Posts Tagged ‘Project Mojave’

Project Mojave, just another get rich quick scheme?

Posted in Lifestyle design on October 13th, 2009 by Christiaan – Be the first to comment

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!

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My blogchallenge, a weekly update 18

Posted in My blogchallenge on August 29th, 2009 by Christiaan – 1 Comment

Look at me :)

Introduction period at University is over, I start next Monday. As announced in a previous post I wouldn’t do a weekly update last weekend. Well, things got a bit worse, I did only one blogpost this entire week! I could apologize, but I thought better of it and wrote a blogpost on the power of silence. Nice way of solving the issue don’t you think?

The month is almost at an end and just a few minutes ago I reached a new all time record. I was planning to have more pageviews this month than last week and I just passed that number with one whole pageview! So again, another month of continues growth on my blog.

Let’s have a look at that first number first. I’ve got some bad news that I’m keeping for the end of the blogpost.

Average numbers of pageviews a day this month so far:176 (period 8-1 till 8-28) A number that’s significantly lower than my last update but at the same time is a bit higher than last month’s average. With only 49 hours to go until the end of the month (according to my pc) I’ve managed to reach the goal I set myself. The goal of having more pageviews than last month. Although not a huge increase it’s growth and so I’m content.

Number of subscribers to my RSS feed: 85, Not my all time record (that was 87 on August 19th) But the 100 subscribers will be here by the end of September and you know what that means :)

Where the traffic is coming from: I’m feeling more and more that this part of the update is useless. There hardly ever are any huge sources of traffic, most come through google and others through blogs all over the place who refer to me. Everyone please do spread the link, it’s the single most effective way to help other bloggers out there.

What I have done this week to get my blog bigger and what I learned: Another useless item on the weekly update as I’m not actively doing anything at the moment, I’m just writing what’s on my mind and comment on other blogs from time to time. I also keep using twitter although I’m rarely really there. I usually autopost on twitter. Seems unfair somehow, I really should become more active again. But that’s going to claim resources.

Which brings me to my bad news: I quit Project Mojave. For one simple reason, I currently don’t have the resources to participate and with a new semester starting in two days I doubt I could invest as much time as I wanted/needed to. I will be back there when the time is right, but for now I just don’t have enough resources to spare. Time to cut my losses so to speak.

Well, that’s the weekly update again. Next month will bring me my long awaited goal of 100 subscribers. I’ll transfer the blog to it’s own domain then and I’ll need to find a new goal, how does 500 views a day sound?

My blogchallenge, a weekly update 12

Posted in My blogchallenge on July 11th, 2009 by Christiaan – 6 Comments

snail11

Although I’m officially on vacation and so working a little less on my blog things still keep getting better and better. I even found the time to write this weekly update again. If you’re wondering where I’m at right now. I’m not going to disclose my exact position but I reached: “51.39943, 4.21195” within twelve minutes of leaving the front door to go running. Take the numbers and paste them in Google Earth. If I had a rod with me that spot would make for some great fishing. I’m still on the fence about buying a rod.

Now you have the numbers for my aproximate position let’s have a look at the other numbers:

Average number of pageviews over this week: 230, An insane jump from last weeks 142. I hit a new record yesterday with 465 pageviews. The rest of the week was hovering around 120-160.

Number of subscribers to my RSS feed: 59, I still need to be pinched. Before you know it I’ll go over 100 if we keep going at this pace and as I’ve said before, when I reach those numbers the feedburner counter is going back on my front page.

Where the traffic is coming from: There is still that single blogpost that keeps generating traffic through Google. For a few days it was even on the first page of Google results, right up there with blogsposts on blogs like zenhabits. To bad it dropped back though, can’t find it anymore within the first ten pages. But what a rush that was, seeing your blog up there. Now to analyze what I did to get there and replicate that strategy.

The big spike yesterday was again caused by su.pr. As soon as someone writes a review for stumble numbers shoot up. Add a few retweets and another spike is created. So please, write a review on the normal blogposts (not the weekend reviews..) and help create those spikes.

What I have done this week to get my blog bigger and what I learned: The only “lesson” this week was “What a rush to get to the front page.” Now let’s do that again.
I have another set of numbers I’d like to give you, these represent the real growth of my blog.

The number of pageviews a month:

March: 145 (I started this blog half way trough March)
April: 1637
May: 2904
June: 3598
July: 1787 so far

Although I don’t believe I will reach my goal of 500 pageviews a month before the 16th of July I’m very happy with all the progress that has been made and all the awesome people I’ve come in to contact with. You know who you are. As I won’t be reaching those numbers any time soon I think it’s time for me to just transfer the blog to it’s own domain somewhere in the near future (this month) and build from there.

A last note: I’ve started another blogging project together with LP and CN. It’s really in it’s infancy at the moment (Only two blogposts, both by LP) so I won’t disclose exactly where it is but it’s going to be great! All three of us are aspiring online entrepreneurs and we’ll be sharing our experience so far. Did I mention all three of us are taking part in Project Mojave?

8 steps to reclaiming responsibility, one small step at a time

Posted in Beginner's fears, Skills and habits on July 6th, 2009 by Christiaan – 7 Comments

steps

Today I’d like to address a huge issue I’ve been fighting with all my life. A problem that through reading other blogs and talking to people seems to be a quite common problem: Not having the guts to take responsibility. I’m responsible for my own life, my own happiness and my own accomplishments in this life right? But I keep waiting for others to solve issues for me.

Take the Project Mojave for instance, now that I’ve found a probably viable niche I haven’t done anything to further the development. I’m scared shitless of the unknown and somehow the act of being in the project seems by itself a guarantee to success. (”If you do these simple steps you’ll get there”).. So I hang around and wait for the steps to happen. Laying responsibility outside myself. If I don’t do anything, nothing will happen. So I need to reclaim the responsibility.

I’m not making much sense here so let me try it from a different angle.

Playing the Blues

Beginning guitar players are constantly looking to buy a better guitar and amplifier. As if just the act of owning such a “perfect” instrument will make them a better player. “If only I can buy such and such… I’ll be so much better at it.” Likewise with gaming mice, running shoes, backpacks, Project Mojave. Maybe their hero is using a certain item and now they must have that thing too, being convinced that owning this item will instantly transform them. Of course the marketing divisions realize this and churn out “signature” items all the time. (Especially true in the guitar market.)

So it is with me and Project Mojave at the moment. There mere act of being in there should earn me money and my freedom. (Or so my subconscious is trying to convince me at all times, so I don’t have to actually do anything.) We shall not discuss the fact that I own several guitars and a stack of perfectly good books that -if I ever do more than just own them and really start to work though them- will make me quite proficient on a guitar.

Realizing you’re stuck in these patterns is the first step towards dealing with them. But how do you deal with them. This is where my problem is at. I don’t have a clue on how to deal with this issue other than to write about it and hope for an external ass kicking. As I’m writing this I also realize that the ass kicking should come from the inside. I should be angry at myself or disappointed or something, beating myself up about it.

Beating yourself up as reward

But that’s not going to be very fruitful. Beating yourself up about something won’t make you want to do it more right? I should reward myself for the things that I am doing, creating a positive feeling associated with those things I want to be doing.

So here is how I’m going to deal with the issue:

  1. Write this blog post and let you know that I have this problem
  2. See whatever external virtual ass kicking this brings (and perhaps some useful suggestions)
  3. Make an inventory of all the things I want to accomplish
  4. Define them according to “SMART”
  5. Break everything down to manageable steps. (I think this is the most important step)
  6. Schedule these small steps. (Using google calender)
  7. Doing the small steps and reporting back
  8. Looking for people who can help me with this. (I’ve already found someone who is going to help me get through those guitar books.)

If we boil that down a bit we can make this list usable by everyone:

  1. Commit by telling others
  2. Get their reactions
  3. Inventory goals
  4. Define goals through “SMART”
  5. Break down into manageable steps
  6. Schedule small steps
  7. Doing the steps and reporting back
  8. Find people to help with the steps

Well, there you have it. My eight step plan to claiming responsibility over my own life. Now to make the inventory… and celebrate every step of the way.

The Personal Development community encyclopedia

Posted in Lifestyle design on June 29th, 2009 by Christiaan – 6 Comments

Let's look that one up

I’ve had several questions lately about what certain terms are that I’ve been using here. Well, to make things a bit clearer I’m going to provide you with a post on  terms that are being used in the personal development and lifestyle design niche. It’s by no means complete though and I urge you to add more in the comments.

  • Let’s start with some names first

Tim Ferris This name really should ring a bell. It’s the guy that started it all (for me at least) He’s the author of “The four hour workweek” and blogger writing about “experiments in lifestyle design”. He’s living the life so many of us want to. It’s probably why his book is so popular, it talks about a something that seems a fantasy and he claims can be reality. However, there are those who believe the four hour workweek to be a lie.

Leo Babauta Blogger over at zenhabits.net and author of the book “the power of less”. Has radically redesigned his life to what he wanted. I could explain it all but it’s easier to read this page.

Jonathan Mead Blogger over at Illuminated mind and author of “reclaim your dreams”. He also writes for zenhabits and lateral action. Someone who really kicks ass in the virtual world stating what it’s really all about without being gentle. He regularly kicks against what people think is reality and gets your head back out of the clouds.

Carl Nelson A friend, blogger at slacker reform, professional lindy hopper, vagabond, philosopher and rising start in the location independence world.

Corbett Barr Blogger at freepersuits writing about lifestyle design, another rising start in the community.

Rolf Potts Author of “vagabonding”, the second book that’s an essential read to anyone who wants to become location independent. Not from the perspective of how to get there, but on what to do when you’ve got it.

Darren Rowse Also known as problogger. A full time blogger making a six figure income through it and a huge name in the blogosphere. Anyone who takes blogging seriously has heard is name and has probably visited his blog as well. A great resource for anything blogrelated.

Seth Godin Writer of a lot of (11 so far) books on diverse subjects in the direction of market development and business.  A name you’ll see pop up from time to time, so I thought I’d mention him.

Steve Pavlina This guy might just be the original personal development blogger. He’s been blogging since 1 oktober 2004

  • Some essential literature

The four hour workweek (4HWW) The book that got it all started, or at least put things on the map. In a nutshell this book teaches you how to find an online market, set everything up, automate it and reduce the number of hours you work to the bare minimum while keeping a descent income so you can spend your time on other things.

The Power of less Leo’s book, a nice summary of all his blogposts that will get you up to speed on minimalist thinking when it comes to daily life.

Vagabonding The book about extended world travel or how to “live out of a backpack” for months or yours. Perhaps even giving up a home and constantly traveling the world.

Reclaim your dreams An  eBook on getting away from the 9-5 till 65 life. You can read my review of it here

  • Some often used terms

Lifestyle design Everything that has to do with living your life like you want to live it. Severing the ties that keep you from doing what you want to be doing. For most people this means quitting their job (a major timesuck where they are not in control) and setting up an alternative income through Internet. This frees up time so one can do all those things that one dreams of but never does. It’s getting rid of preconceptions that life has to be a certain way just because your parents lived that way or the education system has taught you how to live.  In short: It’s thinking for yourself on how you want to live your life and doing everything you can to live that life right now! Corbett over at Freepersuits has dedicated a blogpost to the subject that’s far more comprehensive that the definition I give here. If you’re interested you can find that blogpost by following this link. It’s a great read and will get things crystal clear.

Muse. A term used by Tim Ferris to describe the thing that generates the Internet income. His muse is a food supplement he’s selling online. Probably by now it’s also his blog and his book.

Vagabond. A person who travels for extended periods of time where not the destination but the travel is important and where at times there is no plan on where to go or on how long to stay there.

Digital Nomad. A vagabond with a laptop and other technical devices who has an Internet income and manages that through his laptop while vagabonding.

Location Independent Professional (LIP). A professional who isn’t bound to a location in order to make an income. More often than not these people generate their income through Internet and might just be called digital nomads as well. That is, if they choose to travel. Being location independent means you can go wherever you want, it doesn’t mean you have to.

Freedom business. This term is used in Project Mojave to describe an Internet business (selling an information product) that generates an income that’s significant enough to quit ones dayjob and become free. This means it consistently generates an income of some 2-4k a month depending on your needs. Also, this business requires little “maintenance” so you have an income that costs little time as well. Although you might not reach the 4 hours a week, it’s definitely doable with about 10 hours a week.

Project Mojave An online program where Clay Collins and some others teach you how to set up a freedom business, in three months or less.

Personal development The ongoing effort to develop oneself and keep learning. Learning new skills, keep questioning ones thoughts, beliefs and habits. You probably know people who do the same thing every day like clockwork. Have a dayjob, don’t read, don’t try new things or whatever. These people don’t develop any further for they don’t expose themselves to new things.

Well, that’s it for now, I hope you will all contribute to this blogpost by adding more names, blogs and terms to the comment section.  If you have any questions or if what I’ve written in this blogpost is just pain wrong or hopelessly incomplete please do let me know.

If you liked this blogpost please to give it a “thumbs up” on stumble, digg it, tweet it and use smoke signals to tell others. I’d really appreciate it.

Location independence explored (The survey results are in)

Posted in Skills and habits on June 17th, 2009 by Christiaan – 5 Comments

any questions

Two weeks ago I asked you to fill in the survey on Location Independence and Digital Nomads set up by freepursuits.com and locationinedependent.com. Well, the two weeks has passed and the result are in.

268 people took the survey that was promoted by a group of lifestyle design bloggers. Of course I immediately took a look at the section where all these blogs were mentioned to see how many people actually know about my blog.

Among the people aspiring to become location independent (n= 174) 4 are regular readers, 10 are familiar with this blog and the rest never heard of my blog before.

Among the people who are already location independent (n=94) also knows as LIP’s 2 regular readers, 7 are familiar with this blog and again, the rest has never heard of my blog before.

A quick scan over all the locations tells me there are 4 people who are currently located in The Netherlands who filled in this survey and I’m one of them. A useless fact, but still…

Well, there are a lot of readers out there in this niche I still need to convince to read my blog don’t you think?

What more is the survey telling us

  • There are only 3 people in the survey who seem to be taking part in Project Mojave.
  • The vast majority of aspiring LIP’s are full-time employee and work their ass off (40-60 hours a week)
  • Within the already LIP there’s a also a high number of hard workers although self-employed. So far for the myth of the 4 hour workweek.  Only 8 claim to work less than 10 hours a week. By contrast 15 work more than 50 hours a week.
  • The most common  jobs among the LIP are web design, marketing and writing, Corbett (Freepursuits) wrote about 64 ways the location independent earn a living yesterday.
  • One LIP is a professional poker player
  • Internet is vital for the LIP to earn a living. (But we knew that already didn’t we?)

And now the most important question that was asked those who aspire to become location independent:

“What could the blogs you read provide you with or write about to help you achieve your lifestyle goals.”

Now this is where things get interesting and to me it’s one of the most valuable part of the entire suvey.

What you’ve asked for

  • Motivation
  • Success stories and case studies
  • Money management
  • Support & encouragement
  • Technical aspects of the digital nomadic life
  • Networking with digital nomads (Apparently there is a need for a true online community)
  • Practical tips
  • How to’s/tutorials

Is I’m part of the lifestyle design community it’s up to me and my fellow bloggers in this niche to answer the questions people have. Now that we have a good view on what it is you people want to know we can write more specifically about those subjects.

The two biggest fears I’ve concluded from the survey are failure and running out of funds. (although that could be called failure as well). Tomorrow I’ll provide you with a full list of all the fears people have named in the survey. This list is has a few recurring themes and  provide it just to show you you are not alone with your fears. We all suffer from them and there’s no need to give up just because of those fears.

Of course I’ll writing about stuff inspired by this survey, and as you’ve come to expect from me, I’ll make sure to put zen into it.

I want to thank everyone who took part in the survey, if there is anything else you want to know about the results that I didn’t cover I’ll gladly provide you with answers. All the participating blogs have received the results from the survey to you can expect them to write about this as well.

My blogchallenge: a weekly update 7

Posted in My blogchallenge on June 6th, 2009 by Christiaan – 12 Comments

How did I get up here

Another week passed and my blog is stabilizing.

Although things are slow the roller-coaster ride of pageviews is becoming less bumpy.

Average number of pageviews over this week: 81 within the range of 71-88. This trend has been here for at least a week now. I can expect roughly 70-80 views a day, every day now. I’m happy with that, very happy. Let’s see if this Saturday and Sunday we can keep that number up.

Number of subscribers to my RSS feed: I added a counter to the left side column on my page last week so you can see the number every day. It’s now at 42 and on the slow increase. I get one or two additional subscribers almost every day.

Where the traffic is coming from: Some traffic is coming from the “thank you” page accompanying the digital nomad survey. Other than that it’s all over the place as usual, more and more is getting here through search engines. Roughly 25% of visitors get here through search engines now. I’ve identified what the popular topics are and I’ll be sure to implement that knowledge in further writing.

What I have done this week to get my blog bigger and what I learned: I’ve started a five part series on Stoic psychological tactics and so far it really seems popular. It certainly made people sticky which was one of the goals (at least, if we’re talking in blogging tactics). There is also more interaction and I’m seeing new names in the comments which of course is the best thing I could wish for. I even get some tweets about it which is great.

A short blogpost this time, there isn’t so much to tell. I feel the wildly varying pagesview numbers I had in the beginning is stabilizing and now is getting ready for the slow and steady growth.

I’d like to share a last set of numbers. The numbers of visitors in the first three months:

  • March: 145
  • April: 1673
  • May: 2904

Totally unrelated but also a part of progress: I’m working more and more on Project Mojave, slowly homing in on niches I like and can commit myself to although there still is a lot of brainstorming and statistical analyses to be done.

My blogchallenge, a weekly update 5

Posted in My blogchallenge on May 23rd, 2009 by Christiaan – 1 Comment

Curiosity

Here we are again, another week has passed and what an eventful week it has been. I’ve set my three goals for the oncoming months, I’ve set my life goal and my reason for wanting to achieve it and I’ve entered the Project Mojave to make this life goal (which is a dream) become reality. Although we must not forget that goals are not the things we should be trying to reach, we should be enjoying the route that takes us there. Also, keep in mind what you want to do after you reach your goal. Many people who worked all their lives and saved up for retirement now sit at home, depressed, because they had no goal, no life plan, no idea what to do when the time came for them to start enjoying themselves.

Let’s have a look at this weeks numbers shall we?

Average number of pageviews over this week:118, a slight increase.

Interesting to me is the growth this blog has experienced in three months. If we look at the number of pageviews a month it get’s interesting. Remember, my first blog entry here was on March 13th.

  • March: 145
  • April: 1637
  • May: 2240 (And we still have a week left! I’l probably get 400-500 more views)

Number of subscribers to my RSS feed: This has been fluctuating quite a bit. Google reader is still being a total git when it comes to displaying my feed. The number of subscribers maxed out at 40, but is now back at 32.

Where the traffic is coming from:I had another “powertweet” this week. Someone promised me a guestpost but things fell through as my post wasn’t exactly what they hoped. (Multi-author blog) So I could post it on my own blog instead and they would tweet it for me. It has resulted in some nice traffic coming this way although I doubt I’ve made them stick. If you must know, it was the blogpost about using twitter to climb mountains. Another small contribution in traffic has been made by the forum over at Project Mojave. Traffic sources are becoming more and more varied.

What I have done this week to get my blog bigger and what I learned: I’ve learned that you can make friends in the strangest ways, as I wrote yesterday I’m now participating in Project Mojave and all the knowledge I’m getting there will certainly help me grow this blog further. As you might have noticed my blogposts are getting longer almost every day. I started out with blogpost containing no more than 400 words. My post on hormones this week was over 2000 and I felt comfortable with it. I can really tell my writing skills are getting better. Not only that but I’m making fewer  typo’s and grammatical errors as well.

I’ve also learned that google reader can be a real pain.

I did a new setup on the feed and found the problem, faulty HTML coding… Things are back to normal now.

The global playground and Project Mojave

Posted in Technology, Time issues on May 22nd, 2009 by Christiaan – 8 Comments

playground earthA bit of a chaotic post today. You might recall me writing about Project Mojave in my post on Monday and my writing about it stating that I hope it really does work while at the same time trying to kick everyone who believed in such things and keeps reading without acting upon it. After that ass-kicking blogpost on Monday and the long post on hormones last Wednesday I though I’d go in a different direction today.

I want the globe to be my playground

Project Mojave  opened up to new subscribers last Tuesday 4.30pm PST. At which time it was 1:30 am where my bed and computer are located at the moment so I was sound asleep seeing as I had to get up at 5 am the following day.

Now this is where Carl (Slacker Reform) comes into the picture. This guy really is amazing as I’ve said before. He gave me a heads-up on the project back in April and I’ve been hearing about his adventures on the project for the last month. He got so excited about it all that he really wanted to have me on the project too.

So how do you do that? Remember I was asleep at the time the project went live. I could of course sign in on at a later time but perhaps I would miss out on all the nice bonus material. I could also just wait for the next run of the program but who knows when that one would be. I went to sleep with some thoughts about that and thinking about an offer Carl made me…

..

In the mean time

..

…He signed me up and made all the arrangements! There was a mail in my mailbox the next morning with my login details stating that everything was payed for. Although this was the offer Carl made me while we were talking over twitter I never imagined him doing this for real. I’ve known Carl now for little over a month and we have only talked using twitter and through blog comments, and now this. I knew we were roughly on the same wavelength now and then but this is absolutely crazy. I guess he really wants me on the project and I’m very happy to be on it!

Sorry for the rant-like blogpost but it’s hard to write properly when you’re this excited. So for the next three months I’ll be simultaneously doing three things aside from my every day life:

  • Run this blog like I have these past months and reach my goal of 500 views a day, followed by transferring this blog to it’s own domain
  • Working with Project Mojave to create a freedom business, perhaps I can combine this blog and the project here and there. You’ll notice soon enough
  • Preparing for university which starts this September but for which I still have to do a math test or more accurately a test in proposition and predicate logic.They want to see if I can wrap my head around that kind of thinking

So what is the future holding for me?

  • A successful blog, where I can vent my creativity and generate a small side income
  • An income through online entrepreneurship aka running a freedom business which will make me location independent
  • A degree in information science which if the first two things don’t work out will be my “backup” to a normal job, with more than enough possibilities there to either earn enough to be financially independent or become an entrepreneur using what I’ve learned at uni. I’ll be learning some major computing skills there and whichever way my life goes this will come in handy

All things considering one of my biggest life goals is Financial Independence to do all the things I’ve been dreaming of. To summarize: I want the globe to be my playground as a zen inspired vagabond/digital nomad and I will achieve that, one way or the other.

What all the “Get Rich” Blogs don’t tell you but what you should know

Posted in Procrastination, Time issues on May 18th, 2009 by Christiaan – 14 Comments

stop reading!

You there, sitting at your screen, looking at this text. What the hell are you doing, staring at a screen and reading this text. As if the act of reading by itself will change your life.

All those self help, personal growth and success instantly blogs are lying to you. Zen habits? Useless! Blogmastermind? Don’t make me laugh. All those stories about setting up a payed member site and raking in six digits a year. Just that, stories and marketing. Designed to lure you in and and to keep you coming back. RSS feeds, mailing lists, their sole purpose is to feed you more info and through advertisement, affiliate programs and memberships earn the smarter guy on the other end some (or a lot of) money. The latest of them being “Project Mojave”, even Jonathan Mead over at Illuminated Mind got sucked into this one and is now “Director of Ass Kicking” apparently.

That is exactly what you need right now! A kick… How many blogposts have you read about setting up an online business. How many bloggers are you following who write about this? Is the Tim’s Four hour workweek in your bookcase? Along side Seth’s Purple cow, Ramit’s I will teach you to be rich and all those other books that tell you how to do things. I should probably kick you myself but that is the problem with Internet. I can’t actually kick you for reading all that!

So, now I probably got your attention, if you are one of the few who is still reading this. Why am I pissed? It’s simple, you’re only learning what you should do. That’s all that reading does for you. It let’s you learn how to do it. But the simple fact that you are reading this blogposts states clearly that even though you know how to do it you are not doing it right now!

Close this screen and start doing what you have learned. Don’t spend another minute reading all the info and stop being amazed that these people got so successful. What sets them apart from you is the ability to not only learn but to act it out, even if they don’t know every detail. Although they do fear the unknown they respond with  ”I’ll figure it out while doing it” in stead of “I need to learn more before I get started”. The guys over at Project Mojave have learned some skills and now they want to sell you those skills. Where did they get them? Probably through the same books and same blogs you read. They threw in some common sense though and did some serious research. Now they expect you to buy in to what they have to offer and buy their nice little package so you can learn more, and more….. and more…. but will you ever act on it? I sure hope so otherwise you’ll have made another author some money and didn’t get anything back from it other than more information and dreams about how things can be if you just do so and so.

What are you waiting for, shut down this screen, get off your chair and start actually making a difference right now! I’ll still be here tomorrow and so will this blog, the minutes you spent reading this blogpost are gone forever. Were those minutes of your life worth it?

Don’t just read and learn. Reading is useless! Stop reading and start doing what you know!

This all being said and after reading the liberation manifesto written by Jonathan for the Project I can tell you he does manage to kick virtual ass in there. They might just really be on to something. Although they have posted a “success” video log on their site please do remain critical and ask yourself “Is this genuine or did they ask someone to make up a story just to get things rolling?”. There is great potential on the web to make a side income, many have done so. However, for every one person that succeeds there are countless who don’t make it. Be ruthlessly honest and do what you believe to be right. It’s damn hard work and ever a  ”get rich quick” scheme. There is no such thing as easy money. However concerning making money (earning a living/dying) the paradigm has shifted considerably because of Internet.

If I offended anyone with this post I’m truly sorry, I’m just trying to make a point here and I hope that writing about it this way actually got the message across. I’m sure all the people I wrote about are nice and honest people and actually do want to help you achieve financial independence or a better life with healthier (financial) habits.


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