Leo

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four stages of consciousness

Sadhguru said the four stages of consciousness are: (1) Jagriti, or the waking state in which people are aware of the world around them; (2) Swapna, or the dream state in which we are sleeping but aware of the dreams; (3) Susupti, or deep sleep; and (4) Turiya, or pure consciousness.

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Avoid: 1. Gossip 2. Judging 3. Negativity 4. Complaining 5. Excuses 6. Lying 7. Dogmatism

HAIL - To greet or acclaim enthusiastically H - Honestly (Be straight and clear) A - Authenticity (Be yourself) I - Integrity (Be your word) L - Love (wish them well)

Amazing Toolbox: 1. Register - Locate your voice at your chest to gain some weight 2. Timbre - Voices that are rich, smooth and warm 3. Prosody - Avoid monotone, a statement sounds like a question and repeat a statement 4. Pace - Get excited by saying something really quickly;  Slow down to emphasize; Silent 5. Pitch- Ex: "Where did you leave my keys?" with different pitches, are different meaning 6. Volume: Excited - High Volume; Attention - Low Volume

Warm up your voice 1. Arms up, deep breath in and sigh out 2, 3. Warm up the lips: Ba, ba, ba, ba, ba...; Brrrrr....... 4, 5. Tongue warm up: La, la, la, la, la....; Rrrrrr..... 6. WeeeeeeeeeAaaaawwww (From high pitch to low pitch)

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26 Greek Lessons!

Călugării de pe Sfântul Munte Athos au păstrat și continuă să se împartă cu înțelepciunea grecilor antici. Ei au adunat buna judecată a secolelor dinainte, iar acum tind să ne îmbogățească și pe noi cu aceste cunoștințe.

Iată câteva dintre aforismele și expresiile grecești care astăzi sunt la fel de valabile ca și secole în urmă:

Fratele rămâne frate, chiar dacă te trădează.

Biblioteca este farmacia minții.

Cel mare și bogat nu se face vinovat.

Veac pe veac îl repetă.

Cămila nu-și vede cocoașa.

Ai intrat în horă – dansează!

Ridică un pod din aur pentru dușmanul care pleacă.

Copilul care nu plânge, nu primește nimic.

Tot ieftinul te costă scump.

Dacă nu îți lauzi casa, se va dărâma.

Dacă vei înțelege de ce te-ai născut, vei înțelege și pentru ce trăiești.

Păcatul confesat e pe jumătate iertat.

Pereții aud totul.

Cel care doarme dimineața, lucrează seara.

Mai bine iubind la distanță, decât urând alături.

Mic cu mic face mare.

O fi marea albastră, dar vântul o înnegrește.

Măgarul și stăpânul gândesc diferit.

Pacostea unuia este fericirea altuia.

Vulturul nu se avântă după muște.

Cunoaște-te pe tine însuți.

Printre rău, bun nu găsești.

Bogăția o porți în suflet nu în pungă.

Ce e proaspăt din afară, este putred înăuntru.

Limba oase n-are, dar oase strică.

Rana de cuţit se vindecă lesne, dar cea de la inimă niciodată

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Change your mind for success!

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1.Persuasion 2.Reading People,Forseeing Costumer Needs 3.Sharing The Wealth 4.Leverage (Understand It),Teaming 5.Recruiting 6.Energy Management 7.How To Process Issue(Problem Solving)  8.Time Management 

9.How to Manage Money 10.How to be Aggressively patient. 11.Learn Always

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The big thing!  The intersection between passion, mission, profession, vocation! 

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Becoming creative is not easy. However here are some aspect you need to consider.

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This guy is a master when it comes to journaling

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yLuBt-nRhzY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-f62ncQBWM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-f62ncQBWM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fm15cmYU0IM

http://bulletjournal.com/top-5-bujo-ideas-in-2016/

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Matthew delivered 13 pieces of wisdom for the new graduates based on what he learned from his own experiences. Read about his key points below. 1. Life is not easy "Do not fall into the entitlement trap of feeling like a victim," said McConaughey. "You are not. Get over it and get on with it. Yes, most things are more rewarding when you break a sweat to get them." 2. "Unbelievable" is the stupidest word in the dictionary The actor stated that the word "unbelievable" should never come out of anybody's mouth, and people should give each other more credit when it's due. He also added it's not "unbelievable" when people perform out-of-character actions, such as missing a deadline. "If there's one thing you can depend on people being, it's people," said McConaughey. "I think 'unbelievable' is an unbelievably stupid word." 3. Happiness is different than joy  The actor noted that once he started acting in films that brought him joy rather than happiness, he started receiving more success. "As soon as the work, the daily making of the movie, the doing of the deed, became the reward in itself for me," he said, "I got more box office, more accolades, more respect than I ever had before. 4. Define success for yourself McConaughey says he defines himself by five things: fatherhood, being a good husband, health, career and friendships. "I want to keep all five in healthy shape," he said. "If I don't keep maintenance on them, one of them is going to get weak. 5. Process of elimination is the first step to our identity "Alright, alright alright," said McConaughey as he recalled the three lines he was first hired to say on Dazed and Confused. The actor noted that while starting with those three lines turned into a larger role for his character in the film, there were two scenes that his character, Bill Wooderson, shouldn't have been in. "Back then, making my first film, I wanted more screen time. I wanted to be in the scene longer, but I shouldn't have been there. Wooderson shouldn't have been there," said McConaughey. 6. "Don't leave crumbs" — and the beauty of delayed gratification "If I do my job well today and that movie keeps re-running on TV, five years from now I'm getting checks in the mailbox," he said. "It's a heck of a deal. Get some return on investment." 7. Dissect your successes (and the reciprocity of gratitude) The actor noted that he's spent a lot of time reading the bad reviews of his films that are written by respected critics. "I don’t obsess on the unfavorable aspect of their review, but I do seek what I can learn from it. Their displeasure actually uncovers and makes more apparent what I do do well." 8. Make voluntary obligations The actor insists on making personal protocols with yourself that may not apply to everyone else. "While no one throws you a party while you abide by them, nobody is going to arrest you when you break them, either." 9. From "can" to "want" The actor emphasized that having access to different things doesn't mean you necessarily need them. He recalled a lesson he learned when he received his first paycheck, in 1995, for being in Boys on the Side, and started living the good life with an adobe house complete with his first maid. After he told a friend that he had a maid that was pressing his jeans, he realized that he never really liked the look of ironed jeans in the first place. "I never had my jeans pressed again," said McConaughey. 10. A roof is a man-made thing The actor noted that he, like everyone else, has choked up or felt tense due to expectations. "We have created a fictitious ceiling, a roof to our expectations of ourselves," he said. "We shouldn't create these restrictions on ourselves 11. Turn the page "If we're going to make a mistake, we've got to own them, make amends and you've got to move on," said McConaughey. 12. Give your obstacles credit The actor admitted that he tries to scare himself at least once a day. "I get butterflies every time before I go to work," he said. "I was nervous before I got here to speak tonight." 13. How do we know when we cross the truth? The actor noted that after rising to fame in 1996, following his star turn in A Time to Kill, he began questioning the truth in his celebrity. On a 21-day "fasting" trip to Peru, he noted it took him 13 "hellish" days to purge in order to feel relaxed. "I was sick of myself," he said. "Wrestling with the loss of my anonymity, I was guilt-ridden for the sins of my past." On the morning of his thirteenth day in Peru, he admitted he finally woke up at one with himself. This was confirmed when he went on a morning walk and was greeted by a mirage of butterflies. "For the first time, I stopped thinking about what was coming up next, and my anxieties were at a crazy ease," he said. 

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Compound interest.

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Is that a good use of your time?

The billionaire Microsoft founder said Trump offered him the chance to join the White House team as its most senior science official at a meeting six weeks ago.

He described the encounter in an interview with the medical publication STAT. Here's the relevant part:

"I mentioned: 'Hey, maybe we should have a science adviser.'"

And?

"He said: Did I want to be the science adviser?"

That’s not the answer Gates was looking for. "That's not a good use of my time," Gates recalled telling the president.

Gates admitted he doesn’t know what would have happened if he’d said yes. "I didn’t put him to the test, whether that was a serious thing or not. He probably himself didn’t know if he was serious. It was a friendly thing. He was being friendly."

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The Ivy Lee Method: The Daily Routine Experts Recommend for Peak Productivity

By 1918, Charles M. Schwab was one of the richest men in the world. Schwab was the president of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, the largest shipbuilder and the second-largest steel producer in America at the time. The famous inventor Thomas Edison once referred to Schwab as the “master hustler.” He was constantly seeking an edge over the competition.

One day in 1918, in his quest to increase the efficiency of his team and discover better ways to get things done, Schwab arranged a meeting with a highly-respected productivity consultant named Ivy Lee.

Lee was a successful businessman in his own right and is widely remembered as a pioneer in the field of public relations. As the story goes, Schwab brought Lee into his office and said, “Show me a way to get more things done.”

“Give me 15 minutes with each of your executives,” Lee replied.

“How much will it cost me,” Schwab asked.

“Nothing,” Lee said. “Unless it works. After three months, you can send me a check for whatever you feel it's worth to you.”

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Slipstream Time Hacking by Benjamin Hardy - WOW

Slipstream Time Hacking by Benjamin Hardy

Print | eBook

The Book in Three Sentences

What if we measured our lives based on “distance” traveled rather than time elapsed? If we measure life by distance rather than time, then it becomes very clear that you can hack time by figuring out how to jump further along the timeline of life. This enables you to live many lives in one lifetime. For example, someone who retires at age 30 will free up an extra 40+ years of life compared to their peers, which means they can live an entire second life that many people will never get to experience.

Slipstream Time Hacking summary

This is my book summary of Slipstream Time Hacking by Benjamin Hardy. My notes are informal and often contain quotes from the book as well as my own thoughts. This summary includes key lessons and important passages from the book.

The faster someone moves toward a desired destination, the slower time moves for them.

But what if we did measure time as a distance? How would our lives look? What if rather than focusing on how long something took, we focused on how far we went?

According to Einstein’s special relativity theory, time is a description of distance traveled.

This is how time relativity works. Time feels the same to each individual but can be vastly different—speed is relative to each person.

What if we were to measure our entire lives as we measure light-speed—as distance traveled rather than time elapsed? How would each day look, if rather than passing through 24 hours, we measured how far we moved that day?

“The man who has lived the most is not he who has counted the most years but he who has most felt life.” —Jean-Jacques Rousseau

After acclimating to the speed of my new system, it became obvious to me that I had covered more ground in terms of time-distance than many of my associates. In other words, while we had all experienced the same few years, I felt like I had aged, or changed, by decades.

Today, innovation is so fast that we accomplish more in a day than previous generations did in a lifetime.

If we measure life by distance rather than time, some people may travel great distances on a given day while others can’t remember a single significant thing they did.

If time is relative, we don’t need to assume one minute means one minute. Perhaps, five minutes could be squeezed into one minute, of five hours, or five years. The compression of time is not a matter of compounding activities, but the compounding of meaning.

If the goals you are pursuing do not require wormholes, your approach to life is far too small. The highest pursuits available are those that literally require exceptions to the rules, because such aims cannot be done conventionally.

Nobody achieves the impossible without thinking they can.

Once-in-a-lifetime opportunities aren’t really that rare.

Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” —Roald Dahl

The Jewish physicist, Albert Einstein, centered light as the single constancy of the universe with his special relativity theory. Rather than time being the absolute and unchanging force as previous theorists assumed, Einstein rendered light-speed constancy as the unchanging backdrop to his theories. Light is the framework of the universe and the fundamental reality.

For example, to a person driving a car, the objects in the car (his iPod or Big Gulp) appear to be motionless despite the fact that they are moving at the speed of the car. The objects are at rest with respect to the driver.

The faster an object travels through space, the slower its progress in time.

The faster an object travels through space, the slower its progress in time. If an object could travel at the speed of light, time would stand still.

To move fast is to have all the time in world.

If we have a lot of time, it tends to be filled with busyness. If we are crunched for time, we use that time efficiently.

Thus, to slow time, one only needs to set shorter timelines. If the goal is to get to Hawaii in 15 years, reduce that timeline to 15 months and voilà, put on your flower-shirt.

If a task is perceived to be unimportant, it will take enormous amounts of time to complete. Conversely, if a task is perceived to be important, it will get done soon—sometimes immediately, depending on how important and urgent.

By pursuing things we believe to be important and breaking them down into their smallest parts, time slows and more is accomplished.

Certain people are moving so fast that they can arrive at destinations in moments that would take most of us decades.

For example, assuming Tim and I had the same goal, if Tim could accomplish this goal in one day (like make a successful multi-million dollar investment) the same would likely take me 10 or more years. Tim is moving over 3,650 times faster than me. Thus, time has dilated 3,650 times for Tim. While he can now set grander and greater goals, I continue plugging along. One day to Tim is 3,650 days to me.

Bill Gates is another who is moving so fast he has potentially traveled the same distance in his life as the combined distance of millions of people.

Advances in technology are a great example of time dilation. Due to the rapid progress of technology, humanity is able to progress hundreds to thousands of times faster than we used to.

From a linear perspective of time, Bill Gates will live the same years as most other people do. From a nonlinear perspective, he is squeezing the same amount of life into seconds that most people experience in their entire lifetime.

Each of us has a vision of the ideal life we want to live. Living congruently with our ideal is how time slows down. Consequently, success is defined as living that ideal for the maximum amount of time. The sooner we get there, the longer we have to live.

“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone” —Henry David Thoreau

When we were children, time slowed down. Time meant something; or more likely, we were oblivious to linear time. Ignorance of time literally was bliss.

In contrast, if we know what we want and align our life to what matters most, to reality, time will slow down. All of those things we have spent our life chasing are nothing more than a distraction from what matters most.

The closer we get to reality, our authentic self and desires, the slower time goes.

What good is money when you don’t have time?

A person choosing to spend large portions of time in an unsatisfying job in order to make ends meet is on a fast track to his deathbed.

You may be young in years, but you are closer to death than you think.

If a moment is remembered, no matter how quickly it passed, that moment lasts forever.

You could live more life in one congruent day than many people live their entire lives.

The goal isn’t an infinite quantity of time, but the highest quality of time. This is where time slows down.

People who think “I will be happy when…” are speeding up their time rather than slowing it down. In other words, they believe that once they accomplish a certain task or goal, only then will time slow. If we could learn how to get to where we want instantaneously, we could learn the truth that happiness is now. Time can slow now.

There is always a way to get to where we want to go almost instantly.

Newtonian time’s most fatal flaw is determinism—the present is determined by the past.

Don’t let what may appear to be a setback become a missed wormhole of opportunity.

Change doesn’t have to take a long time, it happens the instant we decide.

Each person lives in their own perceived reality. Stephen Covey expressed, “We don’t see the world as it is, but as we are.”

When another cyclist rides directly behind the first, they get caught in this particle trail and experience a large reduction of resistance while simultaneously being pulled forward by the front rider’s momentum diffusion. Riding in the slipstream allows a rider to keep pace while using approximately thirty percent less energy.

The root of the word decision means to cut-away and remove other options. Thus, when a decision is made, it is separated from other decisions which could have been made. There are opportunity costs to every decision.

When choosing a slipstream to enter, it is crucial to be mindful. Destinations, as well as paths, must be chosen wisely.

Don’t get stuck in one slipstream just because it worked in the past. What got you here, won’t get you there.

Psychologists have found that the ability to experience joy has a ceiling effect.

Whatever we seek—we imagine the satisfaction to be far greater than it really is. Eventually life is just life again.

This is the experience of the successful. To them, life is normal. Not worrying about time, money, or volatile relationships is just how life is. The newness has long since worn off. However, even they have moments where they wake up and cannot believe how far they have come.

To push my own progress, I chose to surround myself with people several decades (literally) older than me. I made friends with people who were near retirement or already retired. I began to see movies with them, hang out at their houses, and engage in their same activities. I wanted to learn now what took them an entire lifetime of experience to learn. I gradually reduced my time with people my own age, recognizing they were at best, in the same boat I was in, and therefore had less experience and wisdom to offer.

When we buy a new home, it isn’t really costing us $300,000. What it really costs is the time spent working to pay the monthly mortgage.

Sadly, people today not only spend the time they have, they also spend away their futures. To accrue debt is to sell away our future time.

Not only is time the ultimate currency, but in actuality time is our only currency. Our time is the only thing that really belongs to us. Everything else belongs to the world and the universe. We can’t take our money or stuff with us when we die. Although we may “own” something, we don’t really own it. At most, we are stewards over our possessions, but they are ultimately the Earth’s. The only thing that is fundamentally ours is our time. To waste our time is to waste ourselves.

There are three distinct requirements for personal freedom: 1) a heart at peace, 2) healthy relationships, and 3) upright character.

There are many successful businesses but few successful families.

Meaningful moments exist forever in our minds—memories are timeless. We get to relive them again and again.

Leadership is not forcing people to follow. Rather than the bee going out searching for honey, it’s being the flower and allowing the bees to come to you.

In our world with limitless options, limitless books to read, limitless clothes to wear, limitless paths to take, it is extremely important to be picky.

We must not be afraid of committing to our true desires at the expense of forgoing others.

I’m not going to be lured by a great opportunity when it’s the wrong opportunity.

Those who become the greatest and go the farthest are highly selective about what they take on. They are clear on where they want to go and recognize that most of what life offers will not get them there. Almost everything in life is a non-essential distraction

“Most people don’t know why they’re doing what they’re doing. They imitate others, go with the flow, and follow paths without making their own. They spend decades in pursuit of something that someone convinced them they should want, without realizing that it won’t make them happy.”

“Anything is possible, but not everything is possible” —Tyler Rex

Right now, most of us engage in far too many priorities. If we have more than three priorities, we have none.

Everything is a myth. It’s not only impossible, it’s ridiculous. You can’t have it all.

The fewer the priorities in our lives the better.

“The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another; and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it.” —J.M. Barrie

The gap between what we know we should do and what we actually do is enormous.

Despite turbulence and other conditions keeping the plane off course 90% of the flight, most flights arrive in the correct destination at the correct time. The reason for this phenomenon is quite simple—through air traffic control and the inertial guidance system, pilots are constantly correcting. Essentially, the plane is on a straight course and keeps getting nudged a degree off course here and pushed a degree or two off course there. When immediately addressed, these course corrections are not hard to manage. However, if a pilot only occasionally checked the course the aircraft could potentially become so far off course that the requisite corrections would take substantial time and resources to execute.

True commitment can only occur when turning back is no longer an option. This moment constitutes conversion in the highest regards. Failure is no longer caused by a lack of commitment. If you are going to fail, you are going to fail epically. If you are going to succeed, you will live at your highest level.

“It’s easier to hold to your principles 100 percent of the time than it is to hold to them 98 percent of the time.” —Clayton Christensen

When you commit to something 100%, all of your future choices are already made—no matter how attractive the circumstances

A true pro gets paid, but doesn’t work for money. A true pro works for love.

“To the individual, character is destiny. To the organization, culture is destiny.” —Tony Hsieh

Essentialists are people who make fewer decisions, but take the time to contemplate those decisions. By doing so they make fewer, better choices.

Avoid checking email or answering the phone during the first few hours of your day—that time is sacred. Checking your email is simply a database of other people’s agendas. Thus, by checking your email at the beginning of the day, you have already set a pattern that your day is not going to be designed by you, but someone else.

Leveraging other people’s time, skills, and money is essential for getting where you want to go faster. You simply don’t have the time to do it all.

“If you ever find a man who is better than you are – hire him. If necessary, pay him more than you would pay yourself… If you always hire people who are smaller than you, we shall become a company of dwarfs. If, on the other hand, you always hire people who are bigger than you, we shall become a company of giants.” —David Ogilvy

Hundreds of thousands of years ago, the world was local and linear. Humans were hunter gatherers, with limited goals, living in limited space. Consequently, our brains have evolved to think locally and linearly. However, today’s world is global and exponential.

We all have invisible doors in our direct proximity that will transport us decades into our best futures.

The people that have moved the needle of humanity live on forever. The time they have expanded for others is their contribution to humanity—their footprint on evolution.

“Do what is right, let the consequence follow.”

Life is filled with an almost infinite wealth of hard decisions. You are bound to fumble along time way.

One thing is certain, life rewards those who act—the hustlers; not the wishers.

When the end of life comes, we leave with nothing but our relationships.

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60 Lessons I Learned After 60 Months of Blogging

60 Lessons I Learned After 60 Months of Blogging

Every day you keep going, thousands of others quit.

If you want readers, then consistently produce quality content. That’s basically it.

Every day you keep going, thousands of others quit. Keep writing.

Being consistent is probably the hardest part of writing. If you can master that, you will achieve success on at least a modest level.

Consistency beats talent, luck, and even quality. Just keep writing.

Overnight success is a lie. Anyone who gets 200,000 views their “first month” has worked 5 years before that “first month.”

Most content out there actually isn’t that good, relatively speaking. Quality stands out. If you produce quality, you’ll get readers.

If you write inconsistently, you simply won’t succeed. You need to build trust, and you do that by writing regularly.

Everyone’s first draft is shit. That’s OK. Your 2nd draft will be better.

Look — at some level, we’re all scared of what people will think of our writing. It takes guts to publish.

“You just have to outrun everyone who doesn’t have the guts to publish their work.” -Jon Westenberg

There are way better writers out there. Good. Follow them. Learn from them. Buy their stuff and apply it.

Going from 5,000 to 10,000 followers is so much easier than going from 0 to 1,000.

Nobody wants your pitches. Write extremely well, and big guys like CNBC, Business Insider, and Thought Catalog will come to you.

If you want to create a truly great platform, you need to spend at least 10 hours a week on it. Actually, probably 20.

It doesn’t matter how many times you proofread, you’ll still have typos. Have someone else read it. My wife finds like, 5 typos for every article I’ve proofread.

Nobody reads your blog. Right now, Medium is the single best platform for online writers. Your blog is a sad little Burger King with flickering lights hidden in the backwoods. Medium is a huge shopping mall of interested customers ready to buy.

Get followers and fans on Medium. People are actually there.

Actually, you don’t even really need a blog anymore — you can get subscribers, sell your stuff, and get book deals, all from Medium.

Nobody wants your “weekly newsletter. No one wants your “free updates.” If you want emails, you need a seriously awesome free download (checklists and eBooks are good). Even then, about 5% will still unsubscribe immediately after your first hello.

Headlines determine everything. They’re 90% of the battle. Spend money on learning how to write them, if you have to.

Most writers are unwilling to learn the business of writing.

“There is such a thing as a technically gifted yet very boring writer and unsuccessful writer.” Ayodeji Awosika

Great writing by itself is not enough. It’s true — the work of writers like Kafka or Faust would probably be drowned out in today’s daily avalanche of content. But that’s the game now. You gotta learn marketing, man.

Even so, some writers will continue producing amazing content nobody will ever read because they’re too proud to learn how to get people to read it.

“It’s called a ‘Best-Selling Author,’ not ‘Best Author.’” -Robert Kiyosaki

100% freelance work is really hard. Pretty soon, all chairs in coffee shops hurt your butt.

One of the surest ways to quality is through quantity. The more you do, the better you get.

You don’t need social media to be a successful writer.

Most “experts” aren’t experts at all. The loudest voices rarely have the wisest words. Choose your heroes carefully.

SEO isn’t a thing anymore. It used to be. But not anymore.

You probably have a time of day when you write best. That’s when you should write. (For me, that’s early morning and early afternoon).

It’s better to write really great content for 2 hours than merely good content for 6 hours.

If you want to be a great writer, you need to read a lot. Not just articles — books. Lots of books.

It takes a long time to build anything — followers, subscribers, views. Anyone who tells you it can be done in a month is lying.

Build a “quote book.” Mine is up to 22 pages front-to-back of quotes from all the books I’ve read in the past 2 years. It’s where I get 80% of my inspiration.

You can’t be crazy-productive every day. Some days I write a crap-ton, like 6,000 words in one sitting. Other days I don’t write a single word.

Recovery is important. Perpetual productivity is a lie.

Style is crucial. 90% of content out there is booooring. Spend time finding your voice so people can recognize it. There are lots of people who will love your unique style.

I learned the hard way my writing can cause tremendous, hurtful damage if I’m not careful. Writing is powerful. Never forget that.

It’s better to pay for quality than go cheap. Readers can sniff mediocre from a mile out.

Invest in yourself. If readers see you’re too cheap to invest in your work, they certainly won’t invest in you.

I don’t always have fun when I write. Sometimes, I hate my writing. It’s not always a good time. But I do it anyway.

Every writer fears criticism. Here’s an axiom to remember: “Haters confirm greatness.”

Most people still don’t think “blogging” is a viable career option.

…These people are partially right. By itself, blogging is unsustainable. To make a living, you need to expand into selling value — books, courses, materials, etc.

Your success is determined by the size of your thinking. If you think you can, you almost certainly will over time.

Great writing involves great storytelling. Nobody wants to read “how to make a great resume.” But lots of people will read about how one guy turned embarrassment into huge success.

Really long articles have the potential to do really well. So do really short ones with great insights.

99% of articles written by anybody don’t “go viral.” Like any great athlete, singer, actor, CEO, or author, there are always a few really great performances, but many more forgettable ones.

You need to be serious about your writing if you expect anybody to take you seriously. If you don’t care, how can you expect others to?

There will always be a reason not to write.

Be vulnerable. It doesn’t matter if they’re 5 miles away, people will smell the fake.

If you want readers to stay, you have to give people more than they expect. And readers want to stay. Give them reason to.

It’s not about you. It’s never about you. It’s about giving value to other people.

Action cures fear. If you’re scared to publish, the solution is simple: hit “publish.”

Anyone who relies solely on inspiration won’t go far. You can’t wait for your spirit to move — you have to move your spirit.

You can’t be a “serious writer” and not be willing to pay for self-education. If you prioritize “cheap” instead of your message, your message will be cheap.

If you’re a giver, people will flock to you. If you’re a taker, people will treat you the same way.

Great writing can only get you so far. Once you reach higher levels, your relationships and connections matter 10x more.

One of the most exhilarating experiences a writer can have is to see an article get a ton of traffic. It’s like crack.

Bonus:

61. You’re not as far behind as you think. Get started, and keep going.

https://medium.com/@anthony_moore/60-lessons-i-learned-after-60-months-of-blogging-4a3fcc665c33

[zmeul]

50 Lessons I Learned After 50 Months of Blogging You always suck at the beginning. Always. Responding to every comment is never a waste of time. Leaving 5 comments a day on Medium is one of the best marketing strategies you can use as a beginning blogger. If someone emails you a question, that’s a tell-tale sign you have a serious future in blogging. Blogging is the most humbling thing you will ever do. People will light you up if your logic isn’t sound. PLOT TWIST: You can be better than these people if you legitimately try to see their point of view and change. Blogging is by far the easiest/best way to become a better person. You’re constantly having your views attacked/challenged, while others keep their thoughts to themselves. Congratulations, you’re going to grow 1,000% faster than everybody else. Headlines are 90% of the battle. If your post doesn’t present anything new, you shouldn’t even write it. Like, your points should be brand new. If you’ve seen them before in another article, that’s BAD. I come up with all my post ideas directly before I write them. My best-performing blog posts were written in less than 45 minutes. Post sucks? Don’t delete it. Save it and come back to it a month later. If you’re pissed about something, fire up your laptop and write immediately. If you’re pissed about writer’s block, go eat a snickers. Then eat another one. Then come back. You’re welcome. Use Coschedule’s Headline Analyzer. But don’t get too angry if you score a 54. Re-work the headline for 5 minutes then just publish it. Your tribe will read everything you write, not your friends or family (weirdly enough). Scared to post something where you’re being raw? People don’t care as much as you think they do. There is no spotlight surrounding you every moment of every day. I say this to inspire you to publish! During your first six months, it’s best to post every single day. Nobody does this, which means nobody’s getting the practice you’ll be getting. BLOGGING IS ABOUT HEART. You should care about the stats, but don’t let them overwhelm what your soul wants to express. Start building your email list NOW. If you haven’t started yet, stop writing everything and get that set up immediately. It’s THAT important. Be patient. It’s taken me two years to get 40,000 page views per month. Once you start finding success, your growth becomes exponential. I’ve gotten 1,000 email subscribers in the last month alone. Every email subscriber you have equals about $1 per month. If you have a blogging question, Google it. I’ve learned everything I know from Google. A 300-word article crammed with useful advice is MUCH more valuable than a 2,000 word piece with regurgitated fluff. You won’t want to write every day, but neither does anybody else. If you can find a way to get over this, it’s a foregone conclusion that you’ll see success. Writing with zero expectations is a surefire way to enjoy blogging. Just because your article got 5 views doesn’t mean it sucks. Your headline probably just sucked. Don’t throw away 700 great words by spending 10 seconds writing a headline. There are a billion reasons people shouldn’t read your article. Get to your points, and get to them quickly. Writing isn’t always fun. Read that again for me. Everybody has time to write every day. Don’t give excuses. Grammar doesn’t matter that much. Neither do big words. This isn’t a college paper. I write with the vocabulary of a 5th grader. Some of the best writers I know do not speak English as a first-language. Your content MUST be native. A tweet should look different than a LinkedIn status. A Medium post should look different than a WordPress post. Your words will mean nothing if they don’t look natural to the platform. For the love of Pete, use stock images. Do not use weird images you found on Google. Use Pexels and Unsplash for everything. I repeat: EVERYTHING. Like, literally, all you have to do is read the best writers on Medium for an hour and you’ll understand how to make your post look beautiful. Other people will be mean to you in the comments. To disarm them, reciprocate with love. It’s never not worked for me. Writing and blogging are two totally different things. Medium is STILL the best place to grow an audience, period. For the first year, I did everything on my own. Then I started reaching out to other bloggers to meet them/network. This has made the biggest impact on my success EASILY. Building an audience requires one set of skills. Monetizing that audience requires a totally different set of skills. Some of the best writers I know never got into blogging for the money. You shouldn’t either. Get into this because you love to write. Content writing is a long game. You’re constantly telling your story over a period of months/years. With each new post, your audience discovers one more piece of your puzzle. That’s why blogging is so powerful. Haters normally hate on everybody. Just look at their profile and see some of the recent responses they’ve written. Always make your writing about helping other people. This isn’t just about telling your story/a way for you to vent when you’re pissed off. Ground your content in giving more than you take, and you’ll be so much closer to success. The best posts happen when you’re deeply, deeply upset. Use writing to help yourself feel better, then publish it to help other people feel better who are going through the same thing.

https://medium.com/the-mission/50-lessons-i-learned-after-50-months-of-blogging-6603cfcd35bc