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24 Jun 08 – Johnny Bunko and His Career
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Just finished—literally, just—a career management book called The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: The Last Career Guide You'll Ever Need. It's pretty short, it's got good advice, and it's got great art. It needs to be : it's a manga.
This sort of thing is commonplace in Japan, where you'll find how-to manga on just about any topic, from medical advice to sex. So it's neat to see one on this side of the Pacific, written by a well-respected career guide (he also wrote Free Agent Nation and A Whole New Mind) and drawn by a top-notch American manga artist.
The advice is, as usual, simple but true. With career advice, it's all about the presentation. We all know the importance of much of this, but we need to be struck by it afresh. Which he does.
For what it's worth, the book offers this advice:
- There is no plan.
- Think strengths, not weaknesses.
- It's not about you.
- Persistence trumps talent.
- Make excellent mistakes.
- Leave an imprint.
I argue that "talent" probably doesn't exist, but the point remains. Again, this is all sensible stuff, but it's how it's presented that really makes it work.
The story follows Johnny Bunko, a recent college grad struggling to figure out why he's not satisfied at work. He breaks open a pair of chopsticks, to be visited by a spirit who gives him career advice. Sure, it's corny—and it's played that way—but it works.
Strongly recommended; I'm thinking of giving copies to everyone I know who's nearing college graduation.
There's also a great little animation at the Amazon.com site.
23 Jun 08 – Incentives and Work
I've been thinking a lot lately. About a great many things.
I'm tremendously fortunate in being able to pursue a freelance career. While I don't have a lot of cash to throw at this venture, I'll be fine for at least a few more months. Far more than most can manage.
But I haven't been nearly as productive as I feel I should be. "Should" is always a loaded word, but in this case I think it's apt: I haven't worked for more than three hours on money-making work in any given day.
Granted, I spent the first two months or so in "detox," as I call it, relaxing after many years of work. I couldn't bring myself to do anything besides read, cook, play around on the computer, and putter around the house. I enjoyed my freedom the same way a tired executive enjoys a vacation: flat on his or her back on the beach.
This isn't that. This is having the mental space and flexibility, and the time, and sitting down to work, and finding yourself refreshing FriendFeed. Why do I do this?
I even wrote a long, plaintive email to Hugh Macleod, asking him how he orients himself to get his work done.
I think this phenomenon is important, and worth examining. People say they don't pursue their dreams because they don't have the time, but time's not the limit. Neither is relaxation.
Focus appears to be the limit. How can I increase focus?
One solution I'm trying now is to rewrite how I see work. I've always enjoyed writing (as far as writing can be enjoyed; I can be frustrated by it, too), but when I imagine writing as a job, it seems dreary. Partly because I see work as dreary, or at least something that one must put up with. So, when I prepare to write (or whatever), I imagine myself having fun at it. Which I usually do. But I need to remind myself that it will be.
It's working so far, though I'm only a day into it. But how strange our minds are. We think they're logical and sensible, and then we scream at the sight of a bug.
9 Jun 08 – Four Tips for Reading Many Input Streams and Maintaining your Sanity
I keep up with a lot of different streams of input: emails, blogs, comics, Twitter, FriendFeed, Facebook, and IM. I have much to learn, but here's what I have learned:
- Skim. Don't worry about catching every bit of every email. Start by skimming, then pay closer attention if the content rewards it.
- Keep up. If you sign up for an email list, read it frequently. I read all my emails and blogs every day. Combined with skimming, it doesn't take very long.
- Reply immediately. Try to immediately reply to any email that needs a reply. Some may have to wait until you gather more information, of course, but can't you reply to most right away? And the more emails sitting in your inbox waiting for a reply, the more frustration and depression you'll feel when you look at them.
- Keep your inboxes clean. Move all emails you've read to a separate folder, or delete them. Process all your Facebook notifications (choose something to do with them). Close your IM windows when the conversation ends. Get it away from you, so you can concentrate on something else.
So, read everything at a high level to begin with, often, reply quickly, then get rid of it. Don't let it clutter up your mind.
7 Jun 08 – Charging up Napoleon Hill
I've heard positive things about Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich, so I grabbed the free sample for my Kindle, and have been reading it over the past few days.
It's the Law of Attraction, but presented in the way that I've found true: that which you focus on, and consistently strive for, will come to life faster and easier than you expect.
While this works with just about any goal, Hill starts with money, and presents a six-step system:
- Write down exactly how much money you want. Work out how much you really want.
- Write down a specific date when you want to have this money.
- Write down what you're willing to give up to get this. You can't get something for nothing. This payment can be in time, resources, short-term money, etc.
- Write down a plan for how you're going to get that money by that date. Nothing complex. And start executing this plan.
- Rewrite the above into a brief English description, such as "By November 30th, I'm going to have $5,000 in the bank, by publishing thirty programming articles."
- Repeat this description aloud twice a day, once when you get up and once as you go to bed. Fix this in your mind. Make it a constant thought in the back of your head.
So, I'm trying it. My goal is: By November 30th, I'll be making $3,000 per month by tutoring, and writing code, short stories, and articles.
I spent the last hour reviewing short stories for submission to various magazines. Odd; I've only performed half a dozen short story submissions in the past few years, despite knowing that when you get a rejection from one magazine, you should immediately send the story to another magazine. I now wonder why I haven't been doing that.
Now to see if this works long-term. And how much money I'll be making on November 30th.
5 Jun 08 – Wisdom of the Chinese
This is from a book I stumbled on a few weeks ago at a used book store in town:
The disciple Kung-too said: "All are equally men, but some are great men, and some are little men; how is this?" Mencius replied: "Those who follow that part of themselves which is great are great men; those who follow that part which is little are little men."
Kung-too pursued, "All are equally men, but some follow that part of themselves which is great, and some follow that part which is little; how is this?" Mencius answered: "The senses of hearing and seeing do not think, and are obscured by external things. When one thing comes into contact with another, as a matter of course it leads (the sense) away. To the mind belongs the office of thinking. By thinking, it gets the right view of things; by neglecting to think, it fails to do this.
"These, the senses and the mind, are what Heaven has given to us.
"Let a man first stand fast in the supremacy of the nobler part of his constitution, and the inferior part will not be able to take it from him. It is simply this which makes the great man."
4 Jun 08 – Tenacity and Tech
So, a few years ago there was this TV channel called Tech TV. And the most popular show on that channel was The Screen Savers, a call-in tech variety show in which two guys and a crew of geeks covered all sorts of technology news and trends and such.
Then, Tech TV died.
So what did they do? They dusted themselves off and looked for jobs in new media.
One of them started Digg. One of them created DL.tv.
But I want to talk about Leo Laporte, who has since started The TWiT Netcast Network. He began producing free podcasts, then looked for advertisers. He only takes on advertisers who he personally supports, and he provides a live advertisement for their services or products directly in the podcasts themselves (instead of inserting an annoying, pre-generated ad).
Then he signed up with Stickam, set up a few cameras, and began streaming live video of his shows as he records and assembles them. It required a significant amount of money, but way less than a typical studio.
His podcasts now have tens of thousands of listeners, and thousands watch his live streams. Today, he's announced that he's breaking even, and his list of advertisers grows.
He's living the dream. Not through massive financial resources or brilliant marketing or incredibly hard work. Because he dreamed of something, and tenaciously worked towards it.
3 Jun 08 – RescueTime - Not For Me
I've been testing out RescueTime, a service that tracks and plots your computer usage. The idea is that it'll give you an idea of what's wasting your time.
You install a small app and let it run. Every few minutes, it uploads usage stats to www.rescuetime.com, which you can access at any time to check out your usage. It'll also email you a summary every week.
I used it for a few weeks, and to my surprise I learned nothing new. I know what I spend most of my time using (Safari and the terminal, mostly). I know what wastes my time (YouTube and Fark, mostly, which I've now blocked).
It was a worthwhile experiment, though, and you might want to give it a try if you're curious about how you spend your time. It certainly functioned well.
2 Jun 08 – Busy
| Henry David Thoreau writes: | It is not enough to be busy....The question is: What are we busy about? |