Mind the Beginner

You have a passion and you definitly want to do something with it later in life? You want to work in a field where you can exploit that passion and convert it into money? Of course! We all want that and we all have the right to do so. But maybe you are not sure enough about your passion, is this really what you love to do? Is this actually your passion?

Why wait until you’ve figured out?
You can wait until you’ve figured it out all of the blue, or you can take some actual action. Start right away, and the start doesn’t need to be very big, just start exploring, experimenting. Test what you really love, go beta on your passion!

How to go beta on your passion

• Find your passion. A big one and the most important one, you would say. But this is just a beta version of your passion! So you can be wrong, you can do something and find out that you don’t ‘absolutely love it’ and that is ok, cause this is beta! Look for your passion, imagine what you would love to do for the rest of your life. Found it? Great, next step!
• If it is something you can do for yourself, do it! Is your passion sharing ideas on kind of teas, or papyrus scrolls? Start a blog about these subjects! Find a readership who is also interested in the topic you are interested about and start develop yourself on that topic. After having a blog for a year, you will be way more knowledgable than before on the subject and it will be a great experience. And with a blog, you maybe can start to cash in on your passion just a little. Besides all of that, you are building an online presence and that can be your resume when you leave college, or start applying for a job.
• Go and intern! If your passion is something you can’t do from your own home, look for a company which does what you love! If it is your passion, you would do it for free (and of course, some experience, resume building), so go interning! Find a company what is doing what you love to do and find somebody who you can talk to who works there. Tell him/her that you are absolutely loving what they do and that you want to do exactly what do, but not right now. But you want to intern right now, in order to find out if this is really your passion. You are free, you are motivated, why shouldn’t they hire you?
• Evaluate. Is this what you really love to do, is this what you can do the rest of your life? Congrats, you’ve successfully found your passion and you may be ready to take your beta version to an official version! Is this not what you really love to do? Start over again, nothing is lost! You’ve just got more experience!

If you are not ready to quit your normal job, if you are not sure enough about your passion right now, start a beta version of your passion. Test, test more and find you ultimate passion, with experience and a resume as a bonus!

This is a guest post by Stefan Knapen who runs the blog StudySuccessful.com, a blog full of study hacks and personal development tips.

One step at a time

Check out the Empire Building Kit and take one small step a day towards your business

Chris is offering his empire building kit one more time, but isn’t going to make a lot of noise about it this time. It’s a strictly low-profile launch so here’s a heads-up. You don’t want to miss out on this chance to work with one of those powerhouses in the bloggosphere.

What is the Empire Building Kit?

The EBK examins the process of building your own successful business. Defined here as a small business where you have one or perhaps two employees. At it’s core is of course something that the owner (this could be you!) loves to do. That’s the business part, the success part is defined as an annual income of $50,000 up to $150,000. A small business; a huge revenue. You like how that sounds? Read on!

Chris takes up this process in a way that works absolutely great and I’ve talked about often: ever smaller steps. There are 365 steps in the kit to be exact. One step a day the Empire Building Kit walks towards the goal of becoming your own boss (emperor if you will, or empress) You’ll get one mail a day, and all the extra’s.

Be warned however, the EBK demands hard work, as do all businesses. But you already know this so that won’t be a problem. If you don’t have a business yet, you’ll learn the fundamentals, if you already have a business the EBK will help you seriously increase your business income.

What do you get?

As said, the launch is under the radar but Chris offers you “a FREE copy of Backyard Biz Profits that helps you apply online biz-building principles to your local city or neighborhood.” if you pick up the kit TODAY. (It will cost you $50 after that) That of course is just the bonus, the kit itself comes in three flavours, depending on your taste: Emperor-in-Training, Hail Ceasar, and Alexander the Great (More info on the options at the Empire Building Kit site)

The kit is packed with video interviews, audio recordings and case studies. Everything you’d like to know. These aside you also get the 365 daily steps to that empire of your own. The case studies will teach you a lot about how real people actually did it and became their own boss. But you’ll not only hear how they did it, you also get the inside information about money, it’s what keeps a business going after all and you’ll need to know these things.

Think not only along the lines of “How much money did you make last year” but also “What is your best seller” and many other questions. There’s no use in just being told that you earn “enough”, that would be like shopping for a new car and nobody willing to tell you the mileage you’ll get or what the insurance would cost. You need details like that and the Empire Building Kit offers you the details.

Check out the Empire Building Kit and take one small step a day towards your business

Every day I’m confronted with problems, problems of my own and problems other people have. And as with all problems I like to see them for what they are: challenges and puzzles to be solved. Sometimes problems are much easier to solve than you’d think. Take the classic Gordian Knot, a very complex knot impossible to untie but made short work of with a sword. Other problems might not be that easy but are still easy enough when cut down to size a bit.

The trap

The hard part here is yielding the sword properly. Cutting the problem down to size will in the end leave you with a very simple problem to solve, but will the solution still hold in the big picture? You could cut the knot, but what if the owner of the rope would get very upset if you cut the rope, which was a family heirloom? You got so focused on finding a solution to the knot itself that you forgot the context.

Just a few days ago I made this mistake in a very complex problem. I kept reducing and cutting away until I got the simple solution, but I forgot all about the context of the problem. My solution to the small problem would actually do exactly the opposite when applied to the problem in situ.  If someone turns down your solution because of this, they are absolutely right to do so. Nobody wants to make things worse now do they? And of course I’m sorry for suggestion such a stupid and short-sighted “solution”.

Keep the context in mind

Finding answers to questions is what we all do. Even up to the point of “If it won’t fit… get a bigger hammer” or “You’ll just have to make time”. Did you ever try actually making time, let’s not go there. Fact remains that when you whittle down a challenge, reducing it to a single step, that step may no longer be an answer to the question. While simplification is a very nice tool, and you can cut away a lot of things that don’t matter at all. If you cut away even a single chip of the context that has a direct or indirect impact on the problem, you just changed the problem and so the answer.

So there you are hacking away at the problem, making it smaller and smaller. It’s actually starting to look like the answer just like making a statue of an elephant from a piece of marble is as simple as chipping away everything that doesn’t look like an elephant.  We all look on while you’re blurred behind a cloud of chippings and then suddenly we hear that dreaded word “oops”.

…

Thankfully you noticed that you messed up and didn’t present your answer as the answer to the question right? What? You didn’t notice!? You were so happily chipping away that you didn’t notice? We’ll just have to display that elephant without a tail and hope nobody bothers to look at the backside of the statue. You might pull it off every now and then, but you will know the tail isn’t there and I’m sure it will get noticed once you realise that the statue was meant to be placed on a low pillar in the centre of a lawn.

The clear view

If you want to simplify problems you’re always free to do so, at your own risk. If you’re to extreme you’ll get into trouble. If you’re not extreme enough you still have a lot of work to do. Simplification is a very delicate business and more of an art-form than just a skill. Something I’ve definitely not mastered yet but am working on every single day to perfect.

What are you trying to simplify?

How many online resources can you name in one minute that talk about how to make money online? Getting rich quick schemes, membership sites giving you all the details, eBooks giving you pointers on things you actually already know. You already know it’s not that hard to make money online. But of course, the problem is that it takes a lot of work, and if there is something you don’t want to do it’s work hard for your cash right? You want an online income, and you want it yesterday.

And this is your lucky day! In this blogpost I’m going to explain to you exactly how you can do it.

It’s actually magic:

Describe exactly what you need

But of course, if you want something you’d better be sure what it is exactly that you want. It’s just like making a wish. You can’t be vague about it. Have a nice clear image in your mind about the goal you want to reach. Let’s say you want to be earning 1k a month by the end of summer. Imagine yourself checking your bank account and seeing all the money, imagine how it feels. Do your best to get rid of any vagueness. Keep track of the whole and of every single minute detail. Feel it, make it as real in your mind as you possibly can. This actually is essential to the whole process.

Do you have a clear image? Do you know what it is you desire? Wonderful, let’s go on with step two

Use exactly the right words

Now write down what it is you want. If you’ve read older blogposts of mine you’ll know it’s very hard to put to words what you’re thinking. But give it a go anyway. To help you a bit with how specific you need to be here’s a quick mind game: Imagine that the one granting the wish is an evil djinn who will do everything he can to distort your wish into something not so pleasant. Don’t wish what you’ll become 100. Be a bit more exact or you’ll have a beard before sundown. It might take you several pages to describe this, that’s alright obviously because then you’ll have something you could even show others to make your idea clearer to them. If you find that you forgot about some details, go back to step one and try again.

Now you have that piece of paper, an exact representation of what had in mind, put to paper. It’s on to step three

Perform exactly the right rituals

You want to earn money from your blog by selling an eBook or some other product? (Just guessing here) You know what to do don’t you? Select exactly the right niche, write a good product you know will be worth every dollar you charge for it, build your blog audience and make sure people know what you are all about. Build subscriber numbers, search engine traffic, use social media. Do all those things you’ve read bout hundreds of times by now. You know what the rituals are, and if not you can quite easily find everything online. You’re not alone in this obviously, there are thousands if not millions of others trying to do the same thing.

What do you say? That sounds like work? Absolutely not, it’s magic! Or you might call it religion. You go to a house or worship, light a candle or incense and pray to a certain saint to get something. Be sure to light the right incense and use the right words in prayer to the right saint. Get it? It’s magic. You invest some time to get something for -almost- nothing.

The alternative

You might be on to me by now, I sure hope so. You need to do things to get things, there is no such thing as the free lunch after all. But there is one alternative way to make your wondrous wish come true. There is? Yes there is. It’s the simplest way actually, I was saving the best for last:

Hire a wizard who can do it all for you, he’s a magic expert after all right? There is just one tiny draw back: it will cost you.

And now back to the real world. There is no such thing as magic, but there are wizards. They just aren’t the magical kind. These are the people who actually learned how to perform the rituals, who invested time (and money) into learning everything and went out and did it. They could have hired a wizard to do it for them but they wouldn’t be one themselves. Now they are “in the know” and offer there services to anyone willing to pay their steep prices. You can buy eBooks written by them where they teach you how to do what you can find online for free. It’s where they got it.

Because you don’t want to learn how to do it yourself, knowledge is money. Realise this, invest time into learning something other people want to have/know and sell it. You’re the wizard now.

A lot of blogs I follow seem to be doing an end-of-the-year review. I myself have been thinking about this a while now and see no reason not to do one. When this year started I didn’t own a blog, I wasn’t active on social media and had never earned a single dollar through online sales (not counting ebay, but that’s not business).

Three small things but I started in all three and combined they made a huge difference. It began with reading the four hour workweek. As I have the habit of writing down the date on which I bought a book inside it’s cover I an tell you that I bought it on October 28th 2008. I read it the following days and reread sections over the following months. The first thoughts about lifestyle design were born and I started reading blogs. A few months later I decided to start blogging over at mindthebeginner.wordpress.com (March 13th 2008). You might recall the adres, it’s where I build this blog to it’s first 100 subscribers. I was doubtful about starting a blog for a long time, thinking I had nothing to write that people would actually want to read. I was wrong and Taking part in probloggers 31 days to building a better blog challenge helped me get into the ways of blogging.

Blogging is not the only thing I started as said, I also got into Project Mojave thanks to my friend Carl. Although I didn’t stay there it did open my eyes to the possibilities of inernet and that things really aren’t that hard if only you believe in yourself and your own capabilities. With so many people online there are bound to be people who want hear what you have to say.

Right now I’m still not completely happy with my blog though. The look isn’t to good and reader interaction isn’t what I’d like it to be. So there we have a goal for the next year. But there are many more goals for the new year. 2010 Will be a themed year for me: freedom. Freedom in many ways, and of course something this vague needs measurable goals so let me give you an outline of what I’m going to do this year:

The Goals

Most significant of all I’m setting the goal of a monthly income of at least $500 a month through online ventures to be reached by the end of 2010. Combined with this the total spendings for 2010 will not be more than the total income. I could try and do that on a monthly basis but I pay my tuition in one go and that will most certainly be more than my monthly income. Freedom of finance.

My second area of goal setting is this blog. I want to reach the 300 subscribers mark by the end of the year and give you at least 100 blogposts over the next year, spread evenly. (So no overload of blogposts in December just to reach this goal.). Also I want to redo the layout and provide you with a better blogreading experience. I might just start using “headway” but I’m still on the fence about that one. A blog to write about freedom, minimalism and zen-inspired life.

In the computer area I have three goals. First off, touch-typing in qwerty. I type a lot of course. Not only in blogging but I’m almost always behind my computer and touch-typing will improve my speed greatly. My education is training me among other things to be a programmer and it’s silly to have to keep watching the keys and be slow just because I use six fingers and cant’ find the [, \ , ; and ] without looking. Secondly I’m going to set up my desktop to be a Linux-only computer. Not because I’m anti-windows (actually I think Win 7 is very good) but because I want to challenge myself and I can see only advantages of knowing how to work with more than one OS. Lastly I want a laptop, so I can properly blog and work/study wherever I am. Something highly portable but capable, like a thinkpad T500. Of course this will run on Linux. The sidenote here is that I’m not going to pay for this laptop with anything else but the income I plan to make through online ventures. Freedom to work/study/play where I want.

In the category of brain-development and useless skills I have another nice set of goals. I want to be able to solve a Rubik’s cube in 60 seconds or less. (Of which I will be posting a video on this blog as soon as I reach that goal.) I know it’s completely useless but It’s something I’ve wanted to be able to do for a long time now and it keeps bugging me.
I want to be able to juggle three balls, yes it’s completely useless, or so you might think. But its a great way of training the brain and developing hand-eye coordination. Together with the cube it’s something from my childhood I never learned and watched others do. Who said every goal needs to be useful.
Speedreading, you’ve probably heard of it, is something I’ve also wanted to be able to do. Although I can reach roughly 600 wpm (words per minute) right now I want to raise this to over 1000 wpm both in Dutch and English. Thicker books will not hold me captive for countless hours anymore. Information is freedom and more information is more freedom.

The minimalism goals are next. A long long time ago I blogged about the 100 items challenge and I must confess that I’m still not there. Why would I want to do this? I want less clutter, more space and a serene living space. I will have to get rid of dozens of books, and all those things that represent cash value but are a total pain to get sold for a descent price. It’s to cluttered right now and have more things ties you down and limits freedom.

Last but certainly not least we have body and mind developments. Five points here, but three are things I’m already doing and need to keep up. (Okay, it’s more of a want but feels like a need)
I want to keep meditating daily for 20 minutes using the methods of zazen. Combined with this it’s always a good idea to take up physical activities so I’m going to run, continuously for an hour somewhere between two and three times a week. I’ve been running for a while now but it’s hardly consistent. The last physical thing I want to keep doing is continue training t’ai chi. Following a weekly class every Thursday evening and I will stay at that for as long as I can, which is probably until I finish university.
As mentioned there are five points, so two are new ones. The first is a huge things if you know anything about personal development and productivity. And of course…. it’s something I’m not doing right now so here it is: I want to become an early riser. Getting up at 6.30 Monday through Friday consistently. Seeing as I live about 15 minutes by bike from Uni and we never start before 8.45 am that leaves me with enough time to write blogposts and perhaps even go for morning runs and/or meditate in the morning as well. We’ll have to see how that goes.
The last goal on this extensive list is something I’m absolutely not sure about if I will be able to do but I want to take up Aikido. Again this is a weekly course but the timing is horrid. Mid-day somewhere and that might interfere with my roster. I just hope it’s possible.

There you have it, my 2010 shortlist:

“Freedom”

• Financial

*Monthly “internet income” of $500
*Live below means

• Blogging

*300 subscribers to this blog
*100+ blogposts in 2010
*New layout

• Computer-related

*Touch typing in qwerty
*Having Linux as only OS
*A laptop (Payed for with internet income)

• Brain development

*Solve Rubik’s cube in 60 seconds or less (and post a video of it here)
*Juggling with three balls
*Speedreading 1000 words a minute in Dutch and English

• Minimalistic living

*Complete the 100 items challenge

• Body development

*Continue meditating daily for 20 minutes (zazen)
*Continue training in T’ai Chi
*Run more consistently (2-3 times a week, one hour at a time)
*Become an early riser (6.30 am Mon – Fri)
*Take up Aikido if possible

An almost insane list to complete and I forgot one essential thing: Do all this AND get proper grades! In the new layout this list will get it’s own dedicated page so you can keep track of the developments. I’ll also be making a so called bucket list (Things to do before you kick the ..) and that too will get it’s own dedicated page. I’m sure this list will develop a bit over the year, but nothing will come off, if anything, things will be added.

With that being said all that is left is to say Thank You! for making 2009 an awesome year where I learned loads of things and finally found my path in life. I couldn’t have done it without you. Enjoy these last days and I hope to see you in 2010

Greets,

Christiaan

There’s a buzz in the lifestyle design sector the last few days. Clay Collins is about to re-open Project Mojave to the public. For a modest fee you can take part and learn how to build a “freedom business” in 3.8 months.

But what is it exactly. What I can tell you is that the project is a collection of people who have combined their skills in teaching people how they can set up an Internet business with the goal of making an income that’s automated leaving you with enough time on your hands (because you no longer have to work) to do what you really want to do. You’ll be freed from the bonds of the 9 to 5 till 65.

Sounds great doesn’t it? Well, yes it’s a sales talk of course it sounds great. But does it really work?

No! it’s not a magic program that will get you up to speed and guarantee you your freedom business. For Clay it’s a business and as any business it earns him money. 200 people, times $99 a month or something like that equals buckets full of money, split in several pieces to pay all the other stakeholders and it’s still a lot of money every month.

But you know what? That’s perfectly alright, it’s a get rich scheme for Clay but at the same time its a wealth of knowledge brought together in one place. All the knowledge is out there on the Internet but most people can’t find it. At Project Mojave it’s all there in easy bite sized bits and easy to follow tutorials. Setting up a business really isn’t that difficult, save for one single thing everybody seems to keep forgetting:

It’s damn hard work! Hundreds of hours you need to spend staring at numbers until you find a niche, hundreds of hours working on an information product. So in the end it’s not a get rich quick scheme. It takes many many hours of dedicated work. On both sides… You get a lot back for your $99 a month, knowledge painstakingly gathered and tested over and over to give you the best possible chance to make it through and be successful. All it takes is a lot of perspiration, some inspiration and a modest monthly fee.

You’ll be in there with people like Jonathan Mead, Johnny B Truant, Laura Roeder and Carl R Nelson, all discussing their take on things and helping you get through the program through discussions on a lively forum.

If you’re up to it and believe this is the path for you, click the banner below and take part on the project, I promise you that if you do the work you’ll make it through. Just don’t underestimate it…  Good luck!

Chances are that you’ve read the four hour workweek, it’s also very likely that you know who Seth Godin is and the name Leo Babauta might even ring a bell. Just a few resources (almost) all people into lifestyle design have heard about.

But names these to just about anyone in daily life and they will have no idea what or who you are talking about. The whole idea of Location Independence (after all, a goal for most lifestyle designers) is completely unknown to them and they are certain you are out of touch with reality. Or at least have very romantic views on how the world works. The possibilities of Internet in the field of generating passive income streams is shrouded in mystery and above all, in disbelief. What are the actually chances of setting up such an income?
Maybe 1 in 1000 people will find a way to generate such an income, and just a few of those will be able to life from that income alone.

Blogging isn’t the way to make loads of money, we all know that right? Yes there are a few bloggers out there who have managed to do very well indeed. (Leo and Darren for example) but most Location Independent Professionals (LIP’s) have different ways of generating their income. Through sales on their blogs/websites, through affiliate programs and general advertisement.

Although I don’t have exact numbers (if you have them, please do share them) I like to believe that it’s not that hard to set up a passive income online. They key here is knowledge.

• Americans under age 60 with incomes under $30,000 per year and those with a high school education or less are considerably less likely to use a computer than their higher income and more educated counterparts
• 49% of adults say they’re keeping up (with computer development); 49% say they’re being left behind
• 75% of Americans use the Internet and spend an average three hours a day online
• Only 30% of cell owners send text messages – but that’s double what the number was two years ago
• One in three cell owners doesn’t know how to use their cell properly (that is, simple configurations)
• a new blogger [joins] the crowd every 40 seconds
• 94 % of high-school seniors have Internet access

A few random statistics that tell us that certainly not everyone is keeping up with all the online developments and there are enough people who -quite harshly said- simply aren’t tech savvy enough to make full use of the networks on offer. Yes, there are millions upon millions of bloggers out there. But what percentage of those bloggers has heard of lifestyle design? It’s a small niche. I’ve been asking around in class and nobody seems to have taken a serious look at things. (and mind you, I’m talking about future software engineers and information scientists here)

If you think what you know about lifestyle design is general knowledge, ask around on the following topics: polyphasic sleep, speedreading, outsourcing, raw food, flashpacking, purple cows, tribes and vagabonding to name but a few.

Grasping the possibilities

If these people, who spend almost every waking hour in the vicinity of a computer with Internet access don’t seem to grasp the full potential of the passive income stream chances are very few people out there really give it a go. Of those who try, most will fail, quite simply because they haven’t done enough research to find out how things actually work. Finding a niche is one of the toughest things you have to do if you want to be successful at this game. Mind you, although in your real life you might be the only one thinking about these things (I know I am…) there are thousands out there trying to do the same. Of those thousands there are a few hundred with enough knowledge to make it work, of those a couple of dozens found a viable niche….

Now putting it all together: Although the Internet is huge and expanding faster than the universe right after the big bang there is just a statistical handful of people who seriously explore the possibilities of lifestyle design and location independence. We’re right there at the front edge of the field, the early adopters. And being here gives us a huge advantage. We know what others don’t know yet. If you’re able to put all the knowledge to action and really give this a go you’re a very rare breed indeed.

You can be the one type, those who don’t try and those who don’t know are the other. Who do you want to be?

As you might now I ride a rather old motorcycle that’s not very fuel efficient (Roughly 42 miles per gallon if I converted it correctly.  18 km/l). As I was riding on the highway last Saturday my fuel ran out, thankfully I have a reserve in the tank so I switched to that. An additional 3 liters of fuel (0.8 gallon) to get me home. More than enough range but as I rode off to uni today I was feeling a bit uneasy as to how much fuel was left, I didn’t fill up yet. Would I run out halfway and have to walk?

This wasn’t the case, but after class I walked back to my motorcycle wondering if I could make it to the gasstation. I can tell you, it’s very unpleasant riding like that. Anyone driving a car with the fuel light on can tell you that.

Well, now something interesting happened: I started holding back. Easing down on the throttle, trying to predict/time stoplights and even shutting down the engine entirely on a long stretch downhill, all in the name of fuel economy. This huge change in style got me thinking, how much effect can you have on your mileages if you change your driving style. I usually tend to gun it a bit.

A short internetsearch later I ended up with a frequently used term on the internet although I’ve only found it in combination with cars (and hybrids in particular) “hypermilers”. A phrase used to describe those people who try to squeeze every last inch out of every gallon while using street-legal production cars.

Although not all tactics are usable on a motorcycle there is one main tactic that is more important than all others combined: stay calm and relaxed. This means no sudden changes in speed or direction, also described as “Foot control, hand-eye coordination, and anticipation”. One study found that jackrabbit starts and hard brake stops reduce travel time by only about 4 percent—that’s 75 seconds on a 30-minute trip. And we didn’t even factor in tire, engine and brake wear. A few tactics applicable to motorcyclists  are:

• Stay off the brakes
• Accelerate as slow as you can without causing problems for other road users
• Idling is zero miles per gallon…. stay moving if possible
• Stay out of puddles and grooves
• Uphill: gather momentum to take you over, you’ll slow down at the top. Time it so you barely roll over and start gaining momentum again on the downhill.
• Turning off the engine and rolling (Can be illegal, check local laws)
• Tailgating/slipstreaming (Again, can be illegal)
• Get your tuires up to proper pressure, perhaps even a bit harder
• Clean out the air filter
• Check and clean your oil regularly
• Keep the chain properly lubed and at the right tension
• Try to minimise drag
• Try to minimise weight

Try these tactics at your own risk of course, and please do put on a high-vis vest, you’re vulnerable as a motorcyclist even without doing these things. And of course, if you can do something on a bicycle or by walking, don’t use something with a combustion engine.

Now if you’re wondering why I would like to save gas, I have exactly one reason for it: Frugality. If I calculated this correctly I filled up my gastank today at the cost of $7.31 per gallon. (€1.32 per liter). Thankfully it’s a small country and my average trip is just over 40 miles but still, it’s no fun seeing all that money just evaporate so some frugality is in order. I’m not one for extreme green thinking, I wouldn’t mind solar panels on my roof and a windmill in the backyard but it’s not a must for me. Just by being a minimalist I find that I’m greener than most, no need to overdo it and build a composting loo as well. When the time comes for a “new” car I’ll go for a prius or some other hybrid but for now, it’s an old ratbike and doing everything I can to save money on gas.

Stay calm while riding and control your right hand, slow down and enjoy the view at the same time. It’s a true challenge to get as many miles as possible, treat it as a game and constantly try to get the new highscore.

Good luck and remember: relax, focus and have fun!

Not to long ago I got a mail from Jean asking me how I handled food and eating. She herself found that “a simple (mostly raw) seasonal consumption of food works best”

I have just one guideline I try to follow in all food:

Concerning food that I buy/prepare myself. If I can’t tell what’s in there I probably won’t eat it.

I try to stay clear from processed stuff, canned things and anything in a plastic bowl you need to nuke for a few minutes. Come to think of it, I have a disliking for nuked food in general. Yes it’s flaming hot, but it’s also limp, tasteless and most times if there is any flavor involved everything tastes the same. I don’t read labels a lot (the only time I do is because my girlfriend is a vegetarian and they put meat in the oddest things lately.

If someone else is cooking I generally don’t look to close, I’m not a fussy eater at all and will eat anything you put in front of me. If we ever meet face to face, just try me.

In general, I eat because my body needs it, either food because my stomach is growling or something protein rich after running. I hardly ever eat because I like to or as comfort food. Needless to say I have no obesity issues. A nice “benefit” is that if there is anything that’s the opposite of a sweet tooth, I have one. I drink a lot, a lot of water and tea, no soda’s for me… hardly any coffee. To make sure I don’t have to buy drinks while not at home I always have a 16 oz Nalgene bottle with me, filled with water. I top it up every chance I get. A simple but very effective way to save money and healthy too.

Well, that’s it in a nutshell for me. If you have more questions, please do ask them.

In the mean time I have a question for you: What is your take on food?

Every day we make choices in our life, what to drink what to eat, where to go and what to do. But those are not the choice I want to talk about here. I want to have a closer look at those other choices otherwise known as taste or value.

As soon as we value something there are things that “better” or “worse” than that thing. In short we’re constantly comparing whatever it is that crosses our path and it limits us, it limits us severely.

Picking flowers

If a flower is less beautiful than the one you saw yesterday, is it a lesser flower? How about this blogpost, how does it compare to other blogposts, not only on this blog but compared to all other blogposts out there. Do you see the limitations? We find it harder (or even impossible) to appreciate what’s in front of us because something else has a higher assigned value.

It’s impossible to stop comparing but it’s not impossible to stop choosing the one over the other. Why wait for something better that’s out there when you have something great in hand. To many opportunities go passed this way just because they don’t compare favorably to your golden standard. To much time is wasted in hunting down these golden standards when something lesser (again, an assigned value) is right in front of us.

You loose a lot of opportunities and time this way.

Letting quality slip

Am I advocating no longer chasing quality? Certainly not! Yes that newest model phone is better, even the best out there but isn’t your current model almost as good? After all, you were happy when you first got it right? The quality of what you have hasn’t changed, the assigned value changed, you choose to make something else your golden standard and now are no longer content with what you have.
It’s an ongoing cycle, the search for ever greater things and always looking to the future for opportunities when they are in fact, right under your nose this very instant.

Why hunt for the better *insert something here* when the one you have is just fine as it is.

The freedom bit

The title of this blogpost mentioned being free and so far I didn’t write about it yet. What does freedom have to do with it all. As soon as you no longer waste time you have more time on your hands to do the important stuff, there’s some freedom right there.But there is more.

As soon as we assign values like beautiful, tasty and pleasant we immediately give birth to ugly, disgusting and unpleasant for the one can not be without the other. We chose to call that flower pretty and so other flowers are lesser flowers. As a direct result the other flowers will give us less pleasure. Congratulations to us, we just cheated ourselves out of pleasure. Way to go!

Assigning value leads to a diminished capability of enjoying what’s right here, right now for you can not enjoy fully what is here if you’re thinking of a golden standard elsewhere.

And so, when you stop choosing, you gain freedom to enjoy whatever is right here.