>>Dom Goucher: Okay buddy, how are you doing
this week?
>>Pete Williams: Doing very well, mate. Doing
very, very well. Yourself?
>>Dom: Yeah, I'm good. I'm having a few
time zone challenges. As you know, a lot of
my clients are over by you in your part of
the world. In fact, increasingly so. I seem
to kind of pick one up a week really, either
inquiries or actual new clients.
>>Pete: Very cool.
>>Dom: My number of UK clients, which is my
nearest country, is dwindling. Although I've
got one client and they've got offices all
over the world literally. I was talking to
one of their operatives in the US last night
and they said basically,'' If you're not
careful, you can work 24 hours talking to
our team.'' And that has happened in this
last week. I literally went on a 24-hour stint.
They have a major launch coming up and their
launch team is all over the world. And yeah,
I just spent pretty much 24 hours. I had a
day without sleep.
>>Pete: That is insane, my friend. That is
insane.
>>Dom: Yeah. It's insane and it's unhealthy.
Folks, if you're listening out there, however
important it seems that you have to stay up
and stay awake, it isn't. Sleep is far more
important because it will catch you up.
>>Pete: Yeah. Absolutely.
>>Dom: It's hit me hard. It's the price
of being a popular person and in being good
at what you do. I could say I blame you because
in your excellent presentation at the Going
Pro Conference for Ed, you stood up and you
talked about your totally mind-bendingly high-speed
video production technique using the mind
maps. That and the whole of your presentation,
which is awesome, got you a standing ovation.
Then you very kindly mentioned to a few people
that I was a key part of that video production,
and the phone hasn't stopped ringing.
>>Pete: Good work. You do a good work and
word spreads.
>>Dom: It seems to be the truth, it seems
to be the truth. So how about you, what's
been happening with you this week?
>>Pete: I bought a new bike. That's the
biggest excitement of my week, so.
>>Dom: A push-bike?
>>Pete: Yeah, a push-bike for the Ironman
triathlon. I've got training on that starting
shortly, so I picked up a new bike. That's
pretty much the excitement that was this week,
so. Haven't had the chance to get out on
it and actually hit the road with it yet,
which is a little annoying. It's sitting
in the office just outside my window. I just
sit there and look at it all day. So hopefully
on Saturday, I'll be able to get out and
hit the pavement for a few hours with a podcast
or two in the headphones and go for that.
That should be fun.
>>Dom: I would make fun of you with the whole
staring longingly at the bike thing. But I
used to know a few competitive athletes who
did the Ironman and things, and I know it's
a pretty big deal.
>>Pete: Yeah.
>>Dom: I will not ask you how much you paid.
>>Pete: Too much. Actually, I got a pretty
good deal because I've helped the bike store
with some marketing and bits and pieces, but
still a lot for a bicycle. Especially a bicycle
I'm only really planning on using for six
months.
>>Dom: I think we'll change the subject.
>>Pete: Yeah.
>>Dom: Well, let's bring you down to Earth
with a crash. How's the book going?
>>Pete: Yeah, it's slowly pushing through,
gliding through. I guess that's the battle
of trying to ship. Progress is good. I think
I've mentioned in last week's episode
I'm really looking forward to breaking the
back of it poolside with a piña colada in
Bali, so looking forward to that.
>>Dom: Did you cave and buy the keyboard for
the iPad or are you going whole hog and taking
the laptop with you?
>>Pete: I decided to go with the laptop. I'm
just going to take the laptop with me. I thought,
well, realistically, once I put the iPad and
the keyboard in there, it's not much smaller
than a laptop.
>>Dom: Yeah, you just can't let go of that
laptop, I know.
>>Pete: Yeah, it's joined to me at the hip.
>>Dom: There are too many shiny tools on it
because of all the things that you do. It's
like me, I find myself, if I go near a machine
that doesn't have TextExpander on it for
example.
>>Pete: Yes.
>>Dom: I type some very odd things on the
machine if it doesn't have TextExpander.
>>Pete: I think it all comes back to having
a very efficient workflow. Realistically,
I could go away and still produce content
and work and do most of the stuff I need to
on the iPad and a keyboard, but it's not
going to be as efficient.
>>Dom: Yeah.
>>Pete: And then it's that question mark.
When I'm actually doing some work for a
couple of hours every day over a 10-day period,
I want to be efficient. There's that routine
element of it as well. When you listen to
people who are serial authors or creators
-- I can't remember who this quote is from,
but a quote I've always loved is, ''I always
just wait for inspiration to strike before
I write. Luckily, it strikes at 9:01 AM every
morning.'' Basically, the whole premise of
that is that you get in that routine and that
routine is what's causing the creativity.
So as weird as it might sound, I really do
think if I did have the iPad and a keyboard,
I could get work done but I wouldn't be
efficient because I'd be just fiddling,
trying to make stuff happen because I wouldn't
have Scrivener to do my writing on. I'd
have to be doing it in text files. I can still
produce, but as soon as that routine breaks,
that workflow breaks, you actually can lose
some of that creativity or that spark because
your mind has to go off about, ''Oh, how
do I do this?'' It doesn't stay on track.
It also comes back to the way Gary Halbert
used to write copy. What a lot of the great
copywriters do is when they're wanting to
find out about the actual dynamics of the
product they're talking about, a golf club
I think is the example that Ed Dale uses when
he tells this story. Gary Halbert is writing
copy one day and he just got into that routine
of writing copy. When he wanted to actually
start talking about what the grip of the golf
club is made out of in the draft letter he
wrote, he just wrote the foreskin of albino
whales or something really obscure like that
because it stood out to him. After the draft,
he'd actually pick that up and write the
exact structural material the grip was made
out of that helps you swing better.
So it's all about rituals and routines,
and getting in that routine. I tried and developed
a bit more of a morning routine with the stuff
I'm doing, which seems to be working really
well from a productivity perspective which
we can touch on at some stage. But I think
it is about rituals and that's really important.
So taking that laptop with me means that I
can stay in that creative ritual that I've
got in terms of how I go about writing something
or producing some sort of content. I don't
have to break that flow, so to speak.
>>Dom: Thinking about it now and you positioning
it that way, I completely agree. When we first
talked about it last week, about iPad versus
laptop, and my brain was thinking overloading
the amount of kit that you're taking, and
I was thinking just having too much work you
kind of stuffed with you on holiday. But when
it comes down to it, I completely agree. Just
being away from the machine that I've got,
my work machine, even if I take out the fact
that I need a high-powered processor to do
the video and audio editing; as you said,
you have a tool for writing -- Scrivener,
and you know the keyboard shortcuts for it.
You know where everything is.
If you were to work efficiently on the iPad
-- we do know people that do. Ed Dale is probably
the most famous exponent of the iPad workflow.
But he's worked on that for months and months
and months to get all the tools lined up,
to pick the right tool, to know how to use
it. The guy's got basically the equivalent
of keyboard shortcuts on an iPad.
And you're right because a lot of people
talk about this. It's slightly different
but they do, they talk about, don't upgrade
software, don't change things in the middle
of a creative process because you'll actually
get caught up in fiddling with the software
and not doing the work.
>>Pete: Exactly. And that was my mindset and
the positive constraint part of the argument
as well was really important. If I'm going
to have that positive constraint of only two
hours of work a day while I'm away poolside
in Bali, I don't want to be spending two-thirds
of that time trying to work out how the heck
to actually copy and paste the paragraph.
If I get in that flow and I need to make some
arrangements or some changes to what I've
written on the iPad, I have to go and then
learn the tech. So that's not going to be
the most effective use of my two hours a day.
How can I be effective the best way in that
positive constraint that I'm giving myself?
That's why I'm taking the laptop because
it will allow me to be effective and efficient
inside that positive constraint that I'm
setting myself.
>>Dom: Absolutely. One of the reasons I like
working with you is because of your ability
to have that high-level perspective over things.
And while my initial response was based on
the bleeding obvious, you stood back and actually
looked at it from a more strategic point of
view. And as usual, I kind of go, 'Yeah,
good point. Fair enough.'' The other thing,
and you talked about this regularity and creative
and positive constraints and things, I think
it was Stephen King, that creativity at 9:01.
>>Pete: Yeah.
>>Dom: He's selling his book, which escapes
me so I will say 'foreskin of the albino
whale.' And then insert a note in the show
notes about…
>>Pete: It's about On Writing? Is that what
you're referring to?
>>Dom: On Writing, thank you. Thank you. I
didn't want to break my creative flow by
going and researching that, so.
>>Pete: I just rudely interrupted.
>>Dom: But no, good thank you.
>>Pete: On Writing, great book.
>>Dom: It's good. I'd laugh for about
half an hour about that. I managed not to
laugh when you said it the first time. Bless
Gary Halbert, makes me laugh all the time.
But yeah, the other thing, I've been working
on a top secret project recently, which we
were talking about before the show. And one
of the big topics in that project, it's
a training course and the people in it are
talking about -- and this is something that
a lot of people talk about in the information
marketing industry, about when you do certain
things and that when you do it, that's what
you're doing. Don't mix it up.
So your example, if you're writing, don't
go researching about what the golf handle
is made of. You insert a silly word and come
back because it's just a draft. And Ed Dale
when he talks about speed writing and things
like that, that's a big point he makes -- just
write. Just write, edit second. Write first,
write only. Comeback to it later and edit.
>>Pete: It's the downdraft-updraft argument.
>>Dom: Yeah, you've talked about that as
well in the past. But the other thing, a part
of what I'm working on at the moment for
someone talks about researching and curation.
And the moment this product gets released,
everybody listening to this will know exactly
what I'm talking about. But they talk about
curation and they say basically, look, if
you're researching, reading about information
in your market and pinging out quick opinions
about it, that's great.
But if you come across something, you go,
''You know what? Actually that's inspired
me to write a big article. I'm going to
go and write a big article.'' Don't. Whatever
you do, don't do it. Make yourself a little
note, have a little inbox if you want to talk
about GTD. Maybe put something in your inbox
in OmniFocus. If it was URI, you can use OmniFocus
all day long.
Put a note somewhere to say, look, big article
on this -- anything you can think of, then
get back to that main task. It's a slight
detour from what we were talking about, but
that's one of those things that if you've
got a lot of things to do: one, having a constraint
and saying I'm going to do it at this time
everyday, whether it's creative or whether
it's mundane, I think, is a good thing.
And the other thing is: one, stick to it;
but two -- and this is the thing that made
the difference to me, have a system or a place
that you can put the things that occur to
you while you're doing that thing but are
not relevant right now. So in your case, if
you're writing creatively while you're
in Bali and you think, ''Oh, crikey. Yeah,
I need to change the logo on my shipping invoices
for the headset company.'' Instead of stopping
your creative writing and winging off an email
to your staff or whatever, you just have a
little pad on the side that says 'logo,
header' or whatever, or you fire up OmniFocus
because you've got your laptop.
>>Pete: Option + spacebar, baby. Option +
spacebar.
>>Dom: There you go, option + spacebar. That's
going out and going in an intro somewhere,
definitely. It's just keeping that momentum
within that space, and that's it. Bringing
it back on topic, it's all about keeping
the momentum. Having a place where you start
the momentum, blocking out a time with the
positive constraints, and then keeping it.
That's something that I definitely struggled
with in the past.
>>Pete: Again, the high-level perspective
is not only a momentum in the moment of creation
or the moment of writing, but also momentum
on a weekly, monthly basis. If you can make
the commitment every day to write at 9AM,
or have a morning ritual when you get up every
morning -- the first hour of my day is going
to incorporate these X amount of things. The
more you do that on a daily basis as well,
that will also build up momentum.
So momentum is a huge force that's not really
harnessed as much as it should be by entrepreneurs.
There's no structured momentum because that
goes against the whole creative vibe. But
all people who seem creative, that's not
how it works.
>>Dom: Yeah. Ed Dale's a big person that
talks about that, the big names. He likes
to talk about the big names and people like
Stephen King. Stephen King's book On Writing
really does lay that one out quite clearly.
There's a good story behind, it as you would
hope so with Stephen King. But the truth of
the matter is the guy has a desk and a place
that never moves. He has the same things on
the desk. And at the same time everyday, up
he gets and then he goes.
The psychologists would say that it takes
30 days to properly form a habit, 30 consecutive
whatever. You can do it in less, but to really
make it solid... And I think that's it.
Once you've done it, you've done it. One
of the things that people struggle with, and
this is something that when I was younger,
I have a little story about this. When I was
younger, the idea of something taking a long
period of time and doing the same thing everyday
used to be crazy to me. These things always
are when you're younger. As a child you think,
''Oh, crikey. When I'm 18, that's a long
way away.'' And now I'm a long way away from
18 on the other side.
The example of doing a little thing everyday
or setting something in motion and then just
checking on it, is one of those things a lot
of people talk about. Just allocating half
an hour a day or an hour can just mass up
the most phenomenal amount of content or progress
on a project as long as you do that positive
constraint thing. It's like, ''This is
what I'm doing, and I'm going to try and get
it done in this time.'' Focusing your mind
on that task for that period of time and then
doing it consistently: one, it's habit-forming
if you do it consistently; and two, the amount
you can get done is phenomenal.
>>Pete: Oh, I couldn't agree more. Absolutely,
couldn't agree more. The thing that I think
is a great way too, if you want to get a bit
granular and implement that, make it stick
and make it a bit of a lever for your business,
your life, your day, or your week is do that
thing first thing in the morning. An awesome,
awesome quote that I got from Joe Polish who
has another great podcast, I Love Marketing,
which I think marketers should really listen
to after they listen to our episode every
week.
But what Joe talks about, he was involved
with Bill Phillips who started the whole Body
for Life phenomenon -- the books, the infomercials
and all that sort of amazing stuff. And while
working with Bill, Joe asked him a question.
The question was, out of everything that you
do to control your body and get it right,
what's the one trick, the one secret, the
lever, the minimum effective dose? And Bill's
reply was, ''Start off with the perfect breakfast.''
And the reason for that was because you are
less likely to cheat, you are less likely
to get off track, and you're more likely to
have that whole commitment and consistency
factor work.
If you start off with a perfect breakfast,
at lunch you're going to go, ''Well, I
had a good breakfast. I'm not going to cheat.
I might as well keep it going.'' Whereas,
if you had a lousy breakfast, you're going
to go, ''I'll eat while at lunch and have
a good dinner.'' By lunch, you'll go, ''I
had a shit breakfast, don't worry about
it.'' So I've always been one,, even before
I've even heard Joe mention that, to actually
make sure that my morning starts strong.
While I've always been a morning person,
I've never been a night person. I go against
most internet people and business people to
a certain extent as well because I'd rather
go to bed at 10:00 and get up at 4:30 or 5:00
and start the day well. Because I think that
if I commit to that morning action, I'll
become consistent with that throughout the
day, which makes the rest of my day more efficient.
And I've only really forced myself and disciplined
myself for that very first thing, that very
first hour in the morning, or hour and a half
in the morning. Just through self-influence,
I'm then going to be consistent with that
and have a better-performing day without even
needing to be as focused and disciplined for
the rest of the day.
>>Dom: I have to agree with you on that. The
challenge I have is that my other half is
a night owl and we can miss each other. We
can kind of not spend a lot of time with each
other during any given week if I'm working
on things because my preference is to get
up and get on with it. And the other thing,
slightly to one side but connected to what
you just talked about, years ago when I first
got interested in the whole GTD and productivity
stuff, one of the big, big names was Leo Babauta,
the guy who wrote the blog Zen Habits.
>>Pete: Yes.
>>Dom: One of the first things I ever read
of his was an article that said 'start with
the big rocks.' If you're going to do
something, find the biggest, hardest, nastiest
problem that you've got to deal with, and
beat that one first. If you've got lots
of things to do in a day, do the hardest one
first thing in the morning. Get it out of
the way. It's kind of like what you're
talking about -- it's a sense of achievement
for the day. Get on with it. Get it done.
Get it out of the way. And then everything
else is easy.
>>Pete: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely.
>>Dom: That works, that works -- the whole
'start the day well.' If I start the day
badly, I go to the point sometimes of literally
not speaking to anybody. I'll communicate
with the cats as I feed them because that's
the downside of getting up early. My other
half said, ''Well, you got up first. You
feed the cats.'' I'll communicate with
the cats and then I'll shut the office door
and that's it. No Skypes, no emails, no
negative influence whatsoever, no chance of
negative influence. Just get on with what
I've got to get on with. That's one of
my 'start the day positively' kind of
ways.
>>Pete: So do you have a ritual that you do
every morning like a sequence of stuff that
you do consistently every morning or not?
>>Dom: No and that's why I'm still not
the Zen master of the stuff that you are.
I bet you do, so I'm going to scribble notes
furtively as you tell us what it is.
>>Pete: Okay. It depends. Obviously, if I'm
in the process of training for a marathon,
Ironman, or something like that, then the
first thing I'll do is I'll literally
get up; bath, glass of water and train. A
way to force myself to do that and to jump
out of bed in really freezing mornings in
winter and go out for a run at 5AM or 5:30,
it's only a small thing but it's actually
having my running gear or my training gear
out ready the night before. It's a small
thing but that makes a big difference to me.
Well, it definitely made a big difference
to me to build that habit. My alarm doesn't
go off, I don't lie in bed going, ''Where
are my running shorts at? Which drawer are
they in? Are they in the wash or are they
on the clothesline? Where are they?'' The
longer you stay in bed, the less chance you're
getting out.
So that's one little trick -- I have it
all laid out the night before. It's almost
I made that commitment and consistency. Again,
I've committed to put the running gear out.
The shoes are out, the socks are out, everything
is ready to go. My GPS or whatever it might
be is sitting next to my shoes. I'll just
get them on and go without any excuse. That's
how the day starts if I actually got a training
session.
And then in terms of a ritual from a business
perspective, it's changed and adapted over
the years. I actually wrote about my original
process in my first book. Where is it? I can't
find it here. It was seven years ago. Where
is it? Sorry, I'm just flipping through…
>>Dom: Well, while you're flipping, is that
the book that you're giving away the audio
of?
>>Pete: It is indeed. Thank you for doing
that.
>>Dom: And how might people get hold of that
audio?
>>Pete: Head over to PeteWilliams.com.au or
PreneurMarketing.com. They'll have options
there to join the newsletter list. And as
part of that, the very first thing you get
is a downloadable audio version. I got the
rights back to this book from John Wiley & Sons,
the publishers who I did this book with years
ago. Part of the deal was for me to get the
rights back after a certain time period, which
I have now. So I thought I'd just get the
audio book created and give it away because
it had done everything I needed it to do for
me.
What I spoke about in that book was what I
referred to as a Daily Success Planner. It
was simply something I do the night before
and it'd be my four current goals, my four
top things I'm working towards and have
that listed down, and then what I'll do
each day to get me closer to each goal. So
funnily enough, I guess you might say this
is a bit GTD before David Allen's book came
out. I never thought about that. That's
kind of cool.
>>Dom: Ooh…
>>Pete: So it's literally just four things.
The question was, what will I do tomorrow
to get me closer to each goal? And it's
just, what's the action I'm going to take
the following day to rate each of the goals
above? I have a Tomorrow's 'friend'
contact and Tomorrow's 'business' contact.
So every day, I try and stay in touch with
a friend via an email or a phone call. I'll
make a note of who I want to talk to tomorrow
and try to make contact with just to keep
in contact with friends and not lose them.
Business contact was a business person I try
and touch base or network with. Then I had
a bit of a daily checklist which was: run
a minimum of 5km today -- because back then
all I was doing was running; eat two pieces
of fruit; repeat my affirmations; do daily
sit-ups; do daily push-ups; and then complete
the Daily Success Planner for tomorrow. So
that was sort of a tool that I use myself
to have that ritual. And that ritual sort
of adapted over time.
My checklist now, if I go through it, is about
an hour, and 10 minutes of that I try and
do almost immediately in the morning is Inbox
Zero. It takes me about 15 minutes generally
most days to get to Inbox Zero. It doesn't
mean I actually action everything. I don't
actually reply to every email or do what needs
to be done. It's at least allocating those
emails to my OmniFocus inbox or replying to
emails if I can do it quickly or forwarding
it onto a PA, or a VA, or a staff member.
So that's the first thing I do. A lot of
people say don't check your emails first
thing in the morning, I actually do. It's
the very first thing I do. I haven't really
tested what my life would be like if I didn't
do that. I'm a bit of an addict. I want
to see what's going on and it's working
for me, which is fine. So that's the first
thing.
Then it's OmniFocus GTD plans. So I'll
then go into my plan and just get a bit of
a mental note of what has to happen today
and quickly run through my OmniFocus inbox
and try and clean that, and allocate those
actions to the various projects and just have
that plan organized. Solid breakfast, I note
that for myself because sometimes I don't
always eat as much food as I should, particularly
coming closer to the Ironman. I have to really
make sure I consume a lot more calories than
I normally do and make sure that they're
the right calories. Vitamins, water -- just
two other quick ticks.
Lumosity is something that I've been playing
with for a little while, which is a really
cool online tool. L-U-M-O-S-I-T-Y, lumosity,
and it's just a brain training thing. It's
about $20 a month. It's maybe even less
actually, probably a lot less than that. What
it does is it's simply a tool. You play
games, but they're all cognitive mind games
to help you with your spatial awareness, your
attention, your number thinking, your memory.
You actually can join a lot of little programs.
I'm still coming to the end of the basic
training and that gives you about five different
games every morning that takes about 10 to
15 minutes. I'm just going through that
basic training, then I'll pick the intermediate
and then advanced. It's just a way to turn
my brain on, so to speak, help with the memory,
which is really cool.
The next thing I've got is Send Out Cards.
Send Out Cards is a tool that I use to send
out postcards and greeting cards through the
internet. The cards are then physically stamped
and posted with real-word stamps, and the
font's in my handwriting -- really cool
service. So every day, I send a Send Out Cards
to someone I've spoken to or met with the
day before. To give you an example, yesterday,
a friend of mine got a promotion at his job.
So today's card was to say congratulations
to him.
Today, I got phone call from one of my best
friends who is looking at going to a new business
venture. So probably tomorrow's card would
mostly be a card to him saying 'congratulations,
good luck. If I can help, let me know.'
It's just a bit of a way to network, and
that can either be a business card or personal
card I send out every day.
The next thing on the list is email a Facebook
friend, so just send a friend a message thru
Facebook or an email just saying, ''Hi, how
are you doing? What's going on?'' Just
to make sure I stay in contact. Forum post
replies -- people who have seen my Going Pro
presentation at Ed Dale's event, which you
can get at www.ed-ucationonline.com/goingpro-conference/session15a.
Basically, you can buy on there the talk about
my forum posting process. I do about 10 minutes
of that.
Then I've got about 10 minutes of writing
out swipe file copy just to ensure that I'm
continually thinking of good ways to communicate,
and sell and write. It's literally just
going and spending 10 minutes rewriting a
good swipe piece. Whether it's headlines
or a Gary Halbert letter, I'll go thru that.
And then the final thing on my checklist here
is change two passwords. So I'll just get
into my 1Password and just change a couple
of passwords to make sure that's up and
updated. That last one I do cheat on quite
a bit. I should be trying to change two passwords
a day just to make sure I'm secured and
all, but I don't do it as much as I should.
But that's fundamentally my first hour on
the laptop of starting my day. Health and
fitness is in there, work and business is
in there, family and friends in there, and
mind and spirit is in there a little bit as
well through a few different things. That's
just my quick morning ritual, that's my
first hour of the day.
>>Dom: That was me just catching my breath
for you.
>>Pete: Look, this is what I work towards.
I think I'm pretty close to being there
most days. There will be days when I will
not change a password. I definitely want to
do forum posting every single day. But it's
a continuing work in progress to make sure
I'm as close to it as possible and I'm
doing pretty good. So it's all about momentum.
>>Dom: So your book's seven years ago.
>>Pete: Yeah.
>>Dom: And then you had your process, which
is a good process. It is one that a lot of
people have talked about. How on earth are
you going to get anything done? I think the
best way to put it is, how on earth are you
going to get anything done today if you don't
know what you're going to do?
>>Pete: That's awesome.
>>Dom: Because the first thing you should
always make sure you've got before you start
work on any day is a list of what you're
going to do. Having that list done the night
before means that you don't waste brain
cells doing it in the morning.
>>Pete: I actually had a discussion at the
office the other day with one of the head
SEO guys about the subconscious brain and
how much it actually exists or not. I love
him to death. He's a great person to have
a conversation with. He's very skeptical
about a lot of things, it's fantastic. I
love him to death. A discussion about can
you listen to an audio book subconsciously
and will you actually learn it was where the
conversation started, and we kind of get into
that whole subconscious thing.
But to bring that to your point, I think by
actually getting it into a list ready the
night before, it does allow you to let your
subconscious mind drift, think about things,
and come up with ideas, solutions and thought
processes before you even start the day, which
is really handy. Whether you think that works
or not, that's up to you to believe.
>>Dom: I hundred percent believe it does.
A few years ago, I read a book and it actually
is still on my desk. I'm a highly visual
person. One of the things that I found out
completely by accident was that the amount
of visual clutter in a room affects me quite
badly. If I can see a lot of visual clutter,
my brain is constantly trying to read it,
organize it, catalogue it, everything. It
was a massive energy strain that I didn't
know about. It was one of the really weird
things. Now what I do is, I'm not quite
the purchaser of inspirational photos and
posters, and all that crap. Even the funny
ones.
But I do have my reading list, it's a pile
of box on a shelf. Pick one up as you walk
past. When you finish one, pick the next one
up, that kind of thing. Also, I have a couple
of, visual reminders. They're just the books
I'm really inspired by and they're at
the back of my desk in a pile. So the spines
are there, visible. My brain doesn't have
to even rotate the words to read them. One
of those books is a book called Hare Brain,
Tortoise Mind.
>>Pete: Hare Brain, Tortoise Mind, okay.
>>Dom: Hare as in H-A-R-E, as in The Tortoise
and the Hare.
>>Pete: Yes.
>>Dom: It's a massive book, really. It's
quite a heavy read, folks, by the way. But
I can summarize it.
>>Pete: Is there an audio version?
>>Dom: Probably. I can summarize it very quickly.
It's very simple. Basically, stick something
in there and leave it. And eventually, something
really good will come back out. It's a bit
like Ed Dale's idea of fueling up by going
and reading lots of stuff before you start
trying to write about a topic. Just go read
a load. I've actually convinced a guy that
I'm training at the moment -- I'm training
up a guy to become an After Effects operator,
that's a real change of topic. And I said
to him, ''Look, just go and watch a load
of these inspirational tutorials where people
are doing this stuff, producing these great
motion graphics things. But don't worry
about actually paying attention to the keystrokes
and stuff. Don't worry about trying to learn
the product, just look at what they do because
it will inspire you later to come up with
you own stuff.''
It's like reading somebody else's swipe
file. So, yeah, one of the more practical
uses of that, I totally believe, is that you
sort out the night before what you're going
to do. Because that also dovetails with that
idea of putting out what you're going to
wear. Here's one for you. You are in a company
of giants, or is it On the Shoulders of Giants?
>>Pete: On the Shoulders of Giants, yep. What
else is on that list? Go through your list.
I'm keen to hear what's in your top books.
>>Dom: No, not today because we're nearly
off the time. We'll do top books in another
one.
>>Pete: Okay.
>>Dom: But I'll let you know that The 4-Hour
Workweek is in there.
>>Pete: Nice.
>>Dom: But not for the same reasons as a lot
of people have it, okay? And Tony Buzan's
The Mind Map Book.
>>Pete: Yes, awesome.
>>Dom: And all three of David Allen's GTD
books, but we'll talk about that some other
time. But On the Shoulders of Giants, I originally
heard of, 'get yourself ready for tomorrow.'
The first person I heard of it was Einstein.
>>Pete: Very cool.
>>Dom: And he said, ''I always choose what
I'm going to wear tomorrow the night before
and I lay it out. Because my day should be
focused on thinking and producing work, not
deciding what shirt to wear.''
>>Pete: Nice.
>>Dom: So at the end of the day, he decides
the first thing he's going to do tomorrow,
in this case, it was the clothes he was going
to wear. I think it was bit of a sound byte
rather than practicality because I imagine
that he also wrote a list of which equations
he wanted to solve and which physical phenomenon
he wanted to prove or disprove. And he had
a little note by the side of his bed, 'Prove
quantum theory tomorrow morning,' and so
on. Oh, the physicists are slapping their
foreheads.
But yeah, that inspired me. It really did.
Even before I'd even heard of GTD and all
these other things, and that made a difference
to me. Putting out what I was going to wear
is a trivial thing, especially for me who
really doesn't care what I look like unlike
you who is a well-dressed man. But it made
a difference, and so does deciding what you're
going to do. And again, not very recently
where somebody said, and I wish I could remember
who it was. I'm going to probably just attribute
it to Ed Dale if I can't think of anybody
better, 'How can you work effectively during
the day if you don't know what you're
going to do?'
>>Pete: Yeah. Absolutely.
>>Dom: So seven years ago you were already
clued into this and now you've evolved this
process.
>>Pete: But don't put that all on me. I'm
that sort of uber-nerdy geek. I was going
to business seminars and events when I was
17. So as much as I'd love to say that I've
dreamt that whole set of process up in my
mind, I have no doubt that that came off the
back of devouring a lot of other people's
content when I was young.
>>Dom: But I'm going to make an important
point, and this is my smoke-blowing for the
week. It's not just at you, I've said
this to quite a few of people. You don't
have to be the guy that came up with the idea.
That's not what makes you good at what you
do. That's not what makes you a clever person.
Okay, yes, there are some geniuses out there
that come up with these systems -- David Allen
and his team. What makes you the smart guy
is looking at the system, working out that
it will fit into what you do or working out
how it fits into what you do, and then effing
well doing it.
>>Pete: That's it, that's it. That is
the ticket. That is the ticket -- it is taking
the actual ride, doing the extra effort, making
it work.
>>Dom: I'm going to say this and this is
going to get me flamed somewhere. Internet
marketing is full of some of the most average
people from an intelligent point of view that
I've ever met. I'm generalizing wildly
and I do not mean anyone any insult. But what
I mean is internet marketing is not full of
the geniuses of this world. Yes, there are
some true luminaries. I have sat and had my
mind truly melted by people like Robert Sommerville.
>>Pete: Oh, mate, seriously. Whoa, the Forbes
rich list is exactly the same.
>>Dom: Exactly, exactly. It's just a bit
more famous. There are some luminaries on
there. There are some pretty sharp guys. But
get me on this, the rank-and-file of the incredibly
successful people on those lists, whether
they're the internet marketing successful
people or whether they're the Forbes rich
list, they don't have to be PhD-grade genius
whatever people. They are the people that
got off their backsides and did it. They found
a system that worked. They didn't maybe
even come up with that system. They just found
one that worked and did it.
>>Pete: I couldn't agree with you more.
As much as I'm sure Frank wouldn't mind
me saying this and he said it himself many
times, he installed dog fences. And now he's
one of the best markers in the world because
he tested more than everybody else, he emailed
more than anybody else, he studied as hard
if not harder than anybody else, and he sat
his butt in the chair and actually did work
for a few solid hours a day, and then surfed
the rest of it. But in those solid hours of
work, he actually did what was needed, focused
on the right stuff, and shipped.
>>Dom: Yeah, shipped it -- Seth Godin. There
you go. Bless that man. He is a genius but
everybody can learn from him the simple stuff.
I think the important thing to say here to
really clarify what I'm trying to say because
I get a lot of this being in video production.
Video production is seen as like the Holy
Grail and, the let me get the right word,
anathema. Is that the right word? It makes
you do the scariest thing in the planet.
>>Pete: Okay.
>>Dom: It's like this evil object. Everybody
knows that it's one of the most powerful
things you can do in marketing. This year
is the year of video. There's Video Boss
2, and again it's going to make you even
more money.
>>Pete: Great course, by the way.
>>Dom: Great course, by the way. Great course,
by the way. Can't fault him. But people
are looking at that. They know it's valuable,
they know it's important. But then they
go, ''But it's so difficult. It's so
expensive. It's so complicated.'' It's
so this, so that, so whatever. The great thing
about the presentation that you did at Ed's
Going Pro was you just absolutely wiped the
flaw with that opinion. It didn't matter
whether it was video production, whether it
was website creation -- it didn't matter
what it was. Because you showed people how
to think about this stuff, which is do the
stuff that you need to do.
You generate a mind map and you pull the pen
out and throw it over the wall. I catch it
and I do what I do. You found me, I do that
for you. What matters to you is the business
and the content, that's what you do. You
don't have to be a video genius. But I'll
let you in on a secret folks, he's very
good at this stuff. And it's the same with
internet marketing and wherever else. You
don't have to be able to do all those things
that are on your list of things to do today.
Go find somebody else that can do them. Just
make sure they get done, that's your role.
>>Pete: Exactly. Absolutely.
>>Dom: We are so way over time on this. So
on that hopefully inspirational note, folks,
which is roughly summarized as anyone can
do this stuff, get out there and do it, we'll
sign off for this week.
>>Pete: Catch you next week.
>>Dom: Yeah, Pete. Catch you in Bali, I believe.
>>Pete: Yeah. I think next week I'm in Bali
-- I have no idea. It's in my calendar.
I'll check it the night before.
>>Dom: Awesome. Well, wherever you are mate,
catch you then.
>>Pete: See you.
