More Why I Do It

One of my most frequent questions abourt Maldives Complete is still “Why do it do it?” In my previous post in response, I cited Scott Adams’ own answer to the question of the “non-zero chance” for some big serendipity. Scott recently published a new book titled “How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life” that delves more deeply into his personal life philosophy. As a part of the release, he has been doing the book promo circuit and his interview with Forbes really hit home for me as another reason behind my compulsive researching and posting…

“For years people have been asking me why I blog. At one point, blogging was taking about half of my work time while providing only 5% of my income. My wife and my friends asked ‘What is your goal in blogging?’ I don’t do goals. I do systems. (That’s a theme of the book.) In this case, my system involved publicly experimenting with a variety of writing styles and topics and closely monitoring the reactions of readers. I was honing my writing skills and my understanding of the reading public. I didn’t have a specific goal. I was aiming for ‘better.’ I reasoned that my system would generate good opportunities for me in ways I couldn’t predict with any precision. That’s what makes it a system and not a goal. I was simply improving my odds that something good would happen. I just didn’t know when it might happen or in what form it would come. Blogging also charges me up. I like the interaction, the angry villagers with torches and pitchforks, and the possibility of saying something useful. It is one part of my overall system for keeping my personal energy high. It also keeps my mind sharp. Several years into my system, it seems to be working.”

Webmastering Maldives Complete is part of my own “system” to keep learning, make new friends and relationships, understand new technologies (eg. Deepzoom, Silverlight), grapple with new media (eg. social media like Facebook, Twitter, TripAdvisor), and to constantly hone my ability to research, distil and share insights.