The Millionaire Hippie

Results Oriented To Process – How To Focus On The Right Stuff

Post published:April 18, 2017
Reading time:8 mins read

From the time we are children, we are taught a mistruth. It’s such a mind-boggling lie, that I’m surprised society still deigns to teach little susceptible minds such a lie. I was taught this lie, as were you. It is the lie below.

The only thing that matters in all that we do is that we succeed. It doesn’t matter if we gave our level best, or that we enjoy doing said items. If we do not succeed, that item doesn’t matter.

Does this lie ring a bell? It isn’t the only lie that is spoon fed to us. And there are many others that are being fed to us. I think this lie is the worst of them all because it ruins all good things in our lives.

For example, I loved to write as a child. I loved creating new stories out of nothing but my imagination. I would sit down for hours with the children in my neighbourhood on cold pavements, and draughty stairwells, and awe them with horror stories, and fantasy stories. Worlds made up entirely out of nothing, but a few neurons beating to the same pulse in my head. It was miraculous. To me. Everyone else thought it was a waste of time.

You are a great writer, they said. But it will never make you any money. It will never change the world. It will never make you rich, and famous. It isn’t a useful skill in any regard. You should focus all of your efforts on something different, like the Sciences, or Maths – these will at least get you a great well-paying job. (more…)

What Is Your Definition Of Success?

Post published:April 11, 2017
Reading time:6 mins read

Society defines success in a weird manner. It is really f-ed up. Most people have this random goal in their head, that if achieved, would be the definition of success for them. So many of us believe that when or if we become millionaires, we will finally have that life that we dream of. One million dollars is that elusive and awesome goal that so many of us aspire to.

I had the same random goal placed in my head by society that I used to gauge how successful I was. It was really odd when one day I realized I could live my ideal life on much, much less. When I realized my ideal life costs about $5000 CAD a month, sometimes even less, that’s when my entire idea of success and what it means shifted.

My definition of success has shifted drastically over the past few years. Slowly but surely, I have realized that success means something entirely different to me, than it did ten years ago, or five years ago. My values shifted over time. Success has as well changed over time.

In my head, most people are chasing the wrong kind of success. They have been told so many times that success means a certain amount of money, whatever that amount might be. But once they reach that goal, they realize that they are still not satisfied, because that wasn’t what was truly important to them. Or they always feel dissatisfied because they are chasing a success goal that is completely opposite to their values. (more…)

Trust The Universe Will Work For You Perfectly

Post published:April 3, 2017
Reading time:6 mins read

One of my major failings as a human is that I don’t trust the universe enough. The good thing is that I am reminded constantly by forces all around me that the universe is kind, benevolent, and working in my favour 24/7. Why is this so important to remember? Because as entrepreneurs, we are understandably high achievers. We are also hard-aholics. We have this incessant desire or need to make everything harder than it needs to be.

Most times if we practiced the art of active non-doing (Wu Wei), most things would fall into place perfectly without us putting much effort into it. That is how we can achieve a lot by not doing a lot. It is absolutely one of the miracles of living in this awesome universe. But as humans, we want to put our foot into everything, unwanted, and unasked for.

Everything Starts With Trust/Faith/Belief

In this world we live in, everything begins with trust. When we are taking big leaps of faith all the time into the unknown abyss, they all begin with the utmost of trust in the universe. We believe or trust that the universe will take care of us, and will ensure that we get to our goals unfettered.

If we didn’t have that trust, or faith, or belief, whatever you want to call it, we would never take that first step into the unknown. We would flounder, and stand around waiting for something to happen. But we wouldn’t plunge into the abyss. (more…)

How To Realistically Write 3000 Words per Day

Post published:March 25, 2017
Reading time:16 mins read

I am 33 years old, and I have never been consistent with anything except writing. I have been writing hundreds of words every day since I was 12 years old. Most days it was just journaling. To write 3000 words every day seemed like an unachievable goal.

But recently, I have been realizing more and more that I want to write fiction not only to teach but to inspire, and entertain. I love to use my imagination to create all of these amazing worlds that are full of characters and situations that are only prevalent in my mind. It is my joy.

Over the past few months, I have started to become more vocal about the fact that I write so much. It has been such a part of my life that I never really thought much of it. Until some people started telling me that this isn’t normal. It isn’t normal to write 3000 words every day. Only a minor percentage of people are able to maintain the discipline to build consistency in their writing.

They asked me for my secret.

How am I able to write 3000 words every day?

I considered the question and I culled it down to the following ten fixations that are responsible for my productivity with writing. I wanted to share it with the world in the hopes that one or more of these will cause you to start writing more.

Building these rituals, or habits into my daily lifestyle and into my mindset has caused me to become a writing fiend.

Not only that, but I am not wasting hours and hours in Imposter Syndrome mentality, or worrying about the quality of my writing versus the writing geniuses.

(more…)

Meditation Kills All Of The Mind-Killers

Post published:March 17, 2017
Reading time:11 mins read

I started meditating a long time back, because I wanted to calm down my crazy mind. I had a lot of anxiety and I knew meditation would help me with that. Why did I choose meditation out of all of the other different things I could try? I mean, I could have started smoking weed, or taking Prozac, or exercising like a fiend, or eating a lot of sugars and carbs, or a hundred other things.

I guess, I was lucky. Or in the right place at the right time. I did a Yoga teacher Training in Toronto, because I inadvertently discovered Hot Yoga, and fell in love with it. Our main teacher for the teacher training was a meditation fanatic. She taught us a lot about it. We meditated a lot. In circles. Solitary. Facing each other. Facing outwards. It was an interesting experience.

Still it doesn’t explain why I started meditating regularly.

Well, this might sound hippy-dippy, but I realized the power of meditation, when I was sitting one day in the meditation pose, in a room with ten others, and I felt this ball of furious, white energy in my hands. It was powerful and white-hot. I felt like I could manipulate it and move it around. It was my first experience with manipulating and working with energy this way. It was quite fascinating.

I thought to myself, if I could have such an experience with just a few sessions of meditation, imagine what would happen if I did many many more sessions. I was hooked.

Imperfect Meditations

Of course, that experience wasn’t replicable every single time. Sometimes I meditated and it was quite powerful. Sometimes, I had a hard time keeping my monkey mind from bouncing around all over the place. Yet other times, I spent the whole meditation session thinking about food, all the food that I was going to eat after the session, or sex, all of the sexual fantasies that I was going to reenact after the session. It was definitely a challenge.

But I realized no matter how the individual experiences of meditation were, the overall effect of them on me was palpable. I could feel the changes happening inside of me. I was becoming someone different. I didn’t even look the same anymore. (more…)

Have You Heard Of The 1% Rule For Success?

Post published:March 15, 2017
Reading time:11 mins read

I love to learn, and I am constantly either reading a self-help book, or listening to an audiobook, or watching to a motivational video on YouTube. We are so lucky to be living in an age where there is so much free material available for us to consume. If you have an internet connection and a phone, you have access to hundreds of thousands of hours of free material online. Of course, this can lead to a bit of overwhelm, and perhaps distraction, where we spend our time watching cat videos instead of doing the work that is necessary to get us ahead.

But that is where the 1% rule for success comes in. It says, that you just need to be 1% better than the rest of the crowd in order to be more successful. It also says that you only have to improve by 1% every single day in order to be a successful person, more so than others.

Let me break it down for you.

Kaizen – Continuous Improvement Changes Lives

You’ve probably heard of this term called ‘Kaizen’ which is a Japanese term meaning improvement, one-time or continuous, large or small.

How does this apply to success and optimal living? Kaizen advocates that as long as we are improving ourselves every single day by a little bit (whatever that amount might be), we will be a 100 times better off than the crowd.

The problem with most people is that they aren’t improving themselves. They are actually back-sliding. In this world, where everything moves so fast, if you aren’t improving and learning and growing, you are actually moving backwards. That is where a lot of people are at. They aren’t improving themselves at all, by learning or growing. They might even be killing off precious brain cells by watching crappy TV for 7 hours a day (the national American average), and drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes, and doing drugs (prescription or not). (more…)

New To Online Business? 5 Things You Need To Know.

Post published:March 6, 2017
Reading time:6 mins read

I spend a lot of time chatting with individuals in coffee shops, and networking events. Most people when they hear that I’m running my online business, ask me a lot of similar questions. I used to answer these questions over and over again, until I realized, I should really write this guide down for people who are wondering about these questions, but don’t have me face-to-face to ask them.

What I want to say first is that it isn’t easy. It is simple, but as you know, simple doesn’t mean easy. Online business needs a lot of effort, time, energy, focus, determination, and will power. It will take your all and you still might not see any results for months or years. So you are in it for the long haul. If you are unwilling to do the work, then stop wasting my time and everyone else’s. Stop asking questions because you are not going to put them into effect. If you are willing to do the work, then bravo! I commend you for taking the step.

What Niche Should I Focus On?

This is one of the first and biggest blocks that people new to online business have. It’s usually the point at which people give up and give in. They fear that they don’t have THE niche that is going to make them millions of dollars. Let me say this about it. There are very niches that haven’t already been taken. So forget about finding a niche that doesn’t already have a lot of competition. The people who are going to care about you and your business will find you. Your vibe will attract your tribe. You have nothing to worry about on that end. (more…)

It’s The Process Of Doing That Teaches You How To Do

Post published:February 22, 2017
Reading time:8 mins read

I am writing a 1000 words of my novel every single day (this doesn’t include blog posts, journaling, and all of the other writing I do during the day). It is the one of the few non-negotiable things that I have to do every single day with my time. Even if I get nothing else done, and I get these words done, my day is a success. Based on the rate that I’m going, I’m going to be publishing a novel every 2.5 months.

Some people look at the rate I’m churning out novels, almost like a mass production line, and they scoff at it. These are the individuals who value perfectionism (and perhaps never putting anything out there), vs. shitty material that gets seen by the populace.

Whatever their quirks might be, I have started sending out the story below to individuals who think my method of writing a lot, and publishing novels at a rapid rate to be the wrong approach. (more…)

Why Does Following Your Dream Really Truly Matter?

Post published:February 20, 2017
Reading time:7 mins read

In Chiang Mai, I live in an apartment building with lots of senior citizens. There are lots of older people from all over the world who come to retire in Chiang Mai. They are living the good life of perpetual sunshine, good food, and ease in Chiang Mai. Guess what is the first thing all of them say to me?

‘You are so lucky you decided to travel when you are younger. We waited too long. I shouldn’t have waited until retirement to live this life. It was a mistake. I could have done this earlier and it would have been the same. Worried too much about money, I wasted way too much on accumulating wealth that wasn’t necessary.’

Following Dreams Matters

When I first heard those words, I didn’t think much of it. But I kept on hearing it not only from older people, but from everyone back home. They were in awe of my life. Jealous, they kept on telling me to keep on going. I took it as a sign from the universe. (more…)