Keys to success

• Take personal responsibility
• Things change so be flexible
• Work smart and work hard
• Serve others well
• Be nice to others
• Be optimistic
• Have goals - want something big for yourself
• Stay focused
• Keep learning
• Become excellent at what you do
• Trust your gut
• When in doubt - take action
• Earn all you can, save all you can, give all you can
• Enjoy all you've got
• Above all - keep it simple



Do or Do not...



I have never been good with 'to do' lists, keeping diaries updated or any other mundane duties life throws at us, things seem to get done eventually.

For those of us that like those reminders stuck on the fridge door, try a 'get done' list. It's more immediate, more in your face punchy. It's a command that says this must get done, today, now, before anything else.

 

To do lists are wishy washy reminders, get done lists, well, that's the business.

Train like Bane



Out of all Batman's adversaries I connect most with Bane:

'He read as many books as he could get his hands on, spent most of his spare time body building in the prison's gym, and learned to fight in the merciless school of prison life.

 

He apparently received a classical education.'

 

3 simplistic rules of life:

1. Read everything you can
2. Use the gym consistently
3. Learn how to fight!

Unless you have some sort of seriously debilitating illness that prevents you, the vast majority can commit to those 3 simple rules to life.

 

Before you knock it, try it and see how much your life changes.

The true artist



"A true artist does not define success based on approval from others. A true artist need only please himself."

 

It was a long time before I was stubbornly persuaded by an acquaintance to reveal my writings for public consumption. Even longer to stop me from deleting my blog posts.

 

So long to get over the self-doubt of whether I'm good enough as an artist (and I mean artist in it's broadest sense).

 

It's taken me six years of solid writing on public display for me to settle, finally, on this blog and to just write my 'essays', though I make no claim to be in the same league as 'Montaigne'.

 

Finally allowing myself to embrace a 'Stoic' philosophy, even though I have admired this in fiction from 'Batman' to 'Gotrek Gurnisson' - the 'Trollslayer', I finally feel ready to give back.

 

And the best thing is I no longer seek approval from others to define my 'success', rather I now please myself, and though I do hold myself to a certain level of 'high-standards', what I write from now, and 'post' from now on, will please me and any true artist need not seek the approval of others, rather a true artist need only please himself.