Lately I’m been enjoying online tunes through Pandora Radio. An old school techie, Jay Coley, President of Editware who began his computing days with punch cards for memory (?!!?!? dinosaur days!) turned me on to this site.

You type in some group you like and it finds music that’s similar to it. Basically, you can customize your own radio station because you can tell it you like or dislike certain songs. The site is easy to use and has been playing for hours for me.

The station I listen to the most is based on Thievery Corporation, a groovy mix of beats and rhythm.

The seventy-third issue of the Project Simplify newsletter The Simplifier is now archived on our newsletter archives page.

Here is a brief summary of the contents:

1. A Note From Shawn
Chargin’ women doing awesome stuff
2. Our Featured Quote
by Suze Orman
3. Interview: Gayle Greco - Creating a Healthy Business
by PS Head Simplifier Shawn Tuttle
4. Your Simplification Tip
Recognizing the right people for your business
5. In the News
Add Organization - Subtract Stress; Slow movement gains pace as architects inject soul into affordable new homes; Church(es) practice environmental stewardship
6. Featured at ProjectSimplify.com
New on the Blog
7. Keep Smiling
This Makes Me Laugh, dot com

Read the full issue here.
Subscribe to The Simplifier here.
[posted by Lance]

Sorry - technical difficulties kept this from getting posted on-schedule yesterday.

By the time we are done, you’ll have a cleared off desk, your foundation containers set-up (Easy Access Station, reference binder, etc) and “defined”, a maintenance system, and a file map to whip your files into shape.

On-site: (2) three hour sessions (Nevada County area)
On-phone: (6) one hour sessions

6 hours @ $60/hour would normally be $360. Special $300

Offer ends on October 31st.

Call Shawn @ 530.205.5775 or email.

Last week I did a workshop covering the Natural Professional foundation. I was fortunate to have an engaged, responsive group.

One of the things I wondered about afterward was the feasibility of dividing a group, OR offering two different versions: one for the lefty brains and one for the righty brains. My concern was that near the end of our two hours, we were covering material fairly quickly. There were three lefties sitting right in front of me and I could tell they were right there, following my train of thought, taking the tips that would work in their world view, letting the rest float off.

The rest of the group… what was happening for them? If I pick up the pace, I risk losing the folks who do better with a more experiential or visual learning process. As a workshop leader, I never want to look out and see glazed eyes reflecting a brain screaming, “information overload!!”

Short answer is: don’t speed up at the end =)

Longer answer begins to point toward the question, “how to pack 24 hours of material into 2 hours?” But that’s not so practical so maybe the question should be, how to better convey a truckload of info in a fascinating and engaging manner such that it fuses into the very cells of my listeners. A sort of magical and mystical expansion of the Natural Professional awareness that comes complete with an integrated understanding of the strategies, tools, and methods to employ. OK. Getting a little off track and unrealistic here?

In any case, it brings me back to a more storytelling type of approach. A couple of months ago I went to the Sierra Storytelling Festival where Willy Claflin closed out the Friday night session with a most hilarious story (of sorts) about how it was Martha, and not George (Washington) who invented the kazoo. (Pardons to Willy if I’m remembering it wrong, but geez! My ears may not have been working properly as my stomach hurt from laughing so much. If I had been drinking anything, it surely would have splurted out my nose and into the hair of the woman sitting in front of me. Her companion, a large bulk of a man who was blocking the view of the person sitting directly behind him surely would have protested to such a dousing of his companion’s curls and who knows what he’d have been moved to do?! If he was as engaged in Willy’s story as I was, he’d have been quite peeved to have attention so unexpectedly wrenched from listening. The situation would have escalated to some yelling and shouting, which would have, no doubt, turned people’s heads. The event producers surely would have frowned on this as the Hulk was not on the program for the evening. It would have been awkward. Which is why I’m thrilled to not have been drinking anything while enjoying Willy’s performance.)

I love that the workshops are a work in progress, forever to morph, grow, and improve. A fun and satisfying vehicle to connect with people everywhere. Onwards!

This article was originally published in The Simplifier #72.

—

Article: Trying to Contain Your Enthusiams

By Shawn Tuttle

It’s back-to-school time and kids are getting supplies for the new year. Have you, too, been picking up organizing supplies for an office that “slipped away” over the summer? Perhaps you’ve been hoarding creatively-labeled files, containers for rogue papers, and sticky notes to capture random thoughts?

In terms of organizing, the concept of “containers” is seemingly easy to get. (So easy, you might not even call it a concept.) This container is for pens, that one for paper clips, this one for files. You sort things and store them in containers. What else do you need to know? Well, we all know containers are a key tool for organizing; however, most people have unleashed only a fraction of their power. One of the functions for which they are often overlooked is as productivity tool. Properly used, containers help you increase efficiency and focus while decreasing muddle time (i.e., time that slips away while looking for things or piddling around in low-priority activities.)

I often hear people say, “I’ve tried a bunch of different systems and they just don’t stick.” That’s because they don’t realize it’s not about the container. 

For one thing, containers are much more than just things you buy at your local office supply store. The store may provide you with the means, but you supply the meaning. You might ask, “What meaning?” The meaning behind the container, where you’ll find the smoothly-running systems that (should) keep your office in order. Integrated systems help you combine form with function – they reflect you, your work style, your type of work, and your space.

Learning from your kitchen
You know how important it is to have the right tools for the job. You don’t use a hammer to screw in a bolt, right? Giving the individual parts of your office the same respect will also have positive results.

The “rules of use” of a container needs to be specifically defined. If this seems a little confusing in terms of the office, let’s take a look at the kitchen, where there are many examples of clearly-defined containers:

A couple of years ago, David Allen (of Getting Things Done fame) offered a 2 minute timer to assist people in sticking with the 2 minute rule when processing their inbox. He charges $10 for this which was $10 more than many bloggers and programmers were willing to pay for what is, apparently to them, an easy little piece of code that could be whipped out in about 2 minutes.

Hence, a number of freebie downloads. Here are 2, one for Mac and one for PC. I haven’t used the PC version since I don’t use my PC more than once a month, but LifeHacker liked it and that’s good enough for me.

Free downloads for a 2 minute timer:
Timer for Mac (click here for download page) by Cocoa developer Dan Messing at StuntBlog. This timer doesn’t make a really loud ding at the end of two minutes so you may want to have the volume turned up.

Timer for PC (click here for download page) by Blogger Avesh Jain
Who got a stylin’ write up on LifeHacker as the download of the day back in June 2006.

Here’s a sweet gem from a fellow mobile worker (I hadn’t seem him there before) at the cafe today. He saw me brainstorming with pen and large piece of paper and he said:

“I did that recently for a project. I had all this info about it in my head. I was working with a coach and he suggested I write it all down on a big piece of paper. So I took this 4ft piece of freezer paper (is this like butcher paper??) and got everything out of my head. I slept so well that night!! I’d been having trouble sleeping because I was thinking about all this and that night I slept great!

“Then my coach told me to highlight with yellow all the things that needed to be done that I really loved to do–the stuff I really dig doing. Then I highlighted the rest of the things that needed to get done with blue that I didn’t care for as much. My coach told me to sub-contract out all the blue.

“I’ve been doing that and this project is just sailing along like you wouldn’t believe…”

That conversation made for quite the rockin’ coffee break! Thanks, mystery man at the cafe today!