Archive for September, 2009

Is a Fixed Income a Sucker Bet?

Friday, September 11th, 2009

I was just reading an article by Steve Pavlina which starts off saying that having a fixed income (i.e job) is dumb. You may or may not agree with that but there’s some other great stuff in the article and I highly recommend reading it.

Anyway I wrote a comment in the forums and realised it would make a good blog post.

Positive Affirmation Posters

There was some talk about putting up positive affirmation posters at work and what colleagues might think. So I posted about my experience as follows:

I put up some positive affirmations at work about being highly productive and loving working on my current game and making the best games in the world etc. and got a funny look from at least one person, but I don’t care because it works for me. You do have to break through a certain amount of social embarrassment if you do something like that though.

Hire an accountant

I was doing a talk last night at the Vancouver Film School to a load of Game Design students about my Indie game developer days and I mentioned some key things that Steve mentioned today. One was about hiring an accountant because they save you time and money so are totally worth it. I don’t want to fill out boring forms, I’ll delegate that to an expert so I can do what I do best. I’ve used an accountancy firm for 7 years with zero regrets.

Speculate to Accumulate

Another thing I mentioned at the talk was “Speculate to Accumulate” in relation to spending money on a business venture. Normally people have no problem spending money on stuff that depreciates in value like a car or a huge TV, but when it comes to investing money in something, fear kicks in and they don’t want to spend the money. In 2006 I decided to spend about $2300 on a game I was making and I reasoned that the worst case was I’d loose it all, a middle case was I’d loose some or break even, and a best case was I’d profit by anywhere from $0.01 to infinity. Turns out the game has made $23,000 so far, nearly a 10x ROI, and it only took me 5 weeks to make, so I’m pretty pleased with that. Also, I constantly receive royalties for that game so the figure goes up every day 🙂

Why am I employed right now?

You may have noticed from my post above that I’m now employed instead of Indie (self-employed), and yes that was a hard transition but I did it for the experience of moving to another country and learning from the best in the industry, and to get paid loads. I still own my company and it still makes me passive income, which is nice.

So, who knows what the future holds? (Well I guess I probably do as I have a 5 year plan – do you? But things can change.) Most likely at some point I’ll run my own company again after building up more skills and contacts. Some people would worry about posting stuff like that on-line, but it’s the truth and don’t believe in having two personalities i.e. public and private like people do on facebook, how lame – and that’s a topic for a whole other post. Besides whilst I’m still an employee, I’ll be a damn good one because I want it to be win-win for me and them.

Anyway, that’s my thoughts. Hope they are useful to someone.

Hire me to speak!

Monday, September 7th, 2009

As I’ve mentioned before I’m improving my public speaking skills because I really enjoy helping people to become successful as game designers, or in running their business, or just in their daily lives. I feel like it’s a mission of mine, a life purpose if you will, and I intend to pursue it.

Already I help people via my blog and I receive grateful comments and emails every week that encourage me to keep going (thanks everyone!) I also enjoy talking to people one-on-one about their goals and aspirations to see if I can help them – so public speaking seems like a good way to literally reach a larger audience. Plus it’s a self-growth experience for me because I have to be confident and communicate my ideas clearly.

Anyway, I’ve made a list of my speaking credentials and would love to hear from you if you are interested in having me do a speech at your venue, or even an interview (via email or phone or whatever).

2 New Categories: My Interviews and Speeches

Monday, September 7th, 2009

Like the post title says, I’ve just created 2 new categories that link to interviews featuring myself (there’s a new interview on the way soon) and speeches that I’ve made because I’m doing more and more of them (couple more on the way soon). My interviews and speeches are jam-packed with great information that compliments this blog such as: game design, motivation/positive thinking, and being an Indie developer – so please check them out and enjoy!