The events going on in the world have impacted people in multiple ways. For some people who are already used to working at home, this has meant continuing with what they were already doing perhaps. For others it means that they are discovering a new way to work. For most people, communication has changed to less face to face and more reliant on technology. As people readjust to working at home it can be a bit disorienting as they continue their quest for success. However, there are quite a few tips that can help set things up for success on a day to day basis.

Stick to the Schedule

Sticking to a schedule is a very important key to success when working from home. While you may not be going into the office and having your normal morning routines, make new ones for at home. Set a schedule for your day and stick to it. Plan things ahead of time. This will make you more effective on a daily basis and also help you stay productive. It will help you account for what you are doing with your time and what you are doing during your time. Make sure to continue to have meetings, meet deadlines, and push yourself forward on a daily basis!

Along with scheduling your work days, make sure to stick with a daily personal routine for success. This includes getting up at your regular time, going through your morning schedule, dressing for success, and taking care of yourself.

Maintaining both a professional schedule and personal routine will help you to keep pursuing success without burning out. It will also help you evaluate each day and make each day better than the last.

Create Your Home Office or Workspace

An important element for success at home is having a place that will set you up to succeed at home. Create a place at home that is your designated workspace. This should be a place that helps you not be distracted but instead be focused. Ideally it should include a desk and a chair that will help you have good posture and a professional feel. This should be a place that isn’t your place to play games, but instead to be professional and get things done. Use it as your place of work. Also when you leave this place, leave the work there as well. Treat this with the amount of respect and professionalism you would your office in a “traditional” workplace.

Stay Focused

While working, keep working. Stay focused on the job at hand and don’t try to do too many things at once. Multitasking won’t help you succeed. Focus will. Jerry Seinfeld said, “lack of focus is why we have a lack of greatness.” If you want to do great things, keep greatly focused!

When working at home it is very easy to get distracted by family members, pets, chores, a readily accessible kitchen, a nearby TV, or a beautiful backyard. While you are working, keep working during your work hours and make your work time count.

Take a Break or You’ll Break

Breaks are important! Make sure to take breaks and get some exercise throughout the day. In general, it is easier to end up sitting down more when you aren’t getting up and going to work. Take this into account and look for ways to get up and get active. Take a walk. Do a workout. Get your heart beating a bit faster. Not only will it help keep you refreshed, it will also help you be more effective while you are working.

Connect

Warren Buffet recently said that people who become effective communicators up their worth by 50%. Communication is so crucial when working from home. This isn’t just for your own sanity as you suddenly work in a more isolated environment, it also helps make things more effective. Connect with those you work with for both accountability and also for building momentum. Utilize multiple forms of communication. Use text messaging, email, social media, Skype, FaceTime, or Zoom. Learn how to communicate succinctly and effectively. This will help you succeed and also the people you work with achieve success as well!

Be Successful

As with so many things, the path to success begins with a choice to be successful. Choose to be successful. Once you have made that choice, as with all choices to be successful, it takes planning, dedication, and hard work. It also takes a positive mindset! So visualize your definition of success, write down your goals and action plan, and then pursue it until you achieve it.

Working from home can be a mixed bag. It can be a liberating way to work for some and it can be the exact opposite for others. The important thing to remember is that it is all about positive thinking, working ,and also succeeding. With that in mind, set yourself up for success as you work from home. Then push yourself to be the most successful person you can be!

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To say it has been an interesting week would be an understatement. Just a little over a week ago people by in large didn’t really have a care in the world. There were potential fears viewed as an outside chance of happening. However, the reality of it in most people’s minds was that life would continue to go on as normal… maybe with a few inconveniences. However, one week ago that all changed. Since then, they have continued to change.

“Adaptability is about the powerful difference between adapting to cope and adapting to win.” – Max Mckeown

When the world finds itself on the other end of this crazy time, it will come out changed. This is inevitable. How people react to that change will, in many ways, determine their future. Some people will be proactive and recognize that change is coming and prepare for it as they analyze the events that are happening. Others will wait to see what the changes are and then react accordingly. Still others will wait for the changes and deny that they every happened. All of these approaches to changes will have different results. Those who have read The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People and embraced those seven habits will try to proactively approach the change and see the opportunities that can be found. Those who wait for change to happen and then react will find themselves approaching things already a bit behind. And those who refuse to acknowledge the change happened will have a whole other set of challenges unto their own.

What is needed right now is the power for people to be levelheaded, proactive, adaptable, and all of this with a level of creativity. All of this will need to come with a focus on how to not just get through this, but how to turn the challenges of our time into a way to win. This will mean embracing new ideas, new ways to communicate, and new ways to succeed economically.

This is the time where people can succeed through adversity. People can focus on just attempting to survive or thrive. Here are a few tips for leaders who want to thrive through adversity.

Attitude is Everything

The power of the mind can’t be underestimated. As people are approaching adversity it is very easy to get caught up and overwhelmed with everything that seems to be coming at them. To succeed moving forward, people need to have an adventurous attitude that also has a sense of humor. There are two important reasons for this. Having a sense of humor and an ability to laugh and the decision to face the future as an adventure to be overcome. Through it all, it is absolutely crucial to maintain a positive attitude! 

A part of having that positive attitude is a firm belief in the fact that “you can.” It is amazing what people can do when they believe they can do it and refuse to be told otherwise. I know in my own life I have been able to achieve things that people said would never happen over and over again because I’ve been crazy enough to believe it. Because of this, I directed a professional symphony at 21 years of age, have run non-profit organizations, and now am the executive producer on an international television show. If I can, you can!

Use the Past to Push through the Future

Your past can determine your future. I’m a strong believer in the fact that the decisions we make today determine the future that we live tomorrow. I also am a strong believer in learning from past experiences to be better during future ones. Those past experiences helped mold you into the person you are today and build up your strength for future successes. As they say, what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger! Keep that in mind when facing new tests and challenges. They will just help build you as your stretch your comfort zone through each new adventure.

The Serenity Prayer is Your Friend

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can,  and wisdom to know the difference. – Reinhold Niebuhr

Be at peace with the situations you are in. Recognize that some things you can change, others you can’t. That’s ok. Just focus on making the things better that you have the ability to. Let the things that you can’t control be. The worst that can happen is for the things that are out of your control get into your head and drag you down. Instead, think of the serenity prayer and focus on what you can do and the adventure that is being had. Mindset is incredibly important.

Don’t Give Up!

The people who succeed during times of adversity are the people who absolutely refuse to give up. Not giving up is a mindset, a choice, a commitment, and a mission. It is not letting anything stop you from where it is you are going to go. Sometimes that means finding a way around an obstacle. Sometimes that means recovering from setbacks. It ALWAYS means that you “keep moving forward” as Walt Disney once said.

A big part of not giving up is knowing why you are doing what you are doing and why you shouldn’t give up. Knowing the reasoning, or your motivation, will help you to continue moving forward. This belief in why you are doing what you are doing will reinforce your ability to never give up!

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Being successful is about boldly going towards whatever definition of success one is pursuing. For some people this is cause and for other people it is a result or destination. Whatever the outcome, a successful outcome requires effort, boldness, and the drive to reach whatever the successful outcome is.

With that in mind, I started thinking about some universal ingredients needed for success. As with so many things, the question must always be answered of “why do I want to succeed at this?” What are the consequences of failure or not trying? What are the benefits of success? Are they worth the effort? These questions should be what is considered first. It will not only help you in the future as you chase after your desired outcome, it will also help you weigh whether or not you actually want to pursue it. Once this question has been answered, and I mean really answered so that you can own it not just in your head but also in your heart, its time to move forward towards where you want to go.

To move forward and pursue your desired successful outcome you are going to need to have a sense of adventure. A sense of adventure is what will help you step out of your comfort zone, try new things, and perhaps most importantly, face your fears. To achieve a new success you must do things you haven’t done before. Recognize that as just a part of success. Recognize also, successful people do what unsuccessful people won’t. They go a little further, work a little harder, face more fears, and push their comfort zones. All of this could be just a little bit more but that little bit more than everyone else can pay major rewards.

Adventure can (and should) have a plan and a destination. Know where it is you want to go. Connect it with why you want to go there. Then combined start facing those fears, working a little hard, pushing a little further, and stretching your comfort zone. Bring a sense of adventure into the journey towards the destination and turn those obstacles into opportunities. Recognize that the adventure is a part of the reward of success. There will be high points and low points along the way. However, with a sense of adventure, these can be a part of the reward instead of the cost of it.

Creativity can change the world. The people who are creative are the people who are taking that adventurous spirit (and I don’t mean being Indiana Jones) to challenge themselves and try something new. For some people this is easier than others. However, creativity isn’t just a gift… it is a muscle. Just like athletes or musicians hone their skills, people can do the same with creativity. If your reason why is strong enough, you will choose to embrace creativity on your adventurous road to success! It just may not look what you initially imagined.

Let’s start off with what creativity doesn’t have to be. It doesn’t have to be someone painting a picture that people will stare at and love for generations. It doesn’t have to be writing a song that is loved by millions. It doesn’t even have to be creating a new recipe that makes people’s mouths water the moment they think of the dish. What it does have to be is a skill that can be intentionally developed over time that can lead to new things. What it will do for your road to success is allow you to look for solutions and new ideas in ways that you hadn’t thought before.

If you want to be more creative the good news is, you can! With the choice to work on being more creative a whole new world can be introduced to you. Once you have made this choice, try a few of these three things to start building up your creative muscle.

First off, do something creative. This can be as simple as doodling on a piece of paper, listening to different types of music, taking pictures with your phone, writing something (ideally fiction), or even reading! I like to do a few of these different things, sometimes at the same time.

Second, learn and be teachable. To do this you want to broaden your knowledge base and put new thoughts and new ideas in your brain. This can be done through taking a course, reading books, going to museums, or attending seminars. It is also a great idea to surround yourself with people you look up to and can learn from. Be teachable from the people who have gone before you and succeeded. Learn from their successes and also their failures. Also be open to learning through doing new things. You never know how a new experience can lead to a new perspective. As all of this is happening, make sure to have some fun along the way. A little play can go a long way.

With all of this, make sure to share what you are learning and experiencing. I remember in school hearing that the best way to learn was to teach. Be thinking how you can effectively share what you are learning with others. This can be done in your head, in a conversation with others, or even on a video online. What is important with this is that you are furthering the development of your thoughts and ability to communicate them.

And third, create an environment for creativity. The proper environment can really help stimulate creativity. Creativity comes from the head and the heart so you want to do what you can do to help those environments thrive. This means doing something as simple as walking and getting exercise, drinking lots of water, making sure you are getting proper nutrition, and also getting enough sleep. These may not seem like big things, but they really do make a big difference. Decluttering your environment can also be very beneficial.

A proper environment for creativity also is also building up that culture around you where new ideas are embraced, failures and the lessons learned from them are celebrated, and the journey is almost as important as the destination. Part of the journey is meeting new people with new ideas. It also is learning to disagree without being disagreeable. It is about creating a culture and environment that is positive and uplifting, not negative and degrading. If you find yourself being dragged down regularly by those around you, it might be time to start asking some questions and making some hard choices.

There are many similarities to the great success stories we hear. Learn the stories of Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, or even Abraham Lincoln. It soon becomes readily apparent that a part of their road to success was choosing why they wanted to do something, having a sense of adventure and willingness to pursue it, and then having some level of creativity to open their mind to new ideas and perspectives along the way. Then they boldly took action to achieve their successes. You can do this too. Boldly choose where you want to succeed and why and success can be achieved in ways you may never have even dreamed was possible!

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“The choices we make today impact the lives we live tomorrow.”

I’ve thought and said that phrase for years. I’m not sure if it is something I came up with or if I read it somewhere. What I do know is that it is true. Our future is influenced by our choices. This is true when it comes to life decisions, career decisions, relationship decisions, and even lifestyle decisions. The choices we make set the trajectory for where we will go. Will we always get exactly where we choose to go? Perhaps not. However, if we don’t make any choices we won’t go anywhere.

Today I’d like encourage you to try something: choose success. It seems ridiculously simple to say this but it also could be life changing. Stop and take a moment to think about this. What things in your life would you like to succeed at? What are the things that you want to do? What are the things you want to change?

Once you have identified these things it is time to evaluate what you want with them. What is the cost of success? What is the cost failure? What is the cost of staying where you are at? Once you have thought about these things it is time to decide the very basic question of is it worth it?

So you’ve decided it is worth it! Excellent choice! Your next choice is to move beyond deciding it is worth it and choosing to actually succeed. Choose success! As simplistic as this sounds, it is a fundamental part of the path to success. Choosing success will not only change your mindset, it will also change your trajectory. When you choose success, you’ve picked a point on the map of life that you want to head toward.

You’ve chosen success. Now it is time to move towards it. Remember why you made that choice with every step you take. Be consistent and proactive about taking a new step forward every day. When you have chosen to succeed and continue the pursuit of success, it is inevitable. It may not end up looking exactly what you imagined it would look like when you do succeed. Often it looks different but even better than imagined. Mainly because the process of achieving success makes the point of achievement that much more satisfying!

So what are you going to choose to succeed at? What choice toward success will you make today? Don’t wait, choose success and succeed!

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Simon Majumdar is an incredible food critic and television personality (Cutthroat Kitchen, Iron Chef America). He appeared on Hour of Power with Bobby Schuller to share about his faith, his work with Convoy of Hope, and his story of transformation. On The Backstory, I had the opportunity to talk to him about his life and how food impacts it. We also chat about his book and podcast called Eat My Globe!

Simon Majumdar on Hour of Power with Bobby Schuller: https://hourofpower.org/episode/living-a-life-without-lack/

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Last year I made a goal to basically read a book a week throughout the entire year. The idea behind this is that I would write a review for each book I read on this blog. While I did read a LOT of books last year, the reviews sadly didn’t happen as originally intended. I discovered it was a lot easier to take time to read over taking time to write. With that in mind, I’m going to give an overview of my books from the last year (some of which you can find I did end up reviewing on DAPS MAGIC) and share some of my highlights.

The top book of 2019 for me was written by Disney CEO and Chairman Bob Iger. The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company is as much a book on leadership as a look at the career of Bob Iger at ABC and then Disney. It gives some tangible tips that can be used in leadership and also pulls back the curtain of the man at the helm of the biggest entertainment company in the world. 

Throughout the course of of this book Iger takes a hard look at the lessons he learned as he went through the ranks of ABC and then Disney. It isn’t just a book that trumpets his successes. It also shares some of the challenging moments he faced as he made his way through his career. It was nice to see the candor that he shared about the pros and cons of his career.

This is a book I would suggest that anyone who aspires to be a better leader reads. It is also a great book for any Disney fan looking to learn more about the leader of the house of mouse!

Continuing on with the Disney theme, I also read several books by current and former Imagineers, a book that was released leading up to the opening of Epcot, multiple books about Disney movies released in 2019, and several historical books from different figures in The Walt Disney Company. Of all of these, Magic Journey: My Fantastical Walt Disney Imagineering Career by Kevin Rafferty was definitely my favorite. In fact, it ranks right up there after the Bob Iger book.

I also read some history books throughout the course of last year and some other leadership books. While most of these were good, there were definitely several duds as well that were hard to finish. Just before the end of the year I read Rejection Proof twice with a leadership group I lead. It was a fun and interesting book but probably doesn’t go in my top five leadership books to date. That will have to be another blog at another date though. In the fiction realm, I did read some Star Wars books, mainly due to my friend Chris giving me some for my birthday. I found myself really enjoying them though and wouldn’t mind reading more of them in the future!

In 2020 I intend to continue on reading and learning new ideas. As I pondered 2019 and the leaders I’ve known that went before me, I continued to recognize the important of taking time to both read and think. New ideas (that are sometimes even awesome) come out of these important times. I’m hoping to not only continue to read more books this year, but also read some books I wouldn’t normally read as well. If you have any suggestions for favorite books I should read, please let me know in the comments below! I’m always looking for more books to read and books that come with a recommendation would be even better!

What are you looking forward to read in 2020?

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Recently I was able to meet and interview Simon Majumdar. You may recognize him from several different Food Network channels. He was a guest at the Hour of Power with Bobby Schuller and absolutely fascinating to talk with. Not only a food connoisseur, but he is also a food historian. This wasn’t always his life though.

Simon Majumdar has always had a love of food, but not the career that was centered around it. In Eat My Globe, Majumdar shares how he ended up pursuing his passion and building a career in the food industry. Burnt out in the book business, Majumdar quit his job and then went on a grand adventure pursuing the different foods of the world.

This food adventure around the globe not only changed Majumdar’s career but also his life. This book shares about his adventures around the globe trying foods that many would try, and other foods that few would. Each chapter focuses on a specific place or country that he visited and shares some experiences and reviews of the food had while there. The book moves at a nice pace, has an amusing wit to it, and gives a good look at the world through the lens of food.

Perhaps the best part of Eat My Globe is the messages it communicates. Eat My Globe isn’t just about an adventure around the world. Instead, it is about pursuing passions and taking responsibility to make your dreams become a reality. Simon Majumdar has done what few people dare to do. He dared to leave one life behind that was comfortable and safe and instead pursue the life he dreamed of without knowing how it would turn out or where it would go. It really is an inspirational (and for some I daresay terrifying) story.

Eat My Globe is a very enjoyable book for people who love to travel, love to eat, or just like to read a story about someone who does. I would not be surprised if I read this book again as it really was enjoyable. It also has made watching the Food Network even more fun as I see Simon Majumdar judging on different programs there frequently. This is definitely a book worth reading. Go out and get it today. You’ll enjoy it!

You can purchase Eat My Globe here. 

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The second book I finished on my road to completing the 52 book challenge left me quite caffeinated. The Devil’s Cup, by Stewart Lee Allen, is a journey the follow the history of the world as told by coffee. In the book, Allen pursues the discovery and development of coffee followed by its expansion throughout the years.

The book is told in story form as Allen travels around the world tasting coffee and learning from locals about their traditions regarding it. He does this chronologically, starting with the oldest versions of coffees and then moving forward in time. As he followed the story of coffee’s expansion around the globe, he also followed what was going on in history around the same times. Some interesting correlations are made as this happens. Whether they are completely factual or not will probably be confirmed or denied by scholars.

The Devil’s Cup is a fun read for any coffee lover or anyone who likes a historical journey. It’s a good adventure that Stewart Lee Allen goes on and it is fun to follow. It is an easy read that picks up the pace as the book progresses. The end left me hanging a little bit as I felt like it just suddenly was done. However, it was still a very fun book and I learned a lot while reading it. I’d have no problem giving this book my recommendation.

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My adventure through reading this year began with a book about writing. You Are A Writer (so start ACTING like one) is written by Jeff Goins. In this book he encourages the aspiring writer to step forward boldly and write.

While this book isn’t specifically about how to write, it is about how to write. When I say that I mean that this isn’t a book about how to construct a poem, blog, essay, or book. What it is about is how to get into the business of writing.

The book talks about the different writers, the way they write, and where they go. Then it goes into specifics of how to get from beginning writer to published author. Along the way, Jeff Goins shares tips about the different aspects of the business of writing. This goes from suggestions on how to start a blog to networking help for once you are to the point that you are pitching articles and then books.

Overall, this was a fun and empowering book to read. It is a fairly quick read that offers practical advice that is definitely useful. I took notes while reading it and found myself putting things on my whiteboard for later reference.

This is an easy book to recommend for anyone wanting to get into the writing business. I would give this book a 3.5 out of 5. It is a quick read, I enjoyed it, but I definitely could use more!

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It is that time of year. Everyone is once again making their New Year’s resolutions and figuring out how this year can be better than the last. While I’m all for this, I also recognize that for so many people they make their resolutions and a month later they have been left in the rearview mirror. My attitude in general towards them is much like my attitude was in school, be consistent and don’t cram.

When I was in school I generally figured that if I hadn’t learned something by the time the test came along, no amount of cramming was going to save me in the long run. So I figured if I just did a little bit each day to make sure I knew the subject matter, I’d be better off. This didn’t mean I was spending hours every night doing my homework and being a really good student. It did mean that during class I tended to spend an extra minute or two trying to focus on whatever the content was.

What’s this have to do with New Year’s resolutions you ask? Well, I think that when one picks New Year’s resolutions they should pick something they can be consistent with. Very much like making SMART goals, resolutions should be something that can be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.

With all that in mind, one of my resolutions this year was to read more. However, that isn’t specific enough. So, to be specific, my goal is to read 52 books this year. Currently, I am working on three different books that I’m pushing through. One is about writing, another about the history of coffee, and still, a third is a biography.

As I work through the year I will be sharing about the books on this blog. I don’t know if I will be posting about each book individually or in monthly blocks or what. I do know that I will continue to track how many books I’ve worked through as the year progresses.

I hope you enjoy this literary adventure that I’m undertaking. I’m curious though, what New Year resolutions did you make? Share them with me in the comments below! Happy New Year!

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