New server, new look, and new inspiration for blogging.

I finally wrapped up MBA school and spent the last few months getting my life back in order.  I’m now ready to get back to blogging.

This blog will now focus on:

• Human Behavior - Understanding why we do what we do
• “Little Things” - Items in life that make a huge difference
• Technology - Trends, Performance, and Emerging Technology
• Entrepreneurship - Business Ventures

Additionally, I will try keeping the posts concise and go for quality over quantity.

I’m looking forward to it.

Wisdom:

I saw an interesting article on how Jerry Seinfeld developed motivation to write jokes and made it into a habit. He took a large calendar and every day he wrote jokes, he put a big red “X” on that day. After a few days a chain developed.

Then his whole goal become to not break the chain.

By not breaking the chain there is not an opportunity to skip a day. Because once you skip a day, it is easier to skip the next day.

This is along the sames lines which of what Tony Robbins talks about. Doing something small everyday keeps your mind focused on it, and your subconscious continues to work on it even when you are not consciously. The small efforts build and soon build into momentum. When momentum develops, that’s when much is accomplished in a short amount of time.

Looking back at some of my major accomplishments, they all came by making small investments early on…and regardless of the fact that I did not see immediate results, I kept plugging away at it and after awhile I started seeing progress. Progress built and built until one day the “landslide” came and not only did I achieve my goal, I achieved far more than I ever thought possible.

Why are some people successful, and others not. Professor Carol Dweck explains the growth mindset.

The US is a very low context culture. Expectations on how a individual should behave and how information is conveyed is spelled out in words (ex. an airport). Contrast this to a high context culture, found predominately in eastern societies, where similar experiences and cultural norms allow for many things to be left unsaid. Information is communicated by the context a person is currently in, and the culture of the society communicates what is necessary (ex. an expensive gourmet restaurants).

This is typically due to a uniformity of culture over generations. However, the US is a melting pot of cultures, and this diversity is why a unified cultural contexts could not exist.

The result of the US being a low context society is the need for “excess” communication to get meaning across. This comes across as Americans being “loud” to low context cultures where these excess words are superfluous. And is much of the reason why these culture do not understand each other.

This idea is also seen in personal relationships. After couples spend time w/ each other, they start knowing what each other is thinking just by the context they are in. This ability of knowing what the context conveys to the other person is created through sharing of similar experiences. As a couple moves through life, they move into a higher context relationship and while they still communicate as much as they used to, they use words less and less.

While Thailand is normally a very peaceful place, they had a bombing over New Years. I had actually flown into the country earlier that afternoon. We went to dinner that night, and then a group of us was planning on going to Central World for the ball dropping since it was only two buildings down from our hotel. Luckily we went back to the hotel first, and our taxi got searched for bombs. We asked them what was going on, and they told us that there was some bombings earlier in the day, and that all New Years celebrations were cancelled. So, we ended up going someplace else instead. When midnight struck, two bombs went off in Central World. Thankfully we were not there.

Too much excitment for me.

I’ve always struggled with giving to charity. I wanted my money to have a large impact on people. The problem with charity is that it’s terribly inefficient, and rarely fixed the root problem (though The Gates Foundation may change my mind on this). If the goal is to help some 3rd world society, I feel like it was a waste of money.

Then I ran across Kiva.org and the idea of micro-loans. This is where entrepreneurs from 3rd world countries w/o credit systems need a small amount of money to get their business started. One example is a Kenyan woman who need $80 for an irrigation pump, and can now increase her income between $120 to $1200 a year. However, this woman could not get a loan without going to the village loan shark getting charged 100% interest.

Now on Kiva, you can loan money to this woman, change her life, and get your money back to help the next person.

Most investors worry about the risk of default. However, an interesting thing occurs. The other people in the village realize that if someone defaults on their loan, that no one else will loan the rest of them money. So there is a peer monitoring system and assistance within the community. This keeps the repayment rate over 95%, which is better than credit card portfolios in the US.

Typically it’s lack of credit which holds 3rd world countries back from bettering their standard of living. It’s not charity, but ideas like mico-loans is what will pave the way to a better world.

I was considering today what drives people to the point of almost breaking. Working long hours when they don’t feel like it, or past the point they need to be comfortable in life. Some people are driven because they have a chip on their shoulder, while others are driven for their ego, and even more are driven to support their families.

So, I thought, “What drives me?”. I don’t have a chip on my shoulder, as I’ve had every opportunity in the world. Nor do I think it’s for my ego, as I would say I’m a secure person in life. Lastly, I don’t have a family to support.

I would say the reason is because of expectations. It is expected that I be successful and _that_ is what wakes me up early every morning even when I would rather be sleeping. It’s not my parents expectations either, as they already believe I am very successful. Rather, it is the expectations of myself. I believe I have the potential to do great things, and I think I would be letting myself down if I didn’t achieve them.

Ultimately, you are the only person who can drive yourself to be successful in life.

This article appeared in an Australian magazine

Inside the self-tuning “Genetic” Linux

In genetic-library updates: I/O Workload fingerprinting should be released to LKML soon. Brandon Philips has a running version of the 0(1) plugin, w/ a small positive improvement. That should be following shortly.

I’ve been doing some soul searching as of late, and much of it has stemmed from my latest class, “Innovations in Business Marketing”. The class really should be called “Intro to a Startup”. The prof. (he’s a VC) tells stories about the lifestyle of these startup entrepreneurs. How they do not even know their children.

So that makes me think…what do I really want out of life?

I used to believe it was owning the next Microsoft. I’m realizing that I’m not willing to sacrifice my future family (whenever that may be).

My soul searching has led me to believe, that I want to see my children grow up, financial independence, and business creation.

So, what does that mean?

I think a more intelligent/balanced way of going about my goals is multiple small-medium businesses (SMBs). Start a SMB, one that might make only 150k profit a year. Hand if off to someone else to run, and now income from that is only 70k. Only a small percentage of time is needed to oversee it. Now with all that free time, start a new SMB and hand it off. Do this over and over again, and wealth will start to accrue.

Eventually a point is reached when the 8 hour day is spent just overseeing the businesses…Hopefully income is substantial at that point and what I want out of life is achieved.