My friends over at dictionary.com define confidence as: full trust; belief in the powers, trustworthiness, or reliability of a person or thing.

Confidence to me is being able to walk into a given situation and believe you will succeed ahead of time. Confidence puts a swagger in your step and it allows you to hold your head up high. It also helps to calm nerves and allows for clearer thought and action.

How confident are you overall? If you either don’t know or score yourself on the lower end of the scale, let me suggest spending some time learning about yourself. There are a few things you are going to have to do before you can start this process.

1. Commit | Self discovery takes time and effort. You can either look at it like a bunch of work or you can see it as a means to the end that will make life less stressful.
2. Student’s mindset | Humans are the most complex organisms ever to be conceived and the depth of complexities that make us who we are dictate that we become students. Be on the lookout for new discoveries and take time to ask (and answer) the “what, why, how” questions. For example:

1. “Why did I react that way to that situation?”
2. “What emotions were stirred in me just now and why?”
3. “Do my childhood experiences have anything to do with how I look at the world?”
4. “Is that good or bad or neither?”

• Right Heart | This journey is best started when your goal is to gain a better understanding of your design for His purposes, not your own. Discovering how you were made and connecting that with for whom you were made will provide the “wow’s” and “aha’s” and those lead to greater satisfaction and consequently confidence.

So, now what you ask…

Start with an personal assessment and ask (and answer) these questions. Go ahead and write out your answers:

• If money, time and resources were unlimited, what would I do with my life?
• What am I getting paid to do that I would do for free if money weren’t an option?
• What type of people do I get along with most?
• Where are my blind spots?
• What makes me the maddest and why?
• What makes me the happiest and why?
• What is my favorite holiday and why?
• If you were to write a book, what would it be about?
• What is your favorite thing about your mate/date/sibling/parent?

The list can go on and on and hopefully you get the gist. Basically, you are trying to get a handle on passions, beliefs and strengths. You will see themes emerge – that’s good…take good notes.

Now, we want to take advantage of some wonderful objective assessment tools to continue to clarify the picture. Understand, you can’t swing a dead cat without hitting an assessment tool. Some good, some not and they all measure slightly different things. What you want is to discover two major categories (three if you are a Christian*).

• Strengths (natural talents, abilities, etc.)
• Personality
• Spiritual Gifts*

Use the questions above to find your strengths – be honest and remember, this is for you, not anyone else.

For personality, I’ve not found none more comprehensive than Servants By Design. My friend Bob Maris and Taibi Kahler developed this assessment tool decades ago and it has been used by NASA to form mission teams, in the public school system to help teacher/student interactions and in the Christian church to assist people in finding the most fulfilling type service, even marriage and parenting. It is very accurate and complete.

Others include DISC, Meyers Briggs, IDAC, and others. The point is that life is perceived based on your personality and experiences. Gaining understanding about your personality gives you the tools to decipher what is happening on the inside, which in turn helps to shape future decision-making. Additionally, the more you understand about your personality, the better you will be at understanding those around you, which can be very useful in communication, conflict resolution and other areas of life.

Spiritual Gift inventories are probably most readily available at your church and your pastor should be able to help you with that request. If you don’t have a church or would rather do one online, I have discovered THIS ONE and it seems fairly thorough.

Simply put, confidence comes from within and is tied to the degree to which you can honestly and gratefully embrace who you really are.

I was approached by Preferred Wound Solutions to help create their website and one of the first things we targeted was their logo. They weren’t interested in a complete overhaul as they had promotional material printed with the old one, but they definitely were in the market for a new look.

If you’ve never embarked on this process, it may have been because it seems daunting. I didn’t want and they couldn’t afford a long draw-out process so I put my thinking hat on and came up with some progressive worksheets that ended up working very well.

Step 1: Style – Discover the right style for the logo. For this, I offered a three-step process that helped them decide the critical elements of the logo.

Style Worksheet

As you can see, they were to choose a dot style, a text style and a background (if desired). The result of this, which only took a few hours for them to decide, helped us move to Step 2 – Color. This resulted in a new worksheet based on their desire for a “brighter orange” to be used as well as their results from the style worksheet.

Color Worksheet

From this, something interesting happened – they chose the entire color palette for the site. I knew they had blue in their original logo and I didn’t want to totally abandon that color so I threw some of those options in for good measure. In similar fashion, they came back quickly with their logo choice, but requested another dot configuration and asked to see them side-by-side in their final colors. A “finalist” worksheet was then developed.

Finalist Worksheet

We are sitting pretty now – and it is all right there in one place. This, as it turns out, was a crucial step as their final choice was #2 above – the last-minute dot config.

All in all, this was a great process for both client and designer. It was clear, clean and provided a very visual client the needed options to decide quickly.

In summary, here are the principles I took away from this experience:

• Focus on one aspect at a time | The tendency is to do color and style and palette all in the same step, but by forcing each aspect to be decided on in order, it helped remove some of the clutter from the process
• Give them enough options to make it complete, but not so much  as to overwhelm them. What you’re after is a balance to allow for your client to move to the next step with one or two candidates that can be explored in the next step.
• Be quick | This process is pretty exciting to the client and I felt an anticipation for the next step, so I moved very quickly on each successive worksheet so that emotion could carry over and keep the process rolling along.
• Add some style | This is also a great time to showcase some design skills you have. Little things like palette swatches and dotted lines make a difference and can improve the relationship as they will be able to see that you care about your craft.

There’s nothing magical about this process, but I was amazed at how well it worked and I’ll definitely be using it in the future.

If you want to follow the progress of how this translates into a website, be sure to bookmark www.preferredwound.com

Way before I knew anything about building websites, I was introduced to something that has changed my life. An instrument used in the hands of the Almighty to teach me about who He made me and provide small glimpses into what I was put on this earth to do.

It’s called Servants by Design – a personality profiling system from Transpersonal Technologies, LLC that, like no other, predicts how we will behave under stress as well as normal conditions. This system is based on over 30 years of research and has been validated in all sectors of life.

It has been used to build NASA teams (it was the reason Chuck Yeager never got into space) as well as educational classrooms to help teachers profile their class to improve communication. It has applications in marriage, parenting and teamwork. And now, its online thanks to a great many contributors including yours truly.

What you receive after completing the inventory is a multi-page document that details out your personality in 6 distinct parts. They are represented in the shape of a house with 6 floors. The most dominant parts of your personality are at ground level while the parts that require more energy to personify are near the attic.

The interface for taking the exam was done with trying to make the experience a bit more fun than any other tool you’ve seen. You’ll use a drag-and-drop system to answer the first section and move sliders to answer the second and third sections. I felt it was time to add something new to the way people fill these things out and thanks to jQuery and some good old-fashioned persistence, it came together quite nicely.

The platform allows us to continue to develop more specific and targeted profiles based on the input data you provide. And the nice thing is that we will use your inventory data for all products, which means you’ll only have to fill it out one time.

So, whether you want some insight into yourself or you’re looking to know how your wife or kids tick or perhaps you’d like to be able to “profile” others via one of the workshops, this is one of the best ways to spend $35 that could very well change your life. It was true for me and everyone else that I know who’s taken it.

The participants were my brother and his family and my family – not even my wife was privy to the workings of the Hunt, which meant she could play right along. We also had to do this on Friday night after the Arkansas vs. LSU game (we won’t go into detail on this subject) because Saturday was supposed to be rainy all day. Luckily, I planned for rain.

This year started with three anonymous texts to my wife, brother and his wife. Each with one word each that when you put them together kicked off the Hunt officially. The words were UNDER, WELCOME, MAT. There they found an envelope with a letter stating the Hunt was now underway should they want to play.

It gave no specific direction, and just like last year, contained a clue to the next step. On the letter were three words in red, which again, when put together led to the RETURN, AIR, VENT. Behind the filter was another envelope tacked to an exposed 2×4.

Inside that envelope was a small notebook and a piece of paper with a series of symbols on it. The notebook was a journal that I wrote like it was from 1911. In it was a short story that told of how the page with symbols was obtained and some clues about how to decipher those symbols.

Let me stop for just a minute and tell you that I thing I had just as much fun watching them try to figure this out as they were working on the puzzles. So far, it was working out just like I envisioned it.

They received a cipher as part of the story for 6 of the symbols, which were actually numbers. From the 6 given, they could build the remaining numbers and thus assign a numeric value to each symbol. My brother provided the next breakthrough when he started writing down the numeric equivalents to the alphabet. They then translated the symbols to “turkeyhunt us”, which they quickly remembered from last year as the web address for the Hunt.

They went to the computer and pulled up the website. On the home page was a congratulatory message and a riddle. Once solved, the page revealed a set of GPS coordinates. We all got our coats on while my brother programmed my GPS with the coordinates. Out the front door and down the street we went in search of the next piece of the puzzle.

After a few wrong turns, they finally got to the location and started looking for a small plastic bottle with red reflective tape on it. It didn’t take long and they had it. Inside was a QR code (mobile bar code) and when scanned with an iPhone QR app, it took them back to the website and another riddle. Solving it revealed another set of coordinates. This process happened 9 times.

Back inside and after the little kids were in bed, the bottles were all put on the table where everyone sat  staring at each other wondering what was next. One of my nephews noticed a patter on the back of each of the QR codes and quickly ascertained that each one was a piece of a larger QR code. They put it together, scanned it and had the final set of coordinates. This took them to the shed in the backyard where they found a box with the Hunt logo on the side.

It was locked with a combination lock and the code was another set of four symbols in the notebook. Inside were two boxes of BeyBlades and a stadium as well as a scroll outlining the tournament rules. It was family against family for an all out battle to ten wins. The two top winners would then battle it out for top honors and become the Turkey Hunt champion. My wife was the champion when we finished the next morning after having to call it quits so the kids could go to bed.

I almost forgot to mention that I also hid in the house a shortcut that would have allowed them to bypass the walk through the neighborhood. All they had to do was discover the clue, which was a tiny Turkey Hunt logo taped to a cabinet door. Inside the door was a small metal tube containing the location of the treasure box. Nobody found it, but now they know to look next time…

I love designing these hunts and puzzles and seeing people engage them while making memories with loved ones. If you are around next Thanksgiving and want to participate, come join us.

Regardless, the plan is to ramp it back up and start letting you into the mind of Steve Manatt again…enter if you dare…

The last go around was between two topics and it was a very short serve and volley:

THE SERVE [Matt]
Justification = just as if we never sinned & just as if we had always obeyed

Read it again because you might miss the profundity in the brevity. Now read it one more time. Isn’t that wonderful and so absolutely true!

Whenever I see the term “Justification,” I immediately hear the word “Sanctification” in my mind. It’s like when I hear the name “Marsha”, I hear, “Marsha, Marsha, Marsha…” from the Brady Bunch. So, I replied with:

THE VOLLEY [Me]
Sanctification = Proof positive that there’s always room for improvement

Now I sometimes say things to gauge the reaction of someone – especially in church circles these days, but this isn’t one of them. I truly believe that our justified lives are one big work in progress that has no ending point this side of heaven.

The point is that everyone around you is some sort of work in progress. And your Christian friends are being worked by the Creator of the Universe, who can be trusted to finish that work. May the Grace and Love of Jesus abound in how we engage those around us.

That’s not love and that’s not what Scripture teaches us that Christ wants from us. Instead, let’s start digging into and teaching people about how to love God, which begins with a deep understanding of how God loves us and goes all the way back to Genesis 1 and the chasm that Jesus bridged to bring us back into a right relationship with our Heavenly Father.

It’s harder and takes much longer, but the sustainability for real-world impact is far greater than maintaining a list of activities that can be recited at the drop of a hat.

Hear me on this – I absolutely believe that caring for our neighbor is the best and most effective form of expressing the love of Christ, but if we do it in order to check a box on some list rather than out of love, we have become noisy gongs and our efforts honor nobody. If we are going to hold people accountable to something, let it be love.

There’s just one problem: Not one person has been able to answer those two questions with enough clarity for me to make a recommendation. It usually takes a much longer process. So, I thought I’d pull back the curtains a bit and get you a little further down the road once the decision for a new machine has been made. The amount of information has forced me to split this article up into multiple parts. This is part one and covers why to buy a new machine and whether to focus on a desktop or laptop.

Let me also say one thing here. This article is focused on helping to make the very best purchase based on need. If you don’t much care or are made of money, just go get something that fancies you. If you’re on a budget and dropping $1,500 – $2,00 on a computer is a big deal, then the work described in these articles should prove valuable.

NOTE: If you see a term here that you don’t understand or just want to brush up for the SAT, visit the Computer Glossary I put together that defines the basic computer components. I included a handy UPGRADE SCORE for each component that is used in designing your next computer.

WHY BUY?

First things first – what is behind the decision to get a new computer?

Typically, people are upgrading from a 5-7 year old computer that is too painful to use. It’s slow, ugly, has served it’s purpose well, but it’s time to get current.

If your needs are minimal, a rebuild of that old computer may be sufficient for your needs. You should be able to expect a faster, more reliable experience – much like what you experienced when you first got it. Most people discount this option because they can’t imagine their dinosaur being able to act like a spring chicken again, but it is possible and costs much less than a new machine. Additionally, you can add more RAM and a faster hard drive and you are back in business.

If that isn’t you, it’s probably safe to assume that you genuinely need a more powerful system. The rule of thumb in this scenario is to plan for the future.

LAPTOP OR DESKTOP?

LAPTOPS
Everyone wants a laptop – their sexy and portable and the possibilities are limitless, but there’s a price for all that beauty…literally a price. You can expect to pay 1.5X – 2X more for a comparably equipped laptop when you compare apples to apples (not Macs…we’ll get to that).

Additionally, the number of upgrades you can do to a laptop to extend it’s useful existence is quite limited – in fact, memory is just about all you can change on a laptop if you want to respect the manufacturer’s specifications. Maybe a bigger hard drive of the same speed, but again, typically not much that would affect performance.

Only the very high-end laptops by the likes of Alienware allow you to swap out components and for the money ($2,500 – $3,500),  one would hope so.

So, the rule of thumb is to buy as much laptop as you can afford and spend your money on processor, video card and screen because your computing needs will probably be dramatically different three years from now than they are today. More power means more life and a delay from having to go through this process all over again.

DESKTOPS
When looking at performance, desktops win every time. The options are greater and the number of configurations are literally limitless. From triple video cards to 32GB of RAM to dual CPUs (not dual core) to 3+ hard drives…you name it, you can probably get it. If your needs are in the gaming, video creation/editing or 3-D worlds, a desktop is the only option. This limitless configuration also ensures that you can upgrade your components down the road to more powerful ones that ultimately lead to longer life.

Furthermore, desktops are much less expensive and that’s due in part to the generic needs to build one – there’s just less to engineer when you don’t have to cram it all into a 6″x10″x2″ box. The number of suppliers for components is also much higher.

Obviously, the portability factor is kinda low (my desktop weighs in at about 40lbs and sits on wheels) and a big metal box isn’t very sexy. So, the rule of thumb here is to get into the current family of technology with just enough power to do what you need in the next year. You’ll be able to upgrade based on need down the road.

Once you’ve made the decision to buy a new computer, the decision between a laptop and a desktop comes down to the need to be mobile because all other factors make it an easy choice – the desktop wins every time. Don’t underestimate the power of this decision – it sets into motion the rest of the process, which is explained in the next post. Stay tuned…

It all started with a delivery by my neighbor that had a box with a letter and a bag of items inside. He relayed a story of how he came into possession of the box (great job BTW) that was very Indiana Jones/Men in Black-ish. The kids were in awe and as soon as the door was closed, they were in the box.

The letter outlined the game and had one hint on it that led to a map where 12 plastic bottles were hidden. On the back, it had what looked like notes from someone who had been tracking the treasure for some time (ala Myst). Included were GPS coordinates to the bottles and the plan was to walk the neighborhood and find these bottles, but the weather had a different idea as it rained the entire day. So, we loaded up the van and a follow car and headed out.

It was quite a sight to see – me and three little boys running around in the rain looking for little plastic bottles with only the GPS unit guiding the way. After crossing back and forth over the one square mile that made up the playing field, we finally had all 12 bottles in hand. Now it was back home to find out what they contained.

Inside each bottle was a multiple-choice Thanksgiving trivia question and each was marked with a roman numeral from 1 to 12.

I had the best time designing the game and the treasure was worth the effort and we now have a memory that will last a lifetime, which is the point of holidays I have to say. Good luck and post a comment on how you did.