History in the Making

You're Gonna Outwork Me

Most of the time.

You're gonna out-pace me, out-hustle me, out-run me.

And as you're going by, I'll yell, "You go! Do that thing!"

I will gladly lay it down.

Sometimes I forget that my projects are not my children.

But not for long.

Wednesday Morning Run-Down

• I'm getting on a plane today to go to a technical creative meeting for STORY 2012. It's coming again =)
• Working with an amazing church in Hattiesburg, MS for the next year. Love going to places I've never been before
• We just changed the Dream Year Weekend location in Charlotte to the Magellan Idea Center. Register [here]
• Only 12 tickets remaining for the Weekend actually
• Portlandia is a funny, funny show... and true
• An office pod for the backyard
• John Finch (Dream Year '11) just announced a project to tell the story of his father's suicide. See the incredible project [here] and the trailer only [here]
• I don't understand why Panera puts a napkin under your food, rendering it "used"
• Burger King tries home delivery
• A fascinating behind the scenes look at a photo for Fox's new film Chronicle by @isayx3 (via Mike Foster)
• Why solitude is critical to creativity (via Scott Hodge)
• Katie Perry's parents' church (via @SarahWeber1)
• If you're a pastor... and someone on your staff is called to plant a church and you hinder that leader's best possible start because you're fearful of what it will do to your church, pls think about who you're actually opposing
• Love Morgan Spurlock's new show Failure Club... for obvious reasons
• Short one this week, stuff to do =)

The Other Platform Builder

Great post on building a blog platform over on Mike Hyatt's blog today. All of it so true. But so exhausting.

About a year ago, I decided I wasn't going to let this blog wag the dog. My rule of thumb is... if I don't have anything to say, I'm not gonna force it. Permission granted to just skip it.

I've been blogging since 2003 and there were years I wouldn't miss a day. It helped me meet a lot of people. It launched my first conference with no start-up budget. And it's been responsible for every dollar I've earned since 2008.

Years ago, blogging was a much-needed voice in the vast wasteland of silence. Suddenly, we weren't doing it alone. There were others out there. And they were talking. It was like picking up shortwave radio signals. We were grateful for the noise.

But I don't that's the case anymore. Today, there's so much noise that differentiation is the new platform-builder. And with all the tweets, jabs, posts, pokes, jokes, discourse and disagreement, the biggest differentiator is... silence.

Doing more off the feed than on it.

Substance over pontification.

A quiet presence over a noisy one.

Maybe this approach will land me off the map. But I don't want some weird sense of social obligation to dictate my life. I'm most intrigued by the quiet ones. The ones who create in solitude. The ones you have to ask for wisdom, not tune out.

Details on Dream Year Weekend Charlotte

DREAM YEAR WEEKEND
January 27-29, 2012 - Magellan Idea Center - Charlotte, NC

I'd love for you to join me for a 3-day Dream Year retreat in Charlotte, NC. In one weekend, you'll learn the principles behind Dream Year and create a personal plan to pursue your unique vision. You'll hear from special guests, get feedback, and connect with other dreamers to share the journey.

Here's what you'll receive as a part of the experience:

• The entire Dream Year process from start to finish
  (For a comprehensive overview, visit DreamYear.net)
• Opportunity for personal feedback on your dream
• Case studies from successful and failed dreams
• Personal milestones for achieving your dream in a year
• New friends who can share the journey with you
• Tools for managing the progress of your dream
• Analysis of your dream's history and viability
• Ways to overcome the challenges of your industry
• Resources to help guide your journey
• Special guests throughout the weekend
• Meals listed in the weekend schedule below
• A much-needed getaway in an exciting city

A UNIQUE EXPERIENCE

Dream Year weekends are about more than just content. You're joining a fraternity of friends who will come behind you and champion your cause. You'll not only learn how to bring your idea to life, but enjoy off-site meetups and strategic breakfasts with fellow dreamers in your industry.

SPECIAL GUESTS

I'll lead most of the weekend; however, you'll also learn from special guests who can speak into your dream. Photo of A Group president Maurilio Amorim

SCHEDULE

Friday, January 27

6:00 pm - Introductory Dinner
7:00 pm - Session 1
9:00 pm - Dismiss

Saturday, January 28

8:00 am - Breakfast
9:00 am - Session 2
10:15 am - Break
10:45 am - Session 3
12:00 pm - Lunch
1:15 pm - Session 3
3:00 pm - Break
3:30 pm - Surprise
5:00 pm - Night out on your own

Sunday, January 29

9:00 am - Tribe-based breakfasts
12:30 pm - Lunch
1:30 pm - Session 4
3:00 pm - Dismiss

REGISTER

Grab one of the 15 remaining spots HERE. If you have questions, you can email Ben@DreamYear.net.

Dream Year 2010 participant Sam DuRegger shares his story.
Photos by Jay Caruso and Ally Fouts

A New Liturgy

Is there anyone hipper than Aaron Niequist?

Yet he's leveraging all that he has into a remarkable music project called A New Liturgy. I like how he says it: It's not music to be shuffled. It's music to pastor you.

Here's the video where he describes it.

Each Liturgy is a 25-minute journey of music, prayer, scripture, and space that helps open us to The Almighty in any location, season, or emotion. Episodic experiences released every quarter.

This really is an extraordinary project. You don't just listen to it. You get led through it.

Aaron's narrative dips in and out of gorgeous melodies by guest artists. Spoken word, ambient sounds underlaying new hymns, responsive reading... it's a killer concept.

You know me though. I love the behind the behind the... so check out the photos on the site of the making-of.

For more, check out the blog tour on his space.

Dream Year Weekend in Two Weeks

We're hosting Dream Year weekend at the Magellan Idea Center in Charlotte, NC on January 27-29. Still time for you to join the group in two weeks at this creative loft space. Register here.

Who's Doing What

Two years ago, I had the opportunity to work with the team at Harvest Bible Chapel in Elgin, IL in crafting the Elephant Room. We wrestled with the name, the format - would conversations work? - the speakers - can we really put them together? But the result was extraordinary. This year, Luke MacDonald has taken it to a whole other level with over 70 sites across the country. The second one goes down on January 25 in a city near you.

John Finch who was in Dream Year 2011 just released the trailer for his film project called The Father Effect. When John was a young boy, his father committed suicide after dropping him off at school one day. See the trailer here and the crowdsourcing campaign to bring the project to life here.

My friend Mark Clement who came through Dream Year 2010 to make a short film has created a service to provide churches with custom video announcements. I was in Hattiesburg, Mississippi and saw his work first-hand. Really great stuff.

Dream Year Charlotte Moved to the Magellan Idea Center

We just moved Dream Year Weekend in Charlotte to the Magellan Idea Center. Inspirational environment, comfy seating, great food, fun community lots of creative stimulation. Would love for you to join us.

Event: Dream Year Weekend

Date: Friday, January 27, 2012 at 6:00 PM - Sunday, January 29, 2012 at 3:00 PM

Location:
Magellan Idea Center
2108 South Boulevard, Suite 201
Charlotte, NC 28203

For more information click here: Dream Year Weekend

Click to see some hotels close to the venue.

Two Kinds of Designers

In Dream Year, we talk about how to choose a great designer for your brand. I'm oversimplifying this to make a point, but there are two kinds of designers:

1. Those who specialize in lay-out
2. Those who specialize in layering

A lay-out specialist thinks in terms of placement, margin, balance. For them, it's more about how elements are arranged than creating something new. Dream Year is a "lay out" brand.

A layering specialist thinks in dimensions, visual depth, collision. For them, the elements must not retain their original form, but become something entirely new. For me, STORY is a "layered" brand, but I use lay-out designers for "second-unit design" based on the original key art.

If you don't know what you want or what your brand is: you a) drive yourself crazy, and b) become the client from h*ll for designers everywhere.

Social Media Predictions

• The honeymoon is over. Social media fatigue has set-in
• Social media has downgraded the power of the singular voice. I don't even remember that Seth Godin blogs until I happen to catch a retweet. It's like roaming through a crowded party catching a conversation here and there
• Authoritative blogs are on the way out. If everyone's an expert, no one's an expert. Observations are in
• Tumblr is a symbol of the observational approach. Yet there's authority in observational prowess
• Every social media platform is on the way out. Just when I catch on to Instagram, everyone's replacing it with The Path. Twitter's just one SXSW away from obsolescence
• There are four kinds of blogs, in my opinion:
  - The aggregator
  - The community builder
  - The shock jock
  - The teacher
• Shock jocks can't teach you how to blog. They're been mastering "class clown" since the first grade
• The more aware of which kind of blogger you are... and focused on doing it... the more effective you'll be
• Number of Twitter followers is the everyman's approval rating. The more we tweet, the more followers we lose
• The prevailing approach to increasing readership seems to be doing more on the feed. But the most effective way would be to do more "off the feed" ... or in real life

Wednesday Morning Run-Down

• The Ford Bronco is back? Now how am I gonna convince @Ainsl3y to trade-in her minivan?
• What are you waiting for? Join me for Dream Year weekend in Charlotte - January 27-29
• Apple's coming out with TVs which I'm sure will once again create a blue ocean
• Water Missions International is looking for partner churches to host Water Sunday in March
• Jason Yarborough provided these fresh nametags at our Charlotte STORY meet-up, but never mentioned it's a start-up for him. C'mon J. Check out imat.me
• I am so so thankful for the encouragement and faith of my wife @Ainsl3y. Could not do what I do without her
• Sound design for Transformers (via Lifepoint Creative)
• "Do what scares you. That's why I'm on Twitter." ~M. Night Shyamalan (love this)
• Great video of Timothy Ferris on the Chase Jarvis blog talking about differentiating yourself
• A gorgeous abandoned film set in Russia
• My kids' ability to start things is more important to me than whether they go to college
• David Messner wrote a very nice review of his first month of Dream Year, as did John-Erik Moseler
• "We hear it every day: 'The magazine publishing industry is in trouble,' 'Nobody buys magazines,' 'I hate magazines,' 'Magazines suck.' But despite these naysayers, magazines continue to thrive. At one point in 2011, there were more magazines laying around people’s homes than any other year in history." ~ David Rees
• Kate Schmidgall from Dream Year '09 hosted a holiday pop-up shop in her DC loft. Highly recommend subscribing to Bittersweet Zine, her DY project
• Sam Mahlstadt has done an incredible job putting together his forthcoming book Creative Theology
• Bryan Allain has a great offer to win free tickets for the Killer Tribes conference in Nashville on March 31
• A busy schedule is a matter of priorities, not duties. A tough insight when people say they're too busy for you.
• People mostly say no to the asker, not the ask. This is why finding the right asker is important

Solve a Problem

A sneak peek into the content of Dream Year:

"What problem is your dream trying to solve? It doesn’t have to be a social justice issue. It could be the lack of a good restaurant in your city, a rarely addressed subject in books or the absence of a particular kind of church. But your dream must address a problem. If there’s not a problem, why should anyone care?

"Seth Godin once described the difference between marketing Aspirin and vitamins. Aspirin is much easier to sell because it solves a problem. Vitamins, on the other hand, are a harder sell. They don’t resolve an immediate, blaring problem."

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Get the full video lessons each Monday through Dream Year Subscriptions or join me in Charlotte on Jan 27-29

Frustration Shapes a Dream

These are my opening words to each year's Dream Year class:

"As you enter this next year, I’m counting on one thing from you – that you’re frustrated. If you were to say, 'No, I’m doing great. I just want to try out this new idea,' I’d be worried.

"If you weren’t discontented, heartsick, or angry about something in the world, you would have no reason to go after your dream. Without frustration, you’d never even recognize your dream, let alone have the passion to pursue it.

"Going after a dream is hard. And frustration is the fuel that propels you through the challenges when your idealism runs out. There are going to be times when you’ll need it. You'll need a 'worse time' to help you endure the difficult times ahead. Frustration makes you intolerant of the way things were."

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You can get the video-based Dream Year lessons each week online through a Subscription. Or join me in Charlotte, NC on Jan 27-29 for Dream Year weekend

Wednesday Morning Run-Down

• The new Dream Year participants have been selected for 2012, and it's a stellar group of 14 innovators
• "I hate it. If it's bad, I'll hate it because I don't like bad writing. If it's good, I'll be envious and hate it all the more. You don't want the opinion of another writer." ~ Ernest Hemingway's character in Midnight in Paris
• I'm shocked at the number of young kids who are allowed to roam through our neighborhood by themselves. I remember two instances from my childhood where I felt I was seriously in danger. And one local search on FamilyWatchdog for local offenders should put the kabash on it by any sane parent.
• A production video from Peter Jackson's The Hobbit.
• Love at minute 8 the description of building Hobbitown on a New Zealand farm, which allows the owners to offer tours after the filming is over. There's a village in Four Stones that I hope will offer the same opportunity
• The real story behind Apple's "Think Different"
• Steven Speilberg still makes money from Star Wars movies because he won a bet with George Lucas
• I can't stop laughing at this Onion article on the plight of authors at book readings and book signings
• Transmedia advertising for TV's Boardwalk Empire
• The secret to Oregon's football success: the uniforms
• And the newest version of their uniforms which are terrifyingly beautiful (via @nathangonzales)
• McDonalds tried outsourcing drive-thrus to call centers?
• If you're too busy, you're doing something wrong
• "Find your thing and do that thing better than anybody else even if you think it has no value because I promise you that it does. And I promise you that other people will see this value too." ~Chase Jarvis
• I got to tour the Hobby Lobby company headquarters last week in OKC and was blown away by their business model. Immaculate facility. Incredible people
• I spent last week writing another screenplay that I couldn't not write. Love writing visually
• Celebrating 38 years of life today!
• STORY 2012 tickets are only $159 until Dec 31
• What happened to YouTube's foray into live video streaming? After watching Google Plus' new television ads, I think they blew a huge opportunity
• Hollywood's list of the best unproduced screenplays

The Stages of a Dream Year Participant

The 14 Dream Year participants have been selected for 2012 and we start next week! I publish this list of stages in Dream Year here on the blog every year and it never fails to prove true:

In month 1, you're terrified but excited about actually having to do this. The most common response to being accepted is "I didn't think I was going to be accepted." =)

In month 2, you're going wonder if this was a mistake. Intimidation will be at its worst.

In month 3 or 4, you're going to want to take a one-month break. It's overwhelming.

In month 5, your dream has a face. Branding manifests your dream out of thin air. It's no longer only in your head.

In month 6, you make some "big asks" and are surprised to see them pay off. It was frightening, but you did it.

In months 7 and 8, the "rainmaker" in you emerges. You think less like an employee and more like CEO.

In month 9, you start using words like "we" instead of "I" and "our" instead of "my" as a team forms around you.

In month 10, you stop asking so many questions, but you... must... fight... this... tendency. Never stop asking.

In month 12, the dream is no longer in your head. It's an organization with a working business model. There's a plan to work toward growth and sustainability.

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Join me in Charlotte on Jan 27-29 for Dream Year Weekend. Also, the new Subscription program delivers fresh Dream Year content to your inbox every Monday morning -- videos, lessons, questions, milestones

This Pretty Much Says it

Merry Christmas everybody

The Gift of 'STORY' this Christmas

The exclusive alumni rate of $159 is now available to anyone who buys STORY 2012 tickets before December 31, 2011. The 2012 website launches in February. Until then, here's a special offer. But hurry. Seats are limited, and regular prices go in effect after December 31. Register here. 

STORY Hightlights
Here are a few highlights from the first three years of STORY:

• Hologram On-Stage - Clark brought hologram to STORY '10. Read the story covered by Gizmodo
• Extraordinary Speakers - see stylized photos of our 2011 speakers taken by the talented Bjorn Amundsen
• Sean Astin - we were honored with a surprise appearance by this star of Lord of the Rings and Rudy
• Ed Dobson - we experienced an unforgettable presentation by this sage and author of Ed's Story
• Creative Meet-ups - in Detroit, Nashville, Chicago, Charlotte, and Cincinnati. More to come in 2012!
• Holographic Snow - Kari Jobe and Becky Ykema's incredible performance of Winter Song
• Community of Creatives - Check out the many faces of STORY. Good looking bunch of people =)
• Live Rainfall on Stage- see photos of the multisensory performance by Blaine Hogan
• Roaming Performers - by local actors and even members of Chicago's famous Second City troupe
• Best-of Photos - here are 36 photos that capture the spirit of STORY. Wish I had more photos of the environments
• The Environment - speaking of... street musicians, live screenprinting, artists, lounge, cafe, etc
• Short Film Premiere - 'Among Us' the first short film produced by STORY by Jared Hogan of Elevation
• Jason Fried - a frank conversation with the founder of 37Signals and New York Times' best-seling ReWork
• Break-out Musicians - Josh Garrells, Listener, John Mark McMillan, and All Sons & Daughters
• Hollywood Insiders - appearances by Ed Saxon, producer of Silence of the Lambs; Richard Walter, chair of UCLA's graduate screenwriting program; Andrew Klavan, author of True Crime; David McFadzean, creator of Home Improvement; and Kyle Cooper, the leading movie title sequence creator

Dream Year Story: Politics in Stereo

Nathan Gonzales is a political reporter for several notable publications in Washington DC including Roll Call.

He joined Dream Year to launch a website that aggregates the best political blogging in the country - from the left, right and nonpartisan. The theme: Here Both Sides.

The site is called Politics in Stereo and it launched TODAY. Nathan personally made the announcement today on his appearance on MSNBC's Daily Rundown - where he's a regular feature. Are you kidding me?! It was top of the news items!

This is a dream come true... and I have loved... every... single... minute of walking through this project with Nathan. Dream Year helps you wrestle through the decision of self-funding vs. investor capital (which has a lot of bad sides). And Nathan stretched and worked extremely hard to fund this himself.

Nathan attends Mark Batterson's church in Washington DC. In fact, I first met Nathan while attending the Buzz Conference at National Community Church many years ago.

Would you do me a favor?

In support of Dream Year, of dreams in general... and of Nathan Gonzales, would you retweet, repost, "like," whatever you need to do to tell his story and share this site? [PoliticsInStereo.com]

Wednesday Morning Run-Down

• Such a beautiful and adorable depiction of the Christmas story, as told by the children of St Paul's Church.
• Give the gift of STORY this Christmas. Tickets for 2012 discounted to $159... just until December 31
• Coldplay involves the audience in a concert light show. And how they do it. (via @thesoundbooth)
• Vanity Fair's photographic depictions of Alfred Hitchcock's movies starring today's famous actors
• Hitchcock's thriller Rear Window was based on a 13-page short story by Cornell Woolrich: "It Had to Be Murder"
• Political reporter Nathan Gonzales (Dream Year 2011) launched his new site Politics in Stereo TODAY
• Rumor of Amazon starting brick-and-mortar stores
• I love going to Apple stores as much as the DMV because they're overcrowded. Get the service dept. out of there
• What the world's biggest websites looked like at first
• Dream Year weekend in Charlotte on Jan 27-29
• I don't enjoy "winning" on ebay as much as discovering valuable things that no one else is bidding on. Why don't they do a commercial about THAT yo?
• I saw the trailer for John Finch's (Dream Year 2011) new short film "The Father Effect" yesterday, and I'm still paralyzed by its awesomeness. His father committed suicide when he was a boy and now he's giving his life to improve fatherhood. Email John here
• And you laugh at my love for animated gifs
• In the spirit of Christmas, North Point's famous iPad carol performance which has over 3 million views
• Gary Lamb was in Dream Year 2011. I'm sharing his story very soon. His church that's reaching the broken and the marginalized has grown from 30 to 300 this year
• It's a short one this week - I've got stuff to do! =)

The Terror of Pursuing a Dream

This week, I start processing applications for Dream Year. So far, I'm blown away by the caliber of these people and their ideas.

After two years of this, I've come to see that the most common response to an "acceptance" into the program is not necessarily elation... but terror. Sheer holy terror.

Now I have to do this.

Now I have to pursue this dream.

There's no going back.

When Moses freed the Israelites from the slavery, death camps, infanticide and mass slaughter of Egypt to take them to the Promised Land, watch what happens just 15 days in:

“In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The Israelites said to them, ‘If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.’” – Exodus 16:2-3 

Just two weeks into their quest, the Israelites were wishing for slavery again. Life got difficult in the wilderness; food was running low; they were forced to live by miracles; they were experiencing God in ways that only freedom could offer; and they wanted to quit.

Think about that.

They longed for bondage.

It's not going to be easy for the participants of Dream Year. They're going to want to quit. And they're going to miss that "former way of life" with its "pots of meat." But the Promised Land's ahead, and they've been called to pursue it.