I was out of town without the second brain (i.e. laptop) over the weekend, hence no clean desk report. I was in Oakland, California for the 20th Anniversary party for the Celebrator Beer News journal. More specifically, I was helping out with a silent auction that raised funds for the California Small Brewers Association (CSBA).

While there, I tried a couple of beers. My favorite by far was from the Duvel booth. It was a sour stout–I’ve never had anything like it and I should dare to hope to have it again =).

Which is saying something as I haven’t been much of a beer drinker in my years. That must have come across to the auction coordinator, Tom McCormick (also the Director of CSBA). At one point, probably in response to my ignorance of the brewery names he was talking about, he asked, “Do you like beer?” pause… “I like goodbeer,” I replied, thinking about the kegs of nastiness that flowed freely during my college days. His response, “That was the correct answer.” Booya!

To wrap up the clean desk report, today I spent all of 5 minutes at my desk, and the second brain is downstairs for some tech logistical issues, hence a super clear desk.

In the blossoming adventures of speaker-dom, I’m looking to raise awareness of my business in the local geographical area. Up to this point, I’ve solely relied on word of mouth (and the occasional newspaper articles) to spread the word.

This month I joined the Grass Valley/Nevada County Chamber of Commerce. I figure this ought to provide some good opportunities to share the ease and benefits of simplifying in front of groups (or one-to-one).

I’m in the Organizing Services category which is good, however they lump household and business together which can be a bit misleading. Seeing as there are only three of us in the category, further breakdown wouldn’t be too practical. I’m guessing the other two are more residential-oriented, though one is a concierge service and the other doesn’t provide a description, so I’m not sure.

We’ll see where it leads and what opportunities arise. =)

I just stumbled across the Small Business Trends blog which had a post called Top Experts Dish with their Best Kept Marketing Secrets from last month.

The overarching theme had to do with relationships–listening and service. Gone are the days of “low prices” as the way to go.

Here’s the one that particularly caught my eye:

Scott Ginsberg, That Guy with the Name Tag – “Don’t have a business card. Have a philosophy card. In order to do so, ask yourself the question, ‘If everybody did exactly what I said, what would the world look like?’ Come up with 5-10 answers, then print them on a nice, thick, laminated card. Include your contact info, picture, branding, etc. Give it to EVERYBODY. It will be the only card they will not throw away. This marketing tool has made me well over $50,000 in new business.”

An interesting way to share with others the grand visualization of your service to the world. Nice!

This morning I was experiencing low motivation to get out of bed. As I lay there, completely comfortable and snuggled in, I wondered if I’d be able to tell the difference between being overrun by an ego who wanted to uselessly mind wander vs. simply being tired in which case some more sleep would be a good thing.

I opted for overruling the ego and was on the yoga mat within 10 minutes. Ahhh. Happy to be up getting the energy flowing! After yoga, 15 minutes of meditation–well, kind of. I tell ya, the ole noggin’ was not cooperating this morning. Sitting was similar to laying in bed–I felt bombarded by all kinds of out of place thoughts (meaning, appropriate during other activities) and had a heck of a time relaxing my mind. Leaves me feeling kind of spun out–and it’s not even 8:30am yet.

Over a cup of chai, I read an article in Inc magazine called “Bill Zanker Never Wants to Come Down” about the ambitious leader, Zanker, of the Learning Annex. I knew the Learning Annex to be a source of day long seminars. It’s changed since he bought it back from his former partner in 2002. Now, in addition to seminars, they put on those huge, convention center sized, big hype, “get rich”, weekends featuring Tony Robbins and Donald Trump.

I’ve never seen Tony Robbins do his thing. Sounds like it’s quite a performance. Thousands of people jumping up and down screaming at the top of their lungs indicates some darned persuasive motivation, indeed. What they were experiencing, Robbins’ calls the “peak state”. And this is the way to change your life, living in a peak state. Find a trigger to get yourself back into it, and ride that emotion to a new life. It’ll probably be a physical activity or movement as “emotion is created by motion” he says.

That does bring up an interesting concept. Can you imagine someone pumping themselves up in the cereal aisle at the grocery store in an attempt to get back to their peak state? Maybe they were being drawn to a sugar cereal and they knew that they’d want the healthy variety if they were tapping into their potential in their peak state. What if 10 people in the grocery store were doing this? Someone in the veggie section, another in the frozen foods, another in front of the Ben & Jerry’s case… It’d be quite a racket.

On a more moderate note, reading about this immediately recalled my wandering mental state in bed this morning. It’s not a state of mind I care for, nor do I think it contributes to my desire for a productive, fun, and interesting day. Frankly, I feel victimized by my monkey brain.

Here’s what I got from that article to apply to this situation: Don’t bother trying to talk myself out of that state (that just feeds the monkey brain!). The only motivation I need is to actually start moving–get on the yoga mat, go for a bike ride up a big hill, turn up the music and start boogie-ing, jump up and down–something with the intention of ramping up the energy level. For me it’s like shaking off a negative mind funk. I’d had a sense that just getting myself to the yoga mat was a huge step in the right direction. Now I know that’s the ticket, Tony says so!

I just read the summary of a blogger’s quest for understanding just how much is Enough for him/her, Hollis.

Under “Finding enough” in the sidebar he/she put a sweet and simple intention. It reminds me of the Tao, the middle way. Not looking for absolute answers, not looking for the perfect result. Rather exploring the active journey of experience and getting rid of that which no longer serves and allowing in that which enhances the adventure of life.

The first post of the new year, First eBay Posting for 2008, would make any simplifier proud. First of all, there’s the goal of cleaning out 2 filing cabinets [me: Yay! Great way to clear stale energy out of your life!] and packing one of them off to a non-profit. [me: Double yay! Reclaim real estate at your place and make someone who does need a filing cabinet happy.]

First item pulled out was memorabilia that represented an intense time of life. [me: Isn't this kind of thing the reason that we tend to end up with a house full of stuff? Oftentimes, we keep stuff not because we need it, but because we have an emotional attachment to it. More energy and thought in the past, less in the present.]

Does a snake wear three skins at a time? (”2004 was a good year, I think I’ll keep that skin.”) No! He moults every year and leaves the old one behind.

Back to the post. The memorabilia is going on eBay. [me: Way to go. Take a little dip down memory lane and then let it go. While this process is taking a chunk of time, it's an awesome way to say good-bye to the past and reclaim Now.]

One final thought here: the more in the Now we live, the less “past” we accumulate and haul around with us–making the journey even lighter.

Thanks, Hollis!

I’ve been thinking about getting a new phone. There are two features that I’d like that my 5 year old phone doesn’t have:
1. mp3 capabilities so that I can catch people’s podcasts and, hey, maybe even listen to music out and about sometimes
2. syncing capabilities with my schedule and address book. In other words, do away with my PDA which is merely an extension of the desktop productivity tools previously mentioned.

In addition to the mp3 player, I’d also upgrade my car stereo (is a tape deck and AM/FM radio worthy of the term “stereo” in today’s techie age? Not sure, that).

An mp3 player would have been a great addition to my drive to Colorado last month. Instead I had books-on-tape, none of which were worth writing home about. When reception was available across the quiet lands of Nevada and Utah, I mostly caught the radio.

One of the gems discovered a couple of hours outside of Salt Lake City was community radio KRCL. I caught a show called “Friday Drive Time” with Liz the LadyBug which is on every Friday 2:00 - 5:00pm PST.

This is how her show is described:

Base Check. One. Two. Friday Drive Time brings the Funk and Soul you know and love face to face with Hip Hop, Post Modern Soul, downtempo and wide-reaching Spoken Word. It’s a smooth, melodic culmination of sound, message and instrumentation at the end of your work-week to make you forget, help you remember and move you forward.

She played an awesome collection of music, most of which I’d never heard before. Yay for the internet and the opportunity to extend broadcasting distances!

This handy program comes from Lance.

If you are a Mac person, skip this post–you have a pdf creator built in to Mac OSX.

If you’re a Windows person, and you’ve wanted to save a document to pdf, you need a little help–and here it is! pdfforge’s PDF Creator.

Once installed, it acts like a printer. Meaning, that when you are in the document you want to convert to pdf, you select Print from the file menu, and then choose this “printer” for the PDF Creator.

Cost: free — though if you find the program useful, a donation would be appreciated.