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A few months later, no one - in the dotcom industry, wall street or even the investment banking world - was smiling. The bubble was poked, millions of capital was loss, hundreds of companies went bankrupt and thousands were left unemployed as the market corrected itself. The then emerging tech world landed back to the fundamentals of what makes a business a real enterprise. That is - it has to be profitable, way sooner, for it to survive. 

Meet the ultralights, businesses that operates as lean as possible in order to become profitable without taking in any venture capital. Owners of ultralights know that their business better be profitable now, or they'll perish later. Last February 16, Graham Lawlor, founder of Ultra Light Startups, a community of online and media entrepreneurs with these types of business shared with me how he founded the organization, why you're never too young to start a business now and how he made his first sale at a ridicuolously young age of three!

You can read the story here at Yeah New York.

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When my dad gave me the book, How to Win Friends and Influence People, it was an act of love from a good father extremely concerned of his son's social life. Well, that was before. I used to dislike people and consider them more as distraction in life than a crucial element of it. Developing human relationships is a boring practice in my past life and an item on my checklist that is better left unchecked.

When I went to college, however, it was a different story. I enjoyed people too much. I love meeting as many of them as I could that I actually ended up with a handful after graduation. I even lose a good bunch of them before that due to some stupid conflict. So much for sacrificing academic pursuits in exchange for relational bonds, most of which have become so magnetic that I didn't realize they had the same charges. But enough of me. The goal here is to examine how to destroy friendships. Sometimes, the best way to learn is by knowing the reverse, the what not to do and how not to do it. Doing so makes us realize that we're stupid enough to actually apply them in real life anyway.

1. Talk about your problems, worries, anxieties, depressions, suicidal tendencies, childhood struggles, bad meals you have eaten lately, horrible shows you've seen recently anf the bus driver who didn't give you a transfer a while ago....at all times. 

It's enough that there are a lot of people who enjoy talking about themselves. Many individuals in this world so lack attention and love that they derive it from human sources by channeling all the attention to themselves, despite the fact that they are innately uninteresting. Considering you're not one of them, it's slightly forgivable that you talk a lot about yourself, however, shift the topics to the negatives of your life and make that the centerpiece of every conversation you have and I guarantee that you will find yourself in a spot that is sure to push you further to depression, a solitary state where no human being would like to hear what you have to say. 

2. Make one (or two) people your version of god

Even if you don't believe in God, it maybe a good idea to at least rely on Him for emotional necessities. He won't mind it, He made you anyway. But if you don't believe in Him and rather consider one or two people in your life as a source of all your emotional needs, filling the void in your heart with their attention and love, then expect a future, with your "source," to nowhere. Always remember that no human being can make you whole. Although it's enjoyable to see it in romantic movies, the idea that someone will actually complete you is a myth. Wholeness is derived by a person's resolve to be who he or she is no matter what the situation is, regardless if he/she's is with someone or not. If you turn someone to your version of god, you'll see yourself forced to be agnostic.

3. Enrich your friendships with jealousy, envy, slander, malice and all other elements of hate

There are no other ways to destroy a growing friendship or a maturing bond between two people than blending jealousy and it's evil cousins into the relationship. Deceit, lies and talking behind your friend's back are surefire ways to eliminate good will and trust between two people, two fundamental elements needed for a relationship to grow. Ensure that these elements are present in your friendship and expect for it to grow deep, deep enough to go six feet under.

There are other ways to lose friends and irritate people, but these three will cause enough damage that you will not have to worry about using other tactics to accomplish your unhealthy social goal.

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There's too many things to extrapolate from the President's speech tonight, but one of the topics spreading around like wildfire is the President's mention of America's "Sputnik moment." Provided, the world is not in a cold war, nor are the Soviets a threat (at least explicitly), to national security. But the idea of pushing the boundaries, stepping up innovation and challenging the limits of preconceived realities is what attracts me to the idea. 

So with no further ado, let me ask you the question, what will create your Sputnik moment? How do you create new processes, methods and approaches that will transform the way you do things? How will you push the boundaries and break the barriers that has kept you from achieving your visions and desires?

Not sure how many people will read this, but I'd love to hear about how you'll achieve your Sputnik moment! 

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I’m partly being paid for writing for the past 14 months and it’s a job I’ve dreamt, as part of my at least 1 billion dreams and secret projections of my future, but never really thought I could get. I’m fearful of my prospects, frightened by the uncharted territories I have yet to explore, the rules and styles I still need to learn and the volumes of content I have yet to create. Add to this, that sense of insecurity in my ability to convey thoughts in the best way possible. I have been borderline nerve wreck when I know I have a blank screen to fill, the feeling started a few months after I have dove in to this potential “career path”, not knowing where the path will lead.

In reality, though, I need to make writing for me to work. My conceptual skills are practically unlimited, but my technical skills have always been geared to doing one thing - dealing with the written, printed, tweeted or in a more web 2.0 fashion, spreadable word. I do not know if I will feel excited to write again, but all I know right now is I want to write. I want to share my thoughts, dreams, aspirations, visions and desires on paper or the web or wherever the characters I’m using now can be seen or applied.

I know it’s difficult to write and this public confession, which will probably be read by at least three people- my parents and my best friend, may still not reflect on my actions, but typing it away feels darn good.

The reason it’s difficult to write is because it involves sharing a lot of you, a good part of you and I guess if I want to be good at this, I need to learn to be very, very generous. In the end, I’ll feel darn good anyway for doing so.

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A few minutes ago, I received a reply from a social media influencer. He is a best-selling author, a fully-booked public speaker, a talent of Hollywood's most prestigious agency and one of the faces of the emerging discipline of new media. His e-mail was short and sweet. By social media standards, it's one word, a hashtag actually.

This was the full content of the e-mail's body without the signature line.

#ThankYou :)

He must have repeated that more than a 1,000 times. It shows that this guy practices what he preach. He firmly believes in dealing with his clients on a one-on-one basis, even if his base has practically been scaled to hundreds of thousands. His Twitter follower count shows that he has 855,000+ followers and on Facebook he boasts 52,000+ likes. In all standards, he's an industry biggie! But he has never forgotten the habit of responding and reaching out to a single customer.

This social media influencer preaches the gospel of building your business one person at a time and emphasizes the need to value customers as people. His teaching of commerce is basic and has been repeated over and over and over again. The basis of what he says is the same, the only thing different is the form. But he connects to people, big time, because he reminds many of us - those who try to market things, ideas, products or services to people the very essence of commerce.

Gary Vaynerchuk brings us back to the basics. He enlightens us what we should have known all along. Business is about people. It is about satisfying their needs. It is about providing a solution to their problems. It is about making things easier to a difficult process they perform.

Business is about serving people. It's about recognizing their past, present and future concerns and devising ways on how our skills and knowledge can effectively respond to those. The presence of an exchange is structured to satisfy a need and providing an incentive to the person or entity who can be the solver. It's about service. It's about enhancing another person's life or duty and gaining a living by doing so. The one who can best provide, solve and enrich life, becomes the winner. 

Unfortunately, this common knowledge has not been to common. The reason why individuals like Gary Vaynerchuk, a passionate, sincere and dedicated marketer has become a fresh face for business, a new icon for aspirants and established entrepreneurs alike. He heralds principles that should be the very foundation of any enterprise.

The fundamentals of all commerce and the free economy can be traced from the dictum of Adam Smith, the Father of Modern Economics. It declares that:

"It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages."

No, I have no way or intent to disprove that. Although altruism is not a core competency suggested in any form of business process, there is one thing in this dictum that holds truth and can be related to what Gary proclaims. Though the butcher, brewer or baker may not characterize any form of generosity in their business dealings, they all intend to do one thing -serve humanity by being a source for someone's dinner.  

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If there's one part of the body that causes more danger and destruction than a male species' private part, it's the tongue. It's the most morally ambiguous member of the human physique, useful for various situations, productive in any given time. Through it, we nurture ourselves physically and with it we speak what's on our mind. The tongue is a bodily instrument that can uplift, encourage and create good things, while at the same time, can emulate the demonic trio of stealing, killing and destroying.

Taming the tongue requires a lifestyle of extreme discipline, tremendous memory, and strict adherence to absolute principles. Keeping secrets, acknowledging what is confidential and not, recognizing what can and can't be said, privately or publicly, are certain guidelines any man must abide if he plans on keeping his mouth shut. Speaking the truth, explaining sincerely, and pinpointing what is false, are few measures that must be taken if he plans on making a positive impact when he opens his mouth. Using the tongue properly requires a holistic effort on anyone's part. He needs to not only concern himself of ensuring that it doesn't emit deadly odor, but he also needs to be careful not to emit something worse - deadly words, packaged as full-sentence lies and false statements.

In order to do this, he needs to know his boundaries. He needs to be enlightened that the tongue has it's limitation and boundaries and he doesn't need to speak his mind at all times. Depending on the timing, situation or nature of the event, the tongue must at many times be kept shut. If it's used, it must be for the purpose of building someone up or correcting what is wrong. Though it is entertaining, the tongue must never be used to enjoy something at anyone's expense. It's function must be applied to enhance something or someone or better yet, be enriching to the point that it can transform and turn things around for the good.

Before someone uses his tongue, he needs to ask himself - will saying it makes thing better? Or will it make things worse? Will speaking it steal someone of his joy, destroy someone's personal image or kill a relationship I have with a person? Is it worth using the tongue at all for this situation? Or must I just use my mind and think through it first?

The worst lie ever spoken to man is framed in this saying: "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me"

Sticks and stones will break your bones and physically hurt you. It will injure you and for a period of time, it will cause pain. Depending on the gravity of the impact, sticks and stones use for a violent purpose can kill you. Words, on the other hand, will have to skip breaking your bones. It will be quick enough to cause pain, light enough to speed the process of injuring you permanently.

The tongue is a gift. Without it, we cannot eat, drink or speak what we must say. But being endowed with it is not a license to plant seeds of sorrow and pain. No, the tongue cannot cause unwanted pregnancy or be used for rape. It can do far worst than that: kill a person's spirit, dreams and self-respect, while he's still alive.

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Diplomats use airport to reach nations and territories to strengthen relationships between two nations. Foreign workers use airports to go to a place where they can enrich their careers or enhance their income. Businesspeople use airports to explore new markets, close deals and develop networks. Religious workers use airports to get to a destination where they spread their faith.

Airports are platforms, the terminals and gates funnels to things new, different and for some, sentimental and full of meaning. It is where you begin a journey or mark an end of one that was just taken. Just as if we have Facebook to connect to people, Twitter to connect to conversations and Wordpress to connect to an audience, we have airports that connects us to new places where we discover, demystify and develop a perspective of the world we may never have gained without the wonders of air travel.

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IMG_0099.MOV Watch on Posterous

Sent from my iPhone

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...doing what you want to learn.

I love reading. I'm very passionate and hungry for information that I read everything and anything I'm interested in. The format and how it's presented doesn't matter because reading for me is a form of relaxation and a chronic habit that I can't seem to shrug, a bad combination for is a potential if not an addiction. Reading for me is like eating. The printed word makes me salivate for new knowledge contained in its every character.

The problem comes when my desire for new information ends with reading. I consider myself knowledgeable on various topics. But when I get to the point that am able to eloquently and articulately explain certain concepts and ideas, but have nothing to show for it in terms of results, I lose confidence, a phenomenon appropriate for the realization. It is because the true value of knowledge is dependent on its application, known as output. Output is defined not by what we know but what we've done. Ideas are meaningless unless they are implemented, executed and transformed into tangible goods, services, entities or movements.

Knowledge is necessary for us to be productive, since all processes begin as ideas weaved into our own thinking, but it need not be gained only through consumption of information. Taking risks, experimenting methods, applying new practices and simply just doing what we already know are all manners of learning. These activities require a holistic involvement - physical, mental and even emotional, making the learning experience active and the knowledge gained easier to retain and master.

I've learned that by doing some of the things I want to learn, giving myself time limits on the passive learning process of just consuming information and forcing myself to immediately implement some ideas, no matter how small the scale, is  the best way for me to gain knowledge. I want to learn a lot of things. My free time will only allow me to read so much.

I'm a believer that wisdom is more powerful than knowledge and wisdom is simply knowledge, applied.

Image Source: http://galton.org/news.htm

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Last Friday I read a blog from Jason Kottke, the founder of the famous blog Kottke. In that blog, which was linked from an article in Mashable celebrating blogging from 2006-2010, he was saying how he finally found a focus and how the leap necessitated support from people and discipline upon himself (mostly financial). In his post, Jason was sharing his desire to focus on his blog and was asking for support. He also shared that the day he decided to just focus on producing and developing Kottke was the day he just had one thing to do.

That one thing to do is the elusive situation I have yet to discover. I hope and pray that the day will come where I need not to do too many things to sustain myself, but will have the luxury of doing that one thing which I enjoy doing the most and am destined to be great at.

If you are in the same shoes as I am, I hope and pray for the same for you.

Reposted from my old blog, http://calebgalaraga.com

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As we meet the next seven days, I hope and pray that we will have the courage to see what's in us, beyond us and through us, viewing it with a lens dedicated to the cause of a persona greater than all of us.

May these seven days be the best seven days yet, and may the coming moments after these build up to something marvelous for you.

Seven days is long for those who have endured existence and have forgotten to live life. I hope and pray you will feel that the next seven days is a really short one.

A week is a crucial part of the year and we only get 52 of them every year of our life, may this week be the best week you've ever had and may the coming weeks be greater than the former.

Seven days can be blessed days and if you decide that it will be, your faith and will can make it happen.

Seven days is not just seven days. It is a week, a part of a year, an element of a decade, a peek to your future.

I hope and pray that the next seven days be a beginning of greater days for you.

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If you can answer seven nights a week to that question, you're blessed. Not everyone, including myself sometimes, is fortunate to be able to answer affirmative to that one-sentence interrogation. It's because fulfillment is never derived but a person's ability to exist throughout the day, but to live it.

The grind, which we can call the rat race, involving a commute, a romantic or violent affair with a desk table or chair and horrendous or harmonious relationship with a superior is part of the daily life of practically every living productive being on earth today. Many have depicted this as a form of imprisonment, which one has to get out of. Books, podcasts (previously tapes and CDs), videos and a host of other information products have been dedicated to empowering the individual from escaping this so-called race. A dead-end, painfully described by a few.

But life is how you make it, as my former housemate used to tell me. It is how you perceived it (as long as you don't try to live in a dream) that defines it. It is how you shape it, that makes it either a good one or a bad one.

Therefore, fulfillment can only be defined by you. What makes you fulfilled? How can you make something fulfilling out of what you do now? How can you transform the grind into a pleasurable journey?

Fulfillment is defined by a man's ability to live without regrets, fully exerting his best to what is before him, giving his all to what has been asked of him. The task we have at work, the schedule we have this week or the plans we need to realize in the coming days may not have been exactly what we desired. But it's there. It's what we do with it that defines if at the end of the day we can sleep peacefully and say, we're fulfilled.

We cannot always blames things beyond our control to provide a rationale of why we're unhappy, dissatisfied or frustrated. We cannot always rely on our lack of maturity and inability to take responsibility to keep us comfortable in the realm of self-pity and despair. We cannot always choose to give our self the delight of basking into sorrow and hopelessness.

The reason many lose their souls on the so-called rat race is not because of the mere reality that they are in a routine, but the lack or the choice to lack the capacity to see things differently and make the most out of what's available, today.

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For many of us, worrying is a part-time job. We have integrated it so well in our daily lives that its second nature for us to worry. They worry about what to wear, what to eat, what to drink, what to say, what to do, basically anything. Some even worry about the terror attacks that occurred 17,000 miles away from where they live, the coming recession 10 years from now or the pending doom that accompanies the fulfillment of the prophecies in the book of Revelation. But like all fruitless day-to-day activities, worrying leads to an unhealthy conclusion that will cause you to worry more: Lack of focus, inability to think clearly, unhealthy emotional and psychological disposition and the ultimate killer – stress.

But life will be too unconventional if we’re not worrying. Besides, some habits are there for a reason; they just need a minor adjustment for it to work well enough to our advantage. Thus, it’s efficient and probably effective to think about those things that we can actually, well, apply the ancient practice of worrying.

Extrapolating from the book of life who urges us not to worry about tomorrow, I will say, it may be safe to worry about today. Besides, faithfulness is not measured in your ability to think, strategize or plan the future, it’s based on how you handle and do things today. There are enough worries today that to think about the future more often is a sin in itself. We have to learn to concern ourselves with how we can be a better person today, how we can have a better attitude today, how we can live a more fruitful life today, how we can handle our finances better today and how we can strengthen our relationships with people and our God, today.

Today is not only tomorrow’s past, but it’s a basis for how tomorrow will play out. If we say we’ll be better tomorrow, we’ll do well in the future or we’ll achieve this or that 10 years from now, today will define if those aspirations will happen.

Our Creator knows what He’s doing, thus He defined and classified “worrying for tomorrow” as sin. He knows there are enough tasks and matters today that we must concern ourselves with. If we deal with it well, faithfully, diligently and excellently as we should have, then worrying about tomorrow may finally appear as what it’s supposed to be all along – a sin we do not need to commit. 

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NO! I’m not a bad son or a backslider, but it’s true. I rarely listen to him preach and not for the reasons that you’re thinking.

Crossing the Pacific Ocean on a weekly basis is definitely not a viable idea, and anyone, who does that just to hear someone preach is either mentally deranged, idolatrous or has no financial self-control in any sense of the word. But ever since I had a decent amount of brain activity going on in my head, I never found it useful or even necessary to hear Papa preach.

The reason: I learned a lot from his example.

I struggled to read through my first non-academic book. I remember reading it 10 pages at a time, per day, in order to finish it. It was a small and thin material, but finishing it was a success. And I started to read more, and more, and more. I don’t remember Papa telling me to read books (or read a lot) before I was actually showing visible interest on reading. But because he loves reading and have actually turned our house, no matter where we lived, into a library/living space, reading has become part of my lifestyle. It’s a passion and sometimes, an addiction, that I still have and my siblings and I can attest that we find ourself very comfortable in bookstores. No matter where we are.

Nation building wasn’t really the main topic at the dinner table. Until all of us kids were old enough and was showing interest in the stuff did Papa tell us of what he was doing. But we knew what he was doing all along. He was involved in all these Christian organizations and activities that has something to do with nation building. At one point he even wrote speeches for the President for religious events. He didn’t have to tell us that we need to love our nation or be passionate about its welfare. We saw his dedication and love for the nation in his work. And because I’m an extremely smart kid (like every other kid on earth), I learned to follow (some) of what he did. Since he lived it out, I tried to sort of carry some nation building work on my own when I was in college. The idea failed. Heaven knows if I may have a chance to do it again. Nation building, however, is still an advocacy and career I will always have an interest in, even if I’m living in a completely different nation now. Someday, I hope to carry some of what he did, remixed in my version, in the new nation I’m in now.

Church ministry and the people behind them did not really interest me when I was a kid. Papa never singled-out the ministry as “the job” or ever said that being a Pastor or minister is a holier calling than being a businessman, doctor, or whatever profession. However, I found myself having greater respect and deeper appreciation for those who do church work. I actually even did a stint at a church-based organization to kick start my working life. I was never coerced to love church leaders or be grateful of what they do, but since Papa is a minister and I saw how much he love other ministers, I ended up emulating his example. Today, I have a special place in my heart for those in the ministry, first because I’m a Christian, and second, because Papa has been giving his love, life and resources to equip them to become more excellent and effective in the calling they responded to.

They say that you tend to remember about 20% of the things you hear, but can retain in your memory more than half of what you experience. Experience happens when something is seen, felt, heard, read, understood and appreciated, all at once or during the process of encountering it. It is the most powerful of ways to learn and receive impartation of a mindset, habit or lifestyle. 

Papa’s greatest preaching is not being delivered with audible sounds, and thus its impossible to listen to.  He has been living it and has made and continually been making a great impact in my life, far more than a thousand sermons combined.

Happy Father’s Day, Papa!

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