Effective is doing the right things for the right results. Efficient is optimizing. It’s the least waste of time and effort.

Before you try to be more efficient, first try to be more effective. There’s no point in optimizing ineffective things. I think of this as first asking, “What do I want to accomplish?”, then asking, “Where can I optimize?”

My manager pointed out to me a while back that today’s problem isn’t information overload, it’s filter failure. Here’s a quote by Clay Shirky, New York University new-media professor, writer, and consultant …

What do we do when we get overwhelmed? We we’re up to our neck in stuff, or worse, in over our head, we shut down, compartmentalize, or we channelize.

The military knows this and they know it well, because lives are at stake. Hospitals know this well because again, lives are at stake. Yet this simple pattern can affect us at home or on the job.

I’ve been asking people inside and outside Microsoft what their definition is of … the good life. I think it’s important, so you know what it is when you’ve got it, or you know what is is that you’re chasing, so you can make smarter choices.

I’ve long been a fan of writing things down to free myself up. A while back, a friend of mine got me in the habit of carrying a little yellow sticky pad everywhere I go. It lets me jot things down, wherever I go, so I never have to keep things buzzing around in my head.

Curiosity killed the cat, but it helps an old dog learn new tricks. John Medina of Brain Rules says curiosity is the most important thing. It’s what brings you joy and it’s how you achieve mastery.

While I’ve always been curious and a natural seeker, I’ve really improved my curiosity over the last few years using 3 ways …

“If you don’t know the trees you may be lost in the forest, but if you don’t know the stories you may be lost in life.” —Siberian Elder

We’re wired for stories. Stories help us make meaning and they help us remember things. They can also help us simplify and avoid getting overwhelmed in our everyday things. The big idea to keep in mind here is that you’re the most important story teller in your life, and you can use little stories for getting results.

Some things bounce back, and some things don’t … Sometimes the right metaphor helps us see things in a new way, or just right. In his 30 second speech on work-life balance, Brian Dyson (CEO of Coca Cola) gives us a powerful metaphor for thinking about what bounces back, and what does not:

“You don’t overcome challenges by making them smaller but by making yourself bigger.” – John C. Maxwell

When it comes to getting results, it takes motivation and ability. Motivation makes things happen. Where there’s no will, there’s no way.

I dedicated a full chapter on motivation in my Getting Results book, but I want to give you an introduction here. If you can master motivation, you can deal with life’s setbacks, as well as inspire yourself to always find a way forward, and create new experiences for yourself, and follow your growth. In this post, I’ll demystify motivation and give you the tools that really work.

“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.” — Anotole France

Now’s a great time to pick your dreams up, blow the dust off, and get ready to make them happen. This month is all about getting results. Along the way, I’ll introduce you to methods from my book, Getting Results, that you can use to stack the deck in your favor and increase your chances of success.

“I learn teaching from teachers. I learn golf from golfers. I learn winning from coaches.” — Harvey Penick

What you get from coaching is largely up to you. Whether it’s a teacher, a mentor, a sports coach, or a coach at work, making the most of a coach is a skill that you get better at with practice. If you can master your ability to leverage the coaches in your life, you can accelerate your success, drop bad habits like a hot potato, grow new skills and abilities, and make the most of what you’ve got.

“Change is not a destination, just as hope is not a strategy.” — Rudy Giuliani

You can hope for the best, or you can focus on effective strategies to improve your business or your life. A Strategy Diamond is a crisp way to analyze, visualize, summarize, and share your strategy for your product or your business.

I collect success. From stories of heroes to gems of insight, I gather and organize principles, patterns, and practices for success. It’s like a living playbook for life with short-cuts, success patterns, and proven practices. It supplies me with insight and action that I can use for just about every situation. Whether it’s motivation or strategies or tactics, it’s my unfair advantage and how I get the edge in life. It’s truly how I “stand on the shoulders of giants.”

Editor’s note: Meet Dan Schawbel. Dan’s super skill is personal branding and he has an impressive set of credentials.

Dan is the bestselling author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success, an award winning blogger at Personal Branding Blog, the publisher of Personal Branding Magazine, a national speaker and consultant on branding, and a BusinessWeek columnist. He’s been called a “Personal Branding Guru” by The New York Times and has been featured in over 150 media outlets.

“If I tell you I love you, can I keep you forever?” – Casper

When you’re in love the birds sing, the sun shines, and the flowers bloom. When you’re broken hearted, the world turns cold and black.

In the spirit of Valentine’s Day, I decided to put together a collection of love quotes for your browsing pleasure. I reached far and wide across songs, movies, and famous people to find some of the best quotable quotes.

One of our greatest sources of pain in life is when our expectations aren’t met. Surprisingly, we can control this if we know how to figure out our expectations and the expectations of others.

We all have rules for things, whether we know them or not. If you know your rules, you can find ways to speed up your success or change what’s not working for you. When you don’t know your rules, you might be doing all the right things, but then feel unsuccessful inside because you have unrealistic expectations. When you don’t know other people’s rules you might create conflict because you violate their rules.

What if you could be 10,000 times more productive? Imagine what you could accomplish. Imagine how you can compete in today’s world. Imagine the personal mountains you could move like molehills.

“No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.” — Voltaire

I see good people go from good to great all the time. It’s not magic. It’s passion, purpose, and action. They find their path, they have a purpose, and if they get knocked down, they get up again. They keep asking better and better questions that get them closer to their goals and they continue to find the people and resources that support them on their journey. They turn resistance into growth and they fully immerse themselves in the experience. I’ve boiled down the pattern I see into 10 keys.

Editor’s note: Meet Nadia Ballas-Ruta. Nadia is author of the bountiful blog, Happy Lotus, and her super skill is spirituality. She was trained by a Buddhist master and this turned out to be one of her most powerful, life changing events. Nadia fondly recalls this as meeting her Master Yoda, the way Luke Skywalker did in Star Wars.

While working on my latest book, I had more than a few people ask me about spirituality. They wanted a succinct explanation or a simple model. I started going through various definitions, models, and testing what I could find. Here’s what I arrived at …