30Hrs of No Coffee

I have been a coffee addict since college. Most of the time, I drink coffee so that I won't get to sleep for I have projects to do. Just like cigarettes, once you are hooked to it, it is so hard to take it out in your system of day to day living.

My coffee addiction is not good. I woke up 5 am and I take one cup. I don't care what kind of coffee and I don't care if they taste good or not. I just need that caffeine in my system to start my day. Then when I eat breakfast, I will have another cup. When I reached the school and before the bell rings, cafeteria first for my cup of coffee. Brings it inside the classroom and drinking it slowly till the class will end.

Soon it'll be the end of one semester. Left and right, projects are coming in. Doing this and that, until such time that I don't have a choice but to stay up till morning just to finish them all and I still have time to study. I need to maintain a grade because I wanted to be in the top 50 students in Business Management course. I did graduate in top 15 but the bad side of it, I am hooked to coffee. Taking in more than 8 cups a day. My sleeping hours starts from 2am till 8am. I am a certified addict.

Recently, I am so pressured at work and my stress level is high, I cling on to drinking coffee to make me calm. I was shivering and I don't know how to stop it. Definitely, drinking too much coffee in a day will soon make you end up in the hospital.

I survived 30hrs with no coffee intake. I am so happy. I want to make it to 48hrs.

Sticking to the Budget

The story starts from applying for a job. After a couple of job interviews, you're HIRED! Oooohhh, yeah. Enjoys your starting salary for you are a single, and since you are single, you spend like from left to right. You thought your salary is big enough for a single person. After a small chit chat with yourself, you told yourself that the 30th of the month is coming up so you will just borrow money from friends and pay them on pay day. Sounds perfect!

Tell me who among you are actually doing it because you deserve a high five? Some may tell me now, "I did that last month."

I know it's hard to do the new year's resolution of sticking to the budget and save. I know that this post is easier said than done. This happens to me too. So that's explains we are human.

In the past 4 months, I tried this simple ways to stick to my budget.

1. I don't do groceries. Whenever my friend would go to the grocery store, I list down what I need and then put a price at the right corner, add them all and just give him the money. If ever the money is not enough, I told him not to buy the last item at the bottom. First on the list are always the priority for I need those items.

2. I sold my car long time ago and I learn to appreciate riding public utility vehicles. It saves a lot of money.

3. Bring your own food for lunch. Or if you eat out, learn to eat veggies and fruits only. No rice please.

4. Don't watch TV commercials.

5. Don't go for window shopping or even go to the malls to eat.

6. Treat yourself on pay day. Only buy those what you really need.

7. Love yourself. It is for your own good.

I will not tell you I was 100% obedient to this cycle but if you will take a look at my bank statement, I guess I was because I see the big difference now.

One last tip, don't make your bank statement fool you. This time you have to be a great actor of pretending your savings are not improving. It will help you not to withdraw some money.

My Adsense is Working

I have been blogging since mid of last year. Then following some people's advices, I signed up for Google Adsense. I didn't know what to do then, so I kept on earning 0.00$ every month. Frustrated but I got the never-give-up attitude and slowly some 0.01$ coming in. A little happy with the progress.

I kept on blogging and I was even tagged as a stalker by someone who is popular but I am not sure whether it was him or not.

I got excited with the "How much is your blog worth?" by Dane Carlson because I didn't expect that for some newbie like me. I got more excited when I knew that my friend's blog is worth nothing and he has been blogging for years now. I was laughing when this other person thinks my blog was useless and hers was no worth at all. Isn't it funny.

Don't laugh at my nonsense stories. I know this is nothing compared to all you top bloggers out there. Actually, this has been a remarkable situation for me, to be able to find out that I was actually doing good at something. I thought social networking is not my thing. And that I am only good at changing friendster profile. I tried to blog my thoughts through the network's blog but I was not happy at how it ended. Some people got mad at my posts. Like I said I am the never-give-up person so I tried again.

If I would do good on this till June 2008, I'd probably buy my own site. Working on how it will look but it is still inside my projects folder.

Now my Adsense is working for me. I don't want to reveal it yet but I know sooner I will get the first check. I am not like you who are now receiving checks and most probably not that excited to get that check. Well, I am very excited and at least I can say something to myself now. And I can do something about my new hobby.

Millionaires at 30

It is nice to look at the list of young millionaires. I'd like to shout at Dulce for providing us the link.

The list of internet millionaires, all young, and full of ideas. They own the top websites too.

Here's the real deal to all that are striving to earn their first million. Some has the idea, they just don't have the resources. Some have the resources but have no idea at all. They might have the idea but they simply tweak other people's idea. It is not a bad thing though, an idea starts from another person. Maybe next time, you might have your very unique idea and at that time you might have the resources.

Internet may have a lot of things to offer, but I wonder, how come there was never a seminar on this? I meant, no seminars like this that is happening here in Davao? A seminar that tells us what to do and how to do it. I do not say, earn millions like the list of young Americans, but earn while being online. I must say, spending time over checking others friendster profile, can be an earning time for Filipinos.

What do you think?

Jermaine Griggs: What He Has Done

"It doesn't matter where you came from, it doesn't matter what color you are or how old you are, your background...doesn't matter of anything. The internet lies on to whoever get in to it....thank God from being born in this era, for having an easy way to money money online."

That's what he said when I first seen his video on Youtube.com.

Yep! I like these kind of people. The never-give-up people.

I was hooked to "Rich Dad Poor Dad" of Robert Kayosaki and any books of John Maxwell, and now I'd probably listen to this guy name Jermaine Griggs.

What is common with these guys is that they've decided to change from the very beginning and they were patient for the results to come and now they've achieved what they wanted and started to share what they've learn.

Jermaine Griggs started with a debit card. He never think of what could have happened after he purchase that domain. He really has done the amazing part of being an entrepreneur, the belief in oneself to do the impossible thing and he succeeded. Turning $70 to a million dollars, well that's how big and still growing.

In the video that I have seen at Squidoo, he seems to be very determined with what he is doing. When I went to college, it was taught that when you do business you should have thought about what business first, then make a plan, then do some research about how to do and go around that business, then start doing it. With the situation of Mr. Griggs, the first thing he did was make a decision that he has to earn and wouldn't want to live like the way he used to live. If he wasn't able to see his situation before he started, that if he would have stayed he would have suffered more. I say, as an entrepreneur, before you ever get to start something you have to think of why you would want to do business? Is it because of money, or you would want to it more because of personal reasons like improving your life?

For my personal opinion, Jermaine Griggs deserved to be where he is now. His name is not that known to many Fililipinos but he sure has the guts to do what he wanted to do to survive and carry himself to the next level. For him, it doesn't matter where you do it but how you do it. I think this guy likes to learn new things every time he encounter something that can be of use to him and to his family.

In everyday that we deal with life, we make personal decisions that we think solely affect our future. In everyday decisions, it has little effect on to world that we are in. But with those little effect, when accumulated together, has brought even more challenges and more bigger decisions that will now have a bigger effect on to those who are close to us personally.

With Jermaine Griggs, he has done what he needed to do because he knew already what will happen if he will just make the biggest decision ever, during that time, to be able to improve his status. The second on the priority list would be earning enough to stay alive then make himself hungry for more without leaving his first priority in life which is to change for the better for himself and for his family.

When can I have that kind of moment? Hey! Mr. Griggs, can you tell me how?

After the 1st Mindanao Bloggers Summit

It was the first blogger summit and I was there. That's history for me. First time blogger, started this year, and I was lucky to be part of the summit.

Learned about Abe who is not good in writing English and he has been into blogging for 7 years. Also learned that Jayvee is in B5 Media and they are looking for bloggers who would want to earn extra. Marc giving tips on how to earn in dollars. Bob Martin is loving Davao. Councilor Peter Laviña's different blogs.

The very thing about blogging that I have learned just recently, after listening to Donald Lim and then Kim, Jayvee, Bob, and the rest of the speakers, is that you got to write with passion. That you were able to write what is in your heart and mind and express that in a way that it will get connection to readers. Primarily, you were the one who get to experience first hand, and write that so that readers will experience the same way and maybe have the same reactions.

I guess, these people earn in blogging because they only not love what they are doing but because they know what to write. So, blogging is writing what you know not just you've heard about it. They've done their own research before they actually blog about it.

I guess that's about it. I still got to learn a lot though.

Google-Microsoft War Over Facebook: And The Winner is?

A drop of jaw when I first read the article from Infoworld;

Update: Facebook chooses Microsoft over Google

Microsoft will purchase a $240 million minority stake in Facebook as well as become its exclusive third-party ad platform

$240 million for Mark Zuckerberg! From a hacker, to a drop out, to a CEO. So that's why Mark said; "We are both happy."

In the article:

The size of the ownership stake Microsoft will take during Facebook's next round of financing puts Facebook's valuation at a whopping $15 billion. Google had reportedly been courting Facebook as well.

In addition to the ownership piece, Microsoft will also extend its existing agreement to provide banner ads to Facebook in the U.S. With this deal, Microsoft will become Facebook's exclusive third-party ad platform as well as provide Facebook ads internationally.

Facebook was founded in 2004, it currently has about 49 million active users today. Over half of its active members are daily users. Some 59 percent of its users are outside the territory of United States.

Read more of the article H-E-R-E.

CEO at 17

She's not like Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook or Keith Rupert Murdoch of Myspace. She's not done yet with High School. She's 17 and smart and will soon be like Mark and Rupert. She's only 17 and she's the founder of Whateverlife.com. She's Ashley Qualls, and she owns an influential and lucrative website.

In two years she earned a total of $1 million dollars. Monthly income in advertisements around $70,000. Again, she's 17 years old.

I wish I was like her but it's never too late to try. A hobby turned into a business.

What Friendster Founder, Jonathan Abrams' Learned From His Mistakes

Friendster started from a brilliant idea of Jonathan Abrams, founder and CEO of Friendster.com. He was the talk of the town of the year 2003 when Friendster was finally open to the public.

Friendster was offered $30 million by Google but Abrams declined and rather go for the venture route, taking $13 million from Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers and Benchmark Capital--and that, he says, is where his troubles began.

"I had basically made a prototype which worked fine for a couple of million users," he says. "But we needed to really rebuild things if we were going to scale." He says his board and investors "didn't get Friendster and wouldn't focus on something boring like fixing the technology." He was replaced as CEO and watched as a succession of marketing deals failed and a parade of CEOs followed--three in one 12-month period. By fall of 2005, Abrams was gone. "I'm never going to make a ton of money off of Friendster like Mark [Zuckerberg] will probably make from Facebook," he says. "But I've learned a lot." (from www.fastcompany.com)

I do hope Abrams new networking site, Socializr, will get him to the top again.

Facebook Addict?

Boink introduced me Facebook.com. It is a new networking site like Friendster.com and Myspace.com. Friendster is known to Filipinos but not Facebook. I am not an addict to both nor to Myspace. If you define, being hooked to something is the same as the word addict, then I am a Facebook addict.

Wait, I was not clear about what I just said. In my own definitions, I do log in at Facebook.com sometimes but I do not spend more than an hour in the site. But yes, I am hooked to Facebook more than being hooked to Friendster.com or Myspace.com.

Even though the two executives, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Myspace CEO Rupert Murdoch, are fighting over who's the leader, waiting for a billion dollar deal with Google, Microsoft or with Yahoo, what is so much obvious is that everyone right now is into social networking. A networking wherein we all know, will come to an end and these guys does not care of how it is going to end but they care more of what they can earn and then maybe later on improve their individual site.

Now, whether you are a Facebook, Friendster or Myspace user, you got to sign up for all these sites. They are all great sites to meet people, to find your lost friends and keeping in touch with your families abroad.

Who is DavaoSale?

I'd like to make a quick shout for friends Hermes, Val and Mark who are the main brain of DavaoSale.com.

I am also inviting fellow Davaoeños to post a comment.

Let us make DavaoSale.com BIG!

Rate this Book: "Guerilla Marketing" by: Jay Conrad Levinson

This book was like a slap on my face. Then again, I am in the Philippines and not in the United States. As you go on further with the book, it will leave you say I DID THAT!

Take this one:

Marketing is every bit of contact your company has with anyone in the outside world. Every bit of contact. That means a lot of marketing opportunities. It does not mean investing a lot of money.

The author is right on that part. Yes, it is every bit of a contact. How do you make him a market if he's not welcome to the idea you are selling. The author said:

The first time a man looks at an ad, he doesn't see it.
The second time, he doesn't notice it.
The third time, he is conscious of its existence.
The fourth time, he faintly remembers having seen it.
The fifth time, he reads the ad.

Marketing is not-to-ever-quit-system. I say this book is a very good book and I recommend this to everyone who is losing faith with their job or their business. Don't mind his examples just get the energy the author has put on to this book.

I'll give you updates on this book. Meanwhile if you have some questions about what the author say about the traditional marketing and the guerrilla marketing, post your questions and comments. I would love to read them

REPOST from my other blog

As a child, Honey Baula, wanted to be a doctor. At 18 and in her pre-medicine year, everything went from bright to bleak in just one stroke. She lost her sight.

For more than 10 years she stayed at home and lived an uncomplicated life, putting dreams of a career at the back of his head. Forgetting everything she ever think of. But things changed, and now she is looking forward to being in the medical field that she so desired, as a medical transcriptionist.

In September 2006, a newspaper report on computer training for visually impaired persons in Davao City caught the attention of her mother. She submitted herself for an assessment for the computer training. She even explained that when she was in the bus, she can feel freedom.

She heard on T.V. of a medical transcriptionist who is blind since birth and was able to work like a normal MT. One day, while walking inside Gaisano Mall of Davao, Flong (Honey's sighted guide) MTC Academy who participated on a Jobs Fair. Ever since, Honey was in and out of MTC Academy inquiring about recent updates and if she can be enrolled.

Finally, February 5, 2007, she was an official student of MTC Academy. Everything and everyone was inspired with Honey's determination and persistence.

Honey gave series of talks to media, group of teachers who are involved in guiding multiple handicapped students from different schools.

Here's what Honey Baula can say:




(from left to right: Mom Estrella, Honey Baula, Wit Holganza, Blogie Robillo)

A CHANCE TO BELONG

We may not make the right choices, but fate can sometimes be ironic

I once lived in a world full of sunshine where colors were a sight to behold. I took it all for granted; I never basked in the glory of wonders that surrounded me. When I was still young, I had high hopes and life was still worth living. Trials come and go, and when it came into my life, my bright future dimmed, the brightness that showered upon my world turned into complete darkness. I felt alone, helpless, and vulnerable. I was afraid, confused, and depressed. Worry, doubt, fear and despair – all these things were on my shoulders and turned my spirit to dust. Then, like a virus, all that I felt turned into anger, anger that was eating me up inside. But we all have choices to make; sometimes trivial, or choices that can turn our life around, be it for better or worse. Even as the anger kept growing, I chose to make my life better. I could have stayed home, be alone, and be dependent on my parents for all my needs, or I can simply go out and see the world at my perspective.

I may have lost one thing, but I gained many. I made more friends than before, I learned how to play the keyboard, and was once the church organist at our local congregation. I also learned how to play the guitar. I learned how to bake cakes and pastries and was able to make a small business out of it. I fought against darkness, darkness ruled over me for a time, but it’s not going to get me the second time around. But no matter how I tried to gain back the world, something is lacking. How many like me are still out there, what are they doing right now, are they enjoying the same opportunities I’m having right now, do they also want to make something out of their lives, are they making the same choices as I am, to just sit around and wait for the world to end or go out and seize the day. (SPED to RBI to MTC)

At first, it was all of personal reason and interest, but as time passes by, a vision began to mold, a vision to reach out for the others like me and be men for others, a vision to be of service to the visually impaired. Today, I have found a niche in the society, a chance to belong in the society, in the community. I may be visually impaired but I am normal. I am human. I am a person.There are lepers. There are differently disabled persons. There are mentally challenged people. But they are all human. We are blind, but we are also human. We are persons of feelings and emotions. We feel pain, anger, and we get hurt too. We are people, and we also belong in the society, but we doubt if society embraces our presence. We may not be able to see or hear it, but we can feel the cold stares of strangers. In the world of technology and advances in other fields of endeavor, discrimination is very much felt. We do not want that. You do not want that either. But nobody is taking actions. We only act when it happens to us, to our love ones, to those near us. Why don’t we all act now. Let’s act now.

By placing Special Education program in your school, you are not only educating the visually impaired, but you are also embracing them as one of us. Through this valuable program, you are breaking the chains of discrimination that unconsciously ails our society. You are giving each and everyone a chance to belong, a chance to let them do the things they couldn’t do before, a chance to meet challenges by themselves, and the greatest chance to live life to the fullest. You are also giving them a chance to say “I did this, I did that, and I did this all by myself”. Thanks to the loving support of my family and the Special Education program (SPED), I was able to meet all these opportunities. Because of this program, they turn my disability into an ability. The success of this program will not and cannot be measured by its monetary value and cost, but by how many visually impaired friends and persons we have embraced in our family and in our society. You are giving them a chance to live life as they want it, a chance to coexist in the society, and a chance to love and to be loved. Give them this chance. Abled or differently abled, I know that there is in every persons’ heart the love of wonder, the sweet amazement of stars and star-like things, the challenges of events, the childlike appetite for what is next, and the joy of the game of living.

I want to give a big shout out, with much love and respect to RBI, MTC Academy.

This is the kind of life God wants me to have. This is what he wants me to be, and this is where he wants me to be. And I thank him for that. We are all as young as our faith, as old as our doubt. As young as our self-confidence, as old as our fear. As young as our hope, and as old as our despair. As I continue to move forward, and as you start your journey by giving the visually impaired a chance to belong, let us all walk with God by faith and not by sight.

Again, I am Honey Baula, with pride and without shame, I can tell everybody that I am visually impaired. We could make it, if we try.