The day my creativity died. I was working for my church. And I was starting to get tired of the arguments I was having. Staff meetings were filled with people who disagreed with me. My ideas were shot down left and right. It seemed people just weren’t getting it. So I gave up. I decided…
Realize this: We live in a world where thousands of people can instantly give you feedback on anything you do. A few years ago, you could write a book, and only the people who really hated you would take the time to write you hate mail. Now, anyone can hop on Twitter and thrash you…
I must admit. Wednesday’s blog post was sort of phoned in. It was actually a chapter from an unpublished manuscript. I posted it because I couldn’t think of anything to post on Wednesday. Before I made the decision, I was wracking my brain trying to think of something I could write about. How did I…
Stop. Pick one. You can either (1) defend your idea to everyone you encounter, or you can (2) act on your idea. Unless you’re one of the characters from Twilight, you probably won’t have enough time or energy to do both. We all have jobs, families, and responsibilities. And chances are, your dream has to…
I swear I’m getting classically conditioned to feel rage every time I hear smooth jazz. Seriously. The only time I ever listen to smooth jazz is when I’m on hold with a poorly run company that’s making me wait while they figure out why they screwed up. Wednesday morning I was on hold with HostGator, my…
I’ve found the most successful things I do have incredible focus. Think about it. ChurchStageDesignIdeas.com. I’m not sure I could get more specific than that. And that’s by far the most successful website I run. The next most successful is another incredibly focused project. I find that whenever I try to incorporate all of my…
Most of a person’s future is lost in the little things. Call it a ripple effect, butterfly effect, whatever. But your small actions each day have a huge impact on your longterm trajectory. We’ve seen this in the negative. A young child makes the decision to steal a pack of of gum. He gets away…
I’ve discovered that life doesn’t work like a sloping curve. If you keep doing what you’ve always done, you won’t keep reaching new heights. You’ll eventually plateau. Instead, life works more like a set of stairs. You act one way, and you reach a new level. You’ll stay at that level, though, until you try…
My pastor says something that rings with so much truth: Jesus is the goal. Daniel Villarreal is a visionary guy. He understands dreams. He understands risk. He’s living a life that’s all about that. But he understands that ultimately, the dream isn’t the end result. Jesus is the end result. He’s the completion. There’s a…
When I look back on it now, I realize how ridiculous I was being. But it didn’t feel that way when I was in the middle of it. You see; up until recently, I was hosting my main flagship site on a web host that cost $8/month. That small investment was running my site which…