Creativity

Sir Ken Robinson gives an amazing speech on how schools are killing creativy. This speech motivates me every time I watch it. Not only does he make some amazing points, but he keeps you interested the whole way through.

Great Advice

“Wherever everybody else looks, look somewhere else and go do something different.” Words from Director of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab, Charles Elachi in his 2008 Serious Play video hosted by TED Talks. This has got to be one of the best pieces advice I have heard in a very long time and something that I wish I would have figured out a long time ago. You can find the full video below.

Funny and creative

I have watched the following video at least three times. Ze Frank, famous for his How To Dance Properly site gives a comical speech about technology and also the various ways which he incorporates it to help others be creative. You can find a lot of his creations at zefrank.com.

Funny And Talented

The Raspyni Brothers performing their comedy and juggling is another video that I have watched several times. They are actually guiness Record holders, but don’t take themselves too serious. Something I should probably do a little more often as well.

Great with Words

Poet and pop-up book creator Rives sums up the 2006 TED Talks.

In my local town, most of the stores have set sales days. The closest grocery store has sales every Tuesday and Sunday. If you shop Sunday, you also get a coupon for 5% off valid on Tuesday. Now a lot of people tend not too worry about such small savings. But over time, these small consistent savings add up to large amounts of money. Not only the money we directly save on groceries, but also the money we save in gas and time.

As you can see, only being able to shop two days a week, or sometimes only once does take a little more planning. Not only planning out our meals, but also planning out where we will store it (our refrigerator is tiny). It will however, save you time overall since you will spend less time in the store and less time going back and forth. Creating a list of the items you need for a set period of time will also help you from buying things you don’t really need. Helping both your wallet and your diet.

Another great way to save money is to buy at the end of the season. If it is something you know you will be using again next season, then purchasing it at the end of the season is one of the best savings you can make. Most holiday items will go on sale from 50-70% off once the holiday is over. If we could make that kind of money in the stock market, we would all be rich by now. Sure you will need to store it for a while, but you also get to purchase it when everyone is already done with their buying.

Additional tips

• Keep records of the prices you are paying. Just because it says “SALE” doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a good buy
• When you find something you use on a regular basis really cheap, buy as much as you can store
• When possible and reasonable, buy in bulk to save extra.

Helpful links

• Recession Eating
• Saving Money Around The Holidays
• Save Money on Groceries
• Time Management

1. You’re too old

• Ray Kroc started McDonalds at age 52
• Warren Buffet became the richest man in the world at age 78

2. You’re too Young

• Steve Jobs started Apple at age 21
• Christopher Paolini had his first book, Eragon published at age 18

3. You don’t know how

• There are 907,000,000 pages in Google for the search “how to”
• Over 5,500,000 pages in Google for the search “online course”

4. You don’t have enough money

• Timothy Ferris went on to start Body Quick and live a dream life after being fired from his job.
• J.K. Rowling was living on welfare while writing her first Harry Potter book

5. You might Fail..

Now you know all the reasons you can’t. But what if you could….

I tend to be a little bit of an extremist. When I start something new in my life, I tend to focus on it very heavily. In many cases this means that I give up other activities. The advantage is that I can improve quickly in whatever that activity happens to be. The disadvantage is that I may exclude things that are more important in my life.  So how do you start something new without giving up something more important? Proper goal assessment and time management.

Goal Assessment

The first step is to decide what you really want. Create a list of the things you want to achieve and order them from most important to least important. In order to effectively achieve these goals, nothing that will not move you towards your goals should override an activity that does. If your most important goal is to improve your health and lose weight, then the choice to spend time playing a new video game definitely should not take up the time you spend exercising.

When you decide what’s important, it makes it easier to choose what to focus on and what new activities to start. By limiting the number of activities you pursue, you will also become much better at them. Some things should never be compromised in your life. Time must be spent to maintain good health, a good diet, and your overall happiness. This is where the time management comes in.

Time Management

There are basically two steps to balancing your life by improving your time management. The first is to limit the amount of time doing things you don’t want to do. The second is to learn the things you are interested in quickly. The key in both is to optimize your time and cut out the wast.

Think of all the things you don’t want to be doing. This may include your job, cleaning, shopping, paying your bills, etc. Analyze each one and try to think of the most important parts of each and how you can do them better and quicker. Could you cut down your shopping time by planning better and buying less often? Or remove 10 minutes of standing in line by shopping at a different time? What about your job, are there activities you perform that don’t really provide any benefit. There probably are. In fact, it’s most likely the majority of your job.

Then do the same thing with your fun events. If you are relaxing, find the way that you relax the best to get the most out of the shortest time. Find the best way to maximize your exercise in the least amount of time. This would also include choosing the best foods to optimize your diet. When you start a new hobby, find the best way to become get good fast. Whether it is a sport, a language, or any other hobby, most of the benefits come when you become very good. The beginner skier goes home battered, bruised, and tired. The expert skier goes home discussing the great time he had and the incredible feeling of the snow.

The Results

The better you get at managing your time, the more you will find you can accomplish and the more balanced your life will become. It may seem impossible in the beginning. I know it did for me. I felt I was already doing everything as quickly as I could. There is no way for me to do any more, but the more I worked at it, the easier it all got.

Other great resources

• Mind Tools Time Management
• Studying Tips
• The importance of quite time
• How to spot time wasters
• Getting more done in less time

What's for dinner

In Japan, there is a great show called “ゼロ円生活” (The Zero Yen Lifestyle). It basically consists of one to two people locating to a shack on a remote island for a few days and only eating the food they can catch. It is a little cheesy since the shack has obviously been pre-made, they have a number of cooking utensils as well as burners and spices, but I really love the concept of catching my own food and living off the land (or sea in this case).If you remember, a little while back I wrote an article titled 10 Things I’ve Decided To Do In My New Life. Number 2 was finding catching my own food.

Well, from 11:00pm-3:00am last night, that’s exactly what I did. Due to a very low tide each month, a large amount of seabed is exposed allowing hunters and gathers to venture fourth searching for octopi, crabs, lobster, shell fish, and just about anything else edible you can find. So equipped with a bucket, a flashlight, and a spear, I journeyed into the dark on the small peninsula of land that in the few hours would be covered by water as the tide once again rose.

The difficult part of the journey was the jagged seabed covered with coral. Walking a mile or two in a moonlit night may not seem that difficult, but being careful not to crush the poor coral  or slip on the rocks took a lot of effort.

After a few minutes of walking I came across a a sea snail a little larger than a golf ball (the ones we were searching for) and excitedly put it in my bucket. The next item I would find would surprise me even more. As I was waiting for my partner to catch up, I had time to really search around the area I was standing. When my light first hit the creature, the color looked just like any other rock but the shape was unmistakable. I had found a conch. However, stretching nearly a foot long and weighing several pounds, I soon realized my bucket was going to get quite heavy.

The rest of the night went on finding a shell here and there, but I also spent a lot of time viewing the various creatures in the small pools including fish, shrimp, crabs, and an eel.

At about 1:30am we turned around and started heading back. By this time my shoulders were starting to get a little tired from carrying a heavy bucket, but I sure wasn’t going to complain. Though not searching as hard on the way back ( I was more concerned with beating the tide), I even managed to catch a decent size octopus and spear a fish.

After washing everything and putting it all in the fridge, we finally got to bed around 4:00am.

Now comes the hard part: cleaning and cooking!

Time Management has become a big topic lately. We are constantly trying to do more work, take on more activities, and spend more time with our friends and families. There are a number of techniques you can do to get things done quicker: eliminate unnecessary tasks, make the necessary tasks more efficient, only take on items you really care about, etc. Another one is to do learn your bodies schedule and put it to use.

Every one’s body works differently and functions better at different times. For instance, I find that I am productive in the morning, much less productive in the afternoon, and most creative just before bed. In fact, most of my great ideas and motivations come once I lay down to go to sleep.

Once I figured this out, I was able to get a lot more done and actually spend less time doing it. I try to complete as many of the difficult tasks in the morning when I find it easy to focus and concentrate. I take a rest in the afternoon or complete the tasks that don’t take much mind power. In the evening, I tend to read and study when my mind is most free. I also keep a pen and pad next to my bed so I can write down all the ideas that come. With out it I tend to forget it by morning.

Give it a try. If you feel totally unmotivated, try completing it at the different time and see if it goes better. Once you have your system done you will be able to accomplish more work quicker and easier.

Related articles

• Time Management-Learning from Your Day
• 3 Steps to Increase Your Efficiency at Work
• Too many interests to commit to any of them
• How to Prioritize
• Body Clock Experts Recommend..

3 Days ago I took delivery of a 1993 Honda Today. A used car I had bought from a very small dealership. After cleaning the entire car the following day, I decided to drive it to the super market as well as fill up the gas. Unfortunately, the engine cranked only a few times before the battery died and I was left in disappointment.

The following day I went back to the dealership and borrowed some jumper cables to charge the battery. However, even after charging the battery the car still wouldn’t start. As I mentioned, the car was very low on gas so I figured maybe it had run out of gas from the dealership to my house. We called the gas station and one of the station employees brought $10 worth of gas to my house. Unfortunately, the car still didn’t start and I had no tools at all. To my surprise, the attendant said he would get some tools and be back in about 10 minutes.

He spent about 15-20 minutes cleaing plugs and checking wires (while continuously charging the battery) and the car finally started. When I asked how much, he told me it was the service that came with the gas. I didn’t know what to say. Since I had to buy a new battery, I made sure to stop by and fill up the rest of my tank at his gas station. Due to the extra service I received, I will continue to use this gas station whenever possible for as long as I am here.

When you surpass someones expectations, you shock them. That shock makes you stand out from your competition and makes them remember you. Most businesses tend to compete on price, better product, or quicker service. The problem is that these don’t break the expectations. They leave no “shock value”. Nothing to make the customer think your product or service is different. People expect the product to be better and cheaper. What they don’t expect is the coffee shop that offers to wash your car while you wait or the car salesman that’s totally honest.

This doesn’t just hold true for companies. This same thing applies with your job and even with your relationships. Seth Godin, one of the top selling athors on marketing recently wrote a post tilted “The Marketer’s Attitude” discussing what he would look for in a good marketer. Basically, things that are out of the norm and exceptional. As Seth Godin says, “They’ve seen it all before“. What will make you stand out? Are you the employee who uses less budget and gets more done or the one who does the average? Are you the friend who always shows up late or the friend who never forgets to send a birthday card?

If you want to stand out, you need to be exceptional!

Other helpful posts on being different

Presentation Zen on A Whole New Way of Presenting

The Secret to Standing Out

And of course, be sure to read The Purple Cow. A great book on standing out from your competition.

I wrote about Flock when I first discovered it a few months ago and wrote it was quite worth while. Flock is an Internet Browser based on the popular Firefox browser by Mozilla that also integrates your e-mail, social media, photos and media, and news feeds all into one place. I was really impressed with how easy browsing had become. The one disadvantage was that Flock was based on Firefox 2.0 and 3.0 had just been released.

After three weeks without internet, I found out yesterday that Flock 2.0 was released. It comes with all the features of Firefox 3, a new cleaner theme, and better performance. Upon startup, they also provide you with a simple video showing you how to use the different features.

Each time you log into an account, Flock will ask you if you want to save the account. Once you have saved it everything becomes one click. One click to see all of your friends in all the different social media, one click to see all your different accounts, to check e-mail, post to your blog, see your favorites, or read your news.

If you do any of these things, then I recommend you give Flock a try. It is will well worth your time. If you already use it, or give it a try, let me know what you think.

If you are using another browser (especially internet explorer) then here are some additional articles to read.

Firefox Hits 20% Market Share- Could it be better?

The FLock Blog

New Features for Flock 2.0

More is More: Flock 2.0- Yes, I think they are right

We left Tokyo on the morning of October 15th and arrived in Miyakojima in the afternoon. The weather was cloudy with a little drizzle of rain, but quite warm. For the first three days we stayed at The Sun Rooms, a guest house just out of town. It was cheap, but with no bathroom, sink or shower in the room we were eager to get out of there.

We spent the next couple of days looking for an apartment, and eventually found one located just outside the main part of town. It’s a 2 story house that has been turned into two apartments. We rent the upper half. It’s huge compared to my apartment in Tokyo and costs less than half. As you can see there is even a slight view of the ocean. After the 3rd day, the weather really cleared up and turned beautiful.

View from the road

Ocean side view

Farmland side

This is the pier (久松港) 10 minutes walk from our house with an amazing view of two smaller islands

And Painagama beach (パイナガマビーチ) is about 5 minutes by car

After finding out that we wouldn’t be able to get internet for about 3 weeks, we decided to just relax and enjoy the island. Here are a few pictures during that time.

Shimajiri Mangroves (島尻マングローブ林)

Eri at Aragusuku Kaigan beach　(新城海岸)

Left: Eri, Center: Me, Right: Guppi- We did this jump about 5 times to get this shot

After a busy day of snorkeling, Eri cooked our first meal at home. Guppi (right) was a huge help in our transition to Miyakojima. If you come to Miyakojima, make sure to stop by for a shiatsu massage and get his advice on places to visit.

View of the Ocean from Kurima Island (来間島)

Lunch at the Pani Pani Cafe. Mie (center) was Guppi’s friend visiting from Osaka. Kaori (right), runs an art shirt store here in Miyakojima

Sunset at Maehama Beach (前浜ビーチ)

If you would like to see more pictures of Miyakojima, please check out Eri’s blog. She has started a blog that focuses on Miyakojima. It is all in Japanese, but you can at least see some more pictures.

Please let me know what you think!

I will be searching for something that with slightly larger text and easier to read side menus. If possible I would like to stay with something where I can insert pictures into the title as with the current theme. Please let me know if you have any recommendations.