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Creative Ways to Succeed in the Knowledge Economy

Reading:

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I enjoyed each of these stories that have been floating around.

If you want to be negative, there’s at least one major point you could critique about each of them. The woman making tons of money on Etsy isn’t actually handcrafting most of her items, which is the guiding value of Etsy. The Rideshare Guy is essentially trading time for money. The poets, well, I guess you could say it’s more of a party trick than real poetry.

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How to Run a Business and Still Care for Your Family


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I met a guy who was a busy executive at a startup in Silicon Valley. His family, a wife and three young kids, lived several states away. He lived in a hotel during the week, worked every evening, and flew home every weekend before returning to the office on Monday morning. Not a very dedicated family guy, right?

On the contrary. When I asked him about living in two cities, he admitted it was sometimes a challenge. But then he talked about what the weekends were like. “We do everything together,” he said. “We go camping. We bake and cook. We play hard the whole weekend long. I know I have to go back on Monday, so I'm constantly thinking about how to squeeze as much time and as many experiences in as we can.”

His family had discussed the arrangement of him being away mid-week, and they re-evaluated it twice a year. So far, at least, it was working.

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Why I Became an Entrepreneur 16 Years Ago

102269936_c53eb13bef_z The best and most honest answer is that I wasn’t good at anything else. For better or worse, I learned that I was a terrible employee. I was unreliable and unskilled.

I’ve written before about my last official job, lugging boxes onto FedEx trucks in the middle of the night.

Stacking boxes was surprisingly hard! It wasn’t just about picking up the box and tossing it in the truck—you had to stack it in a certain way that led to maximum efficiency (and presumably out of some concern for the contents, though that never seemed to be much of a priority).

I lacked the spatial reasoning to do this task well. I was decent enough at Tetris, but when it came to real boxes, I sucked. I kept waiting for that big horizontal bar to come down the chute, so I could clear off four lines of bricks or boxes all at once, but it never arrived. Instead, the supervisor kept messing with me, adding boxes with incorrect zip codes to the queue while laughing at my poorly-stacked pallets.

Whatever. I quit and never went back.

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The Light Outside My Window on the Morning After Launch


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Some past reflections and enduring lessons learned during the launch process:

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This morning I woke up at 7:20am, and it felt so late. There was a touch of light outside—what was that? Oh right, sunrise.

For the past few mornings I’ve been getting up at the entirely unreasonable hour of 5:30am or sometimes even earlier. My breakfast place opens at 6am and I’ve been at the front of the line shortly thereafter. The sun rose two hours after I’d been awake.

Two nights earlier, I went to bed with my laptop on the nightstand. Yep—it was another product launch week.

As I made another cup of coffee on the morning after having slept “so late,” I thought back on the launches over the years. How many have I done? I honestly don’t remember ...

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Et Cetera

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Why “Make Something You Love” Still Matters

9068160297_6c6650210a_z Link: New Video with New Stories about Freedom and Value

New video alert! My friend Marie is preparing to relaunch her mega-popular B-School course. As part of the process, she's releasing three free videos that aren't just teasers—they all include more than 25 minutes each of non-salesy, helpful tips on running an online business.

I mentioned the first and second ones last week. The third one is now out, and you can watch all of them by joining the pre-list at the link.

In the latest video, you’ll learn:
  • The surprising answers to common concerns about starting an online business: not enough time, unfamiliar with technology, etc.
  • Why freedom and value, the essential values of entrepreneurship, matter now more than ever
  • Case studies of real people earning $30,000 a month or more (and how they do it)
  • And, as we often say, so much more. This is a good one!

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A Million-Dollar Secret and 13 Keys to Success (Yep, really.)

Link: Brand-New Video about Love and Marketing (don't worry, it's good)

Greetings, friends and readers! As mentioned last week, my friend Marie Forleo is preparing to relaunch her mega-popular B-School course. As part of the process, she’s releasing three free videos that aren’t just teasers—they all include more than 25 minutes each of non-salesy, helpful tips on running an online business.

The second one is now out, and you can watch both of them by joining the pre-list at the link.

In this video, you’ll learn:

  • Why “Marketing” is Simply About Helping People (note: I wrote a lot about this in The $100 Startup)
  • How to Win by Giving, not Getting (so true)
  • The 13 Keys to Online Business
  • Why Marie’s First ebook Was Almost a Huge Flop

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Don’t Join the Popularity Contest: Make It Happen Yourself

Many times a day, I hear from someone who asks for help promoting a cause. They have something they're working on and want to share it with me—totally fine. I generally like to help as many people as possible. Being helpful relates to feeling happy, at least for me, and it's also a nice thing to do. Some of these requests, however, come in the form of “vote for me and spread the word” pitches—and these I feel less comfortable with.

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