When a new business is created, someone had an idea to provide an income and be worth doing. No one starts a business, or should start a business with an idea which is distasteful. Any new business needs every opportunity to succeed, and if it is not fun for the owner, it will likely fail. Succeeding initially means long hours over a long period even before the doors first open, so a new business idea should be something one really wants to do.
As a business idea grows, it begins to flesh out and become real. Plans are formed around steps needed for value added item the business is going to produce. As plans are written out and looked over, new steps are added.
As opening day gets closer plans become more detailed as equipment, suppliers, requirements, location, customers base is finalized. For some business startups, some obvious details items are overlooked until it is discovered something is not working as it should. If anything pertaining to the business is changed, overlooked, or freshly discovered, the plan is updated as needed.
Eventually the doors open and enough time goes by when there are no surprises. No one is expecting the unexpected. One day, suddenly, without warning something goes wrong and a crisis is born. It may be anything from building problem, a utility matter, illness, or unforeseen supply problems going wrong when it is least expected.
Panic sets in and the business owner focuses on how to fix the problem. A solution is arrived at, implemented, and the crisis is under control. Everyone starts to relax, and shortly it is back to business as usual. Eventually something else happens, and the process of crisis recovery starts all over again.
 Running a business has a lot in common with day to day life although it is not obvious. Each of us in our own way is a start up business in some form. How successful we are in the business of our life, depends on how we manage unforeseen circumstances, and what we do to avoid repeat situations.
One of the tricks successful business use is periodic review. Review of what is done, how it is done, and can it be done better, is a continuing focus of successful business. This same process applied to our life can used to help us be more successful.
Reviewing our day, week, month, what ever length of time works in our life is a good habit to start. What should be reviewed is dictated by our unique and individual lives, but there are fundamental areas of our life we all should be monitoring.
What has been done for example. What was done in the last period of time in our review period. How did we improve our life, control personal resources, and limit stumbling blocks whenever possible. Could we have done anything better?
How is our time, money, and energy being used. Is there any slice of life which needs more time given to it. What is, or what has turned into a time waster(s) we can cease to do. Time wasters come in many forms, and a time waster for one person is time well spent for another. Knowing what is and is not important for us is a key to our success.
What was done well, and what could be done better is something we should learn and understand. We have interactions, arguments, and frustrations which we have handled very well. We also have days when we were not exactly a glowing example of the proper way to handle issues. Defining and understanding when we were doing our best, and those in which we were not allows us to prepare for the next time a similar problem starts to happen.
Living is a dynamic process; our individual life should not be managed by how we feel at the moment. Not feeling like doing something that needs to be done, is as bad as overdoing something that should have been ignored. Setting calendar review periods to review what is going on in our life provides better direction, and helps us learn so we better manage our life problems.
I am guessing like most people, you have defined your resolutions for the next year. How do they feel? Most likely your resolutions are maintenance type resolutions to take care of something with your physical self.
Resolutions such as losing weight, quitting something, or exercising more are common resolutions that are made each New Year. These resolutions are for the most part hollow, and generally groundless.
New Years resolutions are rarely followed over the whole year. The first days and weeks resolutions are fresh and part each days focus. As weeks three, four and beyond arrive, resolutions that were made so firmly, start sliding down the what is important today scale.
Should any of these resolutions really have been be made? Are any of these resolutions really important in life? Are those resolutions only space fillers or place holders, forgotten by the end of the month? Most importantly, do resolutions make anyone feel good way inside where it counts?
Perhaps it is time to make real choices that mean something, and will potentially make a real difference each and every day of the next year, and every year after. I suggest my rule of three to help make real resolutions. This rule of three creates a timeline of the year. Use the rule of three to split the year into: this week, this month, and this year.
 Instead of making resolutions, add value to your life this year and create intentions. An intention is to have a course of action, resolution is simply finding a solution but not acting on it. When creating your intentions, make intentions having a path making real changes in your life.
Pretend it is possible this next year may be the last year you will be alive. If the idea of this next year being your last year alive is scary, think about people you knew or heard of, who thought they would be here this year, making yet another list of resolutions to be forgotten after a few weeks. Being alive means accepting we may be one of those people that someone alive pauses to think about this time next year.
Now that resolutions are out and intention is in, it is time to take the next step. Look at your next week, starting tomorrow, the day after, or whatever day you pick as the start of your week. What can you do to make a real difference in your life that will make you feel and those around you feel good? What will you intend for the next month that can not be done in a week? What will you intend for the remainder of what may be your last year that you can not do in a day or a month? What changes can you bring into your life that will actually mean something.
Here is my New Years rule of three. What are you going to intend for the next week? What are you going to intend for the next month? What are you going to intend for the next year? Thinking in this way is acknowledging our mortality, and focusing our intentions in manageable periods. Combined in this manner intention becomes a powerful reality, and a life tool everyone can use.
Each of our lives are unique, as are our life situations. Below are some suggestions of what you may wish to intend in your life. Intention will improve your life, and the lives of all who will enter and leave your life next week, month, and year. Read these thoughts over and change them for use in your life or use them as starting points for totally new intents in your life.
Resolutions are generally weak and lead to yet another failure on the list of many. Thought out meaningful intentions are powerful life changing tools which make you grateful to be finally alive.
Here are some thoughts to help create intention for your personal use: Tell a parent, sibling, or friend what you really want to tell them; Find out peoples names who are peripheral in your life, and tell them how they change your life for the better by doing what they do; Be grateful and respectful to the once living things that are now your food; Learn about a people or culture you know nothing about; Learn more about your spiritual self.
Learn more about your religion and why you believe what you do; Read autobiographies, listen to audio books, or watch movies about people you admire; Learn another persons culture and beliefs; Create quiet time to be outside; Buy, plant, and care for a plant(s); Plant or place a potted flower in a needy public place and take care of it; Find someone you can help each _; Attend a church you have never been to; Eat a meal of food you have never eaten; Talk to strangers, strangers have something important to tell you about your life right now, ask them what it is. Look for ways to make a difference in someone’s life.
Here is an easy to remember thought: ‘To be resolute is to be unwavering, to intend is to have action and purpose. I create my life with intent.’
I had a visitor at my site last week who felt my posts on self help and life changing in general are hollow wasted words. I agree one hundred percent with their thought. In fact there is not one article, lecture, or event one can attend that will make the slightest difference in any ones life.
Self help is a space filler of hollow promises promoted by people chasing a fast profit. Perusing the internet for unhappy self help victims one can find many instances where the promise was not only not filled, but not even partially filled. Of course there are no refunds which further sparks the fire and fans the flames.
Go into the local bookstore and shelves are filled with books claiming they can help you make your life better. If you have read the ‘about’ page of this blog, you read a similar thought there. here is a quote from my about page, “I have a lot of life experience, so I feel I have something to share with you, that you may enjoy or benefit from. “
If you believe that nothing anyone writes, said to you, or tries to sell you, will make your life any different, you are absolutely correct. Nothing you read or hear will likely make any changes in your life. The idea of any self help material, no matter the source helping anyone is an illusion.
It does not matter if you manage to bring Lester Levenson back as your personal advisor, the Roman Catholic Pope moves in next door to be closer to you, Lillith appears because she is going to be your personal mentor, or the Dali Llama agrees to be your life guide. Anything anyone could provide for you is only so many words or ideas.
 This is the plain and ugly truth about self help. Nothing you can read or hear will help you. Your life is what it is and that is the end of it. Writing this certainly clears the air. Someone at last admits that every written or produced to improve your life is wasted effort. I am glad I went ahead and made this statement. If you are in agreement there is no need to read any farther. Nothing anyone can say will change your life.
However, I am glad for the person last week who took the time to make those comments. Perhaps this is the moment that needed to be said to me. Was I wrong seeking a way of living which improves my life? Maybe it was a mistake to get beyond anger, blame, and dislike. Maybe living my life would have been more rewarding by not trying to change it.
If I was happy living a life of anger, blame, and dislike, I think I would not have decided there was a better way to live and I was going to find it, or die trying. This beginning was frustrating and difficult. What books I read where written by people who never seemed to have to struggle once in their life, with the exception of the bible and we all know what happened there. What little changes I decided I could make in my own life seemed trivial and petty, and of no consequence.
I did not have a clue on how to make my life better. I started at the very beginning. The first thing I did was I admitted I knew nothing about living a happy contented life. Starting here I made small changes I hoped would make a difference in my life.
When I spoke with people who seemed to live a better life than I did, I listened to what they said about their life. I paid attention to their outlook, and expectations for their life. I especially listened to what they thought about themselves and other people in their daily life.
Life is a struggle from the moment of our conception. We struggle to grow enough to be born, we fight off disease when we have few tools to fight with. We struggle from the moment we drop onto the bed sheet. We struggle to learn how to take our first breath.
Life is a challenge, a struggle, an adventure, or an experience. Wether we are happy and enjoy our life or not, we are the person living it. We have the power to change our life, reshape, and remold it into a life we want.
All anyone has to do, is for a split second seriously ponder if there is a better way to live. That is the seed that starts the process of changing ones life into something we want to live. One second of wondering if there is a better way opens a portal, allowing all the help in universe to offer you a helping hand. Open your mind, reach out your arm, stretch out your hand and grab on, your new life is waiting.
Some poker game sessions are very good. Other times I may go home wishing I never sat down at the table to start with. I really enjoy those times when it seems no matter what I do the right cards fall and I win most of the hands I play. Of course I am unhappy when it seems I did everything right and the wrong result happened.
Winning too fast, or losing too fast is of one of the fundamentals of poker. Playing poker it is not how many hands you win in a session, but rather optimizing the hands you play to win as much money as possible from the hands you do win. Forget this concept, and you end up winning or losing quickly in a session, and losing over the long run.
There are times when I play when I am lucky to win one out four hands I play to the river, yet overall I am making a lot of money. There are other times when I play a lot of hands and I also win a lot of hands, but I am barely holding my own as far as staying on the winning side of poker.
One of the tools experienced poker players use is to monitor their variance. Poker not played well results in having a very large amount of money invested in what is essentially a poker game where you should lose much less. Managing, or reducing that amount is managing your variance.
According to a site, icoachmath.com variance is defined as: Variance is a statistical measure that tells us how measured data vary from the average value of the set of data.
 That may sound confusing if you are not a math person. I think of this as measuring or monitoring at certain times whether I am ahead or behind, and by how much. It is not uncommon to sit down at a poker table and win at a very high rate, sometimes three or more times the normal expected win rate of a good player. The opposite happens too, where a player finds themselves losing at the same rate.
When I play poker when I like to use variance as my poker gas pedal. If I am winning or losing at a rate much higher than normal I know my variance is over my average variance. When this happens I start to analyze what is going on. Is the opposition that bad, or that good? Am I getting more than my normal share of winning or losing hands? Am I making dumb mistakes and it is time to leave the table? Keeping tabs on reasons for variance at the poker table, helps keep your chips in front of you, and not in front of another player.
I also keep tabs on my variance in my life too. Life runs in cycles. Some days or weeks are very good, some days or weeks are terrible, though most days and weeks flow without any real ups or downs. It is when the variance in my life is quickly rising either on the upside or the downside that I stop to think about what is happening in my life.
Occasionally, especially when life is going well, we forget to keep an eye on ourselves. The same thing happens when life is not running so smoothly. In both instances it is important to recognize your variance is much higher than normal. When life is going smooth there is little variance in our day to day life, and we need not pay attention to our variance as it is about where it should be at any given moment.
When our life is not going that well, our decisions are sometimes made for the wrong reasons and do us more harm than good which sends our variance plummeting downwards from an already too low point from where we would prefer it. Our decisions are made out of frustration, childishness, not thinking of long term consequences, or just because. Later when our life slows down and we start thinking again, we realize that we were responsible for making a low point in our life worse than it had to be.
Check on your variance daily, and if it is going down, slow down and think of what is going on and how you can keep it from going lower. Spending some time thinking about what to do is a lot better than trying to fix problems from acting without thinking.
At times life is not all it could be. In fact, there will be times when it feels like your life absolutely stinks. For someone looking at your life, it might really be miserable to be you at the moment. Life is not fair, though if you are alive, you are way ahead of tens of thousands of people who will not wake up today.
Your life stinks, what are you going to do about it? If you are like most people, feeling like the world has abandoned you. If that is what you are doing with your life, it is no wonder your life is no good right now. You are not doing anything to make it any better, why should any one else care about your life.
If you want to do something about your life, but do not know what to do, I have a few thoughts that will help you. You must be willing to change those things in your life that you can do something about. It may be also be possible that right at the moment nothing can be done to improve your situation.
 If you are not happy with your life, what are you not happy with? What is your biggest problem or concern right now. What is your second biggest problem? What is the third biggest problem in your life? If you haven’t guessed by now, three problems is a good stopping point to get start fixing your life.
Is your most pressing or biggest problem something you created or are responsible for? If it is something you have created, it may be hard, but you can usually fix this biggest problem in your life. Your ego will argue with you, whispering whatever you did was the right thing to do, and you are not wrong. You should not have to fix anything. If this were true this would not be your biggest problem.
What about your second biggest problem? What is the real reason of this being your second biggest problem? Is it a separate problem or is is a continuation of your first problem? Occasionally smaller problems are a result of the bigger problems. Once again, is this a problem caused by something you did, or did not do you can work on to make it go away?
How about your third biggest problem? Is this problem a result of your biggest, or second biggest problem, or is it too a separate problem? Is there any link between this problem and your two bigger problems? Did this small problem create decisions you may have made that created your more important problems?
It may sound silly to think a small problem causes bigger problems, but it happens. Something happens and you do not tend to it thinking it will take care of itself or go away when it was something you really needed to take care of. Some time later because you did nothing, a second bigger problem is created. Ignore that, and another bigger problem looms on the horizon. Think bounced checks, traffic tickets, missed payments and so on.
Sometimes the biggest problems in your life are not your doing. There is no connection between your three biggest problems and you. When this happens you happen to be in a low point in your life. Everyone has them, and almost everyone gets over them. All you need to do is look to the future and allow your problems to run out of energy. As your problems run out of energy, they go away, and before you even realize it has happened, life will be good again.
If you have been reading my posts for a while you know I like things in three. Three is easy to remember and easy to do. Doing things by three feels natural and simple to do. Three is easy to do in sequence. More steps add confusion and get in a the way of the process needing to be accomplished.
Decision making and the rule of three is a simple way to categorize our options and choices which we use to make our decisions. We almost always have a choice to do something. We almost always have an choice to not do something. We generally have a choice of not making any decision.
Making a decision is an active process. Making a decision changes your life direction and is a proactive action. You are making a change to move your life in a certain direction. Making decision to not do something is an active process. Deciding to not do something is changing the direction of you life by eliminating a certain direction, or life path you could have taken.
Not making any decision is at best a semi-active decision. No choice is made to make a decision. Not making a decision – most of the time is correct – as long as any likely result is not important. Allowing friends on the spur of the moment to take you to lunch is an example of not making a decision. You don’t know what will be served, but you are going to eat something somewhere. Whatever you eat will nourish your body. It is only one meal; what the meal is comprised of does not really matter.
 Because we are the one making or not making a decision we are surrounded by the decision we need to make. Being at the center of a decision clouds our ability to make the best decision. Our ability to make better choices is clouded because we cannot see all the choices or option available to us. We can only see those options pressed upon us by those around us. We do not have the pleasure of stepping back and looking at our options from a more distant unbiased perspective.
A good example is when you are playing a game, verses watching someone else play a game. When playing a game you make continuous decisions based on what you see from your seat and what you did previously. Watching a game and observing what is happening, a different perspective is achieved.
Being able to watch from a distance allows you to see what is influencing the game direction. Being able to see what other players are doing and why allows you to make better decisions because you see more going on than you can see when playing in a game.
At times is not possible to stand back and see all your decision choices from a distance. The decision may be too serious, too emotional, or a decision needs to be made now, not later.
My rule of three in helping to make the best decision are:
1. Is it important? If it’s not important, whatever I decide makes little difference. I save my decision making for another time.
2. Of my remaining choices which decisions will cause the least harm to my life, family, or other peoples life’s?
3. Of my remaining choices, whether no matter what I personally think about it, which choice is best for my life and future life path?
When decisions are difficult and an easy choice is not present, using these three rules will help you to make choices that are the best choices you can make in the moment. Later if you find your decision was not the best you could have made, there may be a possibility of modifying your previous decision to something better.
In any case use what you learned from previous decisions for the tough decision you have to make using little information. If you know you tend to make bad decisions when you have to make quick decisions, postpone your decision as long as you can. If you find you do not consider all possibilities, share your decision with someone you trust.
Someone you trust may not agree with your decision, but they will provide you with options you may not have considered. Making decisions by a rule of three allows each of the three options to become more valuable by modifying any or all of the three choices of decision making on your past decision making learnings. As you refine your options your decisions become better. As your decisions become better, you will have less decisions to make.
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Running a business has a lot in common with day to day life although it is not obvious. Each of us in our own way is a start up business in some form. How successful we are in the business of our life, depends on how we manage unforeseen circumstances, and what we do to avoid repeat situations.
