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There are many different options for keeping your desk decorated. Seeing as how most people spend 8 hours at their desk, it’s important to keep it pleasing to the eye.

You have some of the old reliable stand-bys, Albert Einstein with his tongue sticking out. Some keep an old sports calendar up from a year back in the 90’s when their sports team was good. Others can be really flamboyant with their decorating. Some people will have close to 20 pictures of their kids, dogs, hobbies, all lining different parts of their desk or cubicle.

Here’s a list of the different decorations I have at my desk and what they mean to me:

Austin Powers Bobblehead - The Austin Powers movies are one of my favorite comedy series of all time. If I’m ever feeling down or need a lift I can just think of all the hilarious scenes in the movies. Having a Austin Powers Bobblehead staring me down helps with my happy thoughts.

Mario Figure & 3 Other Video Game Figures - One of the true passions I have in life are video games. You’ll rarely, rarely see me angry and most of the time a video game is to blame. Of course I’ve had just as much happiness as anger playing video games all these years, hence the ‘passion’ (nearing around 20 years, for how long I’ve been gaming). For something that’s such a big part of my life, 4 figures might not be enough.

Kentucky Wildcats Clock - If there’s one thing I’m passionate about other than video games, it’s UK Football. Those who know football might laugh, because throughout my 24 year history there hasn’t been a whole lot to be passionate about. Of course these past few years, you can see how the culture of UK football is changing and people are starting to have faith. For someone like me who stuck with them even during the rough years, makes it all the more sweeter.

So what office decor do you go with? Do you keep it simple or go really extravagant? Or do you not have any decorations at all because you’re so focused on your work?

Tags: Business, Fun by JohnnyV - 24 Comments »

But only when on a deadline…

It’s hard to know how to react to psychological research saying procrastination is now an official mental illness affecting about 20 percent of the population. The cynic notes immediately this telling tidbit: psychologists warn these people need therapy.

Therapy, in case you didn’t know, is how psychologists stay in business. With all these psych majors pumping out of the liberal arts pipeline, there seems an obvious need to create more loonies—even if the loonies are generally functional, generally sane most of the time. There’s a lot of money in just slightly crazy. More drugs to dispense, more hours logged.

But that could be another sign of mental illness: denial. It could be humans have wires crossed in their brains all the time. Just add it to the list of human conditions. Human: man or woman existing in the throes of Kant’s constants of birth, death, and sexuality, but whose pandemic denial of evolutionary-societal conflicts makes them generally a little bit nuts.

Wouldn’t be hard to prove there are a lot of crazy humans, would it? It may be we only notice crazy when it’s really crazy, like-a-violent-monkey crazy or eat-your-liver-with-some-fava-beans-and-a-nice-chianti crazy. Maybe more subtle types of crazy we just tolerate and label as the character flaws that make a person human.

Maybe immediate manic skepticism or depressive acceptance of either theory is a bit too, well, bipolar. Maybe the truth is somewhere in the middle. Maybe that’s a lie too. Doesn’t matter, the research shows what it shows: procrastination is a mental illness and the digital age isn’t helping things one bit.

I remember thinking ten years ago about how many kids I knew were on Ritalin and I wondered if too much stimulation—TV, radio, the Internet, cell phones, movies, music, games, well, you name it—wasn’t contributing to everybody having so much trouble paying attention. We know now that multitasking isn’t what it’s cracked up to be—it actually makes one slower—and I may not have been far from the mark according to the procrastination research.

So here’s what’s up: Chronic procrastination is more common than depression or phobias, and doesn’t affect any particular demographic. Rather, it affects people across racial, gender, and socio-economic lines:

“[I]t encourages depression, lowers self-esteem, causes insomnia, and indirectly affects health by discouraging visits to the dentist or doctor. Sufferers are also more likely to have accidents at home involving unmended appliances.”

They think procrastination is on the rise because of email, web-surfing, social networking, texting, YouTube, blogging, et cetera, et cetera.

But it’s not a new thing, not by a long shot. Time-wasters (”sufferers” of procrastination), they think, are hard-wired to be that way by evolution, by survival instinct. Back when we lived in caves, we only turned on the go-getter attitude when absolutely necessary, like when a saber-toothed tiger was staring us down, and hurrying the hell up suddenly mattered. So then, add this to list of human conditions as well: generally lazy until given a good reason to do something.

Take a good look at orangutans, how they lay about (you can see them on one of the Discovery channels), and then walk by a backyard with a hammock some time. Do you think there’s a difference?

It wasn’t really clear from the article about the study what was meant by “therapy.” When my grandmother was growing up, “therapy” entailed her parents taking switch to her backside. They didn’t know that causes other problems perhaps worse than laziness, which is why we (as a society) don’t do that anymore.

Today we use deadlines, and chronic procrastinators push the limits of those deadlines. Researchers say it’s not true when they tell themselves they work better under pressure; they just have selective memories and put those times they succeed in their mental pockets while conveniently forgetting the times they crashed and burned. One more human condition: We kid ourselves a lot.

How about a different, more radical proposal than trying to rewire a brain hardwired for energy conservation (i.e., chronic procrastinator)? How about we slow down and enjoy life from time to time? Maybe it’s the workaholic who’s crazy, instead?

Yeah, I know. Not gonna happen. I suppose brains are easier to rewire than entire achievement-driven societies.

Tags: Blogging, Business, Computers, Fun, Internet, News, Productivity, Ramblings, Technology by JasonLeeMiller - 19 Comments »

Here are some simple and basic tips that we can apply to become successful,

1. Let go off the Past, Act and Apply in the Present and Shape up the Future
2. Utilize your failures as a guidance towards success
3. Do not try. Trying is quitting when you are almost there. Just do it.
4. Make a list of your dreams. No matter how hard it might be to achieve just sit down and write all your dreams down.
5. Make a list of your goals and think how you can achieve them
6. Use negative feedbacks and criticism to your advantage and better yourself
7. If you want to be successful in someone else’s game ( if you have a boss ), play by their rules
8. Make a list of your value. What do you value most and build your success upon them
9. Keep personal time separate from business time
10. Your success depends on your achievements.

[Read more →]

Tags: Business, Internet, Life, News by Ritu B - 15 Comments »

Let’s talk about marketing a little today. This post is directed towards product and service marketing but if you tweak the information here a little, I am sure it can be applied in blogging as well.

Without a marketing strategy it is hard to gain the exposure you deserve. Whether it’s a blog or a billion dollar company, a marketing strategy is critical to tap into your target market and create the anticipation and desire among the readers and buyers. Without an effective strategy your business is like a cake without icing, it’s got the substance but no flavor to it.

That being said, I just wanted to focus on one most important aspect of marketing - Personalized marketing and it’s benefits. Let’s explore how personalized marketing can gain momentum for your business or firm. [Read more →]

Tags: Business by Ritu B - 4 Comments »

This concept of “link journalism” is interesting, like a more succinct version of blogging or Twitter. Link journalism is basically what Drudge does at the Drudge Report, and it’s proving a popular and powerful medium. Basically, it’s just watching the news and reporting what’s important or interesting by linking.

Sort of puts a new slant on that old “media doesn’t tell you what to think, just what to think about” tack. Of course, you’d have to trust the link source, not in the presumably mechanized, unbiased way Google collects links for Google News, but in an I-trust-his-bias type of way.

Drudge has gotten so powerful that he’s being credited with blowing Prince Harry’s cover in Afghanistan, even though the original stories were published in Australia and Germany and nobody noticed. They noticed when Drudge pointed them out, though. So that’s a credit.

In a way, Craigslist started as a kind of link journalism, just succinctly pointing to what’s going on. He sent out a list of hot spots via email in the beginning. Now, it’s a full blown classifieds business.

Tags: Blogging, Business, News, Social Networking, Technology by JasonLeeMiller - 5 Comments »

What is one thing that we need to do in order to be known? What is the secret to building contacts? How do we get to know people whose interest are similar to ours? How do we find people who can help us boost our business and/or traffic? You guessed it right - Network!

Networking doesn’t mean keeping tabs on everyone you’ve met since you were 5 years old. Networking is something that you do in order to build your contacts and resources that might benefit you and others in one way or the other. Some people are born with networking talents, they get out there and make friends easily whereas for some it is a learned act. I have learned networking the hard way. After running two small businesses both in the real world and on the internet and seeing two of my blogs die, I think I have learned some lessons on how to network to gain the most out of it.

Whether you are a born networking genius or a person trying to learn the ropes, we all know networking is the key to success and is critical to any business and the same goes for your blog, whether you run it as a business or hobby. Here are some tips on networking that I have found quite useful which has helped me gain contacts that are both influential and helpful when it comes to my blogging career.

#1. The key to effective networking is to figure out how you can help others before you ask for help. Remember when you start giving you start receiving, it might not be an immediate gain but with time it will happen. Lend a helping hand and when you are in need there will be a flood of people willing to help you out in a heartbeat.

#2. Keep track of your network. You might have come to known 50 bloggers in a month who belong to your networking circle. Not all 50 bloggers will be as effective or active within that circle. So try and group your network. Make a list of contacts that you are actively engaging in conversation or are sharing emails. These are the most valuable gem within your networking circle. So group your contacts according to their activity and interest level with you or your blog/business. Do not eliminate or get rid of other contacts though. You never know who you might need. [Read more →]

Tags: Blogging, Business by Ritu - 18 Comments »