The Personal Development Thread Vol: Just Do It

[illwill8710]

NT FAM!!!

While listening to an audio book I thought it would be a good idea to develop a Personal Development Thread for our community.

Lets use this space to share tools, the game,videos, advice, books, resources etc. to help us become better people and accomplish our goals.

Lets also use this space to hold each other accountable for personal goals and provide support or advice when needed.

Positive vibes and constructive criticism only.

The audio book that inspired me to make the thread is below:

Amazon product ASIN B0076DF6T4
Audio books have been my go-to for personal development at work or on the go.

Feel Free to share anything around the subject of Personal Development.

 

[thegooch]

"Never Eat Alone" is a solid read about networking. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/review-never-eat-alone/

Spoiler

Section One: The Mind-Set

The first section of Never Eat Alone is rather introductory, as it mostly lays out the basic idea and explains some of the things that you shouldn’t do.

Chapter 1 – Becoming a Member of the Club
This chapter is really an introduction to the rest of the book, laying out the basic premise that real networking is about finding ways to make other people more successful. In other words, jamming business cards in your Rolodex like that somewhat disturbing example above doesn’t cut the mustard. Why is that? If you do something to make someone else more successful, they’re more likely to value your relationship with them, and the more relationships you have with value in them, the more valuable you become, not only to yourself, but to the world: your employers, your clients, and so on.

Chapter 2 – Don’t Keep Score
The most fundamental lesson of all in this book is that you shouldn’t keep score when it comes to networking. If someone calls you up and asks for a favor that you can easily accomplish, make it so and don’t look back. Relationships are not finite things that are a straight-up exchange of one thing for another – they are living, breathing things. If you are going to take the time to connect with somebody, you should be willing to try to make that person successful. If they succeed, you succeed – it’s that simple.

Chapter 3 – What’s Your Mission?
Networking is largely useless unless you have goals, which the book eloquently defines as a “dream with a deadline.” Ferrazzi offers a three-step plan for setting goals. First, find your passion: what do you truly love to do? What would you enjoy doing for the rest of your life? Next, put those goals down on paper and flesh them out; his fleshing-out process is much like my plan for setting and reaching long-term personal finance goals in that you should write them down, then try to break them down into smaller goals that you can really wrap your arms around. Finally, build a “personal board of directors” by finding ways to establish a connection with people in that field already. How do you do that? Much of the rest of the book explains the process.

Chapter 4 – Build It Before You Need It
The main idea here is that you should begin reaching out to others and building your network of contacts before you need anything from them. If you start networking just as your job is about to die, it’s too late. Ferrazzi offers several ideas on how to get started with this: join community groups that interest you, take leadership positions in hobby groups that interest you, enroll in a local community college class on the topic of interest, or try to become involved with an approved work project that enables you to come into contact with more people. Then, as you’re exposed to more people, gravitate towards the ones who are involved with things that you want to be doing (i.e., your goals from the last chapter).

Chapter 5 – The Genius of Audacity
Many people have a very hard time being audacious when building a new connection: they want to appear humble and want to make a “good” impression right off the bat. The author suggests a different strategy: if you want something, be up front about it. It takes courage and a bit of talent, but Ferrazzi offers some guidance about how to find those things: find a role model, learn to speak, get involved, and simply giving it a shot. The worst thing that can happen is that they say no, which is the same answer you already effectively have, so what do you really have to lose?

Chapter 6 – The Networking Jerk
I loved this chapter, because it basically says “Don’t do anything like what you imagine a ‘networker’ to be like.” In other words, be the opposite of the Rolodex-stuffing scumbag. Instead, he offers six rules that ensure that even as you try to build connections, you never become that kind of jerk. First, don’t schmooze: have something to say, say it with meaning, and focus on establishing a few good connections than spending your time surfing the room. Second, don’t rely on gossip because it paints a picture of untrustworthiness. Third, be willing to give something away – he uses the example of bloggers who give away content to their readers. Fourth, don’t treat those under you poorly, ever (I believe in this one strongly). Fifth, be transparent – if you want to meet someone and are happy to meet them, say so. Last, don’t be too efficient – make genuine, individual connections. If you’re going to take the time to touch base with a contact, write to that person individually, don’t just include them on a big ol’ email to hundreds of people at once that starts off with “Dear friend!”

Section Two: The Skill Set

Now Never Eat Alone starts getting down to the meat and potatoes of this ethical and healthy breed of networking.

Chapter 7 – Do Your Homework
Once you’ve defined someone you wish to meet, the first step is to do your homework. Know who the person is (roughly), what their interests are, what they do, and especially what things you might nave in common with them. The author even goes so far as to suggest making up short bios for each person you really want to meet at a particular meeting. This way, you’ll have something to break the ice and also potentially flatter someone as well by knowing who they are.

Chapter 8 – Take Names
Once you have a connection with someone, it’s important to get their contact information. The author recommends starting with everyone in your current network, then building from there by adding people that you want to meet that match your goals. Then, when you have the opportunity to meet them, fill in that hole. Keith recommends doing things like cutting out lists of people assembled by the media, because these people are usually reasonably well-connected – for example, he mentions lists of movers and shakers from trade magazines.

Chapter 9 – Warming the Cold Call
If you’ve ever had to call someone for business purposes without a prior connection to them, you know how terrible it can be, but sometimes you have to do it. Ferrazzi makes a couple of recommendations for how to make this go a lot smoother. First, try as best you can to find a connection to the person you’re calling – someone you both might know. Second, make it clear to them right off the bat why this call is valuable by taking the homework you should have done on the person and connecting it with whatever the purpose of your call is. Be efficient with your words and try to pique their interest – don’t ever drone on and on. If the purpose is to get an appointment to talk to that person face to face, close with a suggestion that even if the topic isn’t of interest, you’d like to meet anyway because of the mutual connection’s admiration. I really don’t like cold calling, so this chapter left me feeling rather … well, cold.

Chapter 10 – Managing the Gatekeeper – Artfully
The entire point of this chapter is simple: work as hard as you can to stay on the good side of administrative assistants. I honestly believe this is one of the best lessons in the entire book – never ever overlook an administrative assistant, blow one off, or make their life unnecessarily difficult. I often spend time just kibbitzing with the administrative assistants, not only where I work, but also in the offices of some of my associates, and there have been times that it has really paid off and some key administrative task has simply happened.

Chapter 11 – Never Eat Alone
The idea here is that a meal is a spectacular time to connect with someone, so if you’re eating alone, you’re missing out on an opportunity to connect with someone. I agree with this sentiment, and it’s one of the reasons that I have to be careful balancing my brown-bag frugal style with the need to eat with certain people. In fact, the author suggests mixing and matching by inviting multiple people to eat with you from different parts of your social network, which can help build new connections and bring hidden ones to the forefront.

Chapter 12 – Share Your Passions
If you want to build a stronger relationship with someone, invite them to share in something that you’re passionate about, whether it be the theatre or a baseball game or whatever. For me, this often means inviting them over for a meal, as I am passionate about cooking (homemade fettuccine Bolognese, a glass of great red wine, and a homemade chocolate raspberry trifle for dessert tends to make friends, trust me). Whatever it is that gets your fire going, share it with those that you want to build a relationship with.

Chapter 13 – Follow Up or Fail
Ferrazzi seems to treat this as the most important point in the book, so I’ll put it in bold: when you make a connection, follow it up. Whether with a note or an email, you need to follow up on any connection you make that you feel is important. Ferrazzi also strongly hints that a handwritten thank-you note may be the best way to go to really stand out from the crowd.

Chapter 14 – Be a Conference Commando
This chapter offers extensive detail about how to maximize a conference in terms of meeting people, but what it really boils down to is discarding the preconceived notions of how a conference works. Generally, you should go intending to reach a wide audience by speaking and/or establish a good relationship with a small handful of people. Most important, though, is that you don’t sit there and do nothing and that you don’t turn into the schmoozing networker, either.

Chapter 15 – Connecting with Connectors
Here, Ferrazzi borrows heavily from the concepts in The Tipping Point and brings up “connectors” – those people who have an incredibly large and strong personal network. These people are obviously great to have a connection to, but how can you find them? Ferrazzi suggests several groups to look at: restauranteurs, headhunters, anyone remotely close to politics, public relations people, and journalists, for starters.

Chapter 16 – Expanding Your Circle
The biggest way to expand your circle of contacts, according to this chapter, is to merge your contacts with someone else. Offer to exchange invites to events with someone whose circle you don’t know well – and who doesn’t know your circle well. This can provide a great opportunity for both of you to seriously expand your circle. You can also agree to swap dinner parties with someone: each of you are responsible for half the guest list to two separate dinner parties, one hosted by each of you. This enables a lot of connections to be made, because when people you’re connected to form more connections, everyone wins.

Chapter 17 – The Art of Small Talk
This chapter is full of the “typical” stuff people think of when they imagine what a course in interpersonal relations is like: Smile At Others, Unfold Your Arms, Relax, Lean In, Shake Hands, and so on. This is basically a one-chapter compression of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People, which I hope to review and give proper respect to at a later date.

Section Three: Turning Connections Into Compatriots

This part of Never Eat Alone is all about building upon those connections made in the previous section and turning them into people that you can rely on for a lifetime. It starts, appropriately enough, with freewill giving of yourself.

Chapter 18 – Health, Wealth, and Children
The best thing you can do to help another person is to directly impact one of the three things in the title of this chapter. Personal and financial health and the benefit of children are often direct keys to a person’s heart. If you are capable of doing something that helps a person in one of these areas, you’re often able to endear yourself to that person and establish a really fantastic and deep connection that will last for a very long time.

Chapter 19 – Social Arbitrage
The idea here is that you should strive to build connections in as many different areas as possible. Have connections in tons of different professions, social circles, and so on, and then make connections when needed between people who exist in completely different social universes. This makes you seem indispensable to both people that you’re connecting, as you’ve benefitted both of them in a way that neither one was capable of independent of you.

Chapter 20 – Pinging – All The Time
I have a habit of making lots of quick contacts with my friends on a very regular basis just so the connection between us stays alive, strong, and healthy. I do this by occasionally whirring through my list and touching base with anyone I haven’t talked to lately. This works for me because I’m highly comfortable with most of them. In this chapter, Ferrazzi highly recommends doing that exact same thing with your entire contact list – just contact them every once in a while to keep that connection alive, because without some maintenance, even the best connection can wither on the vine. The chapter particularly recommends using birthdays as an opportunity to deliver a sharp ping, with a handwritten birthday note.

Chapter 21 – Find Anchor Tenants and Feed Them
This chapter is basically a guide to hosting a successful dinner party, which is a great way to build up established relationships and help the people you invite to establish new relationships of their own. Most of the advice is pretty straightforward here, but I found several of the suggestions to be quite interesting: hire some entertainment, invite some additional people to stop by for dessert only (usually close friends who won’t mind the lack of a dinner invite) and provide fresh blood for the party, and avoid seating couples together as that will get people interacting more and blood flowing.

Section Four: Trading Up and Giving Back

The final section of Never Eat Alone is mostly about specific techniques for strengthening your overall circle, mostly by making yourself more valuable to them.

Chapter 22 – Be Interesting
No one wants to spend time around a boring person, so make yourself interesting. Beyond the obvious of keeping up with current events and having a point of view on the issues of the day, Ferrazzi offers several interesting ways to do this: ask seemingly stupid questions, always be open to learning something new and trying new things, take time out for vacations and spiritual growth, and never get discouraged if things don’t go well.

Chapter 23 – Build Your Brand
Here, Ferrazzi goes beyond merely making yourself interesting into figuring out exactly what value you have for others. What do you bring to the table that others don’t? What do you want people to think of when they hear your name? Figure that out and cultivate it when you can by focusing and behaving in ways that will cultivate that image that you want.

Chapter 24 – Broadcast Your Brand
This is a primer on basic public relations – in other words, spreading the word around about the image you want to cultivate. For me, this blog is, in a way, a method of broadcasting my brand. I’d like it if people saw the name Trent Hamm and thought about interesting and applicable ideas for my life and food for future thought written in straightforward language, and hopefully The Simple Dollar is helping to build that up.

Chapter 25 – The Write Stuff
Very brief here, but to the point: write, write, and write some more. The written word is an incredibly powerful communication tool, and the more you practice writing, the better.

Chapter 26 – Getting Close to Power
Many people want to know how to get close to those who have decision-making power, but often the generic straightforward methods end with no returned email or returned call. Ferrazzi suggests a different route: try being involved with political fundraisers, attending conferences, joining nonprofit boards, and playing some golf. For me at least, golf has been spectacular at opening up opportunities – I’ve met many different people on the golf course and have established some lifelong relationships with people that I’ve met in a foursome.

Chapter 27 – Build It and They Will Come
This is all about clubs and other social organizations. Basically, joining these is a great way to meet new people from areas that you may have nothing at all to do with, which makes it possible for you to expand your social network in completely new and unexpected ways. I found that being involved in the very local political scene has much the same effect – I now know people who run landscaping businesses, two local organic farmers, and lots of other interesting folks simply because I got involved in a group.

Chapter 28 – Never Give in to Hubris
This is a vital life lesson: if you ever begin to think that you’ve got it made, stop right now. It takes only one mistake to knock over the whole house of cards. The author gives a great story about getting caught up in the moment and making a complete jerk of himself by overselling what he had because of ego. Instead, be humble and realize that the connections you’ve already made are the really valuable ones, not the big one you’re hoping to make.

Chapter 29 – Find Mentors, Find Mentees, Repeat
Ferrazzi makes the astute point here that you should always be looking for people to mentor and help you, but you should also be looking for people who you can help and mentor. This means that not only should you seek out help from others, but you should also be willing to step forward and lead others when the time comes – and consistently do both.

Chapter 30 – Balance is B.S.
As the book begins to close out here, this chapter makes a key point that people shouldn’t have to compartmentalize their personal and professional lives and keep them in balance. In fact, Ferrazzi largely encourages the opposite: mix and match the two in whatever way makes you feel happiest about your life. In fact, he argues that the more people you interact with regularly, the more interesting and happy your life will become because of the diversity and variety.

Chapter 31 – Welcome to the Connected Age
Never Eat Alone closes here with a paean to the age of the internet which affords many ways to make connections easier and also affords a lot of ways to make yourself stand out from the crowd. Ferrazzi does go beyond the basic “sign up for social networking programs!” idea that many people seem to claim with regards to the internet, though, and moves on to some of the bigger changes that the internet is bringing about: major shifts in grassroots politics, the rebirth of guilds and old-style labor unions, and so forth. An interesting look at the future from the perspective of someone who is skilled at connecting with people.

 

[AIR J XIII]

Check out Peter Voogd.

He's a younger cat (early 30s), and releases mixtapes that are on spotify.

 

[moderndarwin]

"Never Eat Alone" is a solid read about networking. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/review-never-eat-alone/

Spoiler

Section One: The Mind-Set

The first section of Never Eat Alone is rather introductory, as it mostly lays out the basic idea and explains some of the things that you shouldn’t do.

Chapter 1 – Becoming a Member of the Club
This chapter is really an introduction to the rest of the book, laying out the basic premise that real networking is about finding ways to make other people more successful. In other words, jamming business cards in your Rolodex like that somewhat disturbing example above doesn’t cut the mustard. Why is that? If you do something to make someone else more successful, they’re more likely to value your relationship with them, and the more relationships you have with value in them, the more valuable you become, not only to yourself, but to the world: your employers, your clients, and so on.

Chapter 2 – Don’t Keep Score
The most fundamental lesson of all in this book is that you shouldn’t keep score when it comes to networking. If someone calls you up and asks for a favor that you can easily accomplish, make it so and don’t look back. Relationships are not finite things that are a straight-up exchange of one thing for another – they are living, breathing things. If you are going to take the time to connect with somebody, you should be willing to try to make that person successful. If they succeed, you succeed – it’s that simple.

Chapter 3 – What’s Your Mission?
Networking is largely useless unless you have goals, which the book eloquently defines as a “dream with a deadline.” Ferrazzi offers a three-step plan for setting goals. First, find your passion: what do you truly love to do? What would you enjoy doing for the rest of your life? Next, put those goals down on paper and flesh them out; his fleshing-out process is much like my plan for setting and reaching long-term personal finance goals in that you should write them down, then try to break them down into smaller goals that you can really wrap your arms around. Finally, build a “personal board of directors” by finding ways to establish a connection with people in that field already. How do you do that? Much of the rest of the book explains the process.

Chapter 4 – Build It Before You Need It
The main idea here is that you should begin reaching out to others and building your network of contacts before you need anything from them. If you start networking just as your job is about to die, it’s too late. Ferrazzi offers several ideas on how to get started with this: join community groups that interest you, take leadership positions in hobby groups that interest you, enroll in a local community college class on the topic of interest, or try to become involved with an approved work project that enables you to come into contact with more people. Then, as you’re exposed to more people, gravitate towards the ones who are involved with things that you want to be doing (i.e., your goals from the last chapter).

Chapter 5 – The Genius of Audacity
Many people have a very hard time being audacious when building a new connection: they want to appear humble and want to make a “good” impression right off the bat. The author suggests a different strategy: if you want something, be up front about it. It takes courage and a bit of talent, but Ferrazzi offers some guidance about how to find those things: find a role model, learn to speak, get involved, and simply giving it a shot. The worst thing that can happen is that they say no, which is the same answer you already effectively have, so what do you really have to lose?

Chapter 6 – The Networking Jerk
I loved this chapter, because it basically says “Don’t do anything like what you imagine a ‘networker’ to be like.” In other words, be the opposite of the Rolodex-stuffing scumbag. Instead, he offers six rules that ensure that even as you try to build connections, you never become that kind of jerk. First, don’t schmooze: have something to say, say it with meaning, and focus on establishing a few good connections than spending your time surfing the room. Second, don’t rely on gossip because it paints a picture of untrustworthiness. Third, be willing to give something away – he uses the example of bloggers who give away content to their readers. Fourth, don’t treat those under you poorly, ever (I believe in this one strongly). Fifth, be transparent – if you want to meet someone and are happy to meet them, say so. Last, don’t be too efficient – make genuine, individual connections. If you’re going to take the time to touch base with a contact, write to that person individually, don’t just include them on a big ol’ email to hundreds of people at once that starts off with “Dear friend!”

Section Two: The Skill Set

Now Never Eat Alone starts getting down to the meat and potatoes of this ethical and healthy breed of networking.

Chapter 7 – Do Your Homework
Once you’ve defined someone you wish to meet, the first step is to do your homework. Know who the person is (roughly), what their interests are, what they do, and especially what things you might nave in common with them. The author even goes so far as to suggest making up short bios for each person you really want to meet at a particular meeting. This way, you’ll have something to break the ice and also potentially flatter someone as well by knowing who they are.

Chapter 8 – Take Names
Once you have a connection with someone, it’s important to get their contact information. The author recommends starting with everyone in your current network, then building from there by adding people that you want to meet that match your goals. Then, when you have the opportunity to meet them, fill in that hole. Keith recommends doing things like cutting out lists of people assembled by the media, because these people are usually reasonably well-connected – for example, he mentions lists of movers and shakers from trade magazines.

Chapter 9 – Warming the Cold Call
If you’ve ever had to call someone for business purposes without a prior connection to them, you know how terrible it can be, but sometimes you have to do it. Ferrazzi makes a couple of recommendations for how to make this go a lot smoother. First, try as best you can to find a connection to the person you’re calling – someone you both might know. Second, make it clear to them right off the bat why this call is valuable by taking the homework you should have done on the person and connecting it with whatever the purpose of your call is. Be efficient with your words and try to pique their interest – don’t ever drone on and on. If the purpose is to get an appointment to talk to that person face to face, close with a suggestion that even if the topic isn’t of interest, you’d like to meet anyway because of the mutual connection’s admiration. I really don’t like cold calling, so this chapter left me feeling rather … well, cold.

Chapter 10 – Managing the Gatekeeper – Artfully
The entire point of this chapter is simple: work as hard as you can to stay on the good side of administrative assistants. I honestly believe this is one of the best lessons in the entire book – never ever overlook an administrative assistant, blow one off, or make their life unnecessarily difficult. I often spend time just kibbitzing with the administrative assistants, not only where I work, but also in the offices of some of my associates, and there have been times that it has really paid off and some key administrative task has simply happened.

Chapter 11 – Never Eat Alone
The idea here is that a meal is a spectacular time to connect with someone, so if you’re eating alone, you’re missing out on an opportunity to connect with someone. I agree with this sentiment, and it’s one of the reasons that I have to be careful balancing my brown-bag frugal style with the need to eat with certain people. In fact, the author suggests mixing and matching by inviting multiple people to eat with you from different parts of your social network, which can help build new connections and bring hidden ones to the forefront.

Chapter 12 – Share Your Passions
If you want to build a stronger relationship with someone, invite them to share in something that you’re passionate about, whether it be the theatre or a baseball game or whatever. For me, this often means inviting them over for a meal, as I am passionate about cooking (homemade fettuccine Bolognese, a glass of great red wine, and a homemade chocolate raspberry trifle for dessert tends to make friends, trust me). Whatever it is that gets your fire going, share it with those that you want to build a relationship with.

Chapter 13 – Follow Up or Fail
Ferrazzi seems to treat this as the most important point in the book, so I’ll put it in bold: when you make a connection, follow it up. Whether with a note or an email, you need to follow up on any connection you make that you feel is important. Ferrazzi also strongly hints that a handwritten thank-you note may be the best way to go to really stand out from the crowd.

Chapter 14 – Be a Conference Commando
This chapter offers extensive detail about how to maximize a conference in terms of meeting people, but what it really boils down to is discarding the preconceived notions of how a conference works. Generally, you should go intending to reach a wide audience by speaking and/or establish a good relationship with a small handful of people. Most important, though, is that you don’t sit there and do nothing and that you don’t turn into the schmoozing networker, either.

Chapter 15 – Connecting with Connectors
Here, Ferrazzi borrows heavily from the concepts in The Tipping Point and brings up “connectors” – those people who have an incredibly large and strong personal network. These people are obviously great to have a connection to, but how can you find them? Ferrazzi suggests several groups to look at: restauranteurs, headhunters, anyone remotely close to politics, public relations people, and journalists, for starters.

Chapter 16 – Expanding Your Circle
The biggest way to expand your circle of contacts, according to this chapter, is to merge your contacts with someone else. Offer to exchange invites to events with someone whose circle you don’t know well – and who doesn’t know your circle well. This can provide a great opportunity for both of you to seriously expand your circle. You can also agree to swap dinner parties with someone: each of you are responsible for half the guest list to two separate dinner parties, one hosted by each of you. This enables a lot of connections to be made, because when people you’re connected to form more connections, everyone wins.

Chapter 17 – The Art of Small Talk
This chapter is full of the “typical” stuff people think of when they imagine what a course in interpersonal relations is like: Smile At Others, Unfold Your Arms, Relax, Lean In, Shake Hands, and so on. This is basically a one-chapter compression of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People, which I hope to review and give proper respect to at a later date.

Section Three: Turning Connections Into Compatriots

This part of Never Eat Alone is all about building upon those connections made in the previous section and turning them into people that you can rely on for a lifetime. It starts, appropriately enough, with freewill giving of yourself.

Chapter 18 – Health, Wealth, and Children
The best thing you can do to help another person is to directly impact one of the three things in the title of this chapter. Personal and financial health and the benefit of children are often direct keys to a person’s heart. If you are capable of doing something that helps a person in one of these areas, you’re often able to endear yourself to that person and establish a really fantastic and deep connection that will last for a very long time.

Chapter 19 – Social Arbitrage
The idea here is that you should strive to build connections in as many different areas as possible. Have connections in tons of different professions, social circles, and so on, and then make connections when needed between people who exist in completely different social universes. This makes you seem indispensable to both people that you’re connecting, as you’ve benefitted both of them in a way that neither one was capable of independent of you.

Chapter 20 – Pinging – All The Time
I have a habit of making lots of quick contacts with my friends on a very regular basis just so the connection between us stays alive, strong, and healthy. I do this by occasionally whirring through my list and touching base with anyone I haven’t talked to lately. This works for me because I’m highly comfortable with most of them. In this chapter, Ferrazzi highly recommends doing that exact same thing with your entire contact list – just contact them every once in a while to keep that connection alive, because without some maintenance, even the best connection can wither on the vine. The chapter particularly recommends using birthdays as an opportunity to deliver a sharp ping, with a handwritten birthday note.

Chapter 21 – Find Anchor Tenants and Feed Them
This chapter is basically a guide to hosting a successful dinner party, which is a great way to build up established relationships and help the people you invite to establish new relationships of their own. Most of the advice is pretty straightforward here, but I found several of the suggestions to be quite interesting: hire some entertainment, invite some additional people to stop by for dessert only (usually close friends who won’t mind the lack of a dinner invite) and provide fresh blood for the party, and avoid seating couples together as that will get people interacting more and blood flowing.

Section Four: Trading Up and Giving Back

The final section of Never Eat Alone is mostly about specific techniques for strengthening your overall circle, mostly by making yourself more valuable to them.

Chapter 22 – Be Interesting
No one wants to spend time around a boring person, so make yourself interesting. Beyond the obvious of keeping up with current events and having a point of view on the issues of the day, Ferrazzi offers several interesting ways to do this: ask seemingly stupid questions, always be open to learning something new and trying new things, take time out for vacations and spiritual growth, and never get discouraged if things don’t go well.

Chapter 23 – Build Your Brand
Here, Ferrazzi goes beyond merely making yourself interesting into figuring out exactly what value you have for others. What do you bring to the table that others don’t? What do you want people to think of when they hear your name? Figure that out and cultivate it when you can by focusing and behaving in ways that will cultivate that image that you want.

Chapter 24 – Broadcast Your Brand
This is a primer on basic public relations – in other words, spreading the word around about the image you want to cultivate. For me, this blog is, in a way, a method of broadcasting my brand. I’d like it if people saw the name Trent Hamm and thought about interesting and applicable ideas for my life and food for future thought written in straightforward language, and hopefully The Simple Dollar is helping to build that up.

Chapter 25 – The Write Stuff
Very brief here, but to the point: write, write, and write some more. The written word is an incredibly powerful communication tool, and the more you practice writing, the better.

Chapter 26 – Getting Close to Power
Many people want to know how to get close to those who have decision-making power, but often the generic straightforward methods end with no returned email or returned call. Ferrazzi suggests a different route: try being involved with political fundraisers, attending conferences, joining nonprofit boards, and playing some golf. For me at least, golf has been spectacular at opening up opportunities – I’ve met many different people on the golf course and have established some lifelong relationships with people that I’ve met in a foursome.

Chapter 27 – Build It and They Will Come
This is all about clubs and other social organizations. Basically, joining these is a great way to meet new people from areas that you may have nothing at all to do with, which makes it possible for you to expand your social network in completely new and unexpected ways. I found that being involved in the very local political scene has much the same effect – I now know people who run landscaping businesses, two local organic farmers, and lots of other interesting folks simply because I got involved in a group.

Chapter 28 – Never Give in to Hubris
This is a vital life lesson: if you ever begin to think that you’ve got it made, stop right now. It takes only one mistake to knock over the whole house of cards. The author gives a great story about getting caught up in the moment and making a complete jerk of himself by overselling what he had because of ego. Instead, be humble and realize that the connections you’ve already made are the really valuable ones, not the big one you’re hoping to make.

Chapter 29 – Find Mentors, Find Mentees, Repeat
Ferrazzi makes the astute point here that you should always be looking for people to mentor and help you, but you should also be looking for people who you can help and mentor. This means that not only should you seek out help from others, but you should also be willing to step forward and lead others when the time comes – and consistently do both.

Chapter 30 – Balance is B.S.
As the book begins to close out here, this chapter makes a key point that people shouldn’t have to compartmentalize their personal and professional lives and keep them in balance. In fact, Ferrazzi largely encourages the opposite: mix and match the two in whatever way makes you feel happiest about your life. In fact, he argues that the more people you interact with regularly, the more interesting and happy your life will become because of the diversity and variety.

Chapter 31 – Welcome to the Connected Age
Never Eat Alone closes here with a paean to the age of the internet which affords many ways to make connections easier and also affords a lot of ways to make yourself stand out from the crowd. Ferrazzi does go beyond the basic “sign up for social networking programs!” idea that many people seem to claim with regards to the internet, though, and moves on to some of the bigger changes that the internet is bringing about: major shifts in grassroots politics, the rebirth of guilds and old-style labor unions, and so forth. An interesting look at the future from the perspective of someone who is skilled at connecting with people.

I disagree with all this.

 

[adobecs4]

In for this.

 

[6 Rings G.O.A.T.]

 

[alchemist iq]

I never try over analyze life. I just f'it and get things done. I don't need a book tell me what I probably already know.

I actually like eating alone, I don't like talk while im Eating or rush my food.

"I’ve met many different people on the golf course and have established some lifelong relationships with people that I’ve met in a foursome."

Wtf....that's not networking.

 

[slighted]

What's helped me a lot is Yes thinking
If an event or something sounds interesting, I just go and do it

"Do what makes for an interesting story"

 

[illwill8710]

In my early to mid 20's i use to watch a ton of Elliott Hulse videos for fitness and everyday male perspective. I highly recommend his videos to men of all ages for perspective on pretty much everything we tend to deal with throughout life.

 

[illwill8710]

"Never Eat Alone" is a solid read about networking. https://www.thesimpledollar.com/review-never-eat-alone/

Spoiler

Section One: The Mind-Set

The first section of Never Eat Alone is rather introductory, as it mostly lays out the basic idea and explains some of the things that you shouldn’t do.

Chapter 1 – Becoming a Member of the Club
This chapter is really an introduction to the rest of the book, laying out the basic premise that real networking is about finding ways to make other people more successful. In other words, jamming business cards in your Rolodex like that somewhat disturbing example above doesn’t cut the mustard. Why is that? If you do something to make someone else more successful, they’re more likely to value your relationship with them, and the more relationships you have with value in them, the more valuable you become, not only to yourself, but to the world: your employers, your clients, and so on.

Chapter 2 – Don’t Keep Score
The most fundamental lesson of all in this book is that you shouldn’t keep score when it comes to networking. If someone calls you up and asks for a favor that you can easily accomplish, make it so and don’t look back. Relationships are not finite things that are a straight-up exchange of one thing for another – they are living, breathing things. If you are going to take the time to connect with somebody, you should be willing to try to make that person successful. If they succeed, you succeed – it’s that simple.

Chapter 3 – What’s Your Mission?
Networking is largely useless unless you have goals, which the book eloquently defines as a “dream with a deadline.” Ferrazzi offers a three-step plan for setting goals. First, find your passion: what do you truly love to do? What would you enjoy doing for the rest of your life? Next, put those goals down on paper and flesh them out; his fleshing-out process is much like my plan for setting and reaching long-term personal finance goals in that you should write them down, then try to break them down into smaller goals that you can really wrap your arms around. Finally, build a “personal board of directors” by finding ways to establish a connection with people in that field already. How do you do that? Much of the rest of the book explains the process.

Chapter 4 – Build It Before You Need It
The main idea here is that you should begin reaching out to others and building your network of contacts before you need anything from them. If you start networking just as your job is about to die, it’s too late. Ferrazzi offers several ideas on how to get started with this: join community groups that interest you, take leadership positions in hobby groups that interest you, enroll in a local community college class on the topic of interest, or try to become involved with an approved work project that enables you to come into contact with more people. Then, as you’re exposed to more people, gravitate towards the ones who are involved with things that you want to be doing (i.e., your goals from the last chapter).

Chapter 5 – The Genius of Audacity
Many people have a very hard time being audacious when building a new connection: they want to appear humble and want to make a “good” impression right off the bat. The author suggests a different strategy: if you want something, be up front about it. It takes courage and a bit of talent, but Ferrazzi offers some guidance about how to find those things: find a role model, learn to speak, get involved, and simply giving it a shot. The worst thing that can happen is that they say no, which is the same answer you already effectively have, so what do you really have to lose?

Chapter 6 – The Networking Jerk
I loved this chapter, because it basically says “Don’t do anything like what you imagine a ‘networker’ to be like.” In other words, be the opposite of the Rolodex-stuffing scumbag. Instead, he offers six rules that ensure that even as you try to build connections, you never become that kind of jerk. First, don’t schmooze: have something to say, say it with meaning, and focus on establishing a few good connections than spending your time surfing the room. Second, don’t rely on gossip because it paints a picture of untrustworthiness. Third, be willing to give something away – he uses the example of bloggers who give away content to their readers. Fourth, don’t treat those under you poorly, ever (I believe in this one strongly). Fifth, be transparent – if you want to meet someone and are happy to meet them, say so. Last, don’t be too efficient – make genuine, individual connections. If you’re going to take the time to touch base with a contact, write to that person individually, don’t just include them on a big ol’ email to hundreds of people at once that starts off with “Dear friend!”

Section Two: The Skill Set

Now Never Eat Alone starts getting down to the meat and potatoes of this ethical and healthy breed of networking.

Chapter 7 – Do Your Homework
Once you’ve defined someone you wish to meet, the first step is to do your homework. Know who the person is (roughly), what their interests are, what they do, and especially what things you might nave in common with them. The author even goes so far as to suggest making up short bios for each person you really want to meet at a particular meeting. This way, you’ll have something to break the ice and also potentially flatter someone as well by knowing who they are.

Chapter 8 – Take Names
Once you have a connection with someone, it’s important to get their contact information. The author recommends starting with everyone in your current network, then building from there by adding people that you want to meet that match your goals. Then, when you have the opportunity to meet them, fill in that hole. Keith recommends doing things like cutting out lists of people assembled by the media, because these people are usually reasonably well-connected – for example, he mentions lists of movers and shakers from trade magazines.

Chapter 9 – Warming the Cold Call
If you’ve ever had to call someone for business purposes without a prior connection to them, you know how terrible it can be, but sometimes you have to do it. Ferrazzi makes a couple of recommendations for how to make this go a lot smoother. First, try as best you can to find a connection to the person you’re calling – someone you both might know. Second, make it clear to them right off the bat why this call is valuable by taking the homework you should have done on the person and connecting it with whatever the purpose of your call is. Be efficient with your words and try to pique their interest – don’t ever drone on and on. If the purpose is to get an appointment to talk to that person face to face, close with a suggestion that even if the topic isn’t of interest, you’d like to meet anyway because of the mutual connection’s admiration. I really don’t like cold calling, so this chapter left me feeling rather … well, cold.

Chapter 10 – Managing the Gatekeeper – Artfully
The entire point of this chapter is simple: work as hard as you can to stay on the good side of administrative assistants. I honestly believe this is one of the best lessons in the entire book – never ever overlook an administrative assistant, blow one off, or make their life unnecessarily difficult. I often spend time just kibbitzing with the administrative assistants, not only where I work, but also in the offices of some of my associates, and there have been times that it has really paid off and some key administrative task has simply happened.

Chapter 11 – Never Eat Alone
The idea here is that a meal is a spectacular time to connect with someone, so if you’re eating alone, you’re missing out on an opportunity to connect with someone. I agree with this sentiment, and it’s one of the reasons that I have to be careful balancing my brown-bag frugal style with the need to eat with certain people. In fact, the author suggests mixing and matching by inviting multiple people to eat with you from different parts of your social network, which can help build new connections and bring hidden ones to the forefront.

Chapter 12 – Share Your Passions
If you want to build a stronger relationship with someone, invite them to share in something that you’re passionate about, whether it be the theatre or a baseball game or whatever. For me, this often means inviting them over for a meal, as I am passionate about cooking (homemade fettuccine Bolognese, a glass of great red wine, and a homemade chocolate raspberry trifle for dessert tends to make friends, trust me). Whatever it is that gets your fire going, share it with those that you want to build a relationship with.

Chapter 13 – Follow Up or Fail
Ferrazzi seems to treat this as the most important point in the book, so I’ll put it in bold: when you make a connection, follow it up. Whether with a note or an email, you need to follow up on any connection you make that you feel is important. Ferrazzi also strongly hints that a handwritten thank-you note may be the best way to go to really stand out from the crowd.

Chapter 14 – Be a Conference Commando
This chapter offers extensive detail about how to maximize a conference in terms of meeting people, but what it really boils down to is discarding the preconceived notions of how a conference works. Generally, you should go intending to reach a wide audience by speaking and/or establish a good relationship with a small handful of people. Most important, though, is that you don’t sit there and do nothing and that you don’t turn into the schmoozing networker, either.

Chapter 15 – Connecting with Connectors
Here, Ferrazzi borrows heavily from the concepts in The Tipping Point and brings up “connectors” – those people who have an incredibly large and strong personal network. These people are obviously great to have a connection to, but how can you find them? Ferrazzi suggests several groups to look at: restauranteurs, headhunters, anyone remotely close to politics, public relations people, and journalists, for starters.

Chapter 16 – Expanding Your Circle
The biggest way to expand your circle of contacts, according to this chapter, is to merge your contacts with someone else. Offer to exchange invites to events with someone whose circle you don’t know well – and who doesn’t know your circle well. This can provide a great opportunity for both of you to seriously expand your circle. You can also agree to swap dinner parties with someone: each of you are responsible for half the guest list to two separate dinner parties, one hosted by each of you. This enables a lot of connections to be made, because when people you’re connected to form more connections, everyone wins.

Chapter 17 – The Art of Small Talk
This chapter is full of the “typical” stuff people think of when they imagine what a course in interpersonal relations is like: Smile At Others, Unfold Your Arms, Relax, Lean In, Shake Hands, and so on. This is basically a one-chapter compression of the book How to Win Friends and Influence People, which I hope to review and give proper respect to at a later date.

Section Three: Turning Connections Into Compatriots

This part of Never Eat Alone is all about building upon those connections made in the previous section and turning them into people that you can rely on for a lifetime. It starts, appropriately enough, with freewill giving of yourself.

Chapter 18 – Health, Wealth, and Children
The best thing you can do to help another person is to directly impact one of the three things in the title of this chapter. Personal and financial health and the benefit of children are often direct keys to a person’s heart. If you are capable of doing something that helps a person in one of these areas, you’re often able to endear yourself to that person and establish a really fantastic and deep connection that will last for a very long time.

Chapter 19 – Social Arbitrage
The idea here is that you should strive to build connections in as many different areas as possible. Have connections in tons of different professions, social circles, and so on, and then make connections when needed between people who exist in completely different social universes. This makes you seem indispensable to both people that you’re connecting, as you’ve benefitted both of them in a way that neither one was capable of independent of you.

Chapter 20 – Pinging – All The Time
I have a habit of making lots of quick contacts with my friends on a very regular basis just so the connection between us stays alive, strong, and healthy. I do this by occasionally whirring through my list and touching base with anyone I haven’t talked to lately. This works for me because I’m highly comfortable with most of them. In this chapter, Ferrazzi highly recommends doing that exact same thing with your entire contact list – just contact them every once in a while to keep that connection alive, because without some maintenance, even the best connection can wither on the vine. The chapter particularly recommends using birthdays as an opportunity to deliver a sharp ping, with a handwritten birthday note.

Chapter 21 – Find Anchor Tenants and Feed Them
This chapter is basically a guide to hosting a successful dinner party, which is a great way to build up established relationships and help the people you invite to establish new relationships of their own. Most of the advice is pretty straightforward here, but I found several of the suggestions to be quite interesting: hire some entertainment, invite some additional people to stop by for dessert only (usually close friends who won’t mind the lack of a dinner invite) and provide fresh blood for the party, and avoid seating couples together as that will get people interacting more and blood flowing.

Section Four: Trading Up and Giving Back

The final section of Never Eat Alone is mostly about specific techniques for strengthening your overall circle, mostly by making yourself more valuable to them.

Chapter 22 – Be Interesting
No one wants to spend time around a boring person, so make yourself interesting. Beyond the obvious of keeping up with current events and having a point of view on the issues of the day, Ferrazzi offers several interesting ways to do this: ask seemingly stupid questions, always be open to learning something new and trying new things, take time out for vacations and spiritual growth, and never get discouraged if things don’t go well.

Chapter 23 – Build Your Brand
Here, Ferrazzi goes beyond merely making yourself interesting into figuring out exactly what value you have for others. What do you bring to the table that others don’t? What do you want people to think of when they hear your name? Figure that out and cultivate it when you can by focusing and behaving in ways that will cultivate that image that you want.

Chapter 24 – Broadcast Your Brand
This is a primer on basic public relations – in other words, spreading the word around about the image you want to cultivate. For me, this blog is, in a way, a method of broadcasting my brand. I’d like it if people saw the name Trent Hamm and thought about interesting and applicable ideas for my life and food for future thought written in straightforward language, and hopefully The Simple Dollar is helping to build that up.

Chapter 25 – The Write Stuff
Very brief here, but to the point: write, write, and write some more. The written word is an incredibly powerful communication tool, and the more you practice writing, the better.

Chapter 26 – Getting Close to Power
Many people want to know how to get close to those who have decision-making power, but often the generic straightforward methods end with no returned email or returned call. Ferrazzi suggests a different route: try being involved with political fundraisers, attending conferences, joining nonprofit boards, and playing some golf. For me at least, golf has been spectacular at opening up opportunities – I’ve met many different people on the golf course and have established some lifelong relationships with people that I’ve met in a foursome.

Chapter 27 – Build It and They Will Come
This is all about clubs and other social organizations. Basically, joining these is a great way to meet new people from areas that you may have nothing at all to do with, which makes it possible for you to expand your social network in completely new and unexpected ways. I found that being involved in the very local political scene has much the same effect – I now know people who run landscaping businesses, two local organic farmers, and lots of other interesting folks simply because I got involved in a group.

Chapter 28 – Never Give in to Hubris
This is a vital life lesson: if you ever begin to think that you’ve got it made, stop right now. It takes only one mistake to knock over the whole house of cards. The author gives a great story about getting caught up in the moment and making a complete jerk of himself by overselling what he had because of ego. Instead, be humble and realize that the connections you’ve already made are the really valuable ones, not the big one you’re hoping to make.

Chapter 29 – Find Mentors, Find Mentees, Repeat
Ferrazzi makes the astute point here that you should always be looking for people to mentor and help you, but you should also be looking for people who you can help and mentor. This means that not only should you seek out help from others, but you should also be willing to step forward and lead others when the time comes – and consistently do both.

Chapter 30 – Balance is B.S.
As the book begins to close out here, this chapter makes a key point that people shouldn’t have to compartmentalize their personal and professional lives and keep them in balance. In fact, Ferrazzi largely encourages the opposite: mix and match the two in whatever way makes you feel happiest about your life. In fact, he argues that the more people you interact with regularly, the more interesting and happy your life will become because of the diversity and variety.

Chapter 31 – Welcome to the Connected Age
Never Eat Alone closes here with a paean to the age of the internet which affords many ways to make connections easier and also affords a lot of ways to make yourself stand out from the crowd. Ferrazzi does go beyond the basic “sign up for social networking programs!” idea that many people seem to claim with regards to the internet, though, and moves on to some of the bigger changes that the internet is bringing about: major shifts in grassroots politics, the rebirth of guilds and old-style labor unions, and so forth. An interesting look at the future from the perspective of someone who is skilled at connecting with people.

I'm definitely going to check "Never Eat Alone" out. I never have lunch with co-workers which is probably not a good thing but I tend to have lunch with clients when possible.

 

[moderndarwin]

I said I disagree because networking doesn’t need to feel like a job. And you don’t need to change who you are to succeed.

Find what you’re interested in. Connect with people that are also interested in that. Anything else is forced.

Also, with recruiters nowadays it’s fairly easy to get a job without needing to network. People switch jobs much quicker so it’s almost better to have an agent doing the legwork than you going out there. Of course this only works once you got a degree and a few years of experience.

 

[trelvis tha thrilla]

I stopped drinking alcohol and started meditating every morning. I've been using the headspace app. I've meditated every morning in 2018 and that in combination with no drinking or energy drinks, I've never felt better. I really encourage people to look into meditating.

 

[illwill8710]

I said I disagree because networking doesn’t need to feel like a job. And you don’t need to change who you are to succeed.

Find what you’re interested in. Connect with people that are also interested in that. Anything else is forced.

Also, with recruiters nowadays it’s fairly easy to get a job without needing to network. People switch jobs much quicker so it’s almost better to have an agent doing the legwork than you going out there. Of course this only works once you got a degree and a few years of experience.

I agree with you on most of your points. I don't have lunch with my co-workers because i often have trouble splitting cultural differences. For example culturally they enjoy talking about sports throughout lunch. I can entertain sports small talk but I'm not interesting in spending an hour on the subject especially since I don't watch sports to begin with. There also tends to be a huge cultural difference in humor. I'm not interested in "boys club" humor most of the time.

My interest in learning to network through lunches is because I want to make certain moves within my company/industry and I need to let others know what I am capable of and who I am. I also need to know their world and how they operate (i.e how their "boys club" works). For sure it may be uncomfortable and forced but I need to step out of my comfort zone to the point that I am comfortable no matter what the situation is.

 

[hennessy]

If you have the skills and passion as an entrepreneur start a small business on the side and grow it enough to quit your full time. I quit a really good job last May and opened a business in November. I make triple what I made at my old job now and employ one person full time and one person part time. I was living paycheck to paycheck now I'm completely debt free with more saved up than I know what to do with. It's a scary ride I was completely stable before but just bored. Life's a lot more interesting now and I get out what I put in instead of being relegated to a fixed salary.

 

[illwill8710]

If you have the skills and passion as an entrepreneur start a small business on the side and grow it enough to quit your full time. I quit a really good job last May and opened a business in November. I make triple what I made at my old job now and employ one person full time and one person part time. I was living paycheck to paycheck now I'm completely debt free with more saved up than I know what to do with. It's a scary ride I was completely stable before but just bored. Life's a lot more interesting now and I get out what I put in instead of being relegated to a fixed salary.

That's amazing fam. I want to hear/read more about your experiences with that transition when you have time. I would like to develop a business around fitness and the holistic practices that I enjoy in the future. I would still like to keep my day job until it forces me to be independent, but I would like to know some other experiences that people have faced. Like what got you interested in the business? What pushed you to take the risk? How you got past your low points?

 

[illwill8710]

 

[3900stabler]

I read the Slight Edge by Jeff Olson a few months ago. Solid read. Encouraging without being preachy. Glad you started this thread OP.

 

[illwill8710]

I just finished this audiobook this morning and man is it good. Like 9/10 good.

The only disclaimer I would give for the book is that as a reader or listener you will need to accept that the book was written by a very privileged cis white male. He acknowledges this fact a few times throughout the book when he addresses certain topics insensitively. Some people may get triggered during these "problematic" moments in the book.

Other than that the body of work provides mind-state solutions to the everyday problems that we face from being attached to unnecessary expectations, entitlement and values that do nothing for us at the end of the day. Something of a remixed hindu/yoga mantra of learning to detach yourself from expectations and comfort.

I highly recommend the book.

Spoiler: P.S

There are free pdf copies of the book online of you search google.

 

[illwill8710]

The Four Agreements is a essential personal development book for alot of people. I am about a quarter of the way through a quick Re-read of the book and I thought that it would be good to share. Below is a brief overview I found online and like always if your trapping out the bandwidth you can easily find a PDF version.

Spoiler: Full Summary

Full Summary
Here are the four agreements in short:

1. Be impeccable with your word
2. Don’t take anything personally
3. Don’t make assumptions
4. Always do your best

Domestication
Ruiz says the outside world teaches us how to live. And not necessarily in a good way. We are told what’s acceptable, what’s not acceptable and.. We are taught to judge.

The author says society teaches us all the rules with operant conditioning. You will get a a punishment when you will be bad and flaunt the rules and you will get a reward a when you obey. Good boy. The reward is subtly pernicious because it teaches us to act for the reward itself instead than finding pleasure in the action. The fear of punishment instead becomes the fear of not being good enough (check Daring Greatlyfor the “not enough culture”).
And with both punishment and rewards we learn to wear a mask to please others.

The author says our biggest fear is not death, it’s being alive in the most powerful sense of the word: being and showing our real selves.

Our biggest fear is not dying, it's being ourselvesCLICK TO TWEET

Ruiz says that to find personal joy you have to break all those society-imposed, fear-based agreements which are currently tying you down. And he proposes four agreements that will help you doing just that:

1. Be Impeccable With Your Word
Ruiz says your word is the power coming directly from God.
Impeccable derives from Latin and means “without sin”. Impeccable with your word means you don’t use your words to speak ill of yourself or others.
It’s important that it goes both ways: both outwardly and inwardly. You must stop entertaining negative thoughts about yourself –Albert Ellis recommends you screen out negative thoughts-. And you must equally stop spreading bad gossip about others.
And it also ranges from the small things to the big ones. The author make the example of “black magic box”. When we say something negative to a kid, for example that she’s terrible at singing, the kid will it with her for her whole life.

Albeit he doesn’t it call that way, the author also makes use of the concept of karma: what you put out, you get back.

2. Do Not Take Anything Personally
During our domestication we learn to take everything personally, says Ruiz. Everything is about “me, me, me”. We must learn instead to become less reactive and more detached.

Because wat others say is not a reality, it’s a projection of who they are, says Ruiz. And if it hurt you, it’s not them who hurt you, it’s you who has a wound.
When you take it personally, you are admitting you believe in it. Only it becomes true. When you take something personally you “take ownership” of that thought and at that point it does become yours.

Comments are a reflection of the commentator's reality, not yoursCLICK TO TWEET

3. Do Not Make Assumptions
Ruiz says we make assumptions when we believe we know what others are thinking. But we don’t and we only project our own beliefs onto others.
Unluckily we have a tendency to make assumptions on the negative side though. We often jump to negative conclusions because we are afraid of a negative judgement, so it’s our way to “hit first” and shield our ego from the pain of rejection.

This often leads to useless arguments that needn’t need to happen in the first place -as Crucial Conversations also acknowledges-. Stop assuming you know and ask instead.
And even when you’re of different opinions, similar to Dale Carnegie, the author also recommends you avoid arguing to be right and respect other’s point of view instead.

4. Always Do Your Best
This is my very favorite agreement and a mantra of mine. Ruiz says doing your best, regardless of quality, is the only thing you must ask of yourself.
You only ask of yourself to do your best given the conditions of the environment and of yourself. That means that, in some conditions, your best might very poor. Or very poor even compared to your previous actions. And that’s great because you don’t demand success or perfection.

Doing your best also delinks the action from the reward. It means that you come to enjoy the action without expecting any external prize.
And that’s when you reach full outcome independence.
When you demand your best with full outcome independence, you will also avoid self-judgement, self-abuse and regret.

But don’t forget, the fact that you don’t depend on the outcome doesn’t mean you do nothing. Action is the main differentiator, says Ruiz. Stick to doing your best and your personal improvement and transformation will become an obvious consequence.

The Fourth Agreement allows you to practice and make all the other agreements become a habit. Whenever you fail to implement an agreement, don’t sweat it. It’s OK. Start again. And then again. Until it becomes ingrained in who you are.

Enjoy the path and the destination will take care of itselfCLICK TO TWEET


5. Breaking Old Agreements
Ruiz says that to break old agreements holding us back we have a few options:

• Attack the fears one by one
• Stop feeding the fear by stopping to feel the emotion
• Symbolical death to kill the parasite within us
• Do it “even if”

The example for the latter is the whose parents told her she was a very bad singer. She would then tell herself: “fine. I will sing anyway”.

Spiritual Warrior
The warrior knows that he’s at war with his mind. Ruiz says the spiritual warrior is the one who controls his emotions, instead of the other way around as for most people.
The difference between the warrior and a victim, says the author, is that the victim represses while the warrior re-frames. The victim represses because he’s afraid of showing his emotion. Re-framing instead holds the emotion and expresses it in the right moment.

 

[bodeine brazy]

Keeping tabs on this thread.
Great topic op

 

[a blinkin]

Great thread.

Currently at a crossroad in my life. I’ve got an idea that, if executed properly, has the potential to be something phenomenal and create opportunities for myself and a host of other people.

But I’m set to start law school in August, so I won’t have time to do the necessary leg work to getting it off the ground. I don’t believe time will permit it, since I’ll be going to school full time and working full time as well.

Debating deferring my admission until January, but I don’t want to take that time off and not get enough accomplished.

 

[jaypesoz]

If you have the skills and passion as an entrepreneur start a small business on the side and grow it enough to quit your full time. I quit a really good job last May and opened a business in November. I make triple what I made at my old job now and employ one person full time and one person part time. I was living paycheck to paycheck now I'm completely debt free with more saved up than I know what to do with. It's a scary ride I was completely stable before but just bored. Life's a lot more interesting now and I get out what I put in instead of being relegated to a fixed salary.

My man

 

[illwill8710]

Great thread.

Currently at a crossroad in my life. I’ve got an idea that, if executed properly, has the potential to be something phenomenal and create opportunities for myself and a host of other people.

But I’m set to start law school in August, so I won’t have time to do the necessary leg work to getting it off the ground. I don’t believe time will permit it, since I’ll be going to school full time and working full time as well.

Debating deferring my admission until January, but I don’t want to take that time off and not get enough accomplished.

Thanks fam.

Can you get a team around your idea to assist with the leg work for your idea?

If so, is your idea at a point where you can start bringing the host of people in?

It's hard to say whether or not deferring is the right choice; but, from what I remember about you as a NTer, I think you have the capacity to keep the ball rolling in some capacity with your idea. From what I hear Law school is no joke and also working full time while doing so sounds intense.

Perhaps treat your idea as a class and allocate the time as necessary. But, I also recommend building a team around it if possible. I remember that you are a Kappa (I think you are military as well but I may be thinking of EWD). Do you have frat brothers that can assist you with the idea and law school?

Some movement is better than no movement at all but also make sure there is some level of quality to those movements so that it turns into progress (i.e avoid just going with the motions as much as possible).

If you do defer on either law school or the idea then create a timeline of goals you plan to do for the next few years or so and hold yourself accountable to it. For example; plan to have law school completed by this date and the idea at a certain point at this date. Definitely get your brothers involved with keeping you accountable for those goals and place some kind of consequence for yourself if you miss the mark as motivation.

 

[illwill8710]

Check out this guys soundcloud for the entire Audiobook(playlist) for The Four Agreements.

 

[illwill8710]

I wanted to share a little bit of my yoga journey with you guys. I've been taking my fitness journey seriously for about 6 yrs or so and I've always placed stretching on the back burner for a few reasons:

1. I was insecure about the feminine stigma incorporated with stretching.
2. I thought it would hurt my gains. (bro science)
3. It wasn't a priority because the benefits aren't as tangible as simply pumping more iron.
4. It simply wasn't as cool as pumping iron.
5. It's difficult and it hurts.

But, as I continued to grow in my fitness journey from doing Capoeira, dance and wanting to move more weight, I discovered that stretching was going to be essential to getting better at all various movements in general. Yoga in the US is marketed as a practice to help with stretching and flexibility. So I drank the Kool-aid and started practicing maybe a year or so ago.

At first my practice started with a few youtube channels but now I go to class once or twice a week. There are a ton of various practices of yoga. I mainly do Vinyasa but I encourage looking into all forms depending on what goals your trying to accomplish.

Right away I discovered wide variety of benefits from the practice that I once scoffed at in my earlier years of movement practice:

1. You learn how to stretch in new ways to help you perform better a basically everything. I mean everything. Not just physical activities for fitness but also your love life, your posture, keeping calm during difficult situations, peace of mind etc, but let me get to the other benefits to explain why.
2. You learn how to breath. Breathing patterns are important in all forms of activity. Powerlifting requires breathe control, boxing requires breathe control, diving into the yambs require breathe control, keeping calm throughout the day requires breathe control.
3. You learn to enjoy the pain and discomfort. Listening to yogi's talk about it really brings this full circle. The practice teaches you to become at peace despite pain and discomfort just like life in general. Life is generally full of problems and discomfort. That doesn't mean you can't be happy while solving problems and being uncomfortable. This is also the same meditative feeling I get when I am lifting weights as well. You learn to enjoy moving the obstacle in your way.
4. Alot of yoga practices also incorporate mantras or guided meditation that can focus on a wide array of topics in self-care. This self-care is more so for the mind. Like the video above works on stress or anxiety but some might need a practice like Kundalini yoga to liberate emotion tension.
5. You learn another way to connect the mind with the body and potentially the body with the soul. Depending on how deep you want to get into it, yoga definitely promotes mind and body connections that can promote a better quality of life. From my understanding yoga practices began as a religious practice so the soul can definitely be tied in depending on how you approach the practice.

I don't want to make this post too long but I thought sharing this was appropriate for the thread and another good habit that can benefit someone in their personal development.