Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius — and a lot of courage — to move in the opposite direction.
~ Albert Einstein
New Show -> Starting Cube
Long ago, and far far away … I would gather clips, quotations, and other items that were intellectually stimulating to me.
Sometimes, I would share them with people.
Other times I would just collect them.
All the while thinking and dreaming of doing a podcast or show to share what I found.
Today – the first episode of that show was released: Starting Cube
Starting Cube as a brand and name was not what I was focusing on. A little while ago I picked up one of the rare 4 character .com domain names. It’s easy to find them, but most of the time some cyber squatter wants between $3,000 and $15,000 for the right to have and keep it.
ANSP.com was registered, and I fully intended on using it for the short version of the show. I even asked for help from friends & set up a few “test episodes”.
Last night, with today being the deadline, I was talking with my wonderful wife about the S and P parts. I really liked Success for “s”, but could not pick up any of the Success<“p”something>.com domain names, like I wanted. I decided to use ANSP as a media production company (though I am not sure if “p” shall stand for production or product long term) … or Ally Nation Success Productions … freeing me up to name the show whatever I wanted (and could get the domain for).
Starting Cube is intended to be a short regular podcast focusing on thought & ideas that lead to success.
Episode & Cube 1 is released (we view cubes as the clip, quotation, etc). [mp3]
[audio:http://www.startingcube.com/cube0001.mp3]More to come, but this is a start & that is an important step.
Towards or Away
You are sitting on a boat in the middle of an ocean.
You are moving.
You might not feel it – but you are moving. You are drifting.
Drifting is a terrible way to go anywhere, being intentional is much better and more fulfilling.
There are two ends of a spectrum people use when setting out into the vast ocean of life:
– drift – “God will take me there!!!”
– rowing – row the sailboat as fast and as hard as you can
Neither of those are good.
The best option is to sail the sailboat, where there is a role to play, but also the understanding that you do not create or control the wind.
With that …
there are two fundamental directions one can go:
Towards & Away
They look very similar, the boat is primarily moving forward, but the two directions cause dramatically different decisions.
You can sail towards an island, country, port, or just out to sea.
– vs –
You sailing away from your past, a harbor you want to leave, enemies …
And
You could be doing both at the same time, but what drives your decisions overall is always towards or away .
Sometimes we find ourselves in a situation where we must flee from the instance, event, people, circumstances, etc.
That is just life.
However,
There is a major difference between moving away from the fire and moving away from every piece of wood because it could be a flame
or never stopping your car by avoiding all red lights, stop signs, and traffic. You can get somewhere, but you waste a lot by running away all the time from something that needs not be avoided that aggressively.
The more productive way to live your life [or run a business] is to move towards something.
Solving a major problem
Learning a new skill
Helping a group to be able to feed themselves
Making the society better for success
Acquiring an item
Earning an award
All visions people have for themselves, desires that lead to action.
In the business world it is the difference between basing major decisions on a P&L (Profit & Loss Statement from the past month/quarter/week) or basing your major decisions on the budget.
A budget is your stated goals – what you are moving towards. A P&L, what happened in the past, is important
especially when developing a budget, or plan, but the first question needs to be “where are we going & why?” not “what has happened?”
Ask yourself ….
Do I mostly make decisions based on where I want to go or where I want to get away from?
Where do you want to go now?