The Importance Of Making Meaning

Photo by JdeePanIII

This is a follow up article on the Making Money Online Hype versus Reality series. In Part 1, we dispelled some of the myths about earning huge sums of money when you’re starting off, that you need to be realistic with your expectations. In Part 2, we gave real life examples of people who did make it big, and you can see the photo of Jeremy Schoemaker holding his Google adsense check of $132,994.97 which shows it can be done, and how you should persevere with your efforts to succeed in this game.

Now, in Part 3, I want to share a video from Stanford University with my readers, for anyone who is into making money, this is a must watch video because it teaches the importance of ‘Meaning’, and why you should focus on this rather than think about making money. I have found this video really inspirational and it is one of the reasons I decided on a new blueprint for this website to focus on the quality of content. Let’s take a closer look at why we should take heed of this message in our blogging journey.

Entrepreneurship And Making A Difference

The video was produced around 2 years ago, but it’s message is still very clear and relevant to us today as we blog our way around the world seeking to make money from our efforts. It is from a series of talks by Guy Kawasaki, of Garage Technology Ventures, and is about the ‘Importance of Making Meaning’ in your company or business venture. Guy Kawasaki, states that:

“The core, the essence of entrepreneurship, is about making MEANING’.

Most people start companies to make money, in our case we’ve started Blogs with the same intention. But what Guy tells us is that of all the companies that he started, funded or was involved with, the ones which are fundamentally founded to:

“Change the World”
“Make the World a Better Place”
“To Make Meaning”

are the companies that make a difference, they are the companies that succeed. He goes on to say boldly, that if you set out to make money without making meaning, you probably won’t make meaning or money. This takes us back to the fundamental question, why are you Blogging? We have to answer this question, time and time again, to ensure our focus is right and correct for what we want to achieve. It’s a very deep statement, and you need to realise its importance, because money and success is a by-product of something you have done really well. Believe me, there is no substitute for hard work.

His message is clear to us, the core reason why you should start a company or venture is to make meaning. Now lets see what he’s trying to get through to us.

How To Make Meaning

There are 3 ways to make meaning:

1. Increase the Quality of Life
2. To Right a Wrong
3. Prevent the End of Something Good

Your motivation can be to change people’s lives, by looking at how you can make things better for them and that will give your blog a purpose and an identity, a reason for people to come to your site. Or it could be you find something wrong in the world and you want to put it right and fix that. Maybe you see something beautiful and you can’t stand what’s happening to it, and you want to do something about it. All these things will give purpose and MEANING to your blogging efforts, and I tend to agree with what he’s saying.

Without one or more of these three things, you probably need to reconsider what you’re doing. I see a lot of blogs out there, and the authors admit they are their own ramblings, they are not out to change the world, they are just blogging about life, and using their blog as a journal. There’s nothing wrong with that, and there is space in the blogosphere for everyone to survive. The message of this article is to those, like myself, who have been drawn into the ‘Making Money Online’ hype, to give meaning to your work and give it a higher purpose if you want to succeed.

When I started off, my intention was to share some of my knowledge of networks and what I was learning about blogging with my readers, so that they would benefit from this. As far as this blog goes, I think that’s a good purpose, to teach and educate, so people can learn to do things themselves and thereby improve the quality of whatever they are doing themselves. I had no knowledge of Domain Names, had never owned one myself, so as I learnt things about this, I wrote about how you can get your own domain name, register it, and then link it to your blog. I think, this is the crux of it, there are thousands of websites out there with so much information on them, but when you get down to it, you really want to come to one place where you can find everything you need. Once your website does that, it has authority and as it’s popularity spreads, you will gain the relevance and move up in Google’s rankings.

Conclusions

I hope you will take the time to watch the video and listen to it’s message. The points are well made, because if you’re swallowed up in the Making Money Hype, then this might just give you the grounding you need to give purpose and direction to what you are doing. I know it’s made me think about what I’m doing, and to take away some of the stress of blogging and trying to drive traffic to my site.

With the right meaning, your efforts will have purpose, and that in itself will bring you the rewards. Let’s go out and make a difference in the world.

So here’s the Video.

Enjoy!

Daniel Hunt.

Footnote: Who is Guy Kawasaki?

Guy Kawasaki is a founder and Managing Director of Garage Technology Ventures. Prior to this position, he was an Apple Fellow at Apple Computer, Inc. and sits on the board of BitPass, FilmLoop, and SimplyHired. A noted speaker and the founder of various personal computer companies, Guy was one of the individuals responsible for the success of the Macintosh computer. He is also the author of eight books including The Art of the Start, Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way. Guy holds a B.A. from Stanford University and an M.B.A. from UCLA, as well as an honorary doctorate from Babson College.

Futurepost: I have been asked by a good friend of mine to do a guest post on his blog, so my next post in the coming week will be on the reasons why you should set up your blog on a web host of your own choice as opposed to a hosted platform such as blogger.com or wordpress.com.

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The Making Money Online Hype Versus Reality - Part 4 » »

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