I started my life as an entrepreneur/web worker back in 1995. Back then, I was probably on the cutting edge of online development skills. I created some small to mid-size online, database driven applications for myself and others. Back then it was all pretty cool, and I was “the guy” that everybody knew if you needed a website built. Not only was it fun, but I was learning a ton and growing my skill set … every day.

The last five to six years have been a different story. I’ve become so busy with my busyness - oh, I mean business - that I have not really spent the time to learn anything new. I’ve just applied whatever duct tape solution I could find quickly and easily so I could get back to the “day to day” of the business.

I HATE IT!

Not only do I feel like my “hard skills” are waning, but I miss the learning/growing rush that I used to get daily. Well, about a week ago I started on a brand new “side” project that I am really excited about. But I did not want to build it the way I’ve been building/maintaining current projects. Instead I decided to learn something completely new to me that I also believe will be beneficial to my current as well as future projects. I’ve taken on learning CakePHP to build this new app. I may not stick with it, but it is forcing me to learn new concepts (eg: MVC) and encouraging me to learn new technologies (eg: AJAX). And I can already tell I am going to love these models in application development.

I have written a few web services in .NET before, but they were small and I don’t love the Microsoft platform (too expensive to create, host and maintain). I have recently fallen in love with PHP and am excited about taking my skills there to the next level.

Plus it’s just fun to learn something new. I’ve missed this and it is so worth doing. I think I’ll plan on spending at least two weeks a year doing nothing but learning a new language/tool/framework/technology. This should have multiple benefits as described above and also keep me marketable if the whole “biz on the side” thing doesn’t work out.

This post was spawned by reading this article from Web Worker Daily about professional development for the web worker set. Great site, by the way, Web Worker Daily is!

Compassion has been on my mind a lot lately. It was a topic of study for me about two months ago and has continued at “top of mind” for me. It is also one of the definitions of relent that I discussed in my first post on this blog. Leo from ZenHabits has a post on cultivating compassion with a specifically Buddhist bent. I am not Buddhist, but enjoy many of their teachings and particularly how they teach.

One thing I love about the practice of compassion is how powerfully effective it is in nullifying wrongs done. And it works both ways. Compassion can be a great vehicle to receiving forgiveness from somebody you’ve wronged, certainly. But even more powerfully, compassion seems to have a soothing effect when you yourself are being wronged. Somehow, finding compassion for the source of your difficulties can eliminate the feelings and negative emotions generated by the actions. Ahh, the beauty of counter-intuitive “soul lessons”!

Today has been a bit of a difficult one for me. Today is my birthday. But, my wife and I received some disappointing news regarding an adoption we are currently pursuing, and I am frustrated by a group of people because of it. I’ve been feeling sorry for myself to have to deal with mental anguish on my birthday (poor me:). But even the thought of having compassion not only for the child we wish to adopt, but also those that are struggling to do the best they can is a balm. Bad news is bad news, but who knows what tomorrow will hold … and why not be compassionate in the meantime?

A lot of what I have recently read about and tried putting into practice has been about the simplification of life. Even when reading things I would not normally anticipate having this theme, there it is. So I’ve run a couple expirements lately in regards to this. With the 80/20 principle in mind I have begun to eliminate some activities and materials from my life. I’ve pared down my rss subscriptions quite a bit, with decided benefit. I’ve stopped much of my research surfing on the Internet, which has been a big help in a number of ways. And I’ve cut out about 3/4 of the time I normally spend in exercise, also with some pretty astounding results. I’ve taken a few other actions along the same lines, but these are those currently at “top of mind”.

In regards to the feed reading, I’m reading much higher quality stuff now and finding a lot more time for other, more important things. As I went through my feeds I discovered at least half of those I subscribed were ever read and a bulk of the ones left were rehashes of the feeds I was truly interested in. Net benefit: about 3 1/2 hours a week gained and a lot more “brain space” freed up.

As for Internet research, it’s kind of my thing. I love reading and learning and spending a ton of time exploring the mundane, the fascinating as well as the weird. Usually when somebody I know has a weird or obscure question, they will call or email me if I know anything about it. I’ll quickly jump online and find the answer if I don’t have it in my head yet, I hate not being in the know. So that being the case, this one is truly hard for me. But I am trying to limit my “surf time” to a few hours a week, instead of my normal “do it whenever I have a spare five minutes” routine. While I have still not been perfect on this one, I’ve been better and it’s actually been nice in a way. My mind is quieter, my thoughts more focused. I miss not having all of the different ideas, concepts and thoughts swirling and trying to find homes and connections. But it’s also nice not to have to deal with the incongruities and mental difficulties that also arise because of the “swirling”. Plus, I’ve saved a ton of time. Net benefit: haven’t tracked this one well, but probably about 8-10 hours a week and a lot more “stillness of mind”.

The exercise expirement has been truly fascinating for me. I have been a “do it daily” weight lifter since I was about 14 years old. By that, I don’t mean that I have lifted weights every day for the last 20 years. What I mean is that my philosophy has always been that to do it right and to make progress, you had to lift different body parts everyday and lift at least five times a week (but usually six). I figured that focusing on one body part each day would give me greater strength gains and size growth on each part and eventually on the whole body. I thought that this generally worked for me because of what happened between my 17th and 18th birthdays. As I ended my junior year in high school I weighed 150 pounds (I have been 6′ 2″ since I was 13) and hadn’t gained any significant weight in two years. I ended my senior year I was 195 pounds of muscle (I had about 7% body fat, not a bad index). I figured that my “do it daily” routine had finally kicked in after four years and that was that. I think I may have been duped. You see, I have not made any serious advances on this front since then, and I have worked really hard at times. It is likely that while my workouts helped, I was probably just due to mature at that point.

So anyway, the recent story has been very interesting for me. I have about 10 pounds of fat to lose, but that will come soon enough (I do cardio 3-4 times a week, and have cut my caloric intake by about 1/3 recently — also part of my 80/20 expirement). I have wanted to build bigger arms, chest and legs for a while now (my wife loves big arms, so why not try to please!). So for the last three weeks I have lifted weights max twice a week, but actually only once a week for two of the three. I do the whole body on Friday morning and an occasional light arms or trunk workout on Tuesdays. I have increased my strength on the bench press by 25% and added 1/2 inch to my upper arm. My legs are also seeing similar gains in strength and size. I’ve also made a change in the “how” of my lifting. Instead of trying to “power lift” a ton of weight in rapid bursts, I have lowered the pounds slightly and do a “five count up, five count down” movement. It really seems to be working and I’m making progress for the first time in about 15 years! Also, lest you think I am a “muscle head”, I’m not. I’m a soccer player and generally have that type of build. Net benefit: added strength and size and growing and about 5-6 hours a week.

I am really pretty jazzed about this whole thing. I am currently trying to figure out where else I can “cut and release” wasted energy and time. From these three things alone I have gained about 20 hours a week in additional time. Of course, that is often filled with other useless, time wasting activities, but I’ll figure it out eventually.

If anybody actually ever reads this, do you have any experiences with “addition by subtraction”? Please share.

After returning from a fun weekend with family, you’d think that I would be motivated to jump back into work and “the grind”. But I’m not. In fact, I’m also worse off than before I left. Yesterday was a terrible day at work, full of disctractions and attitudes. I got very little done and even fewer important things done.

Today started the same, so I re-routed my mindset and decided to “clear some space”. I’ve read that a common Buddhist (read: mystical, East oriented, completely hip and cool — whatever) practice is to clean up your space when you feel stuck or down. Well, I decided to relent on this point and give it a try. I took a couple of hours to clean a closet that has needed it for about a year as well as some of my personal (read: bedside) space. It has been so junked up for so long that it has weighed on my mind as one of many “must get around to” items.

I still haven’t gotten much done today, but I feel like it wasn’t a wasted day like yesterday turned out to be. And I have more energy and might even get around to some work tonight, if the “goddess of beauty and brilliance” doesn’t have other plans! I even had some ideas for work as I was doing the fairly mindless “sort and toss” work of cleaning and reorganizing.

Lesson learned … this time, anyway. Next time work is going south, I’ll try to find an outlet that allows for greater energy as well as a break from the drudgery.

We all have limited energy supplies and time availability, which is why effectiveness and efficiency are so important. Given the “choice in a vacuum”, I would much rather spend my time watching a movie, playing a round of golf, or surfing the web than working diligently for the next three hours, or mowing the lawn, or exercising vigorously. The latter activities are “effort driven” for me and are, therefore, difficult to “get to” sometimes. The former actvities sound like fun, or at least relaxing and are, in turn, much easier to “get to”.

The quality of these activities is defined by the outcomes of each. While lazing around and watching a movie sounds fun right now and will be enjoyable during, I know that if that is all I do today I will feel an energy drain and guilt shortly after it is done. This will then make it less likely that I will have the energy to work on those more important and “goal directed” activities.

If I instead spend the next three hours (or however long is needful) working diligently on important things, I will feel energized and excited about what I’ve accomplished shortly after I’m done. That doesn’t sound like fun right now, but once in “the flow” and working towards a recognized goal, even the work itself becomes fun and rewarding. I am then more likely to continue in healthy and productive activities, which under the right circumstances can include watching a movie, golfing or surfing the web.

So the secret is to look past “this moment” (I know this goes against so much of the “New Agey” “in the now” literature, but it works for me) into the future of likely outcomes and results. Is the activity I am about to engage in going to further increase my energy and help me reach my goals? Or will it likely reduce my energy and ability to accomplish those things I have acknowledged as important?

It strikes me that another important concept related to this is the idea of “unstringing the bow”. The need to welcome and seek times of rest and play is real and important. 24/7 focus on accomplishing goals and working without relent is clearly not a way to live or die. These rest periods offer perspective, growth, rebuilding of reserves and strength and much else in the way of benefit. It’s about the chronology of the day and the order of the tasks. When those important things have been attended to, the movie, golf, or other “fun” activity are a lot easier to swallow. Just do those important “effort driven”, “goal directed” things first, then move on to the rewards, both intrinsic and extrinsic.

My family and I just returned from a very quick jaunt to northern Wyoming for a cousin’s high school graduation (congrats Lauren!). We had a great time with the extended family and spent HOURS at the hotel pool, all fun!

I then spent a bit of time catching up in Google Reader and found a great list from Leo at ZenHabits. Handbook for Life: 52 Tips for Happiness and Productivity is a very useful list of tips to try out with the goal of enhancing your life in mind. Many of these ideas are currently on a similar list of my own, and some are new. After reading through the list I feel like I have found my long-lost twin!

The whole “morning and evening routine” thing is something I know I need to do, but struggle with. With the demands of my children at night, and the whole “Are you freakin’ kidding me?! It’s five a.m.!” thing in the morning, trying to create a routine at those times is difficult. Oh well, most things worth doing are, I think this will be my expirement for the week.

I read my first Drucker book over a decade ago (it was The Effective Executive) and it was really my first taste of business management theory and writing.

I loved it and became hooked on business writings as a result of that book. Lately I’ve tried to temper my thirst for such writing because it has become inconsistent with my current goals and desired mindset. While I still enjoy reading it, I have found other, more fundamental writing (scripture, philosophy, and some history) more beneficial in this stage of my life.

That said, I still have great respect for Drucker and just about anything he says. With that in mind, I read an article pointed to by some now forgotten blog post (sorry to whomever brought it to my attention) that needs summarizing for my future use. If you care nothing for Drucker, ignore this post, it is for me … I think it holds great insight and advice.

The last paragraph grabbed and convinced me that I should pay attention to this article, if he (who had WAY more experience and brains than I have) sees these ideas as fundamental, I should at least pay attention. It is …

I am telling this long story for a simple reason. All the people I know who have managed to remain effective during a long life have learned pretty much the same things I learned. That applies to effective business executives and to scholars, to top-ranking military people and to first-rate physicians, to teachers and to artists. Whenever I work with a person, I try to find out to what the individual attributes his or her success. I am invariably told stories that are remarkably like mine.

With that in mind, here are the lessons as I read and understand them …

1. Strive for perfection. It will always elude me, but that only obligates me take one more try at it.
2. Strive for perfection even if only God notices. He uses “the gods”, I use God, but the idea is the same. There are some things we do that nobody else sees, they are often the fundamental activities or attitudes that only show themselves in the shadows of our daily work. They will, in the end though, either lead to true success and happiness or inevitable shame and disintegration of life and more importantly, the soul.
3. Continue to learn and stretch yourself intellectually. Drucker would spend three to four year periods studying something new. He did this to broaden his horizons, which in turn helped him develop new methodologies and understand different assumptions. I think this practice would both be a continuous source of interest as well as very grounding. What should I start with?
4. Spend extended time each year in self-evaluation. Drucker would spend two weeks each summer looking back on the successes and failures of the year … what did I do well? what did I not do well? what did I not do at all? Using these answers, project forward the next year with … what things should I concentrate on? what things should I seek to improve on? what things do I need to learn? what should I stop doing? This practice is really a natural outgrowth of 1-3, but if used well and honestly could change life within two years (I believe).
5. Ask myself: What do I need to do in this (new or old) thing to be truly effective? Drucker pins this specifically to NEW pursuits, jobs, tasks, etc. But honestly, he probably could because he had a high degree of faith in his ability in old or ongoing activities. I don’t have that confidence, I almost certainly could improve dramatically in many of the things I’ve done for years. This will hopefully change as I practice items 1-4, but for now, might as well reevaluate it all.
6. Anticipate results and track actual outcomes. I’ve read about this in a few different places, but never tried it, I think I will. The basic idea is that as you are making a big decision or starting a large strategic effort, write down what you plan to do and what you think will happen as a result. Then revisit these thoughts down the road a month or a year or whatever is appropriate. You should learn quite a bit during this process, of which a few things would be … what did I not anticipate, and why? what habits need to change? what did I do well in the process? what did I do poorly? what are my strengths? what are my weaknesses?
7. What do I want to be remembered for? Drucker points out that what we want to be remembered for will most likely change as we age and mature, but that in the end, we should strive to make a positive difference in the lives of other people. This mindset not only has the most lasting impact, but is also the most worthy and of the most worth.

So there are some points of action that I can start to use. I think I’ll start a log of decision making. I’ll plan on spending a day or two in self-evaluation. I’ll come up with a study item for the next few years (I’m actually really excited about this one). And I’ll start striving more faithfully for perfection in completing projects and “doing the right things right”!

So putting aside the possibility that I have a slight man crush on Tiger Woods, he is in my opinion in the top three examples of the “ultimate athlete”. Some might argue about a golfer being termed an athlete, but I don’t in his case. In fact, I think that his athleticism and “sport ethic” is THE THING that sets him apart from his competitors (I say “sport ethic” as a substitute for “work ethic”). I personally feel that golf is the single most difficult sport to dominate, because of the format of competition and also because of the heavy reliance on the “mental side” that golf requires on each and every shot. And yet, Tiger has dominated the sport in ways that almost seem like the results of typos, not actual game play. Anyway, I am fascinated with the way Tiger Woods does what he does, and yes, I think how he does it relates to my own goals.

One thing that strikes me about most of what you hear about Tiger is the absolute focus he brings to everything he does. Apparently, he became an accomplished black diamond skier in a ridiculously short time (if you haven’t ever skied, trust me, it’s impressive) and tackles pretty much anything he does with undeviating energy. A recent post from Businesspundit (a blog well worth visiting, Rob is razor sharp in dissecting true value from true fluff) shares an anectdote about seeing Tiger on the practice range. Needless to say, he was practicing in a way that most don’t, certainly not the way I do. He spent at least four hours hitting with just one club … a 7-iron. I think that speaks to his focus and ability to seek improvement where others would say “good enough”. I think the results he has achieved also speak to his ability to focus on the right things for his desired accomplishments. My guess is that there are a number of other professional golfers that spend just as much time as Tiger does on their game (if not more), but he dominates them why? Talent? Sure. But that only gets you so far and is often a barrier to true success (think Maurice Clarett and Ohio State) even in “talent driven” pursuits. I think the “something more” is his ability to see what activities hold the greatest potential benefit for HIM.

My goals are not the same as Tiger’s, which is why I won’t be spending 4 hours+ on a practice range with my entire bag, let alone one club, but I believe the lesson is in the commitment to “getting it right”. The key is the mindset of constant and consistent improvement, whether that is for the perfect 7-iron shot, or the ideally balanced day of family and work time. The ability to not “settle” and continue to pursue my unique (just as everybody’s own is to them) concept of perfection is critical to my happiness and ability to live on terms I am comfortable with and even excited about. The secret is not in the doing, but in the “doing right things right”.

A guest post on ZenHabits takes on the issue of a fast paced world and the benefits of slowing it down. The guest post was written by Christopher Richards, author of SlowDownNow.org, a site I will take some time to look over … when I get a chance .

I had a conversation with my eight year old son the other day that has been on my mind since. He was asking when his “half-birthday” would fall … his birthday is in February, so his “half-birthday” will be in August. Anyway, he then asked if I would be getting him any presents for this so called “half-birthday”! I told him, of course, I wouldn’t and that Christmas is just a short time away and he would get plenty of gifts then. After the expected groan, I said, “But wasn’t Christmas just like … yesterday? And that was about half a year ago, and we only have another half of a year to go until the next one. Just be patient, it will come before you know it.” He rolled his eyes and said back, “Christmas was forever ago, and I don’t think I can wait that long before getting more presents!”

Aside from the obvious issue of overblown expectations regarding constant gift receiving, I was thinking about the difference between his and my perceptions of six months. The thing is, I feel like the flow of time has been increasing exponentially for the past decade or so. Ever since I got married, started working, had a child, started my own business, had a few more children … you get the idea. What is interesting to me is that as time has become more important and the supply of “ultimate time” (the time ’til I die!) diminishes, it seemingly moves faster. Not that time itself is speeding up, but my perception of it reads it differently. Like a baseball hitter in the zone can “slow the ball down” through awareness and perception. But right now, I see a fastball coming not at 95mph, but more like 250mph. And if six months feels like a day or two, that means I have about 4 months to live! And in about three weeks my eight year old son will move out of the house and starts his own “accelerated life line”.

This does have to do with my goals. Part of what I want to create is a slower lifestyle that is more apt to slower, more connective moments with my wife and kids. So, I don’t have the financial resources to do this right now, but I am learning that money is often irrelevant where creativity can pick up the slack. I need to figure out some strategies, tricks and actions I can take to slow my life down. And I need to do it now, not only for my own sake, but to try and teach my kids a better way of living. Example is everything in raising children and they will almost certainly stay on the path I helped establish for them.

So like I said, I will be reading more on SlowDownNow.org, but first I’ve got about two weeks of work to get through today!

If you haven’t heard of this book, then you’ve either been in a coma for the last month or you spend more time having fun offline than online (good for you!). I can’t say that this book is the source of my current viewpoint or frustrations or of really anything. The fact is, I have been feeling like a deferred-life slave for a couple of years now. This book has given me some vocabulary and mindsets to work with, but I have known about these strategies for quite some time.

What this book has done for me is give me a kick in the pants to get going on some things that have been in the planning stage for a loooong time. I turn 34 in a less than a month, and I am far short of where I’d hoped to be at this point in my life. While I have never planned on retiring early (or otherwise), I do have some goals that require more time than my current lifestyle affords.

I am going to create a few posts out of the material in this book. I have implemented a few of the techniques and tips with (to me) pretty amazing early success, and gained a few hours a week in the process. For now, I would suggest you go buy The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich and get started on reading it. If you are “web worker” or just need some new ideas on strategies for what Tim Ferriss calls “Lifestyle Design”, you need this book.

It isn’t gospel, but it can be useful and eye opening if you can creatively conceive an implementation in your own life.