Setting Goals
photo credit: aussiegall
Well it has been a couple of weeks or so since I checked in here. Remember in my last post I mentioned that there was a first step that I needed to take?
Well, I’ve been working on that. That first step is to set out my goals. Yeah, I know, the goal is to make money and have a nice lifestyle. Really, that is the bottom line but it is not the whole goal.
Every goal breaks down into a series of steps. Every goal has images to go along with the goal. Yes, I may want to make a lot of money but do I want to just sit in the bank vault and have it surround me all day? Of course not, there are things I want to do as a result of having earned the money. That is the real goal.
My Needs
So, the first step was to spend some time and invoke the images of what I want to accomplish once I’ve made the money I’m seeking. The first major image that comes to mind for me is the peace of mind of knowing that my financial needs are met. I wont have to worry about having enough money in the bank to meet my monthly bills or those ones which crop up unexpectedly.
My Wants
The next image is continuing to earn enough to be able to meet my wants. There are some physical things I want, but, I also have a desire to be able to contribute financially to groups in my community which are in need. I currently contribute my time and my talents, I’d like to be able to add financial to that list. Your images of what you want to be able to do will have to match what matters to you.
How I’m Going to Get There
Now I’ve got the images of what I want to achieve, I need to then lay out how I’m going to achieve those images. Where am I going to focus my energy? How am I going to use my energy to achieve that focus? What do I need to learn in order to achieve that focus?
Spending some time thinking through and writing down those plans and images were an important part of actually being able to come up with my goals and focus. I also have set benchmarks on where I want to be when. What I want to have accomplished and how I’m going to accomplish my objectives.
Nothing Set in Stone
Those goals and images may shift a bit. I may learn things along the way which cause me to rethink the goals or process. BUT, I have to make sure I don’t keep shifting to the point that I accomplish nothing.
Here is a major learning aspect that I can never ever lose focus of. I have to be able to learn when it is time to call something a learning experience and move on and when it is time to think the problem through a bit more and try another angle.
The easy path is usually to call it a day and move on to something else. The tough path is to think from a different angle or reach out to get some guidance from someone else.
My Process
I’ve got my goals written down. I review them daily. Sometimes, if my mind seems to be wandering around like a lost soul, I read them more than once a day. Then I take some quiet time with a piece of paper and decide what my target is for today to move my goal forward.
Today, it was writing another post here. It’s also to spend some time learning how to create a Facebook fan page which will be part of a project I’m working on. As I progress, I’ll share that a bit more.
So, have you prepared your goals? Do you have your image of where you want to be? Your plan on how to get there? Have you set out today’s plan?
visit the Patti Network News to see where else I’m writing.
KAIROS Doc Is No Longer About Funding
It has become increasingly clear that for sure Bev Oda, Minister for International Cooperation, needs to resign or be fired. It has also become increasingly clear that Prime Minister Harper is going to stand behind her no matter how much subterfuge it is going to take.
We’ve learned in the last week that the ‘NOT’ which was inserted into the KAIROS document was done so on Oda’s orders. She may choose to split hairs over whether she knew who exactly picked up the pen and did so, but she had full knowledge the document was being altered. Therein lies the issue. Therein also lies a question.
The issue is that Oda knew the document had been changed and at what point. It was after the two CIDA officials had signed off. The issue is NOT if she made a decision to grant funding to KAIROS ornot. She has the right to make a decision, even if it disagrees with the recommendations of the CIDA officials. The fact she made the decision and then mislead the house and the Foreign Relations committee about the circumstances of the decision, THAT is the issue.
The very fact she had the right to make the decision, truly begs the question — why did she cover up the decision by having someone else alter the document? Why not just make the change, initial it and send it back to the original signatories so they know the finished document had been changed? Or send back a memo advising them that their recommendation had been rejected and why?
There is no reason for the lying and obfuscation that has gone on around this. Oda needs to offer up her resignation before she is found in contempt, which she is.
Harper is currently doing his best to change the channel on this. He’s trying to portray the issue as being if Oda had the authority to make a decision against the bureaucrats. Nice try Harper, that might fly with your buy any crap you throw at them support base, but it’s easily seen through. The issue is, your minister lied. I realize that doesn’t mean much to you since you twist the facts pretty regularly, but it means something to others.
It is also entirely possible Harper’s office ordered the change and Oda had to figure out how to change it without drawing a lot of attention to the change. As long as Harper stands by Oda, there is no reason for the full truth to come out. Now, should Harper give into Opposition and public demand for Oda to go, she might just let fly the whole story.
Personally, I believe the defunding of KAIROS had more to do with politics than good stewardship of public funds but, that is not the issue. The government, and in particular, Oda, had the responsibility to make a decision for whatever reason. She didn’t have either the responsibility or the right to lie to and mislead the House and a Parliamentary committee, for that she needs to pay the price.
Visit Out of the Shadows –
Related posts
- Opposition Goes After the Stalling (1)
- Time Marches on For Castro (0)
- Milliken Ruling More About Democracy Than Detainees (1)
- Ignatieff Slams MIA Prime Minister (0)
Ordinary Courage
I just added a new link to a blog. As you can see, I don’t add a lot of blog links, so I really like this one. Gail Hyatt’s daughter Megan Miller wrote about Brené Brown a week or so ago. I’ve gone back and read that post and watched the video a few times. I learn something every time I do.
Brené is a research professor at the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work. She has spent the past ten years studying vulnerability, courage, authenticity, and shame. Now, one would think that she’s pretty dry and boring. She’s anything but, she’s witty, candid, shoot from the hip and talks to you, not at you.
She also talks about a subject we all experience but rarely talk about, vulnerability and shame. Forgive the pun but a lot of us are just ashamed to talk about shame, our own that is. Anyone who knows me offline, knows I’m pretty reserved. I don’t often let people know what I’m feeling or struggling with. I’m vulnerable, just like anyone else is, I just throw a shield up in front of it.
I’ve done such a great job of shielding it over the years, that other than the gut feelings, I don’t even articulate to myself. I’m aware of that need, that I lose a part of living by not being in touch with that part of myself. For me, it’s been this mystery, when a counsellor has said you need to be more in touch with your feelings and to express them, I’ve often said… how. The usual response is you know, you just need to do it.
I guess that gave the counsellor the wiggle room to not have to guide me into space she wasn’t sure about. It threw the onus on me to answer my own question out of thin air I guess. While exploring Ms Brown’s blog I decided to check out which of her books was available on Kindle (I have the app for that). I purchased and downloaded “I Thought it Was Just Me”, came back to explore the blog further and discovered a read along program for the book. I’m going to explore that further as I read the book.
So, go to Megan’s blog and listen to the TED talk of Brene’s she has there, look up her name on YouTube and listen to her talks and visit her blog. I think you’ll find her real interesting.
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
If you like this post, please tweet it. Follow me on Tweeter here
Who Altered The KAIROS Docs?
photo credit: ViaMoi
Reference Article: The Globe & Mail
One would think it would be a no brainer that when a document is produced for the signature of one or more government officials or parliamentarians, that no alterations would be made to the document along the way. Doesn’t appear to matter with this current government.
Last year CIDA denied funding for KAIROS, a group of churches doing work in developing countries. In one instance, an MP, Jason Kenny, bragged during a speech that the funding was cut off because of the groups criticism of Israel. The official story became that the group didn’t meet the funding priorities of CIDA.
Rather fishy sounding but, with this government’s secretive ways, who was to prove different. Now we learn, the funding was not initially intended to be cut off. The document circulated for signing recommended the funding continue — at least initially.
Someone, somewhere in the process, inserted the word “NOT” in handwriting. At least one of those signing the document said the word was not there when she signed. Bev Oda, the last signatory, would not answer the question when she appeared before a parliamentary committee on the matter. Her response was: “It’s like we’re on CSI or an investigative forensic thing – who’s put the ‘not’ in. I’d like to know what your issue is,” she said then. “What is your issue?”
My issue is, someone changed a government document and no one is owning up to who or why. This refusal of funding was presented as routine. If it had been, the document would have been sent back to be corrected before being signed. In an honest and transparent process, the document at minimum should have been initialled by those signing to indicate they knew of the change. The change appears without any notation or explanation.
I think Parliament, KAIROS and the people need to know, who made the change and why exactly was the funding denied? It’s more than troubling that this government appears to be growing ever more brazen when it comes to subverting document and due process. The Opposition parties need to sink their teeth into this and hold on until the truth comes out.
Visit Out of the Shadows –
Related posts
- Zytaruk Needs Help to Sue Conservatives (0)
- Where Is the Recalibration? (1)
- Playing Games With Democracy (4)
- Pardon System to be Revamped (1)
- Opposition Goes After the Stalling (1)
Marketing in Fits and Starts
Are you a person who wants to make money online and find yourself lacking focus?
Do you take a run at getting started and then let it fade into the background when you don’t see immediate results?
Have you acquired so much information and knowledge about how to make money online that you have no idea where to start?
You know you should just pick something and work on it to the exclusion of all else but fear not choosing the right ‘thing’?
In varying degrees, all of the above is and has been me. There, it’s out there, true confession time. So what am I going to do about it? First , I’m going to recognize that any time I’ve let any of the above hold me back in the past, it’s a failure. A failure doesn’t mean to stop, it means to learn and move forward. Time I moved forward — again.
It is my intention to focus on establishing and growing an online business. The core of that business will be three blogs. This is the first. This blog, going forward will provide me space to share what I’m doing and how that is working out for me. I will also be sharing what I learn about building an online business, the methods I’ve tried and how that worked, the theories I’m learning.
I encourage anyone trying to get going, or even those who are starting to gain traction, to take part here.
First Challenge
The first challenge I’m going to tackle will be establishing a list for this site. That’s the first challenge but not the first step. I’ll talk about that first step in another post.
I know the conventional wisdom is to use either GetResponse or AWeber autoresponders to setup a list opt in. Well, I haven’t made any income yet and I don’t have the money to spend. So, I’ll be setting up my list in MailChimp, a free option that once I get rolling I can either move to a paid option and continue using or move to one of the other two options.
So, I need to get cozy with their documentation, which they have plenty by the way. What I’m about to learn, is their plenty of documentation written well enough that I’ll know what to do? I’ll share what I learn.
So, what about you? Are you frozen in fear of failure or moving forward?
| Subscribe to My Newsletter | |
| The benefits your subscribers are going to receive from your newsletter | |
| Name: | |
| Email: | |
| Powered by Optin Form Adder | |
visit the Patti Network News to see where else I’m writing.
Liberals Take A Stand on Bill S-10
The Conservative dominated Senate has passed Bill S-10 which provides for mandatory sentencing for those convicted of having as few as six pot plants in their possession. The first of many faults with the bill is that the bill fails to distinguish between someone who has a few plants for recreational use and those who are operating a grow op. They are all going to spend at least six months in jail.
It is the jail time where the next major fault lies, it costs money to house prisoners. Money to build the prisons, maintain them and to staff them, not to mention the actual costs of care involved for the inmates. In these days of record deficits, those costs are not just federal dollars, they involve provincial costs as sentences of two years less a day are served in provincial facilities.
This bill like others the Conservatives call tough on crime bills promote a flawed approach to crime. The Americans have already tried and failed with the same approach. In the American experience, many states came close to being bankrupted by the increased costs of building and maintaining prison facilities mandated by federal legislation.
What’s that definition of in insanity?.. oh right… doing something over and over the same way in the hope it will work eventually.
Finally, after holding their noses and voting for previous pieces of legislation with increased sentencing provisions in, the Liberals have announced they are taking a stand against this bill. In addition to the financial costs which will be necessary to implement this bill there is the human costs of creating more hardened criminals out of people who have engaged in the possession of a minor amount of pot.
Like many Canadians, I want to see the worse of our society behind bars, some permanently. I want to see those who commit the heinous crimes sentenced in ways that keeps them locked up. When a person commits two murders, they should serve two life sentences, one after another with the minimum time before parole stacked accordingly. A citizen with half a dozen pot plants shouldn’t be sitting in jail for six months.
Conservatives need to realize they can’t both cut taxes and raise the costs of housing prisoners at the same time without other parts of our society suffering from cuts imposed on them to pay for their pandering to their political base. Canadians need and deserve rationale decisions on how their dollars are spent.
So, jail them all or just the worse ones? Tax cuts or more prisons? More prisons or fewer programs for law abiding citizens? What do you think?
Visit Out of the Shadows –
Related posts
- The Plot That Wasn’t (3)
- Playing Games With Democracy (4)
- Letter to Ignatieff (1)
- Forget Coalition, Someone Needs to Show Some Leadership (1)
- What is Karzai Inhaling? (1)
Time Flies
Wow, it’s hard to believe it’s been so long since I last posted here. I haven’t been doing blogging on most of my blogs for the last while. I’ve been busy, aren’t we all. The reality is, I just kept putting off posting. That’s not really an excuse, it’s just plain honest.
We’re busy at the Legion these days, which is a really good thing. There is a great team of people there who really care about the place and want to see it not only survive but also to thrive. Volunteering can make you rich in ways money can never measure.
Unfortunately, my bills require money to pay so I have to work on actually making some money. I’ve wanted to do that online for several years but never seem to really make it work. It’s me, I know that, I don’t work consistently enough at putting the infrastructure in place to make that happen. There is no overnight success methods, it takes deliberate action.
So, my primary goal for this year is to take deliberate action, consistently. One of those deliberate actions includes posting more regularly to this blog. This is my place to hang out and share what I feel like sharing.
Post Footer automatically generated by Add Post Footer Plugin for wordpress.
If you like this post, please tweet it. Follow me on Tweeter here
Get Your Meter Off My Bandwidth
Last week we saw an outpouring of consumer anger over the CRTC’s decision about internet bandwidth metering. Well actually they gave the big players like Bell Canada, Rogers and Telus the right to charge the smaller players wholesale rates about 15% less than what the big guy’s customers pay for bandwidth.
Bandwidth which costs just pennies per gigabyte and their customers are paying $2.50 and up per gigabyte if they go over their monthly allowable limit. The big guys claim that just 10% of customers go over their monthly limit and therefore that 10% should pay the freight.
If they are talking about their own customers, anyone who accepts an internet package which only gives them 25gigs of bandwidth in a month is a very light user, or they don’t realize how easy it is to rack up bandwidth use and they quickly switch to another provider rather than pay their outrageous overage charges.
I spent several years paying what I considered to be an outrageous cost of almost $60 per month for internet by satellite because that was all I could get. The provider, ExplorNet started out good when they first introduced the service into the area, then the throttling started. You’d be on the net maybe half an hour and the speed would drop to slower than dialup. When I’d complain, I’d be told it was their “fair usage policy” being activated by my ‘excessive’ bandwidth use.
How much bandwidth can I use in 30minutes for pete sake? In several online forums, I soon discovered the more likely issue. They regularly oversold their feed and then throttled clients rather than put the money into expanding the network. After all, they have a captive market when you can only get dialup or satellite.
Then the day came, I discovered I could finally get high speed. I looked at the various packages available, especially from Bell. I quickly found I’d be paying almost as much as I was on satellite for the amount of bandwidth I believed I was going to need. A Twitter friend directed me to TekSavvy.
I discovered that not only could I get a monthly 200gig bandwidth package for a very reasonable cost but when I had the need for customer service, I spoke to someone right here in Canada, not overseas somewhere. Imagine that, a reasonably priced service and I’d get to speak to a Canadian when I needed help. I soon learned, I got to speak to a friendly, helpful Canadian!
Now, I don’t use 200gig per month. I don’t even come close. I don’t spend time on YouTube, I don’t download a lot of files. I surf, I play an online game on Facebook, I do have a lot of email coming in and going out, oh and I blog. I happily paid for the package because I knew I’d not go over the limit and would not incur additional costs. Then came the ruling.
I soon received a notice from TekSavvy, my package would shrink to 25gigs a month. They provided me access to my account to see that I’d been using at most 40gigs a month. In order to continue my current activities online, I’d need to pay another $5 a month.
So, thanks to the CRTC, if the ruling goes ahead, in an era where online demand is increasing in an increasingly connected world, instead of using the resoruces as I need or want to, I will have to be constantly concerned about usage and cost. Meanwhile, our neighbours to the south enjoy pretty much unlimited access to the connected world. Only Australia will be more restricted than Canada if the ruling goes ahead.
The CRTC needs to hear loud and clear from Canadians that restricting access through allowing large companies to gouge us directly or through being able to gouge our smaller ISPs who are trying to provide legitimate competition is not in our best interest. Sign the petition and have your say.
So, should we be metering internet usage? Should the big companies be able to charge $2/gb or more for bandwidth which costs just pennies?
Visit Out of the Shadows –
Related posts
- No related posts.
