(it is about marketing music (or anything really) in the kooky new Internet world so don’t click if this doesn’t inherently interest you, and it is a video blog post too I should point out)

“Business is a good game, lots of competition and a minimum of rules. You keep score with money.” Bill Gates

The above quote moved me when I first read it because as a wanna-be entrepreneur of many years, I always struggled with bringing my ideas out and into the marketplace successfully – purely (I now know) because my definition of success was fuzzy.

You see, for me, money is not a great motivator. It is abstract and boring. You want to know what I think when I look at my bank account balance?

“Oh … some numbers … “

There are other currencies that I find way more exciting. For example – applause.

Sad, I know, but once you have stood on stage in front a crowd that’s wildly applauding and cheering what you just did – well, sorry to say, “some numbers” just doesn’t compare.

This is why I have always rolled my eyes when people say (about an aging, wealthy performer) “Oh he’s only in it for the money these days”. I bet that’s not the reason at all. Once you have a lot of money, it is pretty easy to stay rich by investing your money sensibly.

They do it for the buzz.

How I Motivate Myself To Earn Money

Of course, applause is all very well. But the fact is that unless you are getting a LOT of claps, you ain’t getting much money, and no money means a pain in the backside and then some.

So of course, like most people, I have to get up each day and earn my keep.

So I use the Bill Gates quote above to motivate me. I view business as a game and the score as money. I am not a businessman – I am a key player in the internationally televised…

World Series MoneyBall Grand Slam

This gets me way more excited and motivated because, as my friends will tell you, I am very competitive when it comes to games. Personally, while I keep it all in the spirit of fun, I can’t see the point of participating in a game without trying to win. Whether it’s a ball game in the backyard or a board game, you can be sure that if I am going to bother play at all – I play to win.

And yes, I get a bit pissed when I lose. It’s just how I’m wired up.

The Point Is To Get Points On The Board

I know that sounds horribly shallow. I know I should probably say: the point is to make the world a better place by helping others – and actually that is my other main motivational drive, but it is hard to think about the problems of the world all day. So instead I just focus on business being a game, and money being the points on the board.

In fact I do this quite literally: I have a whiteboard and on that I write up the name of the current month and a sales goal and then I write up each buck as it hits the bank – but ONLY when it hits the bank.

Because you haven’t scored a goal until the ball travels between the posts, you know what I mean? All money is speculative until it is in your hands.

One in the hand is worth two in the bush, dudes.

I don’t know why this motivates me to make money, but for some reason it does. I do have other motivations: things I want to buy or do which cost money – and most important of all – the welfare of my wife and child. Working from home is great because if the game isn’t going very well at any point, I can take a coffee break, walk into the house, clap eyes on my lovely ladies, and suddenly I am instantly amped to get back out on the field and score some quick-fire goals.

By the way, I am totally not (and never have been) a jock, so I have no idea why this whole game analogy works for me, but then Bill Gates wasn’t a jock either.

What fires you up to make money? Or do you just find the whole thing repulsive?

For more motivational goodness check out The Essential Motivation Handbook

Do you suffer from a lack of self-confidence? Is so you should know that learning to meditate effectively can really help you to build your self-confidence levels up.

I recently started doing stand-up comedy as a hobby. Many people I know commented that I must have such strong levels of self-confidence to even consider such folly!

They are correct.

Despite my dubious comedic material, the reason I can go through with it (even though I still get very nervous before getting up on stage) is because I do actually have a lot of self-confidence and yes, a major reason I have this personality trait is due to meditation.

Allow me to explain.

How Meditation Helps You Become More Self-Confident

It is a sad fact of life that as we grow from childhood to adulthood, we invariably go through various degrees of emotional trauma. This is true even for those of us with relatively stable upbringings; think about how horrible kids at school were to you sometimes. This stuff all takes it toll on our developing minds and to protect ourselves from unwanted emotional pain, we build up defensive emotional walls.

These defenses can manifest as aggressive or assertive personality traits – or they can manifest as low self-esteem. By adopting an image of yourself as a person who is not very confident, your ego feels safer knowing that you won’t volunteer to put yourself in the limelight (i.e. in danger of being criticized or mocked).

Now while this may (or may not) have helped you to cope throughout school and your adult life so far, you may be aware that in fact your lack of self-confidence is limiting your ability to shine, to enjoy living the full expression of your talents and abilities. And yes, it may be stopping you from showing them all (dammit) just how good you could be … if only you could find the guts to stand up and be counted.

Using Meditation To Over-Ride the Ego and Find Your Self-Confidence

When you learn how to meditate effectively, interesting things happen.

For starters, if all goes well, you will begin to relax.

And I mean really relax.

At this stage you will feel at peace, and forget about your problems, even if it is just for a little while as you meditate.

Then as you go deeper and deeper, you will begin to bypass the fearful “ego” part of your personality and begin to get in touch with that part of your being that is at peace, happy and free.

You may not believe that there is a part of you that is so carefree and happy – but believe me it is true. It’s just that you may have never bypassed your fearful, wounded mind enough to experience this level of contented awareness that lies at the core of us all.

I could write forever about this process, but in the context of this post, it is enough to say that if you have never meditated successfully enough to have felt this state of being, then it would be well worth your while to explore this phenomenon (by reading and more importantly, meditating) until you get in touch with what I am trying to describe.

When you reach this blissful stage of meditation, you begin to see things from a different perspective. You will begin to understand life from a universal perspective, your own life with all it’s troubles will not seem as urgent and all-encompassing, but rather you will see how small you really are in the grand scheme of things and how this is not something to fear but rather is just fine.

You are a tiny little speck in a vast, vast universe – and that’s ok with you. It’s how it should be.

Go even deeper and you will understand how in fact you are not just a speck – a separate part of the universe – but (woo-woo as it does sound) you are in fact ALL of the universe. Everything is One Thing and you are that One Thing and in a certain way (not the egoistic Christian way) you are in fact eternal.

Then your meditative thoughts may turn to your problems of self-confidence. And suddenly you will not feel so concerned about what people think of you anymore.

And when you are no longer meditating but are back in the “real world” facing your self-confidence issues, you will find that regular meditation will help you with “mind skills”, mental abilities (almost like mild super-powers) to over-ride your ingrained patterns of low self-confidence and rise above your low-self esteem.

Because if you are all of the Universe, and if everybody else that you know is One with you, then what is there to fear?

Nothing.

Fear has no place in your life.

It is a mirage.

Let it go.

Stand up tall, with confidence – and live your life to fullest!

Photo by Kalandraka

Do you find yourself confused as to what your main direction in life is? Do you find yourself exploring This and then That and then berating yourself because you reckon you should have spent that time working on One Major Purpose instead of allowing yourself to get distracted?

Well, if so, RELAX!

Maybe you aren’t wasting time at all!

Maybe – just maybe – you are in the process of creating something amazing and highly original by combining different concepts and fields into One New Thing – a new category even!

READ

Can’t see how this applies to you and your disparate interests? Well, then maybe you need to explore this concept a bit more. Some good books to read are “Purple Cow” by Seth Godin, “Blue Ocean Strategy” by W. Kim and R. Mauborgne and “The Medici Effect” by Frans Johansson. All great books about the importance and methods of creating extraordinarily original offerings.

DRAW

Another awesome method of seeing where the connections lie is mind-mapping. If you are such a tech-head that you need to, you can find software to help with this, but personally I prefer a pen and the back of an envelope – this way I just bang out the ideas in my head, explore the connections, and move on to doing some real work. I don’t recommend spending hours fluffing about with this kind of thing, because it’s not real work, but a quick mind-mapping sessions can certainly help when inspiration strikes – or when it doesn’t.

Fly in the Face of Convention

This concept of combining seemingly unrelated fields of endeavor into a new original category or offering can be difficult for others to understand if you try and spell it out to them as a hypothetical theory. For example, my (always evolving) offering involves combining original music, humour, writing, personal development and entrepreneurship into my One Thing, but unless it serves a purpose (such as to illustrate my point), I don’t try to get people to understand this ambitious plan. Why? Because …

A) I don’t need the let-down when people don’t get it (because it sounds ridiculous to them) and tell me I’m crazy.I know I’m crazy anyway – and I don’t give a fuck! I like it!

B) I don’t fully understand my One New Thing yet myself! It’s an ever-evolving exploration of Self, through which I hope to help others to realize their own True Nature and/or simply to enjoy living more.

C) Because you don’t have to be able to explain it as a theory. It’s just not necessary!

Have a look around and you will find that truly original Creators are Do-ers and tend to either not be very self-analytical, or if they are, they keep this to themselves and just get on with creating the Original Work.

Then what happens? Other, not-so-original thinkers come along, formularize the original innovations, and reproduce lame Robo-Creations that have no soul and are in every way inferior.

Case in point? Jimy Hendrix. Originality oozed out of the man’s pores; he was instincively unique. Since he blew everybody’s minds his style has been rehashed to the point where it is in itself a sanitized and overwrought cliche.

Don’t do the same old shit. Try harder! Combine your different interests and see what you can come up with! Analyse everything about yourself and find what it is that makes you You.

It’s not always easy, but actually being original, then working really hard at getting that “out there” is one of the major laws of success. Good luck!

The secret to success in life is simple. It goes like this:

1. Decide what the One Thing you really want to do is.
2. Work relentlessly at being great at doing it.
3. After you’ve been working at it for a while honestly appraise whether you are talented enough in this area to succeed (believe me, I have seen enough live music to know that sometimes hard work just ain’t enough to cover for complete lack of talent).
4. Keep working at it.
5. Get it out there (don’t hide under a bushel).
6. Don’t get distracted.
7. Keep working at it until you succeed.

This is the conclusion I have come to after years and years of digesting just about all the self-help and “how to” literature that one man should ever read.

Of course everybody’s journey is different and I am generalizing, but my point is that at the end of any self-help journey this is where you end up if you are actually going to go on and succeed.

At one point in my life I needed to read all those books and blog posts, but it all lead me back to the conclusion that drove me onward and upward when I was younger adult (and was doing quite well for myself – before I got distracted). This conclusion is simple:

If you do things, things get done.

So if you are looking for a magic bullet, there it is. Put down the self-help book, unsubscribe from the How-to blogs and to quote one of the world’s more successful individuals, Jerry Seinfeld: “Just work.”

In case you simply aren’t ready to follow this advice, then here are links to two of the more to-the-point and useful “how to succeed” posts that I have come across (but you’d be better just to get to work right now and save the reading until their is no way you could be working, which is not very often).

How To Walk On Water

The 3 Secrets To Success (says it’s about online marketing success but the points apply across the board).

As for me – I am tired of reading self-help and how-to books (unless I need a specific piece of technical knowledge) and I am convinced that the only way forward is just to work hard towards what I want (and know I am good at). I am so convinced that this is true that I am as of 2009 – documenting my journey towards my goals to prove that I am right.

“If you’ve got really smart people who are all focused on the same mission, then usually you can get some things done.”

Barack Obama

For the uninitiated, Think and Grow Rich is pretty much the definitive work on applying your self to get what you want out of life (you can substitute “Rich” for any goal you want, be it “Lose Weight” or *ahem* “Get Laid”). And yes, with a title like that, it does sound like the kind of shit that any sane person would avoid at all costs, but then I am not sane and neither are most successful people.

First – Get Your Freebie

This book was researched and written over a period of twenty odd years and was first published waaaaay back in 1937, but don’t let the antique nature of the book put you off, it is easy to read and as punchy as the latest “thang” to hit the shelves. AND it’s in the public domain which means it is really easy to get it for free as an eBook and legally too … so whatever you do NEVER pay for an electronic copy of Think and Grow Rich.

I read it a couple of years ago and have become a fan of the process contained within. Despite the cheesy title, it is really quite a great system for getting what you need and want out of life and while it isn’t too complicated it certainly is the real thing as compared to miserable rubbish like the Secret that has been doing the rounds lately.

And yes it IS about Law of Attraction but that is just one component of the book. It is also about other things, much more down-to earth things, like *gulp* hard work and persistence.

So all-in-all Think and Grow Rich is an awesome book and I totally recommend it. It is also quite challenging to follow, but as I will explain soon, it doesn’t need to be.

But What About the Hidden Secret?

When you read Napoleon Hill’s book, you will no doubt become intrigued by the way he hints that there is a secret for success that was handed down to him by the then Richest Man in the World title-holder, Andrew Carnegie. Hill doesn’t spell it out for us because he believes that you will know it when you are ready and then it will jump right off the page at you.

Well, you guessed it, I have my own theory as to what this hidden secret is…

BUT

So does Brian Kim in his eBook “The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich”.

My Version of The Hidden Secret

Well I have to say it has never jumped off the page for me but without really doing any serious re-analysis of the book I did read this quote by Carnegie and just assumed that this must be the secret that he told Hill and which was somehow contained within the book:

“Here is the prime condition of success, the great secret. Concentrate your energy, thought and capital exclusively upon the business in which you are engaged. Having begun in one line, resolve to fight it out on that line, to lead in it: adopt every improvement, have the best machinery, and know the most about it. This is the great secret…” Andrew Carnegie

Now it seemed to me to be obvious that when he said “this is the great secret” that he meant what he said and that there wasn’t likely to be some other great secret out there that he also believed in. After all he said “THE” great secret not “A” great secret. And this was where I got the idea for my Curly’s Law eBook which, by the way, you can download free here.

However I recently saw the sales page for Kim’s “Hidden Secret” book and I couldn’t resist buying it to see what he made of all this … and I must admit I was pretty skeptical at first.

But as I read through it last night I came to see that while the above version of Carnegie’s secret is a pretty good one, Brian Kim’s analysis is also a very strong case in point.

Brian Kim’s Version of the Hidden Secret

I guess the main difference between Kim and me is that I am pretty darn lazy in a lot of ways and I was never going to sit down and analyze the crap out of some self-help book just to figure it all out – and good thing I didn’t because Kim has done it for me! He explains in his book how he became obsessed with the secret and poured over the book for weeks and months on end until he finally believed he had ‘got it’.

And while I still like my Curly’s Law version, the “just do one thing” approach, I can see now that Brian Kim has shown that this is really just one aspect of a 5 step process that Napoleon continually hints at over and over again throughout the book.

Kim reveals the secret pretty early in the book, and at first I was under whelmed, but the more I read through his painstaking analysis of what Napoleon Hill means and why it is so powerful and obvious (in the way that all great ideas seem obvious once some other genius has revealed it to you) the more I was convinced.

Once You Know The Second Version of the Hidden Secret Your Success Comes Naturally

Getting back to my comment earlier about how the Think and Grow Rich system can be hard to follow, Kim actually shows how it isn’t hard to follow at all once you realize that there is a specific order that you MUST follow in order to see the kind of massive success you desire. Then he challenges you to think about a time when you DID succeed in something and analyze the process you went through to see if it correlates to the Hidden Secret’s 5 step process. I did this for a few examples of my own success and was pleasantly surprised to note that I ABSOLUTELY DID unwittingly follow this process every single time I was ever successful in meeting a goal and that it wasn’t really hard work, but rather a spontaneous and enjoyable process of getting what I really truly wanted out of life.

So I am sold. The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich isn’t one of those Rah-Rah-Rah books that leave you temporarily and artificially inflated but is rather a fantastic companion to the already brilliant original work that will make you feel both relaxed about your natural ability to succeed in life and will also motivate you in a very steady and true fashion that will last for years until the job is done. I have just signed up as an affiliate seller of the product (makes no price difference to you) and I have no problem in heartily recommending you pop over to the Hidden Secret webpage and invest in a copy right now. I have no doubt that it will really move you in a deep way, and if you haven’t read Think and Grow Rich yet then never fear because you get a free copy with the Hidden Secret Ebook.

And there is a money back guarantee so how can you lose? You can’t – so get to it. You have dreams to make happen don’t you? Well I don’t recommend any old shit so do yourself a favor and make a tiny investment in your own success already – you won’t regret it – click here now.

Cheers, Good to be back after some time off.

Seamus Anthony

P.S. Hold the Phone!

My brain must be suffering from the effects of all those tasty beverages I had during my holidays because I didn’t even realise that when you buy the Hidden Secret eBook now you get two other free bonuses THAT I MISSED OUT ON! Man! That sucks for me, but it’s good for you I guess! (I might have to write to Brian and ask if he will send me mine.)

Now I haven’t read them yet so I will just cut and paste what he had to say about these two bonuses:

BONUS#2: ($12 value) Get a FREE copy of my special report: The Three Biggest Mistakes People Make With The Hidden Secret – make sure to read this so you don’t make the same mistakes!

BONUS#3: ($15 value) – Get a FREE copy of The Hidden Secret Workbook – This 26 page workbook will help you apply the Hidden Secret and become consistent. It also contains helpful notes and summaries to help you remember and understand the information from the book.

If you are still reading this then you KNOW you want that eBook so click here to get your hot little hands on it now.

This is part two of a series about “Going With the Flow”

I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason, and also that you must always listen to the messages the Universe is giving you.

There is so much confusing information around these ideas in personal development writing. You get one Guru that says that no matter how many times you fail, perseverence will always pay off. They would say that should chase your dreams no matter what happens along the way.

This is good advice in most circumstances, especially if you follow Curly’s Law and have found your ONE TRUE THING. But it can also lead to going down the wrong river for a long time, and plunging over a metaphysical waterfall.

On the other hand, there are other experts which tell you to listen to what the Universe is saying. If you constantly get the message that your current course of action is not going to work out, then it is time to change course, abandon ship and start something new.

As an example, say you are an aspiring horror writer. You sit down five nights a week  ’til past midnight, banging out story after story. They are  filled with interesting plot twits, fanatical villains and buckets of gore, and you think that they are fantastic. You send out thirty letters a week to publishers trying to get your novels out of the desk drawer, and into the bookstores. As the rejection letters mount up, you read through them carefully and see the consistant message. The market for horror books is dwindling, and so they are not taking on books by new authors.

You could continue to go along the same way as before, and not change direction. But then you realise you would only have your self to blame if it goes wrong. Maybe the world has had enough horror? Maybe you should change direction slightly, and still realise your goal in a slightly different way?

As in most things in life, the middle path wisdom shows us the way forward. True wisdom and awareness is about deciding the right course of action of the events of your life, as they are occuring in the here and now. That quiet, small voice within is the only thing worth listening too. This source of inner wisdom, called by some intuition, or higher self is the part of you that is constantly surrounded by the current of life, that best feels the flow of the river of time and fate.

Its the closest thing to a paddle and rudder that you have got.

You can learn a lot about life from reading and listening to the life stories of others. I love biographies, to see how my personal hero’s have structured their lives. The struggles they have faced, strategies they have used and the way that they have structured their lives in order to do what they love every day. The insight gained from looking at the place where people have started their life journey, and the steps they have taken to get to their goals is extremely valuable, like the condensed experience of every year of their life, put into the few hours it takes to read the book.

While it is important to use biographies and stories of success to learn and motivate us, there is one thing to be wary of. That is using the circumstances of others as excuses for not taking action ourselves. In the past I have caught myself, after reading about another self made billionaire, thinking things like “If only I got that big break then my life would be different” OR “if I didn’t have all of these responsibilities then I would have time to plan for success.”

This has lead to periods of inaction, or for settling for life circumstances that are less then favourable because I didn’t feel that I had the resources or advantages that others may have earned or been given by fate. I am now the first to admit that when we compare our life circumstances with other people, and then use the differences as excuses, we are entirely missing the point.

It is not that important to get hung up on the facts, but more to take the broad lessons of another’s life experience, and then apply them to your current life and dreams. Sure, your hero may have been a millionaire by 25, and you are close to pushing 40. Does that mean that you are in any less of a position than them? No, it just means that you have walked a different path, a unique experience that is the most valuable thing that you could possibly possess.

Sure, some of your idols may have been overnight successes, or been given a massive “lucky break”, but in general they were people just like you, following an inner urge to do their own thing, and not be confined by the rules of others. Don’t get caught in the game of looking for reasons why your life structure is less than ideal and stopping you reaching your goals. Look to see the advantages and benefits that are unique to you and give you an advantage. Always look to make small gains every day, and utilise the resources at hand as fully as possible.

If an interest in deeper spirituality has taught me anything in my life, it is that each of us must walk their own path towards their own truth.
We are here in this life as individuals so that we can learn and explore a way of living and a path to fulfilment that is unique.

We all face plenty of problems in life, but most of them can be overcome if we take to them like a Samurai takes to battle with his sword.

Be Objective

If you let your emotions over ride you, then you set yourself up for failure. Use your mind to pierce to the heart of the problem, making sure to recognise any hang-ups you may have that may cloud your judgment. Ask others around you to give you an outsider’s perception into events; it is often amazing how influenced we are by our own preconceived ideas about any situation.

Find Out The Facts

Don’t just accept the facts as you understand them from your own point of view. Go to lengths to understand what other facts may exist that you have missed or that others may have kept from you. Again, ask around, what are others aware of that you are not? This information could be the decisive element that wins the battle for you.

Have Fortitude

Draw on your internal strength. Most victories take persistence and determination. Being able to withstand the highs and lows of your own energy, motivation and drive may be just as important as anything else. If you can go the distance, you may find that your opponents cannot. Often the last man standing wins.

Act Outwardly, Be Still Within

Inner tranquility in the heat of battle is the ultimate aim of any martial artist. Modern sports people have also recognised this skill for many years now. If you can act while maintaining a peaceful calm mind, you will find yourself at an advantage. Make your day an exercise in moving meditation.

Conserve Energy

When there is no reason to fight, relax. Samurai warriors spent great amounts of time meditating, often until the very moment of battle. This will mean you have great reserves in stock for when the going gets tough.

Sit Up Straight

No, I am not joking. The classic Samurai pose is perfect for the modern desk bound worker – sit with your bottom on the front third of your chair, your legs shoulder width apart, your feet planted flat on the ground, your back straight and your shoulders relaxed.

Just doing this will make an enormous amount of difference to your ability to get through the day as it promotes good energy flow and reduces bodily aches and pains.

Accept Responsibility

Or in other words: be a person of honour. There is no glory in avoiding the truth; you will sleep better if you admit your mistakes, and others will respect you all the more.

Seek Justice

But not necessarily in a “Kill Bill” kind of way! What I mean is, take a stance that you believe in and you will find the inner-resources needed to win through in the end. This is why finding the right career is so very important for the human spirit.

Seek Clarity

Cut through confusion. Turn your bullshit-meter up high. Dispel doubt and find out what is real. If the problem involves others, there may be an element of subterfuge going on. Keep a keen eye out for those who would seek to discredit you in order to gain from your misfortune.

Have Courage in the Face of Adversity

Sooner or later a hurdle will appear in your path. You must face these with as much courage as you can muster. Courage for me is the ability to “feel the fear and do it anyway”. It is normal to feel fear. It is courageous to battle on regardless.

Choose Your Battles

Walk away from any fight that is not worth your time. Assess each problem you face as to whether or not it is worth investing your energy in. Would the problem go away if ignored? Would it matter if you did nothing? Has your opponent drawn his or her sword? If so, do you really want to be the first to do so?

Commit Hari Kiri if Dishonoured

Kidding!

Click here to get your free copy of our E-Book “Curly’s Law”