I love to have Stanford’s Entrepreneurial Thought Leader Seminar podcast playing in the background while I’m writing blog posts, making plans for my business, or completing my weekly review.

Each podcast runs about an hour and features one well-known entrepreneur sharing stories of their personal successes and failures.

Some of my favorite speakers include Janice Fraser of Adaptive Path and Katie Rodan of ProActiv (see the 2006 Schedule for podcast links).

You can watch videos and listen to podcasts of these seminars at http://etl.stanford.edu/.

“Success is the best revenge.”

If you’re not using del.icio.us to keep you on top of your game, you’re missing out. Below, find my 22 most indispensable tags:

• boredomkiller – Sites to keep you busy when you just can’t bring yourself to do anything else. My favorites include the Where Did I Take This? Flickr Pool and Amazon’s Mechanical Turk.
• calendar – Event calendars that you check on occasion (i.e. the local symphony or theatre) that you can’t subscribe to via RSS. Go through this tag during your weekly or monthly review and update your other calendars accordingly.
• coupons – A repository for coupon sites like RetailMeNot, or specific coupons you come across in your email or while surfing. Review before making any purchases.
• firefoxextension – An easy reference for installing your favorite extensions if you need to reinstall Firefox or install a copy on a new machine.
• gift – Tag pages with gift ideas for others. (Just don’t tag any gifts you don’t want someone in your network to see!) Review for upcoming birthdays.
• howto – Tag instructions for projects you’d like to tackle at some point in the future, like How to Tie a Tie or How to Make an Invisible Bookshelf.
• journal – Read a thought-provoking question or prompt that you want to write about later, like Gretchen’s one sentence journal? Tag it here.
• keeptabs – For those websites or products that haven’t launched yet and you want to remember to visit in the future.
• idea-[?] – This is my favorite tag, and one I use all the time when I see something related to a project I’m working on (or want to work on in the future). For example, if I see an article with a blog-related tip I want to incorporate on Sufficient Thrust, I tag the page “idea-st.” If I want to save a link for a client, I’ll tag it with the company’s initials. This gives me a small bit of privacy (well, until now!) in a very public location.
• refresher – Motivational and inspirational writing that you want to read again when you’re feeling less-than-inspired. Some of my favorite refresher links include Ario’s Ignite Seattle talk on mortality and user experience and Craig Harper’s Fat by Choice.
• shopping – General shopping sites that you like (or think you would like) to browse, like Bamboosa or Artocracy. (Hint: Adding additional tags like “shoes” or “furniture” can help you narrow this category down further.)
• somedaymaybe – GTDers know the drill. Anything that you may or may not want to do at some point in the future, like “go skydiving” (with a link to a local skydiving service).
• tobuy – Items you want to buy, but can’t or don’t want to buy right away. Examples include: cosmetic recommendations, clothes, new speakers, etc. Include in your weekly review.
• todo – Anything you want to take care of in the near future, like recover space on your iPod or download TiddlyWiki. Process during your weekly review.
• toitune – Songs or artists you want to sample and potentially purchase. Maybe you heard them on the radio, or saw a list of tranquility songs on a blog post. Include in your weekly review.
• tolearn – Always wanted to know more about Austrian economics, Buddhism, or how to improve your memory? Tag it here and review periodically when you’re in the mood to learn something new.
• tolisten – Audio files you want to listen to later. This is especially useful when you’re at work for saving things you want to listen to at home. Include in your weekly review.
• toread – Any page you want to check out at a later date. This is a great place to store longer blog posts or site recommendations, and a great place to find items to print out and take with you for a wait at the doctor’s office or on the subway. Peruse at your convenience.
• toreadcomments – Forget subscribing to comments and potentially having to sort through a stack of irrelevant emails or feeds. Use this tag on posts you want to return to later to read responses. I use this all the time at sites like The Volokh Conspiracy.
• tosignup – Sites of interest that take more time to signup (and setup your profile) than you have at the moment, like Zaadz or Reality All-Starz. Include in your weekly review.
• towatch – Videos you want to watch later, from quick YouTube clips to full-length movies. This is especially useful when you’re at work for saving things you want to watch at home. Include in your weekly review.
• wordpressplugin – For easy reference, each time you install a WordPress plug-in, tag it in del.icio.us. If you decide to launch a new blog, or lose your old one, grabbing your favorite plug-ins will be a snap.

What tags am I missing? Feel free to share in the comments!

The main complaint I hear about getting organized, maintaining lists, etc. is that it’s so constricting. People feel like slaves to their To Do lists, chained to their project notebooks and their Crackberries.

I would argue that these people are not truly organized at all, for the goal of organization is the greatest goal there is: freedom.

What does freedom look like?

It’s tomorrow morning, and you’ve just woken up. You’re really craving a croissant from a sidewalk cafe — in Paris. Sixty minutes later, you’re in your car, on the way to the airport.

Your initial reaction this was probably: “Impossible! Only a rich person who didn’t work could do that.” But you’d be wrong. If they’re not organized, even a billionaire couldn’t make it out the door that fast. However, if they are truly organized, someone with just a small amount of money in the bank can be out the door within the hour, and more importantly, they’ll be able to enjoy an entirely stress-free trip.

Consider the aforementioned scenario through the eye of organization:

6:00AM - Your computer starts playing your favorite motivational song while displaying a random inspirational quotation on the screen. This encourages you to jump right out of bed and conquer the day. Of course, since you got to bed at a reasonable time last night, and since you’ve been exercising regularly and eating very healthy, you were wide-awake, anyway.

6:02AM - As you sip the coffee that your timed coffee pot just finished brewing, you decide you want a real Parisian croissant.

6:04AM - You pop open Google Calendar and check your obligations for the week. You see that Aunt Bertha is coming to town Friday night at 6pm.

6:05AM - You pop open del.icio.us and click your “travel +compare” tag, which pulls up the three best travel comparison sites. You search for roundtrip tickets to Paris, along with a rental car and a hotel. Each travel site already has your preferences, frequent flyer numbers, and credit card number saved. While those pages load, you click your “travel + coupons” tag and find the coupon for $100 off an international fight you received in an email last Wednesday. You also click your “paris” tag and remember that you’ve been meaning to visit the Rodin Museum ever since you saw Frank Wildhorn’s “Camille Claudel” musical.

6:08AM - You find and book a round-trip flight that leaves in three hours, and returns Friday morning, leaving you ample time to unpack and pick up Aunt Bertha at the airport. You check the weather in Paris and see it’s going to be chilly enough for a light jacket.

6:10AM - You hop in the shower and run through your AM scaffold. As you complete each step in your hygiene routine (brush teeth, moisturize, etc.), you put the necessary items in your travel bag, which sits at the ready under the sink. It already contains travel-sized samples of most necessities, like shampoo, toothpaste, and shaving cream, along with a small comb and a spare manual toothbrush (so you can leave your Sonicare at home).

6:40AM - You’ll be gone for three days and three nights, so you grab three of each type of clothing. Since your color-coded wardrobe only contains clean, in-season clothes that fit you well, and since your regular exercise habit means you don’t have to try anything on to make sure it fits, packing is effortless.

6:43AM - You check your tickler files for the next few days. It’s your cousin John’s birthday on Saturday, so you’d planned to drop his card in the mail on Thursday. You decide you’d rather it arrive early rather than late, so you put it on your suitcase to remember to drop it in the mail on the way out to your car. (It was already filled out, addressed, and stamped.) Your electric bill is due on Wednesday, but that’s on auto bill-pay — no problem.

6:45AM - You activate your “travel” Gmail filter that forwards email from your main two clients to your Blackberry world phone, and set an autoresponder on your personal account notifying your friends that you’re in Paris and will respond to email when you get back. You update your Facebook status for good measure.

6:47AM - You check your trusty “Travel Checklist.” It reminds you to make sure you have no liquids in your carry-on (a quick rummage through your bag reveals a bottle of sunscreen, which you leave out); to bring a snack (you grab a few pre-measured bags of oat bran from the pantry); and to get your passport (which you quickly grab from your fireproof box). You text your best friend, who has your spare apartment key, and let him know you’ll be gone, and change your personal voicemail message to let callers know you’re out of the country.

6:53AM - You leave a voicemail for your boss, faking a stuffy nose.

6:55AM - You grab a stack of magazines from your “Read/Review” pile, so you can throw them out as you read them and won’t have to lug already-consumed material back home, and your iPod.

6:56AM - You leave for the airport — early.

Let’s not forget the things you didn’t even have to think about:

- Your will and power of attorney paperwork is in order, in case you eat a bad croissant;
- Your wallet has everything you need in it, and nothing more;
- Your car has a full tank, so you don’t need to stop on the way to the airport;
- Your iPod is synced with the latest music, movies, podcasts, and audiobooks, so you can learn on-the-go;
- Your Moleskine is already in your bag, along with a handful of pens;
- Your finances are in good enough shape that you have the financial ability to afford this trip.

How “restrictive” do you think a strong organizational system is now?

Step 1: Look up the phone number for your cable television provider.

Step 2: Call and cancel your cable television service.

Wondering how to wake up in the morning on the right side of the bed? Starting your day with a laugh is a great way to set the tone for a positive, productive day.

What’s the best way to do that? Sign-up for one or more humorous RSS feeds and read them each morning.

My favorites:

• MisJott
• Cute Overload
• I CAN HAS CHEEZBURGER?
• Overheard in New York
• Clientcopia
• XKCD - Webcomic of Romance, Sarcasm, Math, and Language

Tynan over at “Better Than Your Boyfriend” shares the secret to leading an interesting life: it’s all in how you spend your time.

How to Have an Interesting Life

“Good things come to those who wait, but only those things left behind by those who hustle.”

–Abraham Lincoln

Still waiting for iTunes to add a “Wish List” feature?

I learned recently that you already can. Simply create a new playlist, title it “Wish List,” and drag songs you want to purchase from the iTunes Store into the playlist.

Voila!

Take a moment to consider those people you consider admirable — whether they be close friends or long-dead war heroes. Which of their traits do you most admire? Their tenacity? Courage in the face of adversity? Self-discipline?

Do you think anyone else admires you for those very same traits? Wouldn’t you like to be known for them, too?

Why aren’t you?

The fact of the matter is, you can become anyone you want to become and develop in yourself any trait you admire in another person, if you put your mind to it. It is one of my most fervently held beliefs that the key to making the world a better place is to start inside each individual — because if we are each embodying our beliefs, living what we believe, and pursuing our dreams, it would generate such passion as to be an unstoppably positive force.