Category: Expectations
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“Return on Investment”
One key to surviving in business is to make sure the money you put into it is producing (or going to produce) a larger amount of money. There are a lot of ways to measure this—one simple one is known as “Return on Investment” (ROI for short). The calculation is simple: “Net Return” divided by…
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Record, rewrite, rehearse
The next time you prepare for a job interview (or sales call, important meeting, etc.), take a few minutes to recall previous job interviews and note the common questions. Anticipate some new upcoming questions and write them down. Record yourself answering each question out loud. Listen to your answers. How does each answer sound? What…
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A well-rounded creative practice
When you get better at what you do, you’re also becoming more critical of it. You analyze what’s not working, or what doesn’t feel right, and you improve it. It’s a happy working arrangement until the critical aspect of you gets too much influence. It knows it’s important because its taste is keeping you in…
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Optional prerequisites
On your first few trips to the gym, you’re trying to figure how much weight you can actually lift. (Or how fast you can run, how fast you can swim, how deep you can stretch, etc.) One good principle to adhere to is to lift what you can lift. You start light, and see what…
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A regular amount of effort
One of the most helpful, and hopefully the earliest, pieces of advice every writer comes across is to aim for a shitty first draft. That’s because sometimes, when you wait too long to do something—or when you only have one opening per week to do it—you feel like it becomes more precious. Your expectations of…
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Categorization, commoditization, and clarity
When you’re growing your business, one of your biggest challenges is market misunderstanding. When you’re working on a business (as an entrepreneur, freelancer, team, artist, author, etc.), your perspective tends to expand in breadth and depth. You develop expertise and see patterns. You come across better opportunities and bigger markets. In order to grow, you…
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First generation artist
When you’re working as a first generation artist—or author, entrepreneur, etc.—you are doing something really difficult. You are like an immigrant of sorts. It is the complete opposite of the parent-child duo who can perform on stage together, or do an art show together. Your parents practice a different craft and they will have trouble…
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Getting ahead vs. falling behind
If cooking is just a matter of adding heat to food at different intervals of time, then getting ahead is just getting work done earlier rather than later. In spite of the simplicity, it turns out that there are a million ways to prepare, add heat, and serve ingredients. That’s why the culinary arts exist.…
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Strategic desperation
There’s an old story about an army who invades another country. Right before a key battle, the general instructs the army to burn all of their own boats. Without the boats, there would be no way for the army to turn around. The only way back home was winning the battle. In most versions of…
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Confidence scaffolding
Sometimes, it just takes one in-between step (or maybe a few) to set you up from complete doubt to a sense of confidence. It could be a practical, useful, class. Or a light-hearted, well-done, project (which can also serve as a business card). And of course, practice is always great, because you never know when…