books

3 Business Lessons I Learned from a 3000 Year Old Civilization

3 Business Lessons Learned from The Richest Man in Babylon

I recently finished listening to the audio of a book I had once read when I was very young called The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason. I can remember my father brining the book home and telling me to read it, even though I couldn’t have even been a teenager at the time, this was something my father would sometimes ask me to do because he is does not read well. English isn’t his first language and he barely graduated high school as it was, but I on the other hand, had been a very early reader and would sometimes read books or articles for my father and tell him about them. So, he gave me the book and told me to read it, so I did. I can’t say that I remember very much of any books I had read at the time quite as well as this one. The book is a guide to success that outlines basic principles for the building up of wealth and financial security, which you would think would have been boring for a child, but this book was not. It was told in a series of parables that I was surprised to find I still remembered more than a decade later. Listening to the audiobook reminded me of where much of my attitude towards money had come from, and that I had been employing the lessons of this book since the time I found my first job in high school. Although so much of the book was familiar with me and the stories hadn’t changed in all this time, my perspective on the book was something that I discovered was remarkably different and caused me to understand the story in a whole new light. On the surface, The Richest Man in Babylon is a book filled with financial advice, yet in my second experience of the book I found so much more depth in terms of business advice that I knew would be important for me to remember and apply to my own business. So, today I wanted to share with you the three business lessons I learned from the story of The Richest Man in Babylon, in the hopes that this ancient wisdom is utilized even in our modern society!

1. There is no such thing as something for nothing

Getting something for nothing is a concept that has infatuated many people to their ruin. The truth of the matter is that there is no such thing as something for nothing, although it’s quite an attractive offer, it’s against the laws of nature for someone to suddenly receive something of great value for little to no effort or risk. Belief in this concept leads many to gamble away large sums of money or waste tremendous amounts of time scheming to come up with some quick buck business concept.  Although it may often seem, especially in this day and age, that people are striking it rich overnight with very little effort, in reality, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Our world may seem so transparent because of social media and modern conveniences, yet although we think we see much, we really see only a small portion of reality. The online business world is a perfect example of this, and although there is certainly much money to be made by a savvy business operating online, it’s not some get rich quick scenario. Ask anyone who has ever started a business online and they will tell you that so much work went into making their very first sale, and that after that things got harder, not easier! The business world is an uphill battle even when you are working with modern conveniences!

Fortune Favors the Bold

2. Luck comes to those who are ready and willing to act

I’ve said it before, I believe that we make our own luck, and that pertains to everything in life not just business. Yet, this concept of luck still tends to permeate our conversations and analysis of successful people and businesses. When we see someone doing well in their business, we tend to trivialize it. “They got lucky with the timing of their launch,” or “they got some good press because they know so and so, they are so lucky!” I’m not sure what it is about successful businesses that make people believe that luck had anything to do with it. There is no magical force governing which businesses will succeed and which will fail. We all have the same odds, the difference is that some people seize opportunity when they see it and are ready and able to strike when the iron is hot. Being ready for those “lucky” moments and being able to recognize them is the single greatest determining factor for success. If you’re sitting in your office focusing on your work and your business, you will never see the opportunities that may pass right by your door. You need to keep your feelers out there in the world, know what sorts of opportunities you are looking for and keep your plate just a little bit empty so that when a lucky opportunities arises, you have the time and resources to jump on it! Luck is really as simple as that!

3. There is nothing wrong with starting small

The third and final business lesson I learned while reading The Richest Man in Babylon is that when there is great risk and uncertain reward, there is nothing wrong with starting small. When it comes to business, I think people have some sort of preconception that you need to go big or go home, as though starting a large business has some greater chance of success and solvency than starting a small side business. The truth is, starting small is a great way to test a business. It gives you an opportunity to bring a product or service to market with the minimum viable product without having to spend a lot of time making things perfect. Once your business has begun, it’s much easier for a small business to grow than it is for a large business to downsize. Often a small business is better able to adapt and make instant changes to their offerings, which in the end, make their products more desirable because they are responding to immediate data rather than product development testing. Yes, it’s true than when you risk only a little bit, your reward will not be as great, but remember the two earlier lessons and understand that hard work and action are the two quickest paths to success and the type of business you create, whether it’s large or small, can’t escape that truth!

I hope these lessons resonated with you and that perhaps you learned something new from this old book based on even older truths. If you would like to check out the audiobook for The Richest Man in Babylon, feel free to use this link to get two free audiobooks when you sign up for a free Audible.com membership! If you have ever read this book, I’d love to hear what you thought of it and any other gems of wisdom you found particularly useful!

xoxo,

Alexis-Signature

What the Successful Know About Habits is Why You’re Not Achieving Your Potential

Control Your Habits, to Control the Outcomes of all that you do

If you remember my On My iPhone post from the end of March, you may already know that I have been listening to a very popular business book called The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg. I actually recently finished the book and I have to admit it was pretty eye opening to hear about the role our habits plan in our lives and specifically how this pertains to success. Not just success as in a vague representation of our lives, but in terms of how often we as individuals are able to achieve the things we set out to do. I know I’ve discussed before that people often comment to me that they believe I am a very focused and disciplined person, an observation that never fully made sense to me until I was exposed to this book. The book basically explained to me the key information about habits that successful people know and use to their advantage, including how my own habits were bringing me consistent success without me ever feeling like I was “working hard.” Since childhood I have been operating under a certain set of habits that were instilled in me as a child and basically have defined my work ethic ever since. So, the fact that I am constantly achieving my goals, while obvious to outsiders as being a result of disciplined action and focus, just felt like normal day to day life to me. Now, if you feel like you are someone who is not achieving their potential, guess what? I have good news for you! You can change your habits so that success is a habitual activity for your. You just need to understand what successful people know about habits, something I fully realized while reading this book, and am going to share with you today!

Successful People Know that Our Lives are Ruled by Habits

You may think that you have control over your life, but when you boil down your days everything comes down to your habits. Humans are creatures of habit that rely on a sense of regularity to their lives in order to survive, but successful people are able to leverage knowledge of their habits and use these instinctive procedures to make them better at what they do. You can argue against this point if you want, but just accepting the fact that habits play a major role in our lives will make changing them to your own benefit that much easier. Everything from our work, sleep, social relationships, and diet are based on our habits and unfortunately, habits are a hard thing to break. If you have ever tried to quit smoking or implement a new diet or excursive regime, you know first hand that it’s hard to change habits because they are part of an overall routine. When you just try to start or stop a habit cold-turkey, you fail because the overall routine kicks in, resets itself and brings you back to your old habits fast, but when you swap one habit for another strategically, you find that success is achievable!

Successful People Know that You Achieve More when You Don’t have to Think

Remember back to grade school when you were learning math and the teacher taught you how to add and subtract. But it wasn’t enough that the teacher would teach you HOW to perform addition and subtraction, they always went a step further and forced the whole class to remember lines of equations repeatedly. 1 + 1 = 2, 1 + 2 = 3, 1 + 3 = 4, etc and so on. Well, if we knew how to add and subtract, why did we need to basically memorize addition tables? Wasn’t it enough that we knew how to add, so that if we were faced with the situation of having to add 1 + 1, we could figure out how to get to 2? Well the answer is no, it’s not enough, and the reason is because it’s always easier, quicker, and more efficent to know information or to perform an activity when the outcome is a knee jerk reaction as opposed to having to think. Thinking requires effort, it’s a process in and of itself, so when it comes down to having to complete an action, it’s actually more efficient when you know what to do, as opposed to having to think about what to do. When you have to think, time is wasted, errors can occur and questions can even arise in your own mind of whether or not you are correct. When things are an automatic response, its much simpler and smoother of a process. This is why successful people have systems and routines in place that allow them to remove the burden of thought from their lives and work so that important tasks are habitual and therefore more efficient and accurate. Then they can reserve all that mental energy that they would have used on thinking and put it to good use working on solving problems and developing new sources of income!

We Are What We Repeatedly Do - Aristotle Quote

Successful People Know that You Are What You Repeatedly Do

Aristotle said it best “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” If all our actions in life boil down to our habits, then being a person who is aware of and in control of their habits is almost like a litmus test for success. If you can control your habits enough to achieve success once, you can do it again, and soon you can become a person who seemingly succeeds at all they do. Success and achievement are recipes, they are not the same for each and every person, but once you find the recipe to success in your own life, the sky is the limit for what you can achieve once you apply that knowledge and routine to other aspects of your life. This is actually the reason I purchased this book to begin with. As an online entrepreneur, I noticed that other successful entrepreneurs had many of the same habits and once I started seeing the pattern, I knew I needed to learn more about how to control my habits so that I was achieving at a higher level! If you look around and notice that all the people you look up to seem to have habits and routines in place that you are currently lacking, it may be time for you to change your habits as well!

Overall, I think that The Power of Habit was a great business book, and I’m certainly glad I purchased it! I will say, it was a very fun book to listen to on tape as I did, via Audible.com and I would suggest for other entrepreneurs or anyone else who categorizes themselves as a life long learner, that you sign up for an Audible membership because you are seriously able to devour more books and knowledge this way! I’m not sponsored by Audible or anything, you guys know that when I find something I like, I love to share it with you all, and so far Audible has been an excellent tool for me that I plan to use to the fullest extent!

xoxo,

Alexis-Signature

On my iPhone {June 2014}

On-My-Iphone-June

On my iPhone is a new monthly feature on Strange & Charmed where I give you a peak into what I have been loving on my iPhone for the month! Covering topics like apps, games, podcasts, music, websites, books and more, I hope this series helps you all discover new and exciting content out there that can be enjoyed from your iPhone! To stay up to date with this series, make sure to follow the On my iPhone tag!

To kick off this new series, I have a bunch of wonderful content to share from my iPhone to yours! I have spent a lot of time this month focusing on inspiration for my business and consuming as much fresh, new content as I can!

Currently Playing, Lost Yeti: This adorable 32-bit puzzle game is all about helping your little Yeti friend navigate his way to a delicious frozen dessert while dodging obstacles like ice and enemies. I actually got this game for free from the Starbucks Pick of the Week in-store promotion cards, so if you are stopping by a Starbucks, take a look and see if you can grab this cute but casual game for free, or download it from the app store for $1.99!

Currently Reading, #GIRLBOSS: There has been a lot of hype about this book around the internet lately, so I decided to download the sample from the iBooks Store and see what it was all about. This frank, funny and admittedly vulgar memoir is a must read for any female online entrepreneurs and internet lovers alike. Although I download and read the sample on iBooks, I already went ahead and bought the hardcover of the book to own, if only for the awesomely empowering cover!

Currently Watching, Emma Approved: If you enjoyed the incredibly popular YouTube series, The Lizzie Bennett Diaries, you will love Emma Approved. Another timeless Austen tale told via the modern medium of internet and video, Emma Approved is a fashionable, technologically clever web series based off Emma, aka Clueless for those of you who are more familiar with film titles than paper ones! And if for some reason you missed Lizzie Bennett back in the fall when I told you to watch it, you seriously need to catch up on both of these series asap- seriously better than anything else on TV!

Currently Surfing, My Life as a Teacup: My good blogging buddy Kristin recently sat down for a Google Helpout session with me to help revamp her wonderful blog! Although Kristin has a lot going for her on her site currently, we were totally able to brainstorm some awesome new features and content for her site that is seriously going to bring so much more fun and whimsy to her corner of the internet. If you don’t already read Kristin’s awesome blog, I hereby give you permission to click out of this post and click onto her site, immediately! Oh, and if you have or are looking to start a blog but need some guidance from a blogging pro, head on over to my Empire Building coaching page and sign up today for one-to-one blog and business consulting with me! 

Currently Listening, The Lively Show: I have been following Jess Lively for a few years now and I have loved her new podcast “The Lively Show!” Although it’s geared towards female bloggers and online entrepreneurs, I think it’s an inspiring Podcast for any woman who is looking to bring meaning and “intention” in their life! If you are a reader of my blog, you will most definitely love this podcast, so go ahead and subscribe to it now and hear the stories behind some of your favorite, and soon to be favorite, bloggers and business owners!

I hope you all truly enjoyed this first installment of my On my iPhone series! It will be a monthly feature posted the final Tuesday of each month, so make sure to keep you eye out for it! Also, let me know in the comments what you have been loving, content wise, on your iPhone this month! I love new content, so keep your recommendations rolling in!

In Progress

In-Progress-June

I’m one of those people who starts reading more than one book at a time and then never seems to finish any. Lately, I have been “reading” a few books that just never seem to end because I can’t seem to focus enough on getting through them properly. Maybe its me, maybe its the book, but I don’t like when I don’t finish things, so I am making it my goal to get some of these in progress books off my book shelf by actually finishing them up!

Tell the Wolves I’m Home: A Novel by Carol Rifka Brunt

Amazon Synapsis

1987. There’s only one person who has ever truly understood fourteen-year-old June Elbus, and that’s her uncle, the renowned painter Finn Weiss. Shy at school and distant from her older sister, June can only be herself in Finn’s company; he is her godfather, confidant, and best friend. So when he dies, far too young, of a mysterious illness her mother can barely speak about, June’s world is turned upside down. But Finn’s death brings a surprise acquaintance into June’s life—someone who will help her to heal, and to question what she thinks she knows about Finn, her family, and even her own heart.

At Finn’s funeral, June notices a strange man lingering just beyond the crowd. A few days later, she receives a package in the mail. Inside is a beautiful teapot she recognizes from Finn’s apartment, and a note from Toby, the stranger, asking for an opportunity to meet. As the two begin to spend time together, June realizes she’s not the only one who misses Finn, and if she can bring herself to trust this unexpected friend, he just might be the one she needs the most.

An emotionally charged coming-of-age novel, Tell the Wolves I’m Home is a tender story of love lost and found, an unforgettable portrait of the way compassion can make us whole again.

Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me (And Other Concerns) by Mindy Kaling

Amazon Synapsis

Mindy Kaling has lived many lives: the obedient child of immigrant professionals, a timid chubster afraid of her own bike, a Ben Affleck–impersonating Off-Broadway performer and playwright, and, finally, a comedy writer and actress prone to starting fights with her friends and coworkers with the sentence “Can I just say one last thing about this, and then I swear I’ll shut up about it?”

Perhaps you want to know what Mindy thinks makes a great best friend (someone who will fill your prescription in the middle of the night), or what makes a great guy (one who is aware of all elderly people in any room at any time and acts accordingly), or what is the perfect amount of fame (so famous you can never get convicted of murder in a court of law), or how to maintain a trim figure (you will not find that information in these pages). If so, you’ve come to the right book, mostly!

In Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?, Mindy invites readers on a tour of her life and her unscientific observations on romance, friendship, and Hollywood, with several conveniently placed stopping points for you to run errands and make phone calls. Mindy Kaling really is just a Girl Next Door—not so much literally anywhere in the continental United States, but definitely if you live in India or Sri Lanka.

The Paris Wife: A Novel by Paula McLain

Amazon Synapsis

Chicago, 1920: Hadley Richardson is a quiet twenty-eight-year-old who has all but given up on love and happiness—until she meets Ernest Hemingway. Following a whirlwind courtship and wedding, the pair set sail for Paris, where they become the golden couple in a lively and volatile group—the fabled “Lost Generation”—that includes Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound, and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Though deeply in love, the Hemingways are ill prepared for the hard-drinking, fast-living, and free-loving life of Jazz Age Paris. As Ernest struggles to find the voice that will earn him a place in history and pours himself into the novel that will become The Sun Also Rises, Hadley strives to hold on to her sense of self as her roles as wife, friend, and muse become more challenging. Eventually they find themselves facing the ultimate crisis of their marriage—a deception that will lead to the unraveling of everything they’ve fought so hard for.

A heartbreaking portrayal of love and torn loyalty, The Paris Wife is all the more poignant because we know that, in the end, Hemingway wrote that he would rather have died than fallen in love with anyone but Hadley.

Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook: How to Tell Your Story in a Noisy Social World by Gary Vaynerchuk

Amazon Synapsis

New York Times bestselling author and social media expert Gary Vaynerchuk shares hard-won advice on how to connect with customers and beat the competition. A mash-up of the best elements of Crush It! and The Thank You Economy with a fresh spin, Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook is a blueprint to social media marketing strategies that really works.

When managers and marketers outline their social media strategies, they plan for the “right hook”—their next sale or campaign that’s going to knock out the competition. Even companies committed to jabbing—patiently engaging with customers to build the relationships crucial to successful social media campaigns—want to land the punch that will take down their opponent or their customer’s resistance in one blow. Right hooks convert traffic to sales and easily show results. Except when they don’t.

Thanks to massive change and proliferation in social media platforms, the winning combination of jabs and right hooks is different now. Vaynerchuk shows that while communication is still key, context matters more than ever. It’s not just about developing high-quality content, but developing high-quality content perfectly adapted to specific social media platforms and mobile devices—content tailor-made for Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and Tumblr.

So, have you read any of these books yet? Let me know what you thought of these books and also let me know what’s on your In Progress list by leaving a comment below!

Oyster: The Dawn of Enlightenment 2.0?

Oyster-Dawn-of-Enlightenment-2.0

I have been following the progression of the internet’s soon to be newest obsession, OysterBooks.com, for quite some time now. In the vein of Netflix, Spotify and Audible, Oyster is a site/app that allows users to access thousands of ebooks through a monthly subscription based service that right now costs only $9.95. Not bad, right? For the cost of about one ebook, you can access a nearly unlimited supply of reading material that the site boasts includes over 200,000 titles and growing. To be quite honest, I have been wondering how a site like Oyster would fare in our modern digital age. How would a subscription service for full length written works manage in an internet age culture where we communicate through pictures and video, skim news headlines and have a collective attention span of five seconds? We’ve replaced solid magazine articles with short blog posts, and instruction manuals with a Pinterest board. I definitely knew Oyster was something that would come around eventually, we have subscription services for everything from games to movies to TV shows to music, not to mention the hundreds of subscription boxes for toys, clothing, food and grooming supplies, so why not books? But how many of us actually read books anymore, or at least enough to make a subscription worth the money? Initially, I think many people are going to think like I did that paying the price of a book per month is a little silly when we have library’s where you can borrow all these books and more for free, and that’s essentially what you are doing with the app, renting books. Of course, these are ebooks so its much more convenient for you to download a new book than to drive to the library to pick one up physically, and even libraries with ebook selections available online still have a significant barrier to entry and in most library systems only have a few “copies” of ebooks available for lending. This does not seem to be the case with Oyster. All you need is a credit card and an iOS device which gives Oyster a reasonably low barrier to entry. I get it, not everyone has an Apple product, but think about the number of iPods, iPhones and iPads out there in the world. That’s a potentially huge market to sample from, and if anyone were going to pay $10 a month for a book, it would be an iOS user who has been conditioned over the last 7+ years to pay for their content.

So, will Oyster do for books what Netflix did for movies and TV? Will Oyster bring the good news of the written word to our attention deficit population? I think the two platforms are actually incredibly similar when you think about where Netflix was 5 years ago in comparison to where Oyster is right now. Both were flying under the radar, both had a good selection of content although void of new releases or epic blockbusters and both had a reasonable price point. Of course, we all know what happened to Netflix, even I wrote about it, but in the end Netflix made it out of all their troubles and still dominates the at home streaming market, albeit with significantly more competition. I think we could see a pretty similar situation for Oyster in the next few months and early years until the brand Oyster becomes more of a household name.

Oyster-books

So the big question is, will you be signing up for Oyster? To help answer this question I have created something of a litmus test to decide if an Oyster subscription would work for you.

1. Do you read or begin to read at least one book a month at your leisure? 

This is important because if you are not currently a reader, signing up for a subscription service for ebooks certainly isn’t going to turn you into one.

2. Browsing the main pages of the Oyster site, can you find 3 books you would be interested in reading?

Although Oyster boasts 200,000 books and counting, they promote their most popular works on their main pages. If you don’t see things you want to read while skimming their site, you probably won’t find much else better once you have full access to their collection.

3. Are you the type of person who would cancel your subscription if you were not getting use out of it?

Oyster, like Netflix and other subscription services offers a one month free trial, but you still need to sign up with a credit card, which means if you are not pleased you need to cancel before your card is charged.

If you said NO to any of those three questions above, this subscription is probably not for you, unless you also said YES to question three. I’m all for giving things a try and taking a look around, especially when their is a free trial associated with it, so if you know you will stay on top of your trial and cancel before you begin getting charged, by all means, give the app a whirl if you’re curious! If you happen to be an avid reader, or at least someone who likes to pick up a new title or two every month, perhaps Oyster would be a good way for you to save some money and get a variety of leisure time reading material, so long as you are not addicted to new releases.

Okay, moment of truth, will you be signing up for Oyster? If you have already joined, let us know what you think about the service in the comments below. I would love to hear more from those who have joined and understand more of that experience!

The Basics of WordPress

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Some time ago, I stumbled upon the book WordPress for Beginners and ended up a purchasing a copy of the book as a reference for me as a new user to WordPress. After reading through the book, I thought I would discuss the pro’s and con’s to this book if you too are someone who is new to WordPress and wants to get a good understanding of the basics so that you can optimize your current WordPress website or create a new one!

What the book is about

The book really is a beginners guide to using WordPress. It gives the user all the information they need, along with step by step instructions, to set up a WordPress website from scratch without needing to know or use code. The book also helps the user learn the important steps to take when building a website, like buying a domain name and hosting, and how to choose those services. It dives into the basics of SEO and even how to design and customize your website.

Who this book is written for

This book is for anyone who would like to start a blog or website and knows they want to use WordPress. If you have never setup a WordPress website before, this book will walk you through each step necessary to get your site up and running and looking the way you want. Because this book has to do with building a website, I think that a certain amount of computer experience is necessary in order to use this book properly, and one should also know how to get themselves around their computer fairly well in order to make use of this book!

Limitations of the book

To be completely honest, most if not all of the information in this book can be found online through some simple web searches, so if you are someone who is confident in their ability to find information online for free, you may not want to spend your money on this book. That isn’t to say that this book is useless to anyone who could search for the information for themselves as it would probably save you time to just buy this book and read it, but if you don’t want to spend the money, you can find guides on using WordPress and creating a new site elsewhere.

This book also only focuses on the basics of starting a new website so if you are trying to convert your blog from an alternate hosting site like blogger to WordPress, this book isn’t going to help you with the steps necessary in that transition, but it will help you understand how to set your website up before you make that transition, and how to use the tools available in WordPress after you have transitioned.

Overall, this book is very bare bones basic about using WordPress, but gives you some good SEO tips, suggestions for naming your domain and other tricks that are good reference materials even for those of you who are a little more savvy and have some website know-how. If you are looking for a book that will tell you how to do everything in WordPress, this isn’t it, but its a good starter guide for someone who wants to start a blog but has no WordPress experience!

Click the image below to purchase this book directly from Amazon.com!

Finding Free Books

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Free books! I’m sure you’re thinking, you can get free books at the library! Yep, you can, but in case the library is not your thing, or you dislike late fees, there are a few alternatives for those of us who want to read without having to pay! Now, let me be very clear. I am not about to suggest ways in which brand new novels are going to be automatically delivered to your door for free, nor am I going to suggest some random internet scheme that requires you to sign up and accumulate points that will eventually in three years time result in a $5 Barnes & Nobel gift card! My commercial detox is really about finding ways to use what you already own and when your done with that or you need more, to find free and easy ways to access things via the internet or other popular resources. Of if reading isn’t your thing, how about free audio books? Does that tickle your fancy? Well, if it does, some of the below resources should help you find some literary entertainment without having to spend any money on retail paperbacks!

1. Clean out your bookshelf!

Okay, this is the only cheat suggestion I am going to make, I promise, but I bet that you have a book sitting someplace in your home that you purchased or acquired a while back but never got around to reading. I know my bookcase is filled with half-read novels and brand new books that I forgot about after all the hype died down about them! Well, if you’re looking for a free read, its right there. It may not be the exact novel you were hoping to read this week, but its yours, you already own it and it won’t cost you anything! Before even thinking about proceeding any further down this list, make sure you have a good sense of all the unread items you have reading and waiting for you right now, no additional effort required!

2. Free ebooks via your favorite reading app!

No matter which ereader you own or what app you use to get your books, there are tons of free books available for you right now as an instant download! Kindle, Nook, Kobo, iBooks all have a plethora of public domain titles that you can jump into right this very moment. They may not be the new best seller, but most of the books available are classics none the less that you should have read by now! You know, most modern authors refer back to old titles like The Odyssey or Moby Dick and even those old classics have references within them that come from even older novels. So, really, you’re missing out on a whole world created by classic literature that is referenced every day without you even realizing it. How’s that for reading between the lines?

3. Download free audio books!

No, you don’t need a trial subscription to audible.com to get a free audio book. Right now there are thousands upon thousands of free audio books ready and waiting for you to download them at sites like Archives.org. Did you know there are organizations around the world that are dedicated to bringing the written word to audio form? Sites like Librivox and Project Gutenberg rely on volunteers and even advanced computer programs to provide free downloads of all public domain titles! Archive.org doesn’t just cover audio books, but also free music, ebooks and other texts. It’s like an online library where you don’t need a card or ever have to worry about late fees! Best is, once you download an audio book or ebook, its yours and you can open it and listen it from a variety of devices or computers because they always use open source software!

Have these tips taught you something new about finding free books? Do you read free ebooks often? Which format do you prefer audio books, ebooks or traditional printed books? Let us know in the comments below!

Start Journaling with the Carpe Diem Journal

carpe diem journal

At various times in my life I have attempted journaling. Journaling is said to be a great relaxation technique that helps to release stress by giving you an outlet to express your emotions. Its also a great way to keep a certain clarity of mind if you are someone who often feels like you have too much information and too many thoughts just clogging up your brain! As often as I attempt to put my mind to journaling, I always find that I eventually just loose interest in it. Either I don’t think I have enough to write about or I feel so overwhelmed with options that I just can’t focus on a topic. Its like I need writing prompts to successfully and consistently journal.

That’s where the Carpe Diem Journal comes in! Not only is this journal inspiring to look at, it provides short writing prompts and dedicated space in which to write. It isn’t a daily journal per se, although you could certainly treat it as such, but its more like an occasional exercise in self exploration. Many of the prompts, like the cover of the journal suggests, pertain to outlining major and minor life goals. Seize the day is certainly the theme, as each page takes you on a short, unexpected adventure with your own thoughts. I have flipped through some of the pages, without spoiling all the fun for myself, and am excited to start filling it with my own ambitions and aspirations.

So, if you are like me and like the idea of journaling, but find it too cumbersome a challenge to take on daily, perhaps this little journal is a good place to start storing your short term and long term ideas and plans. Check out the Carpe Diem Journal and let me know in the comments below if you journal or have ever wanted to start journaling!

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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Tomorrow is the Summer Solstice, the official start of summer. Something about this time of year always makes me think about the Shakespearean play A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream. It is one of my favorite books, filled with Fairy’s, magic, and romance! Whenever I read it, I envision all the characters as though they have stepped out of a Pre-Raphaelite painting. Mermaids, Sprites, Amazonians, Fairy Lords and Ladies frolicking in an enchanted wood all while leading a bunch of quarreling lovers through a moonlit chase to find their true love! Yes, a little magic is needed to cure the love-sick hearts, but in the end each couple is reunited to their hearts content, with only the memory of a fading dream to explain their night.

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“Once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid on a dolphin’s back,
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath,
That the rude sea grew civil at her song;
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid’s music.”

– Oberon, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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“Come, now a roundel and a fairy song;
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence;
Some to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds,
Some war with rere-mice for their leathern wings,
To make my small elves coats, and some keep back
The clamorous owl that nightly hoots and wonders
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep;
Then to your offices and let me rest.”

-Titania, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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“But all the story of the night told over,
And their minds transfigur’d so together,
More witnesseth than fancy’s images,
And grows to something of great constancy,
But howsoever strange, and admirable.”

– Hippolyta, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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“The eye of man hath not heard,
the ear of man hath not seen,
man’s hand is not able to taste,
his tongue to conceive,
nor his heart to report,
what my dream was.”

-Bottom, A Midsummer Night’s Dream

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“If we shadows have offended,
Think but this, and all is mended,
That you have but slumber’d here
While these visions did appear.”

-Puck, A Midsummer Night’s Dream