Learning to Manage a Short Attention Span
I have always had a super short attention span, in life and in business. I have always looked at it as my major downfall. My mind is constantly turning, coming up with new idea’s, always seemingly better than the previous. I have been known to spend weeks and even months of tireless nights hacking away at building, designing, and eventually destroying or giving up to move on to the ‘next big idea’. I get bored. I live somewhere for a year and have to move to another city, state, or even country. I walk through life realizing how precious and short it can be and am scared to miss out on the world around me. I have many friends who envy this about me, but they don’t realize how crippling it can be.
Then I realized that it’s not crippling, or a downfall, or even a bad habit. I came across Jim Coudal’s theory on short attention spans. I’ve listened to people like Steve Jobs and other great entrepreneurs talk about it. Short attention spans drive creativity. I am in no means putting myself in the same category as Coudal and Jobs, but they have helped me realize that I can harness it, take control, and make it work in my favor.
Over the past year or so, I have been slowly taking control of my finances, health, career, and life with little steps in the right direction and re-designing myself to become the best ME I can possibly be. That originally what this whole blog is about. I will be doing a series of posts about ‘re-designing yourself’. I hope you can take out of it all that I did along the way.
I know I talk about thee guys alot, LOL. I promise I don’t work for them, though I wouldn’t mind it. Today, Mint has launched ‘investment tracking’ - I effing love these guys. The coolest financial management tool ever. period. and free!
It’s Been a While…
Productivity put to the test. I’ve had alot of really cool things I have been working on lately and have been focused very heavily on my finance management, hence the lack of regular posts. Like I metioned before, I only task about 3-5 major projects a day and sadly 29things hasn’t fell in those tasks. I’m on track to wrap up 3 major side projects this week, and have a whole slew of 29things posts to catch up on so stay tuned!
Mint.com FTW! Simple Money Management.
I’ve been on the lookout for the simplest, best money management web app I could find. I have tried them all, I promise you, and Mint takes the cake. I actually tried Mint for a bit after TC50 last year, and while I admired the beautiful design and simplicity, it still had a little work to go. Like most people and our to-do lists, we need to find something that works for us, makes it simple, and we need to commit. The same goes with managing our finances, and Mint has the tools to make it productive, useful, and fun. I’m sold! Actually, one of the best selling points is that it’s free. I will be posting some cool uses and hacks for Mint soon.
[BTW] The customer service is remarkable. I posted a comment on twitter about a problem accessing my account, and within minutes, the support team contacted me to help me with the issue.
Books Be Gone. Shed the Dust Collectors.
While based on a set of loose rules, I may have [around] 29 things, but in reality it is much more due to the fact that I consider my rather huge collection of books 1 thing. If I have ever had an interest in a particular subject, I have book or 10 of which I used to educate myself with. I love learn, and have probably bought well over 1000 [non-fiction] books in my short 27 years. I have constantly shed said books throughout my life, but manage to always have at least 100 at any given time. I have been an early, eager, and welcoming adopter of technology for 99% of things, but I have a bazaar intimate connection with the physical book that I could never have with an e-book, but I think I am starting to get over that, slowly however. But in all honesty, after I have read those books, all they do is collect dust and take up space. In a strange desire to rid myself of my final dangling collection of ‘things’, I have been listing all my books for sale on Amazon, save the ones that I know will be better off going to the local reseller and about 10 books that I have a sentimental attachment too and hope to pass on to the next generation.
Surprisingly, many have already sold and has added a small but nice chunk of income to my bank account. Are you still holding on to that final ‘thing’ or collection just collecting dust and taking up space? An old samurai proverb says “One shall make his decisions within the space of 7 breaths, It is a matter of being determined and having the spirit to break through to the other side”. Take your first breath, make a decision, and act.
Gadgets: Fitbit Debuted at TC50.
This has to be one of the coolest devices I’ve ever seen and judging by the talk from TC50, I’m not the only on who sees the value in it. Fitbit is a small wearable device that tracks your fitness and sleep habits. Using an acceloremeter similar to the one in the Nintendo Wii, it can accurately give you data on steps, miles walked, calories burned, the intensity of your exercise, how well, and how long you slept. When you get within 50 feet of the provided base-station, it automatically uploads all the data to your dashboard on Fitbits website.
Twitter’s Even Williams made a point on his blog that I really agree with: “I’m a firm believer that giving people data on their behavior will change their behavior”. And that pretty much describes the whole point behind Fitbit. Studies show that we often overestimate our exercise, and underestimate the calories we take in and how sedentary we are. Imagine if you look at your dashboard and see that you did nothing most of the day, taken in 3000 calories and only burned 300. How will that effect your daily fitness decisions?
This in $99 well spent. Preoders are being taken now at Fitbit.com and are expected to start shipping around the end of December / beginning of January.
Simple Finance Management for Kids: Shryk.com
I’m a huge fan of simple finance management web apps like Mint and Wesabe, but being a huge supporter of teaching children and teens about finance, those apps are totally geared to adults. Yesterday, Shryk.com debuted at TC50 as a platform focused on the age 5-24 crowd. Shryk describes itself as being focused on building financial literacy for the younger demographic to inspire a generation with entrepreneurial spirit and aid transition into adulthood. They also have an online 2.0 banking platform called iThryv with a cartoon-like interface for kids and cool tools for teens including a ‘savings score’ to promote good financial habits.
29things is a blog about lifestyle design, productivity, and entrepreneurship. Life is amazing and I don't want to spend 1/3rd of it in a cubicle. We are the architects of our existence.
