Everything you need to know about donating your voice: Why you should help The Human Voicebank Initiative

Technology TEDTalks Rupal Patel shares how she is making synthetic voices as unique as fingerprints. Here, how you can help. Photo: Kristoffer Heacox

By Rupal Patel

At TEDWomen, I introduced the audience to VocaliD — a project aimed at designing personalized synthetic voices so that people with severe speech impairments can use a voice that fits their body and personality. This is a project that I’ve been working on for several years, along with my students and my collaborator, Dr. Tim Bunnell of Nemours AI DuPont Hospital for Children. Together, we have developed algorithms to build unique voices for those unable to speak without computer assistance.

Rupal Patel: Synthetic voices, as unique as fingerprintsWe have conducted experiments to iteratively improve our techniques, which rely on combining the recipient’s vocal identity features with the speech clarity features of a matched voice donor. In early 2013, we reconnected with a young woman named Samantha, whom I had met years before, when she was 9. We had been painstakingly working toward the perfect—at least by scientific measures—voice for her and didn’t want to share it until it was absolutely ready. But through working with Samantha, we’ve come to understand that what she wanted wasn’t a perfect voice … she just wanted her voice.

At the end of my talk at TEDWomen, I invited the audience (both in San Francisco and around the world) to visit our website, VocaliD.org, where you can not only request a personalized voice, but also find out more about how to donate your own voice. The response was overwhelming. We have received 50+ requests for voices and nearly 400 people have signed up to help — and those numbers continue to grow.

To meet the demand, we’re working hard to raise funds and build the infrastructure to gather and store all the donor voices. We are calling this effort The Human Voicebank Initiative. Our goal is to collect one million voice samples by 2020 to create the world’s largest repository of voices. This corpus would allow us to generate unique vocal identities for hundreds of recipients for whom we do not yet have matching donors. Recipients like Troy, 24, who uses the same voice as Stephen Hawking; Maryam, 19, who refuses to use a device because it does not sound like her; Sylvia, 53, whose voice is no longer supported on her new device; and Dale, who at just 5 years old has tried several voices but is still hoping to find his own.

Until now, voice donors have had to visit my laboratory — or Dr. Bunnell’s — to record 2-3 hours of speech (around 3,200 sentences) in a professional sound studio. This rather complicated process allows us to collect high-fidelity audio that we can use to create a high-quality voice. The drawback, however, is that it limits our ability to reach a vast audience, which is critical to making a real difference for the hundreds of people already waiting for voices and for the even larger set of people who may want voices in the future. These people aren’t limited to a single age group or a particular educational or technical background. They are as diverse as humanity itself, and thus we need a similarly broad group of donors. We cannot achieve that with the sporadic, resource-intensive visits to the lab that we now rely on.

But replacing our model will be tricky and will require creative solutions. The software we use runs on desktop computers, and it’s not particularly engaging. Instead, we envision an alternative that can run on tablets and mobile phones, which have surprisingly good microphones. To engage children and less technical donors, we need to design a fun, simple game that will capture their attention and make them want to play again and again.

We are committed to advancing our initiative and we need your help. Without you, we simply can’t give voices to the people who need them—let alone perfect ones.

If you’re interested in donating your own voice, you probably have some questions. Here’s what you need to know: 

Q: What do I need to do?

A: You need to be able to read or repeat short sentences that, together, cover all the combinations of sounds that occur in our language. The more of your speech we have, the better a voice we can create.

Q: How long does it take?

A: We need about 2-3 hours of speech from each donor. (Though even an hour of speech can go a long way.) You don’t have to do this all at once. You can take your time and break it up into small sessions of around 15-20 minutes, so that you can record your best voice. That’s why we need a simple website or app — so you can record whenever you want. All we’d ask is that you record in a quiet place. The better your recordings, the better the voice we can create.

Q: Do I need to sound like a radio announcer?

A: No. We want and need all types of voices. Each person has a unique voice, which can help this project in its own way.

Q: Will others recognize me in someone’s voice?

A: The new voice will have elements of your voice blended with the recipient’s voice, so it is possible, but very unlikely that others will recognize you — unless of course you have a famous or well-known voice ;)

Q: Why should I do this?

There are so many reasons! First of all, you can help give someone a voice — that’s powerful. But in the process, you can also learn something about your own voice just by banking it. Most of us rarely give our voice much thought, but the process of recording can be made educational and reflective. In fact, for K-12 donors, we hope to develop a curriculum that will supplement the voice donation process.

But really, there are more reasons than this. If you bank your voice, it may be possible to re-create it should you ever lose it in the future. And your voice may help researchers learn more about the human voice in general. Finally, it could not only help us determine better ways to design synthetic voices, but also ways to apply our knowledge to improve health diagnostics, bioengineering, and other related fields.

Q: When can I start?

A: As I mentioned, we are working hard to raise funds and create a team to launch this exciting effort. If you want to be part of The Human Voicebank Initiative, please visit www.vocaliD.org and sign up to donate your voice, time, expertise, or financial support.

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Everything You Are Looking For: TED Fellows Ryan Holladay and Alicia Eggert have a conversation about their new exhibit

art TED Fellows TED Fellows Ryan Holladay (left) and Alicia Eggert (center) have opened a new exhibit, called Everything You Are Looking For, with the help of Artisphere co-curator Cynthia Connolly (right). Photo: Artisphere

Alicia Eggert makes kinetic sculptures that investigate the nature of language and time. Meanwhile, Ryan Holladay is a musical artist who creates sound-specific installations and GPS compositions as part of the duo BLUEBRAIN. Just a week before TED2013, Eggert and Holladay made contact for the very first time.

See, Holloday is a curator of new media at Artisphere. And he was sitting in his office with how co-curator, Cynthia Connolly, when an inquiry came in from an artist — Eggert, of course. Holloday found her materials intriguing — he loved the way she modified simple household items and was enamored with her highly complex interactive sculptures. He explains, ”But this had me pinching myself: like me, Alicia was a 2013 TED Fellow and she, too, would be speaking at the conference the following week in Long Beach.”

Eggert and Holloday struck up a friendship at TED. The two began dreaming up something to work on together. And while Artisphere has galleries of many shapes and sizes, Holloday felt it was only right to set up an exhibit for Eggert in their flagship space, the Terrace Gallery, located just outside Washington DC.

“Alicia is one of the most talented and inventive artists I’ve come across in some time,”  Holloday tells the TED Blog. “She’s an artist with a highly developed vision, an artist who is ready for something big.”

This exhibit, called Everything You Are Looking For, opens on December 5th and will run through February 2nd. It is Eggert’s largest solo exhibition ever. To celebrate, the TED Blog got Holladay and Eggert together for chat — about their work, their process, their collaboration. Oh, and life. Below, read an edited transcript of their conversation and see some very cool images of the exhibition.

Holloday: So you’ve just finished a marathon of an install. Is that a process you enjoy?

Eggert: I have a love/hate relationship with the installation process. In some ways, it stresses me out, because so much of my work is kinetic, and I’m always afraid it’s not going to work properly. And there’s always the chance a neon letter will break if you just look at it the wrong way. But I really enjoyed the installation at Artisphere. Nothing broke or went wrong. But more importantly, it was fun to work with you and Cynthia, and to engage in a dialogue with the two of you about the work and where it should be placed in the gallery. It gave me a new perspective of my work.

Holloday: I can imagine with so many moving parts there’d be a level of anxiety — the feeling of anything that can go wrong will go wrong. But now that it’s all up, it must be a relief.

Eggert: Yes! Is your working relationship with each artist completely different?

Holloday: Every artist is different for sure. And with new media work, it gets a bit tricky sometimes. There are artists who have all their ducks in a row. Then there are others who may be experimenting with some new technology for the first time, and it doesn’t work exactly how they planned and we find ourselves in triage mode hours before an opening. I once had to do a Skype session with an artist in Japan as he walked me through taking apart and reassembling his work.

Eggert: That sounds incredibly stressful. But it’s great that Artisphere is willing to work with artists who are taking risks and exploring unfamiliar territories.

Holloday: I liked walking into the gallery and hearing you listening to that Haim record! Do you usually listen to music when you work?

Eggert: It depends. If it’s a familiar, repetitive task, I love listening to music or even watching a television show. For example, when I was working on the wiring all of the “Lost Gloves” in my recent artist residency at Sculpture Space in Utica, NY, I watched a few episodes of Breaking Bad. But when I’m doing work that requires any kind of problem solving, I prefer to work in silence.

Holloday: One of the things about making music is that you can’t listen to music while you’re working! I get jealous of painters or architects who can get to work and go through the entire Kate Bush catalogue on Spotify. Sometimes when I want to listen to NPR or a new record or something I’ll play Super Mario 3. I’ve played that game so many times, it kind of puts me in a trance where I can focus all my attention on what I’m hearing.

Eggert: I can totally relate. I can get into a similar trance-like headspace when I’m driving. I get some of my best ideas on long-distance road trips.

A look at the installation of Alicia’s work in the Terrace Gallery at Artisphere. Photo: Artisphere

The back of YAY (2011). Thirty two wall-mounted box fans are hidden behind rows of red and silver metallic fringe streamers. The large red letters dance erratically as the fans turn on and off. Made in collaboration with Mike Fleming. Photo: Alicia Eggert

Holloday: Language seems to play a big role in many of your pieces. You seem to play with our notions of how language is used and often overlooked. For instance, in “You Are (On) An Island,” in drawing attention to how removing one word from a simple sentence can change its meaning significantly. Do you  ever think about how your work might effect someone who isn’t a native English speaker? And have you ever considered working with other languages?

Eggert: I feel lucky that my native language is one that has become so universal. I often wonder how my work would be different if English wasn’t as widely spoken as it is, because it’s always been very important to me that my work is accessible to as many people as possible — something from my Evangelical Christian upbringing that I’ve carried over to my practice as an artist. I would love to be given the opportunity to work sculpturally with another language, especially one that’s completely different from English visually, like Arabic. But I don’t think that’s something I would pursue on my own without a specific reason, like a commission.

Holloday: Well, as the saying goes: “????? ??? ????? ???? ?? ??????? ?? ????.”

Eggert: I’m really curious about your collaborative process. I love collaborating with other artists on visual projects, but I wonder how the process is different with sound.

Holloday: Hays [his brother and BLUEBRAIN collaborator] and I are sharing ideas all the time. Now that we’re living in different cities, everything has to be done remotely. So whether that’s some conceptual art project or an actual melody, we generally have these open lines of communication over the phone, text, email and Skype where we bounce ideas off of one another. I think we look for a reaction from the other to see which ideas might have legs, and that’s usually how we start. But, you know, we’ve worked together since we were kids so I don’t really know any other way of doing it, honestly. It’s fantastic in some ways because you can move really quickly and it’s kind of like having two brains working at once. But on the flip side, if a disagreement turns into an argument, it goes nuclear very quickly. Siblings know exactly what buttons to press. How does it work with Mike [Fleming, Eggert’s partner] when you two collaborate?

Eggert: For Mike and me, every project seems to evolve out of a conversation. “Eternity“ started with a car ride. We drove past a church that had a big sign out front saying something about spending eternity in heaven, so we started to talked about that word and what it actually meant. We decided it would be a fun word to mine for an art project. Then we just started brainstorming, bouncing ideas back and forth about it. I forget who came up with the idea to use clocks to spell it, but I remember us both saying, “YES! That’s it!” And then it took months to figure out how to actually do that.

Holloday: Isn’t that the best, when you can’t remember who actually came up with an idea? I feel that’s a sign of a healthy collaboration, where your brain has sort of relinquished the need for ownership or something and who initially birthed the concept or a part of it seems unimportant.

Eggert: I totally agree. You have to totally let go of your ideas, and completely give them to the other person to see where they can take them. But having a collaborative working relationship with someone you love can be challenging. It’s important for Mike and me to maintain a part of our relationship that doesn’t have to do with our work, so it doesn’t feel like we’re just business partners, so we can salvage some romance. Do you and Hays have to worry about similar things, or no?

Holloday: Well the romance died years ago with Hays and me. No, but to be serious, I think there was a period of time when I wasn’t sure if we were going to be able to work together in the future. We were always able to get down in the dirt and argue about ideas and have that be separate from our friendship. But there came a point where that seemed more and more difficult, and the distinction between our personal and working relationship became less clear. And I felt like, as much as I loved working with him, it wasn’t worth damaging what had always been a really close relationship. What changed, I think, was when we started working on these location-aware compositions, because we were starting from scratch and creating something completely new that neither of us knew anything about. We were learning about software development, about landscape architecture, about interface design and so on. And so it became this feeling of discovery that I think had gotten lost somewhere along the way.

Eggert: You were in new territory together. I can see how that would change the rules. I think that’s when collaborations work best. Can you tell me a little bit about what you’re working on right now?

Holloday: Well, as a curator at Artisphere, I’m working on a number of projects, including putting together a sound exhibition in the Terrace Gallery for next summer. I’m trying to bring TED Fellow Christine Sun Kim down for that one! As for Hays and me, we have about 10 projects we’re working on together right now, little ones and big ones. We’re finishing up a new record — a traditional, start-to-finish linear album — that I’m really excited about. But we’ve been talking about releasing it in a different way than we’ve done before. I feel like it’s a bit early to explain much more, but I’m really excited about it. We’re also starting to transition into a slightly different way of doing these location-aware composition apps, doing them as commissions for spaces and museums, which has been fun. Hopefully we’ll have three of those done in the next two years.

Egger: Wow, and I thought I was busy! It sounds like you have your hands full. I can’t wait to hear your new album.

Holloday:  Considering how carefully you chose words and how prominent they are in so many of your pieces, the pressure to pick a great baby name must be high.

Eggert: You would think so, right? But I’ve been so busy working on this show at Artisphere that I regret to say I haven’t had much time to think about what’s coming next. I still can’t believe I’m having a baby! But it will certainly be my most exciting collaborative project with Mike to date.

Holloday: My money’s on Eternity Eggert. Has a nice ring to it.

Everything You Are Looking For (2012). A neon sign whose jumbled letters slowly reveals the phrase “Everything you are looking for is invisible.” Made in collaboration with Amy Jorgensen. Photo: Alicia Eggert

Another view of Everything You Are Looking For. Photo: Alicia Eggert

Present Perfect (2013). A rock sits on the keyboard of an open laptop, typing the letter Y into in infinity in Microsoft Word. Photo: Alicia Eggert

And a bonus image: Ryan Holladay and his brother Hays perform at the Sweetlife Festival wearing masks of one another’s faces, designed by Kashuo Bennett. Photo: Margot MacDonald

Everything You Are Looking For has its  opening reception on Thursday, December 5th, and will run until February 2nd. Artisphere is located at 1101 Wilson Blvd. Arlington, VA 22209.

Want to know more about Eggert and her work? Check out her Fellows Friday profile »

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8 Habits You Can Adapt to Be Successful at Everything

What habits leads to success? While success can be defined in many different ways, there are 8 habits that highly successful people share, no matter it be in business, marriage, health or life in general.  Being successful all starts with learning these habits and making them your own.  Take a few minutes and watch this TED talk about 8 Secrets of Success then read how you can take these secrets so that you can be successful in every aspect of your life.

Here are 8 Habits you can adapt to your life to be successful at everything.

If you want to be successful in life, you must possess a passion for what you do.  You can’t expect to be successful if you don’t have any passion in what you’re doing.  Passion comes from within so ask yourself, what are you most passionate about? When you find out what your passions are, make it a habit to try and live out your passions every single day!

Success is achieved by putting in the work.  It takes time and dedication to be successful and while it won’t be easy, when you put in the work, you will reap the benefits.

Whatever you decide you want to accomplish, make sure you dedicate yourself to it 100% and be damn good at whatever it is you set your mind to. Invest your time and energy every single day to develop your mind in what you want to be successful in. What separates you from the rest of the crowd? Find what you’re passionate about and make sure you put in the work to be the best at it!

With so many distractions in our every day lives, it’s very important for you to stay focused on your goal.  Keep your attention on what you want rather than allowing distractions to get in the way and take you off course. Keep your focus and success will be the byproduct!

You need to make sure that you push yourself every single day to keep at it. You need to push through all your limiting beliefs that you have about yourself.  Whether it be shyness or lack of confidence.  Get yourself out there! Keep pushing forward even when your doubts kick in. Understand what your insecurities are and make sure that you overcome them by pushing forward. What separates a successful person from an unsuccessful person is the ability to pushing themselves outside their comfort zone and being committed to success.

Take the time and serve to others with your knowledge, wisdom and skills. There’s nothing more fulfilling than sharing your skills with others so that they can have the tools to be successful as well and hopefully, they will pass on what they’ve learned from you to other people.

When you have ideas make sure you put them into action! A lot of us have great ideas but the secret to success is to put those ideas on a piece of paper and turn them into reality.  Allow yourself to be creative with your ideas and figure out a way to turn these ideas into action.

Even when the going gets tough, keep on going. Commit yourself every single day to accomplish your goals.  It’s easy to just give up when you have a day that was not what you expected to be but no matter what happens, continue to have persistence and know that you’re developing even when you fail.  As Dale Carnegie once said, “Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.”  

This is a great quote to remember in times when you’re feeling discouraged and unmotivated.  You will experience some failures but know that experiencing them are also a great stepping stone to success!

While we’d all love to throw in a cup of this or a dash of that, it’s not that straightforward. 10 Qualities That Will Make You Successful

Featured photo credit: Young man standing on a meadow with dandelions on sunset sky backgroundvia Shutterstock

Tiffany Mason is a Professional Life Coach. Personal Development and Relationship Expert. As the owner of Mason Coaching and Consulting, she uses her expertise by helping busy women who feel disconnected in their life and marriage unleash their inner being and feminine essence in order to live a truly fulfilling and rewarding life. Visit Tiffanymason.com for a FREE audio series!

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The psychology of everything in 48 minutes

Psychologist Paul Bloom has made a fantastic video for Big Think that introduces pretty much the whole of psychology in 48 minutes.

It’s a brilliant and engaging introduction to the science of mind. Highly recommended.

Link to ‘Paul Bloom: The Psychology of Everything’ on YouTube.

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Apple’s iPhone 4S: Everything You Need to Know

Yesterday in Cupertino, a little company announced the coming release of a new cellular phone. Maybe you heard about it?

Apple will release the next generation of their popular iPhone, iPhone 4S, on October 14th in the United States. Here is the rundown of the new device in a handy-dandy list for you list nerds.

iPhone 4S will come to AT&T, Verizon, and now Sprint in the United StatesIt will be priced starting at $199.99 for 16GB, 299.99 for 32GB, and 399.99 for 64GB while the last generation model will be reduced to $99.99 for 8GB. Of course a two year commitment is required for this pricing.4S comes in white or black (for some reason, Apple is pushing the white version hard in their promo materials)The new 4S features an upgraded 8MP, 5-lense camera which will take sharper photos, have better white balance, and will supposedly challenge some of the better digital point-and-shoots on the market.4S has the updated Apple A5, 1GHz dual-core processor that has previously shipped with iPad 2.4S supports “rich” 1080p HD video recording up to 30 frames per second.The antenna design has slightly changed and now 4S is a truly global device sporting CDMA and GSM bands. This allows for global use.The general look and feel of the device hasn’t changed from iPhone 4; the exterior has the same dimensions.iPhone 4S will sport the new Siri Assistant program that allows the user to search for things, schedule and move appointments on their calendar, email, text message, play music, dictate anywhere on the phone – basically anything that they can do on their phone – with their voice alone. Siri Assistant was the company that Apple purchased a couple of years ago for their voice technology. The company “went dark” since the purchase and yesterday was the unveiling of what they have been working on. Of note, on the iPhone 4S will contain the Siri Assistant (total bummer). This may be due to the processing demands but more likely because Apple wants you to upgrade.There is a new Cards app that allows iPhone users the ability to create greeting cards right on their device with pictures from their library. The cards can then be mailed my Apple (yeah, like Postal Service, real kind of mail) to friends and family for $2.99 in the USA or $4.99 abroad.iOS 5 ships on October 12th for existing iPhone customers and will be shipped with the iPhone 4S on the October 14th release date.iCloud will also be able to be used on October 12th. With iCloud you can host your email, photos, calendar, contacts, music and more. 5GB for free and low prices for more storage after that.

Many pundits and news outlets are throwing around words that the new iPhone is “underwhelming” and that Apple hasn’t “delivered to their full potential”. In a world where we want more, better, faster (and want it all right now), this reaction is understandable. But, Apple delivers products that are polished and complete. Yes, the hardware is mostly the same, besides the upgraded camera and A5 processor, but I think that this announcement is about much more than the hardware.

Apple has single-handedly threatened Hallmark, “GTD” app makers, Gmail, Google Calendar, Instapaper, and even Dropbox by giving users new apps and access to iCloud. I am in no way saying that these apps are going anywhere soon or will be knocked-out by Apple’s stock offerings. What I am saying is that Apple is integrating services into their hardware and software lines to engrain users into their ecosystem further.

With the announcement of Siri, iPhone 4S users will be able to use their phones like mini HALs and will truly be doing some 21st Century feeling stuff. Just take a look at the iPhone 4S promo video (click on the video link under the big iPhone banner) with the man running and scheduling appointments. It’s unbelievable.

So, while the 4S isn’t revolutionary and the software has been done on Android and other devices before, Apple has made it accessible and easier to use. Apple does an excellent job of providing their customers with use cases whereas their competitors just pile on a list of features and specs expecting that their users will just inherently know what to do with them. This is why iPhone 4S and Apple as a company is a big deal.

So, will you be picking up a new iPhone next week? Or do you think that the iPhone is gibberish and will be going for something else entirely? Let us know your thoughts and concerns in the comments!

Chris is a developer, writer, tech enthusiast, and husband. He holds a degree in MIS and CMPSC from Penn State Behrend. Chris is also interested in personal productivity and creativity and how to utilize technology to get more things done. Check out his tech writing at androinica.com where he writes about Android.

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How To Do Everything Wrong

While I normally write for people who are interested in improving their lives, I’m aware that many are committed to the opposite path. These people deliberately decline steps that would lead to measurable improvements. They prefer that everything goes wrong — for as long as possible.

Sometimes they screw up and accidentally do something right. They’re usually able to sabotage these unwanted successes in short order, but they like it best when they can prevent these positive experiences from ever happening in the first place.

If you count yourself among this under-acknowledged and under-appreciated group, here are some suggestions for how you can do a better job of staving off success and ensuring absolute failure till you die.

Notice the paths that happy and successful people take, and avoid those paths. Favor the popular paths since those will help you achieve average results at best, and average results should safely prevent undesirable feelings of fulfillment. The best roads are those that leave you feeling like you’re walking in circles till you’re too tired to walk anymore and must retire. Roads that are flat or which slope downhill are often good choices, and they tend to satisfy the popularity requirement as well. Avoid any paths that lead over hills or near mountains; the elevated views are disturbing. Head towards terrain you dislike since it’s easier to hate your life when you hate your surroundings. If you can manage to get lost as well, that’s wonderful.

Take stock of which habits are creating the best results for you, and abandon them. Replace them with habits that ensure no forward progress. Even better are habits that cause backsliding. Watch lots of TV. Eat fast food. Avoid exercising. Make Facebooking the highlight of your day.

It’s important to live in a place that emanates a going-nowhere vibe. Look for spots that attract people with average or below average incomes, and favor surroundings that are so ugly, even Shakespeare would succumb to writer’s block. Live with people who will encourage you to take paths you clearly don’t want; living with your parents for as long as possible can be very helpful here.

Never take action when you can justify delay. Stay on the sidelines for as long as you can, and avoid the field for as long as possible. Be non-punctual. Eventually the opportunities will pass. There’s less pressure in showing up late since no one will expect much of you. If you act too soon, you’re risking success.

People are notoriously nosy, and sooner or later they’ll inquire about your plans. There’s an unfair assumption that everyone should be looking to improve their lives, so you’ll need to get good at deflecting their queries with false responses. When they eventually take note of your seeming lack of forward progress, put the blame on external factors such as the economy, how unfair your boss is, how unreasonable your ex was, etc. If you tell people the truth, they may try to motivate you to make some changes, and you definitely don’t want that.

Get up late if you feel best as an early riser, and drag yourself out of bed early if you feel best sleeping in late. Throughout the day, strive to do the opposite of whatever makes you feel happy and productive. Most people find it helpful to get a job doing work they dislike. This ensures that even if they manage to enjoy a nice morning and/or evening, the hours spent at work will drag the whole day down, ensuring an unpleasant overall experience.

String several wrong days in a row, and you can create a very mediocre week — perhaps even a downright bad week if you work at it. It’s important not to do anything genuinely restorative on the weekend — burn up the time with laziness, inactivity, and pointless entertainment as much as possible. You want to head into Monday morning feeling disempowered from the get-go. If you can manage to maintain feelings of stress, depression, or boredom throughout the whole week, you’re golden. Once you’re locked into such a pattern, don’t do anything to upset it.

Learn from other people’s failures, and copy them. Use methods that have proven ineffective in the past, ensuring that you’ll get similar lousy results. Look to your own past as well. Notice what has never worked for you, and keep doing it. If it didn’t work back then, it will continue not working today.

Don’t be too creative or try to innovate. Copy someone else’s technique if you can. Fitting in with the crowd is safer than standing out as a distinct individual. It’s easier to stave off success if you favor the popular techniques of the masses — don’t do anything too fancy. Style is too close to success.

Make sure the key ingredients you’re putting into your life don’t mix well together. Get a job that doesn’t pay enough to cover your expenses, so you can’t make ends meet. Get a relationship partner who can’t get along with your friends. Stock your kitchen with foods that keep you feeling slightly sick much of the time. Keep yourself off balance.

Disempower yourself by blaming your problems on your DNA. Let your genes serve as the ultimate limitation. Ignore the truth that your thoughts largely determine how your genes express themselves.

It’s hard to avoid setting goals altogether because part of your brain will want to fill this void. Keep this spot filled with analog pseudo-goals that will attach to your goal receptors and effectively block real goals from accidentally falling into place. These have been proven to work well: make more money, get a relationship, find a job, etc. The lack of specificity makes procrastination go down easier.

If you ever do get sucked into working on a goal, take the most circuitous route you can. Instead of starting a real business that provides value and makes money, keep yourself occupied with pointless busywork like fussing over the design of your logo and business cards. Switch projects frequently so that nothing ever ships. Create the illusion of progress without causing anything quantifiable to occur.

Create flawed plans to reach your goals, plans that any reasonably intelligent person would be able to poke full of holes. Be sure that at least one crucial step requires a horcrux.

Avoid becoming too good at anything. Skill is a recipe for success, so keep yourself as unskilled as possible. Avoid books, audio programs, seminars, and educated people. Your education ended a long time ago; don’t try to resurrect it. Let your unskilled hands fall further behind with each passing year.

Use a perspective that disempowers you. Rule out the angles that would make your problems look too easily solvable. If you blow problems out of proportion, it’s easier to stay stuck. If a problem looks too solvable, you might be tempted to actually solve it, and that’s only going to speed you along the path of success — bad idea!

Set goals that others expect you to achieve, even if you don’t really care about them. Surely everyone else is right, and you’re wrong, so get with the program and pretend you like it.

Ask questions that cannot possibly provide you with helpful answers, such as Why can I never get ahead? Why are people always mean to me? Why am I such a ‘fraidy cat all the time?

Now take those lame questions, and try to answer them anyway. Be as disempowering as you can. I can never get ahead because I’m stupid. People are mean to me because I’m a loser. I’m a ‘fraidy cat because I have no social skills, so I know I’ll embarrass myself as soon as I open my mouth.

March to the beat of someone else’s drum, never your own. The best advice for you to follow is that which comes from people who seem to care about you but who are too incompetent to know what they’re talking about. Seek health advice from overweight smokers. Consider money advice from people who can barely pay their own bills. Relatives are often great choices for this.

Hang out with disenchanted losers regularly, elevating them to buddy status. Better yet, swear loyalty to them as your peer group. If anyone shows the slightest hint of ambition or brilliance, accuse them of being crazy, and either numb them with sufficient quantities of alcohol, or boot them out of your tribe. Openly welcome new members who demonstrate their adeptness at sarcasm and who wield a video game collection that rivals your own.

Keep your vibe intentionally out of sync with happiness, success, and fulfillment. Visualize failure whenever you get a chance. When you feel pissed off, amplify it into rage. When you feel sad, feed the sadness into a mopey numbness that you can drag out for weeks. Worry a lot. Know that things are always going downhill for you.

Determine that you’ve consumed a sufficient number of venti lattes that your dormant psychic abilities must have finally awakened. Interpret every incoming text message as a sign that you’re on the right path, even though the only people who seem to care that you exist are just as lost as you are. Interpret the seeming lack of forward progress in any quantifiable areas of your life as spiritual growth. Inner growth is always invisible.

Be a hapless couch potato for 28 out of every 30 days who thinks that getting up at 7am is the height of ambition. Then follow it with a 48-hour mania spree where you tell everyone you can about an inspired idea you’re never going to implement. Blow your wad with excited talk once a month; then return to the cozy comfort of inaction.

You know you’re on track to misery when you listen to the overall song of your life, and all you can perceive is discordant noise where everything sounds like it’s out of tune. If something starts working, and you begin to hear something resembling music, then figure out what’s creating those nasty harmonies, and break it.

If you’re already applying most of the above, then you shouldn’t have to worry about success, happiness, and fulfillment infecting your dreary existence. You can relax and coast to the coffin from here. Keep it up! :)

Incidentally, this post was inspired by the song “Wrong” by Depeche Mode. Watch the video on YouTube.

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Dates and GTD – Everything You Need to Know

I have been a GTD fanboy for around 3 and a half years now and with that has come trying all different types of systems over the years. Yet, over that time I have also slowly come to realize that it isn’t about the tools you use, not in the slightest. What GTD is about is understanding the process and actually using your system to get more things done in work and life.

One of the aspects of GTD that I have had the hardest time with is the idea of dates; be it start dates, due dates, milestones, whatever. In GTD, Mr. Allen doesn’t speak of date information related to actions very much other than the brief discussion of giving yourself a hard landscape by ways of your calendar. So, to that end, let’s take a look at the wide-world of dates and GTD, and how they can be used within your system.

Quoting Merlin Mann regarding start dates:

“Start dates are ace. Start dates are a way of punting stuff into the future.”

I couldn’t agree more. Start dates allow you to plan your actions and projects effectively while keeping things that aren’t that important or time sensitive out of your hair for the time being. This allows you to concentrate on the stuff that really matters at the moment without being bogged down by tasks and projects that are in your system but aren’t due for weeks or even months down the road.

Because of the awesomeness of start dates I can no longer go back to a system that doesn’t support start dates as a field for a task or project. The two apps that come to mind that do this well are Toodledo and OmniFocus, but I’m sure there are at least a dozen more. If you have a ton of actions on your lists you should definitely consider using start dates to get them out of the way so you can concentrate on current actions and projects.

Ever have self-talk like this regarding projects?

“Let’s see. I have a report due by the end of the month and have at least 10 actions that go with it. I’m waiting to hear back from John, get the notes from the meeting, summarize the notes, make an outline, etc. So, by next week I should have have the notes summarized and the outline completed. I’ll give that due date of 2/27/11.”

The above is a good example of “fake due dates”; these are arbitrary dates that you set up for actions within a project that are due before the actual due date project. In my experience these types of due dates don’t work. What they tend to do is allow procrastinators procrastinate more, because when they see due dates they push everything back to the last minute.

Here is a much better approach; instead of giving all your project actions fake due dates, make sure that your actions are “highly doable”, meaning that they are something that can be done within 10 to 25 minutes. This will help a project move a long much faster. What you may find is that you get more done than you would have giving all these actions fake due dates.

Real due dates are the actual due date of an action or project. These type of dates are usually put on us by project manager types or are set by yourself as the date that projects or actions are to be completed.

When I receive a due date for a school project or assignment at work I always add it to the action or the project and try very hard to avoid the fake due date syndrome I spoke of above. Sometimes in my project notes I will give myself milestones saying that if by such-and-such date I have a certain number of actions done then I am on track, otherwise I need to clear my back log of tasks to consider myself to be on time. This works well as it doesn’t clog my system with fake due dates, yet still allows me to check my progress on actions and projects related to dates.

The hard landscape that Mr. Allen talks about is the idea of putting things on your calendar that have to be done on that particular day or time (think meetings, actions that can only be done on a single date or time, or reminders for that day or time). This is a sacred place and shouldn’t be cluttered with things that don’t have a hard due date or actions that you’d think you’d like to get done on a certain date.

I will admit though, if I do have a long standing project that has a hard due date, I put in on my calendar as an all day event. Be it “right or wrong” per GTD, I don’t really care. What this has done for me is put things into perspective during my weekly review of actions and projects allowing me to see when large projects or certain actions are due at a glance of the calendar. Other than these hard due dates, the calendar is hands off for anything other than what was mentioned above.

Chris is a developer, writer, tech enthusiast, and husband. He studies MIS and Computer Science at Penn State Behrend. Chris is also interested in personal productivity and creativity and how to utilized technology to get more and better things done. Check out his tech writing at androinica.com where he writes about Android.

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Everything You Ever Really Need to Know About Personal Finance

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