Category Archives: Plans

Can You Juggle Yet?

Feedback Loop Forever

Feedback Loops

​Lots of inventors have tried to come up with a “perpetual motion machine.”

At least in the old days. But then again, there’s still plenty of things being sold today (not the things themselves, the designs for them) that somehow claim to be an endless source of energy.

It’s a pretty shrewd marketing strategy, when you think about it. The “thing” they are selling is just a book with some plans. The “promise” is some magic machine that will spit out endless energy forever.

Only to build it, you’ve got to have a PhD in mechanical engineering, and a decent lab with the right equipment.

The idea of some kind of self-perpetuating feedback loop has been around forever.

This was kind of the promise behind “cold fusion” back when they allegedly discovered it. Pour in salt water, and it spits put clean electricity.

On the other hand, you can view human life on Earth as a kind of “perpetual energy machine.” After all, a few thousand years ago, all we had were basic tools. Now look at what we’ve made. Nobody helped us. No magic aliens came down and showed us the way.

Just humans interacting with other humans and making better and better and more complicated stuff.

Every success “fed back” into the system, which simply created more success.

For some reason, when we think of personal achievement, we think it’s a one stage or one process thing.

Read the right book and suddenly you’ll be blessed with secret knowledge to crack the code.

Say the right affirmations and you’ll suddenly be approached by beautiful people with sacks of money.

If you read a book on juggling, would you be able to juggle? Or would you need to practice?

Sure, it helps to know the theory. But unless you’re content to impress all your friends with your deep philosophical insights about juggling, you would have to actually practice.

Which would mean spending a LOT of time dropping balls (or bean bags or chainsaws) all over the place.

You KNOW this.

But for some reason, when we read books on dating, or making money, or even losing weight, we half expect some magic fairy to come fix everything at night while we sleep.

If it were this easy, EVERYBODY would be thin, rich, and surrounded by super models.

It’s not that it’s difficult to get these things. It just takes time.

And ONE crucial element most people simply CANNOT fathom.

Being able to accept feedback. Not just the good stuff, but the “bad” stuff as well.

Because ALL feedback is more information. That can be fed into the system to make you better next time.

And guess what? 

If you KEEP getting better next time? You’ll get pretty good!

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Forge Your Own Path

Become Ruler Of Your World

How To Become A Creator

Some things happen randomly, by chance.

And others happen purely by conscious choice.

Generally speaking, most everything has a mix of both.

For example, you could be bored on a Sunday afternoon and go for a walk. You may start off without any particular destination, but that doesn’t mean you won’t make conscious choices along the way.

On the other hand, you could start out with a well constructed intention in mind, only to get sidetracked by an unexpected encounter.

Sometimes, these unexpected encounters are the best things that can happen.

The story of Facebook, for example, is really a story of a big accident. The book describing the story was called “The Accidental Billionaires.”

Sure, it wasn’t planned, but that doesn’t mean that anybody would be able to take advantage of such an opportunity.

I’m sure you know plenty of people who sit around coming up with great ideas. Everybody does that. But few people ever take action.

I saw this movie a few months ago, about a true story of a couple of inventors. They tried crazy invention after crazy invention, only to crash and burn every single time.

Finally they found one that worked, and they both became millionaires. The invention itself was incredibly simple, incredibly cheap to design and mass produce.

No matter what you’re doing, you’ll need to have a pretty clear picture of where you’re going, as well as the ability to respond to those things that happen by chance.

The good news is that you are hard wired to do this. You don’t need to learn anything. You just need to set your sights on what you’d like, and get going.

Here’s the even better news. Most people only have a vague idea of what they want. Even if that’s all you’ve got, that’s enough to get started.

All you’ve got to do is to try something. Anything. And see what happens.

If you get closer, great. Do more.

If you don’t get closer, no biggie. Do something else.

So long as you are willing to take action, accept whatever results you get, without self-judgment, you’ll be fine.

Along the way your target will become clearer, the path will become more visible, and your skills will SKYROCKET.

For some, this is pretty scary. Many of us are terrified to do something unless we KNOW we’ll be successful. We want guarantees, step by step plans, and if possible, to see somebody do it first so we know we’re not the only ones.

But where’s the fun in that? All followers get is the leftovers.

Leaders, creators, people like you, get much, much more.

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Who’s The Boss Of You?

Choose Your Own Course

How To Take Control Of Your Life

I love walking in the mornings. 

Especially really early, when it’s still dark. Normally, I follow a pretty standard route. Down to the big park near the main library, and then back home.

But sometimes I take a detour. Sometimes I’ll see something down a side street I feel like checking out.

My only intention for walking is to let my mind wander, and as a side benefit get a little bit of exercise.

I’m not going anywhere in particular, just out and back.

This is a great strategy for a lot of things. When the process is more important than the outcome.

Going on holiday is another example. Sure, the destination is important. But most of the time, the main outcome of a holiday is just to relax and unwind.

Even some things that seem to have a clear outcome are really process focused. People that have certain hobbies for example. Building stuff with wood. Painting, other forms of creative expression.

The intentions is not so much the outcome (unless it’s your career or you want it to be your career someday), but the process. Just losing yourself in the creative process and seeing what happens.

Other things require a much more detailed focus on the outcome.

When you’re boss tells you to have a certain report by a certain date, for example. You wouldn’t write the report the same way you enjoyed one of your hobbies, would you?

Or if your job was a truck driver, for example, and you were carrying perishable materials. You wouldn’t lazily take the scenic route, stopping for photos along the way.

You’d have a specific outcome, to be in a specific place at a specific time. 

Most of the time, it’s easy to tell the difference between process activities, and outcome activities.

One huge indicator is when somebody tells us to do something. Then it’s clear there’s some kind of outcome we’d better achieve.

However, only leaving those “outcome based” activities up to the directions of others is a mistake.

A potentially HUGE one.

See, the biggest process of all is your life.

And your life is filled with outcome after outcome.

Most people are content to let others choose each of these intermediary outcomes, and then just relax on process stuff in the middle.

This is certainly safe. It’s certainly low risk. If you get into trouble, you’ve always got somebody to blame.

But it’s INCREDIBLY limiting.

The truth is that choosing your OWN outcomes is a lot easier than many people realize.

Now, I’m not talking about vague wishes that most people have.

“I want more money. I want to lose weight. I need a partner.”

Everybody’s got these.

I’m talking about rock solid plans to make them happen.

This is what happens when you “become your own boss” of your life.

You can build whatever you want.

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Goal Setting