cubicleless

My neighbor's bamboo is flexible and resilient.

My neighbor has a bamboo forest in his backyard. I haven’t paid much attention to bamboo until moving in and watching this amazing plant.

No other plant grows faster than bamboo. I’ve watched brand new sprouts of it grow as high as 3 feet in 2 days! I have pulled a few sprouts from the ground in an attempt to create a controlled planting of it.

Here’s why I love bamboo and have made bamboo my mentor.

1. Bamboo is resilient. For two years now I have watched bamboo and how it reacts to the different seasons. Regardless of temperature or precipitation, the bamboo has remained standing. Personally, I’ve weathered many storms as a working man. I’ve managed to keep my home and keep my family fed after losing my job and transitioning into self-employment. I remain standing after my battles and have grown stronger as a result.

2. Bamboo is flexible. It’s amazing to watch this stuff when it rains or snows. As you can see in my photo above, bamboo will bend and flex, but never break. When you are self-employed, expect to be forced to bend or flex while trying to keep things moving. Being flexible is essential as you have many hats to wear. Otherwise, you may snap under the pressure.

3. Bamboo grows fast. Within a few weeks I’ve watched the bamboo rise as high as ten feet! I don’t plan on growing any taller as I already stand at 6’2” and I’m comfortable with that. My point is I have to realize that to achieve the goals that I want to achieve in life I have to grow. I have to grow spiritually, I have to grow through education, I have to grow in the habits I am trying to form.

4. Bamboo is versatile. Bamboo is used for many things. Scaffolding, flooring, decoration, fishing poles, Pandas eat it, fencemaking, bridges, walking sticks are only a few of the many things Bamboo can be used for. In my business, I have to how to do a variety of tasks. I have to be versatile. I believe in filling up your toolbox and learning as much as you possibly can.

Sometimes you have to look to nature and emulate nature to keep you going. A boss from an old job told me to examine nature when I needed a creative spark. I chose bamboo.

Are you a Productivity Hero?

A productivity hero gets his job done in the most efficient manner possible and enjoys his free time.

A productivity hero fights time and uses elite time-saving techniques that only a few have mastered.

Today is your lucky day.

The Productivity Hero has released some of his most powerful techniques just for you.

1. Break your tasks into chunks. Let’s face it, some of us can’t clear a building in a single bound. Don’t try to be super-human. Trying to get a HUGE job done in a single sitting is one of the leading causes of procrastination. Instead, break your task or project into smaller, more feasible tasks. You will gain momentum and the rest of the tasks will seem less daunting.

2. Get organized. Heroes, for the most part, are not slobs. You’ll find that they keep their gear neatly packed away and easily accessible so they can get to it when they need it. Look at Batman and his damn Batcave! Or how Superman takes care of his outfit and has it nice and folded up when he needs it. Keep all of your gear in order and make it easily accessible. You will be more productive as a result.

3. Perfect is for perfectionists. Most heroes are not perfect and they know it. Every hero has a weakness or vulnerability. They have come to terms with the fact that they are not perfect. If they had not, there would be a whole lot more crime in this world. You don’t have to be perfect either. Do the best that you can do at your job, but don’t hold off on starting it or finishing it because it’s not perfect.

4. Chase one thing at a time. Think about Spiderman and how he swings around the city while fighting crime. It would be impossible for him to fight two bad guys in two different places at once. When you are doing your own job, focus on one task at a time. Forget thinking you are the multitasking hero. Multitasking dissipates energy and keeps you from giving all of your effort to getting one thing done.

5. Try pen and paper. Think about some of your favorite heroes. What tools or weapons did they have at their disposal? Typically, it wasn’t much. Ok, you’re right… Batman had a belt full of gadgets. What about Superman? All he had was a skin tight suit and red boots. Listen, my point is forget about all the productivity gadgets you think you need. Write down what you need to do with a pen and paper and cross it off when you are done. It’s an amazing feeling.

6. Do what you do. Batman knew he had limitations. He knew that he couldn’t just burst into flight and fly to space if he wanted to. In your own situation, if you want to be wildly successful, focus on doing what you do best. Don’t try to be everything to everyone.

7. Avoid distractions. Imagine what would happen if our heroes were constantly distracted by Facebook, Twitter, cell phones, email, tv, kids… I think you get the picture. If you want to get stuff done you have to shut things off and set expectations with who might be trying to contact you to save the world.

If you follow these seven techniques, you too could be a productivity hero.

Photo credit ultravioletmonkeysons @ flickr

As machines become more and more efficient and perfect, so it will become clear that imperfection is the greatness of man.
– Ernst Fischer

Robots don’t complain.
Robots have to be maintained to work efficiently.
Robots have to be programmed to do the job right, but once they are programmed they can do a job faster than a human.
Robots have to be reprogrammed to do a new task.

Stop Complaining
Robots don’t complain. Complaining is making excuses. When you start to complain about the job you have to do, you are looking for reasons to not do it. So, maybe your job is harder than it should be. Maybe your boss is being a jerk. Maybe it’s too hot where you have to work. Don’t complain. Just do the work and get it done. Like a robot.

Perform Maintenance
Robots are machines that must be maintained in order to remain efficient. Sometimes their parts need to be replaced or they need to be lubed up. How about us humans? How do we maintain ourselves to make sure we are in top condition to perform at our highest levels?

• Quality Sleep – I can’t stress this enough. Getting quality sleep is essential if you want to be efficient at what you do. Getting quality sleep is considered routine maintenance. Robots power down too you know.
• Get Exercise – To keep your heart healthy and to make your body function the way that it should, routine exercise is necessary. You should do at least 30 minutes of exercise 3 – 5 days per week. If you don’t want to feel slow, lethargic, lazy and sluggish: get out and start walking, running or lifting weights.
• Eat Nutritiously – It’s amazing how good I feel when I am eating well-balanced and nutritious meals. Your body was designed to take in nutritious food. If you fill your body full of crap all the time, you’re going to feel like crap all the time. Would a robot eat crap?
• Take Vitamins – Again, your body was designed to take in proper supplements to function correctly. Talk to your physician about what supplements you should take. Personally, I take a B-Vitamin, C-Vitamin, D-Vitamin and an Omega-3 capsule. I rarely get sick, even around 4 kids that are always sick and I believe it has a lot to do with the vitamins I take. (I was getting sick once per month prior to taking vitamins.)

Program Yourself
To do a task correctly, robots need to be programmed. Robots that work in an automobile factory don’t just start assembling cars on their own. They are given specific instructions and have a specific task.

We are the same way, aren’t we? I didn’t just sit down and start designing websites. I have spent years researching, reading, taking courses and actually doing the work to learn how to do what I do.

In order to do a job as efficiently as possible you must program yourself to do so.

photo courtesy of flickr @ tannermoehle.com

I was exhausted going to bed last night! I went to sleep at 9:45pm and got up at 6:05am. Getting up was a bit easier this morning. I fell asleep very quickly, even with my wife reading with the light on.

The Power of Sleep

There is definitely much power in sleep. I am alert in the morning after a good night of sleep and much more productive. Personally, I’m a complete zombie during the day if I do not get much quality sleep. Yesterday was pretty rough for me, but I knew I had to stay the course to get the habit to stick.

The Challenge of Habit

There’s always a challenge when breaking old habits and building new ones. When you mix things up and try to better yourself, you will win in the end. I’ve realized through exercising and going to the gym on a regular basis that if I do the same workout routines over and over eventually my body gets used to it and my gains or improvements slowly subside.  With sleep, I have to steadily challenge myself and try knew methods to get better quality of sleep and to ultimately rise early.

My goal is to feel more productive and to have more time to be more productive.

Time is money. Time while well rested is more money.

“Early to bed and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.” – Ben Franklin

I’ve always been more productive when waking up earlier. I’m going to put BF to the test by actually measuring production, profits and my own personal health while getting up earlier.

For the next two weeks I plan to record how much I am getting done, how much money I make and how I’m doing healthwise. I’ll share my results along the way.

I always thrive when I’m challenged. When you are self-employed it’s vital that you challenge your self to make sure you stay on track and keep money rolling through the door. At the same time you have to take care of yourself.

What I know I will gain from this experiment is productive time. I call it productive time because I tend to be more alert in the morning which lends itself to focus. When I’m focused I get more done. When I get more done I feel better about what I’m doing and the productivity increases.

I basically see it as a chain reaction. When I get more done, I’ll obviously make more money. When I make more money I’ll feel better about going to the gym and spending time taking care of myself vs. trying to work more to earn money.

I will start by getting up at 6am. This is about 2 1/2 hours early than I’ve been getting up lately.

Here we go! Day 1 starts in 12 hours. I’ll let you know how it goes.