Anyone who suggests that you are a victim of others, is trying to victimize you.  Attempting to convince you that the outcome of your life is solely the result of the actions of others is actually an attempt to trick you to give up your power of self-determination and independence so that they may the take it from you and determine the direction of your life instead.

The difference between my warning and those who would make you their victims is that if you do give in to their persuasion, you are responsible for doing so, not the persuader.  I’ve debated similar points to this before, and it continues to be a belief I hold stronger and stronger with time.

Eleanor Roosevelt said “Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent.” I would expand that to “Nobody one can make you a victim without your consent.”

Next time someone tells you that it is some 3rd party’s fault that you are in the place you are in, and that you should join them in doing something about it, run the other direction.  They are not concerned with acting in your best interests, but are instead concerned with you acting in their best interests.

History is full of examples of individuals rising to power based on the platform of a scapegoat, and convincing the populace that they were not responsible for their plight, but that this scapegoat has caused them this harm.  The most classic example that comes to mind is Hitler and the Jews in Germany, but it doesn’t stop there.  Witch-hunts and mobs are the result of when individuals give up their right to make right choices.

Well, that is enough for now, but I will most likely write on this again.  What do you think?  Have you seen this before?

If you follow the pink dos with your eyes, then nothing too exciting.

If you focus on the black + in the middle, you will probably see a green dot that replaces the pink dot that disappears.  This is a negative afterimage effect (neon green being the compliment to pink).  I’ve seen similar illusions before.

Then the really cool effect is if you focus on the black + long enough, all the pink dots will disapear, and you will just see the green dot spinning around the circle.  If you move your eyes, then the pink dots will come back though.

Your eyes will see all this from the same animation.  The animation doesn’t change.  You might ask yourself what else gets distorted in your life when you are focused on one thing?  Do other things tend to disapear?  When is that a good thing?  When is it not?

First of all, do not ask “Would you like to buy some Girl Scout Cookies?”  That is probably the worse thing you could ask, because it puts people on the defensive and forces them to make a decision right away.  Besides, they probably saw you there and figured you were selling cookies.  This is what they expect you to ask, and if they say no, they ended the offer.

Probably the best thing to ask is “What is your favorite kind of Girl Scout Cookie?”  Most people will have a favorite kind of cookie, and thinking about it will remind them how much they like your cookies.  This is also what is called an “open ended question,” which most answers leave them open to buying cookies.

Second of all, know your cookies.  It seems like you have some that are fat free or low calorie.  If they say they don’t eat cookies, then ask them if they knew about your fat free or low calorie cookies?

Once you know what their favorite flavors are, and they know that they can eat these delicious cookies on their diets, then a great way to close the sale is ask them “How many boxes do you want?”  Hold up their favorite flavor, or the one that is compatible with their diet.  Let them know you have more in the van, so not to worry about buying too many.

Next ask them if there is any other flavor they would like, or ask them if there is someone else they would like to buy some cookies for.  This is a great way to increase on the sale you have already made.

If they say they already bought some cookies, or when they have selected a few boxes, ask them “Did you know that Girl Scout Cookies freeze really well?” then you might ask them if they have any freezer space available.

The key is to ask open ended questions (ones with more then a Yes/No answer) when possible, and handle any objections with an acknowledging question.  Make a list of any objections you get from them, and then before the next day come up with a good way to handle them.  For example, if they say they already bought some, you tell them thanks, and ask them if they have freezer space.

Come up with questions and answers that work for you and that you are excited about, then practice.  Good luck!

So we wanted to get our family a Nintendo Wii for Christmas. They run about $225 – $300, which is reasonable, but then you start adding games and things get carried away pretty quickly.

So back in November we decided to start shopping. We tried WalMart and the other big box department stores, and they would promise to have some in first thing in the morning in two days, but then when I would show up, they would only have more empty promises that they would be in tomorrow or the day after. That got old quick.

Next we thought we would look online. The only place we could find a Wii by itself was eBay, but the price reflected the higher demand then supply. Since we still had some time we decided to file eBay away as a possibility and keep looking locally.

Then we called GameStop (a little video game boutique store), which had 80 Wii’s in stock. They were a $249, which is about $20 more then WalMart claimed to sell them for, but they were in stock. Bird in the hand is better then two in the bush and all that, so we decided to go for it.

Before we took the plunge, Dawn and I talked about it and decided we might take advantage of the price gap between GameStop ($249+ tax) and eBay (around $300+ shipping). GameStop said they were limiting Wii’s to two per person, so we decided to pick up a second one and sell it on eBay.

The next day I stopped by the GameStop across the street from the Alderwood mall next to my office. They had no Wii’s, so they called over to the GameStop in the mall across the street, which reported to have some in stock, so I headed over there.

When I got to the game stop in the mall, they said they only had 3 Wii’s in stock, so they were limiting it to one Wii per person, but the other GameStop in the mall should have more (it is a big mall). So I took one there, and went down the way to the other GameStop. They had a few, so they sold me 2 more (which I made the mistake of putting on the same receipt – oops.)

Now to list the Wii’s on eBay. We wanted the auction to end on a Saturday evening, so on Tuesday I started a 5 day auction. I looked at a few other successful Wii listings and borrowed bits and pieces and added some of my own verbiage. Listed the Wii, and then let Dawn review the listing. She said it was good, so I listed the second one. We decided to hold on to one just in case the well runs dry.

Needless to say, hiding 3 Wii’s in our apartment isn’t easy, Sherlock Jonathan discovered them. We strongly believe in not lying to our kids, but at the same time we didn’t want to let the cat out of the bag, so we told him we thought we would sell some Wii’s on eBay to make some extra money. His immediate response was that we should take the money from those Wii’s selling and roll that into buying more Wii’s to sell until we have enough profits to buy a Wii we could keep. I told him that was a great idea and we would see how it turned out.

Saturday night rolled around and we were out to dinner for TJ’s birthday. I decided to check my email on my phone and see if they sold. The first sold for $350 and the second sold for $400. I was quite pleasantly surprised. So we decided to pick up a few more Wii’s and repeat the process.

Listing subsequent Wii’s was really easy. You just select one you already listed and tell it to list again. I would tweak it from time to time to try different shipping prices and descriptive details. None of it seemed to make too big of a difference.

I continued to buy and list Wii’s and Dawn handled counting the money (via PayPal) and shipping them (through PayPal and UPS). Once we had the weight and dimensions of the box shipping was a snap. All in all, we made an average of $80 a Wii after eBay fees (listing is cheap, but they take a percentage on the sale), PayPal fees (another percentage) and Shipping (we listed them flat rate, but UPS charged on distance, so it averaged to about a wash).

Once Thanksgiving rolled around it got really hard to find them, and the price on eBay crept up a little bit. In the end we got a number of games and accessories to go with the Wii, as well as other gifts. The great thing is the Wii ended up paying for the rest of Christmas.

Making the extra money was great, but all the thank you notes from our buyers on eBay was very cool. Most of them said we made their Christmas. We had buyers as far away as Florida (a couple there) and as close as our same apartment complex (but they had their shipped 20 miles from here).

What did we learn?

• Calculate all your fees in advance so you know what your real cost is.
• Get each Wii on its own receipt so you can include the receipt with the Wii.
• Because Wii’s were in such high demand, they were a commodity.  The listing duration (24 hours to 7 days) didn’t make much difference.  We always ended in the evening, but  different days of the week didn’t seem to make much difference.
• Follow-up on feedback and you might still get it.
• If you are willing to risk (starting your auction at $1), you can make a great payoff (all of our auctions ended in a profit).
• Risk is mitigated in volume.
• Once you find a winning strategy, repeat.
• The best purchases are the ones that pay for themselves.

It was a great experience overall.  I hope Jonathan learned from it as well.

Here is my results:

You are an Interpersonal Thinker
		Interpersonal thinkers: Like to think about other people, and try to understand them Recognise differences between individuals and appreciate that different people have different perspectives Make an effort to cultivate effective relationships with family, friends and colleagues
Like interpersonal thinkers, Leonardo had lots of friends and contacts, and was a popular figure at the Italian court.		Other Interpersonal thinkers include Winston Churchill, Mother Teresa, William ShakespeareCareers which suit Interpersonal thinkers include Politician, Psychologist, Nurse, Counsellor, Teacher

You can also view all the different thinking styles.

Why?

I would want a high EQ.  That would make it easy to surround myself with people who know more then me (people with a high IQ and low EQ).  My high EQ would allow me to know if they were being honest with me when they gave me advice and answered my questions.  In exchange I would help them connect with others who have specialized knowledge in other areas.

It isn’t WHAT you know, but WHO you know.  I would know all the people who had all the answers, and they would want to share those answers with me.

Thanks to Tricia Ho in Australia for the question via LinkedIn.

So lets look at the constants in the formula:

• ?: Most people are familiar with ? (or pi), which is the ratio to a circle to its diameter.  It allows you to move between the diameter of a circle and its circumference.  It is an irrational number, meaning it cannot be represented completely in decimal notation.  It is approximately 3.14159265. . . .
• i:Is the imaginary result of the square root of negative one, or i^2 = -1.  Since a negative number multiplied by a negative number results in a positive number, without imaginary numbers, this would impossible.
• e: The one less people are familiar with is is Euler’s number or e.  It is the base of the natural logarithm.  It is also irrational with the approximate value of 2.71828 18284 59045 23536. . .

Mathematically speaking ?, e and i are considered some of the most important constants along with 0 and 1.  Pretty exciting eh?

So it turns out this formula is called Euler’s identity.  I still don’t understand how it works though.  According to Carl Friedrich Gauss, since this formula is not immediately apparent to to me (as a student), I will never be a first-class mathematician.  That is OK.  I just enjoy math as a hobby right now.

Wallace has other books like Science of Being Great and Science of Being Well. I have not read any of those yet.

“Practice until you get it right. Then practice until you can’t get it wrong.”

Don’t know who it is by though. I’ll research that. . .

I am also a fan of the differentiation that practice doesn’t make perfect, it makes permanent. Perfect practice makes perfect results, while imperfect practice makes imperfect results. So always improve your practice.