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I think it’s fair to say that Entourage is the best TV show I have seen my whole life.

For those of you who don’t know what Entourage is about, let me give you a brief summary. Entourage is a story about the life of a rising movie star Vincent Chase, his brother Johnny Chase, his best friend and manager of his career Eric Murphy and his good friend and driver Turtle.

These 4 guys grew up together back in Queens, New York and are best friends. Vince went from being a nobody to celebrity movie star by acting as the hero and lead role in the movie Aquaman. E (Eric Murphy) is Vince’s best friend since they were 6 years old and he is also the manager of Vince’s career. In other words, E does all the organising and gets Vince great roles in movies. Of course, Vince also has an agent, Ari Gold, who’s job it is to get Vince good roles in movies. Ari is quite a character and although he can be quite an asshole, he has some very respectable moral strength and good boundaries.

What makes Entourage so appealing is that it follows the life of a movie star in Beverly Hills. You get to see all the mansions, flashy cars, private jets, trips across the world, crazy parties, models, beautiful actresses. There are even many appearances of real-life celebrities like Kanye, TI, Mary J Blige, Matt Damon, David Schwimmer and more. But besides all that, you get to feel like you are living that life. The 4 guys are all so close and good friends that it feels like you are right there as part of their group when you are watching the show.

What I really loved about Entourage is how it shows that even someone like Vincent Chase, who goes from a nobody to instant world-wide celebrity after starring in the movie Aquaman, gets a series of bad luck and setbacks that almost bring him to the edge of breaking-down. That is something that I can really relate to because I have gone through a series of setbacks and bad luck for a good 3 years in a row and I thought it just happened to me. The lesson is that even though things get difficult, just keep your dukes up and stay in the ring. Never give up.

NOTE: If you have not seen entourage yet and you do not want me to ruin the show for you then you should not read the rest of this post because I am about to reveal some of the big plots and events that happen in the show.

After Vince has his initial success with acting in Aquaman and makes a few million dollars, he gets dozens of offers for roles in other movies. These offers were each worth millions of dollars, but because Vince was looking for something special, he turned all these offers down. He was not in a rush and wasn’t in it for the money, he wanted to act in a movie that he was passionate about and that would show the world that he is a real actor. Time went by, the guys enjoyed life, partied it up, more offers were turned down and still nobody was worried in the slightest because they were all confident that Vince would get another fantastic role in a fabulous movie.

Eventually Vince was able to get his hands on a project he had been wanting to do for two years. He had the chance to buy the script of the movie and create the movie himself. Vince and E decided that they both really wanted to do this, so Vince sold his house and used everything he owned to buy the script, and E put the majority of his own money into this project too. They found an investor who put up $30 million and they found a brilliant (but rather eccentric) director willing to do the movie with them.

Vince, E and the rest of the crew spent months filming the movie in Columbia, and after all that hard work and effort were finally rewarded with a film they thought was absolutely brilliant and would win Oscars. Their movie would first be unveiled to the public at the Cannes film festival. Due to all the hype and excitement around the movie Vince and the crew got an offer of $75 million dollars before the buyer had even seen the movie. It seemed like life could not get any better.

Then…life took a turn down a bad road. Their film was a total disaster at Cannes. People hated it. The buyer who had offered $75 million for the film before withdrew his offer and said that he hadn’t signed anything so they could sue him if they wanted. Good luck…his company was based in Dubai.

The failure of Vince’s own movie had drastic influence on his public image, and all of a sudden there were no more offers for millions of dollars. Vince was very low on cash (close to broke) since he had put all his own money into this movie. However, he was still not worried and convinced things would work out as they always do.

More time passed, more fun was had, more parties were thrown and still no job offers…

Vince finally got a break when E found some writers with a great script. E managed to get the script to Edward Norton who wanted to make the movie, and with some changes in management of a movie studio, Vince was able to get a role in this movie. Everything looked great again until…

Vince was on set, the scenes were being shot, it all looked perfect. But the lead actor kept stealing Vince’s lines…and the director was okay with it. In fact, Vince discovered that the director hated him and didn’t want him on the movie at all. Shortly thereafter, Vince gets fired off the movie and the movie gets shut down due to it being over-budget. Vince and the guys’ world comes crashing down. At this point Vince has really lost hope and begins to feel like he will never get a good role in a movie again.

E tries his best to get Vince a role and as a last resort uses the footage from Vince’s recent movie that was never made (and that Vince got fired from). E’s efforts don’t seem to make any progress and when Vince hears about it he gets into an argument with E. Vince blames E for all the lack of success in the last months and actually fires him. Vince fires his best friend and manager who he has known since he was 6 years old. This is how far the setbacks have driven Vince into a corner. All the time up to this point, Vince has pretty much shrugged his shoulders and maintained the conviction that everything would work out as it always has. Not anymore…the setbacks have finally gotten to him and as a result he took it out on his best friends.

Fortunately, E’s efforts of sending the footage of the unfinished film resulted in some powerful eyeballs viewing that footage, and got Vince requested for the lead role in a MAJOR movie. This was Vince’s comeback, and when Vince realised that he got the part because of E’s efforts, he immediately flew over to see him, apologized and got him back as his friend and manager.

Parting Words

This was a very brief summary of the entire six seasons of the show ‘Entourage’ and doesn’t come close to conveying its awesomeness. I really, really love that show!

The lessons that stood out from Entourage for me were:

• Even if success and money get handed to you on a silver platter, don’t take it for granted.




• Just because you have success or money or friends right now, does not mean that you will always have it.




• In life there will be days, weeks, months or years where you get setbacks or experience failures. You will make wrong decisions. Sometimes these setbacks keep coming, and they keep coming for periods of time that are longer than you expect them to last. Sometimes these setbacks will drive you to the point where you get really desperate, fearful or where you completely lose faith. The only thing you can do is trust and believe in yourself and keep trying the best you can, things will get better.

Where To Watch Entourage

If you haven’t watched Entourage yet and you’d like to start (which I absolutely recommend) then you have two options.

http://www.tvshow7.com/watch-entourage-online

It’s scary to think that nothing you do today will matter at some point in the future because our world as you know it today will not exist anymore.

The degree you studied 12 years to get… the millions of dollars that took you decades to put together… the dream house you spent 5 years planning and building.

There are all sorts of possible scenarios that could turn years of hard work into nothing. The population of the world is growing like crazy and things like war, civil unrest, a collapse of the financial system and imposing of martial law by governments, natural disasters (like the oil spill that could have an enormous impact on food production) or disease could reduce our numbers enormously. Of course it is possible that none of these things will affect you in your lifetime. It could happen next year and it could happen next century.

However, from what I know after studying history, almost everything that gets plotted on a graph that goes up in a parabolic curve, usually comes crashing down to it’s previous break-out point before the parabolic explosion. It’s just a matter of time.

What goes up…must come down.

I took the liberty to grab various graphs to explain what I mean.

Crude Oil

As you may remember, the price of oil shot up to just over $140 per barrel back in 2007/2008. Gas prices shot up and as a result of the record high oil prices,many other sectors also shot up (commodities,metals, stocks etc.). When oil was at those record high levels, analysts on TV were talking about $200 per barrel oil and even higher. In fact…there were analysts from huge companies saying that oil would never come below $100 per barrel again, and they listed ‘peak oil’ as one of the reasons for this.

Well…after that peak, oil pretty much tanked and hit a low of $30 per barrel again. This $30 per barrel was around the break-out point on the chart before oil went parabolic and exploded up to those $145 per barrel prices.

Uranium

The same thing happened with uranium.

Wheat

The same thing happened with wheat.

Nasdaq Composite Index

I was still in primary school when it happened so I don’t remember much of the tech bubble in the Nasdaq Composite Index (which is an index of many technology stocks) in the late 1990′s.

Unfortunately this chart is a logarithmic chart (meaning that the distance from 100-200 is the same distance as 200-400 etc. on the chart) and it does not visually show the decline after the peak as a ‘normal’ chart (where the distance from 100-200 is the same as 200-300).

However, the point is that from the all-time high peak of the Nasdaq in the early 2000′s of 5048, the index crashed to a low of 1139 which is a whopping 77.4% decline!

Tulip Mania

The Tulip Mania happened way back in the 1600′s in the Netherlands, so if you haven’t heard of it I would not be surprised. I added this example to show that bubbles are not a recent phenomenon, they have probably been around as long as man-kind.

If you want to read more about it you can do so on Wikipedia here.

World Population

The reason why I presented all these charts is to indicate how after a parabolic explosion (read as massive change in equilibrium), the balance has to be restored and this is often done by a huge decline in order to try to restore equilibrium.

Now take a look at the human population growth plotted against time on a chart:










Source




Does that not look like a giant, huge, scary parabolic chart?

Deducing from all previous parabolic charts in history, it is logical to expect an enormous decline in the human population in order to restore balance and equilibrium.

What Is The Point of This Post?

The point I want to make is that we as a human race have created (and still are creating) a massive imbalance in the world. Not only have we multiplied our species to billions of people, we are destroying almost everything that our beautiful planet has to offer.

We are destroying vegetation, forests, habitats, ecosystems, food-chains. We are polluting the oceans with toxic waste (and enormous oil-spills). We are polluting our atmosphere and drinking-water.

If we do not collectively (as a human race) do something to stop and reverse this imbalance that we have created and still are creating, then it is going to be restored for us and hundreds of millions of people will be wiped off the face of the earth.

How will our population decrease by a few billion people?

I don’t know. It could be through war, disease, natural disasters, lack of food, pollution or many other factors I can’t think of right now. I also cannot say when this correction of the imbalance will take place, it could be in the next decade and it could be in the next century. Who knows.

All I know is that we are destroying the planet we live on.

You can help to make positive change by wasting as little energy as possible and by polluting as little as possible and of course by spreading the word to as many people as you know. If everyone makes an effort, we can make a big, big change for the better in our world.

NOTE: If you are reading this in a feed reader or email browser and cannot see the Youtube videos you can just visit the post on Upgradereality HERE and you will be able to view all the videos.




Today I wanted to share with you the best Youtube videos I have seen in my life. I’m sure there are many more really cool Youtube videos out there that are not on this list, so please feel free to contribute.

Just post the link of the video you would like me to add to this list in a comment below or send it to me in an email.

Enjoy!

Fitness

Humor

Inspiration

Interesting

Martial Arts

Science

The last few decades have spurred an entire army of consumers. Millions of innocent people have been bombarded with adverts day after day for years in a row. On the television, on the radio, in magazines, newspapers and billboards.

You have been conditioned to buy, buy and buy some more.
Here are some exaggerated examples:

• You already have a complete designer sofa with a matching dining table and home-cinema entertainment system? OMG, it’s so last year. Wait till you get your hands on the *NEW and IMPROVED* collection from this year!




• Already have more clothes than you can wear? Don’t fear, because you don’t yet have the new summer collection from Ralph Lauren, and that means that your wardrobe is not complete.




• Buy this *insert crappy unnecessary gadget* to make your life 1000 times easier.




• Have you heard of the new “health” bread brand XYZ yet? It’s completely fat and sugar free and will boost your immune system so you never get sick again.

The following is one of my favorite quotes from the movie Fight Club:

“Man, I see in Fight Club the strongest and smartest men who’ve ever lived. I see all this potential, and I see it squandered. God damn it, an entire generation pumping gas, waiting tables – slaves with white collars. Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need. We’re the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives. We’ve all been raised on television to believe that one day we’d all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars, but we won’t. We’re slowly learning that fact. And we’re very, very pissed off.”

Another movie analogy:

For a second, can you imagine the scene from The Matrix where Neo fights off hundreds of Smith agents who are all surrounding him and attacking him? Except now YOU are Neo, and all the Smith agents are companies bombarding you with advertisements to buy their products. You must use all the kung-fu you know to fight off all the offers and don’t let them trick you into buy more things you do not really need.

It’s No Longer Cool To Consume

We live in a world where more and more people have everything they need and almost everything they want. In fact, more and more people have way too much of everything, much more than they need to survive.

Regular advertising through means of television, radio and magazine ads is totally not as effective as it used to be. Advertising used to be very effective because only a small percentage of companies were doing it. Today, almost every company is advertising their product on TV or in adverts of some kind.

Do you find yourself blocking out ads when you see or hear them? That’s what I do most of the time. It’s rare that a normal ad really gets my attention or peaks my curiosity.

These days when you go out, splurge and buy,buy,buy, society no longer thinks it’s super cool. In fact, more often than not people will look down on you for buying so much stuff while you already have more than you need.

Consumerism is out. Minimalism is in.

The Emerging Trend Of Minimalism

Have you heard about Minimalism? It is a hot new trend that is emerging. Many influential people (some of who are mentioned further down in this article) are speaking and writing about it and spreading the benefits of living a Minimalist lifestyle.

I personally believe that Minimalism is not just some fad that will fade in a few years, I believe that it is here to stay and will only grow and gain more popularity as it spreads.

What Is Minimalism

“The term “minimalist” is often applied colloquially to designate anything which is spare or stripped to its essentials.” – Wikipedia

My definition of Minimalism is having as little as possible without sacrificing major comforts. In other words, having the tools and possessions to do everything you want to do but not having unnecessary stuff that you buy and never use or don’t really need.

When I was travelling in Europe for over 2 months earlier this year, all I had with me at the time was a suitcase with clothes, toiletries,my wallet, a laptop, cell-phone, a digital camera and a video camera. Everything else was rented (the apartment, bed, kitchen, couches, washing machine etc.)

I can tell you that I still had clothes with me that I never even wore. So that leaves the question, “How much do you really need to live and do everything you want?”

Could I live this way my entire life? I’m not sure.

I believe that I can definitely live off just the suitcase and things I had with me on my Europe trip for a good 10 years, maybe more. I’m still young and am not tied to anything. However, at this moment I feel that when I will have a family sometime in the future, that I would like to have a fixed location, a house with some luxuries like a nice Tv setup, beautiful art pieces and some other things I value.

I will probably incorporate minimalistic design into my future house, something like the picture below.

Leo Babauta on Minimalism

Leo Babauta is the author of one of Time Magazine’s top25 blogs for the year of 2009, Zenhabits and a newer blog he recently started at Mnmlist.com.

The following are extracts taken from Leo’s posts on Minimalism:




“How does ’simple’ differ from ‘minimalist’?

Minimalism says that what’s unnecessary is a luxury, and a waste. Why be wasteful when the unnecessary isn’t needed for happiness? When it just gets in the way of happiness, of peace? By eliminating the unnecessary, we make room for the essential, and give ourselves more breathing space.”

Read more on Minimalism from Leo Babauta here.

Everett Bogue on Minimalism

Everett Bogue is a guy from New York who started a blog on Minimalism called Far Beyond The Stars.

The following is an extract from one of his posts and explains how he began his journey of Minimalism:






“In July of 2009 I quit my job and moved from New York to Portland Oregon with everything I owned in a backpack. I had no plan and $3000 in the bank.

Everyone told me I’d starve, but I didn’t. Instead I adopted an minimalist lifestyle. I cooked all of my own food, I started working exclusively on the Internet. I learned to manage my time and empty my email inbox. It’s about the freedom that comes from leaving everything and embarking on an experience that actually means something.”

After Everett discovered the popularity of his blog and the amount of people interested in the topic of Minimalism, he decided to create an ebook called ‘The Art of Being Minimalist’. (If you are interested you can learn more about it here).

“It’s easy to look at the fact that I’m living with 50-Things and assume that I just dropped everything all at once. This isn’t true at all.

I slowly worked towards The Edge of minimalist existence.

* In 2003 I moved in a Truck.
* In 2007 I moved in a Honda Civic.
* In 2009 I moved with three bags.
* In 2010 I will move with one bag.”

Not Everyone Can Be A Minimalist

The reason why I do not agree with pure minimalism to the extent of being able to fit everything you own in just one bag is simple.

In order for you to fit everything you own in one bag, there is someone else who has to have more of something. You need a place to stay, so you rent or you stay with a friend. If everyone else owned just a bag of stuff, there would be no house for you to sleep in, no washing machine for you to use and no couch for you to sit on.

Just like the fact that not everyone can make their living online, because we need people to work in factories and produce physical goods and we need people to work on farms to provide food.

That being said, I do entirely believe that most people can live with a lot less than they currently own and I am in favor of promoting the halt of excess and unnecessary consumption.

Final Thoughts On Minimalism

Leo and Everett are just two major bloggers who are spreading the word about Minimalism and the Minimalist lifestyle. Hundreds and thousands of people all around the world are picking up on it and starting to apply it to their lives.

It’s amazing how liberating it feels not to own truckloads of stuff. You feel so light and free, there is so little to think about or worry about.

I definitely enjoyed having very little when I was travelling, and it is something the you should experience too. Maybe you will love it so much that you will live your entire life that way. For me, I love cutting down on excess stuff, but stripped to the bone, naked minimalism is a bit too extreme. Everything in moderation, just like all other things in life.

How about YOU?

Very often success is 100 times easier to achieve by having the right connections.

While you may think that great talent and ingenious ideas will automatically spread like fire in a bamboo village, that is not always the case. Often a single recommendation from someone very influential can do more for you or your idea than months or years of self-promotion and trying to achieve success.

While the term ‘networking’ sounds rather technical and like a lot of effort, here is a fun and simple way to describe it:

Networking is all about making friends and staying in touch with them.

Networking Awesomely

My friend Colin Wright (from Exilelifestyle.com) has just released a really, incredibly fantastic guide called Networking Awesomely. It is about building relationships and making friends in order to make your entire life (from business to dating to happiness) a success, filled with fun, joy and happiness.

Networking Awesomely consists of 250 pages of amazing content, is beautifully designed, well put-together and is super detailed and easy to follow. If you are wondering how much it costs, Networking Awesomely is yours for just $20.

I’m honestly not here to write a sales pitch about Colin’s new eBook . I will not think any more or any less of you if you buy Networking Awesomely or if you do not buy it!

Since I was lucky enough to contribute 2 pages to his eBook, Colin sent me a free copy that I really enjoyed reading. He has done such an excellent job in communicating the concept of networking and how to go about it, that Colin’s eBook inspired me to write this post and share some secrets and details about networking. Why? Well, read the rest of the article to discover the secrets and benefits about it.

No Networking = Missing Out

If you are not where you want to be in certain areas of your life (or all areas of your life), then you may need to think about your networking if you are doing any at all.

The very first sentence of this article was:

“Very often success is 100 times easier to achieve by having the right connections.”

• In every aspect of life there is someone who is among the best of the best that the world has to offer.
• In every business niche or industry there is someone at the top who has incredible power and influence.
• In every social circle there is someone who has to power to introduce you to others or even set you up with dates, parties and social events.

Just by being friends or on a first-name basis with people high-up in the industry that you are trying to succeed in, you can make leaps of progress that could take you months longer to achieve if you didn’t know them.

You may think “I am too shy to talk to strangers” or “I’m not good at making new friends”.

These are common fears that the majority of people face. Personally I think that many people make the whole concept of networking much more difficult for themselves by thinking that it is a chore or an effort. Making new friends and building a network can be as simple as inviting someone to join you for an activity that you are going to do anyways like grabbing sushi at your favorite restaurant. You will feel comfortable because you know the restaurant, you enjoy the food and you give the other person the opportunity to experience something new or different which in turn creates a bond between you and them.

What Is Networking?

By now you should have a rather good idea what ‘networking’ means.

My definition of networking is building friendships with people, sharing experiences with them and giving value. The more value you give and the more opportunities you can provide for people to have new and good experiences, the more friendships you will build.

Are you wondering, “But how will it help me if I have 202 friends from all different walks of life?”.

Well…I think the answer to that is fairly obvious. Friendships are mutually beneficial relationships – in other words, friendships help both people grow. If that is not the case, it is not really a friendship. Friends share ideas, help out with each others problems, encourage each other to believe in their ideas and constantly provide positive emotional energy without needing or asking for anything in return.

The process of reciprocity usually plays a very natural role in friendships. Reciprocity just means that if I do something for you without asking for anything in return, you will want to do something for me when you have the opportunity or when it looks like I need it.

So…when you ‘network’ and build up many friendships with people from all walks of life, you literally have all those friends who are willing to help you out and succeed.

Beware…Network With Good Intentions

I may have planted a seed in your mind that turns your eyes into $ signs just like in cartoons. But… like Spiderman said, “With great power comes great responsibility”.

When building friendships in order to network, I would always encourage everyone to set out with good intentions. By good intentions I mean always try to give value to the other person.

Never set out to build a friendship only for your personal gain. If you are needy or greedy and you just want to take value from someone, not only will they pick up on it quickly and not want to associate with you, it could also earn you a very bad reputation.

Who would you rather hang out with or go for dinner with?

• Someone who doesn’t offer to pay or drive or organise the get-together…
  
  
  
  
  OR






• Someone who makes an effort to hang out with you and who always does their fair share or more, without expecting anything in return.

I think most people would opt for ‘someone’ number 2. The value provider and a real friend instead of ‘someone’ number 1 who is just there to leech value for personal gain.

Ideas For Successful Networking

Hopefully by now you understand the concept of networking (building friendships) and you understand how beneficial it can be (both for you and the person you make friends with). Here are some good ways that you can go about finding people (that will help you on your journey to success) to build friendships with:

• Think Like Them
  
  
  If you are looking to meet more people in a certain industry, try to think like them. Where would they hang out and what would they do in their spare time? Once you narrow that down, you can start to hang out in the locations where they hang out, introduce yourself and over time build up friendships with them.






• Be A Man/Woman of Stories
  
  
  Nothing is more boring than having an interview style conversation with someone you just met. “What do you do? Where are you from? How old are you? etc.”

  On the other hand, nothing is more interesting than someone who tells intriguing stories and shares cool experiences (it helps if the stories are believable and if you don’t use them to brag about yourself). So instead of asking someone boring questions, rather share appropriate stories. From there the conversation will flow a lot more and you will find that the other person will also share their personal stories and opinions, which leads to getting to know each other better. Bonding.






• Have Confidence But Not Arrogance
  
  
  As you probably already know, confidence is attractive and appealing while arrogance is a major turn-off. People will notice the bold and the daring but if perceived as arrogant, people will not respect the bold and the daring. The combination of being humble and having the confidence to do what most people fear is a very powerful one that will lead to being able to have many friendships with people from all walks of life.

How’s Your Networking?

Soooo…

Have you been networking? If not, then starting to build a network may be a great benefit to you, your financial situation, your romantic life or your social life. Remember, networking is not about conning people to use them for your own benefit, networking is just about building friendships with people.