I’m writing this in response to Chris Brogan’s post  last week requesting people blog about how important story is in life.   He was giving away 100 copies of Don Miller’s book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years.

I’m about a week too late for the contest.  And I’m good with that, because I love reading Don Miller and it’s just a matter of time before I pick up this book anyway.

Story is important to everyone’s life.  Wait.  I take that back.  It’s not important, it is life.  Let me say that again. 

Story is life.

Everyone has a story.  Everyone is somewhere in the middle of their story right now.  Some are closer to the beginning and some are closer to the end.  Some are just getting to the good part.  While others feel that they have the best behind them. 

If you’re new to this site, the whole idea behind it is that life is art.  It’s lived and created and recreated every day.  And so is our story.  We can amend some of the past mistakes.  We can fix some of the trouble spots.  We can plan on what we’ll make of it today.  And tomorrow has yet to be written. 

Story is art.  Man has passed down stories for eons and will continue to do so.  And, eventually, people, hopefully your kids and grandkids, will hear your story. 

So what is it you want them to hear?  What story do you want them to read or listen to?  What’s the life story that you want history to know about you?

You should think about it, because it’ll be around for a while.  These days, everything is recorded somehow. 

I’ve been writing in a journal since my kids were born, so that someday they and their children and their children will know me better.  Know my story. 

And until I get it finished, I’m just going to keep writing.

I wonder what I’ll add to the story tomorrow.

I screwed up yesterday. 

I said I wanted to earn $50,000 from this blog by a year from now. 

That was totally lame.  Yeah, it’s way more money than I make now, but it’s still pretty lame.

So, I’ve changed my mind.  I’d like to earn $1000/day.

If you do the math, then that’s $365,000/year.  I think that sounds a little better.

Even better, I don’t know anyone who makes that kind of money. 

However, I’m not comparing to what others make because I want more than they have.  And I’m not trying to show that I’m better in some way. 

I want to do it simply because no one else is.  I’d like to earn that much only because no one I know does.  Because it would be unique to me.  And, it’s a huge goal, especially considering  that I make about 1/20th of that right now.

And, when there are fewer people trying to do the same thing, it leaves more room for you to actually achieve it.  If 5 million people play the lottery, then you have about a 1 in 5,000,000 chance in actually winning.  The odds are absolutely against you.  But, if you try to achieve a goal that you just decided on, like making $1000/day, then you automatically increase your chances because so few are competing with you, if any at all.

This is just one more reason to live the life that was meant for you.  If it’s a life meant for you, then you’re the only one who can live it.  And you’re the only one who would be able to succeed at it.  You’re the only one who can go after living the life you want and actually succeed at it.  If anyone else even tried, they’d fail miserably simply because they aren’t you.

So, why not go for for the life that was meant for you?  No one else is going to.

If I’m wanting to make my own life whatever I want it to be, then I need  some goals.  And I have to start today.  So, here are some things I’ve come up with:

• Earn $50, 000 from the blog within 1 year.  I’m currently paid less than $20,000/year,  so I want to be earning more than that. And I believe you should set your goals high. 
• Stay home with my kids.  This will allow me to watch them so we don’t need daycare.  Plus, this can happen once I’m earning more than $50,000.
• Write everyday, whether it’s for the blog or for a related project.
• Publish 3 free e-books within the year.
• Lose fat.
• Build muscle.  I’ll tell you how I do both of these later.
• Build a greenhouse this summer.
• Create at least 50 works of art of some kind or another. I’ve been doing this a lot lately, and I’m looking to expand.
• Read at least 1 book per week.  I already do this, but I want to make sure I continue doing it despite doing other things.
• Get off caffeine.
• Fix my neck. I’ve had pain for years, and it might be because of the caffeine. We’ll see.

That’s it for right now.  But I mostly want to concentrate on the site and continue building it and making it the best I can and make it as useful as possible. 

I’ll keep you updated on the goals and tell you how I get them accomplished.

Posting them gets it out there, too.  So I need your help in keeping me accountable. 

What are your goals for the next year? 

What can we do to help you accomplish them?

Before I do anything else today on the computer, I have to write. 

I’m in the middle of Seth Godin’s latest great book, Linchpin.  In it, he talks about beating the resistance.  The resistance is that thing that sidetracks you, distracts you, takes things from great to awful, tells you no, tells you you can’t. 

Well, the only way to beat the resistance is to do something.  Preferably something meaningful, but still, something.  And rather than get caught up in my email or Facebook or anything else that’s not really productive, I decided to write this. 

So take that, resistance.  I hate you and I hope you die.

I’m pretty sure this could save people thousands of hours and millions of headaches.  It could also make someone millions, or billions of dollars.

The Plan:

Create one central store for returns.

After the holidays, people are scrambling all over to take back gifts or exchange them. 

Help them stop running around and get it all done in one central location.

One location can work with all the stores in the area to offer credit to the people returning items.  The store could then be reimbursed by the stores they work with. 

People are happy to go to just one place and get it all done in one fell swoop. 

Stores will gain business from people if their potential customers know it works with the returns store because it makes life easier for the customer. 

The stores involved win, the ones who don’t lose.  Just one more reason for them to sign up. 

Ultimately, the customers win, and isn’t that what business is really supposed to be about?

At the end of everyone’s life they have an obituary.  It usually contains things like who their family is, where they’re from, where they went to school, what degrees they earned, and what they did for a living.

So, are those the things you want in your obituary? 

When people see that you have passed, will they notice something is missing?

When strangers hear or read about your passing, will they realize anything is different in the world?

Live your life in such a way that the normal obit. won’t do you justice.  Live a life that makes people take notice.  Not just when you’re gone, but while you’re here, too. 

It’s called life because it’s meant to be truly lived, not simply endured.

This is a new addition I’d like to have on Mondays. 

Mondays seem to suck for most people,  so I thought I’d try to make it a little more exciting. 

I’ll give you a million dollar idea every Monday.  Will every one of them produce a million bucks?  Not for me.  But maybe you’ll take one of these ideas and run with it. 

You might love one idea and hate another, but any idea could make someone a million dollars as long as the right person takes the idea.

So, here’s Million Dollar Monday #1:

• A search engine used to look for products only.  It would index the entire web, like all or most engines, and find the lowest price for that term.  The more specific someone is, of course, the better the search results.
• Let’s say you look for goats, it might turn up a site with a price for goats sold in Africa, and it could turn up the cheapest goat feed it can find.  However, if you look up goat feed, then it’ll turn up better results.  Or, searching a certain brand of goat feed, Goat Herders Best Goat Feed (TM pending, so be warned) would turn up the best result.
• The whole point would be to find the lowest price for whatever product you’re looking for.

How would you make it better?  Tell me in the comments.