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Archive for June, 2011

Self-Improvement Benefits of Blogging

June 25th, 2011

My Blog Beginning

Like many others bloggers out there, I started blogging because I wanted to share the techniques that I”ve used to achieve a degree of financial success. I honestly thought that I was going to write so that the average person would get encouraged by read some of my articles and think “Wow, that would work” and give it a try.

I wasn’t arrogant enough to believe that I was perfect, just that I had a better way of approaching finances. While I still believe I have a lot to share, I never took into the account the self-improvement piece that was involved with blogging. I was arrogant enough to believe that I was going to be the teacher, and I would be selflessly helping other, and reinforcing what I’ve learned over time. Lately, I’ve been pleasantly surprised that it’s really a two way street!

The Self-Improvement Surprise

What I didn’t expect was the constant learning and self-improvement aspects of blogging! I’m going to create a short list of ways that I’ve become both more creative and my self-improvements that have and are happening to me.

The Calm: Since I practically create a blog post every day, I’ve learned that if I slow down and remain calm, I can get a decent post created. Sometime going slower is really moving faster…
Organization: I now have organization skills thanks to blogging. In my prior life, I would just fly by the seat of my pants… no more! Blogging has done wonders for the way I organize and track things.
Communication: Compared to where I started, my communication skills now rock, not just in written form either! Since I started blogging, both my written and oral forms of communication has improved. This has been a very welcome and needed surprise in my life!
Continuous Learning: Since I read other blogs and do research on topics, I learn something everyday. Sometimes its earth shattering, but some times it’s small but interesting (it’s all good). The point is that I’m not longer stagnant and just doing my time in life until I retire.
Virtual Friends: I now have friends in remote location that I’ve never seen, but that I care about and who I’m rooting for. We can all rise in the blogosphere!
Engaging in Conversation: Commenting on so many other blog sites has enabled me to engage in verbal conversation in my real life more easily. Whereas I’ve been an introvert for a good part of my life, now I’ll reach out and start the conversation instead of waiting for people to speak to me first. I’ve since learned that prior to blogging, some people thought I was stuck up (to use a high school phrase), but this has never been so! Now that I’m more sociable, they now see my true friendly colors.
Improved Writing Skills: This is obvious, with practice comes perfection. While I still have a long way to go to achieve perfection, at least I’m heading down the road instead of parking on the side of it.
Subtle Confidence: While I don’t walk around saying that “I’m the man“, I do have a certain degree of increased confidence knowing that I’ve improved myself because of all the bullet points above. It’s a great feeling!

Why I Recommend Everybody Trying It

Obviously, I recommend it because of the benefits that I listed above!

If you are going the serious route, consider going with a hosted service (hostgator.com, bluehost.com, etc), but if you just want to improve yourself and have don’t have a goal of creating side income from it, then consider one of the free sites like blogger.com or wordpress.org.

Surprisingly, I do make a little bit of money from blogging on the side. While I didn’t start out with that as a goal, it has been a very welcome and pleasant surprise.

Not sure if you want to try blogging or not? Check out some of my previous articles on blogging called: Pros and Cons of Blogging, and the 15 Advantages of Blogging.

Good luck, if you decide to take the blogging plunge!

MR

23 comments »

Posted in Blogging

Tags: benfits of blogging blogging How blogging has improved me I love blogging self-improvement aspects of blogging

Purging Items That Appear To Have Value But Don’t

June 24th, 2011

My basement is full of Items That Appear To Have Value But Don’t!

I have over 15 computers in my house, but only 4 are currently being used. While I don’t have any computer that doesn’t have at least a 32 bit CPU inside, some of them are still just too slow and obsolete to ever be useful again.

Having such computers sitting in your house taking up precious space is just a waste of floor space. I know that I will never use those computers again, and yet I still have many of them sitting down in my basement. My logic is that I might use them for router or perhaps install some variant of a Linux operating system on some of them…, but I won’t…

Why do we hold onto old things that once had value but really doesn’t anymore? Perhaps there is a bit of a nostalgic feeling with the item? Or maybe we feel like we’ll give the obsolete item to our children, or other family members, or even friends. Knowing that it held great value to us during a time period and we would like it to mean something to someone else too.

But unfortunately most of the time it’s really just junk, especially technology. If you are holding onto a “Palm Pilot” thinking that your kids could use it, don’t! First, it now looks horrible and is terribly underpowered. Your child’s peers will laugh at them if they were to use it, don’t put your kids through that type of embarrassment!

With other junk, you just throw it in the garbage can and it’s taken away. With computer this isn’t a good move! There are toxic pieces in the computer that should be taken to a recycling plant so they can either recycling the toxic pieces or properly dispose of the toxic parts.

Another thing that people tend to hang onto is old outdated clothes. Even if you could fit in them, they are so out of fashion that you would look odd trying to wear them again, at least in public. If your clothes are older than 5 years old, and you haven’t worn them in the past five years, send them to goodwill, put them in a garage sale, or pitch them! You know that you will never wear them again, so don’t kid yourself!

Free yourself of unnecessary clutter and experience more room!

Have a good weekend,

MR

13 comments »

Posted in Problems

Tags: clutter getting rid of junk obsolete items organization purging junk valueless things that once had value worthless items

Toro Lawn Mower Woes, Complaining To Get It Fixed For Free

June 23rd, 2011

Toro Lawn Mower

Well after writing up a glowing review of my Toro Lawn Mower, it decided to break… Murphy’s Law strikes again!

Once of the most important points for me when I bought my lawn mower, was that the product had to have some type of warranty. But when I called the dealer where I bought my lawn mower to complain about my problem, he said that my issue sounds like bad gas and that Toro doesn’t include that in their warranty.

This really irked me because the lady salesperson that I bought the mower from said that the Toro warranty covers everything between the wheels. I specifically asked that question twice, and she said that it was all covered no matter what the problem. So I started complaining calling the Toro product junk and while I didn’t swear, I called the product and warranty crap… After a while the guy (I believe the owner of the store), caved and told me to bring it in and that they would look at it and fix it for free.

During the phone conversation, he told me all kinds of reasons why the problem wasn’t with the mower. Problems like the gas, the EPA changes, and how I must have used old gas, etc… I went to the two gas stations that I typically go to fill my gas can and asked them directly, they stood by their gas quality. Next, I called the owner back and explained how the gas was good and that I used the same can for the previous four lawn cuts this year already.

The point is, I didn’t give up and kept to the facts and even did extra work to backup my claim. I continued to have a dissatisfied voice, but I wasn’t condescending. After a verbal joust, eventually the owner caved and fixed my mower. He said that I had some brown stuff in the tank which must have clogged up the carburetor (or so they claimed). I don’t care as long as it’s fixed and works again.

Since the mower was worked on I noticed that the engine sounds even better than when I bought it, so I’m guessing that the engine had problems from the start.

This little adventure just goes to show that the squeaky wheel does get oiled the most! I stuck by my guns and got my problem fixed for free by talking about my the past experiences and how I’ve mowed with many types of mowers and never encountered this problems, etc. And eventually the owner offered assistance.

Never give up when you are wronged in cases like this one! By sticking to my guns, I saved myself both time and money.

MR

Update: Since the toro lawnmower was repaired, it’s been running great and even sounds better than when I first bought it. I’m starting to think there was something in the tank that did clog the fuel lines, but I’m sure it wasn’t from bad gas as was claimed. It’s good to have a decent mower again!

11 comments »

Posted in Problems

Tags: toro broke toro dealer problems toro lawn mower problems toro recycler toro warranty toro won't start

Is Clutter Keeping You From Being More Successful?

June 22nd, 2011

In an earlier articles called “Getting Wealthy By Swimming to Shore“, I compare the process of getting out of debt and becoming rich to swimming to the ocean shore. Becoming “Financial Independent” would be accomplished once you first touch the shoreline. While it’s still possible to make the swim with clutter, I would think that it would be like swimming to shore through seaweed with your clothes and shoes on.

But why is clutter considered bad, you might wonder?

Because it distracts you from the important things in your life that you need to focus on to get things accomplished! By having clutter at your office or in your home, you are constantly being distracted by unimportant materials.

Another problem with such cluster is that it takes valuable real estate space on your desk or in your home. That space could be occupied by more relevant things!

If the clutter is really bad, you can lose important information within the piles of unimportant junk.

In the past, I would build up clutter by saving credit card offers and other junk mail for later reading. The problem is that I never find the time to read the mail later, so the mail offers would just accumulate in a “never read” pile. Eventually this piles get big and important mail sometimes gets mixed in the piles and things get lost. Or I would avoid those piles because it would be overwhelming.

As you may have guessed, I speak from experience. The way I overcame my cluttering habits is that I had to realize that I’m not going to take my clutter with me when I die. I had to learn (over years), how to process such offers more quickly and disregard those pieces of junk mail or unimportant objects in my life.

Actually, even now I’m in the process of either selling or purging some of my hidden clutter down in my basement. I know that it’s stuff that I will never need or use again, so I’m at the point where I just want to get rid of it.

Do you have clutter, and if so, do you think that your clutter may have held you back from being successful?

Simplify, simplify simplify!!!

MR

16 comments »

Posted in Inspirational

Tags: avoiding clutter beating clutter clutter free eliminating clutter free from clutter helping with clutter success by eliminating clutter

To IPod Touch or Not To IPod Touch, That Is The Question!

June 21st, 2011

iPod Touch

I’m starting to see more and more of my friends and co-workers with an iPad, iPhone or an iPod Touch.

Well actually I don’t see may of my co-workers with an iPod touch, but my son really, really, really want one for his birthday, and he makes this well know daily! I’ve been resisting buying apple products because they are still pretty expensive in my eyes, but the real question is…

“Are Apple Products Worth The Price”?

With the original IPod (sans the touch), I would say NO!

Personally, I can listen to music through a much cheaper Sansa MP3 player just fine. Yes, working with the Sansa mp3 player required more effort, but for often $100 less, I was willing to do the extra work.

Time Have Changed!

As you buy up the electronic device food chain, the story changes drastically! Reviews based on other non-immediate family members, say that YES, the advanced Apple products are worth it! Both my dad (yes, my dad have one!) and my siblings tout how magnificent these handy all-in-one devices are.

So back to my initial question!

“To iPod Touch or Not To iPod Touch”?

After taking my parents and siblings advice into consideration, consulting my friend Mr. Google (who has all the answers), and reading the reviews from well-respected sites like PC Magazine and CNet… I’ve decided to take the plunge and buy my son a iPod Touch for his 11th birthday.

What do you think? Is eleven years old to young for an iPod Touch?

MR

10 comments »

Posted in Kids

Tags: Apple products iPod Birthday gift iPod gift iPod Touch