1. Clear your workspace
2. Get a clean digital desktop photo
3. Don’t be satisfied with complicated software
4. Switch to Gmail
5. Upgrade from XP/Vista to Windows 7, or better yet…
6. Get a Mac
7. Use RSS feeds to read your favorite websites
8. Find and eliminate the little annoyances in your workflow
9. Keep an updated, accurate contacts list
10. Get a Google Voice number and have your voicemails transcribed
11. Automatically filter your emails
12. Make lists on Facebook so you can keep track of people
13. Take a few minutes at the end of every week to organize your files
14. Find the balance between features and simplicity
15. Get an iPad
16. Put your bills on the calendar with automatic email reminders when they’re due
17. Organize your receipts using Shoeboxed
18. Focus on one task at a time
19. Go paperless
20. Scan your books
21. Keep your music organized properly
22. Schedule some of your Twitter and Facebook statuses so that you can focus on other things
23. Know when paper is best!
24. Backup your movies to iTunes
25. Only use technology that makes life more simple

“Advertisement… has brough our disregard for truth into the open without even a fig leaf to cover it.” – Freya Stark

Advertising dominates our lives. The average city-dwelling American sees up to 5,000 advertisements a day. Five THOUSAND –  that’s like watching 50 commercials in a row, a hundred times. When we hear those messages over and over and over again, they eventually do what they were designed to do: change the way we think about our stuff. It’s no wonder we live in a culture driven by the things we own!

I play a game with the advertisements I’m exposed to… I try to figure out what logical fallacy they’re using! It’s great fun to figure out how advertisements are put together, and what the company’s trying to accomplish, often subconsciously, in the mind of the consumer. The recipe for most commercials is something like this:

• 2 parts “appeal to emotion” (instead of facts). Combine with
• 1 part “post hoc” (false cause, i.e. “This beer makes you great”), and
• 1 part “red herring” (distraction, i.e. funny commercial with no relevance to product) on the top as a garnish.
• Hint: Add a dash of “irrelevant authority” (i.e celebrities) and a pinch of “snob appeal” (i.e. “only the cool use this brand”) to give it that extra zing.

Mix well, chill with some cool background music, and serve often (up to 5,000 times a day!). If you’re required to give the “nutritional facts”, put them at the end, use obscure words, and artificially speed them up so that the average person has no idea what was said. If you follow the recipe correctly, your will have the buying public’s mouths watering in less than 30 seconds!

Obviously I was having a little fun with that recipe, but I’m not kidding; those are the basic ingredients for at least 75% of the commercials I hear!

No “industry” is worse about logical fallacies in advertising than politics, though. In this season leading up to the mid-term elections, be on the lookout for three especially  insidious fallacies: the ad hominem (forget the issues, just attack the person), appeal to fear (forget the issues, just make people afraid), and straw man (forget the issues, just misrepresent your opponent’s position).

So study up on logical fallacies, and try playing the game the next time you’re being advertised to. It works especially well on long trips in the car – you can play on the radio, billboards, even political signs and semi truck trailers. It’s fun, it’s educational, and it’s one more way to remind ourselves that life is about relationships, not about things.

For some entertainment in the comments, tell us about the most ridiculously flawed claim you ever heard in an advertisement! Also, if you enjoyed reading this post, please consider clicking the Facebook Like button or retweeting it to your followers! Thanks!

That being said, I’m not the fanboy that refuses to acknowledge the weaknesses, either. One of my biggest complaints about Gmail has been the lack of html-rich signatures – the signatures in Gmail have always been nothing but plain text. I like to have my name, (sometimes a digital signature), the simplifi.de logo, and a link to the latest key piece of content on simplifi.de, all at the end of every email – it is huge marketing and branding tool, and I had to do it manually with every email I sent from Gmail.

Well not anymore! A couple of weeks ago Gmail quietly added a new feature… html signatures! Now I can save my signature and have it automatically added to every email I send! Here’s how… (Note: This feature is only available in the latest desktop version of Gmail… plain HTML and mobile versions don’t have this feature yet.)

Go to Settings >> Signatures and instead of just a plain box, you will now see a Rich Text box, similar to the Compose Mail page. Here you can add text, links, logos, anything you want, any size you want, any color you want! Simple!

Have any other fancy signature tips, or other Gmail-ly goodness? Tell us about it in the comments – we learn best when we learn as a community!

As a management consultant and business coach, I am often called on to help executives and business professionals in their strategic planning process. A big part of strategic planning is deciding where an organization will focus its limited time and resources to best achieve its mission and vision. It’s deciding what to say no to and what to say yes to. The wrong yes can mean pouring valuable time and money into a certain direction that ends up draining resources with little return. On the other hand, saying yes to the right things, can mean increased revenues, lucrative new ventures, loyal customers, an energized workforce, and most importantly, positive progress toward achieving the vision.

This principle applies to our personal lives as well. Let’s do a quick self-assessment, how often has our decision to say yes to the “wrong” thing contributed to the things in our life we are currently unhappy about? What about saying yes to eating certain foods that have caused us to gain those extra ten pounds we don’t want? What about the high blood pressure we are battling that may have been caused by our choice to create a schedule for ourselves that has no downtime or our decision to hold onto anger or resentment toward someone who may have hurt us? What price are we paying because we’ve chosen to spend hours watching TV or on Facebook as our more intimate relationships with our spouse, best friends or our kids suffer from relational malnourishment?

There’s a great article from the Harvard Business Review that I share with many of my clients. It is called “The Strategic Power of Saying No” by Susan Bishop. In the article, Susan shares a story from her own business experience that is a powerful illustration of the transformational impact of knowing your vision and staying focused on it; even when the proverbial carrot is being dangled in front of your face to tempt you to say yes to something else.

She was the owner of an executive search firm.In the earlier stages of her business, she wouldn’t spend a lot of time assessing if she should take on a client opportunity; especially if it paid well. She thought the best growth strategy was in her words “to grant all our clients’ wishes” and to be willing to take on clients even when she knew they would pose many challenges to the company. That often led to burned out employees and low profit margins. Then she came to a turning point where she more narrowly defined her market and what she was willing to do for them. The scariest part was when six figure business opportunities came and she had to say, “Sorry, that’s not our market.” One of the toughest tests came when she turned down a contract for $250,000 from Coca Cola. Then it happened: business started coming in that resulted in higher profit margins, companies she said no to came back with opportunities that were a better fit for the market she had defined.

Day to day, choice by choice, we are building our future. What we say no to and what we say yes to can mean the difference between a life full of regrets, or a life marked by gratitude for a life well lived.

Barbara’s interview is here.

Luke’s interview is here.

The above quote is from a story I read last weekend in The Simple Life. The elderly man told the author stories about his life, from the Great Depression onward. And after all the stories about the struggles, joys, pains, and thrills, that was his proclaimation over it all.

When I’m 83 years old, I want to be satisfied with the way I lived my life, and enjoy telling my story to others. This started me thinking about something else, too… at the end of my life, the stories are really all that’s left.

When we gather with your family at holidays like the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, or Christmas, do we reminisce about how much money you made way back when, how much time you volunteered, what your quarterly sales numbers were back in 1983? No, all that has faded into oblivion – it’s meaningless, irrelevant information. The conversation is about something hilarious that John said when he was three, or how you took your cousins “snipe hunting.”

All that’s left is story.

When a person has a disease like Alzheimer’s that begins to steal away their memories of the past, often the first things to go are facts and figures, and things that happened recently. The last to go? Stories, especially about people and events that happened in the distant past. All the numbers, all the information that was so important to us gives way.

All that’s left is story.

As a follower of Jesus, I know that my life is really all about the part I play in His story… the stories of our lives are relevant only because they fit into the Grand Story of the redemption of all things to Himself. Everything in my life that isn’t a part of His story is lost in the end. All the false measures of success I measure myself and others by… gone.

All that’s left is story.

It’s easy to get caught up in all the fluff, the busy work, the errands to run and the practice to get to, the blog post to write and the email to respond to. Living the simple life requires two things: eliminating all of the non-essential stuff we can, and being vigilant to keep everything in perspective, to not let anything take a higher priority than it should.

I made the comment to my wife last night that I want to live a life that’s full of stories… rich stories, memories that make us laugh when we remember them, adventures that were scary at the time but were worth it in the end. I want to live a life that’s Ridiculously Extraordinary, and better learn the Art of Great Things.

Every day I’m writing the words, paragraphs, and chapters of my story, and you are, too. My hope is that when I get done writing, it’ll be something that I’ll actually want to read!

What are you doing to make your story interesting? We’d love to hear about it in the comments. And if you enjoyed the post, please considering hitting the Like button or retweeting and sharing it with your  friends. Thanks!

“I’m busy every night except Thursday this week.”

“Oh, well my boy has a baseball game on Thursday night. What about Tuesday?”

“Sorry, Tuesday I have a PTA meeting, can we possible do it on Saturday morning?”

“No, my in-laws are coming to town and we’re going out on the boat on Saturday. What about…”

Ever had a conversation like this before? Planning a meeting time for a group of busy people is usually an exercise in frustration. Especially this time of year, everyone is so busy that it’s very hard to find a time when EVERYBODY can meet.

Barbara recently had to organize a meeting like this with six very busy people. Instead of calling everyone, or worst yet, emailing them, we looked up different web based scheduling software options. We decided on When Is Good, it worked out very well, so we thought we’d share it with you!

WhenIsGood.net

I don’t think it’s possible for When Is Good to be any more simple (why do you think I like it?! ;-). You don’t even have to login or create an account – just hit “get started” and you’re on your way. It’s easy – highlight the times that you are available, and then send the even link out to all the other attendees. They highlight the times they’re available, and the event creator logs back and can clearly see the best time to meet.

The design of the calender makes it easy to understand the results. The times where everyone can meet are highlighted in green. All the rest of the time slots have dots next to them, one for every person who is not available at that time (i.e. if there’s three dots, three people are busy). If you mouse over the time frame, you can see who is available and who isn’t. If you see someone can’t make any of the times, you can deselect them by clicking on their name, and they’ll be temporarily removed from the calendar so that you can clearly see what times everybody else can meet.

When Is Good has plenty of great functionality for free, but if you need more options, they also have a couple of paid accounts. Their Premium Account (£5/year) gives your respondents more options, like “These times are perfect for me” and “This would be possible, but not ideal”, and their Branded Account (£180/year) lets you have your own dedicated sub-domain, company logo, custom design, etc. (not affiliate links, FYI)

It’s not often that I am amazed at web apps – most are just a reworking the same old ideas. But I have never seen anything like When Is Good before, and I am very, very impressed. In the leadership positions that I have been in, setting meeting times has been one of the most frustrating and complicated tasks. Using a web based scheduling software option like When Is Good make a time-consuming task like that simple, quick, and easy… I’m officially a fan. Make sure to check it out the next time you need to schedule a group meeting!

What do you do when you’re trying to organize people with conflicting schedules? Any other ideas? Let us know in the comments. If this was helpful to you, please hit the “Like” button below for Facebook or retweet it on Twitter – it’s the only way more people get to know about simplifi.de. Thanks!

So when I heard this song for the first time, I thought, “That would be a great post!” It’s Tim McGraw’s latest single, Still, which topped out at #19 on the Billboard Country Charts. I chose it for this Monday is because it speaks of a skill we all should develop more, one that is helpful in creating a more simple life – the skill of still.

Are things just way to complicated for you today? Does your motto seem to be more chaos, less life? All you have to do is just be… still.

Video after the jump.

Lyrics:

There’s a place I like to go,

Where I can here the cotton grow,

Where that train whistle blows,

A dozen miles down the road,

All I really have to do is just be still!

There’s a place I love to be,

My Momma, Daddy, my sister and me,

First time I ever saw the beach, back to 1983

All I really have to do is just be still!

When this world gets crazy,

And tries to break me,

And I had all I can stand,

I can close my eyes no matter where I am,

And just be still!

There’s a place that I can see,

Where my baby’s next to me,

Close enough to feel the heat,

All wound up beneath the sheets,

All I have to do is just be still!

When this world gets crazy

And tries to break me

And I had all I can stand

I can close my eyes

No matter where I am

And just be still

There’s a place I need to go,

Where the stained glass windows glow,

Every part of me is known,

Thank God I can go there,

Thank God I can go there…

Still.

A time management seminar instructor is using a demonstration to make a very important point. He pulls out a large glass jar and places it on a table for all of the students to see. He then takes out some fist-sized rocks and plops them down into the jar. “Is the jar full?” he asks. Some of the class members yell “Yes!” He shakes his head and says “No, it’s not.” Then he takes a jar of pea-gravel and pours it in the jar until it reaches the top. The gravel has found a place in the spaces between the rocks. Again he asks “Now is the jar full?” Before getting an answer, he takes out some sand and pours that into the jar until it again reaches the top of the jar. This time when he asks “Now is the jar full?” the class shrugs their shoulders and some respond “probably not.” The instructor takes a pitcher of water and carefully pours it into the mixture of rock, gravel and sand until it filters through and rises to the top. This time when he asks “Is the jar full?” they answer “we think it is.” When he attempts to debrief the demonstration as to the lesson it teaches, one class member smiles and blurts out “it means that no matter how busy your life is, there is always room for more!” Although the comments was met with laughter from the class, they no doubt became more thoughtful as the facilitator points out the real lesson: “If you don’t put the big rocks in first, you’ll never get them in later.”

How many times do you or I go through our day putting in gravel, sand and water and then have no time or energy left to put in what really matters? How many times have the “urgent, but not important” details, tasks and requests for our time taken up space and crowded out what really feeds our spirit and soul? We are bombarded by more opportunities than ever to waste the limited time we are given each day. Emails, phone calls, internet browsing, social networking, TV, and hundreds of other pulls at our time tempt us to spend time with something “less” and give up something “more.” How many dreams do we have that are still unrealized because we are “too busy” to pursue them?

Re-reading this story was a good reminder to me to really stay focused on the things are that really matter, and make sure they get my top priority. As Steven Covey says “It’s easy to say no, when there is a bigger ‘Yes!’ burning inside.” What is that bigger “yes” for you? How much time are you spending living that? Today, make a list of what those “big rocks” are for you, and then do a quick review of how you have spent your time the last few weeks. If you’re like me, you realize that there is some gravel, sand and water you need to clear out.

You constantly hear about simplicity giving you freedom, and rightfully so. But there’s a flip side that most people don’t like to talk about, because it’s not as trendy: it actually takes away some freedom.

A perfect example is the iPad. I told you all back in the post on scanning my books that I was going to buy an iPad. While I’m still waiting to buy it, I have taken some time at our local Mac store to test it. Every time I’m more convinced that it will revolutionize the mobile computing industry, mainly because it’s just preposterously simple to use. A toddler who can barely talk can turn it on, find her app, and do a puzzle, and a 99 year old lady can still write funny limericks on it. The simple design and interface gives you the freedom to read books, interact with the internet, and use apps in an entirely new, more intuitive and productive way.

But the simplicity which makes it an game-changing product also takes away some other freedom as well. For instance, you can’t replace the battery yourself, hook up your external hard drive, play Flash games, or manipulate the file structure of the iPad. So you gain a product that’s intuitive and simple, but you loose the ability to do certain (generally techy) things.

And that’s okay.

The principles of simplicity are the same no matter what the subject you apply them to. If you’re decluttering your closet, you gain simplicity but loose the freedom to wear certain clothes. If you rip all your CDs and sell them at a garage sale, you no longer have the option of popping your favorite in the CD player on a trip. Everything is a tradeoff – one kind of freedom for another.

The challenge for all of us is to know how to find the equilibrium of simplicity and options… and that will be different for every person. What we would argue for, especially related to technology, is to err on the side of simplicity. Most people will buy and use products that are much more complex than they need, simply because “they might need it some day.” (which, incidentally, is the same argument most people use for keeping piles of useless crap around the house)

If you can use a more simple solution, do so. You’ll thank yourself later. If you absolutely need more options, at least hide them so they’re not cluttering your screen. Just don’t let the paralysis of “I might need it someday” keep your physical or digital life cluttered anymore.