So, 2012 is upon us, hey?

After jotting down my thoughts on 2011, I really wanted to spend some time looking ahead to this new year. In fact, I’ve been downright excited to write this post. So then, it figures that I start having problems with the site that I have to address before I can keep going.

First, the site went down… again. This was a fairly common occurrence this past year, and I don’t want to risk it happening again. So, I switched servers, which took most of last week. I figure there is no reason to slap together a new post and try to drive traffic to it if the site doesn’t work. So I waited.

Then, yesterday, I notice that MailChimp had screwed up my signup forms for The “I Can” Movement. After hassling with customer service, I decided to switch over to Aweber, which I am still in the process of doing.

So, after all of this, I am ready to start some serious writing, and the site and community should be happier for it (and if the signup form on the right side of this page looks bland, just be patient. I’ll get it jazzed up soon).

So, I find a great exercise is to sit down and figure out what you plan on doing this year. After discovering all the cool stuff I was able to accomplish last year, I was even more excited to put this list together. There’s a great mix of travel, professional, and personal stuff (much of it from my bucket list) on here that should make 2012 a rousing success. If you keep up with what I’m doing here or elsewhere, then here’s what you have to look forward to:

I’m going to totally dominate Europe this year.

This is the big one. In October, my wife and I are going to celebrate our two-year anniversary by flying into London and doing a giant figure-8 across the continent. We’ll be visiting my old college roommate in Scotland, as well as hitting up Germany, Ireland, England, Rome, Paris, and Austria. It’s going to be the trip of a lifetime.

After visiting Taiwan a few years ago, I’m doubly excited to hit another continent, as well as immerse myself in the cultures of the world – and the food!

Attend a Packer game while they’re good.

I’m from Wisconsin. That means I’m a Green Bay Packer fan. They only lost one game all season this year, and as of this writing, they are defending Super Bowl champions. In other words, they’re good. I plan on heading up to historic Lambeau Field to enjoy it in person next season.

Make $50,000/year.

This is the next income goal on my bucket list, and I think it’s very doable this year. It’s going to take a lot of effort on my part, but I look forward to the challenge. As I expand my business, this should become more and more of a possibility. I did not come close to this income level in 2011, but I am poised to make a run for it if I play my cards right in 2012.

Get 1,000 Twitter followers.

It’s not the be-all, end-all in terms of influence, but I do feel that having over 1K followers on Twitter will really give me the opportunity to spread the word about what I’m doing, as well as connect with more awesome people. One thousand is a completely arbitrary number, but it’s a big one for me. As of this writing, I’m sitting at just under 800.

Play guitar at a performance level.

I don’t have clear parameters on this yet. I’d like to record myself playing, or even hit up an Open Mic night somewhere. I love playing guitar, but I’m generally pretty bad at it because I don’t practice enough. This is the year I dedicate myself to the craft so that I can be at a level that I can be proud of for a change.

Attend a bloggers’ conference.

There are lots of these available, but I’m headed to Portland, Oregon in July of 2012 to attend the World Domination Summit. It’s much more than a bloggers’ conference, but it will give me the chance to connect with so many more like-minded individuals.

Take a train somewhere.

I’ve never really been on a train (Disney World doesn’t count). We’ll be taking it around Europe, so this should take care of that.

Run a half marathon.

Yep, last year I ran a 5K independently. Twice. Now, I’m taking it up a notch. I planned on working on this sometime later in the summer, but a friend of mine convinced me to sign up for one on May 5th. So I guess this one will be crossed off a lot sooner than I had originally planned!

Write more epic stuff.

One reason I really enjoyed the 2011 review is because I was able to write a much longer post. That’s the goal this year. I find that it will be better for me as a writer, and it will force me to come up with stuff that you guys will enjoy and be able to learn from. In my head, I’ve got this post from Corbett Barr over at Think Traffic stuck in my head.

Implement “No TV Tuesday”.

Last night, my wife and I had our first full-scale “No TV Tuesday”. We have struggled with leaving the TV on and watching “just one more” episode of something, effectively killing our desire and resolve to get stuff done. Instead of leaning on that, we are now actively not watching television on Tuesdays. The result? We got a lot done, and we spent time playing a board game instead, which was actually a lot of fun.

TV isn’t evil. As I’ve written in the past, I love TV. But it can control your life if you’re not careful. When I was hanging out with Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus when they were in town last month, Joshua said that he didn’t own a TV, but only because he knew he would watch it constantly.

It’s not as simple as saying something is “good” or “bad”. It’s about recognizing your own weaknesses and shortcomings, and taking steps to fight them. That’s what “No TV Tuesdays” are about for us.

Migrate from SEO writing into full-time direct mail copywriting.

SEO writing has gotten me out of the office job, and for that I am grateful. However, it’s not a very challenging or fulfilling occupation. With direct mail, I’ll be able to make a lot more money and work less, creating more freedom in my life while we pay down our debts. I’ve  igotten my foot in the door at several companies, but I have to make sure I perform to the highest level so that I can establish myself. Once that happens, I can ditch the SEO work. It’s a switch that I’ve been waiting to make for 6 years.

50 Guest Posts in 2012

According to Caleb Wojcik of Pocket Changed, I’ve got a little competition for this one. The only way I can grow the audience here and at HustleLife Magazine is by getting my name out there, which means I have to make guest posting a priority. That’s what this year is all about. So I’m hoping that I will be able to knock out 50 guest posts on various sites to really start gaining some traction!

Smarter consumption of information.

A lot of people feel that there is an information overload in today’s online world, and I would be inclined to agree. But I don’t think that we necessarily need to cut it all out. In fact, you can limit your information overload by having a better system of managing it. Some people will use different tools, but here is what I have:

• My Kindle + Readability. With my Kindle, I can read books anywhere – quickly and easily. This is great, but the real power of the Kindle comes from combining it with Readability. With the combination, I can find long-form content online and send it to my Kindle with one click for later reading. So instead of managing magazine subscriptions for my long-form content, I just keep my Kindle. One of my favorite places to find great content that I can read is LongForm.org, which allows me to click “Send to Kindle” and be done with it.
• Google Reader. I keep trying other tools, but Reader still can’t be beat for clean and simple feed reading. I manage a lot of feeds from Google Reader, but I don’t read everything within their interface. Sure, I will if I have the time, but if I want to batch my stuff and save it for later, I use…
• ifttt and Evernote. With these two tools, I can save links from Google Reader and Twitter that I want to review later, eliminating my need to constantly consume information. With ifttt, as I’ve written about before, I can star items in Google Reader that will go into my “Links to Review” notebook in Evernote. Then, when I see an interesting tweet or link on Twitter I want to look into, I just “favorite” the tweet and it is sent to the same notebook in Evernote. Then, I can just read them at my leisure on my…
• Netbook. With my new netbook (see the goofy picture above), I now have the laptop I’ve always wanted/needed. I can use it for quick access to links and content that I want to review, and I can use it for portable working (or blogging – which I’m doing on it now).

Having an organized system of digesting content allows me to read on my own time, where and when I am comfortable. Then, I am able to weed out the important stuff and keep my brain learning new interesting and valuable information without becoming overloaded. Oh, and the entire system uses free services, which is awesome.

Okay, what about you?

What do you want to do this year? Let’s chat in the comments section!

Keeping things in the cloud is a godsend, pure and simple.

Yeah, there are sometimes a few hiccups here and there, but think about this: ten years ago, when your computer crashed, you might have been out of your email for a week or more, depending on your resources/finances. Today, when your computer crashes, you can still grab your email on your phone, or you can hop on another computer and access it through a web browser.

The opposition to cloud-based services is what if the server crashes? In other words, if I keep all of my information on Google’s computers, what happens when their computer goes down?

Well, Google spends a sizable amount of money on their computers, and they keep backups of everything. I’d much rather rely on Google’s state-of-the-art computers, which cost thousands of dollars, rather than on my four-and-a-half year old Toshiba Satellite laptop that I bought for $500 or so when it came out.

The cloud is changing everything that we do, and we don’t even realize it. My favorite? Publishing. This blog is completely run by the cloud. I have backups emailed to me every week, but that’s about it. It is 100% run in the cloud. I’m even writing this in a web browser. Thanks to the cloud, I am publishing the 7th issue of my own digital magazine, an ongoing project that I’ve always wanted to do. My books are stored in the cloud.

We use the cloud for communication. I use Google Voice for my business communication, Facebook to communicate with most of my friends, and Twitter to network with and meet new people in various industries.

The cloud houses most of my entertainment. Whereas I spent my younger years meticulously recording TV shows onto video tapes (remember those?), so that I would never be short of entertainment, I now use Netflix for much of my entertainment, along with Hulu, and I read a number of hilariously entertaining and thoughtful blogs.

I house my thoughts in the cloud with Evernote, I keep my day-to-day life in Google Calendar, and I even used the cloud to complete a correspondence course on direct response copywriting to expand my business. We manage our finances in the cloud with ClearCheckbook, and I can travel to new destinations and enjoy classic moments from movies and television with YouTube. You can even expand your knowledge about almost any subject with Wikipedia and a Google search.

The cloud houses your information, teaches you new stuff, keeps you entertained, and organizes your life. Heck, the cloud even makes me money every month. That is so cool.

Ah, TV.

I love me some good TV. Some might feel that TV is a waste of time, but I think, when used properly, it can be great for breaks, and even for learning. Unfortunately, many people are sucked into cable/satellite TV, pay hundreds of dollars a year, and they spend nearly every waking moment sitting in front of the ol’ boob tube. Many people who claim that they don’t have time to go after their goals are likely using up a lot of their time watching TV. In that case, it’s dangerous.

In this household, we watch TV on demand almost exclusively. We rarely watch anything live. I’ve talked about my love for TV before, and how I do not have cable TV. Today’s setup consists of a dedicated computer hooked up to a nice 32″ Dynex HDTV, and a remote control to handle everything. With XBMC handling all of our backed-up DVDs of movies and TV shows, Netflix for tons of extra stuff that we don’t have, Hulu to grab a few interesting cable TV shows and series, and Windows Media Center to record HD programming from the major networks, we have access to thousands of hours of content at any given time – on demand. Here’s why our on-demand system is about a billion times better than cable TV or the “traditional” way of viewing programming.

We’re not tied to pop culture.

A couple years ago, while working in my office, I saw a picture of Lauren Conrad. I spun around in my chair to ask two of my coworkers who she was, because she looked familiar. One of them said, “Uh… Tom? That’s Lauren Conrad!” I responded with a blank stare, and then said, “That’s not why I recognize her.” They then proceeded to laugh hysterically for nearly five minutes because I didn’t recognize her from The Hills (I haven’t turned MTV on a television in probably 5-6 years, at the very least).

I felt like I was in grade school. And I really didn’t care. I don’t think they realized how stupid they were sounding.

Maybe I’m getting older, but pop culture is getting stupider by the second. At the time of this writing, everybody is talking about how Kim Kardashian is getting divorced. I have yet to learn why she’s famous, other than a “reality” show with her and her family. Not sure why she got that, either. So why do I care if she’s getting divorced?

The same goes for Jersey Shore and Two and a Half Men. I couldn’t care less about this stuff. Having on-demand TV lets me choose what to care about, so that I don’t have to waste time with garbage.

No commercials.*

Quick – what’s the most annoying part of television? That’s right – the commercials! You can pay $70+ a month for cable TV, but you still have to sit through commercials. Netflix has no commercials. Our media center has no commercials. When we record something, we fast forward through them. We don’t have to watch crappy advertising, and we save 10-15 minutes’ time on watching any show.

*The only exception to this is Hulu. We use Hulu Desktop on the machine, which is great, but we have to sit through brief commercial breaks. These would be tolerable, but they just play the same Geico commercials over and over again. I really want to go find Geico’s marketing department and punch them all in their faces.

No news.

Worried you’ll be behind on your news? Who cares? Local news is full of useless, feel-good fluff and horrifying-but-not-as-common-as-you’re-going-to-think news stories about people being killed, kidnapped, and beaten. It’s a strange combination of useless and depressing.

I find that big news stories are going to find you anyway. If something huge happens, I’ll hear it on Twitter or Facebook. Beyond that, I don’t need it.

What about your sports news? Is there such a thing? I have apps on my phone that let me keep up with scores if I’m not watching a particular game. I do subscribe to a couple of sports blogs, but that’s about it. Even as a sports-loving guy, I can live without ESPN. The talking heads on that station are completely useless, and I don’t need to sit around listening to people trying to shout over each other, arguing about the latest headlines. In fact, the same goes for CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News.

We develop appreciation for the classics.

In Milwaukee, on an average night, you’ll see repeats of The Simpsons (but we have all the good ones on DVD), The Office (have all of them on DVD/Netflix), Friends (have all of them on DVD), Two and a Half Men (horrible show), and a handful of other really lousy shows.

When we were in Florida, every night after we got back from the theme parks, we changed into comfortable clothes, grabbed some snacks, and turned on the TV. In syndication in Orlando at night is That ’70s Show, a sitcom that ended a few years back that I had forgotten about. We both enjoyed it, and my wife commented: “I can see why people thought this show was so funny.”

And what do you know? They’re all on Netflix. I’ll take an episode of That ’70s Show over Whitney any day of the week. Netflix gives you a lot of options for great TV that isn’t on anymore, and you could have forgotten about it. A lot of the time, you’ll see that the humor/entertainment value will still hold up.

Flexibility.

Even though I loathe reality shows, and I constantly lament the overabundance of “talent” shows on TV, my wife and I do enjoy The Sing-Off. It has a great combination of no melodrama, great musical talent, and judges that are – *gasp* – likeable! It’s a fun show, and we both come from choir/vocal group backgrounds, so we enjoy listening to the different awesome groups perform.

It used to be a show that was just on for about a month in December, but this year, it was picked up for a full season. Unfortunately, like every major network, NBC screwed it up by giving it a TWO HOUR slot on Mondays. We’ve watched it live only once, and we vowed never to do it again. Two solid hours of sitting in front of the TV with no choice to do anything else is just too much. When we record it, we can watch some of it, pause it, and come back to it later, and we can skip through some of the boring fluff. That flexibility keeps TV from controlling our lives.

It’s also useful if I find a great documentary on Netflix – I can watch a little bit of it on my lunch break and come back to it the next day.

I can control my attachments better.

I’m tired of watching shows that get cancelled way too soon. I loved Arrested Development. Life was one of my favorite shows ever, and possibly one of the best dramas I’ve ever seen. Friday Night Lights just barely got to 5 seasons, and remains one of the finest written television programs in history. Community is consistently smart and hilarious, and of course, rumors are starting to develop that it will be cancelled.

When you watch on-demand TV, like on Netflix, you already know what to expect. I don’t want to get invested in a storyline or show, only to be surprised when it is unceremoniously ended. Then I know what to get attached to. Otherwise, it’s just a waste of time.

(Note: Friday Night Lights is on Netflix, and Life is on Hulu. Watch them. They’re excellent.)

Cost.

Of course, this is always the best argument. Our current setup came out to a one-time cost of under $500. Think you can’t afford that? If you have cable or satellite service for a year, you’ve already spent way more than that. Our only monthly bills are eight bucks for Netflix and the usual standard internet service fees, which we’re all paying for anyway. We use a great antenna to get network TV over the air, and Windows Media Center does not require a subscription. We still have a Program Guide and scheduled recordings of our favorite shows. Hulu Desktop, when run through a computer, does not require a Hulu Plus subscription, so we get it for free.

Also, if you want to get Netflix DVDs in the mail, you can for another $8 a month. It’s still a fantastic deal, and you would have access to nearly anything you would want – seriously. We’ve cut it for now to keep costs down, but I would love to add that back in the future.

We’ve already had this setup for one year, and it has more than paid for itself. In fact, we consider it to be much more awesome than the setups of our peers, who complain about satellite TV going out, or a service dropping a TV station, or wasting money when there’s “nothing on”.

Want some more motivation? Here’s some great stuff from two services that might convince you to make the switch. Note that your Netflix subscription includes ALL episodes of a series, and is available on your smartphone for anytime-viewing. Oh, and by the way, nearly all of this stuff is in high definition:

Netflix

• That ’70s Show
• Breaking Bad
• The Wonder Years
• The Office
• Friday Night Lights
• Mad Men
• Phineas and Ferb
• Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
• Firefly
• David Attenborough nature documentaries
• Ken Burns historical documentaries
• Cheers
• Scrubs
• Bones
• NewsRadio
• Sports Night
• Dirty Jobs
• Reno 911!
• MythBusters
• Survivorman
• Weeds
• 24

Hulu

• House Hunters
• House Hunters International
• My First Place
• NFL Top 10
• America’s Game
• Life
• Man Caves

When the typical American thinks of success, the mind instantly flashes to celebrities: those you see in the movies, on TV shows, hear on the radio, and read about on TMZ.com. Success is defined as being “known” by a lot of people.

One guy that, by that measure, has had a lot of success is Jim Carrey. Jim Carrey is a very successful actor, known for being, at one time, the highest paid comic actor in the world. Whether you like him or you don’t, you have to admit that Jim Carrey has had an enormous amount of success.

But for what? I’m a big Jim Carrey fan, but I know plenty of people who have spent years being annoyed by him. Some of his movies are just plain goofy, and he has a tendency to overact at times. If you didn’t know any better, you’d watch a Jim Carrey movie and think, “Pff. I can do that. They should pay me those millions of dollars!”

But what is your earliest memory of Jim Carrey?

The guy became a household name after Ace Ventura: Pet Detective hit theaters. That was in 1994. Even if you remember him from In Living Color in the early ‘90s, you might be tempted to think of Jim Carrey as a guy who flailed around on that show for a few years, was handed a job with Ace Ventura and struck gold, immediately becoming a ridiculous success.

What you may not know is his career started in 1979.

He just celebrated his 49th birthday.

Yep, fifteen years before Ace Ventura, Jim Carrey was a struggling standup comedian. After two full years of working shows, he moved his way up to being a headliner. If you know nothing about standup comedy, being a headliner of standup comedy shows in 1981 didn’t exactly pay huge gobs of money.

He auditioned for Saturday Night Live in the ‘80-’81 season, and was not selected. Also in 1981, he starred in Rubberface, a movie my brother and I rented in the mid-’90s purely on the basis that he was in it. It was one of the most horrible movies we’ve ever seen. You can look at his IMDB page for more horrible movies he was involved with in the ‘80s.

His first television show, The Duck Factory, lasted three months in 1984. Then he caught a big break with In Living Color.

So let’s do a quick recap.

When Jim Carrey started on his road to stardom, he spent a full 11 years or so with nobody having any clue who he was. It took him 15 years to crack into national stardom and actual, real money.

Continuing on…

In 1994, Ace Ventura was panned by critics, so it wasn’t like he had ultimate job security yet. Once box office numbers came in, then people saw the potential of Jim Carrey. He was then able to star in The Mask, Dumb & Dumber, and Batman Forever. In 1998, he took a risk by transitioning to dramatic films with The Truman Show (an excellent movie, by the way), and you know his movies since then.

What we can learn from Jim Carrey:

You might think of Jim Carrey as a talented actor or just a guy who made a living being an idiot on-screen. But the fact is, Jim Carrey worked his tail off for over a decade before he hit it big. When we start up a new project or go after a goal, even a tiny one, we work for a few weeks or months and expect the world to be given to us.

Nothing happens overnight.

Real, true, lasting success comes from commitment. It needs to elude you for a while so that failure can slap you around. You need to get frustrated and beaten down a few times. You’ll do work you won’t be proud of, but it will be progress.

Rubberface was horrible, but Once Bitten was darn near watchable. Jim Carrey took every opportunity he had to improve on his craft, until he got the big one. Then, when Ace Ventura came around, he was ready to knock it out of the park.

Keep working at improving, every chance you get. Then maybe, one day, you’ll hit the big one. But you won’t know until you commit to it.

This is part of a new series where I try to give you ideas for little goals that you can accomplish in your day-to-day life. Remember, small goals lead to big achievements, so try something out for a while and see if you can stick with it. And why 237 goals? I don’t know. I chose the number at random. I didn’t want to overthink it.

Recently as of this writing, I was at a get-together with my family. My mom and I were discussing our reading habits, as I have a Kindle and she has the Kindle software on her phone. One of my brothers and I were also discussing books we have read recently, and one of my other brothers came up behind us, laughing:

“You guys know they make, like, TV and movies now, right? You don’t even have to read – the story is right there and you can just watch it!”

He was mocking us, for sure. He felt books were boring and too “low-tech”. Yet, I feel like the entertainment world in the United States is on a sharp decline. Television shows are riddled with either the same old procedural cop shows or “reality” garbage, while the film industry is run by marketing teams whose sole purpose is to entertain and sell to under-25 year old males with explosions and lots of CGI in the place of a well thought-out story. The world around us is dumbing down, and as long as TMZ has their own television show, I will not accept television as a viable source of endless entertainment (there’s only so many ways you can say, “Charlie Sheen is a nutball”, before you just gotta give up and move on, guys).

So what benefits are there to – *shudder* – reading books? Aren’t books ancient? Aren’t they just boring old scraps of paper? Well, some of them are. But books hold a lot of value for your own entertainment and learning:

• They exercise your imagination. Yes, this is the classic grade-school, Reading Rainbow argument. You can transport yourself into different worlds, right? Well, sure, if you want. But exercising your imagination is good for your brain. Keeping your brain sharp is the key to being a well-rounded thinker, and thinkers succeed in life.
• They don’t necessarily rely on electricity. I run a home server in our apartment, so my wife and I have access to hours upon hours of television shows and movies. There’s no excuse to be bored at our house. But we came home from church last week and our electricity was out for over an hour. We ate lunch and sat around in the living room. Guess what we did? We read. I busted out my Kindle and she grabbed a book, and we quietly read to ourselves to pass the time. If it was dark out, we could have lit a few candles if we really wanted to, or grabbed flashlights. But without electricity, all those computers and the TV were useless.
• They can go anywhere without disturbing people. Grab a book and carry it around when you have to go places. Sure, you could take headphones and watch something on your expensive smartphone, but that will eat up your battery quicker than you can say “overpriced”. But while you’re in the waiting room at the doctor or while you are getting your oil changed, having a book there is quiet and doesn’t disturb anyone else while keeping you occupied.
• There are many more options available to you, and you don’t have to jump through hoops to get them. Authors from around the world get their stuff translated into your language. There are a kajillion books to read. You can read old war stories, psychological thrillers, hilarious satire, behind-the-scenes exclusives, gripping adventures, thoughtful philosophies, and even a wide range of vampire-related love stories (ugh). You are not limited to what a bunch of producers and marketers thought would get ratings.
• You can find a lot of books for free or insanely cheap. Ever hear of the library? It’s this magical place where you can rent books – for free! And there are tons to choose from there alone. You can even browse your library from home and request books as well. Or try a service like PaperbackSwap to get gently used books for the price of postage. Heck, even a great mainstream site like Amazon has a ton of used books available for purchase. If you’re an ebook lover or own an ebook reader, you can even get free titles from Amazon or from sites like Project Gutenberg.

So, if books are this awesome, why aren’t we reading as many of them anymore? In my mind, it’s because of school. The school system is built to get you to hate books. My teachers existed to try to get me to agree with their interpretations of books. It made me not want to read. And if I’m being forced to read for school, I’m going to associate reading with school, which means reading sucks. Unfortunately, so many people don’t grow out of this habit, and it’s hurting them exponentially.

How do you start reading again? Your goal, as with any small goal, is to make reading easy, accessible, and rewarding. You don’t want to jump through a lot of hoops, and you don’t want to be stuck reading something that keeps putting you to sleep. So, here are some ways to start getting yourself into the habit of reading:

• Start with short stories. The prospect of reading a big, long book (with no pictures!) is daunting if you aren’t used to it. Start with shorter pieces. There are plenty of collections of short stories around that will keep you busy for a while. They cater to your attention span, and they help you build up the stamina to read. Heck, there’s no shame in just sticking with short stories, either!
• Read the book versions of your favorite movies. You’ll be surprised at how much better they are than the movies, for one. But this also gives your imagination something to start out with, so you can better picture the story. Book versions tend to have a lot of stuff in them that the movie versions couldn’t fit, so they lend themselves well to surprise and can be quite fulfilling to a new reader. Suggestions: The Bourne Identity series is a great place to start for exciting reading, but even the more mainstream stuff like Harry Potter or Twilight is supposedly good (if you’re into that sort of thing).
• Stick with your interests. Love sports? My goodness, there are a ton of fantastic sports books out there! Horror fan? There are thrillers that will keep you up at night. Love documentaries? Browse nonfiction sections related to your areas of interest, like war history or biographies of people you are interested in. Just browse around for a while on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or just go down to the local bookstore and peruse the shelves.
• Get a Kindle. The current Kindle is $139, and I got one for Christmas. It’s one of the best gifts I’ve ever received. If nothing else, having a Kindle will motivate you to read because it’s a great toy and we all like new gadgets. Plus, you don’t have the intimidation of larger books, and you can read it like a regular book for weeks at a time. And with loads of free books and built-in dictionary system, you can finally tackle those classics that you’ve always heard were good but never got around to reading.
• Stop reading a boring book. What’s that? You have a book that’s putting you to sleep? Stop reading it. There’s no problem with that. Get another book. There’s plenty of reading for everybody. You are not in school anymore, so don’t force yourself unless you are really trying to read something deep to expand your mind. Get through a chapter or two to give the book a chance, but after that, if you don’t like it, don’t read it!
• Get involved with a book club. You can start one with a group of friends or join one online at sites like Goodreads. Either way, hold a little accountability and enjoy some good discussion with fellow readers. It might open your mind to some new ways of thinking.

What about you? What is your favorite tip to get started reading? Do you have any favorite books that you want to share? Drop them in the comments!

I guarantee you this guy gets more donations than other homeless guys in his area.

Reality TV shows drive me up the wall. It seems like every time I turn around, there’s a new one, and it’s full of a bunch of people who are famous for being famous (an art mastered by Paris Hilton). Jersey Shore, Teen Mom, and an endless parade of washed-up celebrities on VH1 – it’s getting ridiculous. And for a guy who used to love sitcoms, I hate that these things are clogging up the airwaves. But why are they still on?

Well, they’re cheap to produce, for one. But that’s not the only reason. If it were, then we could just have cheaply-produced TV shows in general. They’re on because they get ratings. People watch them. At my customer service job, all I heard was stuff about Teen Mom and other craptastic shows. Apparently everyone was watching them but me. It made no sense to me.

Then, a few weeks ago, I realized why they were on: they have stories. I may hate the stories, but they’ve got stories. Everybody on a reality show has their own plot – real or fabricated. They have something going on. They have a backstory that defines who they are (the jock, the bully, the sensitive guy, the slut, etc.). That’s why we can’t get these things canceled. Producers make sure that each reality TV star has a story.

So what does this have to do with you? If you want to be successful in life, you need to build your influence. People who have a lot of influence connect with other people. That means you need to have a story. My buddy is a magnificent storyteller. If a group of people is together, he’ll find a way to be able to tell a ten-minute story about his ride to work the other day. People latch onto it and listen intently – they laugh when something funny happens, they go “awwww” when something sad happens. They connect with him through that story.

To grab people’s attention, you need your own story. It doesn’t really need to be a story about your ride to work. But what defines you? What makes you stand out? If you want that job, walk into that interview with a story that you can tell. If it’s relatable, your interviewer will put herself into that story and she will remember you. Then, if you are just as qualified as the next guy, chances are you will get that job. If you want to connect with the boss, have a story. When he asks you what you were up to last weekend, tell a quick yarn about spending $6 on a hot dog at the baseball game you went to (or whatever).

This doesn’t mean that anytime is right for a story. After all, people only watch reality TV shows when their TV is on, and it isn’t always on, usually. Sometimes people aren’t in the mood for a story. But take the time to figure out when they do, and start using yours. When you are out on that date, tell a story that demonstrates what an awesome person you are. If you want that blog of yours to take off, make sure you have a story to tell your readers so that they connect with you. If you want your business to bring in more clients, tell a story about how great the last client’s experience was. It makes you more of a human being. People like that.

The truly successful people in this world connect with others, and they are storytellers at heart. Find your story or stories, and start getting comfortable telling it regularly – in short form, in long form, in quick blurbs, on your business cards, whatever. Once people connect with your story, they connect with you. Jerry Seinfeld figured that out, and that’s why he tested his story out. Reality TV show producers understand that, and that’s why they build their shows around interesting personalities. Start trying out your story – it’s what will build your influence with the people around you.

It's one idea of many.

Growing up, I didn’t have a ton of friends. Whichever friends I had, I didn’t live by them. So when I needed something to do, more often than not, I was on my own. So I sat in front of that beautiful idiot box and watched an endless stream of sitcoms and professional wrestling. And while I have fond memories for both of those things, I started realizing as I grew older how much time was being wasted on that stuff – but I couldn’t stop. When I moved into my first apartment, we got a DVR, and I kept taping stuff and watching it. I still spent hours every day watching TV. When I moved in with my brother’s family, I got my own DVR box and recorded everything under the sun – if it was on, I’d watch it.

When I finally broke out on my own, and I started to build my business, I needed to cut living costs, so I dropped my cable. My family laughed at me, knowing my love for television, and they said, “I could never live without ESPN/Lifetime/Disney Channel, etc.”. And while I had a place in my heart for the Travel Channel and ESPN myself, I forged ahead. And I survived.

Actually, not only did I survive, I thrived! I had more time to really accomplish things and more time to spend with people, instead of staring at that box. I started reading more, and writing more. It’s a wonderful feeling. But here’s the kicker: had I not needed to cut costs, I’d still have cable today. If I had not went cold turkey, I’d have lost approximately (quick calculation here, based on $70/month for cable and DVR service): $2,940. Nearly THREE GRAND. What can you do with that kind of money?

And those who argue that three grand over three years isn’t that much are usually the same people who have cable and then complain that they don’t have a dime extra to spend on going out or getting a book or taking a vacation or whatever. What would you do with an extra $70 per month?

So I’m going to issue a challenge: take this week and don’t watch cable. You want to watch network shows? Go ahead. But take a week and don’t turn on any of the cable channels. The Monday Night Football game is the Ravens-Texans and should be something of a snoozer anyway. If you want to force yourself even further, unhook the cable box and get yourself a set of rabbit ears. If you live in a city, you’ll likely get good reception, and you’ll still get all the HD channels. And here’s a list of things you can do to get yourself through the week:

• Ditch the DVR and watch your favorite shows on your computer the next day. Virtually all network shows have their new episodes on the morning after. Or hop on Hulu. Get your sports fix by watching “America’s Game” on Hulu, which is a miniseries of documentaries on all the Super Bowl winners – it’s fantastic.
• Go to InstantWatcher.com and browse the Netflix Watch Instantly library. It’s growing all the time. Start entertaining the idea of signing up at least for their streaming-only option if you watch a lot of movies ($70/month vs $8/month).
• Go get a book from the library, or order one from Amazon. Find something on a topic you like. You like sports? There are TONS of fantastic and gripping sports books out there that chronicle great, dramatic stories that makes the latest “Brett-Favre-Is-Still-Questionable-So-We-Should-Keep-Talking-About-Him” headlines seem ridiculous by comparison. Like celebrity gossip? Read about the sordid lives of celebrities of the past – you’ll have the same scandal, but at least those people were famous for DOING something.
• Get your news from sites like Google News or BBC. You can even watch local news, but watch with discretion: most stories are local violence stories and are not indicative of the state of the world as a whole. Online news sources update in real-time (for the most part), and you can browse the news quickly and get back to your life.
• Start a blog. Yup. Go to WordPress and sign up for a free blog. Just start writing about something you love. Create something. It doesn’t matter if you’re good or not. Hate writing? That’s because you never wrote about something you wanted to write about.
• Get a hobby. Pick up that old guitar and start browsing some tabs over at Ultimate Guitar. Go to Instructables and find a tutorial on how to make something you really want to make. Dive in.
• Work on your relationships. When was the last time you sat down and played a board game with your friends? Your parents? Your wife/husband/girlfriend/boyfriend? Your kids? I don’t mean Madden, I mean Scrabble. I mean Catchphrase. I mean Monopoly. Invest some time in your personal relationships and have fun doing it.
• It’s winter – go ice skating. Go sledding. Go outside and build a snowman. Grab some friends and go play some tackle football. Have a snowball fight. I don’t care how old you are. It’s good for you and it gets your blood moving.
• Find the one thing you’ve always been meaning to do, and do it.

And that list is just off the top of my head. Nobody cares if you miss the latest I’m a teenager and I got pregnant so I get to be on TV now-type show. When someone says, “Hey, did you see [insert name of show here]?”, you can respond by saying, “No, last night I [insert meaningful activity here].”

Uncomfortable with the idea? Hey, this site’s tagline is “Try something new today.” Go for it and see what happens. You can always go back to your old ways if you hate it. But stick to it for a week and see what kinds of cool things you can dream up.

When I first saw the advertisements for Boardwalk Empire, I got a little excited. This show had some very intriguing elements to it. I’m a fan of Steve Buscemi and the idea of him being in a dramatic role was certainly something that I was interested in. On top of that, it’s about Prohibition and the Roaring Twenties, and that’s a pretty cool period of time to take a look at.

Now, I don’t have cable, so I do not have HBO. The only way to watch this show would be to download the episodes. I was fine with that, as I have a home server set up to stream episodes to my XBox 360 (soon to be my Revo nettop PC, which I’ll post about after I set it up), so I could still watch them in decent quality in my living room.

But as the season got started, I fell behind. I haven’t watched an episode yet. When I went to look and see how many episodes I was behind, I realized I was 5 episodes behind, and they are hourlong episodes to boot.

I was laying in bed last night and I realized something: why should I stress myself out trying to get caught up on this show? I’ve never watched it before, and I don’t want this to turn into some kind of chore.

So I’m not watching it. At least not now.

It’s really easy to get so emotionally involved with a show that you feel like you need to watch it every chance you get. But I have little free time, between a full-time job, a side business, my desire to read, spending time with my wife, and everything else, I just don’t have the desire to push myself to watch yet another show.

I consistently watch The Office, Community, Parenthood, and Mythbusters. Beyond that, I don’t want to suck up all my free time with another show. My solution? Netflix. I’m already a subscriber, so I can wait until the show comes out on DVD and then get the discs in the mail. I don’t spend extra, and I could probably watch them in the summer or some time when my free time isn’t being eaten alive by other stuff.

So why should you care about what I watch?

Well, you shouldn’t. But here’s the point: in order for you to get the most out of your own life, you need to look hard at your priorities. You think you can’t live without watching the news every night or seeing the latest TV show, but you can. I’ve done it for a long time now. I will consume news at my own pace, and where I’m not bombarded by stupid political rants and the latest panic attack. I will watch shows when it is convenient for me, and I don’t care if “everybody’s” talking about it.

Keep your emotions in check. It’s just a TV show. It’s just [fill in the blank]. These things have importance because people are telling you they are important. Make your own priorities and free yourself from the chains of the masses. Trust me – you’ll get a lot more done and be much happier/more relaxed in the process.

It’s amazing to me sometimes how crippling fear of change can be. You start at an early age: when you do something different from the other kids, they make fun of you (well, they did to me, at least). If all the kids get average grades and you get better grades, they target you. If they are all average at sports and you are terrible at them, they laugh at you. If they all watch a certain show on TV and you don’t, you are an outcast. When that happened to me as a child, I started pulling back on everything and spent a good number of years refusing to be myself out of embarrassment.

You just got home from a long day at work, and you feel fried. Your brain is running on fumes, and your body just wants to collapse on the couch. You want mindless entertainment, and fortunately, you’ve got hundreds of channels to choose from. You sit down, and from about 6:00pm until 11:00pm, the TV is on. Sound healthy to you?

I hear people at the office talk about Bachelor Pad and other pieces of garbage like that. I hear them spend 10 minutes talking about Twilight and what the celebrities are up to. In my mind, all I can think is this question: “Isn’t there something better we can do with our time?” I’m a self-admitted TV addict, but my TV watching has tapered off in recent years. And with the average cable bill running $75-$100 a month, I think it’s time we staged a revolution. Too often, we have let networks tell us what to talk about, what to buy, what to eat, and how to live. I say we turn off the TVs and start doing something. Here are some great alternatives that will make your life more fulfilling and, let’s be honest, healthier:

Have a conversation

Yoga/Pushups/Situps/Gym/Running/Walking/Get Off Your Lazy Butt

Expand that brain of yours

Start a side business

Read a book, or twelve