Category / action

by Nathan Coumbe

You probably don’t need more schooling. You DO need to take action.

You are stressed, frustrated, angry, bored, or perhaps feeling underutilized. Your job isn’t satisfying, you’re treated poorly, or maybe you’ve lost your job during this crisis.

A common solution to these problems seems to be more education: another degree in a different field, a higher-level degree like a master’s or doctorate, or some other very expensive piece of paper. But is more education going to get you that dream job? Probably not.

Going back to school might actually be a way to hide: you don’t know what you want to do so you hide from making a decision by doing the socially acceptable move of going back to school. You are looking only at job postings online that ask for master’s degrees and Ph.Ds (when in reality you don’t need either in truth–they are simply trying to weed out applicants so the don’t have to look at as many resumes).

Action, not education, is the key to better work

What you really need to do is take action! Start doing work that you actually care about whether or not you get paid for it.

Do you want to move into marketing? Raise $50,000 for your favorite charity, the local zoo, or a museum you love. Run social media for some small businesses and restaurants in your area. This is how you create a portfolio of work that proves you can do the work that someone who is looking for a marketer needs.

Do you want to start counseling people on how to better communicate with their spouses, coworkers or bosses? Read books, attend seminars, create free guides and send them out to friends and connections online. Start creating videos with tips. No one truly needs to have a Ph.D. in Psychology to help people with their personal problems.

Do you want to become a teacher? Start teaching! Read literature, history, business books, magazines, whatever material you can on whatever subject you want to teach. Be a lifelong student. Start tutoring. Private schools don’t require teaching licenses, but they do want to know that you know your subject and know how to teach.

Do you want to be a freelance writer? Start writing! Create a blog, write articles on LinkedIn, pick up a book on copywriting and start making fake promo materials for real companies you care about or fake companies you made up.

A portfolio of work is better than an expensive piece of paper

You need a portfolio, not an expensive degree, to find work you really care about. You need a body of work, examples of what you have done and can do in the future.

You need projects behind your name, not letters. Companies care less and less about degrees with each passing day–just look at Apple, Google, Amazon, or Tesla. They want to know if you can do the work and take initiative on your own. A portfolio of work and projects will show them both. You might need to learn how to code, but you can do that for $40 a month rather than $50,000 for a degree that will be outdated in 2 years.

Schooling rarely gives you what you need to thrive in a career. Actual work, practice, and personal development is the key.

Get an education that pays

If you want some ideas about how to develop yourself without spending a fortune on a soon-to-be useless degree, check out this post I created recently. Another great resource is this article here by my mentor Dan Miller.

While you’re at it, surround yourself with people who are trying to level up and find work that is meaningful, purposeful, and profitable. Check out the 48 Days Eagles group, and surround yourself with likeminded people. Click this link here and get 3 months for the price of 1!

Create a body of work you’re proud of, and you will never want for jobs or income.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Make a huge difference with one small behavior change

In his second great book, The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness, relates the story of Muhammad Yunus, an economics professor who founded the Grameen Bank – an institution that makes microloans to the impoverished citizens of Bangledesh. His story deserves to be quoted at length, but I will not do that here. What follows is a summary.

Muhmmad Yunus Saw a Need

Muhammad Yunus earned a Ph.D. and began teaching economics at a university in Bangladesh. While he was inside lecturing on macroeconomic principles, the citizens of Bangladesh were struggling to survive in a life of abject poverty.

One day when Dr. Yunus walked out of class, he passed a woman making beautiful, handmade bamboo chairs. Upon further discussion, he determined the woman was making two pennies per day.

Why? Because she was in a terrible arrangement with her supplier who only allowed her to sell the chairs back to him. Dr. Yunus then discovered that the woman only needed $0.20-0.25 cents to buy the materials herself, then she would no longer be in bonded labor to the supplier.

He discovered that other citizens were struggling in much the same way. His assistant went around asking how much money different people in his neighborhood needed to make a living: he reported back that all together they needed $27.

TWENTY-SEVEN DOLLARS! Dr. Yunus took that money out of his wallet, gave it to his assistant, and told him to tell those who were receiving the money simply to pay him back whenever they could (which they all did, eagerly and quickly).

Dr. Yunus Met a Need

There is much more to the story than that, including a long battle with banks in the area who did not believe anyone would pay back the money that was loaned to them (which they did). Dr. Yunus discovered, simply by opening his eyes and talking to people around him, that while he might not be changing the world with a $27 loan, he was changing someone’s world.

Dr. Yunus went on to create and found his own financial institution, Grameen Bank, which specializes in making small loans to people all over Bangladesh so they can create businesses, making a living, and pull themselves out of poverty. To this day it has loaned billions of dollars in microcredit to hundreds of millions of citizens, and it changed their lives.

Why am I telling you this story?

What You Need to Do

Change how you move through the world. Today, and each day for the rest of your life, when you drive around town, walk outside, or even scroll through social media, pay attention to the people.

What are they doing? What are they posting on social media? Can you identify a need in what they are saying? Are they struggling to accomplish a task or project?

Are they asking a question to which you know the answer or have a solution?

Assume, as Dr. Yunus says, “a worm’s-eye view” of the world. Don’t look for huge problems to solve: look for small, everyday problems. Find someone in need, ask yourself if you have the will and the skill to meet that need, and then do something about it. Show up, solve a problem, and keep doing that over and over again.

Ask yourself if you have the will and skill to meet someone’s need today.

You may not change the world, but you will change that person’s world. Do that enough times, solve enough problems for people, and you might begin to see a greater need that can be met by a business, service, or non-profit.

Find a need, meet the need, and make a difference today.

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*Note: some links on my site are affiliate links which means I make a small commission for purchases made. This does not affect you in any way.

by Nathan Coumbe

How to get an education that pays during your quarantine

When was the last time you learned something new?

It was probably a few minutes ago when you read an article on your favorite social media site, and you weren’t even aware you were learning. Why not do it intentionally?

Learning and education don’t cease when school ends. If it does, you’ve made a choice, and you will quickly find yourself becoming obsolete.

No one cares about the degree you got 10 years ago. They want to know if you are competent in the areas needed to accomplish the kind of work you want to do.

Learning and going to school are not the same thing. You might have hated school, but you definitely love learning. School requires that you do things you hate, but you aren’t in school anymore. You can learn whatever you want to learn right now.

Always wanted to learn how to draw? Do you want to redo math, not because you have to but because you want to? Maybe you want to learn calligraphy or tennis. Perhaps you want to get a new job, but you don’t have the marketing skills needed by the company. Now is the time, and now you HAVE time.

Learning anything new is part of your ongoing education. Why not do it intentionally? What are you doing right now to invest in your own education?

I’ll give you some ideas.

How to learn for free (or at least cheaply)

  1. Read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. If you only do one thing on this list, do this one. The $10 you spend on this book will be the best investment you ever make. It will change your outlook on life, it will improve your relationships with other people, and it will revolutionize how you act.
  2. Take online courses.
    • LinkedIn Learning
    • Udemy
    • Coursera – want a recommendation? Seth Godin has the absolute best courses on Udemy. Start there.
    • Khan Academy (retake high school absolutely free and enjoy it this time)
    • CreativeLive – learn how to draw, take stunning photographs, start your own creative freelancing business, and so much more.
    • Massachussetts Institute of Technology OCW (seriously, take actual courses from MIT absolutely free)
    • edX – Speaking of great schools, this website lets you take real, full courses from Ivy League schools from the comfort of your living room for free. No strings attached. If you want a certificate to hang on your wall or post on LinkedIn, you can pay a small fee and get proof that you completed Ivy League courses.
    • HubSpot Academy – become an expert in marketing for absolutely nothing.
  3. Read books.
    • Libraries still exist. Even if they aren’t open right now, you can download e-books for free from every library in the country. Go read books on subjects about which you are curious. It doesn’t cost you a dime.
    • Download the Kindle app for free on your phone. Then buy The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Seriously. You can buy books on every subject imaginable for less than $10 each. Most of the time you can get them for $5 or even $0.99. There is no excuse for failing to read. Swap 30 minutes a day of mindlessly scrolling Instagram, and you will become an expert on a subject in a matter of weeks or months.
  4. Subscribe to magazines.
    • Read the Harvard Business Review. It is well worth $18 a month. Get an entire master’s degree in business for what you spend on lunch.
    • Success Magazine and Inc. are two of my favorites. The former will inspire you to live your best life; the latter will give you much-needed insights on how to succeed in any work or business.
  5. Listen to podcasts – again, FREE.
    • “Akimbo” by Seth Godin
    • “48 Days to the Work You Love” by Dan Miller
    • “EntreLeadership” from Ramsey Solutions
    • “On Leadership with Scott Miller” from Franklin Covey
  6. Watch TED Talks and documentaries on Netflix or Amazon Prime Video.

There is no reason for you not to come out of this crisis with new skills, new knowledge, and an unofficial masters degree in one subject or another.

Be proactive. Take control of your education today.

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Note: a few of the links above are affiliate links. I get a small commission if a purchase is made. This does not affect you in any way.

by Nathan Coumbe

Accepting things as they are doesn’t mean you can’t do anything about them

The latest newsletter by Ryan Holiday on Stoicism (feel free to read it here) got me thinking about the difference between stoically, proactively accepting something as it is versus doing so in a passive, resigned way.

Holiday points out that Stoics were once criticized as being “too resigned…[accepting] the status quo.” That particular phrase got me thinking about accepting reality and taking action.

There are plenty of folks in the world who accept things passively, resignedly, like a sad sack – “there’s nothing I can do about it.” However, that isn’t what Stoics, or indeed, any religious or philosophical teaching truly preached.

Jesus told us turn the other cheek.

Epictetus told us to accept the things we can’t control as they are.

However, none of this means we simply roll over and die, accepting our fate. Quite the opposite, in fact. What these teachings tell us to do is face reality, then take action.

Circle of influence

Stephen Covey talks about the “Circle of Concern” and “Circle of Influence” in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People; these two circles are precisely the ideas about which Jesus, Epictetus, and other Stoic philosophers were trying to teach us.

There are things that we simply cannot change or do anything about. You can’t control whether someone slaps you in the face. You can’t control the economy, the weather, what the politicians in Washington do, or what your boss is like. You have to accept these as reality, or you will waste time and energy banging your head against the wall.

You can control how you respond to the guy who slaps you in the face, how you handle your money in times of crises, or how you dress and prepare when the weather turns nasty.

You can control how you treat other people, whether or not you vote, whether you actively contribute to your community, or whether you make positive deposits into your most important relationships.

You can control what skills you learn, how diligent you are in your job search, whether you give more than you are asked and build more trust with your boss as a result, and how you react when the boss doesn’t change his behavior.

Complaining, comparing, attempting to change things involving other people’s behavior, or changing the way the world works, for the most part, is ridiculously ineffective. You must instead focus your attention on things over which you have actual influence and control; most of the time those are things involve you: your behaviors, your actions, and your views of the world.

Accepting things as they are is the most important first step in changing how things are.

Until you accept reality as it is, there is nothing you can do to make a difference.

That’s my rant for today. Thanks for reading.

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by Nathan Coumbe

One hundred

There is something magical about the number 100. Nothing that comes before it really has the same feeling of meaning associated with it.

Think of the first time you had $100 in your hand. Today, that really doesn’t stretch very far, but do you remember the feeling? It was powerful, a feeling of wealth, of richness, of feeling as though you could do anything and buy anything you wanted.

Or what about Napoleon’s 100 Days? He escaped from the island of Elba, rallied 1,500 men, marched on Paris, and became emperor once more. Of course, he was defeated at Waterloo and kicked out again, but he still had those hundred days.

Or maybe working out? Have you ever done 100 push-ups or pull-ups? Have you ever put 100 pounds on a bar and lifted it for the firs time?

United States has exactly 100 senators. And the other important thing to many Americans: there are 100 yards between end-zones on a football field.

100ºF is extremely hot for humans; 100ºC will boil water into vapor.

100% is total, complete, a perfect score.

Most great lists of music, actors, artists, influential people, and books are lists of 100.

There is truly something special about one hundred.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Successful people do ONE thing all the time

Successful people are normal. They have no superhuman abilities, no extreme discipline honed by years of meditation or special operations training. However, they do something the rest of us don’t always do:

They choose.

Successful people choose what is important to them; they choose to prioritize what is important throughout the day; and they choose to carry out those things regardless of feelings or external triggers.

You must plan to do the things that matter – the things that will get you where you want to go. These are the achievements, contributions, and attributes for which you want to be remembered at your funeral.

Before you can plan them, however, you must define them. How will you achieve what’s important if you don’t know what is important?

You won’t.

But even if you lay out what is important and plan your day accordingly, it will not matter unless you choose to carry out the items of importance. This is what separates successful people from the rest.

“The successful person has the habit of doing the things failures don’t like to do….They don’t like doing them either necessarily. But their disliking is subordinated to the strength of their purpose.”

E.M. Gray – “The Common Denominator of Success”

Even if something is important, and you are aware of its importance, you will find times when you really don’t want to do it. You won’t want to exercise; you won’t want to read your kids to sleep after a long day at work. If you don’t, that’s fine. But you are making a choice based on feelings or circumstances, relinquishing control of your own life.

Every action you take or don’t is a choice. Choose to do the things that further your mission, rather than choosing to let other people, feelings, and circumstances choose for you.

Choose to be successful.

In summary

Define what really matters most to you.

Plan your days based around what is important.

And most importantly, choose to act regardless of how you feel, what other people do, or what is going on around you.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Profit vs. service

You have a really good idea, an idea that people will love, that will make a difference, that will make things better. In fact, the little voice in your head continues to tell you, “This might work.” But you continue to hesitate; you still haven’t shipped. Why not?

Money.

It always come back to money…but I don’t mean money in the way you’re thinking.

You might be a freelancer, a musician, a writer, or a budding entrepreneur: you want to improve the world, and you need to eat. Essentially, you are wrestling with two competing ideas: “Will this make me money?” vs. “Will this help people?”

If you live and work by the former question, you will make very little progress. There is no way for you to know if your endeavor will generate revenue, which means you will probably wait until you are sure it will work before you act. But if you can’t be sure (and you can’t), you won’t act.

Around and around it goes.

If you are searching for “yes” to the money question, you will feel fear every time you create a new video or go to click on the checkout button of a webhosting platform. You’ll be terrified every time you pick up the phone to make a sales call or approach a new customer in a store.

If you are worried about the profit, you revert to a scarcity mindset:

“I don’t know that this article will make money, so I probably shouldn’t post it.”

“Someone else is already doing something similar; I won’t be different enough to standout and earn an income.”

“What if I spent a little money to make this happen, but I never earn it back? I’ll have wasted it!”

Is that true? What if you didn’t make any money back, but you helped someone by spending it? You gave a gift; it was charity.

You do need to eat, which might mean you need a job while you seek to serve other people. If you work to answer the question, “Will this help people?” you will find that your ideas come naturally. They will be much easier to send out into the world: you won’t hesitate, because there is much less riding on the outcome.

In fact, the outcome is practically harmless. You either end up right where you started, or you make change happen. If you only help one person, then the answer to the question is a resounding “YES!”

I think the secret is faith and the right mindset. The right mindset is seeking to help people because you want to help them, not because you want to profit from them. Ironically, if you help enough people, you will be much closer to turning a profit than the fool who is focused on it.

Seth Godin says it all the time: “Ideas that spread, win.” They do. Helping others spreads, which means it wins. If you help people, they will know who you are. If they know who you are, they will come to you for more help. They will probably tell their friends about you as well. Soon you have an audience, people who trust you because you sought to help them, not profit from them. When people trust you, you win.

Live a life of abundance and give, give, give. Have faith that if you help enough people, the money will come.

And if it never does?

Well…you still helped a lot of people.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Courage

What is courage? It is the same thing as bravery?

Courage might be doing something even when you are terrified.

It might also be one’s readiness for action when a situation demands it.

Either way, courage is a choice. It is the act of deciding to act when the need arises.

Be courageous. Choose to act.

by Nathan Coumbe

Perfection is the problem

If you are an artist – a person who seeks to create beneficial change in the world – you are probably a perfectionist.

This is why you never hit “publish” on your blog, why you don’t post your photos on Instagram, or why your songs aren’t on YouTube and SoundCloud. It isn’t because the work you did is bad: it’s because you think if you do just a little bit more to it, it will be perfect.

You’ll never get there.

“An artist’s job is not to be perfect, but to [always] be creating.” – Jeff Goins

The more you create, the more practice you get. You’ll hit that 10,000 hour mark we’ve all heard about. The more practice you get, the better your work will be.

Create something today.

Ship it – today.

Repeat tomorrow.

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by Nathan Coumbe

What would it take to replace you?

Think about your work and personal life for a moment.

What qualities and skills would your employer look for in a new hire were she attempting to replace you?

Be that person now.

What would your spouse, significant other, or children look for in a partner or role model if you weren’t around?

Be that person now.

Start.

Be the person others in your life want and need; you will become nearly impossible to replace.

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