Here’s an example of two very different perspectives on an identical situation:

Its raining – lousy weather, i’m stuck on an awful train, i’m going to be late to work because i slept in, i can’t think of anything to write because i made a goal to write a blog every day this week but just can’t keep it up, just want the day off.

Or:

Nice cool weather today, it’s good to be on a train but not sweating like a pig. I slept through my alarm clock – whoops – but I was around for when my daughter woke up, which was sweet. I’ve written 4/5 days this week so far – doing well!

Both are perspectives on the exact same situation. But if you let yourself think like in the first example, you’ll be such a downer, such a grump, that nobody will want to be around you – you’ll even hate your own company. So why not take the second perspective?

You’re going to have to choose one way or the other. You might as well choose to think positively. I know – it’s harder, it goes against the grain, it takes conscious effort, it may simply not be in your personality. But nothing good came of no effort. So make the effort.

Just don’t be fooled into thinking that your current way of thinking is the only option available to you. It is definitely possible to change your perspective. Once you know that you can change, well you’ll just have to live with the knowledge that if you’re not improving, it’s nobody’s fault but your own.

I had a thought the other day which i’d like to expand on (and it doesn’t matter either way, as basically nobody reads this blog!). It was: If you give someone a responsibility, but don’t give them the authority or power to fulfil that responsibility, you can’t really hold it against them when that responsibility inevitably goes unfulfilled. It’s a common principle in leadership and in business.

And it got me thinking about the derelict family up the street. The one that, at midnight once a week runs outside their house screaming at each other, waking everyone up in the street. Now my first instinct is to think ‘Trash! Grow up.’ – as would most people. But after considering my own struggles to deal with smaller issues, it’s hard to not feel hypocritical.

It’s as though we’re responsible for living well (eg: not screaming at your partner out on the street at 1am in my neighbours case, or being more fun to be around in my case), but aren’t given the authority/power to actually live well. And if not, well, who could blame you for being a shouty bogan?

Or is this just justifying our lack of effort at dealing with this stuff? Does ‘free will’ come into play somewhere? Do we actually already have the power to deal with this stuff: is our free will that power? I’m not so sure, because there seems to be an awful lot of people out there living crappy lives. And i’d like to know exactly: what is it that’s different about those random people you occasionally meet, those people who seem to have unlimited reserves of willpower to improve themselves, and seem to be doing really well? What’s their secret?

Or is this concept of responsibility and blame completely irrelevant anyway? If a criminal is who they are because they never were given the power to improve themselves (eg were born to a lousy family, grew up in a lousy school) – you have to forgive them, surely? Of course you’d have to lock them up anyway for the sake of public safety. But it wouldn’t be for punishment’s sake any more: it’d be simply for the purposes of rehabilitation (Ha! Like our prison systems rehabilitate anybody).

But this all strikes me as a little cold. There’s no room for the magic that is the human spirit in all this – and if life isn’t malleable with our free will, then it’s a pretty grim existence. We all love the stories of someone who pulled themselves by their bootstraps out of a crappy upbringing and sitation, the classic underdog tale, because I think it speaks to a deeper truth embedded in our psyche: we do have what it takes within us to win, if only we’d try hard enough.

I really would like to know how it works! I often see people who i’d love to help, love to see them pull themselves out of a hold, but i just can’t figure out how to do it. I can’t make my mind up at all about these issues. But i’m still leaning towards thinking: We can’t really blame people for failing to improve themselves, but we can certainly blame them for failing to try.

There are two types of badasses in this world: idiots and heroes. We all know an idiot or two: the friend that, especially when drunk, is willing to do crazy things with nary a second thought to their safety. Their bravado is simple: fear is simply not part of the equation. But there’s a second type, too: the heroes. These are the average Joes whose life is punctuated by real danger and fear, but who fulfils their true duties despite the presence of fear.

Idiot badasses have no fear at all. It is as though they were born with a part of their brain missing. Or maybe they simply give no heed to the consequences of their actions, as though thinking further than 10 minutes into the future is beyond their capabilities. Or, most insidiously, a bigger fear overshadows every other fear: the fear of being exposed as a scared wuss. The idiot will chase cheap thrills (see: trainsurfing) without a trace of fear, but will never attempt the big challenges of life.

The idiot badass has a big disadvantage over the rest of us: with no fear, he has no compass that points towards what he should be truly doing. When you’ve got a set of goals in front of you, and you’re wondering what to do next, the easiest way to prioritise is to consider which one scares you the most. That is your internal compass pointing you towards which course of action is what you truly should be doing with your life. However, the idiot badass cannot rely upon this, because they have trashed their compass.

True badasses look like you and me. An average life, full of the normal big challenges we all face. These big challenges carry real danger: What if i can’t find a job? I’ll lose the house. These dangers gives rise to fear. This sprinkling of fear is what prevents most people from rising to the challenges they face, and thus they check out, and settle for a second rate existence. But a true badass sees these fears for what they are: hollow bullies that, once confronted, will crumple like a paper tiger. And thus the life of a true badass consists of moving from challenge to challenge, facing and feeling fear the whole time, but fighting forwards with the knowledge that ‘I have what it takes to beat this’.

It is a truly satisfying life, beating increasingly larger challenges and fears, free from the need to chase the cheap thrills that an idiot badass will do. Who needs to go train surfing to prove their bravado, when day in and day out you’re kicking ass when it comes to what is truly important? Personal demons, financial troubles, marriage woes, problems with the kids – all these are the challenges that you were put on this earth to beat. Your life is a hollywood blockbuster. These problems are the stereotypical eurotrash bad-guy, wreaking havoc on the people you love. You’re mission is clear – face your fears, overcome these challenges, do it scared, and kick his ass. Do that, and you’re a true badass in my book.

I think I finally understand the meaning of sacrifice in leadership now. For many years, I assumed sacrifice was all about taking yourself down a peg. It’s as though being born in a first-world country was somehow an unearned privilege, and that you have to make a sacrifice in some way to avoid being a bourgeois pig.

Now that always struck me as a guilt trip, and I hate those. So I relegated the notion of ‘sacrifice’ to the dustbin, and went on with my mission to improve my lot in life. And after my umpteenth frustrating time trying to get work done on my side business whilst packed into a noisy sweaty train, I realised: I’m sacrificing.

It flipped my realisation: sacrifice isn’t a guilt trip, some way of paying back some of what you owe, as though your position of privilege has endeared you with some kind of karmic debt. No – it’s just the nuts and bolts of what is required if you are going to do something with your life.

I could be riding my motorbike to work this morning. The riders at work think i’m crazy not to. But instead, i’m on the train, working on my laptop, gradually making progress on iPhone apps that one day will increase my family’s income. I’m certainly not paying off a guilt debt, i’m working hard towards improving my situation. It’s the polar opposite of my original thought of what sacrifice was about, but i think it’s the more accurate of what sacrifice is about.

All good in theory, but how does this affect my life, though? Well, your perspective on sacrifice affects the type of sacrifice you’ll take. Let’s say you have some unsavoury personality trait that you aren’t particularly proud of. For me, i get too impatient and lose my cool. Well, if I believed that sacrifice was about ‘paying back’, every time i lose my cool I’d go off on a guilt trip as my sacrifice. However if I believe in sacrifice as ‘paying forwards’ towards a better tomorrow, instead of wasting time on a guilt trip I’d be engaging with the painful work necessary to deal with my issues – hopefully with the outcome that i will eventually beat that flaw of mine. Now think – which of those two approaches is more worthwhile? Hands down the latter, in my opinion. Guilt trips will get you nowhere.

Sacrifice isn’t about the past. It’s about the future. It’s the struggle of getting through the tough times necessary to build a better future.

Don’t even bother trying to lead others if you haven’t mastered the art of leading yourself first. Seriously, you’re wasting your time.

It works like this: you’re at the doctor, and he tells you to stop smoking. Even recommends a program. But you can’t help but notice that he smells oddly like cigarettes himself, has telltale yellow teeth, and looks a lot older than the 40 years that you know he is. You think about the program he’s recommending. Well, it worked so miserably for him – as if you’d waste your time.

Or you’re watching some random TV host recommend their latest results-guaranteed exercise program. The same host whose weight has gone up and down like a yo-yo over the years. That’s a recommendation that’ll probably be best ignored.

Here’s the thing: nobody’s looking for wisdom. Find me 10 people who don’t know that the best way to look after your body is exercise + eating properly – good luck! No, we all already know what we should be doing. We just want an example to follow.

Nobody wants to be told what to do. Everyone wants to be shown what to do. Show, don’t tell.

I think this is because we want to see that it’s possible before we try anything ourselves. We need to believe that a certain course of action has paid off for someone else, and that they’re willing to hold our hands, to show us how to do it. Only then will a person follow your advice, because it worked for you, and you’re willing to show them how.

This is also why you’ll end up like your friends: Their examples show you what is possible, and how to get it.

If you can’t kick your own ass into gear, someone whom you are intimately familiar with, how do you expect to be able to kick anyone else’s?

Guest post by Jason McDougall from Ironside Knights

If you had a business idea and someone offered to help you do all the hard work for you, help get your business up and running: what would be your response?

How good would it be if someone gave you proven instructions to help you get out of your current situation, guaranteed the return, and even offered to do the hard work for you. Would you take the leap?

I think sometimes we are scared, not confident in our abilities or just don’t want to see ourselves fail. But what if we could overcome that? When that person says to us: I will hold your hand every step of the way, get you up and running and ensure your success, and all you have to do is believe, what if we were able to take the risk?

Most of us say we would take it. But why is it then that most of us don’t?

Why is it that most of us are afraid: stuck where we are and not willing to step out and take a risk? Or we rationalise, thinking ‘I don’t have that person that will do it for me’. Ok, so I don’t either – but what if you spent an hour a week actually taking concrete steps towards your goals? After all it is only an hour – would you do it?

Take that risk, step out and believe for the impossible. Believe that we can, believe that we aren’t going to be stopped at every corner. Believe that like Benjamin Franklin, with a bit of hard work we too can achieve our destiny.

This week I want to focus on what we believe is the impossible, whether it be changing our attitude, making those sales calls or just teaching our kids something that they will treasure for the rest of their lives. I want to encourage each of us to step up, step out and take a risk. Do it from a place of confidence that we have the potential and we can achieve it.

I’ve been thinking lately about the concept of ‘starting small’, and now it’s the time of year for new year resolutions I’m hoping to marry the two.

So the idea is to approach my new years goals in a small way. Sneak up on them, as it were. Catch them unawares. And then knock them flat.

Watch the chips fly

I maintain that it’s impossible to remain motivated at anything unless you can see progress, the metaphorical ‘chips flying’. So why do we set goals that will take an entire year to accomplish? Who has the kind of discipline to remain motivated in their goal half-way into the year, let alone for the full year?

So here’s my strategy to keep myself motivated: lots of small goals. Ideally, a week each. That way, as i can tick them off rapidly, and see my progress, it’ll be easier to remain motivated.

Games and Scouts

This idea of lots of little goals came to me, of all places, while playing jetpack joyride on my phone. This game has a very common ‘game mechanic’ these days, which is aimed at keeping you engaged with the game. Because the longer they can keep you engaged with the game, the more likely it is that you’ll spend money on upgrades etc.

The game mechanic is to give you lots of small accomplishments as you play. At any time, there are only three goals that you can achieve. The small number of goals avoids too-many-options paralysis and helps keep you focused. And the fact that the goals are simple to achieve keeps you motivated because you can see your progress.

There’s nothing more demotivating than trying to do something incredibly difficult and making absolutely zero progress, is there? You just feel like you’re wasting your time. Which is the feeling this ‘game mechanic’ aims to avoid.

And this mechanic isn’t even a new idea – the Boy Scouts thought of it a very long time ago! Their badge system is the original game-like engagement strategy: lots of small, achievable goals that you can try. And as you achieve each one, you get a nice pat on the back: a little badge to sew onto your uniform. Sometimes i wonder if the game companies deliberately copied this system. It’s genius.

One more thing: as I’ve written about before, it’s impossible to really stick with something if you don’t really believe that you stand a chance at achieving it. So by keeping these goals within your reach, by making them believable, you stand a much better chance of sticking with it.

Example goals

So, when coming up with my goals, i’m keeping a few things in mind so as to emulate the game/scouts system: Keep them simple, short, achievable, and part of a bigger goal.

A bigger goal i have this year is to be less tired and irritable. So my first few mini-goals are:

• Get to bed by 10
• Not drinking any coke/coffee late in the day
• Go cycling every day

These goals will hopefully help me sleep better, by making me more regular in my sleep patterns, with less caffeine in my system and a bit more tired. Better sleep = less tired = less irritable. Brilliant!

How

So how to put these goals into place? In my case, i’m taking one at a time. Each goal will last for a week, and i’ll make a little checklist on a post-it note for each day. I’ll keep this in my wallet and check it off each day, and at the end of the week i’ll hopefully have done well. Once a week, i’ll use Trello to keep track of 3 lists: upcoming goals, my current goal, and accomplished goals. The accomplished goals is important: looking at this list rapidly grow is the key to keeping motivation and momentum up.

The key here is that everything is so simple and achievable. I’m not shooting for the stars or anything crazy. All i’m doing is getting to bed early for a week. Anyone can do that. Then i’ll cut out some caffeine (still have it in the morning though) – who can’t keep that up for a single week? As for cycling, well i’ll do the best i can.

Anyway I think it’s a more realistic system than massive goals like ‘Learn another language’. I mean, goals like that will get you nowhere. It’s like going indoor rock-climbing and going straight to the difficult wall. You’re not going to get anywhere. Much better to start at the shorter walls with lots of easy-to-hold rocks. Which is, in a nutshell, what i’m doing.

And, if i could be so presumptuous, you should too.

So, it’s curtains for 2011, and i’m old now, having just had another birthday. Time to grow up, I guess. Well – in that vein, here’s a bunch of things i learned and grew in over the last year.

Be active, not passive

I spent 4 years in a dead-end job, waiting for something great to happen. Needless to say, it didn’t. Eventually, the revelation dawned on me that I was meant to make that ‘something great’ happen. I should have been active, taking initiative, rather than passive. We’re not meant to sit there and take life as it comes, we’re made to get out there make a ruckus.

This led me to wonder, ok so i’m meant to do something, but do exactly what? Options in life are basically infinite, so you need some boundaries when choosing. Which leads to my next two lessons.

Use what’s in your hand

So – what to do with my newfound zeal for action? Well, the first key is to look at what’s in your hand. Do what you can with what you have. In my case, that is programming skills with making iPhone apps. So I started making lots of apps in my spare time and on the train to work, and putting them on the app store. I contacted a couple of charities and offered to make apps for them.

Try a bunch of things

The next thought i had was to use the concept of ‘failing forwards’ when it came to trying to figure out what i should be doing. Basically, try a bunch of ideas, and see what fails and what works. The failures – well, give those up as a bad idea; as for the successes, keep at it with those.

So for me, working with the charities ended up being a failure. Working on my ‘comet server’ project was another failure. But working on iPhone apps in my spare time was a resounding success.

Start a book club with friends

This year I started a book club with a few friends. We mainly read inspirational / leadership themed books, and meet up every few weeks to discuss what we got out of them. It’s been a great source of inspiration and growth to us all.

Some practical things that have been important: Kindles, not paper books, are the only way to go in Australia – as it simply takes too long to ship books from the states for it to be workable. Also, we’ve decided it all works better if we’re reading the same book, so that we can all discuss it together.

It turns out that Benjamin Franklin did exactly this – set up a book club with friends. In the day of kindles and cheap ebooks, it’s a really easy way to grow.

Start small

One recurring theme in my life this year has been to ‘start small’. In my apps, i try to keep them small and manageable so that i’m more likely to finish them. Same with other projects in life: my friend one day wants to become an ambassador for fatherhood. So we’re working on getting to start small, as a blogger. Once he’s got 100 posts, he’ll write an ebook. Later on, possibly a printed book, and then we’ll see what doors that opens.

The key is to start small, with something that is within reach and currently achievable. Starting small is the key to achieving big things.

If you’ve got no platform, you can still work on yourself

It’s all about building a platform. Someone like Bono has a massive opportunity to make a difference, because of his influence. His fame and influence with world leaders are his platform. And he can act from that platform and achieve far more than most people can.

I’ve found that living an influential life is about building that platform. We start with no platform, then we may have a small platform when we have a family to influence, then a larger platform if we became a business leader, and so on. As before, it is all about starting small, and doing what we can with the platform we’ve got. As we do what we can with our current sized platform, it’ll naturally grow – and then we can do more.

But all this left my friends and I with the question – what do we do, as guys with no platform or influence? Well, we realised that if you’re not in leadership over anyone else, you’re in leadership over yourself. So your own self is your platform. So do what you can with that – build yourself, learn to lead yourself and grow yourself.

I’ve got a plan now

This year’s growth started with the thought: I’m getting older, probably should grow up and do something with my life. But no further plan was forthcoming until much later on. It’s funny how doing the best with what you’ve got brings ideas to the fore about what you can do next.

Anyway my plan (described in another blog post) is to keep working for a few years, meanwhile working on apps in my spare time. And when the time comes that the income from apps reliably eclipses my day job, i would leave work and start a business creating iPad applications for small businesses, with the dream being to emulate the success of Dr Chrono (an iPad medical management app) in Australian hospitals.

It’s surprising what you can achieve with a bit of work

There’s been a lot of hard work this year. Between me and a friend, we’ve written a heck of a lot of apps and blog posts. But it’s been amazing what has come out of it. In his case, his quality of writing has gone through the roof. His first book is looking more achievable by the day. As for me, 10 apps later things are looking bright.

Inspired by a recent popular post on HN about a guy who’s about to turn 30 and laments the lack of actually doing anything in his life…

Ideas

Some people regret the fact that they can come up with lots of great ideas, but cannot execute them. Others are frustrated that they can execute well, but cannot come up with an idea that is original or noteworthy. I personally find myself in the latter – but either way, people are going to be upset that they find themselves on one side of the balance and lack the ability to do the other.

I used to think that ‘ideas are nothing, execution is everything’. I think this idea has been spread wide and far by people who find themselves on the former side of the aforementioned scale, thinking: ‘I’ve got lots of ideas but haven’t prospered – therefore ideas must be worthless’.

Nowadays, I’ve come to the conclusion that ideas are just as valuable as an execution skillset. I’ve spend the last year executing well – i’ve come up with 10 original iPhone app ideas, and executed and shipped all of them in my spare time (and they’re not just “fart apps” – they are useful utilities). So by any measure, i think i can safely claim to be good at execution.

But here’s the rub – 2 of my apps are the only ones that have done well. And, to me, these were among the most poorly executed of my apps – they certainly didn’t take more than a couple weeks each to develop, with no marketing whatsoever. So, i’ve come to conclude that the ideas behind these apps, in terms of creating something that people actually want to buy, have made them successful.

For an opposing example, let’s pick on my first app, which allows you to enter your 20 favourite recipes. It will then choose a week’s worth of dinners at random, and compile a combined shopping list for you, and let you tick off the items as you purchase them. Now the market has decided that this idea isn’t worth paying $1 for. Hey, what gives? I executed pretty well – its not an awful app, why won’t people buy it? I can only conclude – the idea sucked.

So, if you’re what we call in Australia an ‘Ideas Man’, don’t be too upset – the world needs your great ideas just as much as it needs people like me who can execute on them.

Growing

And who’s to say you’re at one end of the scale or the other? Who’s to say that i’m good with ideas, therefore i must be awful at execution? Who’s to say that if i’m good at grinding out the work and getting things done, I mustn’t be very creative?

The two skills aren’t mutually exclusive. There’s no reason you can’t be good at both. If you’re great at one, there’s no reason you can’t grow to become good at the other. People can grow and change, if they believe they can. I mean, i’m sure you’re better at a lot of things than you were 10 years ago.

Becoming an Ideas Man

This part is for me: how to get better at ideas. James Altucher talks a lot about your ‘Idea Muscle’ – basically his idea is that the creative part of your brain is plastic, and if you practice enough, it will get better at coming up with ideas.

So his exercise is to spend 10 mins each day coming up with ideas. Just get a post it note, and scribble down 10 ideas each morning, to get the juices flowing. Start with writing down terrible ideas, just so long as you’re coming up with any ideas you’ll be working out your brain. And inevitably the ideas will improve with practice.

It’s worth a try – i’ll see how I go with it. If nothing else, it’ll provide me with, on average, as poor ideas as I already have – but due to the volume, there’ll surely be a couple of gems in there that’ll be worth executing on.

(And ladies, the reason I don’t say ‘Ideas Person’ is because in Australia, ‘Ideas Man’ is a bit of an amusing meme.)

Become an Execution Man

How to get better at ‘getting things done’? Well, for me, i’ve found the key is to start small. Recognise that you have a set ‘attention span’ and work on projects that fit into that span. And each time you ‘ship’, your confidence and thus your ‘attention span’ will bump up a notch.

For instance, my attention span for any project is about a month. If anything takes longer than that, i’ll become demotivated, disinterested, and bored – it simply won’t get done. So the key is – when starting a project, i think ‘can i do this in less than a month?’. If so, i’m golden – i’m confident i can get through it with my motivation intact.

If you bite off more than you can chew, you’ll end up with a string of large projects that you only got ½ way through and abandoned them. Don’t be tempted to take on those large projects – if it’s ego, or ambition making you do it, well swallow your pride and try biting off something a bit more ‘bite sized’.

Babies start with small spoonfulls of smooshy stuff: if you feed them too much they’ll spit it out. You’re like that – start with small smooshy projects, and as you personally grow in your ability to execute, work your way up to a massive steak of a project.

The key is to start small, and take on bigger projects as your capacity grows bigger. Just be sure to take on projects that you can finish – because each time you finish, your confidence will grow. Don’t take on projects that you can’t finish – because when you fail, you’ll shrink. As you stick to achievable projects, your confidence, attention span, and motivation will grow.

Keep growing :)

I was initially thinking of titling this post ‘Making a dent’, in memory of Jobs' memorable quote about putting a dent in the universe. However, I believe that enough people are already sold on the idea of making a dent, while there are not enough people sold on the how or the execution of making said dent.

So here we are: how do you make that you-shaped dent you were born for? I believe the answer is simple: start small, do what you can, take small steps, and build on those steps.

What does this look like?

Goal

Here’s my goal, inspired by a talk recently given by John Gruber about the rise of tablets: Using tablets, take computers into fields where computers never made it before, because people in those fields don’t sit at a desk all day.

Strategy

Here’s my big-steps plan, or strategy if you will:

• Get free from the dayjob in a few years
• Use that freedom to make said dent

My thinking is that you can’t change the world if you’re stuck from 8am-6pm doing another man’s bidding. You may be lucky however – your dayjob may be all the platform you need to change the world (i’m looking at you, nath and matt).

Small steps

And i also have a small-steps plan, or tactical plan if you will:

• Make iPhone apps in the evenings / train trip / weekends whilst employed in a day job
• Hopefully not neglect the family too much in doing this!
• When, in a few years, this is bringing in enough income to overtake my day job, i will resign and be able to work full-time on my ideas
• I will then use the strategies in this post about cold calling to make some contacts with local small doctor’s practices
• Build a iPad (+web/mac) app to manage medical records and the ancillary affairs of a doctors practice, with one of my contacts. Make it so good that they just love it.
• Sell it to lots of doctor’s practices, and work towards selling to the big companies that own many practices
• Leveraging my reputation gained by this point, get a small regional private hospital to work with me to build the features they’d need
• Sell to other private hospitals
• Sell to public hospitals / government, and…
• BAM! Australia’s medical industry has been disrupted. Imagine how effective our health system would be if it was liberated from its crushing paperwork load.

How this works

See how every one of my steps above in my specific plan involves achievable, small steps towards bigger things?

It’s all about small steps: doing what you can with what you’ve got, and doing stuff that builds you a platform for doing something bigger.

Even if you don’t have a big goal that you want to work towards, practice the skill of doing small things with what’s available to you now (your time/skills/resources). Get good at execution, and direction will inevitably come. And once you’ve got that direction, start taking baby steps in that direction.