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Hi I have 2 questions: 1) If you are being overwhelmed by the amount of books you are being suggested by mentors, entrepreneurs and others, how do you tackle

Hi I have 2 questions: 1) If you are being overwhelmed by the amount of books you are being suggested by mentors, entrepreneurs and others, how do you tackle this information overload so that you only read and implement the ones which would have the most impact in your life ? 2) What would you do if you had recent failure and now you don't have enough clarity about goals, life direction and the skills you wanna learn to succeed ? I'm 22/non-technical and got little bit of savings from sales commission I earned through online stuff after dropping out from my undergrad program. The money that I made from online sales was higher than the money I could had made from the job in next 10-12 yrs after getting my undergrad degree. So that sales thing is now busted and I was naive enough to believe that the sales gig would last long but it lasted only 1.5 yrs. I had no team at the time, didn't knew much about marketing, startups etc. It was just self employed thing. I'm living in asia. Although I could still start that sales thing again cuz now I know alot more, but it would be just like a commission you get. Should I work on some other idea/startup or get some skills before I do something. Right now I know little bit of sales/marketing. What do you suggest ?

FameofLight 15y ago
1) This is very common problem, everybody has problem of information overload. Its not possible to read all the book, read all the blog post etc you get the idea. We are always worried by not reading a particular book, we are missing on something important. Our mind try to deceive us whenever we are doing something that we are losing on something else, it will try to bump some idea so that you get off the work, its afraid that he might lose the control on you. Solution: The main point here is taking back the control, when you are doing something and your mind tells that you are missing, or I have this another great idea. Ask him objectively what is the great idea or what I am missing, if he can answer your question, write it down in your notebook and politely say to him that I know you are trying to help me, I have duly noted down your suggestion / idea will work on it once I am done with the current stuff I am doing. About books , blog , videos etc, I know I can find the something useful if I go find the dustbin again. The idea here is pick some gem, pick your books / blogs very acutely. Now trust that the book you are reading is sufficient and good and if you need to know anything other than this one, you will bumped by difficultly when you will be needed to know. I think the whole problem arise when we try to use books as Textbooks not as helpbooks, when we try to find the exact method in books not direction where to go from current situation.
FameofLight 15y ago
For second problem, I would advice you, encourage you to go finish the undergrad if possible. If its not possible, don't worry its not the end of the world. When I don't know what are my goals and dreams, I help others to accomplish there dreams and goals, that's really a great starting point. Go help some startup use your skills to further their goals and nourish your skills.
mikegreenberg 15y ago
Apologies for the slow reply. I had an unexpectedly busy weekend. Much as has been said, information overload is a real problem we subject ourselves to. The way I help cull this wicked overflow is by using "systems"... or any method or tool which helps regulate flow. It's important to realize the fixed set of resources we each have available to us. The king of these is time. Managing it is topic I'll leave to experts. But we consciously decide to use a portion of our available time to improve ourselves in various capacities. And the trick is to use systems to maximize the efficiency of our learning during the time we dedicate. Some examples: We browse an ungodly amount on the web. Usually without purpose. I use an RSS reader to improve my efficiency. Not only does it let me control the inputs by subscribing only to the content I'm interested in, but it lets me eliminate most of the distractions that being on their website would introduce (ads, links to other parts of their site, comments, etc). And as a bonus, my RSS reader tracks my usage...so now I know which sites I really read so I can regularly trim the fat and optimize my reading schedule around the parts of the week when the interesting content gets published. Another example: Email is burden for everyone. Having a good email client that you know REALLY well and fits into your routine will help tremendously. My email client provides me an incredible backlog of my activity on the internet which I keep for reference. I use filters to automatically sort this information for me. Important contacts, social activity, purchases, subscriptions, marketing, spam...all divided up automatically with the relevant portions being pushed to my phone as needed. (Yep, my phone doesn't notify me of just any email...just ones on my "VIP" list. Now I can help emergencies as needed and deal with my regular email zeroing once or twice a day.) Books are something I don't particularly deal with because of the long commitment required to get through them. I'll try to find an abridged version of an audiobook if it's HIGHLY recommended. I can't think of any particularly good suggestions on how to get through them quickly aside from scanning them in the bookstore and deciding if you want to invest a week of your time getting through one or not. Regarding your "clarity about goals", I don't think anyone is ever 100% certain about the direction they should be going in until they have enough experience to know that's the right way to go. You're young and being worried about the "right way" is pretty natural. And I've found that the time you spend "idling" and figuring out the best possible route could cause you to miss some interesting opportunities. Don't spend too much time on the decision. You're looking at the problem from the perspective of "these are my skills, how can I use them?" Instead, you should be asking "Of the opportunities I have in front of me, which would I most regret not doing?" It's how I try to frame my decision making and sometimes it helps make a difficult decision an easier one to live with in the long run. Worst case scenario, most of the time you'll be able to double-back and find a way to go down the "other path" if you're disappointed with results. Hope this helps. :)

FameofLight 15y ago

1) This is very common problem, everybody has problem of information overload. Its not possible to read all the book, read all the blog post etc you get the idea. We are always worried by not reading a particular book, we are missing on something important. Our mind try to deceive us whenever we are doing something that we are losing on something else, it will try to bump some idea so that you get off the work, its afraid that he might lose the control on you. Solution: The main point here is taking back the control, when you are doing something and your mind tells that you are missing, or I have this another great idea. Ask him objectively what is the great idea or what I am missing, if he can answer your question, write it down in your notebook and politely say to him that I know you are trying to help me, I have duly noted down your suggestion / idea will work on it once I am done with the current stuff I am doing. About books , blog , videos etc, I know I can find the something useful if I go find the dustbin again. The idea here is pick some gem, pick your books / blogs very acutely. Now trust that the book you are reading is sufficient and good and if you need to know anything other than this one, you will bumped by difficultly when you will be needed to know. I think the whole problem arise when we try to use books as Textbooks not as helpbooks, when we try to find the exact method in books not direction where to go from current situation.

FameofLight 15y ago

For second problem, I would advice you, encourage you to go finish the undergrad if possible. If its not possible, don't worry its not the end of the world. When I don't know what are my goals and dreams, I help others to accomplish there dreams and goals, that's really a great starting point. Go help some startup use your skills to further their goals and nourish your skills.

mikegreenberg 15y ago

Apologies for the slow reply. I had an unexpectedly busy weekend. Much as has been said, information overload is a real problem we subject ourselves to. The way I help cull this wicked overflow is by using "systems"... or any method or tool which helps regulate flow. It's important to realize the fixed set of resources we each have available to us. The king of these is time. Managing it is topic I'll leave to experts. But we consciously decide to use a portion of our available time to improve ourselves in various capacities. And the trick is to use systems to maximize the efficiency of our learning during the time we dedicate. Some examples: We browse an ungodly amount on the web. Usually without purpose. I use an RSS reader to improve my efficiency. Not only does it let me control the inputs by subscribing only to the content I'm interested in, but it lets me eliminate most of the distractions that being on their website would introduce (ads, links to other parts of their site, comments, etc). And as a bonus, my RSS reader tracks my usage...so now I know which sites I really read so I can regularly trim the fat and optimize my reading schedule around the parts of the week when the interesting content gets published. Another example: Email is burden for everyone. Having a good email client that you know REALLY well and fits into your routine will help tremendously. My email client provides me an incredible backlog of my activity on the internet which I keep for reference. I use filters to automatically sort this information for me. Important contacts, social activity, purchases, subscriptions, marketing, spam...all divided up automatically with the relevant portions being pushed to my phone as needed. (Yep, my phone doesn't notify me of just any email...just ones on my "VIP" list. Now I can help emergencies as needed and deal with my regular email zeroing once or twice a day.) Books are something I don't particularly deal with because of the long commitment required to get through them. I'll try to find an abridged version of an audiobook if it's HIGHLY recommended. I can't think of any particularly good suggestions on how to get through them quickly aside from scanning them in the bookstore and deciding if you want to invest a week of your time getting through one or not. Regarding your "clarity about goals", I don't think anyone is ever 100% certain about the direction they should be going in until they have enough experience to know that's the right way to go. You're young and being worried about the "right way" is pretty natural. And I've found that the time you spend "idling" and figuring out the best possible route could cause you to miss some interesting opportunities. Don't spend too much time on the decision. You're looking at the problem from the perspective of "these are my skills, how can I use them?" Instead, you should be asking "Of the opportunities I have in front of me, which would I most regret not doing?" It's how I try to frame my decision making and sometimes it helps make a difficult decision an easier one to live with in the long run. Worst case scenario, most of the time you'll be able to double-back and find a way to go down the "other path" if you're disappointed with results. Hope this helps. :)