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In June 1851, US anti-slavery magazine “National Era” began publishing a fascinating story in 40 weekly installments. Written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, it depicted the life of a black woman, Eliza, who escapes with her son Tom who is sold “down the river” into slavery.

In 1852, Stowe’s 40 installments were bound together in book form and sold 300,000 copies the first year in print. “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” was translated into all major languages and became the most influential novel of the 19th century. It also became the best-selling book after the Bible.

I think you’ll like these, too…

I took a customer survey earlier this week. The last question was totally open-ended:

“If you could ask Perry any question what would it be?”

The most common question was:

“How do I stop procrastinating and just DO the stuff I need to do???”

Let me tell you what I do.

Does it ever seem like Google is a Greek goddess who demands human sacrifices from her fearful worshippers?

If you’ve ever done any Search Engine Optimization, you know what it’s like to get sucked into all kinds of time-wasting activities, hoping they’ll someday pay off.

And if you’ve ever wondered what it might have been like to toss a damsel in the volcano, hoping rain would finally come . . . well, maybe you do know what that’s like :^)

There was an investor in the company I worked for who I personally liked but every time he’d call I’d feel a subtle, almost imperceptible wave of fear. Only much later did I realize his mission was to slice my fingers off one bloody joint at a time.

My head didn’t know it, but my gut did.

Ignoring my gut was a costly mistake.

You might have some memory of Admiral James Stockdale. He was the guy who was Ross Perot’s Vice Presidential candidate in ‘the US 1992 election.

He didn’t fare so well as a VP candidate, but he was quite an impressive military man. He was former president of the Naval War College and was the highest ranking officer in the dreaded “Hanoi Hilton” in Viet Nam.

He spent eight years in Hanoi and was tortured numerous times by his captors.

Mr. Thomas Barnett relates:

“Stockdale tells the story of the optimists who never survived their time in Hanoi, simply because…

I’m not sure I’ve ever told you the story of THE lowest point of my career.

Laura and I drove from Chicago to Nebraska over a steamy hot 4th of july weekend in our $1200 1985 Honda Civic whose engine had just $$$ blown out 3 months before. We were buying gas on whatever fumes were left on our credit cards.

I’d been demoted from my sales job to production manager at a tiny manufacturing company. Now I was earning zero sales commission. To try make up the difference I took home “outsourced assembly” projects from work.