LIFE DE FACTO

So much of life is us focused on the impression we are making on others. You don’t ask for extra olives on your Subway sandwich because you don’t want to be perceived as greedy. The receipt you got from the grocery store doesn’t quite add up, but you don’t inquire about it because you don’t want to look cheap. When your financial advisor (you do have a financial advisor right?) says something you don’t quite understand but think you should know, you let it slide because you don’t want to look stupid.

Enough!

When you give in to these impression-action-modifiers (as I like to call them), you aren’t being who you really are, and are in effect, living a damn lie. Not just a lie–a damn lie! And for what? So people can perceive you a particular way? Well here are some truths about you and the external world.

• Most people couldn’t care less about you. Need proof? Think about all the people you’ve seen this week. How many of them do you remember? Q.E.D.
• Okay, it’s true. Some people will care about you…all of FIVE minutes! So you slipped and fell and people laughed at you. How long do you think those folks are enjoying that moment? Okay, they might laugh for like 30 seconds if it’s a really, really, really, big fall. But then 30 seconds from now, they’ll be talking about how Lebron James will win a ring before the Cavs or whether soccer will ever make it big in the United States. They will go to sleep having already completely forgotten about you. And while I used a relatively harmless example, this holds for more serious situations (e.g., if I choose this school/major/spouse/job/career, what will be people think?? EEK!).
• There is a vanishingly small minority of people out there who might care for the rest of their lives about what you do. Such people fall in one of two categories: losers, or close family and friends. If the person is a loser, then yes, he has nothing better to do than ponder your life. You shouldn’t waste your time worried about such people anyways. When it’s a close family member or friend it’s tough. For this, I will state the following: if someone really close to you doesn’t like who really are, should you be reevaluating whether this person should be in your life? More often than not, you’ll find that true close family and friends will accept the *real* you.

Hopefully I’ve galvanized you to start being more authentic.  To not care about what anyone thinks is to be socially inept and maybe a tad psychotic.  I’m not advocating a “screw everyone” mentality.  I’m advocating a be authentic mentality.  It’s a beautiful place to be. Once you get there, you won’t want to go back. Trust me.

While watching a tech conference video, a scientist by the name of John Gottman, Ph.D. was mentioned. The conference presenter alleged that John could, within 5 minutes of watching a couple argue, determine with 94% probability whether the couple would stay together or break up. He’d watched couples in his “Couples Lab” over 35 years! Being that this is the age of the Internet I HAD to look this dude up.

I found the following videos from him: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3. It’s 30 minutes total, probably worth watching nonetheless.

Below are my notes. Dr. Gottman refers to the couples that stay together as Masters (M) and the ones that break up or unhappily stay together…well, Disasters (D).

When There’s Conflict
M: Raise issues gently. They admit ANY part they have in the issue.

D: No or little tact is used. They state the problem as a defect in their partner. This is pretty much straight up criticism with no K-Y.

D: Stonewalls. This is effectively tuning the other person out. The partner stops giving the cues that he/she is listening (e.g., no/little head nods, no/little eye contact, few “uh huhs”). 85% of stonewallers in the study were GUYS.

M: Repair hurt.  Fights are inevitable. Studies show that the Masters and the Disasters don’t fight any less or more than each other.  Hence, hurting one’s partner in some way is inevitable. Even Dr. Phil (the relationship guru) just got divorced! Nobody’s immune to conflict. A key quality Masters have is the ability to repair hurt. Being able to say “I’m really sorry” and mean it and have the other person know that you mean it is crucial. There should be a willingness to talk about stuff that didn’t go really well.

When One Person Gets Attacked, That Person…
M: says “interesting.” He or she may proceed by saying to the effect of “tell me more on how I contribute to this problem.”

D: gets defensive. He or she tends to respond with a counterattack. OR he/she acts like a completely innocent victim (whines).

Biggest Indicator That Yall Won’t Last
D: Being contemptuous. This can be understood as any act of talking down to your partner. Usually comes out as insults or name calling.

Side Note: The receiver of the contempt is more likely to get sick too!

Keys to Making Your Relationship More Like the Masters
Build a love map. It’s a psychological understanding of your partner’s internal mindset [and remembering it!]. See video for examples (Part 2)

Fondness and admiration system. D: look at partner mistakes. M: look for what is going right and appreciates that.

Turning toward. M: turned toward each other 86% of the time D: turned toward each other 33%. This attribute alone was a good predictor of whether newlyweds would get divorced months/years later.

What is Romance?
Romance: a shared fantasy that becomes a reality.

The Litmus Test for Determining Whether Your Relationship Has Healthy Level of Romance/Intimacy
The test is knowing whether you or your partner have a positive perspective or a negative perspective. In the negative perspective, you miss 50% of the good things your partner tries to do for you (as observed by disinterested 3rd party viewers). In the negative perspective, when a negative comment comes from your partner, he/she’s seen as an adversary, not an irritating friend (as you would under the positive perspective). If you have the positive perspective, the romance/intimacy in your relationship is good. Otherwise, womp womp!

_{photo credit: Mattox}

Studies have shown that each time you use your willpower, your ability to use your willpower in the future decreases.  Our brains inherently understand this finding.  Think about the last time you thought about doing the dishes, when you were comfortably sprawled on your sofa and chose to forgo doing dishes.  In that instance, your brain felt that washing dishes required too much willpower from you.  Ergo, the dishes didn’t get done.  The last time you said “the weather’s too sucky to go to the gym today,” your brain decided that going to the gym in “sucky” weather required too much willpower.  The brain is always trying to conserve its energy.  And since we are controlled by our brains, we are subservient to them.  Thankfully though, it’s pretty easy to fool the brain!

This Harvard Business Review (HBR) article espouses using willpower at the right times — in the tough moments — and letting momentum and focus take over after that point. I’ve alluded to a similar strategy in the past.  However, the HBR article articulates something far more effective for killing procrastination.

When you think about it, isn’t it true that once you get over the initial hump of starting a task other forces take over?

The hardest part really is starting.

It’s tough to start washing dishes, until you’re already doing them.  It’s tough to go to the gym and workout, until you’re already in the gym working out. This alternative perspective to the usage of willpower has empowered me to get on with a lot of things that I would’ve otherwise procrastinated on. Somehow, knowing that all I have to do is provide a smidgen of willpower and momentum, forces of nature, whatever you want to call it will take over is SO empowering! I mean, who doesn’t have a smidgen of willpower???

I’ve talked about procrastination in the past. However, I’ve found an alternative method that erodes procrastination and actually juices you. You see, when I’m procrastinating I am in some way saying “I gotta do…”, “I have to do…”, “I really need to…”, “All the things I gotta…” Newsflash…

Each one of these statements is a lie.

You don’t have to do anything. This is really screwy, but all this stuff that you’re procrastinating on, saying that you “have to do,” are all things you *want* to do. If you think about it, it’s actually true. I mean, it is you saying “I gotta/I have to” in your own head right? The minute you come to the realization that you’re telling yourself this lie, immediately set the record straight with the truth: you WANT to do x. This may be hard to swallow at first appearance, but it’s the truth. And the truth will set you free…from procrastination.

You might be saying, “I really don’t want to do my homework,” or “I don’t really want to wash my dishes,” or “I don’t want to write this proposal.” But the truth is you DO want a good grade in your class. The truth is you DO want to be able to use clean dishes. The truth is you DO want the grant money and accolades that come with writing a winning proposal. And if there really is nothing that you want from doing the thing you’re procrastinating on, then don’t do it. Simple as that. It must be relatively worthless if there’s nothing you want from it.

When you find yourself complaining about your boss or work, you really don’t have to take that bullshit. You are choosing to take that bullshit. And you’ve made that choice because amid your frustration, there is something you WANT be it a paycheck, experience, or both. Important Note: it’s up to you to determine if the frustration has eclipsed whatever it is you want and made the thing no longer worthwhile.

Ever wonder how entrepreneurs can work on their business seemingly around the clock?

Answer: the work they’re engaged in is WHAT THEY WANT TO DO.

Yes, it’s true that some parts aren’t that fun. But when they recall that this is ultimately what they want to do, internal energy comes from somewhere to push them through their barriers.

You don’t have to be an entrepreneur to give this a spin. I’ve personally tried this out with work I’m “supposed to do” (another version of “have to,” albeit a lighter version), and it really works. But maybe you still think I’m full of shit.

Cal Newport did a nice comparison of two competing views on procrastination a while ago on his blog. Early research by Baumeister suggested that using your willpower (beating procrastination with sheer willpower) depletes your ability to use your willpower over some period of time in the near future. However, later research by Ryan and Deci suggests

if the activity is autonomously self-regulated — if it derives from a deeply held interest or value — then willpower (as described by vitality) will not be depleted; in fact, it might even be enhanced.

So what is “autonomously self-regulated”?

Simply: doing what you want.

It’s doing what you want without the feeling of you have/need/supposed to do the thing in question. What Ryan and Deci have proposed is referred to as Self-Determination Theory (SDT). And what I’m claiming is that within the framework of SDT, if you purposely make things more autonomously self-regulated, you’ll effectively squash procrastination and give yourself more energy to do more work than you would have otherwise. Full stop.

The following are notes on a presentation given by Curtis Worsey at Purdue University last week.  The talk was entitled: “Effective Communications for Greater Influence and Power.”

Presenter: Curtis Worsey

• Obtained B.S. in Computer Science from Purdue in 1980

• Became partner at Accenture in 1990

• Spent the past two years with JMPerry

• Angel Investor in mavenlink

The process for performing better is a 3-pronged approach:

1. Increase Personal Power (via the “Inclusion Language” (c) approach)
2. Ultimate Persuasion (via “The Pull” (c) approach)
3. Targeted Focus (via “Access Codes”(c) approach)

In this talk, Curtis belabors the first two points. This is a talk that is typically given over the course of a few days. So cramming this into a 2-hour session was a challenge. However, “Access Codes”(c) refers to the general notion that people are different. Thusly, different things excite different people. If you can have a profile for what excites different people, you’ll be more prone to get your way.

Increasing Your Personal Power

What you radiate you attract. People will treat you the way you teach them to treat you. If you need proof of this think about being around an optimistic person, then assess how you feel. Next, assess how you feel around a pessimistic people. Without much other information, just the thought of being around these two type of people causes you to absorb their “vibes.”

A lot of evidence suggest that being an optimist beats the pants off of being a pessimist in virtually all arenas of life.

Our behavior (and subsequently performance) grows out of what we think, say, and feel. Of these three things, what we say is the easiest to control. In comes “Inclusion Language” (c). This notion says that we should replace what “it” ISN’T with what “it” IS (Good or Bad). “It” is whatever is being thought/talked about.

Examples
w/o inclusion: “I don’t think we will be able to do Y.”
w/ inclusion: “I think we will be able to do X.”
(Instead of focusing on what you think is not possible to do, focus on what think can be done)

From Nwokedi: The presenter went through a series of examples, but I’m still unsure whether I really understand this principle of inclusion. Some of the examples just seemed to remove the negation out of the sentence. Such an approach seems like a cheap parlor trick. From my personal experience, I believe being solution focused is far more productive than being problem focused.

The Pull (c)
People hate to be sold but love to buy.

Push = giving unsolicited advice.

From Nwokedi: This article helped me to quit giving unsolicited advice.

Absolutes/Shoulding/Needing/ creates push back from the party you are trying to convince or get to do something.

Examples:”You should do work 12 hours per day.” “You need to take Automata Theory.”

Instead of Pushing onto people, do The Pull (c). This is a process where you let the other party know you understand its position.

1. Ask
2. Listen
3. Empathize/Reinforce (the behavior you like to see)
4. Repeat steps 1-3

From Nwokedi: My recommendation is to simply read the 7 habits of highly effective people. In it Stephen Covey discusses the notion of active listening.

Terry Jones was at Purdue University April 7th, 2010. He gave a talk on the ”Business of Innovation.”  He is the founder of Travelocity (although he’s no longer associated with the company).  Before I get into the notes.  His bio is a tad misleading.  Terry isn’t a “take life by the balls entrepreneur” that had an idea and ran with it.  He’s actually a corporate guy.  Travelocity came from American Airlines (a company Terry worked at for years), which later created Sabre (also a company Terry worked at for over 24 years).  With that preface, below are my notes.

• Technique follows Technology.
  This basically means that as new technology is produce people adapt themselves more and more to that technology.  For instance, online purchases were rare when the Internet first arrived.  Now the online purchasing is normal.  Before armies had guns in wars, they would use swords and more hand-to-hand combat.  With guns and missiles at their disposal how war takes place is dramatically different.

  An example of two companies that didn’t change technique to technology: Virgin Records and Tower Records.  Both of these companies are now closed.

• Experiment. Split test. Fail fast.
• When building teams ensure that you have a mix of old people and young people. The young have the energy and zeal, and the older folks have the contacts and domain knowledge.
• There’s more than 1 right answer.  You can find better answers to problems.
• Crowdsourcing can be powerful but it is hard to manage.
• Unimplemented ideas are worthless.
• If you’re going to spin out a startup from a larger company SEPARATE the smaller company from the larger company. Put the startup in separate a building and have the startup use its own mechanisms for getting things done.

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Nwokedi’s Commentary and Biggest Takeaway:

My BIGGEST takeaway from this talk was actually nothing from the talk itself.  Aside from the FEW personal stories, nothing in the talk was original.  So, my big takeaway was that all you really need is ONE win in business.  ONE!  And you can MILK the hell out of that single victory.  Terry’s claim to fame is Travelocity.  Based on Travelocity’s success he serves on many company boards and gets paid obscene amounts of money to consult and give extremely mediocre presentations.  So take inspiration from Terry.  A single ‘W’ can bring you YEARS of coasting.

Below are my notes from the Jason Fried’s talk at Purdue University that took place March 23rd, 2010. The talk was advertised as “How to Build a Brand.”  However he immediately jettisoned the idea of building a brand in favor of the idea of building a business.  The notes below summarize the talk.  Enjoy.

The Talk

• When nobody can do less than you, you’re in the best position. “Don’t let anyone out-simple you.”
• Failing is Overrated. If your first 5 ideas are bad, the sixth will probably be bad. Find out what worked well and do THAT again. Work on your best idea. Too many folks work on an idea they don’t think is their best because they think failing is a “rite of passage.”
• Business plans are actually Business guesses. There are 30 todays not 30 days.
• Interruptions cause you to stay late or to do work on the weekend.
• Usefulness is much better than Innovation. “Cool” wears off but usefulness never goes away.
• Never use any of the following words regarding a project: Need, Can’t, Easy, Fast. These 4 words kill projects. Need usually isn’t a need. Can’t usually isn’t a can’t. Easy and fast belittles other people’s jobs/tasks.
• ASAP really means As Fast As You Fucking Can. Everything becomes effected–skewed once the term ASAP is thrown around. Because decision making is critical, and ASAP can screw this ability up, it would behoove you to avoid its use.
• Draw a line in the sand. In other words, stand for something. You should have a point of view. Everything becomes a debate when you don’t have a point of view. And if profit is the only aim, you will easily lose focus. Moreover, you probably won’t do whatever it is you’re trying to do very well.
• Find the by-products of what you do. You’re always creating something else when doing something. Moreover, there’s always people interested in what you’re doing if you present it in an interesting way.
• Focus on what won’t change over the next 10 years–what values/needs people will have.
• How you say you’re sorry matters. Choose to be more human and less lawyer-like. A measure of your company’s greatness is if your customers trust your apology.
• Your estimates suck. The farther out your estimates are, the harder it is to have them be accurate. The smartest people in the world get it wrong. Look out over a week to get good estimates.
• You can’t build the culture. You can’t build a brand. Brand & culture grow out of what you do consistently.
• Companies should have an audience. Important caveat: Getting an audience takes a long time.  Ergo, choose a business you’ll enjoy doing for a really long time.
• Emulate the great chefs that teach you so your “pupils” end up loving you. Companies think that their competitors are waiting to steal information from them.  In reality, this rarely happens.  Competitors are usually too worried about their own shit.
• Having policies decreases flexibility. Policies cause employees to ask permission for everything. Having no policies is good route to go.  However, if something goes wrong a number of times, then maybe think about putting a policy in place.

Q & A Portion of the Talk

Note: all questions and responses are paraphrased for ease of reading (and typing).

Question: Since you claim not to do business planning, how do you plan for the future? Like something that’s 6 months out?
Answer: Why? Why should I plan for something that’s 6 months out?
Questioner: *Silence*
Answer: I’m not saying that to be mean, but at 37Signals we try to question everything that we do or think we should do with “why?” Moreover, it’s been my experience, and of others, that not worrying about the future helps me work better in the PRESENT.  And working well in the present “works out” the future.

Question: How’d you build your audience?
Answer: Slowly. It started with 37 principles 37Signals believed in. Actually, the thoughts weren’t original but they just weren’t said out loud. So say what you believe again and again (not what you think the audience wants to hear).

Question: How do you choose the most important thing to work on today?
Answer: By looking at what I want to work on and feedback. I try to find a synergy between these two things.  On occasion, the quantity of feedback may sway what’s most important. The scope of what’s being considered limits what we choose to work on as well.  (37Signals does work usually in 2-week iterations.)

Question: Since your company meets so infrequently, how do you determine if everyone is on the same page?
Answer: You determine whether people are on the same page by the work they produce.

Question: What’s an example of a policy at 37Signals that’s different from most big companies?
Answer: In the summer, 37Signals has 4-day work weeks. Making decisions is hard when you’re tired. You can’t compartmentalize burnout. So we believe you should ensure that you’re getting ample rest.

Question: What was the genesis of 37Signals?
Answer: I was always entrepreneurial and knew I could never work for anybody else. I started design consulting in ’96 while in college. The Internet was really picking up steam in ’95. Although I had a degree in business and finance, I had a strong interest in design. Ergo, I learned to put together Websites. I emailed companies that had bad Websites and pitched them to have me create better Websites for them. This made me a little bit of money, but it eventually led to getting more leads.

Made my first hire in ’98.  In ’04, to get Basecamp (37Signal’s first product) done, 37signals treated it as just another client. It was completed on 10 hours/week over a 3-4 month period.

Question: Why don’t you release revenue numbers publicly?
Answer: In short,  it attracts the wrong kind of attention. Litigation. More competitors.

Question: How does 37Signals hire?
Answer: We really read cover letters.  So write a good cover letter. If you write well, you already put yourself at an advantage. Your resume is looked at a little bit to determine if your skill set is appropriate. We look for the extra effort people put in. Curiosity is something we also look for. I tend to ask questions that try to understand why and how someone comes to a decision.

Other Suggestions and Observations:

• See business as an oak tree. It may take a long time to grow, but when it grows up it has a very strong foundation and sticks around for 400 years. This contrasts with trees that grow fast and are be easily uprooted.
• You should read “Maverick.” Examples from the book: employees hire people; employees review managers.
• If you’re in a beautiful environment, it influences you positively.
• Having a customer that’s really big–that gives you a lot of money–forces a lot of companies to build crappy products.
• Give tech support power to do things for the angry customers.  Otherwise their jobs really suck.

To the question, “how do you overcome the pain from relationships that crashed and burned?” I’ve always gotten the same response: “time.” This answer has never satisfied me. So I never stopped looking for a better answer. And now, I think I have one, and I would like to share.

Signs to the Right Direction

According to Dr. Peter Reznik many people suffer from a “mistaken notion that the purpose of a relationship is to love and to be loved.” He suggests we consider an alternative purpose: “[to] discover our true identity–to find out who we really are.”

While I don’t particular care for the article I linked to above, I do think Reznik is on to something. Reznik’s “me-centric” view of relationships points to a tool. A tool to be used when a relationship tanks. Brad Bollenbach gives us a better glimpse in an old post:

About a year ago, I changed my view of women and relationships entirely, and I feel much happier for it. I took full responsibility for my unhappiness.

The Antidote

I’d like to make a stronger statement than the one expressed by Brad.

When a relationship goes down in flames, accept full responsibility for everything.

At first blush this statement may seem hyperbolic, but I assure you it’s not. I can already hear the dissenters, “how do I accept responsibility for what the other person did (lying, cheating, etc.)? That’s not in my control!” You’re right. The other person’s actions is not in your control. The other person’s actions are not in your control in the same way corrupt employees at Enron were not in Kenneth Lay’s control (former CEO of Enron). Regardless, at the end of the day, YOU are responsible. At the end of the day, Kenneth Lay was held responsible (though he died prematurely). No matter how you try to view it, you are inextricably linked to your failed relationship. It couldn’t be your failed relationship without YOU.

The End of Rumination

The biggest thing that makes failed relationships “bite” is rumination. Our brains seem to love thinking the same repetitive thoughts over and over. It loves to have fictitious conversations where you completely “bust out” the other person’s “weak” arguments. The mind really loves chest pounding. Then just when you think you’ve grown tired of hearing the same ol’ memories, it’s as if the mind works double time to try to dig up “new” old memories to see if it can get a reaction out of you.

Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be this way. If you honestly accept full responsibility for everything, your mind will cease with its rumination, pretty much, immediately. The moment it forgets and tries to dig something up, curtail it with “yeeah, but it’s my fault.” When this is said, the memory goes black and silent. Try it.

Why This Works

I’m not certain of why this works, I just know that it does. I do have a series of hypotheses though.

• We don’t like beating ourselves up (unless we’re hopeless losers ). As soon as you say its your fault, your mind lays off, like: “My bad! I didn’t realize I was really talking about us!” As much as it doesn’t seem like it many times, your mind really is on your team.
• No matter how you twist it, turn it, flip it, bend it, it’s always your fault. What would you do if you were on a date, and the person you were on the date with gave you the same exact answer no matter what question you asked him/her? I’m willing to bet you’ll lose interest pretty damn quickly and stop asking questions. Our brains work the same way. Digging up more memories or new fake scenarios become highly uninteresting because whatever it is, in the final analysis, it boils down to the same answer: it’s your fault.
• It pushes you out of the position of “the victimized,” and places you firmly into the position of the empowered. Accepting full responsibility actually gives us complete control over the current the situation. It becomes something we own instead of something that owns us.

Action Steps

1. You must tell yourself a story about what happened in that failed relationship. According to Daniel Kahneman we have two selves. The Experiencing Self, and the Remembering Self. The Experiencing Self is the Present Self. And the Remembering Self is the Self that, well, remembers…what the Experiencing Self did (watch the video linked above if this intrigues you). Because the Experiencing Self is so fleeting, your Remembering Self dominates your feelings about things from the past. And because our memories are sketchy, we can easily manipulate the Remembering Self with the story we choose to tell ourselves.
2. Make the story as cogent and succinct as possible. The story should be cogent because things that don’t fit our schemas of the world causes cognitive dissonance. The story should be as succinct as possible, because the more descriptive you are in the story, the more emotions you will evoke. When you describe things in fewer words, you in some sense trivialize the experience. So if I describe a past relationship as “she played me,” it generates virtually no emotional response. Alternatively, if I were to a provide a whole screenplay for how it went down, some of those old emotions might get stirred up again.
3. Accept full responsibility for everything. From your present level of happiness to whatever went down in the relationship. It’s the best way forward.

Why don’t advertisers create Super Bowl level commercials all the time??? Why do advertisers wait until the Super Bowl to make their commercial really good and memorable? Yes, I realize that a lot of eyeballs watch the Super Bowl, but surely some number of eyeballs watch commercials that do not air during the Super Bowl? Can anyone clarify this for me?

What the hell do I know though. I’m not in advertising.

James Hong, the cofounder of HotorNot.com, was recently on one of my favorite web shows these days, Mixergy. Please take the time to watch the above video. I feel like James articulated perfectly the meaning of hitting the 1M dollar mark when he said he was able to reclaim his life. If you have creditors breathing down your neck or bosses breathing down your neck for that matter, your life doesn’t feel quite like it’s completely yours. Taking the entrepreneurial path often means that you put a premium on freedom, and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that!

Another interesting point that James makes, that isn’t in the above clip is that you only gain liabilities as you live. Ergo, if you can get into a startup while you’re young, jump at the opportunity. Many times, young people decide to take the “safe” route and go work at some big company. What these people are failing to realize is that this is an expensive tradeoff. And the tradeoff is the following: when you go to work for big company X, you are trading off the unique startup experience for the banal big company experience.  If entrepreneurship is something you really want to do whether now or in the future, nothing will help you more than the startup experience.  As far as we know, we only have one life–why not make it an interesting one?