Browsing Date Archive: 2005 November

The 30 day, no risk trial

Back in April, Steve Pavlina wrote about the concept of testing changes in your life for 30 days.

A powerful personal growth tool is the 30-day trial. This is a concept I borrowed from the shareware industry, where you can download a trial version of a piece of software and try it out risk-free for 30 days before you’re required to buy the full version. It’s also a great way to develop new habits, and best of all, it’s brain-dead simple.

I like this method because it’s a great way of overcoming the initial resistance to change. You know you can stop after 30 days, which also drives you towards completing the trial period.

The power of positive affirmations

I’ve read about the use of positive affirmations in several books, but I’ve never got around to trying them out. A recent entry on Out of Bounds about positive affirmations renewed my interest in them, so I’ve decided to try them out.

The article also links to a very interesting site, bmindful. It’s a very modern looking site that allows you to share and tag affirmations. I’m using a few of the affirmations as inspiration for my own.

The experiment

Starting on the 1st of December, I’ll be using positive affirmations for 30 days. It’s quite likely that I’ll tweak as I go along, but at the start I intend to write my affirmations on an index card and read them aloud three times a day.

I’ll be writing about the whole experience, and I’m looking forward to seeing what the results are.

If you like this article, you’ll like my other site, philnewton.net. It’s dedicated to productivity, time management and other personal development tips.

I’ll admit, I’m not particularly keen on using telephones. Whilst searching for help on the problem, I found the rather amusing text above.

It’s pretty obvious to me that the page has been created from a standard template, and that they replace a few phrases with whichever fear they’re claiming to help you with. It doesn’t give a good impression of the company that they overlooked something that would easily have been spotted by a proof reader.

There’s an important lesson there.

Incidentally, this reminds me of one of the first programs I ever wrote. It was a short BASIC program on my old Atari ST that generated thank-you notes for Christmas presents. You simply entered who it was to, what they gave you and it would generate a sentence. Naturally it made plenty of mistakes, but it was certainly amusing.

Evolution of the progress log

Stirred by a comment from David Seah, I thought it would be interesting to look over my progress log for the last few months, and see how it’s changed. It’s still a relatively new book, but there have already been some big modifications:

• Fewer goals – I used to have 3 goals per day, which in hindsight was a little too much for me. Now I have my “Big 21” at the front, and 3 smaller goals for each week. This seems to work much better, and I don’t feel overwhelmed anymore.
• More focus on reflection – Because 21 weekly goals took up a lot of room, there was very little space left for reflection at the end of the page. I used to write one or two lines about how each day had gone, but now I have a whole side of the page for reflection, which I use to make notes of what went right and wrong.
• No more analysis – I removed the daily reflection, and tried a brief period of writing a section called “Analysis” which focussed on the week instead. Unfortunately it usually ended up as some pretty harsh criticism. It’s no great surprise that I got rid of it.
• No rating – My “b-Alert” tracker used to have a small column at the end where I would rate myself out of 10 for that particular day. As with my analysis section, this usually turned into a chance to kick myself. Not very productive. This has since been replaced with my PCO implementation, which I prefer as it’s not my opinion of how I’ve done, but based on physical evidence of how I’ve performed.

It’s been interesting to look over how things changed, and it’s one of the reasons I chose to use a book. I really wanted to be able to look over it at a later date and see how things have changed. It’s also nice and flexible, as all these changes show.

This week’s change is the addition of a progress bar underneath each goal, inspired by the “Task Progress Destruct-o-Matic Edition“. I’m not too sure about it at the moment, but it’s worth a try. It’s more than likely that I’ll change my rather lacklustre progress bar into something with a finite number of steps, possibly involving explosions. Everybody knows blowing stuff up is cool.

Too much planning?

Gerard’s comment on LifeHack.org got my attention:

That’s just too much planning. Life is meant to be lived, not planned like a well-organized conference complete with grading each and every facet of life. I went over to the sodaware site and looked at both parts of the Keeping A Progress Log post and thought, ‘What are we becoming?’ The answer – if we are not careful – is pre-programmed, graded, narcissistic people-bots who have taken the life out of living.

Naturally I disagree, but it did give me food for thought. All those goals sound like a lot, especially when you think that there are 60 goals for a 90 day period. However, considering I used to be at 3 goals a day, which equates to nearly 300 goals for a 90 day period, I think there’s been an improvement on that front.

As for taking “the life out of living”, I’d have to disagree with that too. I don’t plan each day in excessive detail, and I usually just have a “next actions” list to work through. I’ve tried planning in more detail, but I like flexibility in my day so I ditched it. I don’t think having this system is detrimental to my enjoyment of life. If anything, it’s helped me enjoy things even more.

Perhaps it’s just a question of personality and lifestyle. Everybody has different ways of doing things, so just do what works for you.

Related Posts:

• Keeping a progress log, part I
• Keeping a progress log, part II

In the last thrilling instalment, I briefly covered my progress log, a book which I use to keep track of how close I am to achieving my major goals, as well as my overall level of productivity.

In this entry I’ll be describing:

1. How I create my 90 day goals.
2. The points tracking system I use
3. The “b-Alert” system

Creating my 90 day goals

As mentioned in my last entry, I have a total of 21 goals to achieve in 90 days, divided equally into seven categories. I got this idea from “The Power of Focus”, and I’ve found it helpful for making sure I have balance in my goals. I use the following categories:

• Financial – This covers how much money I want to earn and how much I want to save.
• Business – This concentrates on what I want to achieve with my business, and where I want it to be once the 90 days are up. If you don’t run your own business, this area would cover work instead, and may include goals for promotions, raises or important tasks you want to achieve.
• Fun – Sometimes it’s easy to forget the fun side of life, so I use this section to note any fun things I want to do, as well as how many days I want to take off work.
• Health – This makes sure I’m thinking about my exercise and diet plans.
• Relationships – This includes family and friends, as well as work relationships. It’s important to nurture your most important relationships, and to make time for the people in your life that matter.
• Contribution – I like to do my bit for others. My contribution goals tend to focus on my work with the Scout Association, as well as helping people on software development forums and producing material for when the rest of this website goes live.
• Personal – The last section contains any goals that don’t quite fit anywhere else.

I use mind-mapping to create goals for each area, and then decide on the time span for each goal. I may wish to achieve some in less than 90 days, and others may be longer term goals. It’s important to note that I usually have more than 21 goals at this point, so I pick the three most important goals from each category, and these become my 90 day goals. I keep a note of the other goals, and these will usually become integrated into my weekly goal setting session.

Tracking my progress

I use a modified version of “The Printable CEO” for my daily tracking, and although it doesn’t look as good as the original, it gets the job done. I keep the list of activities that are worth points on a seperate piece of card, which also acts as a bookmark. The list itself is modified from the original, and it now reflects my interests and line of work.

Even though I’ve only been using this part of my system for a few weeks, I’ve already spotted a few patterns. It’s a great way to identify which areas need improving, and also which days are least productive. So far Monday is my worst day, and Thursday my best. Curious.

The “b-Alert” system

I read about the “b-Alert” system in the book “The Power of Focus”, and I really liked it. It’s not particulary complex, and it only takes a few seconds to update it at the end of the day. The idea is to make sure you have balance in your daily activities (much like creating balance in your goals).

“b-Alert” stands for:

• Blueprint – This might consist of a few “to-do” items, or it might be something more complex. Either way, it’s good to have an idea of what you want to achieve during the day.
• Action – Action is the most important activity, hence the bold letter. Not action = no results.
• Learning – A daily dose of learning helps you increase your own knowledge, and stimulates your mind. You don’t need to devote hours of study in the library, and what you learn doesn’t have to be profound. Don’t limit yourself to a single source either. Books, journals, and magazinesare all good sources, but what about blogs, podcasts, audio tapes and even interviews?
• Exercise – It only takes thirty minutes a day. I always exercise for 20 minutes every morning, and although some days I really don’t want to, it’s made such an improvement to how I feel that I really wouldn’t want to give it up. As with learning, vary your sources of exercise. It doesn’t have to be a fourty minute session in the gym thrashing your biceps, it can be a nice walk or a bicycle ride.
• Relaxing – If you’ve worked hard, you deserve time to relax. Spend time with your loved ones, admire nature or have a nap! The break will do you good, and leave you feeling recharged and ready to face whatever challenges life decides to throw at you. Remember – you deserve the break, so don’t feel guilty for not working. If you work for yourself, this can sometimes be hard to do but it’s important that you don’t let yourself get burnt out.
• Thinking – A little reflection can go a long way. This is what I use the “What went right/wrong” sections in my progress book for.

My book has a grid for tracking this, and once I’ve worked on a particular section I circle the letter. At the end of the week it’s quite easy to see which areas aren’t getting the attention they need. You don’t need to work through the letters in order, you simply use them as a guide for planning your day.

The future…

That about wraps it up for now, but this system is constantly evolving. I’m quite happy with how it’s performing at the moment, but there’s always room for improvement. Don’t worry – I’ll keep you updated.

If you like this article, you’ll like my other site, philnewton.net. It’s dedicated to productivity, time management and other personal development tips.

I’ve been keeping a progress log since the end of August, and although it’s still far from perfect, it’s been a great help on my self improvement odyssey. Recently I’ve modified it slightly to use a version of “The Printable CEO”, and although I’ve not been using it for very long, I do feel like it’s made an improvement.

Even though I use computers most of the time, I prefer to keep my log on paper as it means I can review it when I’m not in my office. I also think it gives it some character, although that’s entirely down to personal preference. I also do everything by hand – no printing here. Perhaps “The Drawable CEO” would be a good name for it.

The basics

Using both sides of a single page for each week, I keep track of the following:

• Weekly goals
• My points monitor
• My “b-Alert” tracker
• What went right
• What went wrong

I added a transparent pocket to the inside of the book, which I keep my 90 day goals in. I have 21 goals, divided into seven sections. In part two I’ll explain these sections in more detail.

Each page starts with the date, and then the top three goals I wish to achieve for the week. I put checkboxes in front of each goal so I can tick them off when they’re complete. The original system had me setting three goals for each day, but I felt this crowded the page a little too much and also distracted me if I had goals from the previous day that I hadn’t completed.

Underneath this is my points tracker, and then underneath that is my “b-Alert” tracker. I took the b-Alert system from “The Power of Focus” (reviewed here). I also use the goal setting tips from the same book to make sure I’m covering the important aspects of my life. This will be covered in more detail in part two.

The back of the page is divided into two sections. The top two-thirds is “What went right”, where I note anything important that was achieved. Reading over this gives me a boost, and helps remind me of what I’ve achieved during the week.

The remaining third is “What went wrong”, which allows some analysis of where the week could have been improved. I deliberately kept it to a third to prevent myself from being overly critical, and also to focus myself on the major issues.

Where possible I use bullet points, as it makes it easier to scan for a quick overview. It’s useful to look over this during my weekly review, as it helps me find areas for improvement.

In part two, I’ll cover the trackers in detail, and also explain how I ensure I have balance in my goals.

If you like this article, you’ll like my other site, philnewton.net. It’s dedicated to productivity, time management and other personal development tips.

If you work for yourself, the chances are that motivating yourself is an important, and sometimes difficult, activity. David Seah has a great method for overcoming this problem, in the form of “The Printable CEO”. I’ve only been using it for a week, but I’m already seeing an improvement in the amount of work I’m getting done.

The basic premise is to assign scores to certain jobs you’ll be doing throughout the day. Each time you complete one of these jobs, you give yourself “points”. It’s a simple system, but there’s strangely something satisfying about earning points during the day, and so far I’ve found it to be a real motivator when I don’t feel like doing anything.

Next week I’ll be writing about how I’ve integrated the Printable CEO into my personal progress system.

Read more: The Printable CEO

In Monday’s entry, I explained some simple techniques to turn a drain on resources into a free* method of advertising.

In today’s entry, I’ll be going into more depth about how to use a little PHP to dynamically generate your adverts. Why would you want to do this? For starters, you can modify the image to include a discount code, which will help track where the orders came from. Who knows, you could even strike up a deal with the site owner to display ads on their site should it bring you a lot of customers.

Please note that most of the code will just be fragments, and I’m not tying it down to one implementation. It’s quite likely that I’ll modify this method over time and post updates in the future. There’s also the small question of “is it worth it”. Again, I’ll keep you updated.

First things first

First, we’ll create a database table to store several things:

• The full referring URL – The unique identifier.
• The number of hits to this file.
• The discount code, either for this URL or for the domain.

Nothing particularly complex there, although you may wish to tweak it to allow for different advert styles.

Basic PHP

Our file, which I’ll call “image-script.php” needs to carry out several functions:

• Check to see if we’ve had a referrer from this site before.
  • If we have, log the hit and get the discount code
  • If we haven’t, create an entry and generate a discount code.
• Create and output an image

Lets look at some sample code

[php]
// Get the referrer and look for this site in the database
// Please note: HTTP_REFERER is not a typo
$referrer_url = $_SERVER['HTTP_REFERER'];
$siteData = find_site($referrer_url);

if ($siteData) {
// Seen the site before, so grab discount code
add_site_hit($referrer_url);
$discountCode = $siteData['discount_code'];
} else {
// A new site, so create a discount code and add it to the db
$discountCode = create_discount_code($refferer_url);
add_new_site($referrer_url, $discountCode);
}

// Image Creation code
[/php]

create_discount_code would need to be tailored to each particular solution, and I’ve deliberately left out the database code to save space.

Image Creation Code

The final bit of code is creating our image, complete with embedded discount code. You’ll need the GD engine installed to use these functions. More information about that is available in the image section of the PHP manual.

The code itself is relatively simple. We open an advert image, and then add the discount code to it before outputting it to the browser.

[php]// Image Creation code

// Setup where we want the code to appear
$codeX = 5;
$codeY = 5;

// Load advert image.
$advertImage = imagecreatefrompng(‘background-image.png’);

// Draw discount code
$textColour = imagecolorallocate($advertImage, 255, 255, 255);
imagestring($advertImage, 3, $codeX, $codeY, $discountCode, $textColour );

// Output our image and cleanup
header(‘content-type: image/png’);
imagepng($advertImage);
imagedestroy($advertImage);[/php]

In case you’re wondering if creating an image works, here’s one I made earlier (using slightly modified code for the shadow and position).

One of the advantages of using dynamically generated images is that you can modify the code to perform a split test if you wish to check ad wordings or appearances. That falls outside the scope of this article, but I may write about it in future.

All done

So there we have it – how to change an unpleasant situation into something that can benefit your business.

The code is still a little rough around the edges, so I’ll be cleaning it up to make it ready for release. My goal is to create something that is simple to install and use, which will take some work.

In case anybody’s wondering, I’m using “iG::Syntax Hiliter” to produce the highlighted code snippets.

—

* Not including bandwidth costs, but seeing as your bandwidth was already being stolen at least now you’re getting some value out of it.