~ Community Inspiration ~: Oktober 2011

Kamis, 27 Oktober 2011

Be dare to experiment

Yes, be dare to experiment ! In life optimization, experiment is very important. In fact, I think experiment is an integral part of life optimization. There is no life optimization without experiment. Or to be exact, there is no life optimization without continuous experiment.
Why ? The answer lies back on the word “optimization” itself. Optimization means that we try to get the most of something. It is a continous process. We always want to find better and better ways of doing something. In computer science for example, the process of finding faster and more efficient algorithms is an “eternal” process, it will never stop.
The same thing applies to life optimization. It is an eternal process in which we will never reach an end where we can say “stop” and “enough”. Furthermore, in this process, the only way to make progress is by finding new and better ways of doing things. And the only way to find these new and better ways is by trying something, well, new. In other word, it’s experiment.
Be willing to experiment here means that we must have:

Open mind.
Something that we believe as the “best practice” may very possibly be proven otherwise in the future. So, we must have an open mind to accept something new. Or as scientists say, we must have the will to doubt to the current “theory” to accept the new one.
Flexibility
Not just in mind, we must also be ready to change our “workflow engine” at any time. Experiment means that sometimes we need to change our workflow pattern to accommodate the new practices we want to try.

Of course, the results of experiments are not always positive. There are times when our experiment ends in failure. But that is also a lesson in itself, because at least we know that we should not do it that way. That’s also a progress, right ?

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Time management pronrity management

I think time management can also be called priority management. Why ? Because everything we do in effective time management is actually nothing but managing our priorities. To justify this, let’s see what the goal of time management is.
The goal of time management is how we can get the most of our time. Given limited amount of time, how can we use it in such a way that maximize our productivity ? Or put it in another way, how can we use it to maximize our happiness ?

The problem is, we do not have enough time to do everything we want. I have made a list of things that I want to do daily. And most of the time, I cannot make it. Or sometimes I managed to make it, but only by sacrificing some other things which should be of higher priority. I felt less productive then.
So I think the way to go is by managing our priorities in such a way that things with most impact will be done over the ones with less impact. We must be able to adapt to changing situation, and connect each situation to our vision and values to determine which activity should be done in any given time. It’s a kind of art.
One fact we must remember is we will never have enough time to do everything we want. There is no choice, we must sacrifice some (or sometimes many) of them. We must be able to make hard choices about what to do and what not to do. As you can see, it’s all about priority management.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Productivity posts in problogger group writing project

I’ve joined Problogger Group Writing Project with my post How to Become a Maven (Mr. Know Everything). As you can see from the project’s web site, the total number of entries is 343 ! I’ve scrolled through them to find any posts related to personal productivity, and here are what I find:

You can go and check them out to get some tips on life optimization.
Well, it’s great to see so many good blogs out there that I never know before. Even more exciting is the fact that I can get more insight about how the blogosphere works. It’s cool !

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

How to become a maven mr know everthing

Maven is the term used by Malcolm Gladwell in his best-seller book The Tipping Point. This is one of three types of people who can trigger “social epidemics” (the other types are connector and salesman). In short, maven is the “Mr. Know Everything”. If you are a maven of gadgets for example, you will know about all gadgets and all their functionalities. Maybe you can even tell the exact type of a gadget you touch without opening your eyes ! Cool right ?

The problem is, nowadays there are more and more reason that we all need to become a maven in our field. Well, at least if you want to distinguish yourself and be priced high by the market. Remember the economic law, less supply and more demand will increase the price. If you can get through the barrier and become one of the few mavens, then market will surely price you high.
Of course, being a maven is not easy. It’s very hard in fact, and that’s why there are very few mavens in any respective fields. But the good news is, it’s always possible for us to become one. Here is how:

Have passion
To become a maven, you must choose a field you are passionate about. There is big difference between those who do something because they love it and those who do it just because they must. Passion will make your learning process a fun and joyful one. You will be several times more productive in learning because everything is so fun. Furthermore, passion will make you impressive in your writing and speech because of the energy and excitement you transfer to the audience. Your audience will be excited about your topic only as much as you are excited about it.
Have focus
Focus is an absolute condition for becoming a maven. The road to become a maven is very, very long. Research shows that it takes approximately 10 years of heavy labor to become a master in any field. If we don’t have focus then we will very possibly get distracted by other things along the way. So have focus. Always direct your effort toward your goal.
Have good resources
It’s essential to have good resources. Your input determines your output. Select carefully what you read, listen, and watch. If you let yourself accumulating only gold then people will find that they will also receive gold from you. So choose the best books, the best web feeds, the best videos, and the best podcasts in your field to be your resources. Overtime, don’t forget to evaluate your resources. If you find that something is decreasing in value then don’t be hesitate to remove it. Allow only the best resources to fill your precious time and mind.
Have discipline
As I’ve said above, research shows that it takes approximately 10 years of heavy labor to become a master. It means that you must work hard, and do it continously for long period of time. While passion will surely help you to stay motivated along the way, discipline is still irreplaceable. There times when we feel uncomfortable or simply lazy. Discipline is required to keep us doing our part whether we like it or not, whether we are in good mood or not. Remember, small things accumulated continously over long period of time will become a mountain.
Share to others
Believe it or not, by sharing to others we will receive more and more. So don’t keep all you’ve learned for yourself. Help others, share to others, and contribute to the society. You will find that you can learn more from other people. Futhermore, the flow of new ideas will never stop within you.

Note:
This post is my submission for ProBlogger Group Writing Project.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Why personal innovation is important

Many people just talk about innovation in corporate level, but I believe that today innovation is also important at individual level. It is not just companies that must innovate ; individuals must also innovate. Why? Here are two reasons:
1. We are now living in globalization 3.0
In his best-seller book The World is Flat, Thomas Friedman says that we are now living in globalization 3.0. And what special about this era is we now compete globally even in individual level. This is different from globalization 1.0 where the main participants were countries and globalization 2.0 where the main participants were companies. Of course, countries and companies will still have important role in globalization 3.0, but the fact that individuals can also compete globally is something new and something we must be aware of. And if individuals can compete globally, then it means that individuals – just like companies – must also innovate to success.
Individuals who do not innovate will suffer the same thing as those companies who don’t innovate: they will be left behind in competition and may have to declare bankruptcy later on!
2. We must differentiate ourselves to avoid commoditization
In globalization 3.0, skills and knowledge can be transferred from all over the globe very fast and easily. It means that we face the danger of commoditization on our skill set. In globalization 2.0 we may feel safe because very few people in our environment have the same skill set as we do. Those who have the same skill set are hundreds or thousands miles away. But now in globalization 3.0, the world has become a global village. Why village? Because people can now find each other very easily around the world.
For example, how much time do you need to wait for your mate in IM to respond to your question? A few seconds. Wow! It implies that all people around the world with the same skill set as you are suddenly within reach from each other. No matter how far they are, they are actually only seconds away. It also means that your client can very easily choose them and not you to do your job, especially if they are cheaper than you.
Scary, right?
Not really. We can see it in different way: now, instead of only your environment, you have the whole world as your potential clients! What a great opportunity! It’s like a dream comes true. But the ingredient you need to success in this era is differentiation. What’s so special about you that other people don’t have? What makes you different from the others? To answer these question we have no choice but to innovate.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Optimize your day with audio learning

Audio learning is a very good way to optimize your day. One obvious reason is because nowadays knowledge and information grows very rapidly beyond our ability to cope with it. The only way to handle it is by increasing our learning ability. We must learn to take information at higher and higher rate. We cannot learn the way we used to be.
One way to do it is by finding more time to learn. We must try to convert some time which normally are not used for learning into learning.
For this purpose, audio learning is a very good solution. There are several reasons for this:

Audio learning allows us to learn something while we are doing something else
It means that we can finish the tasks at hand while at the same time learning something new about the world. Audio learning allows us to achieve more within a given time.
Audio learning doesn’t take extra time
Since we are supposed to do those tasks anyway, adding audio learning while doing those tasks won’t cost us extra time. We simply add more value to that time. We increase the quality of the time without increasing the quantity of time required.
Audio learning teaches us to learn in different way
Many people – me included – are visual learner. They normally learn through what they see than through other methods. Or they learn through what they read more than anything else. While this is a good thing, this may no longer be sufficient in this age of fast-pacing world. We must open our mind to new learning methods. Audio learning teaches us to be auditory learners who learn through what we listen to.

I think this three reasons are enough to emphasize the importance of audio learning. In this fast-pacing world, audio learning is clearly the way to go.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Vision the first step of life Optimization

Many people want to optimize their life. They want to grow and reach the their maximum potential. Unfortunately, many people fail to do so. They just go around and never achieve anything in their life. Or even worse, they don’t know whether or not they have achieved anything !
How can that be ? Why can’t people reach their true potential ?

Well, I think the very possible answer to that question is because they miss the first step of life optimization, and that is vision, the purpose of their life. Without vision, there is nothing we can do to optimize our life. Why ? Because:

Vision shows us the right direction to go to
If you are a runner, first of all you must know where the finish line is. The finish line shows you the right direction to run to. You will never win if you run to the wrong direction. In life, vision is the finish line. To become a winner in life, first of all we must know where our finish line is, that is what our vision is. Vision shows us the right direction to run to. Without vision, it is very possible that we push ourselves to the west while we should actually go to the east.
Vision gives us a standard to measure our progress with
Vision is the base upon which we measure our effectiveness. Without vision, there’s no way we can know whether we are effective or not, whether our life is optimized or not. Why ? Because how far we have optimized our life is always measured by how close we are to our goal, which in this case is vision. How can we know how far we are from the finish line if we never know where the finish line is ? And how can we know that we have reached the finish line if we never know where it is ?

From the two reasons above I think it’s clear that vision is the essential first step of life optimization. Only after knowing the vision can we think about how to adjust our life to reach our maximum potential. So, before anything else, have a vision.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Watch your imagination

Imagination is a very powerful tool. With imagination, great things can happen. One hundred years ago, who would expect that people will go to the moon ? Or who would expect that people throughout the world can connect so seamlessly to each other like today ? Indeed, imagination makes great things happen.
But unfortunately, the negative effect of imagination is just as powerful. We can ruin our whole life (or even the whole civilization) through wrong imagination. For example, it is the imagination of Hitler that play big role in the World War II with all the miseries it caused. Or maybe not that extreme, but our whole day can vanish through wrong imagination. For example, if you let yourself think negative thoughts, then negative things are very likely to happen throughout the day. Negative imagination also leads to negative behaviour. How can we optimize our life if we have negative imagination in the first place ?
So it is very important to watch our imagination. Be careful not to let negative imagination come to our life. Instead, let only positive imagination come to our mind. It is very important because whether a person will be a winner or a loser is very much determined by his/her imagination.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

How to have an expert min

There is a very interesting article in the August 2006 issue of Scientific American titled The Expert Mind. The article explains about recent researches in cognitive science which tries to understand how experts think and how people can get such kind of expert mind.
The researches are specialized on chess players for the simple reason that chess-playing strength can objectively be measured (by using the rating system). Hence, it provides the opportunity to learn how people think from all parts of the skill spectrum – from novices to grandmasters. Of course, the results of the research is not meant only to the chess players. Instead, the goal is to find a general pattern that can be applied to all fields.
You can get complete information by reading the article directly, but here I want to give you the key points:

Experts think much more using structured knowledge in their mind rather than using analytical thinking
This explains how a grandmaster can get the right decision within the first few seconds of thought, while a novice needs much longer time to analyze the situation and still makes the wrong decision. He already has database of similar positions in his mind. This also explains how an expert physician can quickly diagnose a patient and how an experienced curator can quickly “know” whether a work of art is authentic or not (like the example in Blink).
This structured knowledge is built by years of effortful study
The only way to build this structured knowledge is by studying hard for long period of time. Effortful study marks the difference between experts and others. Effortful study means that someone consistently try to push slightly higher than her current limit of competence.
It takes about ten years of effortful study to become an expert
Not only a will-be expert must do effortful study, she must do it consistently for long, long period of time. As a general rule of thumb, it takes about ten years of heavy labor to become an expert in any field. There is no shortcut to have an expert mind.
To do this years of effortful study, motivation is a very important factor
Who can manage to do such hard work consistently for long period of time without strong motivation? Clearly, motivation plays big role here. Motivation makes someone endure the hard years toward expertise.

These points can be illustrated by the diagram below:

The conclusion is: experts are made, not born. It’s very motivating for me. It gives hope that any of us can become expert in our field, regardless of our background or innate ability.Of course, as long as we are willing to pay the price.

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Welcome to Life Optimize

In this first post, I’d like to welcome everybody to Life Optimizer. Optimizing life has always been a fascinating topic for me. I have always wanted to push my life to the limit and leveraged my true potential.
Personally, I believe everybody has unique talent and potential. I believe that everybody can live a meaningful life, life that will not only benefit themselves but also give value to other people. It is our duty to discover our unique talent and potential and then leverage it to the limit. We should live our life to the max!
Sure, this is a long journey, a lifelong journey to be exact. But by optimizing our life along the way, I believe we can get the most of our life. Today, I’d like to invite you to join me in this journey :)

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org

Selasa, 25 Oktober 2011

Self Motivation

People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents.
(Andrew Carnegie)

If you want to excel in life, self motivation is essential. You must know how to motivate yourself. You must be able to keep your spirit high no matter how discouraging a situation is. That’s the only way to get the power you need to overcome difficulties. Those who are discouraged in difficult times are certain to lose even before the battle is over.
The question is: how do you motivate yourself? Here are several tips I’ve found to be effective to build self motivation:
1. Have a cause
I can’t think of a more powerful source of motivation than a cause you care about. Such cause can inspire you to give your best even in the face of difficulties. It can make you do the seemingly impossible things.
While other causes could inspire you temporarily, a cause that matters to you can inspire you indefinitely. It’s a spring of motivation that will never dry. Whenever you think that you run out of motivation, you can always come to your cause to get a fresh dose of motivation.
2. Have a dream. A big dream.

Only as high as I reach can I grow, only as far as I seek can I go, only as deep as I look can I see, only as much as I dream can I be.
Karen Ravn

Your cause is a powerful source of motivation but it’s still abstract in nature. You need to make it concrete in the form of a dream. Imagine how the world will be in the future. Imagine how people will live and work.
Having a dream is important because it’s difficult to be motivated if you don’t have anything to shoot for. Just think about people who play basketball. Will they be motivated to play if there is no basket to aim at? I don’t think so. They need a goal. You need a goal. That’s what your dream is for.
But just having a dream is insufficient. Your dream must be big enough to inspire you. It must be realistic but challenging. It must stretch your ability beyond your comfort zone.
3. Be hungry

Wanting something is not enough. You must hunger for it. Your motivation must be absolutely compelling in order to overcome the obstacles that will invariably come your way.
Les Brown

To be truly motivated, you need to have hunger and not just desire. Having mere desire won’t take you through difficult times since you don’t want things badly enough. In many cases, hunger makes the difference between the best performers and the mediocre ones.
How can you have hunger? Your cause and your dream play a big role here. If you have a cause you care about and a big dream related to it, you should have the hunger inside of you. If you think that you are losing hunger, all you need to do is to connect again to your cause and dream. Let them inspire you and bring the hunger back.
4. Run your own race

I do not try to dance better than anyone else. I only try to dance better than myself.
Mikhail Baryshnikov

Comparing yourself with others is an effective way to demotivate yourself. Even if you start with enthusiasm, you will soon lose your energy when you compare yourself with others.
Don’t let that happen to you. You have your own race so how other people perform is irrelevant. Comparing yourself with others is like comparing the performance of a swimmer with a runner using the same time standard. They are different so how can you compare one with the other?
The only competitor you have is yourself. The only one you need to beat is you. Have you become the best you can be?
5. Take one more step

Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
Winston Churchill

When you meet obstacles along the way, there could be the tendency to quit. You may think that it’s too difficult to move on. You may think that your dream is impossible to achieve. But this is where you can see the difference between winners and losers. Though both of them face the same difficulties, there is one thing that makes the winners different: the courage to continue.
In difficult situations, just focus on taking one more step forward. Don’t think about how to complete the race. Don’t think about how many more obstacles are waiting for you. Just focus on taking the next step.
6. Let go of the past

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Believe it or not, one of the best demotivators is your past. Your past can drag you down before you realize it. Your past can give you a heavy burden on your shoulders.
The good news is it’s a burden you don’t have to carry. Take it off your shoulder and leave it. You might make mistakes in the past. You might disappoint others with what you did. But it’s over. It’s already in the past and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Today is a new day and you have the chance to start again. No matter how bad your past might be, you still have a bright future ahead waiting for you. Just don’t let the burden of the past stop you.
***
Apply these tips and motivate yourself. Don’t settle for mediocrity. Let your self motivation take you to excellence.
This article is part of October 2008 theme: Winning Attitude

http://www.lifeoptimizer.org/2008/10/22/self-motivation-how-to-motivate-yourself/