How A T-Shirt Changed My Life

It's a cheap t-shirt. In fact I got it for free at a conference I went to recently. It's not really anything special, just a grey cotton t-shirt and on the front in fluorescent green letters it says "Evolve." That's it. So what is so special about this t-shirt?

Well for me I see it as an instruction. Evolve. You might be asking "Nick, how do I do that? Isn't evolution a process that takes hundreds or thousands of years?" Well beyond altering your DNA what I think of it as is an instruction for a mindset. Evolve. Make yourself better. Push yourself to be better in some way every single day. In the words of James Altucher, improve yourself by 1%. That's it. Evolve. Be better. A simple instruction but definitely a philosophy to live your life by.

Now when I wear this shirt, I often wear it for sports. For those of you who don't know, I recently went through a pretty bad depression. It was a really hard time for me, and I gained a LOT of weight. Recently I have lost almost all the weight (I'm still working on it, but god damn carbs are delicious). This t-shirt serves as a reminder to push myself harder, be better, improve by 1%. Evolve. Don't settle for being ordinary when you can be extraordinary.

And you know what? You can be extraordinary too. Evolve. It's not a process, it's not a theory, we're not talking Darwinism here. Evolve. It's a mindset.

Is it time to re-think the work week?

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We've all heard the classics: "I don't wanna work, I just wanna bang on my drums all day", "Everybody's workin' for the weekend", even "Taking care of business" is about not working. Clearly something isn't working here.

So there have been pushes to alternative arrangements. Telecommuting, compressed work weeks, trading longer work hours for "more time off". But does this really work either? Sure, some people are probably more productive working from home, but it doesn't work for everyone. And while you are slaving away at those 10 hour days, are you really as productive when you are pushing hour 9 as you were when you were pushing hour 4?

Sure there's upside for you too. Nothing like that 3 day weekend every week! But really, do you make the most of your 3 day weekend?

One person I have recently come to admire is James Altucher. For those of you who do not know who he is, he is a prominent blogger, author, podcaster, etc... who mostly writes and produces content about self improvement. One of his mantras is "improve yourself 1% every day, if you do that it compounds and results in a 3800% improvement over a year".

Who has time to do all that improving?! I know I get home at around 6-ish, by the time I make dinner, eat, and even THINK about cleaning up all I want to do is watch TV for an hour or two then go to bed. Not have to use my brain, forget about work because I've got to wake up and do that grind again tomorrow.

Anyways, on a recent episode of the podcast "Ask Altucher", James interviewed 15 year old Mark Messick (I highly suggest you listen to the episode!). To give a little backstory, Mark and his family moved and Mark had to be homeschooled for a while. Mark found that doing his school work, he would routinely work productively in the morning, finishing around noon or early afternoon, and then have the afternoon off.

Now I know what you are thinking. The automatic assumption is that Mark "wasted" afternoons playing video games or watching TV. Maybe he did do some of that, however, what really struck me is that Mark mentioned he got bored, and started looking for ways to fill that boredom. With that time off, he got to reflect on himself and find what he loves.

I'd like to think that this is the natural human condition. That humans are not meant to spent hours and hours idle, that our natural desire is to make ourselves better, to innovate, to find what we love, and to be truly happy. Taking time to reflect on yourself, and who you want to be is important. In my opinion Mark supports the idea that left on our own, humans would not simply recede to the couch cushions and go extinct.

Now here is where I might get really controversial, what I would suggest is a 6 day work week working 6 hours a day. Work from 8 until 2, then when you get home, you have 3-4 hours before dinner to focus on yourself, to grow, to improve 1%.

It's a complete paradigm shift. Companies would have to embrace it, work with staggered shifts, hell, it may not even work at all. People might have to be paid less. Companies would have to hire more people (actually that's probably a plus). But what we switch to is from a society focused on making money, on efficiency, on effectiveness, to a society focused on BEING BETTER. I think that is a really important thing.

Since starting to follow James, I try to improve myself 1% everyday. I don't always do it, sometimes I'm too tired, sometimes I'm too stressed, sometimes I just want to sit and watch TV. But I know when I have time for myself I get restless, I want to do something, I want to get better at something. I think we could all go a long way if we had a little more time to make ourselves better.

How do you make yourself more productive? What are some ways that you "improve 1% every day"? I'd love to hear your stories!

Why I quit my job...

It was early on a Wednesday morning. I was sitting at my desk taking the first few sips of coffee, for once at work I was calm. No apprehension about dealing with difficult clients, no dread of dealing with my overbearing, micro-managing boss, for once not wondering "What time can I leave today?"

I didn't have a new job lined up. But at that point it didn't matter to me. I'd had enough.

There are many reasons to quit a job. You don't like the work, you don't get paid well enough, there is no opportunity for promotion, and on and on and on. None of these are really the reason I quit.

Don't get me wrong, there are definitely politics, personal differences, and maybe a little bad blood surrounding my departure. I wasn't paid enough, I didn't feel like I was positively contributing to the world, and I didn't feel like my company appreciated me.

But what I am realizing more and more, and perhaps this is a justification, but I had peaked.

Does this mean that I will never improve, that I am as good as I could possibly be? No. It means that I had made the most of the opportunity, that I had improved as much as I could under the conditions, and that any further improvement would be restricted by the company culture and the limitations of my position.

So it was time to move on. Time to find a new environment, to continue to grow, to continue to make myself better.

One thing I would like to urge to all of my peers before I sign off. To all you twenty-somethings out there: we have all worked hard, some of us have fancy degrees and credentials. That does not mean that our education is over. When I took my previous job, I wasn't happy that I was being paid only a little more than I made as a grad student. What I saw was the opportunity to learn about business, to expand my skill-set, and make myself more valuable to any future employer.

Education doesn't start and stop with school. Education starts and stops with YOU.

What do you value in a workplace? What are some reasons that you quit a job?

Why write a blog?

I've asked myself a few times, why write a blog?

Businesses do it to connect with their customers, provide resources and increase marketing base. People do it to share stories, experiences, teach, and put themselves out there for friends, family, and yes, businesses to see.

But what about me? What could I possibly have to say that would be of any use to you, the reader? I'm just an ordinary, 27 year old guy living in Vancouver.

I think that's it though. I'm an ordinary, 27 year old guy. I don't know about you, but lot's of 27 year old guys don't really talk about their experiences. It's a tough time, recently out of school, trying to build a life, trying to build a career, and having to grow up in a hell of a hurry.

I've tried to write blogs before, most of them were "hey, here's my thoughts on a book I read" or "oh here's something that frustrated me". Most of them never lasted more than a couple posts. I lost interest in them almost as fast as my readers did.

What is different this time? What do I have to offer? I'm sure I have experiences to speak to a lot of people, but that's not why I'm writing. I'm sure other people are going through the same journey as me, but that's not why I am writing. I'm sure other people could learn from the success and mistakes I make on my career journey, but that is not why I am writing.

I am writing for me. That's it, and that's why I think that maybe I'll write a couple more posts this time, because I don't care what you think, this is for me.