Mark Sisson is the guy that puts the facts behind lifestyle, exercise, and nutrition claims. His current mission is to create the happiest, healthiest, leanest, most fit, and productive life that he can while he’s here on earth.

In the good ol’ days Mark Sisson was a professional triathlete, endurance runner and finished in the top five of the US National Marathon Championships — ultimately qualifying him for the Olympics. Following conventional wisdom, and exercising more than most human beings on this planet, Mark found himself to be unhealthy and overworked.

This unexpected state of health beckoned Mark to ask the question of ‘what do we do in the name of fitness?’ He spent the rest of his life, up until now, doing research on diet, fitness, nutrition, and all the erroneous assumptions that have been surrounding these topics over the last several decades.

Mark looks at our lives in the 21st century from an evolutionary perspective. Particularly, how our genes expect us to act and behave in a particular way, in order for us to be healthy. Unfortunately, we mismanage our genes, and Mark’s life for the past 20 years has been centered on figuring out which genes we want to turn on/off to manifest good health, lean fit bodies, happiness, productivity, and all of the things that make us human.

The Reluctant Crusader Against Conventional Wisdom

Mark Sisson takes it upon himself to dispel many of the myths that we believe about science by investigating them back to the original source. Let’s take a look at just five of the many myths that he’s undertaken during his career.

1. Myth: “Your diet ought to be comprised of a largely carbohydrate based intake” The food pyramid has at it’s base 6-11 servings of grains on a daily basis, which is something that humans never adapted to, and possibly the worst advice that the government could give us. Grains may be largely responsible for the obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and arthritis that we experience as a population.

2. Myth: “Saturated fat is bad for you” Saturated fat is a critical component of human cell membranes, and is what our bodies choose to store added fuel as. There’s nothing inherently wrong with saturated fat, but combined with the high carbohydrate intake that increases insulin level and wreaks havoc on other systems within the body, saturated fat can become a bad thing.

3. Myth: “Cholesterol is bad for you” Cholesterol is one of the most important molecules in the body.

4. Myth: “Avoid the sun. UVA and UVB rays are causing cancer” Mark contends that staying out of the sun causes more cancer than it prevents. Human bodies need vitamin D, which is manufactured when the sun hits the body and converts cholesterol into vitamin D. Vitamin D is incorporated into the immune system in ways that prevents us from getting cancer.

5. Myth: “Drink 8 glasses of water a day” There’s no rational reason to drink 8 glasses of water per day, because we get most of the water we need from the food we eat.

Mark Sisson: #Primal vs #Vegan

The human body is a very adaptable mechanism. For instance, some people have survived on seaweed and shoe leather  during the great potato famine. However, surviving is not necessarily thriving, and Mark contends that there has never been a society in history that has survived on a meatless diet.

Speaking extremes — if you happen to be an adult that has already gone through the development stages, and go from a fried food and grain diet to a fresh fruits and vegetables based diet, you’ll obviously see improvements and feel better for some time.

The base of the Primal Blueprint foods pyramid has fruits and vegetables as the base of the diet. Cutting out the meats, fish, poultry, and other proteins may have it’s consequences, but it doesn’t mean that as a Vegan or Raw Foodist or Vegetarian you won’t thrive and survive. It’s just not optimal if you are looking to maximize your health, strength, lean body mass and all the things required to create the ideal body.

Mark Sisson goes on to share his thoughts on a book that I have enjoyed for a few years called The China Study. He contends that the book was written with a bias that does not reflect the actual research. Perhaps if Dr. Campbell, author of The China Study, wrote a book based on the actual research, he might not have come up with the same conclusions.

In recent longevity studies, it has been shown that individuals who consume the least amount of calories tend to be the ones that live the longest. The results in The China Study could thus be a function of calorie restriction. Mark Sisson contends that Dr. Campbell never looks at populations that are strictly vegetarians, just ones that consume less meat, less fish, and thus less calories.

In The Primal Blueprint, Mark Sisson points out that humans evolved to do a lot of low level activity, and the populations of China that have been studied in a lot of studies are rural populations where people do a lot of physical labor. They’re working their days doing low level activities in the fields, which Mark contends is the perfect type of exercise.

The Research Methods of Mark Sisson

Mark Sisson is not a doctor, yet he’s consistently producing high quality scientific articles that he’s researched from various sources. Mark feels that not being a physician allows him to have more of an open mind and this is because he was not exposed to the methodologies taught in medical school.

Mark uses Pubmed.com to do most of his scientific research (I also like to use scholar.google.com). You can easily lose yourself for hours by following links to more articles cited by the ones you were searching for, and the ones reviewing the ones you searched as well.

It’s important to realize that not everything written on the internet is a factual scientific study. For this reason, it’s important to learn how to differentiate between what’s science, and what’s an opinion column. I take for granted that I’ve seen hundreds of scientific papers throughout college and my masters program (I used 150 citations for my masters paper alone). You want to learn what is what, so you can take your research to the next level and not be misled.

Mark contends that for every article you find to prove one viewpoint, there is another one out there with facts proving the exact opposite. He uses the example of fish being good for you because they contain beneficial omega fatty acids, yet often times contain an unhealthy level of mercury from pollution. It’s also important to realize that studies cost money, scientists need to be paid, and it’s not uncommon for the people that pay to have a study made to get the results that they were looking for.

The Day to Day of Mark Sisson

Now here’s a man that doesn’t put his shoes on one at a time like the rest of us. Mark Sisson is usually up at 6:30 AM, has his cup of coffee with heavy whipping cream and the occasional bit of sugar. He then does some crossword puzzles while reading the paper, catching up on twitter, or ingesting some sports news. Mark then moves on to do some interviews, blog posts, and e-mails.

On workout days he’ll either head over to the gym, or goes to the beach to catch some waves. Mark values play very much, and works out so that he can play. The gym workouts are short, sweet, and pretty intense: pushups, pullups, dips, squats, lunges, and dead-lifts. The goal is to be able to play different sports, snowboard in Aspen 6 days in a row, have fun paddling for 3 hours straight, and play Ultimate Frisbee with his 15 year old son. Mark just wants to be able to play, and at 56 he’d like to do so uninjured.

He then comes home to do some work and have his ‘Big-Ass Salad‘. He’ll work the rest of the afternoon, and stop to have his favorite snack – a handful of Macadamia nuts. The end of the day might include a workout, if he hasn’t had one already. Mark no longer obsesses about missed workouts, since he realizes that 80% of his body composition is based on the foods that he eats and 20% based on how he trains. Then there’s the evening, which is filled with either family time, getting some writing in, or catching up on a movie (yes, he’s human too!)

The Mentors and Books That Shaped Mark Sisson

• The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins is a book that cemented how important it is that we understand how evolution has brought us to where we are today.
• Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes. A tough read if you’re not a scientist that offers a lot of explanation about how the scientific community has been manipulated and subject to politics, funding, and special interest groups.
• The Biology of Belief by Bruce Lipton. A book about how to reprogram our genes based on the thoughts we think.
• Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers by Robert Sapolsky. A book on how the stress response that is so vital to the survival of every animal has become perverted in the human organism because of our ability to worry.

One More Tip for Success

The first tip for success is when you take on any program — diet, exercise — regimen, it’s important that you own it and understand that no matter who you are, no matter where you come from, no matter what sort of background you have or what sort of future you predict for yourself your health is probably your number one job. If you’re not healthy and don’t have the ability to go through life and enjoy every moment, it really sours the whole life experience.

I really do want people to own that notion that your job as a human being, first and foremost, is to stay healthy. That’s what your genes want you to do, and when you do that then everything else you do increases by orders of magnitude. The enjoyment of life, the ability to experience movement and be able to travel and to have access to memories and to be able to support your loved ones and to be able to love. All of these things emanate from the first core job one, which is to stay healthy. It’s critical to embarking on any new program.
~Mark Sisson~

More Mark Sisson

• MarksDailyApple.com – Main blog
• PrimalBlueprint.com – The book (Amazon.com)
• @Mark_Sisson – Twitter (use #primal)

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Suzy Welch graduated at the top of her class at Harvard Business School, wrote a column in Oprah’s O Magazine, and was the editor of the prestigious Harvard Business Review. Since then Suzy has gone on to marry the ex-CEO of General Electric, Jack Welch, who now runs 11 companies.

Jack and Suzy Welch co-authored the bestselling book Winning. Most recently, Suzy Welch documents the decision process that has brought her much success in life in her bestselling book 10-10-10: A Life Transforming Idea.

Suzy Welch: The Mission

Suzy’s life is currently focused on talking about and spreading the message of her new book 10-10-10. Her current work revolves around talking about the book, and helping people understand the idea. This is all connected into her life mission of helping people create their own lives.

10-10-10: A Decision Making Tool

Suzy Welch says that our biggest faults in decision making are the two deadly Gs, gut and guilt. In this case, 10-10-10 serves as an intervention. It forces us to take our decisions, and instead of basing them on expedience, pressure, or the last voice in the room, to make those decisions after we think about the consequences in the context of 10 minutes, 10 months, and 10 years.

It doesn’t have to be taken literally, and with a stopwatch, but generally as the immediate future, and the distant future. Suzy Welch has been using this idea in her personal life for 13 years, and spreading it for the past 10, and then writing about it in O Magazine about 5 years ago. Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have effectively applied 10-10-10 to their own lives.

This 10-10-10 process has helped people to create their own lives, and change their lives from being reactive and gut driven, to proactive and strategic. The tool is organized around how 10-10-10 has worked in relationships, careers, entrepreneurs, managers, friendships, and the dozens of stories in the book reflect how 10-10-10 can be used in all aspects of our lives.

10-10-10: A Three Step Process

First of all, Suzy Welch says that compromise is a bad decision making tool, because everyone is left only a little bit satisfied, which often backfires in the long run. Let’s look at the steps to take instead of compromise.

Step 1: Define The Question. A lot of times we are faced with a dilemma, but we don’t really know what we are deciding, which makes it really hard to get to the solution. We’re all over the place, and when we get to a solution, we come to realize that’s not even the problem.

Define the questions like “do we buy this house, do I stay in this relationship, do I take this job?” Sometimes this is simple, and sometimes it’s the hardest part.

Step 2: Data Collection. Also known as identifying your options. It doesn’t always have to be a simple binary options like yes or no, but it could be something outside the box that goes beyond yes or no. Once you’ve laid out the options it’s time to examine the consequences in 10-10-10 format.

Step 3: Prioritize Your Values. Things like “who you want to be, what you stand for, how you want to live” must be prioritized, so that you can make decisions properly and really own your decisions as a reflection of your authentic values. The book goes into greater detail as to how one can ‘excavate’ their values and really figure out what they are.

Suzy Welch: Conquering Her Day

In the hopes of getting out of this interview with a HUGE secret, and sharing it with you guys, I asked Suzy Welch how she manages to do more than most of us in the same 24 hours that all of us get.

Suzy Welch is at a point in her life where she really lives by her values, so she knows what matters to her. Because of this, she doesn’t spend a lot of time on things that don’t matter to her. The biggest time saver in the world after knowing your values is candidly communicating them. Suzy is able to tell someone “this is how much time we’re going to spend on something, because of whatever reason.”

The best thing you can do is not be a phony, and candidly tell people how and why you’re spending your time. Then you don’t make a lot of excuses or have a lot of phony conversations, and that creates a huge efficiency.

Suzy Welch on Extraordinary Leadership

It’s not about you. I mean REALLY that’s it. ~Suzy Welch

When you’re an individual contributor you concern yourself with yourself and your performance. The place that people trip up when they make a transition from being individual contributors to leaders is that they don’t get that it’s no longer about them. A great leader is not one that raises their hand, it’s one that realized it is no longer about them, and succeeds on the reflected glory of their people.

The better you make your team, the more you build their skills, self-confidence and their ability to over deliver the better a leader you are. It is about them.

Suzy Welch’s Biggest Mentor

It’s Jack Welch. While Suzy Welch let’s life be her mentor, and literally learns from everyone, Jack Welch is ultimately her biggest mentor. He’s also the mentor to millions around the world. Suzy Welch now believes that if we’re realistic about ourselves, we could probably achieve bigger dreams than we allow ourselves to believe.

Suzy Welch: The Problem of Poverty

I asked Suzy Welch which world problem she would tackle first. She believes that poverty seems to be the underlying cause of most other problems. The key is ending it is to create self-sufficient communities. How’s that for a goal worth giving your life for? If you’re reading this, and want to discuss possible solutions, I’m sure Suzy would have a pair of ears to lend.

One More Tip For Success

Success is when you’re living a happy, centered, fulfilling life and for each individual that comes in a different package. To get happiness, you must live by your authentic values.

More Suzy Welch

• Suzy Welch – Main Site
• Suzy Welch – WelchWay
• Suzy Welch – Everybody’s Business
• Suzy Welch – Twitter
• Suzy Welch – Amazon

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

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AJ Jacobs is a fascinating NY Times bestselling author, current editor of the infamous Esquire magazine, and what I would say is the “father of outsourcing.” AJ Jacobs has written The Know-It-All, in which he documented his experience of reading the whole Encyclopedia Britannica from front to back in his journey to becoming the smartest man on earth.

Another riveting book written by AJ Jacobs is The Year of Living Biblically, in which he followed all the laws of the bible as literally as possible. Some of the other wacky-genius things that AJ Jacobs has done include many one month experiments, known as immersion experiments, which we get into during our interview.

AJ Jacobs: Immersion Experiments

When AJ Jacobs gets interested in a subject, he likes to become immersed in it, and live it from the inside out. Sure enough, when AJ Jacobs became interested in religion and the bible, he decided that the best way to learn it would be to live it.

After researching several versions of the bible, and recording a large list of rules, AJ Jacobs proceeded to follow every single rule in the bible – literally. This included not shaving his beard, following the 10 commandments, and stoning adulterers, as well as many other rules.

This immerse way of learning is truly gripping, and life changing, as AJ Jacobs will testify. While he is no longer religious, the year of living biblically changed his psyche in such a way that the rules of gratitude have carried over into his secular life. Pressing the elevator button, AJ Jacobs is grateful that the elevator comes, and then once again upon arrival he is grateful that the elevator didn’t plummet to the basement.

AJ Jacobs: Creating a Bestselling Book

Let there be no mistake, AJ Jacobs attributes some of his success to luck. Hundreds of great books do not become NY Times bestselling, so riding on the theme of gratitude, AJ Jacobs is very grateful to have made it onto this list (love the humility in this man!).

AJ Jacobs started writing in a tiny newspaper in California about PTA meetings and sewage taxes. After about 15 years in the business, AJ Jacobs finally got to the point where he could write the book. AJ Jacobs took on topics that fascinated him, such as religion and the Encyclopedia (which pretty much covered everything, from advarks to zygotes).

While AJ Jacobs does have narrow focus topics that he enjoys, such as the history of peppers, he decided to write on his more general topics of interest in order to break in in popularity.

When writing The Know-It-All, AJ Jacobs first created a 20 page proposal, which included only 1 letter (A) of the Encyclopedia Britannica. Including the approval chapter, the entire book took approximately 2 years to write.

AJ Jacobs: Outsourcing Your Life

Following his love for immersion experiments, AJ Jacobs outsourced his entire life for one full month. When I say entire life, I mean it. He outsourced reading bedtime stories to his kids, arguing with his wife, shopping and beyond.

In his upcoming book The Guinea Pig Diaries (coming September 2009), AJ Jacobs includes many of these immersion experiments such as My Outsourced Life (Esquire, 2005.), and uses outsourcing to get a lot of the research done for the book. This is 110% on my reading list (I’ll be reviewing it here, and AJ, when you read this, I’d like to do coffee and an autograph!)

So with everything outsourced, what does one do with all the free time? Nothing too out of the ordinary, just some TV, catching up on reading books, and just taking the month off. Following the article, an onslaught of people requested more information about outsourcing from AJ Jacobs. In response, a lot of these outsourcing companies created special departments for “personal life” outsourcing. (I even hear there was some hate-mail from people who thought that AJ Jacobs single handedly ruined our economy by encouraging mass outsourcing, but I think he just wrote about what was inevitably going to happen anyway – globalization).

AJ Jacobs’ article My Outsourced Life has also been included in Tim Ferriss’ bestselling book The Four Hour Work Week. Tim Ferriss called AJ Jacobs while he was still writing 4HWW to request permission to use the article. Tim said he was a recent Princeton graduate and first time writer, so AJ Jacobs was nice enough to let him use the article for free, under the assumptions that only 500 or so copies would be sold. A business mistake he later regretted when just 6 months later 4HWW was number 1 on top of the NY Times bestseller list.

AJ Jacobs: Radical Honesty

Radical Honesty is a movement that requires the “removal of the filter” between your brain and mouth. Not only are you to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth, but you are to say directly what is on your mind at all times. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? Big trouble ahead! The Esquire article in which AJ Jacobs documented this experience was called I Think You’re Fat, which should give you some indication as to just how much trouble this whole Radical Honesty business is really worth.

For AJ Jacobs, to not lie to his wife or boss, was unheard of in his normal day-to-day (something that many of us can relate to). An awkward moment presented itself when AJ Jacobs and his wife ran into a couple they knew from college. The couple suggested that they should all get together, and being under the influence of Radical Honesty, AJ Jacobs had to say “You seem nice, but I’d rather not, because I have enough friends that I don’t get to see, so I don’t want any new ones.” (Damnit AJ, I was hoping WE could be friends… maybe if one of your friends disappears…. jk!)

Now that the experiment is over, AJ Jacobs is once again left somewhat changed. However, instead of bashing people over the head with Radical Honesty, AJ Jacobs practices something called “Sustainable Radical Honesty.” This means you pick when you’re honest (ok, no it doesn’t). This means that you take responsibility for your own actions and mistakes, but when it comes to speaking at the expensive of someone’s feelings you bite your tongue. We both agree that with the way technology is headed, it will ultimately be futile to lie, since everything will be transparent and exposed.

AJ Jacobs: Interviewing George Clooney

I personally love interviewing people, and I’m so humble and grateful to have the opportunity to do so through this site. AJ Jacobs interviews some really awesome people, like George Clooney, so I’m sure he can relate.

The standard stale method of going about such an interview is a lunch with the celebrity. Is AJ Jacobs standard or stale? No. AJ Jacobs is different and remarkable, so he did something a little bit different with that interview.

AJ Jacobs sat George Clooney in front of a computer and had him look at George Clooney fan and hate sites. Believe it or not, George Clooney has never looked at these, in an attempt to spare his personality from splitting.

The first website the viewed together was called “George Clooney is Gay Gay Gay,” to which George Clooney replied, “This is absolutely not true, I am Gay Gay, but that third gay is not true.” Funny guy!

AJ Jacobs: Favorite Books

A Walk in The Woods by Bill Bryson. Bryson documented “trying” and failing to walk the entire Appalachian trail. In the entertaining process Bryson documents his experience, the history of the Appalachian trail, and environmentalism in the US. This type of book, one that combines a personal story with real nonfiction history is AJ Jacobs’ favorite type.

In the realm of personal development books, AJ Jacobs likes Nudge by Richard Thaler and Cas Sunstein. This book talks about how people are born with a brain full of biases, leading us to be irrational. It then gives pointers on how to overcome and compensate for these biases and ultimately be a happier, healthier, and wealthier person.

AJ Jacobs: Tip for Success

Altering his own psyche by reading about positive psychology has really helped AJ Jacobs’ to redefine what success means and increase his happiness level. Had he still been using his old philosophy from 20 years ago, he would have been miserable today, despite achieving what we would say is a great life and great deal of success.

This is because that philosophy stated that there is always something bigger and better, so don’t be happy until you get there, and then don’t be happy until you get to the next level. Under the influence of this new positive psychology AJ Jacobs has learned to really be satisfied with what he has, that fact that he’s published a book, can read interesting books, live interesting experiments, and still have enough to eat.

More AJ Jacobs

• AJ Jacobs Official Site
• AJ Jacobs on TedTalk (this is kind of a big deal!)
• AJ Jacobs – The Year of Living Biblically: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible.
• AJ Jacobs – The Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World
• AJ Jacobs – The Guinea Pig Diaries: My Life as an Experiment

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

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Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

I’ll be referring to the superstar singer Ishtar from the world famous group Alabina as Ishtar Alabina in this interview.

Ishtar Alabina is a singer that is truly loved by fans all over the world. In the early 2000s Ishtar Alabina made millions in record sales worldwide, while performing for audiences in the hundreds of thousands. These days she does a lot of private shows for Oligarchy, and runs in some of the same circles as Edward Mermelstein.

Ishtar Alabina is a great success story. She is someone who maintains a great marriage and family life as well as an overall sense of life balance. Most importantly, in my opinion, is that she’s able to follow her passion for music as her first priority, and graciously accepts the money that comes pouring in with it as a bonus, not a destination.

The many styles of Ishtar Alabina

Ishtar Alabina sings in several languages including English, Arabic, French, Hebrew, Russian and Egyptian. Her early music influences were everything from middle eastern, rock, pop, and r&b, which is clearly seen in the musical style that she produces now.

World-music would be the genre that she best fits in to, but even that is a bit hard to describe. It’s a mixture of a lot of different cultures and instrument combinations, infused with modern beats, and middle eastern touches.

Ishtar Alabina – Career Mistakes

Like many success stories, Ishtar Alabina has a bit of a ‘failure’ story. When she first signed onto Sony records, they had her produce a completely french album with a totally melancholy feel. This was a complete disconnect from what her fans came to expect from her, and learned to love about her.

While there are no regrets, Ishtar Alabina learned the importance of performing and catering to the fans, while standing by what she personally loves about music. She’s since quit Sony, and produced 3 other albums solo. This philosophy has brought her much success.

Ishtar Alabina – Superstar, Twins, and Family Life

Ishtar Alabina’s husband is also the producer, and he’s been traveling by her side for the past 15 years. It makes the relationship much easier, considering she doesn’t have to leave him often for extended trips.

On the other hand, now that Ishtar Alabina has had twins, it is much harder to create new music, and take great care of the kids. There’s not much sleep at night, and it’s hard to concentrate on creation. She uses the night hours to think of new beats, melodies, and lyrics.

When traveling, the twins are left back home with family, which makes traveling easier. The downside of course is that you tend to miss your kids when you’re away.

Ishtar Alabina – Advice for Independent Musician’s

There’s no recipe for success. If there was a recipe, then everyone would be doing it, and the music industry would be so easy and so obvious. The only secret

The only “secret” that Ishtar Alabina can share is:

“Believe in what you do, and don’t do something because you think others will love it. First you have to love what you do and believe in what you do.”

Ishtar Alabina – Online Promotions

These days it’s essential for an Artist to have online profiles such as Facebook, Myspace, etc. However, Ishtar Alabina does not personally focus on these mediums. Instead, her husband collects data, such as letters from fans, and hands it over to Ishtar Alabina to read.

This gives Ishtar Alabina the freedom to concentrate on the important thing, which is the actual creation of the music. This is something to think about for people in any field who try to do everything themselves. Sometimes success comes when we concentrate only on the essentials.

Ishtar Alabina – Getting In “The Zone” To Create

Before, Ishtar Alabina would eat, breath, and sleep with her music in mind. After… after the twins were born that is, she has someone else to wake up for, feed, and care for. This makes the act of creation VERY difficult.

Sometimes Ishtar Alabina would hear a melody, perhaps while singing to her children while they’re taking a bath. When she catches this melody, she waits until they go to sleep, and then stays up developing this melody.

If she’s not writing this music, she’s writing lyrics. When she has lyrics, she can find music to it, and vice versa. Sometimes composers will send her music to look at. She takes all these things into consideration in order to squeeze some creativity out of them.

This is a big reason why her latest Album, which is due to release in late 2009, is taking so long to complete. It takes a lot of time to put together something really special.

Ishtar Alabina – The Passions of Food and Reading

She doesn’t just like world-music, she likes world-food. Japanese, Egyptian, Moroccan, Chinese, Italian, French, and everything else that’s good.

Before the kids, Ishtar Alabina would read a lot of books on philosophy and mystic stuff. Things that related to God, knowing ourselves, as well as the truth and power that lies inside of us. She also read books about desires, and emotions, and things that made her stronger and shaped her character.

The game has changed since having the kids, and most of her reading now involves parenting books and children’s books. So far no parenting success tips from Ishtar Alabina… we’ll have to wait until her kids are all grown up to see how successful she was… but I’m sure she’s an awesome mother anyway!

Ishtar Alabina – Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood

As I mentioned above, Ishtar Alabina sings in several languages besides English. This one song in particular has some English vocals, with some Spanish and middle eastern sounds. You can watch this video to get an idea of the type of hit music that Ishtar Alabina puts out.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Final Success Tip

Don’t always be so sure that you are right. Instead, be kind, patient, hear, listen, and be open to other people. When making important life decisions, take into account what all the people that love you and really care about you have to say, then following your intuition pick the choice that you really believe in.

In today’s world there are many so-called artists are are just packaging for promoters and record companies. There’s a lot of money that comes with that, but that isn’t success. Success doesn’t mean you sold millions and zillions of records. It means that you create something and love it, and people listen to it, appreciate it, and love it. Success is hard work, falling and standing up again, and then having this appreciation.

More Ishtar Alabina

• Ishtar Alabina Official Site
• Ishtar Alabina MySpace

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

Enjoying the Podcasts? Make sure you click the image above and subscribe to this podcast via iTunes. This ensures that you get the full repertoire of interviews in an easy to listen to format.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

In this short episode of the Practical Personal Development Podcast, I talk about 4 fundamental principles that get me excited to work out. When we’re passionate about fitness, we make time, we get energized, and we’re able to take our day to the next level.

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

Enjoying the Podcasts? Make sure you click the image above and subscribe to this podcast via iTunes. This ensures that you get the full repertoire of interviews in an easy to listen to format.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

Lewis Howes, a good friend and fellow mutant, is an absolute sensation in the online social networking world. He’s a record holding arena football player, author, networking event planner, ridiculously good networker, and now the owner of his own publishing company.

Lewis Howes has become one of the leading LinkedIn consultants, helping people improve their profiles, connect and network with people in their field, and ultimately place themselves in careers that they love.

Lewis Howes turned his passion for helping people, networking, and LinkedIn, into a book called LinkedWorking, with co-author Frank Agin. The book goes into great deal on LinkedIn techniques, each one backed with a real-life success story from their clients.

Lewis Howes: Football Record Holder to Social Media Tycoon

A freak accident left Lewis Howes temporarily disabled. With a mangled wrist, and a full arm cast, Lewis Howes had to take a brake from sports and look for a creative outlet elsewhere.

Instead of spending 6 hours a day training for sports, Lewis Howes would spend 6 hours a day, in bed, networking with sports professionals on LinkedIn. This wouldn’t be much of a problem for most people, but as a world-class athlete limited from his physical activities, this was another big challenge to overcome.

Luckily his wrist is all better now, and the invaluable experience that he gained from that time, when he turned adversity into opportunity, has gotten him a great career helping people achieve their very own professional goals.

LinkedWorking: Teaches You To Make Real Moves Using Linked In

“I’m on LinkedIn, but not getting any job offers, what am I doing wrong?”

That’s the question that Lewis Howes tackles in both his LinkedIn consulting business, as well as in his book LinkedWorking. Lewis Howes takes real life networking principles and teaches you how to apply them to the tools and applications within LinkedIn.

Lewis Howes has one of the largest networkers on LinkedIn, particularly a sports centered network of individuals who are looking to meet other sports professionals. In the same way that Lewis Howes grew his network, and met all the top people in the sports industry, he consults, and illustrates in his book, how we can do the same thing.

The point isn’t just to make a pretty profile. Lewis Howes teaches us how to stop thinking in terms of old-fashioned resumes and enables us to portray our skills, talents, abilities, hobbies, interests and personality, ultimately creating the persona of the real person that we are, and getting us into the career that we dream of.

What I like about LinkedWorking is that it is riddled with success stories for each of the tools that Lewis Howes presents. You begin to understand how everything that he teaches has been successfully applied time and time again with real people.

418 Publishing: Starting Your Own Publishing Company (Goodbye Middleman!)

After looking at many publishing companies, and considering all their pros and cons, Lewis Howes decided that the best route to take his book from his computer and into our hands was by self-publishing. He then went ahead and created the 418 Publishing company.

In order to self-publish, Lewis Howes had to front some money, find a printer that works with a lot of publishers, apply to work with them, buy ISBN numbers, have a cover designed, have an editor, have someone do the layout and design of the book, and then follow up with marketing efforts.

He describes it as a challenging process at first, but well worth it for him, since he is in the process of doing a book tour, and doing a lot of self-promotion for the product. Marketing would be one of the biggest reasons to get a publisher, but you aren’t guaranteed that your book will be popular regardless, and you’ll end up keeping less money on book sales.

Marketing expert Seth Godin says that out of the 70,000 books published each year, only 100 or so get proper marketing treatment. Odds are you won’t be one of those top 100, and you’ll need to leverage your own network to make sales.

Hosting Networking Events With 300+ People Via LinkedIn

To create all his networking events, all the promotion, sponsors, and venues were found through LinkedIn. Lewis Howes created lists of people in his network, and divided them by cities. A couple of e-mails, stating “free food, half priced drinks, and very cool networking opportunies” and Lewis Howes fills up venues with 300-500 people.

The venues are contacted before hand, and something is planned for an off night when no one usually comes in. Venues are happy to not only do this for free, but offer a 10% on all food and bar sales. Lewis Howes tries to make everyone happy, by announcing sponsors all throughout the night, offering door prizes, and connecting people amongst each other.

The sponsors are happy because they get dozens of qualified leads, the attendees are happy because they meet people in their industry, meet people in positions to offer them jobs, get cool gifts from Lewis Howes, and genuinely leave feeling like they had a productive and fun time.

Lewis Howes Shares His Networking Skills

The most important rule of networking, according to Lewis Howes, is to define your intentions before setting out to an event. By saying “I just want to go out there and have fun,” and not setting up a real goal, you’ll likely pass up a lot of networking opportunities due to lack of focus.

On the other hand, if you create an intention that you’re sure about, and clearly define it, such as, “I want to make 10 quality contacts at this networking event,” then it’s likely that this will happen. With the intention in place, you’ll idle less, talk with more people, put yourself out there, and ultimately walk away meeting the number of people you set out to meet.

I personally think it’s not about the quality of contacts, but the quantity. If you happen to make one real solid relationships from a networking event, then it’s worth 20 loose ones. Regardless, go out there and make it happen, and you won’t have any regrets. Without regrets, you’ll end up having more fun too. Remember what Jim Rohn says, discipline weighs ounces, but regret weighs tons.

Lewis Howes’ Recommended Reading

The Alchemist by Paulo Cuelho: This book is a real easy read, with a great story line, and a message that we can all relate to. It reminds us that life isn’t about the destination, it’s about the journey that we’re on.

The Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman: This book is about a talented, olympic bound athlete, that gets injured and loses his ability to compete. After meeting a humble socratic-like gas station attendant, our peaceful warrior pulls himself up, and competes in another event that he’s physically able to – the moral is to take each day as it comes.

Lewis Howes’ Mentors

Lewis Howes tries to surround himself with as many successful and positive people as possible. One of his mentors is Chris Hawker who is a genius eventor. He comes up with the most amazing, simple, and useful inventions.

Another mentor is the old CEO of his college, Stuart Jenkins, who is also a Socratic figure who always has something useful to say. He was involved with licensing the invention of the Nike Air Bubble (the bubble in the sneakers). He also created another company, Skydex, which is seen is Navy ships, as well as used as a matte for pole vaulting.

Lewis Howes’ favorite mentor is his brother Christian Howes. At 19 he was encarcirated for 4 years. After getting out, he turned his life around, and became a music sensation in the Jazz world. Argueably one of the most successful Jazz musicians of our time. He also teaches at Berklee College of in Boston, which I visited yesterday, and travels the world to play for fans.

Final Success Tip:

“Connect with everyone.” A lot of people think they should connect only with people in their network. By reaching out and accepting other connections you expand your second and third degree connections. This exposes you to far more opportunities, because you never know who you’re going to meet, and how they can add value to your life.

More Lewis Howes

• SportsNetworker
• LinkedIn
• LinkedWorking Website

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Edward Mermelstein, plays monopoly with properties all over the world, moving $300 million last year alone. With his largest deal to date in excess of $100 million, it’s refreshing to find out how this real-estate juggernaut has reached his success, and maintained a down to earth demeanor at the same time.

Edward Mermelstein’s Three Careers (and Cornering the Market)

Edward Mermelstein is a powerhouse that corners the real-estate market as a triple careerist. All tied under the real-estate umbrella, Edward Mermelstein is a lawyer, broker, and developer. Each specialty can be a full-time and lucrative career on it’s own, but with the combined knowledge his firm is an unstoppable real-estate machine.

With offices in Moscow and New York City, a firm that speaks 11 languages, and the desire to meet and exceed the needs of his clients, Edward Mermelstein, sets the standards on service and quality in the high-end real-estate market.

The Importance of Language

Edward Mermelstein used to speak 4 languages, including English, Russian, Hebrew, and German. While he let the Hebrew and German slide under the rug in the past years, his mastery of English and Russian has helped him tremendously in doing international business.

While English is going to be the primary international language of choice, Edward Mermelstein believes that a couple of the Chinese dialects will make an excellent secondary language for anyone interested in getting the most bang for the buck. Of course, you will want to concentrate your language learning efforts on the geographical areas that are of most interest to you.

High-Profile Clients

Edward Mermelstein doesn’t do $2 transactions, so his client-base involves some of the richest people in the world. A good chunk of his clientelle are the priveleged few of the Russian and Ukrainian origin. Some of them are actually known as Oligarchy, and control much of the power and government in their respective areas.

At their prime, some of these clients commanded billions of dollars. Like everyone invested in the world-financial market, these clients have lost quite a bit of money, and are only worth hundreds of millions for the most part.

Success In This Market

With all the problems that exist globally, you have to look for the gem in all these terrible situations. It’s just finding the opportunity and making the most out of it.
~Edward Mermelstein

This market changes drastically, especially as of late, so flexibility is a key ingredient to success. While many people might be losing their homes and properties, these properties don’t simply vanish, they go somewhere. The key is be ready for these day to day changes, and constantly put yourself in the position to cease these emerging opportunities.

Edward Mermelstein’s Passion For Real-Estate

When everyone around you is into it, you eat, breathe, sleep real-estate, and then it gets into your blood, and becomes a very exciting part of your daily activities.
~Edward Mermelstein

Edward Mermelstein’s real-estate adventure started during his high-school days. His older brother had just started in real-estate rentals and sales, and would occassionally call upon him as an assistant. During the college days, Edward Mermelstein began to invest more time with real-estate people.

During a trip with a college buddy, he became profoundly aware that his personal interests meshed very well with the opportunities available in the real-estate industry. This was even more pronounced by the fact that his wife’s family were also very much into the business of real-estate.

His biggest real-estate mentor would be his father-in-law, whom Edward Mermelstein respects tremendously. His father-in-law has succeeded in the business his whole life by taking the slow-and-steady approach. Unlike many people that we’re currently hearing about, that making millions in real-estate, only to lose it all within a few months.

Successful and Down to Earth (the Outhouse Story)

Edward Mermelstein is able to stay down to earth, as well as fuel the fire for his success, by remembering that he wasn’t always financially successful. Financially speaking, he came from nothing. His family immigrated from Eastern Europe without any solid finances, much like my family, and the families of thousands like us.

One thing that Edward Mermelstein always remembers is the tiny outhouse that his family had to use when he was young. Something like that puts his success into perspective, and I’m sure allows him to appreciate what he has to a much larger degree.

Importance of Dressing For Success

When you’re sitting across the table from someone who is trying to do a deal that is worth a couple hundred million dollars, they don’t want the person sitting across from them to not be on a similar level. You just want to make someone comfortable in knowing that you can play in their circles.
~Edward Mermelstein

In the business world, presentation is obviously very important. Being able to speak well is important, but the first impression isn’t speaking, it’s both your clothes and the way you carry yourself. You want your persona both to not distract, and at the same time present itself well.

Some people in the fashion industry dress in a way that catches attention, but in Edward Mermelstein’s profession it is more important to look put together, instead of loud. I believe that it’s all a matter of building rapport.

Edward Mermelstein: The Day to Day

Glamor, Bentleys, supermodels and exotic vacations are probably some of the ways that you would imagine a person that moves hundreds of millions of dollars per year is liable to live his life. Let’s break that generalization right now. As I once heard in an interview with Shawn Carter (Jay-Z), “I don’t put Cristal in my Coco Puffs™”.

Just like you and I, Edward Mermelstein, wakes up and puts his suit pants on one leg at a time. He then wakes up his two little kids, feeds, clothes, and gets them to school. He then goes to his typical day of work, which occasionally involves meeting clients in other parts of the world, but not something you would classify as jet-setting. Since his world revolves around his children, his typical vacations include Disney Land, or anything child related.

Edward Mermelstein: Recommended Reading

These books allow you to see how things haven’t changed in thousands of years, and how as a person, you are defined by your actions. This is why it is important to create day to day routines that are a good reflection of what we want to be, and be known as.

• The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
• The Art of War by Sun Tzu

Tip for Success

The idea from the Spike Lee movie popped into his head, “Do the right thing”. As a small part of this world, it’s important to remember that one good deed can change the world. So do the right thing, every day.

More Edward Mermelstein

• Edward Mermelstein and Associates, P.C.
• Edward Mermelstein in the news.

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Rabbi Henry Harris has one of the more fun positions on Wall Street – especially these days. As a religious man by occupation, earning a living mentoring the best and brightest on Wall street, Rabbi Henry Harris is a unique asset to this show. It’s a gift to have a career that is fun, stimulating, and rewarding on a daily basis, while at the same time paying the bills.

Aish HaTorah and Becoming a Rabbi

Becoming a Rabbi is not as easy as it looks. The task of ‘Bringing Light Into the Nations’, isn’t exactly a job you’re prepared for at some vocational school. In fact, much of the preparation takes place away from work.

A Rabbi strives to reach an understanding of the meaning of life, and the meaning of their life specifically, in order to uphold the highest of moral characters, and assist both the Jewish people, and people in general in finding their own purpose.

Aish HaTorah is an international organization, whose headquarters I have personally visited just opposite the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Branches in almost 30 cities around the world, with dozens of projects to meet the needs and concerns of the Jewish people.

The New York location, which is where Rabbi Henry Harris is located, is fueled by the mission to create a Renaissance of Jewish Pride in the city. They accomplish this with various programs of engaging learning, social events, and personalized studies.

Rabbi Henry Harris holds the positions of Educational Director at Aish HaTorah New York. Forging programs that are meant to unlock people’s potentials. He also coaches and councils individuals and couples to become the greatest version of themselves.

Coaching Top Wall Street Executives

A team of four Rabbis, including Rabbi Harris, go into the field to learn with top level executives. They act as a coach and counselor not only in Jewish matters, but also in relationships and aspects of business. As someone that took a brief glimpse into the Jewish Orthodox lifestyle, I can vouch that much time is spent learning laws, social dynamics, business ethics, and self-improvement.

Some of the high-powered executives that Rabbi Henry Harris and his team mentor are:

• Robert Hormats – Vice Chairman, Goldman Sachs International
• Andrew Fox – CEO, Hansa-USA
• Gerald M. Lierberman – President & COO, Alliance Bernstein L.P.
• Carrie Gray – AVP, Merrill Lynch
• Neil Cole – CEO, Iconix Brand Group
• Mitch Kuflik – Managing Partner, Brahman Capital Corporation
• Peter Hochfelder – Managing Partner, Brahman Capital Corporation
• Scott Beck – Managing Director, Bank of America

By now you know my stance on spending time with successful people. Our philosophies and behaviors are greatly influenced by the people that we spend most of our time with. The list above is a glimpse at the type of people that Rabbi Harris sees and learns with on a daily basis. The level of success that these people have reached in their professional careers is surely fueled by great character and philosophies, that I wouldn’t mind rubbing off on me on a daily basis either.

Common Attributes of Successful Executives

Rabbi Harris and his team coach a lot of these guys. The common denominator from where we’re looking is that all these executives are successful. However, that isn’t enough for me, and the point of this Podcast show is to dig a little deeper.

One of the things that’s in common between all these high-powered executives is their humility. Come again? They’re not brutally cold, rich, snobby, and overly bossy individuals who live their life in solitude in that big office on Wall Street? Not according to Rabbi Henry Harris, who spends a heck of a lot more time with them than we do.

Who is the wise one? The one that learns from every person.
~Talmud

These successful individuals got their success in part because they understood the power of listening and learning from others. This is also the same quality that draws them to their Judaic roots and lessons with Rabbi Harris, because they’re more in tune to listen to the wisdom of the ancients, such as the quote above.

Harris Coaching: Business, Relationships, Religion, & Beyond

A common principle that comes up in sessions with Rabbi Henry Harris is that real leadership is about having relationships with values and principles that are larger than you. To be an effective leader that helps people accomplish their greatness takes a commitment to your own wisdom and values.

Rabbi Harris points out that, before reacting to changing circumstances and financial matters, it is important to step back and look at our core principles that we’re committed to unconditionally. Much like the idea in my ebook, How To Get a Girlfriend, it is important to define who you are and what you’re looking for, so that you aren’t swayed into making bad decisions.

Another principle that commonly comes up is a recognition that there is a higher power. Powerful people are not those that have no limitations, rather they are ones that see their limitations and use them to create meaningful partnerships. The successful executives that Rabbi Harris coaches rely on and seek out individuals that can help them accomplish their goals.

The Day to Day of Rabbi Henry Harris

From 6:30am to 10:00am every day Rabbi Henry Harris works on his Personal Development. He does this by praying, which to him is a way of opening up his consciousness to Gods consciousness, and trying to see the world the way God sees the world. Part of this time is also spent learning Jewish law and Jewish wisdom, which are used to further the understanding of how God sees the world as well as instructions for living.

At 10:00am Rabbi Henry Harris starts his day of work, which currently means creating programming. For the set of learning programs that his team is creating they are finalizing the curriculum, marketing, and partnering with other parties to help create the series. There is also the individual relationships, such as the executives he is coaching, which require meetings, conversations, and coaching.

The Marketing Secrets of Judea-Christian Religions

The spread of this work, from Jews to Jesus, has seen nothing short of astronomical gains. I asked the good Rabbi if they put these guys through some kind of intense marketing boot camp to prepare them for spreading the word. I figured, if it’s just marketing techniques, then I can use them for anything, right?

The truth is, it’s not the marketing skills, in fact, technique and personality must be put aside, in order to authentically deliver the real goods; which is the product.

Rabbi Henry Harris’ Recommended Reading

1. What the Angel Taught You: Seven Keys to Life Fulfillment ~ Noah Weinberg
   Every human being is endowed with an extraordinary intuitive wisdom and life is the process of rediscovering it.
2. It’s All a Gift ~ Miriam Adahan
   A book that opens us up to a paradigm that everything we go through in life is an opportunity.
3. Rejoice O Youth ~ Rabbi Avigdor Miller
   Mapping ancient wisdom onto contemporary society and issues. How to see the world today and understand it with the power of these ancient teachings.

Final Tip For Success

Every single person has the power and gift to make an extraordinary difference. Who is the rich person? The one that takes pleasure in what he has. By taking time every day to see the world through this paradigm, you open yourself up to living an extraordinary life.

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

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Ronn Torossian, CEO of internationally acclaimed public relations firm 5WPR, is a devoted father, Jew, and all around decent human being. His company 5W Public Relations has been a breath of fresh air in an otherwise old, passive, and slow industry, since he founded it in 2003.

Since then, Ronn Torossian has taken the company to the Inc 500 list, as one of the fastest growing public relations firms in the country. 5WPR stands out as being diverse and aggressive, and continues to deliver excellent service to their clients, despite the bit of doom and gloom in these economic times.

Ronn Torossian works with everything from small businesses to mega-corporations, which includes accounts with corporate, religion, and government groups. The mission is to work hard, and deliver the true essence of a company to the media, and ultimately to the hearts and minds of the general population.

To name drop a bit, Ronn Torossian has served clients such as Evian Water, Snoop Dogg, Pamela Anderson, Marc Ecko, Bad Boy Entertainment, high powered Politicians, the Government of Israel, as well as 2 of the 50 richest people in the world.

Successful People Seek Other Successful People

One of the great things about Ronn Torossian’s job is that he gets the opportunity to network with people that are highly successful. One such person is Marc Ecko, whom Ronn Torossian asked “what drives you every day?”

1. Never stop pushing. 2. Know when to make decisions — whether they be good, bad, indifferent, ugly — make a decision!
~Marc Ecko

I’m a firm believer that we’re a mix of the people that we surround ourselves with. We absorb their philosophy and adopt their behaviors. Ending a relationship with a co-worker, friend, or even worse, a family member, that is doing harm to our way of life can be a hard thing. Especially if there is a great deal of emotional attachment or interdependency. However, it can open up more opportunities, and more time and space to fill with more positive people, that will help us improve both our lifestyle, as well as our impact on the world.

Most Significant Contributor to Ronn Torossian’s Success

God. His Mother. Working Hard. Ronn Torossian doesn’t believe that people get lucky in business, or that people that don’t work hard will get ahead. People that think in terms of 9-6 don’t have what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur.

When you start to think in terms of “eating and breathing your company” you become success material. You bring your worries home to you at night, and into the weekend, and you do whatever it takes to keep your head above the water.

Ronn Torossian’s Day to Day

The day to day work is not always glamorous. It’s hard work, and clients can call at all hours of the day and night, depending on their specific needs and expectations. It’s not all about celebrity parties, and living in the lime-light.

There isn’t an exact formula or certainty to a day in the life of Ronn Torossian. It’s not like a scene from the Jetsons, where George Jetson comes in for his 3 hour day, and presses a single button repeatedly, while Mr. Cosmo yells at him.

Ronn Torossian starts off early by waking up at 5:00am. He arrives at the gym at 5:15am, where he runs and works out until 7:00am. Talk about being in great shape, last time I saw Ronn Torossian, his neck was the size of a tree-trunk (that’s a compliement).

Today work starts at 7:45am, Ronn Torossian takes care of business, does the interview with me at 9:30am, takes a client meeting at 10:00am in the office, another one at 12:00pm out of the office, two interviews in the afternoon, speaking to a college at 5:00pm, and then dinner with a client/friend at 8:00pm downtown. Running the large firm goes in between all of the meetings (which I’m sure he only told me a small fraction of in the interview), and then what’s left goes into ‘personal time’.

Ronn Torossian Blog

These are the rantings and ravings of a successful businessman. The content is anything from the business of being an entrepreneur, marketing thoughts and policies, thoughts on what’s going on in TV and media.

It’s a good read for an entrepreneur, as well as anyone interested in marketing, pr, and communications in their own brand. He writes it all himself and updates 4-5 times per week.

Surprisingly, most CEOs of Ronn Torossian’s magnitude don’t blog, and don’t share knowledge and tips with the world. This is another thing that separates 5WPR from the competition, makes them different, and shows that they’re playing to win.

5WPR – Playing to Win
~coined by Alex Shalman

Tips for Managing Small Scale Public Relations

Many readers of this site have blogs, websites, small-businesses, or some other kind of entrepreneurial venture. I asked Ronn Torossian for some tips for us, in order to handle our own, small-scale, public relations.

1. Don’t make the story about you, make it about something in the news.
2. Work hard, work hard, work hard.
3. Search engine optimization, twitter, facebook, and any way to dive into social and traditional media.

I was also curious to know how an unknown author could promote their book like the big boys. Ronn Torossian represents Barnes & Noble, so he knows this space, and how difficult it is to break into it.

1. Find the stories being written about your topic, and make sure you’re mentioned in them.
2. Seek out all the blogs and websites that write about your topic, and pitch to them.
3. Be very specific to the audience you’re trying to reach.

Ronn Torossian’s Productivity Tip

Like many of us, Ronn Torossian is still learning and tweaking every single day, and says that his faith in God helps him to keep pushing forward. The other thing that keeps him pushing forward is that he grew up with no money, which keeps him hungry every day.

Ronn Torossian got the opportunity to spend a couple of days with a client, that is one of the richest men in the world. Ronn Torossian noticed that the man wasn’t wearing a watch, one day after the other. Finally Ronn Torossian asked him “You’re one of the richest men in the world, how come you aren’t wearing a watch?”

The man recalled that when he was 13, he asked his dad for a watch for his Bar Mitzvah. His dad had to decline this request, because he could not afford to buy his son a watch. He saved up, and got himself a watch the following year. When he was a bit older and more successful, and accumulated X million dollars, he stopped wearing his watch. This served as a reminder from his youth, when he couldn’t afford a watch, and this fueled the hunger that pushed him to even more success.

Ronn Torossian’s Recommended Reading

• The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
• Blink by Malcolm Gladwell
• Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy
• It’s Not the Big That Eat the Small…It’s the Fast That Eat the Slow: How to Use Speed as a Competitive Tool in Business by Jason Jennings

Final Tip for Success

Work hard, be focused, and don’t please all people. Please yourself, pleasure your clients, take chances. Even in an economy like this, there is a chance to win, you just have to understand what the market place is, what the market place is looking for, and go for it — don’t be afraid of failure.
~Ronn Torossian

More From Ronn Torossian

• Ronn Torossian Blog
• 5W Public Relations
• Ronn Torossian on Facebook

Practical Personal Development on iTunes

Enjoying the Podcasts? Make sure you click the image above and subscribe to this podcast via iTunes. This ensures that you get the full repertoire of interviews in an easy to listen to format.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

Scott Young has been a leader in the personal development field since his teenage years. He started his self-improvement blog nearly 3 years ago, cranking out hundreds of articles, as well as 5 personal development ebooks.

To me Scott represents that feeling of “if I could go back in time, knowing what I know now, my experience of life would be significantly richer, more enjoyable, and much more fulfilling.” Of course, it’s never too late for a fresh start, and Scott Young is a great role model for what’s possible when you take the time to think about your life, and where you want to go.

Scott H Young and His Mission

A blogger at ScottHYoung.com who writes for over 7,000 subscribers. His mission is to provide something that he finds to be really valuable to people. He does this by sharing his own experience, in the form of writing, at… you guessed it, his blog.

His mission is very much aligned with mine, since what I like to do is take wisdom from successful people, that found in meaningful books, and that of my own experience, and write them out in simple to understand and practical to apply articles.

Success at Life and Blogging

It’s all about self-improvement, and trying to be as successful as you can every day.

The more people I interview, the more I realize how subjective the term success really is. I’m always fascinated to know how different people define it. To Scott success in life means having a lifestyle that is fulfilling to him, and consists of having meaningful goals as well as reaching out to people.

Success is not about what you have, it’s about how you live your life. In blogging, success means connecting with people and writing content that people find valuable. It’s important to note that you will receive positive, and negative feedback, so you have to gauge it and ‘temper it with your own value system’. The main question to ask yourself is, ‘are you helping people?’

Most Important Contributor to Scott’s Success

Scott believes that his daily habits are the number one most significant contributor to his success. This combined with cultivating proper behavior, and you have a day that may or may not seem fruitful in the grand scheme of things. However, when you take your daily habit, and run is through 365 days, you have made some considerably significant gains that you can look back at and admire.

Like many of us, Scott’s day to day tends to vary, and seeing how he is still a university student, his summer days are significantly different than the school year. During the summer he wakes up early, goes for a run, tackles a project until about 2pm, followed by some time at the gym, and finally caps it off by spending time with his friends and relaxing. He points out that a day doesn’t have to be 12 hours long in order to be productive, and I’m willing to bet that he gets more work done before 2pm than most people do in a full days work.

Motivation and Productivity

Scott’s primary way to stay motivated is to find a project with a heart in it. I call this defining what you want, and doing that which we love. Many people tend to neglect this very important step of figuring out how exactly they want to live their life, and what is significant to them.

In order to stay on top of his productivity, Scott takes the most important thing, or the thing that he’s least looking forward to doing, and gets it out of the way at the very beginning of the work day. Why? Because this eliminates that monkey on his back that distracts him all day long. Once you get this done, you’re work day feels like it’s on a down hill slope, and it’s easier to enter into a state of flow.

This could very well differ for your life and work situation. You may hate exercising, so it would be wise to do that first thing in the morning so that you don’t dread it all day long. The most important thing for you may be to write a book, so you would take the first few hours in the day to write, instead of putting it off and possibly not getting to it.

Scott Young’s Ebooks

How to Change a Habit. The purpose of this book is not to dictate which habits you need in your life, rather it is for of instructions for installing the habits of your choosing. After receiving much positive feedback on his habit forming ideas, Scott went ahead and elaborated on these techniques. The ebook combines Scott’s personal experience, as well as techniques from popular psychology and neurolinguestic programming.

Learn More, Study Less. Scott Young is best known for his top of the line study skills. In this book Scott goes into great detail to explain the process of holistic learning. This means that instead of spending a vast amount of time memorizing facts and figures, you make connections between the new data and things that you already know. The end result is that you have an intuitive understanding, and quicker learning curve of any subject of your choosing.

Little Book of Productivity. Systems are great, but they’re often geared for a specific type of person, or they’re optimal for getting a specific type of job done. In the Little Book of Productivity, Scott Young gives you 99 ideas that have been proven to increase your productivity on their own. This means you can mix and match the tools, and apply the ones that are most effective for your personality type or the task at hand.

One of the 99 tools is to keep a weekly and daily todo list, instead of one huge list that has everything you want on it. A huge list gives you the perception that you’re never done working, and that you always have work to do. One advantage of a daily/weekly is that it chunks down huge goals or projects into bite sized actionable tasks. The other advantage is that you can set a good amount of work for the day, and whether you finish at 4pm or 9pm, you know you’re done and can stop working without feeling guilty, thus increasing the quality of your leisure time.

Most Influential Books for Scott H. Young

Scott points out that a book might be most influential not because of the book itself, but because of the state that you are in when you read that book. Never the less, books that offer a more useful tool, or a better philosophy will have a higher chance to influence and inspire a greater amount of people.

Scott got a lot of benefit out of The Power of Full Engagement. This book discusses energy management in relation to productivity, which is a topic that isn’t given enough attention. When you figure our when and where you work best, as well as under which energy levels, you’ll be able to take your work to the next level.

Another ther books that Scott recommends is Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead (which I’ve read and recommend). This book focuses on a persons individual philosophy, in a very extreme way, and points out how we’re all selfish in our own way. The main character is one of the purest people that you’ll ever meet in a story, and someone you might take on as a mentor.

The final book that Scott mentions (which I’ve also read and recommend) is Dr. Campbell’s The China Study. This book provides a lot of scientific data on the dangers of the western diet. There is much evidence as to the effects of this diet, versus the one in the east, and the effects that this diet is having on newly industrialized eastern areas. It will likely change the way you think about food.

More from Scott H. Young

Scott says to: Spend time to getting clear on what you want and what your expectations are from yourself and the world around you. Instead of looking at society’s wants and expectations, create your very own. When you’re clear, you’ll be able to get what you want!

• Scott H Young Blog
• How to Change a Habit
• Learn More, Study Less
• Little Book of Productivity

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Muhammad Saleem is known as a ‘Social Media Maven’, which means he’s put news stories in front of millions of eyeballs using social networking sites such as digg, tip’d, and stumbleupon. If you’ve ever gotten off-track while surfing the internet, you could appreciate how Mu is able to stay focused while browsing for business.

Always online, always on social news, social networking, and microblogging sites at the same time – probably researching ways to take over the world – Mu’s day-to-day consists of a lot of social media consulting (stuff that’s so hush-hush he has to sign Do-Not-Disclose agreements). Mu’s consulting involves talking to people and figuring out what they’re trying to do with their website/business, what their goals are, and helping to develop and market their content so they can reach their goals.

You may not necessarily be interested in social media, but I know you’re interested in the philosophy that makes successful people successful. Let’s grind up Muhammad Saleem into powder, sift through his life, and extract the wonderful personality and success principles and see how we can apply them to our own success.

The Secret Formula To Digg Front Page

Mu is notorious for submitting over 2,000 (with as much as 250,000 readers per article!) Digg front page articles. To some people that’s a pretty big deal. As bloggers we want our words to be read, and a digg front page guarantees many thousands of eyes looking at our masterpiece.

In our interview, Mu is nice enough to reveal the simple formula for reaching a Digg front page. When you realize just how simple it is, you’re going to kick yourself for not thinking of it yourself.

The formula is: Become a part of the digg community. Learn about the trends and preferences of the demographic. Start or join a niche that would be of interest to this community. Be patient, and over time you will build a following. As your following grows, so will your articles exposure to digg traffic. That means the success ratio of articles that hit front page to articles submitted will increase.

Urbanist, Ecoist and Manliness

Muhammad Saleem is managing WebUrbanist, WebEcoist, and the Art of Manliness (you’ll love this one if you like my site). Mu helps develop content, train writers, content ideas, promotion of content, and has a part in monetization of the sites.

As someone that manages every conceivable area of his own site, I can definitely appreciate how much work Mu needs to put in to do this at 3 different websites. Each one can be a full-time job in and of itself. It’s important to realize that effort is not necessarily correlated with success — smart effort is.

Tip’d – Digg For Economy & Finance

Muhammad’s most recent project is Tip’d, which is somewhat of a digg clone, but strictly for financial news. With the current economic issues being a hot topic, launching a website dedicated to the top financial news online is a great idea.

If you’re a news junkie, and finance is your poison of choice, than Tip’d will prove to be an invaluable source of information. I’m personally not big on news, but I’m really interested in what it takes to get a project of this magnitude from concept to success.

For Mu this took a few weeks, $25,000, a super-star team of social medium experts, designers, and coders, and some good old fashioned elbow grease. The hardest part, after the project is built, is getting the world out and spreading it to both interested users as well as financial news website owners.

The Art of Networking Online

Actually building a website such as Tip’d is easy – relatively speaking – compared with the arduous task of attracting users to it. That’s where networking is absolutely essential. Mu covers 2 very important networking principles – creating mutually beneficial relationships and educating the target audience.

Mu and his team searched out and contacted all of the top finance websites on the net. They needed to create this beneficial relationship, but they didn’t have anything (specifically traffic) to offer them in exchange. Regardless, they went ahead and traded getting traffic now, for giving traffic later.

Since such a process is a gamble on the part of the other party, Mu had to educate these site owners as to the potential of Tip’d. The game plan is that 3-6 months after launch Tip’d will be generating enough traffic to return the favor and then some.

Staying Focused On the Internetz

One of Mu’s jobs is to find the best articles on the net to promote on social networking sites. This has the potential to be a tremendous time sink, as one interesting story can lead to another, and so on. Sometimes Mu even has to get some writing done, but the temptation of the internet is always there, and always calling – can you relate?

A lot of times I have to quit my IM, quit my browser window, and open a text edit and really start writing. It can be very distracting, and you can lose hours if you just keep opening tabs if you’re on digg or any of these sites. ~Mu

Isolation from distractions is the key element. This also goes for studying, or working on any projects that require singular focus. The more you get distracted, the longer it takes time to get into a work-flow, so you need to make sure you’re distraction free.

Key Elements to Starting an Online Business

The key focus of your business should always be to provide value ~Mu

When you’re providing value, you’ll get most of your clients through word of mouth. You see Mu do this with his consulting business. He merely leaves an e-mail on the website, and says ‘contact me.’ People that have already been told about his great work will quickly get in touch and make a deal.

His main question to ask himself when creating a new product or service is ‘what void are you going to fill with your service?‘

Last Bit of Advice

Many people think in terms of ‘How do I advance myself, so that I can make more money?’ This is the wrong approach, especially on the social web, because a lot of people will see through you. Mu makes himself readily available – at the risk of getting spam and bad referrals – which allows him to make some great relationships and bring a lot of value to people.

Find more Muhammad Saleem at MuhammadSaleem.com, Twitter, or Tip’d.

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A special treat this week, as always, is our guest Leo Babauta of ZenHabits.net. He’s a regular guy, married with 6 kids, likes to write, run, read and that’s about it. Over the past couple of years Leo has quit smoking, ran several marathons, began waking early, became organized, began eating healthy, became a vegan, doubled his income, wrote 3 books, eliminated debt, and began commuting by bike.

This is an extensive list of accomplishments, but it’s only the tip of the iceberg in Leo’s life. I think the most brilliant part is the ability to achieve. Arguably any person has the potential to achieve anything in life, but to know this about oneself, and to have proven yourself right time and time again, that my friends is priceless.

1. How To Make Time For It All

Having 6 kids isn’t easy, yet Leo manages to accomplish more than many people with only 2 kids, or no kids at all. When I say accomplish, I don’t mean making time for 12 hours of work, 12 hours of family time, 12 hours of running, and 12 hours of reading – each and every day. That’s not possible, is it?

Leo takes one day, and makes that day be a total reflection of his priorities. He says that the 4 most important things in his life are family, writing, reading, and running. It follows that his day is divided amongst those priorities, and the unnecessary distractions are blocked  out as much as possible.

The truth is, you don’t have to make time for it all, only for what’s really important. The things that make life worth living, excite you, and make you happy. You can think of everything else as an enemy that tries to steal your time (my words, not his Leo’s).

Leo’s main objective for Zenhabits was to share the knowledge that he was gaining in his life own life. I think this is the driving force for a lot of us, and it’s certainly one of the reasons why I got started on this path. For Leo, quiting smoking for the seventh and final time, served as a catalyst to take massive action and form solid habits.

2. Did You Sell Your Soul For Success?

Everyone always wonders what Leo’s success strategy is. Many of us, including myself, started blogging around the same time as Leo. Despite of this, and with all his personal responsibilities in his way, Leo has blazed a trail and earned a well deserved awe of admiration. The question is ‘How the heck did he do it’?

Put out really great content, share things that you learn, be sincere and write with your voice. People want to see someone do the things that they want to do. Once they see someone else doing it, and how they did it, they’re inspired to do it themselves.

Be valuable, and remarkable, and people will come to you and remark about you to others. Now that’s some practical advice you can take to the bank.

3. The Power of Less

Leo Babauta’s book is available on December 30th, 2008. It’s called The Power of Less. Simplifying your life, focusing on the essentials, and in doing that making yourself more effective. This effects both your work and home life. The book shares powerful principles like ‘creating new habits’ ‘setting limits for yourself’ ‘choosing the essential and simplifying’ ‘starting small’.

The impact on the world, if everyone read this book, would be a global shift of people working less and enjoying life more. People can get more work done in a smaller amount of time, and then stop, and enjoy! We would get the same amount of work done, in less time.

One of the first things the book asks us to do is to identify what is most important to us in our life. Just like Leo identified his four list of important things, it is our job to identify what is most important and go for it!

The first part of the book is a series of six principles, which serve as tools for changing your life, becoming for effective, and simplifying. As with any tools, you can use which ones work for you, pick up the tool you need for a certain situation, and another tool for a different situation. You can basically pick up the book, open to any chapter, and get valuable information.

4. How Can We Become an Internet Entrepreneur

You have to focus your time on whatever enterprise you’re starting. Focus your marketing, such as guest writing on the blogs and sites that have the audience that you’re going for.

Focus on less. If you try to do everything and be everywhere you wouldn’t be able to do it. There isn’t enough time in the day.

Big enterprises cost a lot of money, take up a lot of time and resources, and it’s hard to change with the times. With the internet and speed of business today you really have to be able to change and be nimble. To do this you have to be small. As a team of one, or small group of talented people.

The bottom line is figure out what’s the most important action, and do a lot more of that. Distractions, and non-important items, seem to be our biggest downfall. This is where prioritizing, and outsourcing come in very handy!

5. Is Leo a Tim Ferriss or a Gary Vaynerchuk?

Let’s take a look at two branding giants. Unless you’re living under a rock, you don’t have internet access, you’ve heard of Tim Ferriss and Gary Vaynerchuk. Why have you heard of them? Because their force, aka their brand, is strong!

On one hand we have Tim Ferriss who is wildly popular for his best selling book The 4-Hour Workweek. Tim is all about work less, don’t answer e-mails, and outsource as much as possible to virtual assistants.

On the other hand we have Gary Vaynerchuk, popular for his work on Wine Library TV, who is rumored to single handedly take his inbox from five million to zero on a daily basis. Gary just doesn’t let anyone else near his e-mail account. He says it’s the need to be personally involved, and the love for his business, which makes him do that (or he doesn’t trust anyone with his passwords).

In this case Leo finds himself to be more of a Tim Ferriss. Leo prefers to live life, have family time, read, write, and run instead of being bogged down at the inbox all day. I can understand both cases. Which category do you fall under?

Leo uses his time “talking with great bloggers like me” (aww Leo, *hug*), and guest blogging on different blogs. This allows him to reach a whole new audience everytime instead of e-mailing the same people over and over again.

6. Final Success Tip

Focus on one thing at a time. If we all made a list of goals on 2009, we could all come up with a lot, but we can’t tackle them all at the same time. We lose the focus and energy that is required to do well with each goal. Take one goal, and try to do it as well as possible. Once you’re done, and it’s finished, work on the next one.

Single-tasking is the new multi-tasking, so jump on the bandwagon — it’s a revolution! Leo has practical tips, for every day people, that prove to be effective. It doesn’t take a brain-surgeon, or a rocket scientist to understand what he’s saying. It’s because Leo is a regular guy, just like you and I, that we can relate to him, and easily apply in our lives what works for him.

More Leo Babauta

1. The Power of Less – The book we talked about, available in stores on December 30th. Contains free Audio-Podcasts, Video, and eBook! I like free!
2. Zen Habits – One of the top blogs in the world on simplifying and improving your life.
3. Web Warrior Tools – Essential books on improving your online existance.
4. Write To Done – Leo shares he secrets for blog writing success. Information on branding, writing valuable content, and amazing headlines.

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This week we’re right on track bringing you a super successful speaker that you just can’t miss. Derek Sivers is a dot com mogul, the likes of which you’ve never seen before. He is the CEO and Founder of CD Baby.com a company that pulled in over $100,000,000 in sales for independent musicians.

Well, he was the CEO, until he sold the company for $22,000,000, most of which he placed into a trust fund which will be used, not for his own spending, but to help musicians. Who needs a lousy 22mil anyway, right?

1. Defining Ourselves For Success

Derek has mastered defining himself, which is a key element for success, but the quality that drives him to success will probably surprise you. After he shares this quality, he gives some solid advice that we can follow so that we too can define ourselves.

Derek describes himself as fiercely driven man, whose theme is centered around rebelling against mediocrity. He’s seen too many stories of high-school music sensations that turn out working dead-end jobs, because they didn’t work hard enough to get it. In a way, the thought of settling scares the shit out of him, so he does everything in his power to reach his goals.

“Look into your past, and see what keeps you up all night … or get you bouncing out of bed first thing in the morning, … or gets you so intensely focused that hours fly by and you don’t even notice.”

2. The Start (and end) of CD Baby

Derek started by making his own CD and then sold a CD for a friend. Soon enough other musicians started begging him to make their CDs, and all of a sudden this hobby spread through word of mouth, and got to $100,000,000 in sales and 85 employees. The reason he sold it? He hates being comfortable, and after 10 years of doing it (actually after the first 5) he was just doing stuff he already knew how to do.

“The key to my success is to try not to grow, and only grow when there is such a demand that the world is saying ‘we really want you to do this thing, please do this, we will pay you money to do this thing’”

You have to blow people’s minds. Derek mentions some concepts from the king of marketing Seth Godin. Seth’s book, Purple Cow, had an interesting theme:

“forget marketing an ordinary product or service, don’t spend a dime marketing something, until the product or service is so remarkable, that people are going around telling their friends about it, not as a favor to you, but as a favor to their friends”

3. MuckWork – The Savior To Musicians

The new challenge for Derek is MuckWork, which is going to be an international-decentralized company, providing virtual assistance for independent musicians. These assistants will do the dirty uncreative work, clearing up more time for the musicians to do what musicians should be doing — making music!

This project answers the artists need for “I know everything I should be doing, but I just don’t have the time to do it myself.” Don’t you see what a monumental moment this is? Derek is helping to match people up with the things they love to do, and sending the stuff they don’t love to do to people who love to do it.

I’m not a musician, but I enjoy marketing, so if a musician would send me a marketing task, and I could send him a request for a beat (or something), that would be a win-win. Of course, MuckWork will be different, in the sense that it’s not a trade-off, or bartering system. Who knows if the Virtual Assistants will even like the tasks, they may very well be doing it for the money, but the work will be done, and the artists will get to play more.

4. Staying Focused In The Internetz World

Derek is a ‘focus junkie’, which is the opposite of an information junkie. One of the ways that Derek does this is by disconnecting from the internet (this is lunacy! lol), and concentrating completely on the work. He stays away from news or blogs, and subscribes to Tim Ferriss‘ ‘informational diet.’

There’s really no point in passively reading about tragedies happening all around the world if you’re not going to take an immediate next action. When you notice what really excites you, block out everything else, and go do that!

5. The Day to Day of Derek Sivers

Living each and every day on his own terms. One moment to the next. This could get dangerous, especially if you spend half a day searching the web on ‘scuba-diving in Iceland’ (you have to hear it on the Podcast to understand).

Having free time is especially difficult when you need to get stuff done. This is where you have to setup your personal priorities. For Derek they are:

1. Programming
2. Exercise
3. Creative Writing
4. Business Communication
5. Personal/Social Hangout Time

Derek organizes his whole day in order of priority, with the Most Important Thing (MIT) first. You can hear more about the details of this breakdown on the Podcast.

6. Success, What is It?

Derek and I get into a debate as to what success really means. I’m not going to spoil the surprise and tell you either opinion. I will tell you that Derek does know what the hell he’s talking about! This is where I learn that Derek’s side job is being an advocate, the devil’s advocate that is LOL.

7. Derek’s Crashes and Burns

This is where Derek starts to sound like a page out of a self-help book (which I’m totally into, so don’t hold back!) He actually doesn’t believe in failures, just experiments, and lessons. Derek’s thoughts are that you shouldn’t judge someone until they die, because you’ll never know which way their life will turn.

One of his biggest burns was when the VP of his company stole a bunch of money from him. Derek just moved on, with his ‘ridiculously positive attitude towards failure’. Most people I know would be pretty pissed off to have that much money stolen from them, especially by a person who they invested their trust in. Derek, can I hold 5mil for you? Put it in my Swiss account, you can trust me! LOL

8. Music: The Inspiration

Seeing how Derek has been a pro-musician since age 18, this was the most shocking part of the interview for me. Derek was never a fan of music. His whole life revolves around music, but he doesn’t like it? Actually, that’s not entirely accurate. Derek is a huge fan of the creative process of music, and the necessity to be creative while having a boundary. This makes me want to pick up an instrument!

This is the part of the interview where Derek gives us a music lesson. Haiku, rhyme, beats, etc. I learned a lot! We also learn about the Dao of promotion “sometimes the best promotion you could do is the least.”

I had to pop the question, “Do you have a lot of groupies Derek?” and you’ll have to hear this for yourself.

9. Books That Inspire Derek

Derek points us to a URL on his personal site, Sivers.org/book, where he lists some of his favorites. Is it a coincidence that he reads a lot and he is successful? Could there be some kind of correlations? Is it true that the size of a successful person’s library should be bigger than his television? Hmmm?

Derek devoured Anthony Robbins‘ stuff since he was 18 years old, and it was internalized by the time he was 23. At 24 he was basically singing along with Anthony. He particularly liked that most things in life are neutral, and it is our thoughts and reactions that are the real creators of what something will mean to us.

10. Final Success Tip From Derek

Whatever Excites You, Go Do It
Whatever Scares You, Go Do It

The theme of his life is, when you love what you’re doing, work is not work, it’s play!

Final Thoughts

Derek is an extraordinary example of a regular guy, like you and I, who has the right philosophy for living life. This Podcast is very interesting and captivating, and Derek’s story really keeps you engaged throughout the whole time. We hope you enjoy!

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Tynan’s life is amazing, because he does whatever he wants, whenever he wants. A retired world-renowned Pick Up Artist, and professional Gambler, Tynan now spends his time traveling the entire globe. The kicker is he does this with only one small back pack worth of stuff. This includes his laptop, which he uses to make money online and finance all his adventures.

I first heard of Tynan a couple of years ago when I stumbled upon his blog www.betterthanyourboyfriend.com which discussed some awesome adventures and celebrity escapades. Tynan and I became “internet friends”, which changed shortly after he launched his website www.lifenomadic.com.

Life Nomadic records his traveling adventures, and I became his first official road guest when I visited with him in Panama. I actually did something REALLY stupid with a 5 Gallon water balloon on this trip, and the truth comes out in this Podcast.

In the Podcast, Tynan discusses some of the equipment he brings along with him, and how he keeps in touch with family and friends while abroad. The cool thing is Tynan and his travel companion Todd named a couple of key phrases after me, which we discuss in the Podcast as well. You’ll find out what a ShalPic is!

It should be noted that Tynan is a vegan, and one of the healthiest people I know. He talks about some of his healthy habits, and what mentality he fosters in order to make such positive decisions. As per request, I asked him how he deals with family gatherings, and keeping a 100% strict diet.

Tynan discusses some of the real social dynamics that are involved in picking up women, which is great to hear from a insider (I don’t mean insider like as a women, but as a professional!)

Tynan’s success tip is that people should do whatever they want, and pay less attention to what society and “normal people” tell you to do. That’s his secret to living an EXTRAORDINARY LIFE!

Do what you want to do, no matter what.

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This week I interviewed John Chow, the internet mogul that makes $30-40,000 per month blogging at JohnChow.com, and 7 figures with his media empire The Tech Zone.

I’ve previously interviewed John Chow in the Happiness Project, and got to know a bit about what happiness looks like for a person who is successful and financially independent. In this podcast interview I asked him about what success means to him, and what he does day to day to achieve it.

One advantageous edge that John Chow has over the competition is that he was born in communist China, and then brought to Canada, a free capitalist country. Living in a slum community in his early years taught him a that if he ever wanted to make something of himself he will have to shape his environment as opposed to letting his environment him. You can also hear about what influence his father had over him growing up.

Being at the helm of two super profitable companies would insinuate that John is a pretty busy guy, but this just isn’t the case. He wakes up late, checks his e-mail, twitter, and blog comments, followed by playing with his wife and daughter, and then participating in top secret ‘dot com mogul’ activities, the hardest of which is figuring out what to have for lunch.

One of the most evil things about John Chow is that he enjoys having his readers salivate over the savory restaurant reviews that he posts over on his blog. He goes to top-end restaurants, videos, reviews, and writes them off as tax deductible expense.

In order to put his skills to the test, John Chow coached a ‘no-name’ blogger into making a good income online, and he gives a little spoiler as to who that might be in the Podcast.

I found John’s views of success very interesting, and I liked what he said about his various philanthropic ventures. One would even say that he has a very Bill Gates state of mind.

One of my favorite parts of the interview is when John Chow shares his secret to building a successful and profitable online investment. You can hear this for yourself in the interview.

John Chow’s rules for happiness?

Something to hope for, the ability to give and receive love, and something to do.

His final message?

The worth of a man is not how much he makes, but how much he gives.

Enjoying the Podcasts? Make sure you click the image above and subscribe to this podcast via iTunes. This ensures that you get the full repertoire of interviews in an easy to listen to format.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

This week I’m honored to have interviewed Steve Pavlina, a person that I greatly admire. Steve Pavlina has had a lot of influence on my life and personal growth, so I couldn’t think of asked for a better person to interview. Steve Pavlina is the author of the best selling book Personal Development for Smart People, and the most popular personal development blogger in the world.

The stats say that Steve Pavlina’s website sees over 2 million visitors per month. The real power, however, is in the affect that Steve Pavlina has on an individual’s life, and the way his ideas of Truth, Love, and Power spread virally throughout the world.

For over 10 years Steve Pavlina has been passionate about learning personal development, applying it to his life in a variety of wacky growth experiments, and then sharing his findings with the world via his popular blog StevePavlina.com. In this interview we’ll touch base on some of these experiments, and go into a wide variety of topics.

Steve Pavlina: Mission in Life

“To explore consciousness, and raise consciousness.”

Steve Pavlina is very passionate about the principles of Truth, Love, and Power. You can’t make apple pie from scratch, unless you reinvent the universe, and in this way Steve Pavlina didn’t “invent” these principles. He did, however, meditate on them and put them into a very practical format that can be applied to anyone, and any area of life.

Truth is helping people become more aware, knowledgeable, and honest. Love is helping people connect with what they want, be happier and more joyful, while escaping from what they don’t want. Power is helping people take action, become more disciplined, and create the reality that they want to experience and get things done.

Steve Pavlina’s goals are to align everyone with these three principles, which he gets into in great detail in his book. The Steve Pavlina blog, and resources are all aligned with helping people achieve consciousness and improve various areas of their lives.

Steve Pavlina on Measuring Success

The way Steve Pavlina used to go about goal-setting is by setting “smart goals,” meaning goals that are specific, measurable, and action oriented. After much experience with this, Steve Pavlina now takes a different route in setting goals, based purely on that which most inspires him. Instead of thinking of a goal as a place to reach in the future, Steve Pavlina thinks about how a goal will affect him in the present moment.

For example, if setting a goal of becoming a millionaire at a future date does not inspire you right this moment and get you taking some sort of action then it’s a “lousy goal.” My example of the opposite of this would be setting a goal to run a marathon a year from now, and then going right outside for a run, and subsequent training sessions in order to prepare for this. It must create a mental shift, in the now.

Trying to be aligned with Truth, Love, and Power can be disempowering for Steve Pavlina when forced into a specific and measurable box. However, what does work for Steve Pavlina is when he thinks of the goal in terms of “what can I do right now to move people in this direction,” which is when he starts generating ideas and taking action on them.

Even for financial goals Steve Pavlina claims that he doesn’t pay much attention to how much money he makes because it doesn’t inspire him. He focuses more on the present moment, asking himself, “what am I doing right now?” and “what kind of vision can I create that will inspire me right now in this moment?”

A trap that Steve Pavlina used to fall into was setting goals too often. He would fill up pages worth of goals, only to file them away and not look at them. Taking a glance back after six months or so would reveal that no progress has been made in these areas. These were the specific and measurable goals that Steve Pavlina tries to steer clear from these days.

Steve Pavlina on Day to Day and Motivation

Steve Pavlina gets his motivation from the focus on each and every day. The focus in each day, combined with being able to keep yourself free from things that bring you down is what works for Steve Pavlina. With the advantage of being self-employed, Steve Pavlina gets to have control over the way that his day will turn out to a much larger degree than if he was employed for someone else.

Steve Pavlina’s website brings in enough income that he has the privilage to live this way and pay all his bills. The specifics of Steve Pavlina’s daily schedule often vary to some degree. The typical day gets Steve Pavlina out of bed at 5am, and straight into the gym. After this he gets back home for breakfast, at which point he starts to either catch up on communication such as e-mail or phone calls, or just focused in on content creation such as writing and podcasting.

Steve Pavlina’s afternoons sound amazing to me, because he spends them on personal growth activities, which of course I love, such as reading. Steve Pavlina estimates that 30-40% of his weekly “work hours” are spent soaking up new information and connecting with people. It’s not unusual for Steve Pavlina to spend the afternoons in online communication with people, sharing ideas, getting ideas for new articles, and just generally getting inspired. Steve Pavlina even gets the opportunity to coach some people “on the side,” which I think we all do when we give advice to our family, friends, and co-workers, although, I’d be willing to bet that Steve Pavlina takes this to the next level.

At the time of this interview, Steve Pavlina is on day 26 of an experiment where he eats nothing but juices from fruits and vegetables. This is known as Juice Feasting, not fasting, because he gets more than enough calories. So far the experiment has taken Steve Pavlina through a daily detox of different emotions, which I hear is a wild ride. In order to sustain an experiment such as this Steve Pavlina must do a lot of reading. Steve Pavlina has read 10 books on health just this month alone, which is probably more than most people read in a lifetime.

Steve Pavlina likes to live life emersavely. This means that when he gets one of his ideas, he jumps into them fully and gives them everything he’s got. In the Juice Feasting experiment Steve Pavlina gets to learn about the benefits of all the different fruits and vegatables, their properties, and the different affects that they have on our mind and body. This translates into more reading on juice feasting, juicing, and various raw supplements.

Steve Pavlina on Methods of Generating Creative Ideas

I find Steve Pavlina to be like a fountain of creative ideas. Many of the ideas come about from reading extensively on a wide range of growth topics, as well as communicating with many people. It’s a progressive process. It was during his previous 30 day trial into Raw Foods that Steve Pavlina became aware of Juice Feasting. At the time, Steve Pavlina thought the Juice Feasting was way out there, and now he’s fully emersed himself in it.

Out of the many creative ideas that Steve Pavlina gets, he chooses the ones that most inspire him. Since Steve Pavlina wasn’t born to, and never subscribed to the idea of living an average life, it’s of no consequence to him if the ideas are normal or way out there. The factor that matters is whether the ideas are interesting and a good experience for growth. The ones that are growth experiences provide the added benefit of being a topic to share with the audience on the Steve Pavlina website.

Steve Pavlina: Contributing Factors to Success

Do you consider Steve Pavlina to be successful? I definitely do. The start of the conscious journey to success was when Steve Pavlina thought about the idea that he could improve himself by embracing new experiences. Steve Pavlina realized that it didn’t matter if his attempt at something new would be a success, or a failure, because each one would be a growth experience and thus a contributor to his overall success.

Steve Pavlina doesn’t view success and failure as two opposites. He doesn’t even view one as better than the other. Instead, Steve Pavlina likes to ask himself “what am I here to do, and what would I like to experience.”

It’s of little consequence whether Steve Pavlina’s juice feast works out positively and negatively, because despite the outcome Steve Pavlina will be able to extrapolate a valuable benefit. This is due to Steve Pavlina’s paradigm of success, which states that the worst thing you could do is stand still. What it comes down to isn’t about trying to succeed, but about having interesting experience while we’re here. Virtually any experience can be a growth experience if we choose to learn from it.

Steve Pavlina’s: The Courage to Succeed, and Fail

I asked Steve Pavlina what questions he gets asked the most, and what questions he thinks people would benefit most from if they asked him.

The questions that people ask Steve Pavlina the most are “what is personal development?,” and “what does it mean to grow?” As already mentioned, growth is aligning yourself with Truth, Love, and Power. To increase your awareness, to become more connected in your life to what you want, and less connected to what you don’t want, and to build your self discipline.

The question that Steve Pavlina thinks people should ask, is not one of information, such as “how do I gain clarity about my life,” because we usually already know what it is that we need to do ourselves. The problem real problem here is that what we know to do is usually hidden under a few deep layers of fear, which stops us from acting on the solution. So the real question people should ask is, “how do I build my courage?” “How could I face those fears?” “How could I turn towards what I want?” People get a glimpse of what they want, but are afraid to go after it.

A common situation that Steve Pavlina describes is of a person that is working at a job that they are satisfied with, or inspired by. While they know they’re not happy where they are, they don’t have a solid idea as to where they would be happier moving to. This causes them to become stagnant, and not search for a more fulfilling career option. What advice does Steve Pavlina have for people trapped in a job that they don’t want? “Quit!”

Steve Pavlina says that the reason people don’t have the courage to quit is because they over think all the negative consequences of taking action. What are the negative consequences? Not being able to pay your bills, and being homeless come to mind, which is still not the end of your life. Sitting at a job you don’t like, for the rest of your life, is something you don’t like, and so is being homeless, but perhaps it’s not necessary to settle for either of these options and go for what we really want.

It might actually be better to be homeless then trapped in a cubicle cage. At least then you would have more free time, and the ability to rebuild your life from the ground up. Steve Pavlina, although never homeless, used to live in a time when he couldn’t pay his bills and had to scatter to find an apartment of half the size. This taught him that it’s better to consistently question the standard of “get what you want out of life and being able to contribute to people,” instead of beating yourself down and living just to pay your bills.

It’s important to have such reference experiences, many of which are gained from the failures in our life, because they all contribute to our growth. The first business that Steve Pavlina had in the game development business was a failure which sank and went into bankruptcy. Steve Pavlina did the best he knew how to do at the time, but he just wasn’t running a business under a viable business model. The situation was not a disaster, it was a complete catastrophe, and one of the best learning experiences that Steve Pavlina ever had.

Look at people like Walt Disney, and Abraham Lincoln, who failed so many times throughout their life that it was pathetic. When we look back at their life, we all view them as a major success, which was hard earned by lives that were much more full of failures then they were of successes.

Steve Pavlina on Happiness and Suicide Advice

The definition of happiness that Steve Pavlina subscirbes to is that of an emotional feeling of well-being. When it comes to fixing problems, Steve Pavlina believes it is important to realize that it’s not always practical to fix our problems overnight. What works better is to focus on the idea of growth, improvement, and getting better each day, and let that paradigm guide is to success.

At just 19, Steve Pavlina was arrested for felony grand theft. While spending a few days in jail, Steve Pavlina realized that his life was just a train wreck heading in undesirable directions. Thinking of an overnight solution was frustrating, and seemed overwhelming. At that moment Steve Pavlina realized that it doesn’t matter whether he good or couldn’t fix the problems and that regardless of the outcome the truth was that he was the only one responsible for the outcome of his own life.

It was getting that sense of responsibility that really helped Steve Pavlina. He knew that the problems wouldn’t go away on their own, and that no one was going to rescue him, so he had to take action himself. Sometimes this means accepting problems as they are, while other times it means working to fix them. By chipping away at the problems a little bit at a time, Steve Pavlina was able to get his life to a level of normalcy after a few years. He did this by focusing on daily growth, and asking, “how can I make my life a little bit better?”

Chronic pain and depression, as Steve Pavlina learned in his research are often times a factor of our nutritional intake. The emotional “dumps” that Steve Pavlina is experiencing in his Juice Feast are a proof that food can govern how we feel. This means that people who suffer from chronic pain and depression can look into healthier diets, away from unhealthy processed foods, in order to fix their health issues in both the mental and physical capacities.

Relationships are the other major category to work on to promote happiness. It’s important to analyze our lives and see whether the people in our lives are all depressed, and if it’s possible to start spending more hours with people that are positive and uplifting? Steve Pavlina made the decision to change his social relationships in his late teens, and has been evolving his relationships ever since, which had made a huge impact in his life.

Self-discipline is another important factor that Steve Pavlina recommends to work on. It’s important to embrace this principle, instead of giving into wallowing in depression and entertaining suicidal feelings. Being in this state is disempowering, which in my opinion leads to a negative cycle that reinforces itself, and takes discipline to break out of. Our ability to take action is like a muscle, which grows with proper exercise. Unfortunately the opposite is true, and remaining apathetic will make the discipline muscle weak, and make it easier for these negative thoughts to take over your mind.

Another solution is to emerse yourself in positive positive information. Steve Pavlina recommends reading lots of books by positive successful people. Not only will this put you into a positive frame of mind, but you’ll also learn lots of new ideas that you can apply to improve your life. It’s important to note that these changes won’t be instant, but over a period of years we’ll be able to drastically improve the quality of our lives.

Steve Pavlina on Taking Responsibility

Steve Pavlina equates building our personal responsibility to working out with dumbbells. While looking at a set of 40 lb dumbbells might seem like a heavy weight to lift to us, a body builder might think those weights are too light to even bother with.

Therefore, our personal responsibility is more a matter of degree than it is of essence. You can take responsibility for a tiny piece of your life, a larger piece, or you can take responsibility for the whole thing. This is a sliding scale of how much responsibility you’re willing to take, deny, or just blame away on people and situations.

Of course, taking full responsibility is the best option, but a very difficult one if you’re just starting out. A better place to start is with our own bodies, because it’s easier to control what we put into our mouths and how we exercise, and much harder to blame away on other people and circumstances. There may also be addictions, to nicotine, caffeine, etc. which we can take responsibility and gradually increase our control over. The more we practice personal responsibility, the more we increase our capacity for it, and the more capable and competent we’ll feel in our lives overall.

Steve Pavlina on Relationships

The key to the wonderful relationship between Steve Pavlina and his lovely wife Erin Pavlina is their honest communication. They take a lot of time to communicate and have conversations about the state of their relationship itself. They use the principle of truth to address issues that really matter, along with addressing the needs that are, or aren’t being met. After having such honest conversations, their relationship always comes out on top.

The nature of all human relationships is that they’re temporary. Without considering the spiritual afterlife, it’s a given that all physical relationships end by either a breakup or the natural course of death. When recognizing this truth, Steve Pavlina is able to look at his relationship not as a burden, but as a privilege, and the temporary time with Erin Pavlina becomes much more precious.

One advantage to the Relationship between Steve and Erin Pavlina is that they’re able to spend a lot of time together, due to their work at home arrangement. They have a lot more opportunity to work on the principles of Truth, Love, and Power by asking by consistently asking themselves, “how can we increase the level of truth in the relationship and be more honest with each other?” It’s not uncommon for them to sit down for a couple of hours at a time, and talk about how they’re feeling about the relationship.

I had to ask what this picture perfect couple actually fights about, and it turns out it’s compatibility and unreasonable demands that are sometimes made of each other. Sometimes they’ll ask their partner to meet the needs that the other person is either incapable of, or unwilling to meet. What gets them through this issue is to realize that their relationship isn’t their only means of getting fulfillment of their needs, and that they can have other relationships to meet these specific needs.

Steve Pavlina is a bigger fan of physical outdoor activities than Erina Pavlina. After trying to get her to participate in these activities, which she’s not a fan of, Steve Pavlina realized that it’s much better to get other people that do like these activities to participate with him. For one of his favorite activities, Frisbee Golf, Steve Pavlina enjoys the company of friends, instead of expecting Erin Pavlina to fulfill this pleasure.

Instead of just looking at the need, and asking how can he get it from her, Steve Pavlina asks, “how else can I fulfill this?” He can go off and do things with other people, and this opens the relationship up to not being so exclusive. Steve and Erin Pavlina started out as friends, and shortly thereafter this lead to dating. Their mentality has always been to go to each other to fulfill their “best friend needs”, but it’s difficult for one person to meet all of those, and it’s completely impossible to meet ALL of a persons needs.

Steve Pavlina on Living Consciously

In order to promote living consciously, Steve Pavlina recommends journaling. While Steve Pavlina is a PC, and I’m a Mac, we both use our blogs, and journaling software to journal. The added benefit of journaling software over the ol’ pen and paper is that we can type much faster than we can write, and the software provides password protection for our private thoughts. The software is also searchable, and date-oriented, which allows us to easily find certain themes, or find out what we were thinking at a certain time in our life.

Writing down, and then reviewing our thoughts is an excellent aid to living consciously. The usual way that we think thoughts in our head is in a linear pathway, as we jump through one thought to the next in a repeating cycle. In written form, we’re able to go back and track our line of thought in order to get a birds eye perspective.

This look at our thoughts, and thought patterns allows you to see the big picture of what your thinking is and where it’s taking you. You can do exercises where you look at certain thoughts that lead to dead ends, and make a conscious decision to avoid these types of thoughts that just lead you in circles.

It becomes easier to explore new lines of thinking, and to keep track of and see where they will lead you. Some of Steve Pavlina’s thoughts inspire him to write articles, while others lead him to procrastinate. Journaling allows him to choose more thoughts that are productive the next time around. This whole process gives you an awareness of your own mental processes and allows you to examine how they’re affecting you.

Steve Pavlina on Blogging

Narrow niche blog topics are a no-no for Steve Pavlina. He managed to succesfully avoid this when he started the Steve Pavlina blog, which is a general personal development blog. Writing about specifics such as “time management and productivity, fixing your car, and real-estate,” is something that is exhaustible and could lead to boredom.

Once you outgrow a subject in your niche, you become bored, which is easy to do after you’ve written a thousand articles or so on the subject and developed it very well. Such limitation can stun your growth, which is what happened to Steve Pavlina after 10 years of running his games business. He started thinking about another niche site to start, but realized that he didn’t want to be a serial-entrepreneur that consistently picks up and changes projects.

Steve Pavlina wanted to build something permanent, so he decided to start a site about growth itself so he could never outgrow it. Personal development, to Steve Pavlina, is not a niche, rather it is a focus. A way of looking at life that allows the site to follow Steve Pavlina wherever he went. In a way, it became a vehicle of self-expression.

Steve Pavlina: Future Projects

Concentrating on one major project at a time is a great productivity tool, which is why Steve Pavlina aims to finish the Juice Feast before starting anything new. In the future, Steve Pavlina is looking to expand into other media. He’s currently enjoying a lot of professional public speaking, which allows him to be more expressive, so he’s looking into online video to supplement the written content on his website.

In the meantime, Steve Pavlina has been doing some research into the art of video, and palying around with making and editing sample videos. Eventually there will be videos on the Steve Pavlina site, and I would love to see a Steve Pavlina personal growth DVD product in the future as well.

Steve Pavlina: Final Word of Wisdom

Growth is just about the most intelligent thing that we can do in our lives. Instead of focusing on being perfect and living up to some impractical ideal, we can just focus on making our life a little bit better each day. Bring a little more awareness, and get a little more truth injected into our life. Connect a little bit more with what you want, and start disconnecting from what you don’t want in your life. Work on building some of your power and self-discipline.

Each day, take a little bit more action. While perfection is not an attainable ideal, growth is very attainable and accessible to all. Focus on growth, because it makes for a really great life. Working on growth, on a daily basis, will create a major change in your life 5 years from now. So much so that you won’t even recognize who you are today. Your life will be much better then, and the process of getting there will be very enjoyable as well.

More Steve Pavlina

• Personal Development for Smart People Website
• Personal Development for Smart People Book
• Steve Pavlina Happiness Project Interview
• Steve Pavlina on Twitter

Enjoy the podcast and feel free to leave feedback in the comment box below, as well as who you would like to see on future shows.. Next week I have an interview all set to go with John Chow; subscribe so you don’t miss it.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

In this interview Dan and Jennifer from www.AskDanAndJennifer.com tell us how they started their online relationship media empire. They tell us how they’ve managed a safe and comfortable place for people from all over the world to ask and get answers for their most personal sex-love-relationship related questions.

Our friends also discuss their unorthodox relationship that is 9.5 years difference in age between the two of them with Jennifer being the older of the two. They also go into quite some detail about safe sex, to the point where I accuse Dan of working for Trojan/Lifestyles!

The dating-duo discuss the tipping point of their site taking off, as well as their amazing success on YouTube with their dating question and answer sessions. I then ask them the tough question of what will happen to AskDanAndJennifer if Dan and Jennifer break up!

If you’re currently dating, or interested in improving your already existing relationship, check out my free ebook, How To Get A Girlfriend.

Enjoy the podcast and feel free to leave feedback in the comment box below. I’d like to know if there is anyone you would like me to interview for future podcasts.

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!

Here is the very first AlexShalman.com “Practical Personal Development” podcast. This is an interview I did live on SIRIUS Satellite Radio, and edited for length and with commentary. The program I was on is called Game On, and is a dating advice show sponsored by Maxim Magazine.

The two co-hosts during this show were Joshua Pellicer and Kelly Kellam. Also, thanks to the other regular host, Jordan Harbinger, for setting up the interview.

I cut off the first 30 minutes of the radio show mainly because I wasn’t in it, and it would have made this podcast too big. The guys were talking about the concept of Holding Court in dating, which basically means walking up to a crowd of strangers and getting the positive attention of the females in the group.

If you’re currently dating, or interested in improving your relationship, check out my free ebook, How To Get A Girlfriend.

Enjoy the podcast…

Attention: Don’t forget to download my free ebook, How to Get a Girlfriend!!