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Profit in Peace 7: Day Three

I didn’t do the powermoves yesterday. Dunno how I’m already so burned out.

Dunno how to find my power or center again.

This is very interesting for me, like the logistics portion for me.

Thoughts and questions today:

  • Alibaba is not a marketplace, its a directory of manufacturers
  • You can send them an RFQ and they can produce your product
  • Certification used to make something eco friendly
  • Click hearts on suppliers that look good > Favorites > Select all > Contact Supplier
  • High quality images
  • Talk about benefits not features
  • Use canva for images
  • Turn off on keywords that are not delivering, put more money into the keywords that are delivering
  • 20-30 per hour for sourcing agent
  • about 400 for each project
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Profit in Peace 6: Day Two

Today is the second day in the Profit in Peace Challenge live sessions. I feel really tired. I was dreading this so much.

Questions/thoughts:

  • Calling Amazon a startup sounds like a scammy thing to say
  • I’m so tired of forced enthusiasm
  • I like this analogy
    • If you and your friend start a hot dog stand, and your friend is better than you at cooking, beat him by finding a starving crowd
    • The right bait for the right fish
  • Knowing your customer is about knowing your customer like you know your loved ones when buying Christmas presents
  • Introvert advantage is knowing yourself and knowing what you want
  • Become aware of your own patterns
  • Go to your favorite room in your house, pretend you have 100,000 dollars. Do a window shopping spree.
  • Think about how to create words that describe the whole niche but not specific, hard to find results
  • Pinterest is where people look at what they want to buy, amazon is where people search for the actual item
  • Pinterest > Etsy in 6 months > Amazon 6 months
  • Pinterest extra is an extension that you can use to see the number of saves
  • We are looking for at least 40% margin
  • Six Ps checklist
    • Popularity
      • Look for search volume on amazon (at least 20 thousand)
      • Cerbro reverse product search to find searches
    • Powerplay
      • How much of a difference can we make in this niche
      • Do we have a unique product
      • Is there a dead end search?
    • Persona
      • Do we understand who is this for?
      • Pinterest and internal research
    • Profit
      • Helium10 x ray tool
      • Find supplier on alibaba
      • Look and see how much it takes to manufacture
      • Then do a profitability calculator on a product with a similar size and weight since amazon charges based on size and weight for shipping
      • Need at least a 40% margin because other costs will bring the margin down to 25-30%
    • Practicality
      • Is it practical for you to pay for the costs of sourcing and making your product
    • Powerhouse
      • What is the second and third idea and are they cohesive ideas?
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Profit in Peace 5: Day One

Today is the first day in the profit in peace challenge live sessions.

Questions/thoughts:

  • Asking me to empty my cup
    • Isn’t this a question about time? What if I can’t quit my job or scared of doing it?
  • Hmm he means a few goals – fuzzy targets don’t get hit
  • The three Ps
    • Power – gain skills needed to maximize your natural strengths
    • Purpose – do something you love
    • Profit – products that sells themselves
    • Peace – at the center
  • I wonder if it is just because I’m so isolated but meeting with others becomes more important to me as soon as I get my alone time
  • But I do feel like I have charisma, I just burn out the more I work on things I don’t believe in
  • The lever is your why
  • But what if I don’t want to sell a physical product or do drop shipping
  • Trying to apply to what I want
  • Should I try this out? Or focus on what I want?
  • I’m guessing you somehow figure out what is a popular search, but aren’t there people already doing that?
  • Helium 10
  • At least 20k total searches
  • Rich buy time
  • The way that we see money and treat money comes from our parents
  • I can probably invest 5 to 10 thousand in my business
  • I can invest 10 to 15 thousand if I make 5000 in my coaching business

I actually got really stressed when attending this session.

I got stressed because I have my work and my coaching business and this challenge and I don’t want to do anything half-assed, but that’s what it felt like I was doing because I felt so scattered.

I decided to completely give up working on coaching for this week so I can fully focus on learning about e-commerce, then kind of work on coaching again afterwards.

Powerup Goal Calculator

My Goal

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Profit in Peace 5: Next Steps

Today I want it to be all about Instagram.

I want to do the following:

  1. Put in a good headshot
  2. Rework bio
  3. Create Instagram brand/colors
  4. Add in youtube videos, add brand
  5. Add friends and create offer

Also, I want to spend 20 minutes watching the next part of the coaching session.

Finally, I want to go after the brand and posts in a directed way. I’ll use the syllabus method.

A reminder for the syllabus method:

  1. Create a clear, ambitious, and exciting goal (something to inspire the angels)
  2. Use Alex Hormozi mindset (don’t think about how to achieve it, think about what would make it impossible for you to not achieve it)
  3. Break down those things into 3 steps
  4. If the steps are still too big and nebulous, break those steps into 3 more steps, repeating step 2 and 3

Goal: Create an Instagram page that is able to bring my energy of coaching to all artists, something so clear and powerful it is easy for me to create posts (3 hrs)

Step 1: Develop Brand (1 hr)

  • Tap into coaching energy, write down ideas
  • Try looka and other ai brand generators
  • Develop style guide

Step 2: Ask Questions and Get Answers

  • Put myself in the mindset of posting videos, posts, etc
  • Ask questions
  • Tap into coaching energy, answer questions
  • Research other similar brands

Step 3: Play Around With Brand

  • Create templates
  • Create sample videos and posts
  • Tap into coaching energy and adjust

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Profit in Peace 4: Next Steps

I was thinking in the coaching mindset today and here were the next steps that came to me:

  • Divide coaching call into 20 minute segments
  • Make Instagram page more developed, make it my main page
  • Invite all artists to the page
  • Make offer
  • 100% off coaching
  • Looking for feedback and honest testimonials
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Profit in Peace 3: Asking Questions

I just had a realization. I was thinking about what I “should” be doing in the mornings with this new blog commitment. But I think that EXACTLY what I “should” be doing.

I want to spend my time asking questions. And if an action speaks to me, I will do it.

In fact, this was a major technique in Connection Theory that I forgot about. Connection Theory is about understanding is the pathway to change.

One technique for understanding is to ask many many questions. Very good, specific questions. Questions that beget more questions.

Through questioning, we begin to understand.

Another technique I used to do was to ask myself questions. Imagine myself older and wiser, and come up with questions to ask my current day self, and then answer those questions.

Anyway, I have to transition to work, so this will have to wait for now.

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Profit in Peace 2: First Day

Today is not the first day working on the Profit in Peace challenge, but it does FEEL like the first day I am living it.

Today is the first day when I dedicated my morning to finding my magical life. For some context of what that means:

Something that I still don’t really understand or feel comfortable with applying is the values that I believe in every day.

I think that writing honestly and focusing on myself in this blog every morning might actually hit all of these points:

  1. Honesty – well, this blog isn’t called unfiltered for no reason! I do remind myself all the time of the “if they don’t like me please leave” mentality.
  2. Imagination – for me, this blog is dedicated to all my imaginative parts: art, YouTube, philosophy, poetry etc.
  3. Intuition – this is the place where doing things “my” way is celebrated and I tap into what is the best way to do something (according to my intuition) rather than how everyone else does it.
  4. Empathy – this blog is a lot for my feelings where I process feelings through words, video, and images. It is a part of honesty too, honest emotion where this is my place to express everything imperfect.

I also like using the blog as my way of living out all my values and being the person I want to be because it really feels like I am sacrificing something to do this…in a good way.

JT Franco talks about if you aren’t willing to sacrifice for what you want, what you want becomes the sacrifice. In the end, I had no idea whether I would sacrifice time talking to my girlfriend, going on YouTube, working, playing games, or making YouTube videos. Those are the things I spend most of my day doing anyway. But none of those things seemed right. It was too blunt on an idea, how could you sacrifice all of YouTube? How could I sacrifice all of work?

But by sacrificing my mornings, in a way, I am also sacrificing all of those things. I resist the urge to listen to audiobooks, watch YouTube videos, check messages, or work in the morning. I dedicate all my time to working on my blog and all my challenges, thoughts, ideas, and philosophies.

I also feel a deep unease and anxiety keeping pace with me this morning:

I’m Afraid I My Boss Will Check

I’m afraid my boss will check

See I’m not working

It won’t matter that I have bigger dreams

it won’t matter if I did a bunch of planning

On the weekend

Feverishly, desperately trying to

Make my workday

Productive, efficient enough

To make up

To make it easy

For me to balance

I remember the look on his face

When I told him

I like to meditate

Skeptical

And

I also wonder

If finding my magic

Will make me feel sad and lonely

Like I did yesterday

I feel tired as I

Let go of trying to change the feeling

And accept it instead

Another anxiety that I have about this challenge or this “morning commitment” is just the sense of lack of clarity. I don’t know what I should be working on, or what I can work on. I think is the pressure of time. Or maybe its because I completed all the prework for the challenge and I don’t exactly have something to work on right now. I’m afraid every action is not “right”.

Is it the right thing to:

  1. Work on challenge videos?
  2. Work on editing videos?
  3. Work on reaching out?
  4. To focus on my body?

Wow there is so much here and I feel that I may be stalling. Scared to make a decision so I’m just rambling on a super long blog post that doesn’t really say anything in particular.

Well all I know right now is I feel like doing a bit of freewriting, fantasy writing or something of that nature. So I’ll go do that.

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The Profit in Peace Challenge

So here is the long and short of it.

I saw an ad on Facebook. It was talking about making money as an introvert and making money without giving up your inner peace.

I immediately signed up. It was about 20 dollars.

Now I have done a bunch of the exercises for the prework of the challenge and here are my reflections.

Some major questions that I have right now:

  1. What am I willing to give up and how will I go about giving it up?
  2. How do I live my values every day in a way that is in flow and not forced or mechanical?

I have some initial ideas.

First, I was thinking originally about what I wanted to give up in terms of things like YouTube, or socializing. But recently it made a lot more sense for me to think about time. Specifically, I wanted to dedicate my entire morning to succeeding at these goals.

From the time I wake up, I usually am doing what JT Franco calls “buffalo brain” (the idea of being one of the herd that moves without thinking). I listen to audiobooks, and watch YouTube videos. I don’t eat breakfast or drink water. I keep the blinds closed. I feel awful and I don’t feel the feelings.

Someone once said (might be Melinda Gates) that the first few hours of the day are the most important because they set the stage for the entire day to come. If I want to give up anything, I want to give up my mornings to getting up, drinking water, feeling my body, and going downstairs into the lounge to write on my blog and work on achieving my dreams.

Middle of the day has to be reserved for work and for talking to my girlfriend. End of the day has to be reserved for me time. Being alone, taking time, creating art, and letting the magic of nighttime take over.

This is what I’m thinking roughly:

7/8 AM – 9/10 AM: Dedicated to living the magical life

9/10 AM – 12 PM: Dedicated to doing the impossible at work

12 PM – 1/2 PM: Lunch, meditation

1/2 PM – 5 PM: Work, performing at the highest levels

5 PM – 7 PM: Misc time

7 PM – 11 PM: Alone time, creativity, play

During the weekend, work will be removed, leaving more time for dedication to my magical life. I think it will look something like this:

7/8 AM – 12 PM: Dedicated to living the magical life

12pm – 7 PM: Misc time

7 PM – 11 PM: Alone time, creativity, play

With this balance, it seems that my breakdown is this:

Weekday

  • 1-3 hours per day on living magical life
  • 5-7 hours of work
  • 4 hours of alone-time/play
  • 2 hours of miscellaneous time

Weekend

  • 4-5 hours per day on living magical life
  • 4 hours of alone-time/play
  • 7 hours of miscellaneous time

I suspect, I will have to do careful planning during the weekend, in order to perform at the absolute highest levels of work and potentially spend less time there.

In terms of living out my beliefs of empathy, intuition/following feelings, creativity/imagination, and honesty. I’m not entirely sure what actions I need to take to feel that I am in congruence with my values.

My main thought right now is about taking risks, breathing through difficult emotions and sensations, and following connection theory.

The Project Management Crash Challenge

It is time for a crash course in project management!

Objectives:

  1. Understand and be able to apply major project management methodologies (PMP school, waterfall, agile project management)
  2. Review other methodologies that I already know (design thinking, OKRs, SRE, DevOps, UI/UX)
  3. Formulate resources and learning into distinct repositories of knowledge and simple shortcuts and worksheets that I can use as shorthand reminders and ways to kick off processes

Total time: 4 hours

PART ONE: Master project management (2 hrs)

  • Section one: Learn, research, and gather (1 hr)
    • Subsection one: Warm up via listening to videos and gathering resource lists (20 minutes)
    • Subsection two: Create own practice scenarios and find questions in them (20 minutes)
    • Subsection three: Consume and build resource repos off of resource lists and answer my own questions (20 minutes)
  • Section two: Create practice scenarios (30 min)
  • Section three: Question and answer (30 min)

PART TWO: Review other methodologies (1 hr)

  • Section one: write down everything from memory basic searching (20 minutes)
  • Section two: watch videos (20 minutes)
  • Section three: search for resources and worksheets (20 minutes)

PART THREE: Create and organize resources (1 hr)

  • Section one: create a structure for folders and docs (20 minutes)
  • Section two: create resources for project management (20 minutes)
  • Section three: create resources for other methodologies (20 minutes)

Here is a video that I started out with:

Project Life Cycle
Project Management Process

Links to the worksheets

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The Sales Funnel Challenge

I’ve always wanted to take as many sales and marketing offers as possible. I don’t know whether or not they are scams or not. I don’t know which ones are useful or not. So I wanted to take all of them, and treat them all like challenges.

Today, I started one of the Challenges. I signed up for a book called “Sell Like Crazy” from King Kong marketing agency with founder Sabri Suby. The book is about building clients from facebook ads (something I can already see they are good at and I have an interest in). I want to try this out with my coaching business.

The reason why I started with this sales funnel is that they have a hilarious Facebook commercial and they also had a unique offer – a free (or almost free) book.

My thoughts so far:

  • Really well-shot and entertaining commercial, they are a good marketing agency.
  • Glassdoor makes me think they are legit
  • I’m excited about the free book
  • They are too salesy, they kept me on the funnel for like an HOUR and predictably tried to sell me something immediately afterwards
  • My idea of them definitely soured in the sales funnel because of the endless funnel and greedy money grabs

Excited to see where this will go!