I have a dream / Part 1

It has been 3 years since I wrote my last post..And the last post was about procrastination :) At this point I can't help, but embed this link here =)


These days I started getting excited about a new project in my mind..I don't know whether I can maintain progress on it, or not, but I'm really excited now.. As being a person who tries to be happy and likes taking risks as long as it is safe (?!).. I quit my job and started thinking about this project of mine.. I gave myself a bit of time to go into action..And if I don't, I promise I'll go back to my lovely job :) One of my best friends who gives me a real support about my project sent me this link and it really makes sense at this point..

And if you are wondering what the project is about, if you know me a little bit, probably you'd guess it's something about my sister..So..wish me luck about it =)

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/497084877591335755/

Are you a procrastinator?

The intervals between the posts started getting longer..And I thought procrastination would be a good topic start up again..

I noticed that since 5 months, I have been procrastinating anything that I want to do..

I really want to do at least 1 thing from my "Do before you die" list before 2010 ends..May be the list is way too unrealistic..But starting is priceless, isn't it? And I, especially, used the verb "Learn", I don't want to be a pro at each of them, I just want to learn..I just want to start..

Here is a few realistic samples from my utopic list:
-Get a professional camera, learn how to use it
-Learn one more language (Spanish/Italian)
-Learn a dance (Salsa/Tango)
-Yoga certificate
-Learn playing piano
-Trips around the world
-Write a book
-Discover your dream job and do it..

Actually I kind of started..Got a camera..Now it's time for practice..

So procrastination..I tried to think about it and analyze its nature..And I reached the rules below:

«http://www.suberapps.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/pto_thumb_300x300.jpg»

The art of procrastination
*Make at least 1 excuse for each specific situation
*Make yourself believe that you will start the other day
*Pity yourself and make yourself believe that you are too tired to start
*Hard part- make others believe that you don't have time and you are too tired to start
*Put small goals before starting work such as watching 1 episode himym, calling a friend, cleaning home (if your main aim is not cleaning)
*Always believe that a time except the moment you are in is a better time to start..

Warning: If you are a good procrastinator, questions such as "Do I really have to do this thing??" starts popping up in your mind and you may end up thinking that you don't really need to do anything -> This is the dangerous part!

Think it as a test; How many items above do you think fits you? If your result is(3-4+), Congratz! You are a procrastinator!

PS: I don't accept any responsibilities.. =)

Down Sendromu Farkindalik Aktiviteleri

3 Eylul'de Istinye Park'ta cok ama cok guzel bir sergiyle baslayan bu aktiviteleri haber vermekte oldukca geciktim aslinda..Eger Down Sendromunun ne oldugunu merak ediyorsaniz, cok uzaklarda bi yerlerde olsa da Down'lu bir tanidiginiz varsa, Down Sendromu nedir ki diyorsaniz veya benim gibi hayatinizda asik oldugunuz cok ozel bir Down varsa bu aktivitelere bi yerinden katilmanizi siddetle tavsiye ediyorum...

Mesela 11 Ekim'e kadar Beyoglu Galatasaray'da olacak sergiyi kacirmayin kesinlikle..Ozellikle de sergide yer alan fotograflari kimin cektigini okuyunca etkilenmemek mumkun degil..

Bir de tabi ki pazar gunu olan dostluk yuruyusu var..3 Ekim Pazar saat 15:00'te Galatarasay-Tunel arasinda Beyoglu Belediye Baskani Ahmet Misbah Demircan'in da katilimiyla bu tatli insanlarla ve onlar icin, onlari biraz daha tanimak ve tanitabilmek icin yuruyecegiz hep beraberce..

Siz de bu ozel insanlarla tanismak istiyorsaniz mutlaka gelin olur mu, huzur garantili!

Hey you!

It’s been a very long time since I wrote my last post..I don’t know whether it’s a coincidence, or not, but since I changed the name of my blog to “Everything, Anything” , it became a lot more difficult to write something . I guess I should have been more specific..

What I’ve done..What have changed in my life..Not so many things..Just changed a country, a city, a job, friends and anything that I used to..that’s all..(=

I left the US and moved back to Turkey, but to “Istanbul” this time with a new job..I was trying to find one in the United States, but I wasn’t so lucky..My luck started with my entrance to the US..It was September 16 when I entered to the US and Lehman Brothers cited a bank debt of $613 billion..But I didn’t lose my hope and had one of the best years in my life in Santa Barbara..it was all perfect living in somewhere you can reach the ocean in 5 minutes..

My certification program was also one of the best choices I’ve ever made in my life..I learned lot of lots of things in the marketing certification program (me at pg 6 =)) with all the perfect instructors, program curriculum, projects that helped me to find out that how much I love creating ideas..And gained lots of friends (Alexi & Anja♡)..

After completing the program, I had about 3-4 months for looking for a job, but I was able to use only 1 month because of personal reasons (may be this is the thing called fate)..I was interviewed with Google and Zappos(♡ the company of my dreams). These both didn’t go well. (Zappos – I haven’t given up yet =))

This is now all I have from the United States =)



And in a way, I’m here in Turkey again..Working..and trying to get used to my new life..

I was supposed to be working in the US according to my plans while leaving Ankara, but I found myself changing cities and even countries..Life’s changing & time’s passing so quickly without you even notice..And I don’t really have any clue what’s going to be next..The only thing I know that there are so many things that I want to do and I haven’t actually started doing them..I’m still trying to figure out myself and have the best that I can, live the best I can..I’m happy as who I am and I’m trying to create fine moments in my life that is going to help to sustain and power this happiness..that’s the aim of my life..If you want to join, you’re always welcome =)

I think the presentation below about delivering happiness that Tony Hsieh (Zappos CEO) prepared as a present to little Ava(11) to teach a few important things about life probably summarizes most of the things I’ve tried to say..

Ava 11th Birthday - Delivering Happiness

View more presentations from zappos.

See you soon...

After I saw Holland, I'd say, I'd go to Holland again and again

I just read a poem of Emily Perl Kingsley about having a child with disability and I wanted to share it with you..This poem tells a lot and better than most of the sources..



WELCOME TO HOLLAND
by
Emily Perl Kingsley.


c1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

Zappos & Amazon sitting in a tree =)

I’ve been feeling so excited, happy and curious at the same time since I got the news about Amazon and Zappos. I think I don’t need to tell my feelings about Zappos from the beginning now, but they’re special for me, you know that.

Now Amazon joined the party, too. And now what? I first had the news as “Amazon Acquires Zappos for bla bla” , and there are also a million news as “Amazon buys Zappos”, but it’s actually not exactly like that.

I’m sure that anyone who knows a few things about Zappos also knows that the thing that creates the “Zappos thing” is their culture, values, the people who were chosen carefully to be a perfect fit to Zappos team and it’s not so easy to acquire all of those by a specific amount of money.

As Tony says in his letter today “I personally would prefer the headline “Zappos and Amazon sitting in a tree…””. And yep, let’s say so. Because when we say so, we’d also mention one of the most powerful partnerships and then it fits the spirit of the transaction more.

I’m sure it’d be perfect for both of these companies that I adore.

They both think about their customers, they both make us want to shop like crazy, and they’re both good at building relationships with us, customers and making us happy in a way. Only their styles differ in these processes.

As Tony also mentioned, Amazon makes us happy with low prices, variety of goods, and convenience in a lot of ways while Zappos makes us happy by developing sincere relationships, friendly connections and WOWing us all the time.

So I’m excited and happy about the future of the shopping with these companies. It’s so peaceful to know that both of these companies are going to do their bests for us, therefore the only thing to do for us is to enjoy it.

And I’m really curious about what are these companies going to learn from each other and how is it going to reflect to us exactly?

Zappos & Amazon! WOW!

What do you think?

My Culture, Your Culture, Our Culture..

Zappos Core Values by Me

I came to United States about 9 months ago and yep I changed a lot, but it’s impossible to replace all the past years’ experiences with these 9 months' .

There are about 7 billion people in the world who are all different from the each other; we think differently, feel differently, talk differently, live differently, etc. Although we have nearly similar problems, we have different solutions. But, when we look closer we see that some communities have similar solutions or we can at least group some of the people based on some similarities. We can group people according to their nationalities, according to their gender, and according to their jobs. So, what can we call this thing that connects some people, makes them understand others? It is like a secret agreement among the people in a community that helps them to stay together in peace and to create a unity. Yes, our word is CULTURE.

May be we all born with some characteristics, but as we grow, we learn a lot of things from our environment. We learn how to think, how to speak, how to behave and even how to feel. We start being programmed slowly with all these data. When we want to make some changes in our program after a few years, we need to reach main code of our program to make a permanent change, which is not so possible. But one thing we can do is to add some new properties to our program and use the convenient ones in the convenient times.

So culture makes us connected, helps us to understand each other and to generate common solutions, constitutes the feeling of unity, and as a result creates a society that has the same interests.

While there is the culture for a country that creates the feeling of homesickness, another one is the company culture which makes a substantial company and differentiates it from the others.

Zappos is the company that introduced me the concept of company culture. After observing their efforts on creating their core values and keeping them alive, I started to think the importance of having a specific company culture. And it didn’t take me so long to understand its importance after I started following Zappos blog, following Tony and other Zapponians on Twitter, and reading Zappos Culture book. Everyone is working so hard just to present their culture and core values in a lot of different ways, and they are really good at this. As they always do, they again create another brilliant idea to pull us to more inside of Zappos with their 2 day Bootcamp which is to express themselves in a different way. And I found myself again trying to meet these people, to be a closer witness to their success. May be this is my lucky day..