A Balanced Life

By Bob Proctor

In his publication Better Families, Dr. J. Allan Petersen quotes C. Peter McColough of Xerox who says, "I look for breadth of interest.  Individuals with broad interests are best able to perform within a company today.  We face many societal changes, and a broad outlook and encompassing overview are more pertinent than the traditional circumscribed career preparation.  Perhaps one of the most important qualities a man or woman can possess is balance.  That simply means that one doesn't go off the deep end.  You balance your life with wives, husbands, children, recreational activities, hobbies, physical programs and community involvement.  To get off in one area or another, I think, is a mistake and will lead to trouble."

Research is conclusive that the more broad, general knowledge an individual has, the more balanced he or she will be in life.  Interestingly enough, it also conclusively proves that those people with a broad range of knowledge are the most creative in the solution of problems, not only in the corporate world, but in their personal and family lives as well.  When our analytical left brain is supplied with a broad range of information, when we encounter problems which we've never encountered before, or when we meet unique opportunities, the broader that range of knowledge, the more creative we are in the solution to the problem itself or on the capitalizing of any new opportunity that presents itself.

Now, combine this broad range of knowledge with an ever-growing increase in knowledge, and exciting things really happen.  The new input of knowledge into the mind stirs up all of the old input and when new information meets old information, they get together and create new concepts and ideas.  The message is clear: Broaden your range of interests; live a balanced life; continue to grow in information and knowledge and I'll SEE YOU AT THE TOP in all areas of your life.

SOURCE

13:19:00 - By Vincent 0

HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN LUCK

By Mark Manson

We’ve all had the feeling at some point in our lives where it seems other people catch all the lucky breaks while we seem to be screwing everything up. It’s a common perceptual bias. In other people we focus on the successful result, not the toil and struggle they endured to reach it or the missed opportunities and growth experiences they suffered through. While in ourselves, all we’re aware of is the toil and strugglewe endure and not the success that is readily apparent to others. It’s a kind of Blind Man’s Bluff that we’re all doomed to continue playing throughout our lives.

The concept of “luck” stems from this perceptual bias: the belief that some people’s existence defies mathematical probability, that because they have it and we don’t, they’re violating the universe’s probabilities.

The truth is, across the spectrum of a lifetime, we all receive both opportunity and injustice in healthy doses. Some of us may defy the odds early in life, perhaps by being born into perfect circumstances, and then face unfair or unlikely challenges later on. Others may be born into squalid conditions, but as they grow, they meet great opportunities that change everything for them. Or sometimes chance can be just that — random chance. My grandfather started seven businesses throughout his lifetime. He became a millionaire once and went bankrupt twice. He finally sold his last business for a modest sum so he could retire in rural Texas with his remaining comforts. A few years later they struck oil on his property. A lifetime of hard work, risk-taking, spectacular successes and more spectacular failures, and the minute he hangs it all up and calls it quits, he struck oil.

Life’s cruel roll of the dice.

But the truth is, we can actually control our luck to a certain extent. Although we may not directly affect the major opportunities that enter our life at any given moment (like finding oil on our property), we can indirectly influence how many opportunities spring up and the ferocity with which we pounce on them. In fact, if we define “luck” as the amount of beneficial opportunities and life events that happen to us which aren’t completely in our control, recent research not only finds that some people are much luckier than others, but that those lucky people have quite a few things in common.

And no, it’s not rabbit’s feet. Or a dearth of black cats. Lucky people have specific behaviors and mindsets which cause them to encounter far more opportunities and advantages than others on average. You can, in effect, train yourself to become a lucky person, if you so choose:

1. BE A SOCIAL BUTTERFLY

Psychologist Richard Wiseman is an authority on luck — or what is perceived as luck in our lives. In his book The Luck Factor, Wiseman found that the best predictor of how many “lucky breaks” a person has was how social and interconnected they were with those around them. Lucky people enjoy connecting and relating to other people and are comfortable doing so. When presented with new social situations, unlucky people talked to people they already knew or people who were most like themselves, whereas lucky people talked to a large array of people equally.

Most of life’s opportunities don’t land on us mysteriously. They come through our networks, our connections, people we stumble across at random.

My one-and-only attempt at a day job was landed through an acquaintance I had made when I was going out five nights-a-week in Boston back in 2007. I once landed an audition for a touring rock band by randomly meeting the singer at a Fourth of July party (he and I happened to be hitting on the same girl). A blogger recently wrote about sitting down in a coffee shop to work on his laptop and accidentally striking up a conversation with an old man who just happened to have invented the first ever programmable computer and spent the afternoon chatting with him.

Wiseman states in his book:

“I discovered that being in the right place at the right time is actually all about being in the right state of mind… Lucky people increase their odds of chance encounters or experiences by interacting with a large number of people. And that makes perfect sense: Chance opportunities are a numbers game. The more people and perspectives in your sphere of reference, the more likely good insights and opportunities will combine.”

As the old saying goes, it’s not what you know, but who you know.

2. PERIODICALLY DO SOMETHING STUPID

The perception of luck is more likely to fall on those who take a dumb risk or two. Again, it comes back to our perceptual biases. We notice the spectacular successes and quickly forget about the fizzled failures. If you’re on vacation with your buddy and he decides to go on to the strip club by himself at 5AM and next thing you know he’s showing up in your hotel room at noon with two women on his arm and stories about partying with Charlie Sheen all morning, chances are he’s not some divine purveyor of fortune, but rather he’s had a lot of meaningless, lackluster nights at strip clubs and this time he happened to wander into the right one at the right moment.

Spontaneity will open you up to more potential opportunities and adventures. Falling into the same drab fixed routine is going to yield less unexpected opportunities and fewer possible big gains.

There is a horizon to our ability to see opportunities when we pursue certain actions. For instance, we may see the one clear opportunity available if we quit our job or move to a new country or take up a new hobby. But we don’t see the other opportunities that job, that move, or that hobby will lead to.

For instance, when I started working online, I thought it was my internet business or bust. I either made it work or I’d be dutifully gulped back up by the 9-to-5 world. But over the years, I’ve met people and had opportunities for business ventures in places as odd as Thailand, Ukraine, and Brazil. I’ve made friends of different industries in the most random of ways and have developed connections that keep me confident that I’ll never have to work a day job again for the rest of my life.

And chances are if I had acted on any of those opportunities, they wouldn’t have completely worked out, but would have opened me up to a whole new host of opportunities I can’t fathom at the moment. Such is success — a long, painful string of failed shots and course corrections. What is commonly perceived as luck is often merely someone who wasn’t afraid to screw up a few dozen times.

The point is this: be open-minded and spontaneous. The guy with the hideous shirt may actually be the perfect business partner for your new venture. The networking event your brother is dragging you to could actually score you court-side tickets to a playoff basketball game. That guy who sold you cocaine might introduce you to your future spouse. You never know.

(OK, probably not.)

3. MAXIMIZE YOUR RETURN ON LUCK

See? Bill Gates had bad luck too.

Recently, two researchers finished up a nine-year study on luck and its role in determining the fate of the most successful companies in the world. Did tycoons such as Bill Gates simply get bigger lucky breaks more often? Did software businesses go under when Microsoft thrived because of unfortunate circumstances, because of unpredictable events outside of their control which derailed their company?

The surprise answer is no.

In fact, the researchers found after measuring 230 “luck events” over dozens of businesses, that the ultra-successful businesses did not receive any more lucky breaks than the companies that failed on average and vice versa. What set them apart is something they dubbed “Return on Luck” (ROL).

All businesses have positive and negative events impact their businesses in unpredictable ways. What sets the successful companies apart from the others is that they maximize their positive luck and minimize their negative luck. They get a high ROL. When Bill Gates found out he had the opportunity to program an operating system from the original Altair, he stayed up for weeks on end, skipping classes, often not sleeping for days at a time, to take advantage of the opportunity. He was able to recognize that this was a once-in-a-lifetime moment and he had the wherewithal to push through and take advantage of it. That’s a high ROL. Researchers found that the ultra-successful companies regularly did this. And even though other companies were exposed to similar lucky circumstances, the most successful companies took far more advantage of the serendipitous situation.

In addition, the best companies were able to minimize bad luck the most successfully, or even in some cases, turn bad luck into a strength and an advantage. The companies that failed? Not so much. As soon as disaster struck, they caved.

4. BE OPTIMISTIC

Not to rattle off the ridiculous list of the benefits of optimism or anything (optimists are healthier, happier, more successful, more likable, they live longer, etc.), but being optimistic and generally expecting the best of people and things around you goes a long way to accomplishing bullet point number one above: i.e., no one likes hanging out with a negative asshole.

But beyond just helping you become the most popular girl at the prom (like you’ve always wanted to be), optimism and overestimation of oneself is more likely to lead to successful performance. Even the belief that one is lucky can alter one’s results drastically. Score another point for adopting positive beliefs.

But this isn’t hocus-pocus stuff. Our performance usually rises to the level of our expectations. If you consistently expect yourself to be better than you actually are, then research suggests that you’re more likely to improve and have a large breakthrough. A little bit of healthy delusion goes a long way.

And in terms of optimism/pessimism, think of it this way. Optimists are more likely to identify a lot of “false positives” — believing something is good when it’s really bad — while pessimists will more likely identify “false negatives” — believing something is bad when it’s actually good. It’s not hard to see what is more advantageous. While optimists will sometimes mistake a steaming turd for pure gold, they will not miss a piece of genuine gold when it crosses their path. Pessimists, on the other hand, will spot every steaming turd they come across (and duly let you know about it, I’m sure), but they will also mistake opportunities of genuine gold and let them slip away (kind of like a turd).

So are you in the business of spotting turds or spotting gold?

SOURCE

12:36:00 - By Vincent 0

10 Ways to Reduce Rigidness, Decrease Anxiety, Increase Flexibility, and Have More Fun

Andrea UmbaBy cBy
By Andrea Umbach

Structure, organization, and consistency are highly encouraged in the workplace, at school, or in parenting. But how much is too much? At what point do we become too rigid and inflexible?

As a clinical psychologist, I’m not surprised that I frequently see rigidness in individuals who are depressed and anxious. A good source of ways to learn about managing symptoms of anxiety and depression is the Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) website.

People who are controlling and inflexible often find themselves frustrated because the rest of the world doesn’t live by their rules and expectations. Just because you want to eat green foods only or arrive to the airport three hours early doesn’t mean that anyone else wants to, so you are setting yourself up for disappointment.

Flexibility means seeing things from different perspectives, tolerating ambiguity, taking risks, and learning from mistakes. It helps us adapt to a constantly changing environment and shows that we can handle diversity and accept other people’s preferences. Flexibility leads to openness, more opportunities, and less depression and anxiety.

Adults and children must find a balance between structure and spontaneity. Structure allows for a framework, choices, and some flexibility, but rigidity means you follow the rules — or else. How do you find balance? The best thing is to maintain structure and organization, but allow time for fun and taking advantage of opportunities that come your way.

Some people can do this on their own. But others need the help of a therapist. With appropriate treatment from a mental health professional, you can overcome anxiety and depression, which leads to a healthier quality of life.

Try these 10 ways to increase your flexibility:

1. Observe your rigid behaviors. Spend a few days actively taking note of your routines and rules. Ask your partner, children, or friends to tell you when your rigidness appears. This exercise isn’t meant to make you feel bad; it should help you learn to make your life more flexible.

2. Try new things. Try a new food, sport, type of movie, deodorant, anything! Get your brain used to doing things differently. If you havesocial anxiety and are worried about being judged by others, be honest about the worst thing that could happen: You might feel uncomfortable. But taking a risk will help you tackle the unexpected and open up to new experiences.

3. Embrace opportunities. Don’t say “no” purely out of habit. Instead of thinking of 20 reasons not to do something new, think of five reasons you should do it. Keep the bigger picture in mind. For example, I might not feel like going out with friends, but I want to continue to build friendships.

4. Be in the moment. Don’t think about all the other things you need to do. Slow down and focus on what you are experiencing internally and externally at that moment. Remind yourself of what you value most. I’m guessing that having good family relationships ranks higher than a clean kitchen.

5. Mix it up. Do you always do things exactly the same for a reason or just out of habit? Practice doing things differently. Drive a new route to work, substitute spinning for yoga, or build a fort with the kids and let them sleep in it. Show yourself that you can do things differently, and nothing disastrous will happen.

6. Go with the flow. This one might be a bigger challenge: Allow others to take charge. Have a day where your partner or friend plans everything without your opinion. This is a great way to see how it feels to be on the other side of rigid.

7. Compromise. Identify the situations where you are always in charge. Are there others in your life who deserve some input ? They may have stopped giving their opinions because you don’t acknowledge them, so this will be an adjustment for both parties. Actively listen to others and see if you can meet them half way.

8. Let it go. Practice letting the small stuff go. If your partner doesn’t fold the towels the way you like or the kids don’t make their beds well, just let it be. Keeping quiet will be very difficult at first, but consider how much freedom you’ll gain not having to monitor or complete every single task on your own.

9. Catch yourself. Monitor your vocabulary for “can’t,” “shouldn’t,” or “not right.” These are red flags that you are moving into rigid territory. Try “let’s see,” “let’s find out,” “I’m not sure,” or “what do you think?”

10. Practice. Just as you have to practice stretching your muscles to become more physically flexible, you must do the same thing to become mentally flexible. Set small goals at first, such as making one small change each day. The more you can challenge yourself to allow for new experiences, the easier it will be to integrate them into your everyday life.

SOURCE

13:00:00 - By Vincent 0

20 Small Ways to Break Out of Your Comfort Zone and Create a Positive Change Starting Today

by HENRIK EDBERG

“Move out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new.”
Brian Tracy

I’m a big fan of doing the unusual thing. Sometimes in big ways. Often in small and daily ways to mix things up.

Why?

Because this habit is a simple and relatively easy way to:

• Expand your comfort zone. And if you change your perspective on yourself from someone who sticks to the old and comfortable all the time to someone who likes to mix things up then it will feel more natural and easier to break out of your comfort zone when comes to bigger things too. Because this habit makes the inner resistance and the fear that may hold you back smaller.
• Add a spark to your day and come alive. It keeps you from getting stuck in the same old daily or weekly rut. And it adds more fun to your life.
• Refuel your curiousness about the world and life. When you do the unusual thing regularly you to discover a ton of new and exciting things. And that will refuel your curiousness about what else is out there that you haven’t discovered just yet.

So how do you do the unusual thing and break out of your comfort zone in small and sometimes bigger ways?

Here’s 20 ideas that have helped me and still help me to do just that.

1. Eat the unusual thing. Instead of choosing the meat-based dish at lunch try the vegetarian alternative. Or try the fish if you usually go for the beef.
2. Smile towards everyone. Instead of just going along with your day in your normal social way try smiling more. Smile more towards your co-workers, the lady at the checkout at the supermarket, the people closest to you and smile to yourself when you encounter a mirror. See what happens.
3. Cook something new. Each week we try cooking a new recipe. It is most often a tasty experiment and helps us to find, sometimes unexpected, new favorites. It has also certainly made me a better cook in the last few years.
4. Mix up your music. I mix things up by trying new music every month. I have a look at the best music on sites like Pitchfork.com and Metacritic.com. Then I load a few of those albums on Spotify and listen.
5. Work in complete silence and stillness. Shut the door to your office, shut off your music, unplug the internet and just focus on doing the most important thing you can do today while enjoying the silence.
6. Read something that your friends wouldn’t guess that you are reading. Right now I’m reading a Swedish book about investing sensibly in stocks. Definitely not my usual cup of tea. But it’s really interesting.
7. Do all your shopping for the week. Instead of doing grocery shopping when you feel like it or need to, sit down and plan what you will eat and need for a whole week. Go and get all of that at the store. Now you don’t have to go back there for a week and you’ll probably have a bunch of extra free time and less stress to enjoy this week.
8. Have a day of kindness. Instead of having the usual bursts of irony, sarcasm etc. during your day try to go for a day where you are just being kind and friendly to everyone including yourself.
9. Enjoy it all. All fluctuations during your normal day is a part of life and as life it’s a gift in some way or another. So on some days I just tell myself: “enjoy it all”. Then I try to enjoy my day no matter if the inbox is overfull, if I’m hungry and starting to get cranky. The things I usually don’t like so much I tell myself to enjoy as a part of life. And so my day actually becomes more enjoyable because much of how we see life is about how we choose to think about it.
10. Watch something odd. If you usually watch thrillers then try a romantic comedy. If you most often get stuck with documentaries try an animated movie form Japan (I recommend anything by Hayao Miyazaki). If you love Family Guy, try the Wire. Expand what you watch to get new ideas and impressions.
    
11. Listen to the sound of the world. Leave your portable music player/radio at home. Just listen to sounds of the city, nature and people as you move about during your day.
12. Take a day to be offline. I tend to spend a day a week offline (usually Saturday or Sunday). It’s a wonderful change of pace and feels like I’m on a small, healthy and extra relaxing vacation. Plus, it makes it more fun to get back to work on Monday.
13. Take a news black out. Instead of reading the paper or watching the news as usual try to go without that for a day. See how it affects you and how much you miss the news.
14. Hide a note for a loved one. Hide a sweet note of affection for a partner, family member or a friend in his or her cookie jar, tea or coffee container, book on the nightstand, hat, shoes or somewhere else where they look each day. Make him or her happy in an unexpected and unusual way.
15. Take a different route. To work or to school. To your gym or home. See something new even when you are in transport mode.
16. Walk or take the bicycle to work. Instead of taking the car or riding the bus as usual. Get some exercise and fresh air before it is time to start working and on your way home.
17. Let it go just for today. If you often get into arguments or have trouble letting issues go and replay them over and over in your mind then just for today let it all go. Tomorrow you can take up your old habits just where you left them . But for today, instead of getting into an argument just let it go and walk away. If you replay something in your mind, let it go for today. If an old memory pops up today too, let it go instead of dwelling.
18. Go out. If you usually stay in during the weekdays, then call up a few friends and head down to the pub for a few hours even if it’s just a Wednesday. Or call up someone you haven’t met in ages and go for a cup of tea or coffee. Or pop down to the movie theater and catch a movie. If you usually do those things though, consider just staying in with PJs on and taking it easy.
19. Sit in a new place. If you have favorite chair or part of the sofa where you always sit then try another chair or place to sit today. It can give you a new perspective at work or at home. And I have found that it can even give me some new and fresh thoughts and perspectives on life.
20. Throw out the things you haven’t used in 1 year. Go through one part of your home – a closet, a drawer in your desk or bedroom cabinet – and see what’s in there. Go through the items one by one and ask yourself: have I used this item in the past year? If not, give the item(s) away to charity or a friend or simply throw it out.

16:44:00 - By Vincent 0

To Anyone Who Thinks They're Falling Behind

BY Jamie Varon 

You don't need more motivation. You don't need to be inspired to action. You don't need to read any more lists and posts about how you're not doing enough.

We act as if we can read enough articles and enough little Pinterest quotes and suddenly the little switch in our brain will put us into action. But, honestly, here's the thing that nobody really talks about when it comes to success and motivation and willpower and goals and productivity and all those little buzzwords that have come into popularity: You are as you are until you're not. You change when you want to change. You put your ideas into action in the timing that is best. That's just how it happens.

And what I think we all need more than anything is this: permission to be wherever the f*ck we are when we're there.

You're not a robot. You can't just conjure up motivation when you don't have it. Sometimes you're going through something. Sometimes life has happened. Life! Remember life? Yeah, it teaches you things and sometimes makes you go the long way around for your biggest lessons. You don't get to control everything. You can wake up at 5 a.m. every day until you're tired and broken, but if the words or the painting or the ideas don't want to come to fruition, they won't. You can show up every day to your best intentions, but if it's not the time, it's just not the f*cking time. You need to give yourself permission to be a human being.

Sometimes the novel is not ready to be written because you haven't met the inspiration for your main character yet. Sometimes you need two more years of life experience before you can make your masterpiece into something that will feel real and true and raw to other people. Sometimes you're not falling in love because whatever you need to know about yourself is only knowable through solitude. Sometimes you haven't met your next collaborator. Sometimes your sadness encircles you because, one day, it will be the opus upon which you build your life.

We all know this: Our experience cannot always be manipulated. Yet, we don't act as though we know this truth. We try so hard to manipulate and control our lives, to make creativity into a game to win, to shortcut success because others say they have, to process emotions and uncertainty as if these are linear journeys.

You don't get to game the system of your life. You just don't. You don't get to control every outcome and aspect as a way to never give in to the uncertainty and unpredictability of something that's beyond what you understand. It's the basis of presence to show up as you are in this moment and let that be enough.

Yet, we don't act in a way that supports this lifestyle. We fill every minute with productivity tools and read 30-point lists on how to better drive out natural, human impulse. We often forget that we are as we are until we're not. We are the same until we're changed. We can move that a bit further by putting into place healthy habits and to show up to our lives in a way that fosters growth, but we can't game timing. Timing is the one thing that we often forget to surrender to.

Things are dark until they're not. Most of our unhappiness stems from the belief that our lives should be different than they are. We believe we have control—and our self-loathing and self-hatred comes from this idea that we should be able to change our circumstances, that we should be richer or hotter or better or happier. While self-responsibility is empowering, it can often lead to this resentment and bitterness that none of us need to be holding within us. We have to put in our best efforts and then give ourselves permission to let whatever happens happen—and to not feel so directly and vulnerably tied to outcomes. Opportunities often don't show up in the way we think they will.

You don't need more motivation or inspiration to create the life you want. You need less shame around the idea that you're not doing your best. You need to stop listening to people who are in vastly different life circumstances and life stages than you tell you that you're just not doing or being enough. You need to let timing do what it needs to do. You need to see lessons where you see barriers. You need to understand that what's right now becomes inspiration later. You need to see that wherever you are now is what becomes your identity later.

Sometimes we're not yet the people we need to be in order to contain the desires we have. Sometimes we have to let ourselves evolve into the place where we can allow what we want to transpire.

Let's just say that whatever you want, you want it enough. So much so that you're making yourself miserable in order to achieve it. What about chilling out? Maybe your motivation isn't the problem, but that you keep pushing a boulder up a mountain that only grows in size the more you push.

There's a magic beyond us that works in ways we can't understand. We can't game it. We can't 10-point list it. We can't control it. We have to just let it be, to take a f*cking step back for a moment, stop beating ourselves up into oblivion, and to let the cogs turn as they will. One day, this moment will make sense. Trust that.

Give yourself permission to trust that.

 SOURCE

16:46:00 - By Vincent 0

Making Connections Outside Your Social Comfort Zone

By JENNIFER HANFORD

“Life begins at the end of your [social] comfort zone.”

~ Neale Donald Walsch

Many people treat social media as simply another way to communicate with friends or personal acquaintances. In other words, they engage, but only with people within their comfort zones. Of course, there is nothing wrong with doing this. However, in my opinion, they miss out on making connections with a world full of potential friendships, collaborations and possible business opportunities.

In my own experience, I discovered how much I enjoy making connections with people from all over the world. I often compare my casual social media interactions to cocktail parties. In an article I wrote last year for Doina Oncel, one of my “virtual” friends, I touch upon how easy it is for anyone to get involved in social media. Making connections with people from a variety of experiences and niches can be a life-enriching experience. When you are willing and open to taking chances – and stepping outside your social comfort zone – you may find opportunities you never knew existed.

So, are you ready to dip your toe into the social media waters – or dive in headfirst? These are a couple of ideas to get you started.

Making connections through online chats

One of the quickest ways I know of for making connections is by participating in Twitter chats. Hundreds of chats take place on Twitter every week and the variety of topics seems to offer something for everyone. [Click on this link to see a current list: Twitter Chat Schedule]. When you participate regularly and relevantly in the conversations, you begin to feel a camaraderie with other chatters, and most are open to connecting. The best part? If you lose interest or become offended by particular chat topics, you can easily bow out.

Another good place to meet and converse online is on LinkedIn. In Connecting 101: LinkedIn, I provide some best practices for making connections on LinkedIn, including the benefits of joining LinkedIn groups. Closed groups often offer moderated chats with relevant topics for its members, but good discussions take place within open groups as well. Making connections on LinkedIn may be more complicated than on Twitter, depending on how open others are to accepting invitations. It never hurts to ask though.

Making connections through blogging

Blogging for your business involves a lot of time and effort, but the rewards make it worthwhile. Hubspot’s 2013 State of Inbound Marketing Annual Report provides promising statistics for businesses that blog:

1. 43% of marketers generated a customer from their blog this year.
2. 79% of companies who have a blog report a positive ROI for inbound marketing this year, compared with just 20% of those companies that do not have a blog.

Bloggers who focus on making connections usually experience increased visibility and exposure for their posts. Blogging communities, such as Triberr, bring groups of bloggers (known as “tribes”) together to share and offer feedback on blog posts. Just like Twitter chats, there are hundreds of tribes with people who blog about anything and everything. Triberr also gives you the opportunity to start your own tribe if you prefer.

Another effective way to increase readership for your blog is through contributing to other blogs and/or accepting guest blogs on your own site. If you have the time and opportunity, you may find it beneficial to publish blogs about different topics in which you also have knowledge. This is a great way of making connections outside your social comfort zone, as well as expanding your readership.

What are some of the ways you go about making connections outside your social comfort zone on social media? I would love to hear about them, or tweet me @jennghanford anytime!

 SOURCE

Resources:

Doina’s Infinite Solutions: How Social Media Brings Worlds Together

Search Mojo: Not Blogging Yet? 10 Statistics That Will Convince You to Start Blogging

16:30:00 - By Vincent 0