As we are in the information age there is nothing more important to knowledge and a constant willingness to learn
About knowledge
I strongly believe in knowledge as it is the only worthwhile asset in today’s society, It is not about blood, status, land or even money anymore like it might have been in the past. The only thing that truly matters in knowledge. What do you know and how do you use it. The reason is simple. As we already mention before, money is just another tool. There was a time when we didn’t have money, and society still existed. What is important, it o undesrstand how to make money, how to fish, how to travel….how to do it anything really.
We are information privileged and we should be grateful. For those that can remember, there was a time before Google and the search engines. If you wanted to know something at a given moment, it was just too bad for you. As probably you would never know. Of course, there might be ways to get the exact information your were looking through books, encyclopaedias, schools and researches…but it was a complex and time consuming process. Which had the consequence, of you loosing the momentum once you got what you needed it.
Now you got all the information you need on your fingertips, and I mean literally on your fingertips in the case of the iPhone or Android Phone. I believe that anybody that is using a broadband connection, and especially those using a smartphone can definietely relate to what I am saying. You can find almost anything for free, from anywhere, right now (or any given time you wish). So we can say that information is funky success, designing its own lifestyle with the freedom of location, time and income ().
Power of the network
Now you create anything you wish from the information. It may be a movie, a book, a disk…anything you really dream of. There is no mo excuses. If you think about it, back in the days if you wanted to create a movie, you had the easy excuse that it was very complex and very expensive process. Not too mention that you needed to have all the relevant contacts to get to the right people, from the crew to the distribution. In order to prevent easy access, there was a lot of barrier to entry. The beauty of today is the most of them are gone. With technology and communication you can easily get access to the right people you need in a click. Not to mention how easy it became to distribute or advertise yourself. So basically, you are the boss. The possibilities are there. It is not about luck any more. You need to be good, to be focus and to create results. And you will not be the judge of that, but the people, the community will.
This was an example with movie making, which was one of my biggest dream when I was in high school. It was for me all this dream becomes a reality concept. But I guess apart from my beliefs, it was the control aspect that disturbs me a bit. Today you may have total control on your final product, and as I said before the only judge will be the end-user who will enjoy the experience or not. It is important that you only have control of the muse or the solutions, but it is sometimes hard to anticipate how the user will react. One thing is sure it will be a viral thing. Just as a tree grows a viral campaign will grow naturally in an organic way. If you try to force it, you might see the your effort will go in the opposite of the intended direction.
Inspiration
Lots of this book is based on some several concepts aroud some
Here is a list of my Top 10 favourite authors including
- The 4 Hours Work Week – Tim Ferris book
- The Power of Less – Leo Babauta’s
- Funky Business Forever;
- The Purple Cow
- Mind Maps – Tony Buzan;
- 7 Habits of highly effective people
Tim and lifestyle design
Time Ferris is perhaps my favourite author as he is the creator of lifestyle design. Some may say that a lot of the concepts have already been talked and done before this book was published, but he is the first to put Lifestyle Design on the map for real. Here is a brief peek on his book with a four steps DEAL process if your are serious about creating the ideal life for yourself, it includes:
- Definition
- Elimination
- Automation
- Liberation
Definition
In this first part he starts by distinguishing the new rich from the old rich, where the first is all about money and financial success as the other is about lifestyle design. Being able to have an automated income and have the freedom of time and location to accomplish the things that really matters. If you are really serious about creating your own lifestyle, you need to stop following the crowds and start acting outside your comforts zone. The last chapter is about the need of resetting your system and create your dreamlines, a precise plan to define your craziest dreams.
The Definition phase chapters consist of:
- Cautions and comparisons: How to Burn 1M a Night
- rules that change the rules: everything popular is wrong
- Dodging bullets: fear and escape paralysis
- System reset: being unreasonable and unambiguous
Elimination
The Elimination step is about eliminating 80% of the things that are unimportant (even if they might seem urgent at the moment) and only keep whatever is producing results. Will it be bad consumers, unnecessary tasks…you name it. It is about being effective, meaning producing effects as opposed to only being efficient and really good at something. In order to keep focusing on the essential, you will need to be very selective in the information you process as so much of what you watch, read or listen is unnecessary. Finally he praises the power of saying no and how you may accomplish more, cheaper with batch processing.
The Elimination phase chapters consist of:
- the end of time management: illusions and Italians
- the low-information diet: cultivating selective ignorance
- interrupting the interruption and the art of refusal
Automation
This third step is about muse creation, an automated business the requires minimum effort on your side. First he talks about outsourcing and the benefits it will bring not only to your business but to you life as well. Then he plunge in the core of muse development, which all start with finding the right one, then testing it and only developing it if it has prove itself.
Finally in the last chapter is about delegating responsibility and remove yourself as the bottleneck. The whole idea behind the muse is to create a system that manage itself and not be stock inside of it (which so many managers seem to be doing – micro managing).
The Elimination phase chapters consist of:
- outsourcing life: off-loading the rest and a taste of geoarbitrage
- income autopilot 1: finding the muse
- income autopilot 2: testing the muse
- income autopilot 3: MBA – management by absence
Liberation
Liberation step is the last and final step. First he deals with people that have a job and the way to live that life you dream and still produce the results. Then he follows chapters for the entrepreneurs and how to liberate yourself once you have an automated income. This includes how to fill the void by having a purpose. He is also suggesting going on mini-retirements every now and then in stead of waiting for the big pay off at the end of your life. The beauty of those times we are living in is that world travelling became accessible and you don’t have to be fitly rich in order to relocate to another country for a couple of months. It is good way to learn about the people and tradition but also to immerse yourself in a language, sport or hobby.
The Liberation phase chapters consist of:
- disappearing act: how to escape the office
- beyond repair: killing your job
- mini-retirement: embracing the mobile lifestyle
- filling the void: adding life after subtracting work
- the top 13 new rich mistakes
As a brilliant marketer as he is, he is also offering some restricted reading and some bonus chapters including catchy tittles of how to get $700, 000 of Advertising, and “How to learn Any Language in 3 Months”. Isn’t this book the definition of how to be remarkable.
It was one of this authors that certified my beliefs that an alternate reality, the ideal lifestyle and funky success is real. It is after reading this book, that I started to discover so many other passionate authors including Chris, Leo and Seth.
Chris and world domination
Chris Guillebeau is for me the guy that genuine cares the most for others online. He used to help people in Africa an now his mission is to visit all of the world’s countries in the, and let me tell you he already did quite a few. He has the capability to truly inspire. He has an overall vision but also has a really pragmatic, really hands on approach. He offers 95% of his content for free and I strongly recommend to have a look. There are two eBook that are more to relevant to Funky Success, one is bout dominating the world and the other about blogging.
World domination is one of Chris’s biggest hit. The funny thing it is actually on some government agencies black list and even banned in China. The real is however, that this eBook has nothing to do with becoming the next dictator, it is about how to take control of your own life.
The free ebook “279 Days overnight success” clearly explains how to make a career out of blogging which will take not 10 days, not a month but about a year to built your community. So if you are looking for a quick rich scheme, this is definitely not it. Chris suggests that it takes a year or even two to build a solid community of followers around your blog. But, for those who do follow it is absolutely worth it.
The key elements that will make your blog project a success includes:
- What? A “remarkable” story;
- Why? What is in it for the users. As far as I’m concerned I think it is the most important question to answer. A good approach is to put yourself from the user perspective. What they have to gain? Inspiration, education, entertainment….there must be something. The answer will change over time, so you always need to have it in mind.
- Prioritize Writing and Marketing. Based on a concept of the 7habits of the Highly effective people, it is the importance of differentiate between what is important instead of what is urgent. Yes it may be hard, especially if you are good at multitasking. Yes sometimes it is beneficial to be able to do many different things, but the best way to get something done well, is to have your focus entirely and only on this thing. What Chris is suggesting is have a schedule and stick to it (no matter what urgent matters come up) time for writing your 1000 words post (something substantial) and also time for 5 marketing actions such as reaching to experts, affiliates or journalist (using the web, emails, twitter…)
- Be bigger then you are. I think this statement speaks for itself
- Build long term relation. No empire was built in a day. Therefore you need to bet on the long run. You are building a relationship and it takes time, it takes patience, it takes persistency.
- Strategic introduction of product and services. You need to be careful not to transform your blog into an e-commerce site.
I am constantly following Chris’s Blog as he really makes you feel that he cares, which is truly unique on the web. I recommend you do the same, and you might learn a thing or two about some of the world’s most isolated destinations.
The Swedes and Funky Business Forever
As you might see Funky Success was a bit inspire by 2 of the greatest Swedish mind. Jonas Riderstrale & Kjell Nordstrom are known as the top management thinkers in the World and they are at the forefront of a new generations of business Leaders. They first released this book in 2000, but are constantly updating it with the most relevant data. They found a way to enjoy capitalism in a remarkable way.
Their book is divided into 6 related parts including:
- Funky Times
- Forces of Funk
- Funky Village
- Funky INC.
- Funky U
- Feeling Funky
Funky Times
As you might know it by now, times had change and they will never be the same. The biggest revolution has took place, the knowledge revolution.
Forces of Funk
There are a couple of forces that drives those funky times. Those include:
- Technology
- Institutions
- Values
- Freedom
Funky Village
- The surplus society
- The real time society
- Brain based society
- Linked society
- Blurred society
- Fragmented society
Funky Inc.
- Focused
- Leveraged
- Innovative
- Heterarchical
Funky U
- Meaningful leadership
- Coming out
- Dreamanagement
Feeling Funky
- Wet dreams
- Last taboo
- Infinite innovation
- Emotional entreprise
About
I just want to make sure that I will not pretend to have found the whole truth, and am not forcing anyone to adhere to my views, this may be taken only a as inspiration. Yes, most of the opinions will be controversial, so if you don’t agree by any mean, only focus on the ideas that make sense to you . I am not trying to convert you, my main objective is to find the best available way to my funky success and in the process if I can actually inspire you then great. Finally, one shall never forget that by definition Funky Success is totally subjective, and one must adapt it to its personal style depending on the needs, wants and objectives that you might have.
About myself
For those of you who might not know me yet, I am a writer, project manager, entrepreneur and world traveller among other things. I also like to consider myself as a solution maker, a visionary.
The whole idea behind Funky success is traditional success was hard to define. Many people when asked this questions responded that real success is about having lots of money, or having a big house or nice cars …and so on so forth. But is it really about that? Ask someone who is dying what money means to him, is it really what success is about? Or is it more a question of living your life to the fullest, make the best of what you have
My history
- I was born in Krakow, Poland in 1980, the year of the Monkey. Poland was at that time under soviet occupation.
- Instead of complaining about the situation, my parents decided to do something about it and planned to reach to the West. It is important to notice that during the cold war era, trying to escape from the east block was considering an act of treason. So was it risky? Yes it was. But first going to Bulgaria on vacation, then to Yougoslavia and finally to Italy, my parents with their old traban and 2 babies in the back escaped the soviets.
- When we reached Badan Badan in Austria as political refugee we were offer asylum in the US, Australia and Canada. My mum wanted France, but finally opted for the French speaking part of Canada, Quebec, which soon became my home.
- After moving around the province, we finally settled in the metropolis, Montreal, one of the happiest cities on the planet. That’s where I luckily graduated from a French High School and the completed a business bachelor in Commerce. I wasn’t a great student; I got kicked out twice because of my low grades, but somehow always convinced the dean to take my back. It wasn’t because I wasn’t smart, but mainly because I was lazy and believed that enjoying that full possibility of the city was such a main option.
- During one of my expulsions I decided to try a little adventure State side. I always loved the state, as we used to take many vacations when I was a kid. I’ve ended up staying a couple of months in New Jersey and another couple months in the NYC. That was my first long-term experience and I just loved it
- When I got back, I finally completed my degree and decided to take a little break to Europe.
- What was suppose to be a short-term thing ending up a longer term experience as I’m still in London at the time of writing.
- I first when to see my family in Poland, but then met this girl and ended up moving to Liverpool. We lived together for a couple of months, but she ended up marrying our next door neighbour shortly after I moved to Wales.
- Llanelli (it is spelled in welsh) was my second destination in the UK. Lovely little town with great people and even a well known rugby team. It was a great place to recover my batteries and really cheap places to live, but it couldn’t last forever.
- In March 2006, a few days after coming back from a sunshine vacation in Nice and Barcelona, I’ve decided to quit my job and move to London as a contractor on a similar BBC e-learning project.
-I’v been since living in London and travelling the world.