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Explosive productivity June 18, 2008

Posted by sdpurtill in : Life, Advice , 4comments

I think I have a condition of sorts. In the last few months I’ve noticed that I am either really motivated and get a lot of stuff done, or have no motivation at all and am useless. I see it now more than ever because one of the guys I work with is really consistent with how he gets work done. I like to think of my condition as “explosive productivity”.

Take the following example:

I try to consistently do a weekly review on Sunday night or Monday morning and write a todo list for everything that needs to be accomplished in the upcoming week. The weeks that where I do these weekly reviews I always cross everything off the list and have extremely productive weeks. But there are weeks where I have no motivation to do a weekly review (it’s about 1 in 4 now, used to be 1 in 3 so I’m improving). In these weeks I have no direction and am generally pretty lazy about everything - work, communicating with people, even making my bed. I call these my recovery weeks where I realize I’m still 19 and not a machine (yet). They’re quite humbling.

I’ve noticed similar behavior in a lot of people that I’ve gotten to know in Silicon Valley. I feel like there is a perception about a lot of entrepreneurs that says you should be working 24/7 to make a startup successful, but everyone is wired differently. Myself? I can’t work for more than 4 weeks straight without having a “recovery week”. As time goes on I’ve been able to build up more and more stamina, but I have a hard time seeing myself becoming a machine. My logic behind this is as follows: If I can get done in 1 week what takes most people 2 weeks, I should have an explosive 3 weeks and then take a 1 week break to recover and get ready for the next 3. I am tossing the word “recover” around without defining it - by it I mean a week where you’re not at your productivity peak. Maybe you’re at 1/2 of your normal productivity. Whatever it is, this week should be spent planning what the next 3-4 weeks will be like.

I’ve read a lot of books on productivity. The best one I ever read was How To Get Things Done by David Allen. Halfway through the book I slipped a bookmark in it and threw it under my bed, never to pick it up again - kind of ironic. How to get things done eh? :) I’ve come to the sad conclusion that no matter how many productivity books I read, none of them are made specifically for me. They’re made for the “general public”. I think these books are similar to health diets — they last for a few months but aren’t sustainable in the long term for people with strong patterns (like myself).

I have applied methods that the books have taught here and there — one of my favorite is the 2 minute rule that David Allen talks about in his book. If you can get the task done within the next 2 minutes, just get it done and out of your system. Another one is writing everything down (I have a habit of sending myself emails via BlackBerry when I’m not around a computer). I’ve found that this takes a lot of my perceived stress away, because I know if I write something down I won’t forget it. Thinking that I forgot something is where a big part of my stress always coems from, so I’m glad I’ve solved that. But by and large none of these productivity books have boosted my productivity more than methods that I’ve found myself (the recovery week being my best example).

I hope that one day I will figure out how to work non stop for several months at a time - until then I’ll need my recovery weeks here and there.

What are some of the things that make you productive?

I need your opinion! February 4, 2008

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice , 5comments

Everyone comment on this!

I can’t tell you for what, but I have two domain names that I am deciding between for something I am doing:

tastychurro.com
mychurro.com

It’s down to TastyChurro or MyChurro. What do you like better? And if you can think of something with the word “churro” in it that is better than both of them, I’ll give you $20.

Comment away, thanks!

Smart people can be so irrational sometimes… October 8, 2007

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice, Apple, Money , 1 comment so far

I like reading Dave Winer’s blog, but today he announced that he bought 300 shares of Apple (AAPL) stock (approx. $50k). I rarely ever click through to the sites from Google Reader, but this was the only one I clicked through today to see if I could comment on it. Let me quote what he says about the stock:

I decided, after giving it much thought, to buy 300 shares of Apple. I think it’s a good long-term investment.

The only thing I had to look at was their P/E of 47.42. Ok you could go over hundreds of future earning potential scenarios for Apple, but it is SO ridiculous to justify a PE of 47.42 for a company that is already HUGE.

But then again, maybe everybody sees something that I don’t? I’m just not buying into all this BS hype; MS is trading at a steady P/E of around 21, seems like a much better buy than Apple. Apple is a great company, they make awesome products, but the irrationality of the market seems so absurd to me.

Google’s P/E of 52 doesn’t look as bad to me, because I think Google is about to become the biggest telecom and ISP the world has ever seen, so they still a massive market to capture.

q ewjoifmdsalk aoidsjfsoi das

Ahh! All this stock market BS is making my brain hurt, people are just a bit crazy sometimes when it comes to the whole castle-in-the-air hype. Bleh.

Oh by the way… having a great time in SF, moved into my apartment and living on my own. More on that at a later time, I’m just mad at the market right now.

A great view of risk June 26, 2007

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice , 1 comment so far

I just came across this article on Digg. It’s an interview with Peng Ong (I’ve never heard of him until a few minutes ago, but he sounds like a big Silicon Valley guy). This is an excerpt from the interview that I thought was great

SM: I am an entrepreneur’s daughter as well, and it is a risk taking propensity that I think kind of gets built in if you are from that type of a family.

PO: Let me try and pose this slightly differently because I think this helps some folks even if it doesn’t help everyone. I am actually not a really high risk taker. I will explain why. It is how you look at risk. Most of us, when we think about risk we thing of dollars and cents. Now flip the situation around and think about something else; in my case I invite people to think about the time they have. You can always make money here and there later. If you don’t make some now you can make some later. You get a little bit smarter and you can figure out different ways to make money.

Time just keeps marching on. Most of us that I know of have a limited supply of it. The biggest risk to me is not that I loose money but I do not make use of the time I have as effectively as I can. When you look at it from that perspective it is very risky to get a regular job, not learn anything and not to experience very much. From that perspective, losing all of my money is lower risk to losing all of my time.

Buying Music on iTunes — My Experiences February 9, 2007

Posted by sdpurtill in : Life, Advice , 1 comment so far

Recently, I’ve been buying all my music off of iTunes. I used to buy the CDs from Best Buy when they came out, but wow, after using iTunes, I’ll never go down to the store again. Talk about convenience! The only thing that I don’t get from iTunes is the little booklet that comes inside CDs you buy at the store. I kind of miss those, but in reality, I usually just look at them once and never pick them up again (especially the ones that don’t print the lyrics). I’ve bought over 100 songs on iTunes now (not much compared to a library of 1000+) and I am “hooked” on it, if you will. 

Most kids my age don’t bother to pay money for their music. They do have legitimate reasons:

  1. I make minimum wage — $8/hr
  2. LimeWire and BitTorrent are always free and easy
  3. Artists already have enough money, there’s no point in me giving them more
  4. I have ANTI-CAPITALIST tattooed on my arm! (I’ve seen a guy with this)
  5. I am so original that the bands I listen to aren’t on iTunes (only good excuse here)
  6. I like the band, but they aren’t worth my money (I used this excuse forever)

So here is my rebuttal to those excuses:

  1. You should have learned Ruby on Rails when you were in 8th grade. You would be making upwarsd of $80/hr now :p. No but seriously, learn a skill and charge money for it.
  2. I have downloaded hundreds of songs from LimeWire — almost all of it Rap music. I really don’t feel the need to support people that shoot eachother for “turf”… Hahaha
  3. They have a lot of money because they are talented, a lot of people like them, usually MTV made them, and I respect the fact that Viacom took the risk of making them. I’m not going to lie, I don’t have what it takes to build the next Viacom… Gotta respect “the man” ;)
  4. For everyone out there that is “anti-capitalistic”, I really pity you. Money makes the world go ’round, I’ve said this a million times over. You have to eat to live, and food doesn’t come out of heaven like it did in the days of Moses (manna :p)
  5. This is actually a good excuse. I don’t know what to say except… Those bands suck hahaha
  6. Quick solution to this problem: if they aren’t worth your money, they aren’t worth your time. The saying goes “time is money”, hence my reasoning behind that statement. I only buy music that I deem “worthy” of my money and [listening] time.

The reason why I prefer buying music to downloading it is because:

  1. Quality of paid for content always trumps illegally obtained content
  2. The Album Artwork is always right… Haha, I hate when Album Artwork is wrong
  3. When people at school are talking about all the songs they have been downloading, you can tell them how superior you are because you buy your music (hahaha juust kidding)
  4. YOU FEEL GOOD about the songs that you’ve bought when you listen to them. You aren’t thinking… Wow, I could actually get thrown in jail because I have this illegal content on my computer (I know, I know, chances of that are one in a billion). But, it’s a good feelinggg ;)

Moral of post: Buy Music on iTunes.

I absolutely love this weather November 15, 2006

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice , add a comment

Winter officially trumps summer. Forever. In Narnia, it would have been better if it was always sunny and never snowing :p. Anyways, I have a post about the seminar last night that I’ll be posting later.

I don’t post when I’m angry November 11, 2006

Posted by sdpurtill in : Life, Advice , add a comment

I have about 10 drafts that I’ve saved from the rest of the world. Why ? Because I don’t post when I’m angry.

A few reasons

#1- You’ll feel differently about the situation tomorrow.

#2- You may not know all the details behind the situation which is making you angry; therefore, until you know all of the details, there is no point in writing about stuff that may be wrong.

#3- Mark Cuban does, but he’s a billionaire. That’s 100% justified. A high school senior that doesn’t have a penny to his name, now that’s not.

#4- No point in smearing someone’s name on the internet. If you don’t like them, tell it to their face; posting something online about them is the pansiest thing ever. Kind of like people on Myspace trashing each other on those stupid bulletins… Get a life :p

#5- Because it’s public information. And that’s not something to take lightly.

#6- What goes around comes around… Karma’s a bitch. And those aren’t just sayings, they’re facts.

The reason I write this ? I’ve had quite a few posts that have gone unpublished in the last few days… And sadly, they will never see the light of day.

:)

Ok, going to see Will Ferrel’s new movie tonight with friends. I can’t wait — Will Ferrel is the funniest guy alive. Elf is by ffffaaaaarrrrr the greatest Christmas movie on the planet.

Put this ad on TV, HP !!! November 2, 2006

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice , add a comment

Mark Cuban’s computer… :D

Diddy’s new CD… October 25, 2006

Posted by sdpurtill in : Music, Advice , add a comment

Is TERRIBLE. It is the worst CD I have bought in the last 2 years. Alpha Launch of Monvia’s first product this Thursday, so we’re working like crazy to get everything perfect. My schedule will be freed up to blog more next week.

If I could go back to 9th grade October 5, 2006

Posted by sdpurtill in : Advice, High School , add a comment

This is what I’d do

#1 - I wish I would have gotten really good grades and kept on caring about school like I did at GVCA. After 8th grade, I didn’t care about school whatsoever. I did the minimum possible to still get A’s and B’s on the report card. I’ve learned very little in school since 8th grade. Seriously.
#2 - I wish I had read soo many more books. And not just technical books; books on philosophy, books on analyzing people, books on sales, novels, etc…
#3 - I wish I could be a really good Christian; its soo hard for me. I have everything I want and most of the time I feel like I have no need for God
#4 - I wish I had never listened to Eminem. I haven’t listened to him for a few months, but I used to play his stuff religiously.
#5 - I wish that I would have focused on Flash. I could probably be one of the best Flash developers in the world right now. Instead, I wasted my time with friends.

There’s a ton of things that I wouldn’t take back though. I’ve learned a lot since 9th grade, and I have so much more to learn. They say “the more you know, the less you know”, and I totally agree.

Right now, the only thing I want to learn in school is Spanish. It’s a reality that there are millions of Mexicans coming into California; anyone with half a brain and a 5th grade education could just imagine the economic opportunities possible if they could harness the power of this new population.