Like all of you, while on “my road” I hit a rough patch, spin out, get confused, lick my wounds and wonder what I should do next.

In my car my GPS helps. In my business and my life it’s my annual plan.

Here are a few good reasons why you need to have one, why to keep it close at hand – and why it needs to be kept current.

1.   Taking Action Without Planning  

When it comes to your goals and the future, impulsiveness is the mother of regret. Considerable thought should be given to the ends as well as the means of your strategy.

2.   Planning versus Action  

Planning without action is worse than action without planning. It’s better to be first than to be perfect.

3.   Unrealistic Timeframes and Expectations  

Life is a process not an event. Nothing great was ever built in a day. Exercise wisdom and learn to be patient. Unfortunately most things in life take longer and cost more than the best-laid plans anticipate.

4.   Motive

Why you want to achieve a goal is far more important than the goal itself.

• The rabbit running for his life is more motivated than the fox who is running for his dinner.

5.   Denial  

“Denial is a river in Egypt” and an extremely popular destination for those looking for an easy way out – or a simple solution. Solid success required solid, reliable information. When you deny reality for whatever reason, you discount the importance and the integrity of good information and invite personal + business failure.

6.   Conflicting Values  

When you have not defined your reasons and motives for success you default to and are motivated by the definitions of others. At some mission-critical junction your values will be in conflict with those of others and your progress will STOP!

7.   Diffusion of Energy

Doing too much too soon is a recipe for mediocrity and failure. Do an excellent job on the fundamentals and build solid track for your future endeavors.

8.   Lack of Focus  

Success demands focus. It is the hallmark of all truly great people. Your ability to get and remain focused over the long haul is a key determinant of your success.

9.   Fear Of Failure  

Fear resides where knowledge does not; the more you know, the less intimidated you’ll feel. Replace your fears with knowledge and watch your performance leap.

For a long as I can remember my mother has been sending out hand written thank-you notes. So does my older sister. My wife and I mix it up with e-mails and phone calls, but I admit it’s not the same thing.

One of our sales coaches swears by the value of written notes. An international business executive who jets around North America in his own lear jet, he devotes at least a 1/2 hour each day to writing hand-written notes to his core clients. This is in addition to a multi-million dollar on and offline campaign to promote his business.

Yesterday I received a tax receipt, form letter, U+A survey, pre-paid return envelope AND a hand written note from Second Harvest Food Rescue. The note thanks me, tells me how many people my donation will help and encourages me to stay in touch. It’s a very nice touch.   

I know enough about NFP, and direct mail to tell you four things:

1.  Handwritten inserts can easily double DM response rates.

2.  2HFR would not be employing this media tactic if it wasn’t offing them a (statistically) significant lift in DM response rates.  

3.  DM when designed properly and employed by the right brand for the right reasons is still a very powerful advertising tool.

4.  Generalizing (think best practices) about DM or any other (on or offline) medium is pointless because the holistic context is fundamental to an insightful and effective media campaign. (Meaning it takes a pro to set it up and make it work properly.)

There’s another condo going up in my Toronto neighborhood.
While the renderings for this condo (on the hoarding + website) are gorgeous, the copy is written and client approved by idiots.

(Unlike other construction projects her in Toronto,) this development is “Naturally strong.” and “Infinitely beautiful”.
It’s called “HeartwoodTheBeach” - all one word. My guess this is a cleaver little (SEO optimized) wordplay.  

Bonus: residences are “Designed by nature.” and “Grown by the sun.”

In my 40 or so years in the advertising business, this takes the cake for stupid copy. If I had my way, pink slips would be handed out to the copywriter, graphic artist, art director, and the client for having the audacity to look at this stuff and conclude that they have done a piece of incredible work.

When I walk by this tree in the morning it’s easy for me to think of our ancestors who worshipped “pagan” religions and how they may have been inspired by a determined fruit tree like this. The tenacity of it’s fruit makes me want to bring some of it into my home on December 22nd, our longest night, and add it to the ritual celebration that invites the light to return to our cold, dark world.

But I won’t. Left on the tree all those who pass can admire the tree and be inspired by it, and the wild things that need food will have a bit more to get themselves through the lean times.

Like so many other holidays, today’s “Christmas” is a just another sales event that I don’t really want to take part in.

Here’s a brief history of how a peaceful pastoral setting like this apple tree became today's Christmas.

As Christians spread their religion into Europe in the first centuries A.D., they ran into people living by a variety of local and regional religious creeds. Early Christians wanted to convert “pagans”, but they were also fascinated by their traditions.

The Christmas tree is a 17th-century German invention.

The modern Santa Claus is a descendent of England's Father Christmas, who was not originally a gift-giver.

Father Christmas and other European variations are versions of old pagan ideas about spirits who travel the sky in midwinter.

The dark days of winter, and the solstice, were lightened with feasts and decorations that invited the light to return.

With no Biblical directive to do so and no mention in the Gospels of the correct date, it wasn't until the fourth century that church leaders in Rome embraced the holiday. To show that Jesus was a real human being, not just another “spirit” like other religions worshipped, a celebration of his birth was invented.

Pagan midwinter festivals, and the lengthening days after the winter solstice in mid December were already widely celebrated and the date had a good fit for the new Christian festival celebrating “the birth of Christ”.

While the Catholic Church gradually came to embrace Christmas, reformist-minded Protestants considering it little better than paganism. In England under Oliver Cromwell, Christmas and other saints' days were banned, and in New England it was illegal to celebrate Christmas for about 25 years in the 1600s.

People used to share presents on New Year's Day; blessing people to make them feel good as the year came to an end. It wasn't until the Victorian era of the 1800s that gift giving shifted to Christmas.