learned the boring?

    It took me a good hard think to come up with just two people. Maybe there were more, but I remember two who e-mailed me. One of whom went on to generate $XXX,XXX/year using Adwords. (The other did well, but not quite in 6 figures.)

    If you want to excel at anything one of your first steps is to learn the boring.

    I’m all for the whole “do what you love find your passion travel the world sip margaritas” idea. But the truth is it’s never quite like how others sell it to you. Anybody who you respect is working their ass off. What you don’t see is what goes into it. You only see what they want to show you. You don’t see them working nights. Working weekends. Hustling. That’s the the stuff that makes them successful.

    It’s tempting to skip this stage. It’s even very easy. Especially if you have some disposable income to spend on Elance. For many people that’s not a great option. Which means your options are either getting nothing done or doing it yourself. And we both know getting nothing done is for losers.

    More than anything, learning the boring is about not being helpless. If there’s anything that proves you’re an adult it’s being self-reliant and learning the boring is about becoming self-reliant. There’s an unparalleled sense of pride that comes from cooking a nice dinner from scratch for the first time, or building a website, or even from writing your very first “Hello World!” script. These are all signs of self-reliance and all come from learning the boring.

    Interestingly, happily, when you begin learning the boring you might not find it boring at all.

  • No Negativity Challenge Lessons Learned

    Last month I did a “no negativity challenge.”

    The goal was to stay away from negative words and conversations or steer them towards something positive. In truth, it’s a near impossible task to completely guard ourselves against negativity. That might be why I felt like it would be an important challenge. I like to think I’m a realist as opposed to an out and out optimist and I really just wanted to see what would happen if I paid attention to the negativity from myself and those around me.

    So what did I learn last month?

    1. Many (most?) conversations devolve into something negative at some point.

    As a result I avoided a lot of conversations, especially via Skype and Twitter.

    I’d love to figure out why this is the case (maybe it’s me?), but almost every in person or online conversation I had took a negative turn at some point. Usually a complaint about the weather, a beverage, food, a person, the world. Nothing necessarily extraordinary, but complaints none-the-less. I was part of this sometimes as well, though I was often able to recognize it and change course thanks to the challenge.

    2. Sometimes I felt stifled.

    In some ways I felt stifled because I couldn’t mention something or express my thoughts fully. That said, I don’t know that it’s beneficial to state negative thoughts and feelings except in certain circumstances.

    There are a few ways to look at complaints and figure out if they’re beneficial.

    • Complaining about things you can’t change is useless. (Weather, for example.)
    • Complaining about things you won’t change is senseless. (Your job or relationships, for example.)
    • Maybe the only time complaining is actually positive is when you use it to fan the flames of change.

    In other words, if you’re using a negative thought or feeling to motivate you then more power to you. If you’re using it just to complain then stop.

    3. Living without news is not only beneficial, it’s necessary.

    I used to check CNN.com, Google News, and Reddit a few times a day prior to this challenge. I diligently used the Self Control App to block them for the first couple weeks of December. At that point I often forgot to open Self Control, but I wouldn’t visit the sites anyway due to the newly broken habit. It was outstanding.

    I still got news, of course. Everybody on Twitter and Facebook seemed to have an opinion about the school shooting in Newtown, Conn. and I heard all about that immediately. It didn’t get me down as much as it probably would have in the past because I was tuned out of the majority of the coverage.

    While I think it’s important to know what’s generally going on in the world it’s not necessary to know all the details. If you’re a journalist or a pundit then yes, it’s your job to know. But if you’re a regular person you’re doing yourself a disservice by exposing yourself to drama and negativity that doesn’t much concern you. Especially when you have no power to affect any change.

    You’re better off reading a book, listening to music, spending time with loved ones, or even doing absolutely nothing. If everybody took a 30 minute nap instead of watching 30 minutes of news coverage I have a strong feeling the world would be a decidedly better, happier, and at the very least more well-rested place.

    4. I had to stop reading the bible.

    I’ve been reading the bible (King James via a free iOS app) so I can be smarter about it. It’s been 20 years since my forced catechism classes and I didn’t remember all that much detail, but this experience has been telling. To find the positive parts of this book you have to cherry pick as they conveniently did for us in catechism and church. (Exodus 23:9 “thou shalt not oppress a stranger”; I can dig that.)

    “Properly read, the Bible is the most potent force for atheism ever conceived.” – Isaac Asimov

    Death (“And all flesh died that moved upon the earth …”), destruction (“And every living substance was destroyed …”), evil (too many quotes), misogyny (“and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee”), people who live to be hundreds of years old (Noah = 950 years old; not negative, just ridiculous). And that’s just in Genesis.

    Full review when I’m done, but this is a difficult and slow read. I hope to be finished by year’s end, reading front to back (Old and New Testaments; no cherry picking!).

    5. We live in outstanding times. If you focus on creating more good moments you’ll put yourself in a better position to realize this.

    In that way I think it’s better to do a “positivity challenge” instead of a “no negativity challenge.” During a positivity challenge you’re focused on doing good things and thinking good thoughts. It feels better to think “how can I make this a positive experience?” instead of “how can I make sure this isn’t a negative experience?” It’s subtle, but if I were to do this over I’d do a positivity challenge instead.

    What about you?

    If you joined in on last month’s challenge I’d like to know how it went for you. What did you learn? What was a struggle? What was easy?

    ###

    I posted a new challenge for this month right here.

  • Fiction Friction

    When I was a youngster of 5, 6, 7 years my Mom would often take me to the public library where I would proceed to check out a dozen books – or as many as my toothpick-like noodle arms could carry – with titles like Danny and the Dinosaur and Sammy The Seal.

    I revelled in living in the fantasy worlds of the written word. I’ve told this story before, but when I was very young I used to think China was on a different planet. I don’t know if I truly believed that or simply made myself believe it, but I dreamt of suiting up in astro-gear and shuttling to the far reaches of that land of a billion people and, of course, the The Five Chinese Brothers. One of my favorites, this was a book I actually owned instead of simply borrowed for 14 days from that wonderfully free governmental institution housing the Dewey Decimal System.

    Whenever it was time for a Scholastic book club order at my school it was all I could do to wait for the material to arrive.

    As I grew older, however, something happened and I’ll never be able to pinpoint the reason why.

    I lost my love for fiction. I developed what one might call fiction friction.

    I still read a lot, but it was – besides those times when an English teacher would assign a book nobody was particularly excited to engage in – mostly non-fiction. How-tos, autobiographies, business, self-help, personal development, you get the idea.

    Over the years I still tested the fiction waters. I wanted to see what others saw. “What joy do you get from reading about fantasy worlds?! I just don’t understand. Help. Help me understand.”

    All those classics I was supposed to love and appreciate resulted in nothing but boredom or even, it pains me to say, hatred. Hatred towards people for believing what I thought was old school drivel was any good. Hatred towards authors for writing these – things – teachers forced us to read. Hatred towards teachers for being cowards and assigning the same literature every other teacher assigned.

    Sometimes – rarely – some piece of fiction stuck. Most of it contemporary. A Clockwork Orange. Wow! The Alchemist. Good. American Psycho. Yes. But those books I was supposed to fall in love with? The On The Roads and The Great Gatsbys? I couldn’t even finish them. By this time I had lumped all fiction together. “I don’t really read fiction” was my mantra and I mostly stuck to it.

    I still yearned for that understanding of fantasy worlds. What do the Twi-hards see that I don’t? Harry Potter? Why not just watch the 15 hours of movies and do something productive with the 100 hours saved reading? What did young Karol feel that older Karol no longer felt? I needed to know.

    As a result I began a quest to find and read more fiction. No more giving up on a book too soon. Learn to appreciate the written word, the written worlds. Creativity.

    In 2012 the fiction floodgates opened once again.

    I’ve read more fiction this year than probably my previous 10 years of life combined, but there’s an important distinction to be made. I still can’t get lost in most fantasy worlds. The fiction books I’ve been growing to love read like real life. To the point that I’ve found myself googling “facts” and people to see if they were real.

    An unexpected result of falling in love with fiction again is I’ve been learning to stop myself when having any kind of gut reaction to something. “Stop and think, Karol.” The general premise of Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink was that – and forgive me for making it so basic – our initial reactions, what Gladwell calls “thin-slicing,” are often close to spot on. Supposedly if you trust those feelings it will serve you well. I don’t believe that’s true.

    Sometimes what seems like a gut reaction is less instinct and more learned. “Ehh, I don’t read fiction,” when somebody recommends a novel, for example. This is definitely true the older we get and the more set in our ways we become. Old dogs new tricks and all that.

    Just because you believed something in the past doesn’t mean you have to keep believing in it. It’s OK to be wrong and it’s perfectly acceptable to change your mind.

    More than anything remember that everything learned can be unlearned.

    ###

    This essay wasn’t about books. It’s about a different kind of fiction. Read my comments in the comments.

  • Launching 3 iPhone Apps In One Day

    I’d be lying if I didn’t say that today’s a pretty exciting day for me.

    The last time I released an iPhone app was over 2 years ago. I liked the app even though it was done with no design and only broke even. Some people found it really useful and that was good enough for me at the time.

    Today I’m launching 3 apps all at once and I’m not messing around like I was 2 years ago.

    I’m not stopping here. I’ve already got another app in development (for a hopefully mid-January release) and I’m hitting the mobile app market hard since I quit or sold my other businesses.

    I mentioned via e-mail last week (sign up at top of this page) that I’d be releasing these apps and also creating a free or cheap class on how to brainstorm, research, and create beautfiul iPhone apps like I’ve done. I didn’t do any design or development on these apps so don’t worry if you’re not a designer or developer.

    I’m going to make it simple to get that class. Read on to find out how …

    The Apps

    All these apps work on iPod Touch and iPhone. I personally own an iPod Touch. (They’re also compatible with, but not optimized for, iPads.)

    Random Gratitude Journal

    I’ve been practicing daily gratitude since 2011 after I stayed a couple nights at the Forest Hostel in Georgia. I’ve written about it a few times elsewhere on this site as well as on my old blog.

    Random Gratitude Journal is a gratitude journal with a twist that makes it more fun for me to keep up this healthy practice.

    My issue with my normal gratitude journal was that it would e-mail me at the same time every day and then I’d respond to the e-mail with my gratitude. Gratitude Journal sends prompts (via a push notification) at random times throughout the day. You can set the time frame so it doesn’t bother you at inopportune times. Or you can turn off the alerts and use it as a normal gratitude journal. Open the calendar, tap on a date, write. Easy.

    Buy Random Gratitude Journal here.

    Extreme Pushup Bootcamp

    This was the first app I started getting developed.

    Pushup/fitness apps abound in the app store, but none of them got me to do my pushups. This is a very simple app that plays off a similar concept as Random Gratitude Journal. You set a time frame and Extreme Pushup Bootcamp will send you a push notification at a random time prompting you to “Drop and Give Me 20!”

    You can accept, decline, or have the app remind you in 10 minutes. Pushup Bootcamp will keep track of your streaks. How many days in a row you accepted or declined the challenge.

    So far my longest Accept streak is 11. Which, I’ll admit, isn’t very good. But sometimes you don’t want to be Extreme and do pushups in the middle of the grocery aisle.

    (I’m starting from scratch today since I’ll be deleting my developer version and buying the official app from the app store.)

    This is the only one of my apps that has its own website right now: http://www.pushupbootcamp.com

    Buy Extreme Pushup Bootcamp here.

    Insane Pushup Challenge

    What?! Another pushup app?

    Yes, this one is for the more advanced pushup people. (Though you can use it in conjunction with Extreme Pushup Bootcamp as I do.)

    The goal here is to enter the insane asylum and do 36,500 pushups in 365 days (or less). It has been my goal to do that for about 10 years and I’ve never kept it up. It’s an … well … insane challenge.

    Once you hit 36,500 pushups you’ll be presented with a surprise. Take a screen shot and e-mail me. ;)

    Buy Insane Pushup Challenge here.

    How To Get My “Absolutely No Design or Development Experience Necessary” iPhone App Class

    Sorry, you’re too late. This class is no longer available … for now.

    Thanks for your support with this new venture.

  • Selling Out (Part 1)

    Originally published October 4, 2012

    Unless you’re a close friend you wouldn’t know this, but I haven’t owned my old site RidiculouslyExtraordinary since August. It still looks like it’s mine, but it’s not.

    Part of the agreement I made with Dwayne at Ezoic.com was that if he were to buy the site he needs to change the header and remove my name from the site. In addition, I was to be allowed one last post on the site to explain that it is under new ownership. Unfortunately, that part of the agreement hasn’t been put into action.

    Why did I sell?

    RidiculouslyExtraordinary is the past. After I stopped writing there it became worthless to me. Sure there was a bit of sentimentality there, but I don’t like that feeling. It’s not empowering. Detachment is one of the greatest skills I have developed over the years. Things – which includes the bits and bytes of a website – just don’t matter.

    In 2005, as I was quitting a particular business, I was offered 6 figures to sell. Instead of doing that I simply deleted the websites and the accompanying e-mail lists, which was ~50,000 people (~3,000 were paying customers). When I think back on this today I think, “That was young and dumb.” Not because I think it was the wrong decision, but because I didn’t even consider the offer. If I had thought it through I might have very well come to the same “no sale” decision, but I regret not taking some time to consider my options.

    So when Dwayne e-mailed me out of the blue in July with an offer to buy RidEx I considered it. I ultimately decided I didn’t like the offer and said no thanks and I didn’t feel like negotiating. But a few weeks later I had a change of heart. “What the hell?” I thought. “Why not just get rid of it? It doesn’t mean anything to you.”

    In addition, even though Dwayne’s original offer was much less than I thought I could sell the site for if I put in some legwork, it was still enough to live on for about 6 months. When I thought about it from that point of view – prompted by a conversation with Max – my decision was instant. I thought it would be crazy to pass up on a half year’s worth of living expenses for something I felt no attachment to.

    I sent Dwayne an e-mail with a counter-offer 50% over the original offer. In short time we came to an agreement.

    How much did I sell for?

    Not a lot, but not a little. It’s on the lower end of $XX,XXX. I’ve mentioned elsewhere how much my lifestyle costs so I’ll let you reverse engineer based on the data I’ve presented. I think I got an – excuse me for this – extraordinarily good deal. Prior to selling I installed Adsense on the site (the simplest ad monetization method available) to get a general idea what the site was worth from an ad-revenue perspective. Although RidEx still gets over 30,000 unique visitors/month the daily Adsense revenue was single digits.

    In addition, all the content on the site is “uncopyrighted.” Meaning it was always available to you or anybody else to do with as they pleased. Essentially I was selling the domain, the backlinks, and the search engine rankings – which are almost guaranteed to fluctuate.

    What was the process?

    We signed a simple agreement via an online service. (OurDeal.com – which my friend Kyle owns – is an example of this type of service.)

    Then we started the cash and site transfer with the help of Escrow.com.

    The site transfer was pretty easy. I backed up and zipped the database (via PHPMyAdmin), downloaded and zipped all the site files (using Filezilla), and uploaded everything to Dwayne’s server. I also pushed the domain from my NameCheap account to his. (Shoutout to Norcross and Will for database backup tips, as I hadn’t played in PHPMyAdmin for a few years.)

    A week later the cash was transferred via Escrow to my account.

    All told – including all e-mail communication/negotiation – it took less than 2 hours.

    How do I feel now?

    I feel the same as I did before. I hadn’t felt like I owned RidEx for a long time and it’s not like I sold for anything nearing a life-changing sum.

    Though after I sold I went on a spontaneous trip to Gdańsk and Paris. I think it was the first time I’ve ever said, “Hey, you want to go to X tomorrow?” and then booked it. If you’re a history buff you might know WWII began in Gdańsk, specifically Westerplatte. We happened to be there on September 1, the anniversary of the first invasion. If you ever visit Gdańsk I would steer you to nearby (20 minutes by train) Sopot as well. In Paris we stayed in this loft, which I would recommend if you’re ever visiting. (Also, buy 10 pack tickets for the Metro instead of over-priced day passes.)

    Part 1? What’s Selling Out Part 2?

    I’ll talk about Part 2 soon enough and it will likely surprise a lot of folks.

    This is all part of the Clean Slate Theory, which I’ve mentioned before, but I’ve never written about at length. You can probably get the general idea. I’ll write about it … eventually.

    ###

    Related: I’m selling RollerCoasterTour.com. Just the domain or the site/contents as well. karol at gajda dot com if you’re interested.

  • Always Leaving

    As this post goes live I’m leaving on a jet plane from Frankfurt, Germany to my birthplace and all-around fantastic city Wrocław, Poland.

    “I leave, and the leaving is so exhilarating I know I can never go back. But then what? Do I just keep leaving places, and leaving them, and leaving them, tramping a perpetual journey?” – John Green

    Are you me John Green? I don’t remember changing my name.

    For the past 3 years my life has mostly revolved around leaving someone, some place, somewhere, at some time. You might argue I’m running from something.

    I’m comfortable with leaving. It’s the way life works in my head. That means not getting too comfortable with staying.

    I was chatting with Nicky about this in Mexico a few months ago. There’s an art to leaving.

    • If you stay in a place for just a couple days or a week you don’t have enough time to set strong enough roots for leaving to matter. Leaving almost isn’t an issue, except for logistics.
    • If you stay somewhere for 1-3 months relationships may form and leaving is a bit more difficult. If you don’t leave now, you may never leave. That’s not an option, until it is. Usually the only real option is to tear the bandage from the wound before it has a chance to stick and leave an unnecessarily painful mess.
    • If you stay for 6 months or more you’ve dug a hole that’s very difficult to climb out of. Routine has been established. Roots have firmly taken hold. If you’ve ever tried to uproot a tree you know how difficult it is, and the roots of routine are no different.

    I’m always leaving.

    It’s not that I don’t want to see you again. It’s not that I don’t enjoy your company. It’s not that you’re not good enough. It’s really as simple as I’m always leaving.

    Maybe it’s a defense mechanism. A defense mechanism, however, is something we use to protect ourselves from getting hurt.

    I want to hurt. I want to feel pain. I’m not running away. I’m running towards that possibility.

    I’m always leaving.

    ###

    I didn’t think I was finished with that yet (I’mma let you finish!), but a funny thing happened as I was writing.

    It hit me that long term travel isn’t what I want anymore. I was trying to convince myself otherwise with the words above.

    When people used to ask, “how long do you plan on traveling?” I’d respond with, “for as long as I can see into the future.” It was true at the time. It’s not anymore.

    I periodically ask myself the question, “Am I having fun?” If the answer is “no” I ask myself, “is it temporary?” The answer to that had never been “no” before.

    But as I write this, the answer to both questions is generally “no.” In other words, it’s time to pivot.

    If I think about it I could’ve seen this coming. Maybe I didn’t want to believe it before.

    There is no particular geographical location that’s pulling me right now. No bucket list* of places or things I must see or do before I die.

    *Bucket lists are for bragging rights and boosting the egos of the insecure. “Hey! Look at me! This is what I’ve done! Please, please, please care about it!” I don’t care for that. (As I hypocritically make one of these.)

    My most recent international plans (Panama City, Panama and Costa Rica) were plan-less. And, maybe consequently, my least favorite places I’ve visited. (I particularly think Costa Rica’s tourism board does a fantastic job of selling something that’s not there.)

    I knew nothing about either country and I didn’t choose visiting them for any particular reason. I knew I’d be working most of the time and I figured any place would be fine for that. I was wrong.

    This is in contrast to most of my past travels.

    • Going to Australia/New Zealand for 100 days was my first experiment in long term solo travel. Everything was a new experience.
    • The 16,000 mile road trip around the US had a point. Go on every roller coaster. (Actually, if I’m being honest, the point was to do something press-worthy, which it semi-was until I blacked out and cut it short.)
    • Visiting India was based on an experience. Learn how to build a guitar by hand.
    • Living in Chiang Mai, Thailand for a month was on purpose. It was named one of the most vegetarian friendly cities in the world and I wanted to experience what that would be like.
    • Moving to Poland for 5 months in 2010 was so I could re-learn the language and experience my birthplace in a way I hadn’t before.

    For a short term stay nearly anywhere can be fine. A weekend here. A week there. But for a longer term stay (e.g. a month or more) I feel like it has to be coupled with something else.

    I think what this boils down to is I’m tired. I know I’m exceptionally privileged to have this freedom of choice and I fully understand these are “First World Problems.” I’m OK with that.

    I’m tired of moving every day, week, or few months. I’m tired of wasting energy thinking about the next location instead of what I can do for my life and my business. Travel planning is not enjoyable. The rewards (the actual travel) used to make up for that. They don’t anymore.

    I’m also tired of seemingly little things. I’m tired of not having a chef’s knife that actually does its intended job. I miss riding a bike every day. I miss making breakfast smoothies.

    I’m tired of not having a guitar and not being able to make music. I built a guitar in India and traveled with it for a while, but being that it was my first guitar build it wasn’t exactly a piece of artisanal craftsmanship. In other words, it was difficult to play and didn’t sound good as time went on (and the neck started warping due to temperature changes). It fell off the luggage rack on the night train (bottoms up) from Bangkok to Chiang Mai and the truss rod broke, which means I can’t fix the warping from all those temperature changes. (Damn!)

    I’m tired of dealing with the stresses of establishing new friendships. I’m as far from an extrovert as may be possible, and I don’t mind having few friends. But I do mind having to recreate those few friends everywhere I go. I enjoy mostly going solo, but I also like to hang out with people I connect with.

    Note re: going out and pickup. It’s still very enjoyable although I did take a ~5 day break recently.

    What I love about traveling is it has helped me recognize again and again what makes me happy. It’s not very much and I don’t plan on buying a whole bunch of garbage I don’t need.

    I’ll likely still live out of a figurative, if not literal, backpack. I will never again understand $5 DVD bins or getting a new car because “it’s time,” or owning 7 pairs of shoes. I won’t be buying a TV or subscribing to mind-numbing cable programming. I’ll be perpetually lost when people talk about funny commercials. (Although that’s what YouTube is for!)

    Traveling has forced me into trying things I wouldn’t normally try and doing things I normally wouldn’t do. I don’t have any relevant examples I want to share.

    Traveling has taught me to be more patient. Standing in line for hours (and hours and hours … and hours) to buy a SIM card in India, or waiting for a Blue Line train at 3am in Chicago when it’s below freezing (without a winter coat), or waiting to be served food in countries where there is no tipping culture so there is no incentive to be efficient. Travel is patience. You either learn to be patient or you hate your life. Learning to be patient is a lot more enjoyable. You big city folks might know this already, but I ain’t no city slicker.

    Traveling has made me appreciate walking. Too many of us are in too much of a hurry for no reason. For about 6 months now my main mode of transportation has been my feet and it has been glorious. My rule is, “if it’s 3 miles or less I walk.”

    Which brings us to moving to a more permanent residence. What does that look like?

    The biggest issue with moving permanently is that when I first started traveling one of my ancillary goals was to find a city I liked more than Austin, TX. I never really found that city. Wrocław, Poland comes very close. In actuality, I like it more than Austin, but it’s cold for ~8 months and that’s too much. I can handle a month of misery (hell, I could just leave for the month), but more? Nope.

    I also love NYC, but I’m not going to deal with their Winters either.

    I’d like to live in San Francisco because of all the great things going on there, but again, weather is a deal breaker. (You people who think SF is warm are insane.)

    I think, of all things, weather is my only real deal breaker. I can deal with a lot of things, but I can’t deal with being cold. I don’t like wearing socks or shirts or pants or underwear or coats or hats. Cold is misery.

    Which brings us to the obvious: Why not move to Austin? I can’t see the future, but that’s likely what I’ll do if I leave Poland. For now, I’m going to enjoy Wrocław.

    If you happen to live in Poland (I know there’s quite a few of you, I check my stats!) get in touch. I’ll be visiting a few cities this Summer.

    ###

    This was written some time in February and edited to reflect the present. The “underwear” thing was a joke meant to illicit a double-take. Hope it worked!

    ###

    Update (June ’12): I’ve really been enjoying Wrocław and may just stay in Poland for a longer while. Wrote about that here.

    Update 2: Staying in Poland for the foreseeable future.

    Update 3 (Feb 6, 2017): I got married in Poland! And now we live in the US. :)

  • Advice

    We love to give advice. I love giving advice. You love giving advice. We’re an opinionated people. It’s what we do.

    • “You shouldn’t date him, he’s wrong for you.”
    • “Don’t do that, you’ll end up failing.”
    • “Ehh, that’s not what I would do.”
    • “Well here’s how I would do it, but you do what you want.”

    But how often do we take our own advice?

    • How many wantrepreneurs who teach entrepreneurship have never made money being entrepreneurs?
    • How many life coaches who sell their life coaching services don’t have their own lives together?
    • How many web designers have poorly designed web sites?
    • This list is endless.

    “I don’t know.”

    I don’t feel comfortable giving people advice I don’t follow myself. It’s OK to say, “I don’t know,” if somebody asks for your advice or an opinion.

    It’s also OK to say, “Listen, if you really want my advice I’ll give it to you, but I’m not in a position to give you advice on this topic.”

    What’s not OK is giving people advice via a blog, info-product, website, podcast, e-mail, telephone, or face-to-face and not following that advice ourselves. That is toxic, irresponsible, possibly dangerous, and weak. We see it regularly anyway.

    If I had enough vitriol I’d link to the dozens of articles I see on a weekly basis that are founded in bullshit, but I’m currently vitriol-less.

    If you’re not an expert, don’t claim that you are. It’s OK to show your flaws. It’s OK to not be an expert. You don’t need to fake it til you make it.

    “Fake it til you make it” is the rallying cry of those far too interested in selling you something subpar instead of doing something that matters.

    You’re better than that.

    That’s my advice.

  • Dear great idea, meet marginal execution

    In January 1991 Jeffrey Katzenberg, then head of Disney film studios, sent a memo to his executives which included the following:

    If a movie begins with a great, original idea, chances are good it will be successful, even if it is executed only marginally well. However, if a film begins with a flawed idea, it will most certainly fail, even if it is made with “A” talent and marketed to the hilt.

    What a kick-in-the-pants reaffirmation reading that was.

    This is the issue when an “entrepreneur” says they need more money or better opportunities or good luck.

    Nope. Stop the presses. Wrong.

    Throwing money at a problem will rarely solve that problem. Opportunities are everywhere. And luck is created by doing the work.

    A bad idea executed phenomenally well is still going to be a bad idea. On the positive side of this: if you execute a poor idea well you’ll know pretty quickly it’s a bad idea and then you can move on.

    A great idea with average execution, on the other hand, has a better than average chance at success.

    The Problem: What’s A Good Idea and What’s A Bad Idea?

    While I identify with his statement I don’t fully agree with Mr. Katzenberg. What he’s missing is that we are horrible judges of good ideas vs bad ideas.

    • How many times was Colonel Sanders’s chicken recipe rejected? Supposedly ~1,000.
    • How many publishers rejected Tim Ferriss’s idea for Four Hour Work Week? 20+.
    • How many publishers, agents, magazines, and newspapers rejected Tucker Max’s idea for the eventual NYT Bestseller I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell? Supposedly over 500.

    Depending on who you ask, these were all great ideas. And, depending on who you ask, they were all bad ideas. These three were off the top of my head, but if you spent an hour on Google I’m sure you could find dozens more similar examples.

    What To Do?

    This is a dilemma. If we don’t know if an idea is great, good, bad, or atrocious, what do we do with our ideas?

    Surely we all have some good ideas in the recesses of our brains. How do we discover them?

    My suggestion, with a hat tip to Jeffrey Katzenberg: learn to execute, even if just marginally well.

    So many things I’ve read lately have converged on the notion that when you have an idea you think is good you need to test and learn from it as soon as possible. It’s where my new motto, Create. Learn. Improve. Repeat., came from. It’s really a pep talk slash reminder to myself more than anything.

    Here it is in a little more detail:

    Create: Launch something already. Don’t rush it out the door, but don’t make excuses. Time is not on your side.

    Learn: What happened when you launched that thing? What worked? What didn’t? Why? Why? Why? Why? Why?

    Improve: If the idea worked with some modicum of success, what can you do to improve it? What can you do differently? What can you do better? If it failed, go to the next step.

    Repeat: Start this process over, either with a new idea or with a new facet of the same idea. Alternate: keep repeating what worked. If you know how to make $100, you know how to make $10,000. It’s a question of scale.

    Ideas are both fleeting and common. Keep generating ideas, good and bad. Write them down. Throw them away. Post them online. Keep your idea muscle strong by getting your ideas out of your head in some way, shape, or form.

    Most importantly, when you think you have a good idea, execute.

    Execute no matter how much sleep you lose.

    Execute no matter how much it hurts.

    Execute no matter how unsure you are.

    Execute even if you don’t know what you don’t know.

    Execute no matter what people tell you. Believe in yourself first, listen to misguided advice never.

    Execute because, even though it’s not easy, you have no other choice.

    Execute until you have a clear success or failure. Right now, that’s what matters.