I am a lazy ass. I can’t deny that about myself. I leave things to the last minute, I go onto Facebook, WLM and just let myself get distracted. I’m the typical university student. I mean, the only reaon I’m writing this article is because I didn’t write one yesterday, so I’m doubling up on my load today, just so I can complete the EzineArticle Hundred Day Challenge thing.

Anyway. I figured sometime earlier this year that if I really want all the things I want, you know, high marks in my degree, successful Internet Marketing business online, all that sort of thing, I’ve really got to be more productive and get more stuff done.

God knows that we are always beggars of time, each and every one of us. One of the biggest reasons we pursue the Internet Marketing dream is because we want more time to do what we want. Yet we procrastinate endlessly. In that sense, we are too frivolous with our spare time. We make spare time unknowingly. There are so many parallels with money and the fact that the value of time changes depending on the situation is no surprise.

What I’ve done in the past to try and make myself get more stuff done is to remove distractions. For example, if I’m doing my homework on this laptop, I exit WLM, Facebook, Skype… anything from which I can get distracted or anything from which my friends can contact me. I try to reason with myself by saying that if I get this done now, I have more time to do more important stuff later. The reasoning hasn’t been that effective, as I have found myself still procrastinating.

The times when I have been the most productive is when I’ve been motivated by fear. I was doing a programming subject in 2009 and because I don’t have an eye for detail, I was scared that I would fail. After my 2nd exam, I studied about 30 hours in the following 5-6 days to make sure I would pass. That subject turned out to be my highest and I was stoked.

I don’t want to have to raise my heart rate every time I want to get stuff done. I have a friend who studies extremely well. She does thing ahead of the due date and I believe it is just her habit. I guess making it a habit is the ideal goal, but I’m sure there are some steps leading up to it that make it a lot easier to establish that habit.

There is something from an Internet Marketer called Jason Fladlien. He has a report for article marketers and he has a bonus in which he does something called “time folding” and uses NLP techniques to work such that he “tricks” his mind to enjoy otherwise tedious work. I think this is an important point to address: your attitude going into the activity. Regardless of if you remove all distractions, if your mind’s not on the job, your progress will be slow. You want to be distracted. I’m thinking of investing in it just for this bonus.

Was just thinking about what else I could write about today. I was doing an assignment last night til 3:30 am in the morning, so I didn’t do my daily 400-500 words. I had a realisation that just felt right during university. If you’ve been reading my posts/articles for the last few days, you would have noticed that they lack some direction and focus. I was more writing for the sake of writing and grabbing some nice readers and SEO in the process. I got my first EzineArticles comment today from a REAL person.

At any rate, I decided to talk about a video that I watched on TED.com a while back. TED showcases some amazing speakers and performances from around the world, enlightening and delighting people of all ages, generations and backgrounds. I was watching a video about an Indian artist called Raghava KK. His video, which I’m still trying to embed at this point in time talks about his “5 lives” that he lived through.

Have a watch of the video. It is quite interesting and his cartoons are provocative, in-your-face and entertaining. There will be a part in the video that you might or might not pick up on. It’s the bit where he talks about his decline from fame after his cartoons started turning ugly. In any other “normal” person, this would have been a big deal. He swept it off as if it was nothing and continued on talking about his next “life”.

Stop and have a think about it. Someone reaches the dizzying heights of fame, mixing with the celebrities and stars and suddenly it’s all gone. I don’t know about you, but I would feel pretty bummed; people who you thought were you friends turned out to just be using you since you were the “it” man at the time. Old friends who might know you might have dumped you if they got too jealous or if you simply lost touch with them.

It was interesting to see that his wife actually stayed with him. It says a lot about our society that is so focused on fame, recognition and glory, simply for the purposes of satisfying one’s ego. The fact that experiencing fame and losing it breaks a lot of healthy relationships you have with people is sad. The fact that it’s considered the norm is even sadder. But I guess that’s how our society is structured.

In an ideal world, it would be awesome if people were constants. You were their friend or lover because you like or love them for their Essence and not who they are as a bundle of expectations tied together. Because really, it isn’t that big a deal if you’re not popular. The real damage comes from yourself when you’re telling yourself that because you have no friends, there must be something wrong with you.

The ego is a dangerous thing and it’s pretty easy to get sucked into what people expect of you. The hardest part is breaking free from those expectations and leading a different life. It’s not as simple as giving it all up one day. You can’t help but feel as if you would be disappointing too many people.

If you’re a beginner blogger, one of the best things you can do is get a domain, buy hosting and start blogging about whatever you feel like blogging about. It’s simply a matter of sticking to a certain goal of writing 500 words a day, everyday. This is good for the blog since it gives it content that gets natural SEO and more importantly, if you really write from the heart, then people are going to find you and become a fan of your work.

What you write doesn’t even have to be that crash hot. As long as you have a clear message and you know how to best convey it to your ideal audience then that’s all you need. Once you do get good enough to have a following, you will be noticed by other bloggers. If they like what they read, they will link to you.

More often than not, you will find that for certain topics, they will tend to link to you more simply because they like how you write. The content itself might be mediocre and not garner much of a response from either your audience or the other blogger’s.

It’s a prime example of blogging or writing for someone else and not yourself. It is essentially Marketing 101 as well. There is a demand and there is a supply. Your audience demands a certain kind of content from you. You’re supplying content, but who is your audience that you’re satisfying?

A. Pro-bloggers

B. Your niche audience

There is nothing wrong with getting excited about massive traffic spikes when an article of yours gets picked up by a massive blog that you read and look up to. You’ve just got to make sure that when the readers land on your site, you convert them in a way. The spikes come and go. So do the readers. Make sure that you form a relationship with them ASAP so that your blog becomes a long-term lead generation device, in essence.

That’s a whole different topic altogether. The focus of this article is to get your content in front of the eyes of the people who you want it to be read by. Write like how you talk. Write personally. Tell a story. Don’t ask too much or come off as desperate. Most of all, write as if they’re not there. Write for the sake of writing. It’s not a competition or a race. Your blog is about you and people will come to appreciate that in the long run. That’s what will keep them coming back for more.

There was a pretty big turn out; the executive committee were all at the front of the room, going through the proceedings. After all the administrative stuff had been gone through, the fun started.

First, peopled voted for the president and vice-presidential positions. As soon as the new vice-president had been celebrated and sat down, the officer called the nominees for treasurer to stand up and walk to the front.

There were four of us. Two of the guys were friends of mine. The former vice-president, who I’d been studying Japanese for 2 years with, made me give my short speech about why I should be the new treasurer first.

Out came my prepared stuff: I’d studied Japanese for 15 years, I was a freelance writer who clients from overseas so I could manage money well, I had important ties with the executive committee of other university clubs, etc…

I went out of the room and called the next guy in. As soon as all four of us had made our speeches, we nervously waited outside as we anticipated the result, each hoping that we were about to be congratulated.

I was pretty confident but alas, I was apparently short one vote from handling the finances of the Japanese club. The guy who got it was the second guy right after me.

He looked pretty flustered right after his speech. He said he froze up there and didn’t know what to say. Yet, he got the position. I didn’t ask him why, but as the proceedings continued, I pondered as to why this might have happened.

Then it hit me. I didn’t actually talk about what I would do about the club. As fun-loving as the people who were part of the club were, they ultimately wanted someone who put the club before themselves first to make sure that it continued to run as effectively as it did. I crapped on about how good I was yet I left out some stuff that I had prepared earlier about how the finances would be managed well by me since I knew the ex-treasurer well.

It’s like how I’m writing for you guys right now. I know who you are, or so I’d like to think I do. I told a story to draw you guys in and put you in my position and now I’m tying it in with the moral to the story so that there is a link back to Internet Marketing (pretty clever, huh?).

Know who you’re talking to. It doesn’t matter if you have the best message in the world, it ain’t the best if it isn’t conveyed properly to the right audience. That’s right. It’s not just about what you say, it’s about how you say it too (are you guys OK with me using “ain’t” just then?).

And I had a mini-epiphany.

I always considered myself a fighter, not a lover. Most of the things in my life had to be won.

I succumbed to my porn addiction that I said I would beat. I made a promise and I willingly broke it.

I’ve realised there’s little point in saying to myself, “this is the last time” or feeling disgusted and disappointed with myself afterwards… it’s bound to happen again.

So instead of resisting, suppressing or fighting, I started doing what I do best and I started thinking.

I identified a pattern amongst those three words, resisting, suppressing and fighting. All three suggest that whatever it is, it’s stronger than you.

That’s where it all really starts, doesn’t it? The initial way of perceiving it. Most anti-addiction therapy groups treat it this way.

I wonder: is it something you can ever recover from or beat (even those two words suggest that you’re being dominated)?

One of the more common ways to beat it is to ignore it and deny its existence. That’s like having a burning house; if you ignore it, it won’t go away. It will keep burning and take you down with it.

People tend to hide addictions. They do this out of shame. What they don’t get is that hiding it lets it grow, since it is essentially denying its existence.

This is why there are anti-addiction groups, I guess. You talk about it with people who have the same problem.

If you keep succumbing to it, like I do, it does tend to feel stronger than you, at times. Who doesn’t love falling into temptation once in a while? It only gets bad when it involves loved ones.

So here’s my theory: regardless of whether it’s stronger than you or not, by hiding it, it’s always going to be there. Think of exposure as sunlight burning it away.

1. Get it out in the open: love it, in the sense that it’s a part of you. As soon as you see it as yours and taking ownership of it, the sooner you can get rid of it. Hiding it will only keep it closer to you.

2. Rewire your neural circuity to do something else: if you feel the urge, set something else productive to do. Work out, do homework, do yoga, whatever. Make it a habit.

3. Remember yourself: Picture yourself standing somewhere else in the room, looking at yourself as you’re about to commit the deed. Acknowledge the feeling, but don’t let it take control. Embrace it.

Take it day by day. You are better than it is.

I’m not going to regurgitate the contents of that post here. I want to ramble about what went through my mind as I was reading it and the mini-epiphany I had.

So. In this post, Mark cited one GI Gurdjieff, who talked about the difference between Essence and Personality of Man. In my own words, this is what I took from the post:

Essence: is a man when he strips himself bare to the soul and is entirely true to himself (whatever that means).

Personality: is a man with the expectations and opinions of the World oppressed upon him. More often than not, this culminates to become the Ego.

And it’s the Ego that I want to talk about.

For anyone who is keyed into themselves, they will be aware that their Ego is something to rid themselves of if they want to advance in any area of their life. If they can do this, there won’t be any mistakes or discouragement, or failures… only Beauty.

(Click here to check out someone who does this in her artwork)

What I’m getting to is the clash between Entrepreneurship and Ego that I struggle with.

I’d like to see myself as an Entrepreneur, even though I’ve done nothing remotely remarkable (yet). I’m full of Ideas, virtually none of which have been crystallised (yet). When I make excuses to myself, I’ve realised that they predominantly revolve around my Ego.

For example, whenever I meet someone younger than me who has that success that I want, I experience Tall Poppy Syndrome when in reality, I can still be classified as young, at least compared to the people who discover their Entrepreneurial Edge later in life. I fear joining the Entrepreneur group at uni, in case I find someone who is “better than me”.

And that’s where the core of it lies: the “better than me” mentality. Why are they better than you? Because they earn more than you do? Because they have the attitude that you lack?

No. They’re better than you because you’re leting your Personality and Ego get in the way of your Cause. What happens if your Cause was based on P & E from the get go? Well, depending on when you realise it or whether you realise it or not altogether, you could be heading for a Crisis.

I’d like to think that my Causes are noble: being enough of a Man to support myself and those I love, ending or at least lessening the ravages of global poverty, etc.

It’s this latter Cause that I’m concerned about. Whenever I think about it, I always imagine myself receiving awards and recognition. Yet there are thousands of people who do it everyday as volunteers or on  a grander scale without any obligation.

I mean sure, if it ever does happen, millions will benefit, which is never a bad thing, but I think I’ve got to dissociate my Causes related to Ego from my Causes related to Essence and somehow shift the Noble ones over to the Essence side of things.

It ain’t gonna be easy, but I think I’ve gotta start living in the moment more and let my Essence speak for me, not my Ego.

1. Get Your Ex Back

2. Weight Loss

3. Building Muscle

4. Seduction

5. ???

These are the ones I thought of just off the top of my head. Any more you might care to add?

Yep... pretty pathetic, I know...