Judged or Ignored?

So I went to an interview last afternoon, and as exciting as it was, it was also really scary. Here were a group of people judging me (and my entire life/set of experiences )based on a 15 minute presentation. I walked away feeling like I hadn't done justice to conveying my potential...and consequently was a little bit sad.

But that was exactly when I read this amazing post by Seth Godin:

(being judged and Ignored) Those are pretty much the only two choices.

Being judged is uncomfortable. Snap judgments, prejudices, misinformation... all of these, combined with not enough time (how could there be) to truly know you, means that you will inevitably be misjudged, underestimated (or overestimated) and unfairly rejected.

The alternative, of course, is much safer. To be ignored.

Up to you.

I choose judged over ignored any day...and I really hope you do too!

Lessons for Aspiring Entrepreneurs

1. An untended garden quickly becomes a field: plant what you want to grow.

2. Have partners, but don’t do the same things: make sure you both do something you enjoy.

3. Hire people for what they can teach you, not for what you can teach them.

4. Everyone should be able to take criticism: creative trust is built on critical honesty.

5. Design is only one part of the puzzle: savor the discussion, development, debate, and dissemination of your work just as much as the making of it.

6. Goals may be arbitrary, but not having them will be maddening when there’s no one else to tell you if you’re doing a good job: set 3-month, 6-month, and 1-year goals at the outset.

7. When you take your favorite clients out to lunch, it’s a good time to propose what you’d like to do together next.

8. Knowing more designers doesn’t necessarily translate into having good clients: spend your development time wisely.

9. Be known for something: it helps.

10. You will never work harder than when you’re building something: find balance. Sometimes the best way to solve a creative problem is to take a vacation or read a book

Advice on design entrepreneurship from Rob Giampietro. 

I realise these lessons are set within the context of design, but I still think these rules apply to all entrepreneurs :)

The future has arrived...

Forget the jetpacks, researchers at Virginia Tech have developed an interactive 3D-printing vending machine and the future has officially arrived! 

iPhone Business Cards

Now this is creativity...

iPhone Business Cards by Frederic Tourrou. Oh my!

Don't Try..

In a letter to good friend, fellow poet, and founder of New York Quarterlymagazine William Packard in 1990, then-70yr-old Charles Bukowski discusses the art of writing, reiterating his belief that a writer's words and ideas should come naturally, and not be forced. Four years later, Bukowski passed away. Carved into his headstone are the words, "DON'T TRY".

Here's the transcript of the letter (i've highlighted the bit that really struck a cord with me):

Dec. 23, I990

Hello Wm Packard:

No, you're not down, maybe I'm down, sometimes I feel like my skivvies are down around my ankles and my butt is a target for hyena turds.

Listen, your Pincus is awful hard on the poets. I thought I was hard on the poets. Well, I'm glad I get by him. And he's right on WAITING. Only if the octipus has you in its tentacals you can't wait too long.

On WAITING I know what he means. Too many writers write for the wrong reasons. They want to get famous or they want to get rich or they want to get laid by the girls with bluebells in their hair. (Maybe that last ain't a bad idea).

When everything works best it's not because you chose writing but because writing chose you. It's when you're mad with it, it's when it's stuffed in your ears, your nostrils, under your fingernails. It's when there's no hope but that.

Once in Atlanta, starving in a tar paper shack, freezing. There were only newspapers for a floor. And I found a pencil stub and I wrote on the white margins of the edges of those newspapers with the pencil stub, knowing that nobody would ever see it. It was a cancer madness. And it was never work or planned or part of a school. It was. That's all.

And why do we fail? It's the age, something about the age, our Age. For half a century there has been nothing., No real breakthrough, no newness, no blazing energy, no gamble.

What? Who? Lowell? That grasshopper? Don't sing me crap songs.

We do what we can and we don't do very well.

Strictured. Locked. We pose at it.

We work too hard. We try too hard.

Don't try. Don't work. It's there. It's been looking right at us, aching to kick out of the closed womb.

There's been too much direction. It's all free, we needn't be told.

Classes? Classes are for asses.
Writing a poem is as easy as beating your meat or drinking a bottle of beer. Look. Here's one:

flux

mother saw the racoon,
my wife told me.

ah, I said.

and that was
just about
the shape of things
tonight.

HAPPY NEW YEAR

P.S - This post is dedicated to a dear one who had a really hard day yesterday :)

The story of tomorrow

Watch with headphones, watch until the end, and watch with your whole heart...


And once you do....Get out there and Explore!!

What they don't tell you...

…when you set out to change the world, is that the bottom right part of the table is actually MORE frustrating than the bottom left.

If you’re stuck there, I hope you choose to keep looking for the top right (succeeding), rather than retreating to the bottom left (not trying)

Is life good?

The secret of happiness, in a simple flowchart. Need a hand with that change in finding purpose and doing what you love? Here are some more flowcharts to help