eSoup

Can Using A Bigger Monitor Increase Your Productivity?

  My Current Setup 
  Originally uploaded by lannadelarosa

The Wall Street Journal says a larger monitor can increase productivity by up to 52% (!) for certain tasks  according to a recent study. I'm not that surprised.

Last year when I bought my iMac, I decided to go for the biggie--a 24 inch monitor. My reasoning is that I am looking at the computer for much of the day 5 days a week, so why strain my eyes?

I never thought that having a bigger screen would affect my productivity, but the bigger screen is quite addictive.

I do a lot of work that combines emails and internet, and I can have my email open on one side of my screen and right beside it the website that I'm working on. And any other little screens I need (documents, spreadsheets, etc) I can have them open too, and my screen is big enough to accommodate the crowd.

How To Get Your Blog (or Yourself) Featured In Newspapers

  newspapers & flowers 
  Originally uploaded by ♥girlwithcamera {cris}

Within just a few months of starting eSoup back in 2006 I was fortunate enough to be featured in an article by Boston Globe career columnist Penelope Trunk, which ended up being published in The Boston Globe and syndicated in several other newspapers. Here’s how that media windfall came about:

Penelope and I came into contact with each other through our blogs– I had written a post responding to one of her posts and linked back to her, then she came to check out my blog, saw what I did for a living, thought it sounded like a cool job, and found a way to include me in one of her articles.

That article led to me being interviewed for this article by Emily Shartin, which led to a few other interviews, the most recent of which came out just a couple weeks ago.

My first media blitz was the result of being in the right place at the right time (plus having a blog that established me as a credible resource). The other times the journalist contacted me either through being referred or through finding a relevant post on my blog while doing internet research for a story.

As someone who just started blogging a couple years ago (and before that I didn't even know what a blog was!), I am astounded at how having a blog has made it really easy to reach journalists without even trying.

Actually when you look at the numbers, it's shouldn't be that hard to believe--over 75% of journalists refer to blogs when doing research for stories.

I really think that if you have a blog and if you write on timely topics, it's just a matter of time before a journalist calls you up or emails you asking for your expert opinion.

How can you get ready? How can you inspire journalist to want to talk to you? How do you give a good interview?

If I could give just a few pieces of advice for getting mentioned in mainstream print, they would be:

Is Anyone Doing TV Turnoff Week?

  Dinner on the Porch 
  Originally uploaded by shinyrobot

If you are, please let us know how things are going.

Each year I do this my reaction never ceases to amaze me. The first day I'm thinking "Do I really need to do this? I don't watch that much TV."

But I do it anyway, just because I like to deprive myself sometimes ;-) and several times during the first couple days I find myself automatically planning some of my daily activities around favorite TV shows.

But then I catch myself.

When TV is taken out of the equation it's amazing how much time opens up, even when you think you don't really watch that much TV to begin with. You start to notice that the birds chirp throughout the day, not just in the morning. You dig out that old "books on tape" set that you started a while ago and never finished. You sit outside to eat dinner on the patio. You think "I might as well mow the lawn" (and it isn't even the weekend!).

The biggest difference I'm noticing is that there is a calmness to these days. It's like your brain has room to roam and spread out. I've also gotten much more work done, because for some reason as I've ruled out television, I'm also naturally not doing as much online socializing stuff. There is an abundance of time now, and I'm filling it with things that I've been meaning to do for a while, and also fun stuff (like shopping), and chores too. The days just feel more productive, more calm, and more satisfying.

Ahh, now I remember how I ended up giving up TV for an entire year the first year I participated in TV Turnoff week! The feelings of calmness are almost addictive (in a good way).

If you forgot about TV turnoff week or if you just decided today that you'd like to do it, just go ahead and start tomorrow, and abstain for a week. (Shhh-I promise that I won't tell the TV turnoff people that you're doing at an off-time :-) )

How Artists Do The Web Differently

I know that most of us are on the web because this is where our work is, but for a lot of us there is an artistic element to our online aspirations that gets stifled when we follow the herd who tells us all the stuff we should be doing and worrying about technology-wise.

This is why Robert Bruce turned me upside down (in a good way) with his guest post on Problogger called 27 Thoughts On Blogging For The Artist.

He doesn't pull any punches, and his points just made me think and acknowledge--are my activities/ways of approaching the internet leading me closer to or away from what it means to be an artist?

My faves of Robert's thoughts on Art and the Web:

6. If you’re spending more time on Twitter than on your novel/painting/film/poem/play/sculpture, you’re dead.

7. The creation of great art has nothing to do with Community.

9. If you’re the real thing, you’ll be around in 30 years, still working. Most of these services and sites you now admire will not.

13. Aim for Greatness, not the front page of Digg.

15. Though tempting, you’ll never crush your own mediocrity working only four hours a week.

What Is The Biggest Way People Waste Time Without Realizing It?

  Wasting Time (Papiroflexia Time) 
  Originally uploaded by eℓ_rapsoda_mut

I just bumped into an excellent post over at Productivity 501 that asked this very question with answers from some of the most organized people on the planet.

The biggest time wasters they mentioned that really hit home with me were:

Watching TV. Y'all know how I feel about this. I go back and forth myself--sometimes I'll forsake TV completely for a year and other times I'll catch myself spending an entire Saturday (it seems) watching HGTV. (HGTV and the Food Channel are my Kryptonite.) But I know for a fact that it's a waste of time, and that when I'm disciplined enough to not turn on the TV that I use my time much more creatively.

Not having a game plan for the day. This may be just me, but on the days that I wing it I can start out doing just one little thing for fun thing, and then an hour or so later I still haven't officially started doing my real work. I find that having a plan (1. do this first 2. do this second, etc.) helps me stay on track and not get distracted.

Procrastination. We do this without even noticing it sometimes, and the reason why we don't take notice of it is because what we're doing to procrastinate feels so much better than the option of actually doing what we need to do. All of us procrastinate from time to time, and one thing I've found that works for me is to do something, anything to get the ball rolling. I ask myself "What are the first steps I need to do to get this done?", and then I force myself to do the first step, and then the second, etc. If there's something I've been procrastinating on, I'll also get all hard core and force myself to do it first thing in the morning, so I'm not dreading it all day. Some folks call this "doing fear things first", and I've found that it's uber helpful at decreasing stress.

Thinking about unimportant things. I love this one, because it's something that I think a lot of us do that we don't even notice. Have you ever had an argument with someone in your head when an argument hasn't actually taken place in real life? Have you ever replayed vexing conversations with people you'll never see again? Most of us do this without realizing that we're taking up valuable moments of our life on things that don't really matter, and when we force ourselves to become more conscious of our thoughts we'll gain valuable time.

Being busy without really accomplishing anything. On the internet we have so many tempting avenues for busyness, and I admit that I fall prey to them too :-). Playing around of Facebook, IMing, Twittering, prolonged blog surfing, etc. I know that if I don't watch myself a whole day can be sucked up doing these busy, but unproductive tasks. This is where it really comes in handy to have a game plan for the day. I have made a deal with myself that if I get all my work done, then I can take an hour and do whatever I'd like online. But you know what? After my real work is done, the temptation to do all the distracting internet-y things fades away. Could it be that busyness is another form of procrastination? Hmmmm... :-)

And I'd like to add 2 more I've noticed:

Reuters Interview: Thou Shalt Unplug

I'd like to give a big thank you to Jill Serjeant, journalist for Reuters International Newswire, who interviewed me a few weeks ago and included me in her article about the new movement that is sweeping the tech world--the Secular Sabbath.

A little excerpt:

"Sharon Sarmiento knew it was time to unplug when she realized she was blogging in her dreams and hearing imaginary instant messages.    

For Ariel Meadow Stallings, it was the hours lost while surfing the Internet that left her feeling like she had been in a drunken blackout.

Both women are part of a new grass-roots movement in which tech geeks, Internet addicts, BlackBerry thumbers and compulsive IMers are deciding to wrest back control of their lives by daring to switch off -- if only for a day."

Read the rest of the article...

Getting Ready For TV Turnoff Week!

  TV-Turnoff 
  Originally uploaded by TijmenK

The remarkable thing about television is that it permits several million people to laugh at the same joke and still feel lonely. -T.S. Eliot

Books are the quietest and most constant of friends; they are the most accessible and wisest of counselors, and the most patient of teachers. -Charles W. Eliot  

I really didn't like TV-Turnoff Week except I did notice that my grades went up and I was in a good mood all week. -Drew Henderson, 2nd grade

It is that time of year again, folks--TV Turnoff week is next week April 21-27, and I challenge all of us to turn off the boob tube and find some other way to occupy our minds. I'm telling you--if you are used to watching TV every day, then this will be a healthy challenge for ya!

A few years ago I participated in my first TV Turnoff week, and found it so much harder than I was expecting. Apparently I was much more dependent on TV than I thought! But I knew that I was adding value to my life by spending less time watching TV, and I came up with a way to completely ween myself off TV for an entire year!

Here are some resources that will help you take on this challenge and ween yourself off of TV:

The saga of how I gave up TV for an entire year

10 ways to cope with going TV free

How To Get Started Reading More Books & What To Read When You Do

Everyone, let's get ready for next week. Is anyone else gonna do this? I'm telling you it may change your life--it changed mine!

HowTo Create A Work Schedule That Feels Like A Vacation

  Young spring love 
  Originally uploaded by mormoralice.

The NY Times has come out with a downer of an article siting a few web workers who died due to lifestyle related health complications.

It was implied that the desk potato lifestyle of these folks contributed to their premature demises, but I know of many, many, many virtual workers who have healthy, well-balanced  lifestyles that anyone would be jealous of.

Being healthy is something we are all challenged with, no matter what our jobs are, but we web workers are strategically positioned to create lifestyles that promote an extremely high quality of life. We can work the hours that we want to, we can arrange our day around what we enjoy most, and we are entirely in charge of how we organize our lives so that we have time for playing outdoors, spending quality time with family, and having diverse interests (outside of the computer).

Let's focus on the positive folks, and harken back to last year's Springtime Workday Remix. At this very time last year I told y'all about a seasonal change in schedule that I came up with that made it so that I felt like I was on a continuous vacation. Let's review:

Painless Social Networking For Newbies: Twitter 101

  twitter_03 
  Originally uploaded by netwalker100

I know, I know--there are too many "must-do" things online, too many social platforms that all your friends are waxing poetic about, and for those of us that are not tech heads, it can be more than a little overwhelming (and actually kind of intimidating).

You have no idea how much I've resisted all the "must-do" things that almost everyone is participating in, such as Facebook, Linked In, MySpace, Second Life, Digg, Reddit, Naymz, and about a hundred other social apps that most of us don't really feel like we have the time for and feel totally out of place doing.

I know, I'm with ya. But let me tell you something--if you are working online, if you are marketing online, you pretty much need to start getting involved in some aspect of online social networking. This is what the internet is about these days--community, meeting people, connecting in some informal way, almost effortlessly building friendships and connections with folks around the globe who you thought you'd never be lucky enough to meet.

I know it can be overwhelming to think about the sheer number of social networking outlets available, setting up accounts and profiles, adding friends, and wondering "what exactly am I supposed to be doing on this thing?"

I know because this is me too, but I've learned a very painless, easy way to dip your pinky toe into the social networking waters that your friends, competitors and colleagues are probably already knee-deep in. I promise, this won't hurt a bit--this is the big secret for us non-techy, non-MySpace-y types:

Tick-Tock: Six Figure Blogging starts in 5 days!

I just talked to Andy, and it's such a thrill because Andy and Darren have had such an amazing response to the preview call they did the other day for Six Figure Blogging. (I'm not surprised at all :-))

In case you're wondering what the dealio is on this course, this is an intensive 6 week course showing you step-by-step how you can turn your blog into a profitable business taught by two globally recognized blogging experts (Darren "ProBlogger" Rowse and Andy "Blogwild" Wibbels) . 

This class kicks off in exactly 5 days, so the clock is a tick'n. They don't do this course very often, so if you're the least bit interested, you should listen to the preview call they did a couple days ago and make a decision pronto. (If you go here and put your email in the box, a link to the preview call will be sent to you. You can also take a look at the syllabus)

Y'all, I've taken this course the first time around and it really changed the trajectory of my business. It makes an incredible difference to learn from the pros rather than to try to figure stuff out on your own. In fact, I've downloaded all the classes and still to this day I listen to them on my iPod!

Here's the nitty gritty, you get: