For this one whole month, right after attending Jay Abraham’s seminar, I have been busy reviewing on my current projects, systems and stuff. That kept me busy, looking in and looking out of the limited view that I used to have.

And I happened to drop by a site and saw this optical illustration image. Take a good look at it, and think about what do you see from the image:

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business resources, self improvement

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Meatball sundae. This is going to be the new marketing book that is up on shelf. It definitely put me on a temptation struggle to get this new book. But it sounds pretty interesting. Why would I say that?

Seth’s theory in making a meatball sundae is the unfortunate result of mixing two good ideas. The meatball and sundae toppings are great nice stuff by itself, but once mixed, create a different unlikeable result.

He explained that:

the meatballs are the foundation, the things we need (and sometimes want). These are the commodities that so many businesses are built on. While the sundae toppings (hot fudge and the like) are the New Marketing, the social networks, Google, blogs and fancy stuff that make people all excited.

The challenge most organizations face: they try to mix them. They attempt to slap new marketing onto old and end up with nothing but a failed website.

This book explores the 14 trends that are changing our world and how organizations can either embrace them or be punished by them.

Well, embracing technology or fancy stuff or even funky ideas may not be possibly be a bad thing for companies, but how they cook the meatball and make the sundae toppings to blend into a nice and wonderful favor, is a BIG challenge to any and every company.

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Have you ever given yourself too many excuses, be it in life or in business, and eventually ended up doing nothing? That is simply what a procrastinator does, and you can read about the graveyard for procrastinators. We made ourselves the victims instead or being responsible for our choices. Absolute Personal Responsibility or APR, is something that is within us, we have the choice of blaming others, as well as the choice to make a change.

As like what Robin Sharma had quoted, “I am the captain of my soul, I am the master of my faith”, and you have the power to dictate the change, because you have the power and the responsibility to your decision.

Here’s the video by Robin Sharma:

procrastination, self confidence, self improvement

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There are two kinds of don’t know that Seth has noted. Take a minute of thinking, how often have you been replying with “I don’t know” as an answer to questions. And you will tend to realize that your “I don’t know” answers will fall into 2 categories of reasoning.

And the real reasons behind these don’t know are either:

• Stuff you don’t know because you haven’t been taught it yet, or
• Fear or lack of interest

First Reason to “don’t know”

The first reason to “don’t know” is due to the fact that you have not been taught, or have the technical knowledge or skill to perform and complete the task.

As for the second reason of “don’t know” is due to the fact that it is not about technique or lack of the knowledge, but your fear or lack of interest to go ahead and perform the task.

As Seth had stated we can easily look for the answers for the first reason of “I don’t know”, because knowledge, skill and techniques can be learned. And more than often, books are good problem solver, as well as good teacher.

Books and teachers are in fact, from my humble point of view, can be act upon as a directional map, because at the end of the day, it is still up to the individual to devote time and effort to make things happen, practice and perfect, to go through the repeated process of trial and error, and accumulate the different experiences, to eventually the end of mastering the skill, and continuously update and upgrade.

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self improvement

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In some point in time, we are bound to meet with opportunities in our business, career or life. And the decisions that we made for all these opportunities are going to be an impact in our life at a later stage.

It could be anything like a decision for career switch, a decision for business start up, a decision for joint venture and partnering, a decision to migrate with your spouse to another country, etc. There are so many opportunities and options as we walk through the different stages of our lives.

We are more than often at the junction of whether to proceed and take off from the point from where we are at to the point where we want to be, or a point where we would just stay where we are. It is a tough call for some. And it is a gamble to others.

As humans, we are always putting ourself at the mercy of temptation; the picture that we paint in our mind, that the grass is greener at the other end, or the persuasive sayings and opinions of others, or the emotion appeal that was created as a result of temptation, which all sums up to in putting our brain in an unfavorable condition to make the real decision and see the whole picture.

What is the missing piece of puzzle?

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business resources, self improvement

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When Steve Jobs offered a $200 discount to the late iPhone adopters, it really got the early adopters who had paid the full price of $599 pretty upset. Steve wrote a personal note to all his iPhone customers and decided to give early adopters a $100 store credit in return. It probably helps a lot to prevent the situation from turning worse, but it also cost him about $20 millions of profit. If Apple were to take a funnel vision, realized that the crowd would not be happy about the discount, and deploy their tactics differently, would things turn out differently?

Seth Godin suggested a few other tactics for Apple. Personally, I would not believe in using the tactics of price reduction to Apple product especially to late adopters, because Apple’s products are in fact of a great sense of prestige and standard as the image that it always portray.

I remembered Jay Abraham mentioned about not lowering yourself and your value. And I would think if this were to be done without direct engagement in price, but rather increase in the after sales or freebies or discounted add-on accessories, whereby it would not directly impact on the early adopters, things would probably be different and perhaps the $20 million would probably decrease to less than a quarter of the cost for the additional freebies or discounted add-on.

I believe people would not mind if the company were to do it indirectly, in the right way. As cited from Seth’s post, people in coach would not mind about first class seat and service, or probably VIP front row sit in an event, or so. And those who are not in the first class seat or VIP seat, are fine with the fact. These have hereby, clearly determined the fact that people would not mind about being treated differently, as long as the right way to do it is implemented in place.

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Are you happy with the way you currently live your life?Here is a little story that I would like to share with you:

There was a poor but happy and helpful farmer, though he lived in poverty, but that did not stopped him from trying to help others, and in fact he enjoyed doing so. Those that received help from him, were thankful to him, and the farmer was friendly in return.

And one day, he happened to saved a child, whom was in fact an angel in disguise. And due to his kindness, the angel decided to grant him one wish. So the angel asked the farmer “If I were to grant you one wish, what would you wish for?” The farmer said that “For all my life till this age, I have been living in poverty. It would be great, if I become a millionaire”. And yes, his wish came true.

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