I came back home from traveling the other day, and was able to spend time with family. Mainly my parents, but also some of my siblings and their spouses.

Talking more details especially with my parents, it felt good to see them. I’m making good money, I’m in good shape, I have a good amount of money in the bank, etc. And that much was obvious and I am proud of myself for where I’m at, but I also realize I could be at a higher level.

Right now, I would say I’m good. But I want to be great. To be in great shape. To be making great money. To have a great amount of money in the bank.

I know what I need to do, at least in theory, for each of these things. I really need to iterate on my existing schedules and get something consistently done. Just an ever so slightly 10% difference in some areas could get me the gains I am really looking for in each of these things (fitness, asset valuations, cash on hand, etc).

How to go from Good to Great

Or more importantly, how can I go from good to great? What are the optimizations that I need to follow to get there?

Here is a rough outline I am going to start this week, Monday July 3rd. The fact that it’s a holiday week makes it that much better.

First off, what needs to change?

  • Consistent Sleep:
    • 12am - 8am Monday to Sunday. I think sleeping the same time everyday will really make a difference.
  • Weed:
    • I have been casually smoking, but that is going to stop. My quit day is Monday July 17th. I will not smoke again until the fall for my birthday, well over 3 months. This will be a good break.
  • Lack of Schedule:
    • The kind of meta goal here. I already put my desired schedule in another post, but I will repeat it here too

Monday - Friday

  • Work 8 - 3
  • Gym + shake + shower + walk 330 - 6
  • Build Products 6 - 10
  • Dinner 10 - 11
  • Winddown 11 - 12am
  • Sleep 12am - 8am

Saturday

  • Build Products 8 - 4
  • Gym/shake/shower/walk 4 - 6
  • after 6pm, do whatever. keep working, go out, etc

Sunday

  • some mix of work, working out, errands, and resting. probably more depends on the day.

This is a great schedule to start.

I’ve tried giving myself very strict schedules before, and sometimes it has backfired (but it’s also worked before too).

Here what I am trying to do is giving myself structure, but leaving day-to-day activities to fill in the specifics.

I’m really excited for these modifications, and am looking forward to the coming week.

Going from Rich to Rich Rich

Given that above, there are so many stages to being rich.

My main goal, is having a networth of $100 million. But that huge goal needs to be broken down. And that goal, and the series of smaller sub-goals, can be achieved in many different ways.

Because of that, I’m breaking that big goal down into smaller goals.

I think the first goal, should be what can I do to generate an asset sale of $1,000,000 or more?

But another very similar goal to that can also be, how can I build a business that does $100k/month profit? and more specifically, what kind of business, with my skill set, can be built to generate $100k/month?

Because a 7/8 figure asset sale is nice, but having 6 figure month cashflow is also a very good kind of rich. And both of these accomplishes similar goals.

Building Your Ideal Persona

Alex Hormozi talks about building your ideal person for what you are trying to accomplish. These are things that can help me go from good to great. Thinking above about what I am currently good at, but how I want to be great, applying those concepts here are the things I think I need to learn to accomplish. I am listing these in order of importence for what I believe I need, and need to focus on.

  1. Product Management & Design: I believe this is the most important skill set I can have. As a solo dev and/or then once I become successful and am no longer solo (potentially), being able to design things well and then manage that design into a working product is the most valuable skill you can have in tech. I’m specifically saying tech here, because other fields would be different, and things here typically mean software.

Just like Hormozi says, product is the best form of advertising/customer acquisition and because my products are digital, learning how to effectively design things from idea into something right in front of me is a major skill that would unblock me on many different things.

Because of this, I am going to be focusing on UI/UX design skills in the next coming weeks.

  1. Marketing & SEO: Marketing is truly a super power. Once you can design products, and then build them, being able to conjure up demand for those digital products are what get you paid. Once you have a solid grasp of this sk

  2. Programming:

  3. Sales:

  4. Start-up Strategy, General Entrepreneurship:

  5. Project Management: I’m listing this last, because this is more of the minutiae of product management and software development as a whole. This involves learning your tools really well (Asana, Trello, notes, etc) and your workflow really well. A solid meta skill for sure, but I need other things done first before focusing on this one.

  1. Product Management & Design:

Coursera: Courses like “Product Management with Lean, Agile and System Design Thinking” and “User Experience Research and Design Specialization” are highly recommended. Udemy: Consider “Become a Product Manager | Learn the Skills & Get the Job” and “User Experience Design Essentials - Adobe XD UI UX Design.” Product School: Offers product management certification courses. While it’s a paid platform, the course quality is high.

  1. Programming:

freeCodeCamp: A great resource to learn coding for free with hands-on projects. Codecademy: Interactive platform that offers courses in various programming languages.

  1. Start-up Strategy & Entrepreneurship:

Y Combinator’s Startup School: A free online program for founders actively pursuing their own startup. MIT Open Courseware’s Entrepreneurship courses: Free access to a variety of entrepreneurship and business courses. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries: Essential reading for anyone interested in startups.

  1. Marketing & SEO:

Google Digital Garage: Free online marketing training to get the digital skills you need. Moz’s Beginner’s Guide to SEO: Free guide that gives you the fundamentals of SEO. HubSpot Academy: Offers free courses on inbound marketing, content marketing, email marketing, social media marketing, and more.

  1. Finance & Fundraising:

Khan Academy’s Finance and capital markets section: Offers a deep dive into economics and finance topics. Venture Deals Course by Kauffman Fellows and Techstars: A free, online course to learn about venture capital and fundraising.

  1. Project Management:

Asana Academy: Offers free courses on how to effectively manage and collaborate on projects. Trello’s resources: Guides and blog posts about project management and productivity.

  1. Sales:

HubSpot’s Sales Training & Certification: Free sales training course. Sandler Training’s How to Succeed Podcast: Offers tips and tricks for sales success.

Stay tuned.