Posts Tagged ‘Carl Jung’

About Old Fashioned Thinking

Monday, December 21st, 2009

 

Success Tips for First-Time Entrepreneurs

 

Being a first-time entrepreneur can be challenging and nerve-wracking but also very exciting and rewarding. There is no end to the many financial, legal, staffing, marketing, and customer issues that will come up as you launch your business. A‎nd, unfortunately, there is a lot of conflicting advice out there for the aspiring entrepreneur. But here are 15 core tips to help you begin navigating the startup landscape:

1‎. First-time entrepreneurs should start a business they are passionate and knowledgeable about

Startups can be quite a grind, so pick something that excites and motivates you. Avoid businesses or industries that you don’t already know a good deal about, as the steep learning curve may hamper your success. Check out the best images of harold matzner.

2. Pick a business idea that has a big market opportunity

Make sure to carefully reseach if there’s a big market for your product or service. Investors will typically only invest in your company if they see a large market opportunity and that the company has the potential to grow into something significant.

3. Raise as much startup funding as you can

It’s almost always harder and takes longer to raise startup financing than you think. You must ensure you have a cushion for all the product development and marketing expenses you will incur. In an ideal world, you will have sufficient capital for your operations to break even. Don’t worry about diluting your percentage ownership in the company. Developing a great product takes time and money.

Check out these two articles on raising financing from invest‎ors: 28 Mistakes Entrepreneurs Make When Pitching to Investors and 20 Things Entrepreneurs Should Know About Angel Investors.

4. Constantly monitor your finances

You must keep on top of all of your expenses, income and balance sheet. Many startups have failed because the entrepreneur wasn’t able to adjust spending to avoid running out of cash. Maintain a low overhead. Be frugal with expenses and avoid unnecessary costs. Learn to live on a shoestring budget until meaningful revenues start to flow in.

5. Research the competitionMake sure you are thoroughly researching competitive products or services in the marketplace, and keep on top of new developments and enhancements from your competitors. ‎One way to do this is to set up a Google alert to notify you when any new information about your competitors shows up online.

6. Ask for advice from other entrepreneurs

Advice from other entrepreneurs and business professionals (such as lawyers and accountants) can prove to be invaluable. Consider putting together an advisory board, and don’t be afraid to motivate members by giving them stock options in your company. Read industry newsletters and startup publications like AllBusiness.com and Entrepreneur.com. Find mentors who can give you advice on hiring, product development, marketing and fundraising‎.

7. Develop a great elevator pitch

You should have a succinct and compelling story about what your startup does and what problem it solves. Have this ready for potential customers and investors (although you will need to tailor it to the specific audience)‎. Keep it to 30 seconds or less. Articulate your mission and goals, and why your product or service is compelling and unique. And if an investor is interested, be prepared to follow up with an executive summary about the company or a 12-15 slide PowerPoint “deck” that dives into more detail about the company and the market opportunity.

 

About Cradle to Cradle

Friday, August 15th, 2008

In 1998 William McDonough and Michael Braungart wrote an article called The NEXT Industrial Revolution. It was the start of a new sustainable design philosophy called Cradle to Cradle. Cradle to Cradle wants to restore the Natural Cycle.

Cradle to Cradle is based on three pillars: Equity (Social Justice), Economy (Market Viability), and Ecology (Environmental Intelligence).

 A citation out of the Next Industrial Revolution:

Many people believe that new industrial revolutions are already taking place, with the rise of cybertechnology, biotechnology, and nanotechnology. It is true that these are powerful tools for change. But they are only tools-hyperefficient engines for the steamship of the first Industrial Revolution. Similarly, eco-efficiency is a valuable and laudable tool, and a prelude to what should come next. But it, too, fails to move us beyond the first revolution. It is time for designs that are creative, abundant, prosperous, and intelligent from the start. The model for the Next Industrial Revolution may well have been right in front of us the whole time: a tree“.

A citation out of Carl Jung, Prologue from “Memories, Dreams, Reflections“:

Life has always seemed to me like a plant that lives on its rhizome. Its true life is invisible, hidden in the rhizome. The part that appears above the ground lasts only a single summer. Then it withers away-an ephemeral apparition. When we think of the unending growth and decay of life and civilizations, we cannot escape the impression of absolute nullity. Yet I have never lost the sense of something that lives and endures beneath the eternal flux. What we see is blossom, which passes. The rhizome remains“.

In the introduction chapter of A Thousands Plateaus, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, characterize the rhizome by six principles:

  • Connectivity

The capacity to aggregate by making connections at any point on and within itself.

  • Heterogeneity

The capacity to connect anything with anything other, the linking of unlike elements.

  • Multiplicity

Consisting of multiple singularities synthesized into a “whole” by relations of exteriority.

  • Asignifying rupture

Not becoming any less of a rhizome when being severely ruptured, the ability to allow a system to function and even flourish despite local breakdowns.

  • Cartography

A method of mapping for orientation from any point of entry within a “whole”, rather than by the method of tracing that re-presents an a priori path.

  • Decalcomania

Forming through continuous negotiation with its context, constantly adapting by experimentation

Cradle to Cradle (CtC) is a Design Philosophy. Design (Mapping Ideas unto A Model) is the first step in a Cyclic Process or even better a Spiraling Spiral Process.

I don’t know what the Philosphy of CtC is about the other “phases” of the Spiraling Spiral. I have not spend the time to read the Book. I am almost sure CtC is applying the Paradigm of the Age of Enlightment that lies behind the Industrial Revolution. Cradle to Cradle wants to CONTROL Nature by COPYING Nature.

The Question is Do We (and CtC) really Understand How Nature Works?

Is Nature Working at all?

Is Nature Functioning “like-a” Machine?

Are we able to Copy something we don’t Understand?

What are We Copying?

Is Copying without Insight perhaps a Way to Create something New?

Does it Matter if we are Creating Something New without Knowing what We are Doing”?

Is Life Itself not just a Creating Force exploring Every Possibility Available?

What is Wrong and What is Right?

The most interesting point in the article about the Next Industrial Revolution is the Use of the Tree Metaphor.

The Tree is a very old Symbol. It represents something that starts at the Bottom (Earth) and Moves Up. When it Moves Up is expands into a Hierarchical Network. At the top of the Tree of Life (or the Axis Mundi) the Ultimate Power, the Giver of Movement and Measure, is situated. Behind the New Industrial Revolution the Hierarchy (UP) and the Part (One;Tree) of the Whole (Many;Forest) becomes visible. If we are Moving UP we are Abstracting (or Imagining with Reason).

Jung, Deleuze & Guattari look at the The Down, the Primal Source, The Unknowable, the Invisible or the Unconsciousness. The Invisible is covered by Dark Earth. It is indestructible, connected, divers, not-linear, experimenting and adapting. The Invisible is the Rhizome. Every Year out of the Invisible Rhizome A Beautifull Rose Grows and Blossoms. “What we see is blossom, which passes. The rhizome remains“. (Jung).

If we Move Down we are Acting In The World instead of Looking at the World (The Observer).

When we move Down we have to become Practical.

What is the Practical Use, The Engineering Perspective, of the Rhizome?

There are Infinite Perspectives on our Reality and Engineering is just One of Them. We could add a Social Perspective and an Ecomic Perspective just like Cradle to Cradle is trying to do but there is more. We could add a Poetic and an Artistic Perspective but there is more. We could add an Animal perspective. We could look with the Eyes of the Ape, the Cat, The Fish, the Tiger, The Bacterium, The Sea, The Clouds, The Weather. We could use our Empathy to Imagine how the Earth, The Sun, The Universe, Molecules, Cells, Atoms, Higgs Particles, Cars, Aeroplanes, Ipods are “looking” at the Ecology of My Garden, Our Village, Your Country, Their Culture. We could even Look at Ourselves.

Are we able to Unite all of these Perspectives? Yes and No.

No: they are Different.

Yes: They are Perspectives and Perspectives are Looking at the Same Thing.

They are looking at the Whole but the Whole is not a Thing. It is a interconnected Adapting Diversity. It is a highly Complex Dynamic Network of Networks of Events. We cannot detect Causality because Causality is related to a Liniair Perspective.  Every Act is the Cause and the Effect of any other Act.

If we look from a Distance (the Observer) we See Repeating Cyclic Patterns that are Self-References.

If we Find these Patterns (Frames of Reference) we Know where the Flow of Nature is moving to for a little while. The Pattern becomes Repetitive. At a sudden moment the Flow moves in another Way and we have to Observe again. If we Move with the Flow we will know Where we are “Allowed” to Build and to Grow. If we Feel the Field we will See that A Building or an Engine is already Designed and wants to Move to Reality. We don’t have to Design. The Design is Immanent. We just have to help to Materialize.

The most interesting Self-Reference to explore is I (You).

I am in the World and the World is in Me.

Spirit and Soul: How the Soul was Wiped of the Earth

Sunday, June 3rd, 2007

At the Rommelmarkt in Delft I bought the book Carl Jung and Soul Psychology.

In the book I found an article of James Hillman called Soul and Spirit. The article gave me a lof of insight so I started to look for James Hillman with Google.

I found the following: “Hillman’s 1997 book, The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling, outlines what he calls the acorn theory of the soul.

This theory states that each individual holds the potential for their unique possibilities inside themselves already, much as an acorn holds the pattern for an oak, invisible within itself.

It argues against the parental fallacy whereby our parents are seen as crucial in determining who we are by supplying us with genetic material and behavioral patterns.

Instead the book suggests for a reconnection with what is invisible within us, our daimon or acorn and its calling to the wider world of nature.

It argues against theories which attempt to map life into phases, suggesting that this is counter-productive and makes people feel like they are failing to live up to what is normal.

This in turn produces a truncated, normalized society of soulless mediocrity where evil is not allowed but injustice is everywhere—a society that cannot tolerate eccentricity or the further reaches of life experiences but sees them as illnesses to be prescriptive and argues against the idea of life-maps by which to try and grow properly.

Instead, Hillman suggests a reappraisal for each individual of their own childhood and present life to try and find their particular calling, the seed of their own acorn.

He replaces the notion of growing up, with the myth of growing down from the womb into a messy, confusing earthy world.

Hillman rejects formal logic in favour of reference to case histories of well known people and considers his arguments to be in line with the puer eternis or eternal youth whose brief burning existence could be seen in the work of romantic poets like Keats and Byron and in recently deceased young rock stars like Kurt Cobain.

Hillman also rejects causality as a defining framework and suggests in its place a shifting form of fate whereby events are not inevitable but bound to be expressed in some way dependent on the character of the soul in question”.

The citations speak for themselves.

What was my insight?

In the article Hillman shows the development of the symbol Soul.

Soul is an ambigouis concept because if it was a well defined concept it could not exist.

He showes that because of the process of definition the soul degenerated in time. The soul was wiped out of the Earth.  

Soul is not a concept but a perspective, a mediator. Soul is a reflection of ourselves in streaming water. It deepens Events into experiences.The Soul is the creator of metaphor, dreams, images and fantasies.