Tag: Curated Content

The brand is a story. But it’s a story about you, not about the brand.

Seth Godin writes:

Why prefer Coke over Pepsi or GE over Samsung or Ford over Chevy?

In markets that aren’t natural monopolies or where there are clear, agreed-upon metrics, how do we decide?

Yes, every brand has a story—that’s how it goes from being a logo and a name to a brand. The story includes expectations and history and promises and social cues and emotions. The story makes us say we "love Google" or "love Harley"… but what do we really love?

We love ourselves.

We love the memory we have of how that brand made us feel once. We love that it reminds us of our mom, or growing up, or our first kiss. We support a charity or a soccer team or a perfume because it gives us a chance to love something about ourselves.

We can’t easily explain this, even to ourselves. We can’t easily acknowledge the narcissism and the nostalgia that drives so many of the apparently rational decisions we make every day. But that doesn’t mean that they’re not at work.

More than ever, we express ourselves with what we buy and how we use what we buy. Extensions of our personality, totems of our selves, reminders of who we are or would like to be.

Great marketers don’t make stuff. They make meaning.

via Seth's Blog: The brand is a story. But it's a story about you, not about the brand..

Think about that as you plan your next steps in social media…

0

All You Need Is Love — of Self!

Dawn Gluskin wrote:

“All you need is love.” The Beatles knew what was up! Love really is all you need… self-love, that is. The foundation of a happy life, healthy relationships, and achieving every bit of greatness you were put onto this earth for does not exist anywhere externally. Its all right inside! Tapping into love of self is what allows us to opens doors to infinite possibilities. Everything weve created in our outside world is a reflection of what is going on with us internally. So, if you have a tough time fully accepting and loving yourself because of past circumstances, or due to holding yourself up to ridiculous high standards, or because you dont believe the truth that you are meant to shine, than the world around you is going to reflect as such. When self-love is missing, it manifests into negative actions and emotions like insecurity, feelings of lacking, and unhealthy comparison to others.

Inner-peace, on the other hand, is the catalyst to rocking your outside world in a totally awesome way. Imagine being completely accepting of yourself, including all of your flaws and past mistakes: “Were not here to be perfect, were here to live and to feel and to learn and to grow!” Imagine being super-confident in your abilities and embracing the gifts that you have: “We all have our own unique talents that can literally change the world.” Imagine not easily being swayed by the opinion of others, I mean literally not caring what anybody else says or thinks because its just their opinion, which has nothing to do with you: “You know what you were born to do and nothing is going to stop you.” This is self-love, baby! Self-Love is not the same thing as vanity. But, we often get it twisted! Vanity and narcissism are actually the opposite of self-love, as they are based in fear and lack. It is when the ego mind wants to make you feel special or better than others and thus creates illusions to support the idea. Its when motivation comes from hopes of gaining attention or acceptance rather than coming from the heart and done with pure intentions. Confident people who love themselves unconditionally do not think they are better than anybody else. Contrarily, they tend to see the beauty and oneness in all. Having true love and acceptance of self allows you to love and accept others more deeply, as well as receive love more fully.

Please read the rest of Dawn’s post here: Dawn Gluskin: All You Need Is Love — of Self!.

Personally, I prefer the term self-compassion, but the message is the same; it is very difficult to aspire to thought leadership if you have not met your inner critic with love and compassion. How can you rock the world if your inner world is rocked by turmoil?

If this resonates with you, I encourage you to investigate the work of Kristen Neff on the topic of self-compassion. She has 4 great articles online at Psychology Today and if you like that her book on self-compassion by the same name will be a good investment…

41A4d+sT3wL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_SX285_SY380_CR,0,0,285,380_SH20_OU01_

Related articles
2

Learn How to Avoid the Link Apocalypse!

Hannah Kaufman writes:

Linking is a great way to increase your website’s value. However, there are good ways (white hat) and bad ways (black hat) to do things. We have all heard of the horror stories about what happened when people violated Google’s ethical linking practices. The infographic below has some of the stories and what Google did, as well as the red flags of bad linking.

Learn how to avoid the Link Apocalypse!

via Learn How to Avoid the Link Apocalypse! [Infographic].

Learn How to Avoid the Link Apocalypse! [Infographic]

1

Information is NOT power [unless you harness it effectively!]

Information-is-not-knowledge.-1024x682

Now that you’ve decided that you want to begin blogging for all the RIGHT reasons, you need to think about how you’re going to be your mind so that you will be able to your blog. For the past 6 1/2 years I’ve used tool called Google Reader which Google and its infinite wisdom has decided to kill. That doesn’t stop me from continuing use it for the time being because I know I’ll be able to export my data and import it into the next RSS reader I choose to use. Much more important than tool are the thoughts that you use to guide what you put into the tool…

If my goal is to be recognized as a thought leader in my industry I need to think about questions that people in my industry are asking and think about positioning myself as a solution the answer. In order to do this effectively, at a basic level I simply need to ‘out-search’ and ‘out–aggregate’ the best thinking on my topic I can find. I can either share their thinking as is or use it to fuel a thoughtful blog post that will demonstrate my expertise in my field. Ultimately, I have the possibility of getting found in search if I do a good job of finding and sharing good information.

I use an RSS reader to track the sites, the searches in the sources that help me to continue to develop my expertise. In my vocabulary sites are just that; key websites that everyone in my industry rates. This methodology may sometimes render some useless information however if I’m using my RSS reader well it will make all that much difference as long as I don’t subscribe to too many sites. On the other end of the spectrum we have searches. Anything that I can search for in Google I can turn into Google alerts which I can then read in my feed reader. This is particularly useful because I can make my RSS reader deliver exactly what I want to find no matter what it is on a consistent basis. Sources are industry or thought leaders whose opinions I respect and whose words I don’t want to miss. I can use a tool like Topsy to ferret out industry leaders and track them in my feed reader.

Here are some of the thoughts and tools I use for harnessing information:

This is a dynamic list of my top tools for information management. Bookmark it and check back often, especially if you’re looking for a Google Reader replacement…

http://storify.com/livingbusiness/tools-for-information-management

0

Any Day 7

Nicholas Bate shares this list of things you can do any day:

  1. you can re-invent
  2. you can let it go
  3. you can try one more time
  4. you can realise maybe you own some of the consequences
  5. you can see it as the way it was meant to be
  6. you can learn
  7. you can go for a walk, breathe and look at the horizon

via Any Day 7 – Nicholas Bate.

0

Food Choices

recite-30225--204239027-1qjsrs5Craig Harper writes:

If you typically eat three meals and two snacks each day, then over the next twelve months you will make 1,825 individual decisions about what you put in your mouth. And that’s not including the significant liquid calories you’ll probably consume in that time. In no small part, those 1,825 decisions will influence how your body looks, feels and functions a year from now.

Nobody ever accidentally ate a cheeseburger.

via Food Choices.

This is a good reminder for me. If I want to stay shiny and play my ‘A Game’ every day, I need to be mindful of my choices. Am I the only one that ever let what I put in my mouth affect my mindfulness?

1

What is a blog?

What is a blog? It can be everything and it can be nothing. As the Bard said “Nothing is good or bad but thinking makes it so”. During my blogging career, I estimate that I have created between 15 and 20,000 blog posts on every topic from A-to-Z — most of them, unfortunately, ineffective…

And this is only my business blog...
And this is only my business blog…

In this next phase of my business I’m attempting to become more mindful and intentional about what I’m doing online and why in this post is an attempt to unpack blogging from that perspective; more mindfulness and awareness of why we actually do social media and what we can expect from the effort.

What blogging isn’t…

A get rich quick scheme. If you are thinking that this was one of those articles I think you’ll be happier somewhere else on the Internet. But if you’re looking for deeper insight into what blogging is from perspective of mindfulness and intention and what it can do for you then please read on… Continue reading “What is a blog?” →

0

What Feeds You?

Rebecca Butler writes:

What feeds you?

What serves as fuel for your soul?

What are you hungry for?

What can you never have enough of?

What do you crave?

Not just food, but yes — food?

Emotions—attitudes—indulgences

Beauty in life…

Energetic exchange

Sunsets? Thunderstorms?

Baby hugs, big kisses..

Puppy kisses

Kitten snuggles

Wildflowers

Live music

Art

Food, gourmet food

What feeds you? What fuels you?

via What Feeds You? | Choose Joy | Rebecca Butler.

0

recite-23748--361854509-1whtt5m

0

Daily Quote by Warren Buffett

Daily Quote by Warren Buffett - Lifehack

Daily Quote by Warren Buffett – Lifehack.

0

Lessons learned for the week ending 4/6/2013

http://storify.com/livingbusiness/lessons-learned-for-4-8-2013

0

Create a Blog that Makes a Difference

Create a Blog that Makes a Difference. ~ Cailen Ascher | elephant journal

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” ~Ernest Hemingway

Full story at: Create a Blog that Makes a Difference. ~ Cailen Ascher | elephant journal.

0

Like Jeopardy? Like TEDTalks?

Then you’re going to love this one! I think Ken Jennings is a fascinating guy — perhaps you will too…

0

recite-9467--645196541-6syeai

0

How to make feedly your default rss reader in Chrome

Do you love feedly as much as I do? Here’s a short 3 minute lesson on how to make it your default rss reader:

Here’s the text to copy and paste:

http://www.feedly.com/home#subscription/feed/%s

Of course, you can also subscribe using the Feedly Mini button but if you’re used to using that RSS icon this will help! Questions? Feedback?

Related articles
10

Start it!

recite-31328--710867189-802fo3
Continue reading “Start it!” →

0

What is it You Love So Much You’re Willing to Fight for It?

Friend and client Nilofer Merchant shares this thought:

Many scoff at Larry Lessig. They say he is an optimist, out of touch with reality.

But what it is that is said about the people who ultimately change the world?  “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”- Ghandi

Larry Lessig, if you don’t already know of him is one of the original creators of the Creative Commons. Creative commons lets any individual creator manage their rights to content, fundamentally updating the original notion of copyright to be less-lawyer intensive and right-sized for the Social Era. Since then, he’s gone one to support the Sunlight Foundation, aimed at opening up transparency to who is financing what. More recently, he’s been focused on dealing with political corruption, at RootStrikers.

His TED2013 talk at TED was, well, a stunning talk, one of my top 5 that I’ve been waiting to share…and it went live on TED.com today. Although it’s focused on the US, the issues it raises apply far more broadly.

Source: What is it You Love So Much You’re Willing to Fight for It – Nilofer Merchant

Well worth the watch…

0

The Questions Coaches Say You Need To Be Asking Yourself

Leigh Newman writes:

Ellie Gordon, a personal and executive life coach, helps us figure out what we really need to be thinking about when we’re looking for lasting, hard-to-make change.

1. Can I Replace The Word ‘Afraid’ With The Word ‘Alert’?
“An artist client recently introduced me to this question,” says Gordon, “and it quickly proved effective at dealing with fear.” Fear, as most of us know, is the biggest obstacle to change. Sometimes our fears are authentic (“My husband is going to leave me because he’s having an affair!”) and sometimes they are inauthentic (“My house is going to blow down even though it’s made out of brick, I have a new roof, and the wind isn’t blowing!”). Either way, we usually try to dismiss our exclamation-pointed feelings as silly, ignore them altogether or blow them up to such a hellacious magnitude that we can’t move, breathe, sleep or… well… live. Continue reading “The Questions Coaches Say You Need To Be Asking Yourself” →

0

Snapshot; LinkedIn…

The state of the art on 4/3/2013…

http://storify.com/livingbusiness/snapshot-linkedin

0

5 thought leaders who have helped shape my life…

Here are the first of 5 thought leaders I’ve added to the resource section of my site:

http://storify.com/livingbusiness/5-thought-leaders-who-have-helped-shape-my-life

PS Here’s a behind the scenes look at how I used Storify in this post:

2

recite-13473--1064760217-jxgjgv

0

Start a Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑