Adventures
of an
Optimist
A Progress Report on the 400 Year Project
to Help You Improve 20 Times Faster
Donald Mitchell
Coauthor of The
2,000 Percent Squared Solution
Other Books by Donald Mitchell
The 2,000 Percent Solution (with Carol Coles and Robert Metz)
The Irresistible Growth Enterprise (with Carol Coles)
The Ultimate Competitive Advantage (with Carol Coles)
The 2,000 Percent Solution Workbook (with Carol Coles)
The 2,000 Percent Squared Solution (with Carol Coles)
The Portable 2,000 Percent Solution (with Carol Coles)
Adventures of an Optimist
A Progress Report on the 400 Year Project
to Help You Improve 20 Times Faster
Copyright © 2007, 2012 by Donald Mitchell. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may
be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means,
including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods
without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of
brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial
uses permitted by copyright law.
For information, contact:
Mitchell and Company Press
P.O. Box 302
Weston, Massachusetts 02493
http://www.mitchellandco.com
This publication is designed to provide accurate and authoritative
information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is sold with the
understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering legal, accounting,
or other professional service. If legal advice or other expert assistance is
required, the services of a competent professional person should be sought.
Published in the United States of America.
This book is
dedicated to all unborn children in hope that they can inherit and flourish in
a world filled with health, happiness, peace, prosperity, and love.
Contents
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Background Briefing: What Can Four Centuries Worth of
Improvements in a Generation Mean for Your Life?
Preface: A Singular Sensation
Introduction: Seeds of an Optimistic Idea, the 400
Year Project
Part One:
ORIGINS
Chapter 1: How I Became a Practical, Unlimited Optimist
Chapter 2: A Surprise Announcement
Part Two: LESSONS
Chapter 3: Crawling and Toddling Ahead
Chapter 4: Introducing 2,000 Percent Solutions
Chapter 5: Irresistible Growth Beckons
Chapter 6: Reaching Millions of Readers
Chapter 7: Competitive Advantages
Chapter 8: Tutoring Lessons
Chapter 9: A Complementary Dimension: Getting More Out
of Life
Chapter 10: Multiplying Exponential Improvements
Chapter 11: Making
400 Years Worth of Progress Quickly by Further Multiplying Exponential
Improvements
Chapter 12: Saving More Souls
Part Three:
PRESCRIPTIONS
Chapter 13: A Learning Foundation for Rapid Progress
Chapter 14: Entrepreneurial Models for Rapid Progress
Epilogue: Your Role in the 400 Year Project
Appendix A: Become a Helpful Book Reviewer
Appendix B: Why Are 2,000 Percent Solutions Available for
Almost Any Activity?
Appendix C: How to Have Your Own Optimistic Adventures
Foreword
What would you do if God gave you knowledge for making the
world a much better place? Not your everyday, ordinary, run of the mill
knowledge, but knowledge that would allow you and your team to create solutions
that would otherwise not be available to the people of Earth for another 400
years.
Though he’s far too humble a
servant of God to say so himself, I believe that is exactly what happened to my
mentor and friend Don when he was gifted with the inspiration to create the 400
Year Project — a project to create 400 hundred years worth of improvements in
merely 20 years. You read that right: four centuries worth of improvements in
only two short decades.
The kinds of global improvement
methods he writes about have the potential to provide nutritious food, clean
water, excellent healthcare and safety to everyone on the planet. These
improvement methods have the potential to bring peace to every region of the globe.
On a more personal level, these methods have the potential to dramatically
increase longevity, perhaps even to more than double one’s lifespan. Don’s
methods offer the potential to improve the quality of life, personal
relationships, finances, and education, and to present a myriad of new
opportunities for you and everyone around you. If you’re not already familiar
with Don’s other works such as The 2,000
Percent Solution, The 2,000 Percent
Squared Solution, The Irresistible
Growth Enterprise, and The Ultimate
Competitive Advantage, then this may sound like a fairytale. However if you
are already a follower of Don’s work, then you’ll immediately recognize the
potential of his 400 Year Project to bring that Divine inspiration into
physical reality, ushering in improvements on a global scale, limited only by
the imaginations of those who are putting these teachings into practice. In a
world where many find themselves lost in the doom and gloom of contemplating a
future dominated by disease, disaster, crime, war, and suffering, Don’s
optimistic vision is not merely a shining path of hope, but a template for how
to recreate our world into something so blessed and wonderful that everyone
experiencing it would become optimists.
In Adventures of an Optimist,
Don takes you on a personal journey of how he came to be such a practical
optimist and why he has so much faith in all of us. He gives a crash course on
his world-renowned 2,000 percent solutions, i.e. any way that you can accomplish 20 times as much with the same time and
resources, and gives convincing evidence on how that kind of incredible
progress — though seemingly enormous at first blush — is merely a baby step for
each of us. Don shows us again and again that we can gain infinitely more by learning
how to make breakthroughs in areas with the most potential to benefit ourselves
and everyone else.
One of the great things about Don’s
writing is how he demonstrates the ways he and his students have repeatedly
succeeded with these improvement methods. He also shares the flops, lest we
begin to feel that we are reading the optimistic musings of an intellectual
superman!
Don’s masterful use of metaphors
and riveting storytelling ability draw you in to experiencing those moments
with Don almost as if you were there in person while it was happening. One of
my favorite examples is when he describes becoming one of Amazon.com’s top ten reviewers.
Like so many people, I had wondered how in the world he accomplished it,
especially in addition to his busy life as CEO of Mitchell and Company, helping
world-class business professionals create better and better business solutions;
professor at Rushmore
University, guiding
students to create their own 2,000 percent solutions; and writing numerous
finely crafted books. You get to imagine what it was like in Amazon’s earlier
days when most people were using dial-up modems, see how Don’s thinking
interacted with the growth of the internet and of Amazon, and find out how he
realized he could reach more people through Amazon reviews than even the most
famous authors of business books do.
Once the reader is comfortably
grounded into imagining the possibilities of 2,000 percent solutions, Don eases
you into multiplying those exponential improvements. He expands the vision more
and more, and you’ll either come out on the other side with your mind wide open
for the very real possibilities that the 400 Year Project offers, or you’ll
already be taking action to start making those breakthroughs in those areas
with the most potential to benefit yourself and others.
As you read the book and begin to
fully grasp the promise of the 400 Year Project, creating 400 hundred years
worth of improvements in only 20 years, you’ll ask yourself, “What role do I
want to play?” If you’ve ever wanted to make the world an infinitely better
place, if you’ve been looking for an opportunity to make a difference so
profound that you joyfully leap out of bed each day to create that difference,
then this book may just be the introduction to the means you’ve been seeking.
Get ready to open your heart, open your mind, and let the possibility of a
future brighter than all your wildest dreams be revealed to you.
Teresa Bolen
Author, Master Plan to
Master Exams:
How to Discover Your
Hidden Abilities to Create the Success You Desire
Kyoto,
September 15, 2007
Acknowledgments
Any project of this scope owes debts to more people than
could be listed inside a book of this size. I feel an immense sense of
gratitude towards everyone who has assisted in my development as a person,
including those who have been role models, teachers, and counselors.
As you will learn from reading
about my experiences, God deserves the most credit. I wouldn’t be here,
wouldn’t have taken on this challenge, and wouldn’t have succeeded without His
constant guidance and love. No script writer could have developed a more
inspiring and rewarding role for me. I also wouldn’t have had the courage to
write such a personal book about my experiences Thank you, God!
I have been blessed with a great
family. Without such a sound foundation, I would not have had the tranquility
and support to work on such an ambitious project. I love you all!
I have learned from so many
people that I doubt if I can always remember where I first obtained a certain
perspective. Thank you all for your willingness to share and patience with me
while I slowly absorbed the lessons.
Peter Drucker played such a
pivotal role in my life that it’s hard to pin down where his thoughts stop and
mine begin. It’s only in the last five years that I’ve begun to see any
distinctions between our thinking. Perhaps the largest difference between us is
in personality, rather than focus. The title of this book is an intended play
on Peter’s autobiographical work, Adventures
of a Bystander (Wiley, reissue edition, 2001). That book was very revealing
to me for how to draw important lessons about difficult subjects from one’s own
experience. When I first read the book, I could see added dimensions to the
inner structure of Peter’s thinking. I hope this book will do the same for
those who want a deeper understanding of my work in the 400 Year Project.
I have had great support from
clients, organization members, volunteers, students, critics, other authors,
and editors in all of this work. The cumulative value of those influences
vastly outweighs my own contributions.
Let me specially thank my
long-time colleague, coauthor, and wife, Carol Bruckner Coles. Without her
constant love, support, and encouragement, this project would have stopped a
long time ago.
I was very moved to be blessed by
the beautiful foreword written by Teresa Bolen, author of Master Plan to Master Exams (BookSurge, 2007). Thank you, Teresa!
As usual, the manuscript was
improved by the careful reading by and comments received from many outstanding
people. I would like to especially thank Elijah Chingosho for being the first
to go through the manuscript and making dozens of improvements. Bill Lampton
was the second to complete the manuscript and he, too, made dozens of fine
suggestions. Teresa Bolen also carefully examined the drafts and was brilliant
in pointing out many opportunities for clarification. Others made great
contributions including Jim Barbarossa, Signe Dayhoff, Hiroshi Fukushi, Tom
Karp, Art Kleiner, Arun Kohli, Bob Kudyba, Alain Pierre Mignon, Sam Okoro, and
Jacob Yesaya.
I’m also pleased to have teamed
up again with that remarkable woman who helps me make my prose worth reading,
Bernice Pettinato of Beehive Production Services, who copy edited the book.
This is our sixth book together. I appreciate all that she has taught me about
writing.
As always, all responsibility for
any remaining errors and oversights is mine alone.
Copyright © 2007. 2012 by Donald
Mitchell.
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