15 Things Highly Confident People Don’t Do

Highly confident people believe in their ability to achieve. If you don’t believe in yourself, why should anyone else put their faith in you? To walk with swagger and improve your self-confidence, watch out for these fifteen things highly confident people don’t do.

1. THEY DON’T MAKE EXCUSES.

Highly confident people take ownership of their thoughts and actions. They don’t blame the traffic for being tardy at work; they were late. They don’t excuse their short-comings with excuses like “I don’t have the time” or “I’m just not good enough”; they make the time and they keep on improving until they are good enough.

2. THEY DON’T AVOID DOING THE SCARY THING.

Highly confident people don’t let fear dominate their lives. They know that the things they are afraid of doing are often the very same things that they need to do in order to evolve into the person they are meant to be.

3. THEY DON’T LIVE IN A BUBBLE OF COMFORT.

Highly confident people avoid the comfort zone, because they know this is a place where dreams die. They actively pursue a feeling of discomfort, because they know stretching themselves is mandatory for their success.

4. THEY DON’T PUT THINGS OFF UNTIL NEXT WEEK.

Highly confident people know that a good plan executed today is better than a great plan executed someday. They don’t wait for the “right time” or the “right circumstances”, because they know these reactions are based on a fear of change. They take action here, now, today – because that’s where progress happens.

5. THEY DON’T OBSESS OVER THE OPINIONS OF OTHERS.

Highly confident people don’t get caught up in negative feedback. While they do care about the well-being of others and aim to make a positive impact in the world, they don’t get caught up in negative opinions that they can’t do anything about. They know that their true friends will accept them as they are, and they don’t concern themselves with the rest.

6. THEY DON’T JUDGE PEOPLE.

Highly confident people have no tolerance for unnecessary, self-inflicted drama. They don’t feel the need to insult friends behind their backs, participate in gossip about fellow co-workers or lash out at folks with different opinions. They are so comfortable in who they are that they feel no need to look down on other people.

7. THEY DON’T LET LACK OF RESOURCES STOP THEM.

Highly confident people can make use of whatever resources they have, no matter how big or small. They know that all things are possible with creativity and a refusal to quit. They don’t agonize over setbacks, but rather focus on finding a solution.

8. THEY DON’T MAKE COMPARISONS.

Highly confident people know that they are not competing with any other person. They compete with no other individual except the person they were yesterday. They know that every person is living a story so unique that drawing comparisons would be an absurd and simplistic exercise in futility.

9. THEY DON’T FIND JOY IN PEOPLE-PLEASING.

Highly confident people have no interest in pleasing every person they meet. They are aware that not all people get along, and that’s just how life works. They focus on the quality of their relationships, instead of the quantity of them.

10. THEY DON’T NEED CONSTANT REASSURANCE.

Highly confident people aren’t in need of hand-holding. They know that life isn’t fair and things won’t always go their way. While they can’t control every event in their life, they focus on their power to react in a positive way that moves them forward.

11. THEY DON’T AVOID LIFE’S INCONVENIENT TRUTHS.

Highly confident people confront life’s issues at the root before the disease can spread any farther. They know that problems left unaddressed have a way of multiplying as the days, weeks and months go by. They would rather have an uncomfortable conversation with their partner today than sweep an inconvenient truth under the rug, putting trust at risk.

12. THEY DON’T QUIT BECAUSE OF MINOR SET-BACKS.

Highly confident people get back up every time they fall down. They know that failure is an unavoidable part of the growth process. They are like a detective, searching for clues that reveal why this approach didn’t work. After modifying their plan, they try again (but better this time).

13. THEY DON’T REQUIRE ANYONE’S PERMISSION TO ACT.

Highly confident people take action without hesitation. Every day, they remind themselves, “If not me, who?”

14. THEY DON’T LIMIT THEMSELVES TO A SMALL TOOLBOX.

Highly confident people don’t limit themselves to Plan A. They make use of any and all weapons that are at their disposal, relentlessly testing the effectiveness of every approach, until they identify the strategies that offer the most results for the least cost in time and effort.

15. THEY DON’T BLINDLY ACCEPT WHAT THEY READ ON THE INTERNET AS “TRUTH” WITHOUT THINKING ABOUT IT.

Highly confident people don’t accept articles on the Internet as truth just because some author “said so”. They look at every how-to article from the lens of their unique perspective. They maintain a healthy skepticism, making use of any material that is relevant to their lives, and forgetting about the rest. While articles like this are a fun and interesting thought-exercise, highly confident people know that they are the only person with the power to decide what “confidence” means.

Top 5 Most Inspirational Business Movies Of All Time

Putting together the list for the top 5 most inspirational business movies of all time is a daunting task because there are so many funny videos like Horrible Bosses I wanted to put on the list, but that aren't very inspirational. 

Just want to put this out there that I don't endorse businesses like the ones in Wall Street or Boiler Room, the movies are great and a lot can be learned from them!

Here's my top 5 list:

1. Pursuit of Happyness. One of my favorite quotes comes from this movie during the scene when Chris Gardner and his son are playing basketball together: "Don't ever let somebody tell you that you can't do something...not even me. You got a dream, you gotta protect it. When people can't do something themselves, they'll tell you that you can't do it. You want something...go get it. Period."Pursuit of Happyness is one of Will Smith's best movies and is the epitome of the pursuit of the American Dream. It's also based on a true story. Why you should watch it: if you're in need of an inspirational pick me up this movie will get you motivated.
2. Wall Street. This might be the best example of what can happen when you get too greedy! Charlie Sheen plays as Bud Fox, a young stock broker willing to do whatever it takes to get to the top. Here's one of the best scenes from Wall Street. Why you should watch it: thinking about working in a really cutthroat industry? This movie might make you change your mind. 
3. Glengarry Glen Ross. Alec Baldwin stars in this movie about closing sales. I'm not sure if the term ABC (always be closing) was coined in this movie or not, but they sure talk about it a lot. In this scene from Glengarry Glen Ross, Blake (played by Alec Baldwin) is hired to come in and clean house at the sales office. Why you should watch it: when I first started working in sales, I was too nice. This movie will give you an idea of how to push the envelope a little more. 
4. Boiler Room. Here's one of the opening scenes in the movie. Boiler Room has quite the all start cast with Giovanni Ribisi, Vin Diesel, Ben Affleck, Scott Caan and  Nicky Catt to name a few. Seth Davis (played by Giovanni Ribisi) is a college dropout hired as stockbroker who quickly hops on the fast track to success in the finance world. Why you should watch it:getting salespeople motivated and excited about their job can be difficult sometimes. A lot can be learned from the excitement they create around "making the sale."
5. Pirates of Silicon Valley. Although somewhat dated, Pirates of Silicon Valley does a great job showing the beginning of the Bill Gates and Steve Jobs era. Here's a great clip, don't mind the 80's music! Why you should watch it: a lot of people don't know that Bill Gates didn't invent the operating system nor did he even really create it. Back in the day, people thought Jobs and Gates were crazy for even thinking that people would ever want to own a personal computer. 

What's on your list of most inspirational business movies of all time?

via jasondbay

9 Alternatives To Bitcoin You Probably Haven't Heard Of

Bitcoin’s recent meteoric rise in value to over $1,000 has shone the spotlight on alternative currencies, but bitcoin is not the only new digital currency vying for relevancy in 2013.

Like bitcoins most of these currencies are mined by computers solving hard mathematical problems. The "coins" do not exist physically, of course, as the currencies are virtual existing only as computer files.

As they are based on peer-to-peer protocols, no one computer controls the currencies, but networks keep track of all transactions made using these digital currencies, but they do not know what the coins were actually used for – just the ID of the computer "wallet" they move from and to.

Here are nine alternatives to think about before putting your time, effort and money into bitcoin.

Litecoin

Like bitcoin, litecoin is another crytography-based digital currency, which has also seen a dramatic rise in value in recent months. 

Litecoin, a peer-to-peer opensource digital currency, could be described as an offshoot of bitcoin. In fact, it is based on the bitcoin protocol, but instead of requiring extraordinary computing power to mine effectively, can be mined efficiently using standard computers due to its algorithm originally designed by Dr Colin Percival for the Tarsnap secure online backup service for Linux and other opensource operating systems.

Namecoin

Also based on bitcoin, namecoin is another opensource offshoot. A cryptocurrency, namecoin also acts as a decentralised DNS – the protocol on the internet that turns human-comprehensible website names such as theguardian.com into addresses understandable by machines. By acting as its own DNS, the currency operates outside the regular internet and therefore outside the governance of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (Icann).

The currency values and domain names are stored within the blockchain record, which limits the total number of namecoins to 21m, with each coin divisible down to eight decimal places.

Peercoin

Another variant of the bitcoin-like peer-to-peer currency principle, peercoin promises increased efficiency of mining, improved security and safeguards to avoid abuse by group mining, which has recently been highlighted as a potential flaw with bitcoin. 

Peercoin has the fourth-largest market cap among “altcoins” as these alternative digital currencies are known, according to CoinMarketCap.com, which tracks emerging and traded currencies.

Primecoin

A cryptocurrency like bitcoin, primecoin differs at its core because it uses a totally separate mathematical basis for mining. Instead of relying on bitcoin’s “Hashcash” algorithm, primecoin finds long Cunningham chains – a certain sequence of prime numbers named after the mathematician AJC Cunningham – to build value into the currency.

Unlike bitcoin, primecoin’s mining difficulty increases slightly with each new coin created, scaling more evenly than bitcoin’s bigger shift in mining difficulty every 2016 blocks.

Feathercoin

Based upon litecoin, feathercoin adjusts its mining difficulty more often than litecoin and was announced in April 2013. Unlike some other digital currencies, feathercoin updates regularly to incorporate new features and enhancements, including protections from abuse and forking by group mining.

Novacoin

Yet another peer-to-peer digital cryptocurrency, Novacoin differs from most of the other altcoins by integrating protection schemes within the core of the currency, which deters abuse by mining groups.

Novacoin also has a technical cap of 2bn coins, a much larger number than most of the other digital currencies which top out in the millions, rather than billions of coins. The cap could also be increased if it was ever reached, giving novacoin a theoretical dynamic inflation.

Infinitecoin

Announced in June 2013, as another litecoin spin-off, infinitecoin differs with more frequent difficulty adjustment rate during mining and the total number of coins that can be created, which is 1142.86 times as many as litecoin.

Megacoin

A bitcoin analogue in its infancy, created within the fourth quarter of 2013, megacoin is limited to 42m total coins and is mined like every other crytocurrency. Each coin worth around $0.50, and its main selling point is its overt branding, something quite a few other digital currencies lack.

Quark coin

Another altcoin in its infancy, launched in 2013, Quark coin takes the security elements of the cryptocurrency very seriously employing nine separate rounds of encryption using six different algorithms.

If those nine bitcoin alternatives weren’t enough for you, there are over 60 different altcoin currencies currently being traded at various exchanges like Cryptsy, including AndroidsTokens, AlphaCoin, AmericanCoin, AnonCoin, Argentum, AsicCoin, BBQCoin, BitCar, ByteCoin, BitGem, BottleCaps, CryptoBuck, CryptogenicBullion, CopperLark, Cosmoscoin, CHNCoin, ColossusCoin, CopperBars, CraftCoin, CasinoCoin ...

via businessinsider

Become More Positive With These 5 Tips

For me, changing my negative mental attitude to a positive one resulted in a completely different lifestyle, both personally and professionally. When I changed my mindset and increased my positivity, I went from multiple failed startups and a depressed state to starting a successful app business and being featured in Entrepreneur Magazine.

Here are five tips that have helped me release my negative mentality and become more positive:

Express gratitude. One of the easiest ways to increase your positivity is to express gratitude. Being thankful for what you currently have immediately releases any negativity that you might be holding onto. Gratitude instantly puts you in touch with the feeling of love. Where love resides, fear and all other negative emotions cannot.

The best and most effective way to implement gratitude in your life is to express it every morning. Upon waking up, express 10 things you are grateful for. This list can either be spoken out loud or within the confines of your mind, but they must be detailed and come from your heart. Closing your eyes can further help you feel gratitude.

Be a giver. Many times, negative feelings can be caused by focusing on the perceived negative aspects of your life. You can instantly shift this feeling by giving unconditionally to others.

Control your breath. It has been said that those who have the ability to control their breath have the ability to control their life. In many aspects, this statement is very true. Look back to a time when you lost control. What happened to your breathing pattern? In anger, your breath became short and quick. If you control your breath, you can understand and change your negative emotions.Share your skills with the people around you. If someone is looking for advice, help them out. Do not hesitate or doubt your value. Even the smallest of gestures or thoughts shared can cause a massive shift in another individual's perspective.

Either in a quiet space or during meditation, practice following your breathing. As you take a breath in (through your nose), feel the air enter your body and go deep into your lungs. As it hits the deepest part of your lungs, feel it slowly leave your body (through your mouth) and release any and all tension.

Visualize success. Tapping into your ability to visualize or imagine can be used as a powerful tool to become more positive. Many of the world's greatest minds, including Oprah Winfrey, Will Smith, Tiger Woods and Arnold Schwarzenegger, have been known to use the power of visualization to attract what they desire throughout life, so why aren't you?

Begin by closing your eyes. Think of a positive event that occurred in your past. In your mind's eye, see the event exactly as it happened. Place yourself within the event and feel the positive emotions as they occurred. When you open your eyes, allow yourself to stay in this positive state. The effects of visualization can be multiplied if meditation is practiced beforehand.

Meditate. Meditation is one of the most effective ways to increase your positivity. The practice of meditation expands awareness within the individual and allows for a clear connection between mind, body and soul. Through meditation, you can learn to release negative emotions that are holding you back and connect with your higher self.

Find a quiet and comfortable place to sit, lie down or do whatever feels right to you. Close your eyes, take a few deep breaths and allow yourself to relax. While breathing deeply, feel yourself letting go of all the emotions you are holding onto. With each breathe, let go a little more. As you let go, realize everything around you is made of love and allow yourself to live within this love.

If you implement these tactics and practice these techniques, you will be connected to the flow of life and you will find more "luck" than you ever have before

via entrepreneur

Thinking of Quitting? Remember, the Sun Will Rise.

I'm convinced that founders need to be absolutely crazy to start a company. It's not the long hours or instability that makes it tough, it's the soul-grinding lows that puts the founder in a constant existential crisis with no relief in sight.

If you ever find yourself in one of these low points, it helps to remember you are not alone. Ben Horowitz, who sold Opsware to HP for $1.6 billion, talks about "The Struggle." Elon Musk suffered through deep depression when Tesla, now worth about $20 billion, was near bankruptcy in 2008.

Victor Hugo put it best in Les Miserables: “Even the darkest night will end and the sun will rise.” As entrepreneurs, we set out on our journey with a certainty of darkness. It is how we manage ourselves during these downtimes that are critical to our success.

A few years ago I had a job as an innovations manager at an advertising agency. My days were spent trying out various "intrapreneurial" projects, while my nights were filled with personal entrepreneurial experiments. The project that I ended up settling on was a niche do-it-yourself blog targeted towards suburban housewives called DIY Weekender. We featured interesting home projects and craft ideas that you couldn't find on some of the larger DIY sites.

Once the site launched, it had little traffic for months. Here's how I pulled through the tough times:

Darkness sets in. Advertisers pay based on impressions (views of ads), so the low readership meant the site made no money. An unhappy advertiser canceled and the publishing software started giving me problems. I would lay awake at night fantasizing about shutting the website down. Everything was going wrong and the only thing that I could do was to focus on little things that I could control. Every day I made an effort to come up with a handful of new topics or ideas that I thought would boost traffic. The next day I tried the ideas and if they didn't work I rinsed and repeated.

Persevere through dawn. After a number of iterations, I saw dawn. The idea that worked involved using video to increase my advertising revenue per page view. When I researched existing video systems I couldn't find one that fit my needs, so I built my own. Shortly after, PK4 Media started licensing the technology from me and started making a killing by allowing their publishers to use it.

The sunrise is amazing and absolutely worth it. About 12 months from the launch of DIY Weekender, I received an offer to acquire the company, which included both the website and the video platform. I took the acquisition offer, left my day job and spent a month pursuing my dream of learning to fly airplanes before the earnout started.

During this downtime, I was able to reflect and found that I was fundamentally different. Not because of the sudden influx of material things, but because I saw that the world is created by people who walk through the darkness just like I had. Now I believe that anyone can do it if they choose to stick it out.

Many times when things get really dark, I remind myself that entrepreneurship is a journey that with each step you get closer to success. There will be many failures, but if you stick it out, the sun will always rise.

via entrepreneur

5 Essential Ingredients to Doing What You Love For a Living

When I decided to leave my own corporate job years ago to pursue the culinary arts, I couldn’t think much further than doing what I love on a daily basis: cooking. But it soon became clear to me that leaving the safety of one career to take up another is not quite that simple.

Doing something you love will make you work harder at it, but that alone doesn’t mean you have a good business. Hard work, ultimately, has to meet with the right opportunities, and that’s where entrepreneurial spirit can come in, allowingpassion to meet real business sense.

1. Treat goals like recipes. Remember to take it one step at a time.My own journey in the kitchen has taught me innumerable lessons that extend far beyond time and temperature. If you are looking to change yours, here are some tried and tested lessons I can share:

It’s easy to get mired in the day-to-day, and though you may be doing something you love broadly speaking, that doesn’t mean you will love it all the time. Segmenting my goals and having a clear vision has allowed me to stay calm and focused on the process. Keep your ultimate objectives in mind, but try to appreciate and not look past where you are today. I often remind myself that I'm always learning and getting a little closer to my dream.

2. Get to know the people who came before you.
When I changed careers, I studied star chefs like Jean-Georges and Thomas Keller as well as people with successful food and lifestyle brands like Martha Stewart and Giada de Laurentiis. I wanted to better understand the landscape as well as the successes and mistakes these guys had made. I never expected to take their exact path, but I did gain an understanding of what went into their level of achievement.

3. Always have something to offer.
I do a fair bit of traveling, learning from chefs and home cooks around the world. When I visit a new location, I like to shadow cooks in professional or home kitchens to learn their techniques and dishes. This has been a huge challenge as both a foreigner and a female. I usually start small, asking if I can watch service for the day. In exchange, I offer to prep and make something, whether that be the staff’s family meal or a recipe the chef may not know. Taking a little more time to build trust and having something to offer helps open people up more.

4. Seek help from those who do it better than you can.
Use your network and resources thoughtfully. If you don't have a skill, you likely know someone who does. For example, I wanted to photograph the recipes from my book myself but I wasn’t a pro food photographer. I bought a great camera, reached out to a talented photographer and friend who was willing to teach me and prepared myself for trial and error.

5. Prepare to be uncomfortable, both physically and mentally.
Some of the greatest lessons and most gratifying experiences have come from times when I wasn’t entirely comfortable with what I was doing. I'm not just talking about having to lift 80 pound vats of stock in some of the kitchens where I worked. When I signed on to write my first cookbook, I was pregnant and already working full-time. I had to write, cook, test and photograph the entire book. This idea terrified me. There were days when I was so exhausted it was hard to get off the couch. But the book is done and will be out this year.

It just goes to show: When you’re pushed, you push back. Rise to the occasion because success might be waiting around the corner for you.

via enterpreneur

The 4 Mantras of Successful Entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs who make it beyond their first few “lean and mean” years learn to let the rewards of freedom trump the anxiety of “what if I fail?” They acquire a devotion to the rhythm of riding their vision, unshackled from the slavery of following a conventional schedule.

In the past 30 plus years I have been an entrepreneur, I have been asked hundreds of times by new entrepreneurs and wannabes how to thrive, not just survive, in a “be your own boss” enterprise. I have studied those who win and fail with an eye toward learning the secrets of sustainable success.

But as my entrepreneurial father often said, “Running a successful business is a lot like losing weight; the principles are simple, but the practice is difficult.” Here are my four principles for being a successful entrepreneur. I call them mantras because they bear repeating every single day.

Create a masterpiece daily. Since every day as an entrepreneur is a day you invent, make it a masterpiece. No one cared that Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel ceiling for four years in such an awkward position it permanently damaged his health. We simply marvel at the result. Likewise, no one cares about the depth of your inbox, the number of cold calls you made or how many meetings you attended. Only concrete results matter; tireless effort is just the stuff you do to get there. Masterpiece creators do not act as if they are passengers on some cruise ship transporting them to retirement. They assume responsibility for their own destiny, never hiding.

Be a joy carrier to those you serve. Successful entrepreneurs are joy carriers bringing a bold spirit to all they influence. They think positively, assume success, and work with a clear vision of what they want to be, not what just what they have to do. Spirit is not inherited, acquired or borrowed. One chooses spirit much like you choose to introduce yourself to a stranger. Those who opt for an upbeat, positive spirit are happier, healthier, and far more successful. Great entrepreneurs are bold and courageous and their spirit is contagious.

Assume complete accountability for results. Playing the blame game does not get you a “get out of jail free” card. Clients and customers are never moved by hand-ringing excuses nor made more confident by shifting the focus to the supplier who failed to deliver. Being late signals a lack of commitment, regardless of the reason. Being unprepared telegraphs you don’t care about your client or customer, despite the demons you tussled the day before. Winners show up ready to perform and are only interested in efforts that yield a path to achievement.

Be both a doer and marketer. Successful entrepreneurs are both driven and ardent promoters. This means they don’t just focus on their product, service or solution -- they also market their work. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods.” Ralph made no mention of a better mousetrap, and he clearly had no knowledge of the importance of effective promotion. Great works deserve a spotlight -- successful entrepreneurs ensure the focus that enables the marketplace to be influenced.

Being an entrepreneur can extract sweat and tears. It can yield bone-chilling fear and sleepless nights. Following these four mantras can help turn a challenge into adventure and toil into a labor of love. The rewards can extend way beyond a fat bank account or large net worth. They can provide a deep source of pride in making a difference and the sheer joy of creating a masterpiece.

5 Great Call-to-Action Film Quotes For Entrepreneurs

Great films tell stories and inspire us to become better people. There’s nothing more powerful than an inspiring movie that leaves you wanting to be your best and try a little harder tomorrow. While there are some truly motivating quotes from real people out there, there’s still wisdom to be shared through the words of great characters.

Here are the five best film quotes that will get you pumped up and ready to take action:

1. “Do or do not. There is no try. Only do.” -- Frank Oz as Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back

Yoda was kind of the Dalai Lama of the swamp. His wisdom and robes were a nod to his transcendent wisdom and Buddhist philosophies. It’s only a few words, but therein lays the simple truth of the matter: If you want to do it, do it. Give it your best. Give it your all. It’s that hard and it’s that easy.

2. "Don’t ever let somebody tell you you can’t do something. Not even me. You got a dream, you gotta protect it. People can’t do somethin’ themselves, they wanna tell you you can’t do it. If you want somethin’, go get it. Period.” Will Smith as Chris Gardner, The Pursuit Of Happyness

The entrepreneur’s path isn’t a simple one. It zigs and zags. It’s at times incredibly euphoric and then at other times, agonizingly crushing. You’ll make lots of sacrifices. You’ll have plenty of mistakes. Other people are always going to be there to tell you it’s a bad idea, or you can’t do it, and maybe that you shouldn’t even try. It’s up to you to surround yourself with people who believe in you, support you and ultimately to make the choice for yourself that you’re going to succeed.

3. "It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard everyone would do it. The hard is what makes it great." -- Tom Hanks as Jimmy Dugan, A League Of Their Own

The hard parts are truly what make the entrepreneur’s path great. The times you fall and get back up, you find incredible strength that will carry you through greater challenges. The struggles will groom you for problem-solving skills and equip you with natural “opportunity lenses” to reframe every obstacle you see. That’s why everyone isn’t an entrepreneur. This path takes a lot of work and self-discipline. It requires mountains of courage and the ability to believe that you’ve got this.

4. "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." -- Mathew Broderick as Ferris Bueller, Ferris Bueller's Day Off

Alright, so the path of entrepreneurship can be rocky -- but hey, have some fun! Life does move pretty fast so don’t only keep your nose on the grindstone, or you’ll miss the scenery. You won’t notice the beauty in each day, you might push right past the great love of your life or miss out on the chance to create a mighty friendship. Don’t let life pass you by, by living only for work. Love, family, experiences, travel and friendships are other key components of life, too.

5. “Live! Life is a banquet and most poor suckers are starving to death!” - Rosalind Russell as Mame Dennis, Auntie Mame 

Perhaps the most inspiring quote of all, this classic line from the 1958 film is a true call to action. The great part of being an entrepreneur is that it allows you to feast on the banquet of your life’s great adventures. Don’t starve -- fill up your plate with all the experiences of life. 

Steve Jobs' 13 Most Inspiring Quotes

"Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn't really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while."

"Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart."

"Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected."

"You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever."

"Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it."

"Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful … that’s what matters to me."

"I’m as proud of many of the things we haven’t done as the things we have done. Innovation is saying no to a thousand things."

"I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what’s next."

"Getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life."

"Quality is more important than quantity. One home run is much better than two doubles."

"When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: 'If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right.' It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: 'If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?'"

"I'm convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance."

"I want to put a ding in the universe."

via enterpreneur

The great virtue of lowering the gaze

اعوذبالله من الشيطان الرجيم
.سۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيم.
صلى الله عليه وآله وصحبه وسلم
Allah the Exalted has said:

“Say to the believing men that they should lower their gaze and guard their chastity; that will make for greater purity for them. Indeed Allah is well acquainted with all that they do.” [Al-Qur'an 24:30]

So Allah made purification and spiritual growth to be the outcome of lowering the gaze and guarding the private parts. It is for this reason that lowering one’s gaze from (seeing) the prohibited things necessarily leads to three benefits that carry tremendous value and are of great significance.

The First: experiencing the delight and sweetness of faith.

This delight and sweetness is far greater and more desirable that which might have been attained from the object that one lowered his gaze from for the sake of Allah. Indeed, ” … whosoever leaves something for the sake of Allah then Allah, the Mighty and Magnificent, will replace it with something better than it.”

The soul is a temptress and loves to look at beautiful forms and the eye is the guide of the heart. The heart commissions its guide to go and look to see what is there and when the eye informs it of a beautiful image it shudders out desire for it. Frequently such inter-relations tire and wear down both the heart and the eye as is said:

When you sent your eye as a guide

For your heart one day, the object of sight fatigued you

For you saw one over whom you had no power

Neither a portion or in totality, instead you had to be patient.

Therefore when the sight is prevented from looking and investigating, the heart finds relief from having to go through the arduous task of (vainly) seeking and desiring.

Whosoever lets his sight roam free will find that he is in a perpetual state of loss and anguish for sight gives birth to love (mahabbah) the starting point of which is the heart being devoted and dependent upon that which it beholds. This then intensifies to become fervent longing whereby the heart becomes totally dependent and devoted to the (object of its desire). Then this further intensifies and becomes infatuation which clings to the heart like the one seeking repayment of a debt clings firmly to the one who has to pay the debt. Then this intensifies and becomes passionate love (ishq) and this is a love that transgresses all bounds. Then this further intensifies and becomes crazed passion and this a love that encompasses every tiny part of the heart. Then this intensifies and becomes worshipful love .

Hence the heart begins to worship that which is not correct for it to worship and the reason behind all of this was an illegal glance. The heart is now bound in chains whereas before it used to be the master, it is now imprisoned whereas before it was free. It has been oppressed by the eye and it complains to it upon which the eye replies: I am your guide and messenger and it was you who sent me on this vain errand in the first place!

All that has been mentioned applies to the heart that has relinquished the love of Allah and being sincere to Him for indeed the heart must have an object of love that it devotes itself to. Therefore when the heart does not love Allah Alone and does not take Him as its God then it must worship something else.

Allah said concerning Yusuf as-Siddiq ‘alayhis salam:

“Thus (did We order) so that We might turn away from him all evil and indecent actions for he was one of Our sincere servants.” [Al-Qur'an 12:24]

It was because the wife of al-Aziz was a polytheist that (the passionate love) entered her heart despite her being married. It was because Yusuf ‘alayhis salam was sincere to Allah that he was saved from it despite his being a young man, unmarried and a servant.

The Second: the illumination of the heart, clear perception and penetrating insight.

Ibn Shuja’ al-Kirmani said, “Whosoever builds his outward form upon following the Sunnah, his internal form upon perpetual contemplation and awareness of Allah, he restrains his soul from following desires, he lowers his gaze from the forbidden things and he always eats the lawful things then his perception and insight shall never be wrong.”

Allah mentioned the people of Lut and what they were afflicted with and then He went on to say:

“Indeed in this are signs for the Mutawassimin.” [Al-Qur'an 15:75]

The Mutwassimin are those who have clear perception and penetrating insight, those who are secure from looking at the unlawful and performing indecent acts.

Allah said after mentioning the verse concerning lowering the gaze:

“Allah is the Light of the heavens and the earth.” [Al-Qur'an 24:35]

The reason behind this is that the reward is of the same type as the action. So whosoever lowers his gaze from the unlawful for the sake of Allah, the Mighty and Magnificent, He will replace it with something better than it of the same type. So just as the servant restrained the light of his eye from falling upon the unlawful, Allah blesses the light of his sight and heart thereby making him perceive what he would not have seen and understood had he not lowered his gaze.

This is a matter that the person can physically sense in himself for the heart is like a mirror and the base desires are like rust upon it. When the mirror is polished and cleaned of the rust then it will reflect the realities (haqa’iq) as they actually are. However if it remains rusty then it will not reflect properly and therefore its knowledge and speech will arise from conjecture and doubt.

The Third: the heart becoming strong, firm and courageous.

Allah will give it the might of aid for its strength just as He gave it the might of clear proofs for its light. Hence the heart shall combine both of these factors and as a result, Shaytan shall flee from it. It is mentioned in the narration, “Whosoever opposes his base desires, the Shaytan shall flee in terror from his shade.”
This is why the one who follows his base desires shall find in himself the ignominy of the soul, its being weak, feeble and contemptible. Indeed Allah places nobilty for the one who obeys Him and disgrace for the one who disobeys Him:

“So do not lose heart nor fall into despair; for you must gain mastery if you are true in faith.” [Al-Qur'an 3:139]

“If any do seek for nobilty and power then to Allah belongs all nobility and power.” [Al-Qur'an 35:10]

Meaning that whosoever seeks after disobedience and sin then Allah, the Mighty and Magnificent, will humiliate the one who disobeys Him.

Some of the salaf said, “The people seek nobilty and power at the door of the Kings and they will not find it except through the obedience of Allah.”

This is because the one who who obeys Allah has taken Allah as his friend and protector and Allah will never humiliate the one who takes his Lord as friend and patron. In the Du’a Qunut their occurs, “The one who You take as a friend is not humiliated and the one who You take as an enemy is not ennobled.”

Taken from Al-Muntaqaa min Ighathat ul-Lufhan fi Masayid ash-Shaytan [pp. 102-105] of Ibn al-Qayyim, summarised by Shaykh Ali Hasan

Here's How Much Money Big Tech Companies Make In Just One Second

e all know the major tech companies have a ton of money. But just how much money do these companies bring in everyday? How about every second? 

WorldPayZinc is a website that visualizes this data, showing how their profits grow over time. 

The above image shows how much they make in one second. In just ONE second, Apple makes $1,997, while Google makes $658. Facebook brings in $81.

This GIF shows how much they make in 8 seconds.

via business insider