Why Shop Small?

 Why shop small?

It’s a serious question. One that, as a small business owner, matters very much to my success, even my survival. Why should people shop small? Why should people walk into your store? Why should they visit your restaurant? Why should they choose you, or me, over Amazon or Walmart or Chili’s or McDonalds? 

Give me one good reason why customers should choose you and I don’t want to hear the tired cliches about how buying small helps an entrepreneur pay their mortgage while buying big helps some fat cat CEO buy another ski chalet. I am a consumer. None of that matters to me. What matters to me is price. Well, not really price but value. All other things being equal, price is the deciding factor so I guess that means small businesses should probably shut down because we’ll never be able to compete against the big boys. Right?

Probably true, but the good thing is that we don’t have to compete against the big boys, we can easily be better instead of equal. But we do have to work. Being small and opening your doors isn’t enough. We need to each find our edge. We need to find what Warren Buffett (no little guy) calls a durable competitive advantage. I believe as small business owners, there are a few easy ways to do this.

Be nice to your customers. My wife and I walked into a small shop in Charleston, South Carolina yesterday. The shop sold crystals and the like and had a yoga studio attached. A very nice, and inviting space. There was a clerk behind the counter. We said hello, she said nothing. Others walked in, carrying yoga mats and dressed for yoga. She was all smiles and hellos for these folks. They were people she knew.

Our daughter is a collector of crystals and although she wasn’t with us, souvenirs are a regular part of travel and I would have liked to have bought her something from this store, but alas, we bought nothing. The clerk finally did acknowledge us but it was only to let us know from across the room that we had to leave because the class was going to start and she had to lock the door since there would be no one to keep an eye on the place.

The clerk did inform us that she had called the owner, but the owner wasn’t around and so she had to ask us to leave. We were welcome to come back and spend our money when the owner deigned to show up. This wouldn’t have irked me so much if she had acknowledged us in the first place. The clerk may not have thought about her actions or maybe didn’t care, but she was rude to us and that is why zero of my souvenir budget will be spent at that particular shop. If she had been nice to us from the moment we walked in and walked over and explained the situation instead of calling across the store that we had to leave, we may have returned and spent some money with her. But no, she doesn’t deserve my hard-earned.

The sad thing is that the clerk doesn’t care or even know why the way she treated us will echo in her career, too. I will never spend my money there. I would never recommend this establishment. I would discourage people from visiting this establishment. I may even go so far as to recommend other places where the same goods may be acquired along with service and a smile.

Acknowledge your customers. Maybe this point should have come first but I want you to be nice. Don’t acknowledge a visitor just to turn them off with a scowl.  Be nice and acknowledge your customer. Say hello when they walk in. let them know you’re nearby and happy (not just available or willing) to answer any questions your customers may have. After all, if I want to be ignored, I can go to Target.

Anyone who knows me knows I am a bookworm. I found a lovely bookstore and went inside. The clerk behind the counter, who maybe was the owner, raised her head from what she was doing, looked at us and only said hello after we did. We wandered through the store without a word from her. I love books and I love buying books from small places but I walked out empty handed.

Contrast this to my favorite bookstore in West Yellowstone, Montana. I walk in and someone says hi. Employees roaming through the store offer assistance. The cashier makes small talk. I never leave that place without a book or three.

We walked through the market in Charleston and got both kinds of treatment. There were some vendors who made eye contact and smiled and bragged about their goods like proud grandparents. Others sat behind their tables and mumbled prices or said nothing at all, treating potential customers like an inconvenience.

Know your stuff. One of the greatest things about shopping small is getting to speak to someone who really knows their stuff. I don’t just want to know what the product is. I want to know its provenance. I want the person behind the counter in the small store to come out from behind the counter and tell me why I should spend more at her store than I would have to at a big box retailer.

We walked into a jewelry store a while later and the clerk took the time to tell us that all the pieces were handmade by the artist who owned the store and that she only made a couple of each piece. This immediately made the products more desirable and made price less of an objection. She asked us where we  were from and it turned out she was about to jump on a plane that very evening and head toward our part of the world. She also took the time to tell us about some other unique places we can visit and told us about a great restaurant we could go to for lunch.

She earned my business. Big Time!

So be an entrepreneur. Set up your business. Stock it, market the hell out of it and sell! But do the little things that are going to give you an advantage. Most people are price sensitive, but many of them will make price a secondary consideration for the right product, and maybe more importantly, the right experience and the right person. Be the right person and provide that experience to all your customers all the time. It costs you nothing, but will pay off handsomely.

Adolfo Jimenez is a small business owner and writer living in South Florida with his family. He is the author of The Successful Vendor, a guide to succeeding in the competitive world of small-scale retail.

Getting to Know You

 My wife and I have been married a long time. We've known each other just a little longer than we've been a couple. We have a great relationship. Go back and read the second sentence again. We "rushed in." Elvis may think us foolish but it worked out pretty well. I love her as much as I ever did and I'm pretty sure she means it when she says she loves me. We have a nice time together. We enjoy one another's company. Even the romance is still strong, nudge nudge wink wink say no more! 

I believe the lesson here is that you don't really need to get to know a person before getting married. Well, maybe that's an oversimplification. I think there has to be attraction, you have to know each other as well as you can without the benefit of years, and you have to get along.

When people have asked me the secret to the success of my marriage, I always give the same answer: our values are aligned. We want the same things. We are committed to the same things. We agree on how or kids should be raised. We worship in the same way. We like a lot of the same things, and more importantly, we believe the same things.

Our values are aligned. What does this mean?

We are committed to one another and we believe in the institution of marriage. We believe we made a commitment that must be honored for life. We didn't take the decision to get married lightly so it stands to reason that a decision to part ways would also be taken seriously.

Our values are aligned when it comes to money, to family, to work, to everything. This is why our marriage works.

This is not to say that we have a perfect marriage. No one does. We have our ups and downs. We fight. We disagree. We get on each other's nerves. I always love my wife. I don't always like her. I'm sure she would say the same thing about me. Maybe she won't be as nice about it as I am not as lovable as I'd like to believe I am.

That being said, Happy Birthday, Abdaliz. I love you now and always.

How To Everything 2

Yesterday I ranted about productivity. I'll admit, I'm not as productive as I'd like to be. I would say I am among the most productive people I know personally. After many years in the corporate world and now as a business owner serving the world of academia, I can say most people waste time. I am among those people. The difference is I am aware of it.

A good deal of my workday is spent with customers. From making sales and taking orders, to collection calls and the occasional dispute. I am in the food service business, so I also spend some time everyday in the kitchen, actually cooking. I often run inventory. I have to place orders and receive them. I review invoices and I balance my checkbook. I even run payroll. These are useful and necessary activities that I could delegate, but I feel they are good ways for me to keep an eye on the business; a finger on the pulse, if you will.

I actually spend some of my down time (when there are no customers and no calls to make) stocking coolers and racks and even shopping. This also keeps me in touch with the business. I will often listen to audio books while I'm doing this kind of work as I'd rather engage my mind in learning while performing tasks that don't require too much thought on my part.

Audio books are a great time saver. You can get through books during time that would otherwise be wasted like when you're stocking coolers or walking your dogs or sitting in traffic. I probably get through just over one book per week. You can always buy audio books or you can download the Libby app to your phone, which works with your public library so it's free! I do some of both, but I will admit I love Libby.  And, it's not really free. My taxes help pay for the local libraries so I might as well get some of my money back in the form of self-improvement.

I tend to use audio books when it's a subject I want to learn about, not one I need to learn about. The reason is there will always be distractions. People will call or approach you with a question or some other thing. I have a short attention span (now known as ADD) so it's easy to lose my place even when listening. I'll often "rewind" and re-listen to the portions I missed.

I know this may seem obsessive or, at the very least, uber-nerdy, but I believe in learning and bettering myself. I also believe that time should be treated like the valuable, limited resource it is, so I find ways to not waste it. This is one of them.

Adolfo Jimenez is an entrepreneur, author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published ten books, which you can find here. Adolfo is the co-owner of The Cafeteria Company, a commissary outsourcing firm. He also co-owns Soup -n- Sam, Le Velo Macaron, and Starlight Catering.

Why Dreams Matter More Than Reality

I am a business owner. I enjoy what I do. I enjoy making decisions. I like the fact that people depend on the services I provide and the paychecks I sign. It's one of the most rewarding things I've ever done. One of the most rewarding. Not the most rewarding. 

I am, behind the entrepreneur/business owner facade, an artist. I am a writer. I am a performer. I enjoy getting up in front of a crowd and presenting whatever it is I'm presenting. I've been a corporate trainer. I taught a comedy class. I've done improvisational comedy. I've made corporate presentations. I've given political speeches and invocations.

If I had my druthers, I would write all morning and dazzle audiences all night. I haven't my druthers. I have... priorities. I have responsibilities and I have commitments. My dreams must continue to be on hold. This is a situation of my own making. I took a seat on this runaway train. I must remain seated until it runs out of steam or goes off the rails.

It's a sad feeling to know that you made the wrong turns. It's sad to know that you zigged when you should have zagged. There's no choice like no choice. I can't blame anyone else. I allowed it to happen. I was not just a passenger on the train. Oftentimes, I was the conductor. Make the decision now, before you're painted into a corner. Make the decision while the decision is still yours to make. If you allow the world to make it for you, it will probably be a decision you won't like.

The world is a screwy place. We don't know what tomorrow brings and we don't know if we'll be here to see it. We only know where we've been and where we are at the moment... sometimes. It's important to pursue your goals and keep dreaming your dreams. Pursue them, too. Make your dreams your goals. Or, at least, make your goals rest stops on the way to your dreams. Do it and you may get there. If you make it, that's great. If you don't, at least you'll have the satisfaction of knowing you did your best and that your life was spent in pursuit of attaining your highest purpose, not something as common as money. The pursuit of happiness is all that matters.

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published ten books, which you can find here.

An Earned Advantage

I'm sitting at my dining room table reading an article. My wife is leaning on the kitchen counter with a cup of coffee in her hands. It's Saturday. We have the day off. There is a man crawling around our attic installing a new central air conditioner.

I share my thoughts on the article with my wife and she tells me I am a smart cookie. I'm not sure I agree. I have an advantage over many people, though. I know how to read. I earned that advantage. It's not like being born tall and good-looking. I don't have those unearned advantages. My parents made sure I can read. That I enjoy reading and devote significant time to it, may be something I earned, or may be something I was born with.

Because I am a man who will look for any advantage he can get, I tell my wife that the only real proof of my intelligence is that I married her. She smiles, walks over and kisses me. I steal her coffee. What do you know about that? I am smart!

I never finished high school. I got my GED at 24 and took some classes at the community college. No degree. But I read every day. I read books, magazines, newspapers, anything I can get my hands on. This has been my advantage. I learned what I wanted to learn, what I felt would be useful; not what a college administrator wanted me to learn. I'm better for it. And... no debt!

If you're taking the time to read this, you may share that same earned advantage. In which case, good for you, and thanks for stopping by!

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published ten books, which you can find here.

What's easy not to do

I've been thinking of creating a new website. I've also been looking to team up with an editor who could work closely with me. I've been looking for a web designer, too. 

In this day and age there is no reason for me to be thinking about these things and not getting them done so I put out a feeler on Facebook, asking for my creative peeps to reach out. They did.

Now begins a new chapter in my life.

Follow me to Apresterra!

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published eight books, which you can find here.

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Swimmin' Without Women

It's Tuesday morning. It's cold in my house. Not because of anything having to do with the climate or the environment. The A/C is blasting as it will all summer. It's actually pretty warm outside although it's not even 8:00 AM. 

I sit down at my computer to write as I do most mornings and I am a little more awake than I might otherwise be. It's not the coffee. It's the pool. I took a little swim this morning. I was letting out the dogs (I guess I've answered that Baja Men question - sorry, it had to be done!) and I decided to do something a little different. I stripped out of my boxers, stepped into my trunks, and went for a dip. I would have preferred to go in my birthday suit but I don't have that level of privacy in my yard, unfortunately. Time to build a taller fence.

I didn't go into the pool with any kind of agenda. I didn't tell myself I'd swim ten laps or do that aqua-aerobics stuff they do at the YMCA pool. I just floated around and listened to the world waking up. I heard the sounds of cars on the road. I heard road construction a couple of blocks away. It was just me and my ears. 

It's a good thing to go out once in a while and just be. You don't need music or even a companion. My dogs were living their own lives, not worrying about me. My family is inside asleep. There is nothing but me and the water and that is all I need. It's a nice transition from asleep to the hectic action that follows on any given day. 

I tried to guide my thoughts toward projects I'm currently working on but nothing doing. I let it go, It was too early and the water was too calm and too warm for anything structured. I let my thoughts go where the wind and the leaves and the noise of the world led them. And that was all right. I'll be out there again tomorrow. Maybe without my bathing suit... maybe not.

Find your quiet spot. Enjoy it. Soak it up a while. 

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published eight books, which you can find here.

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The New Guy

On Thanksgiving day 2019, I left my house, planning to go to the grocery store. We have a tradition in my house. My wife will always forget at least one ingredient for the feast and I will brave the wilds of the local Winn-Dixie to procure said ingredient.

As I went into the front yard, my daughter in tow, I saw a little dog in my yard. Alone. Long story short, we rescued him, tried to find the owner and couldn't so now he is part of the family. He was sick and underweight when we found him. He seems to have been abused and is suffering from trauma around food and being crowded. Sudden moves will startle him. The people who owned him were bastards. It's taken time and treasure, but Maximus Achilles Jimenez is close to being a normal dog. He's still a jerk sometimes, but so is everyone else.

Then, last Saturday, I got the news that a new dog was coming to join the family. His name is Mason. He is a Golden Retriever mix and outweighs Max the chiweenie by about 40 pounds. Max is under five pounds. Not a fair fight. Still, Max is pretty fearless and stands his ground, even if Mason swats him around like a rubber ball, in a friendly, brotherly way but still... it has to be hard on the little guy's ego.

These dogs are a distraction. They are a severe pain in the ass. And, please don't tell them, I love them very much.

Life is better with a dog. Of this, there is no doubt. I am actually allergic to dogs, but it's worth it. The happiness outweighs the itchiness. I can scratch.

The challenge for me is fitting the extra responsibility in with my work. I work at home and I need something near silence. It's hard to get that when I have two yelping madmen losing their minds every time a cat, duck, squirrel or pedestrian dares to walk past my house.

It's only been a few days so we're all getting used to a new routine. Soon, we'll be all right and when we are,  the fun will really start.



Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He has published eight books. He lives in Hollywood, Florida with his family.  He published four books in 2019, which you can find here.

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Happy New Year

I'm not Barbara Walters, but this is still 2020.

It's been a long day after a long night, but I wanted to jump on here and wish you all a great New Year.

Got any goals?
Any big plans?

If not, get some. Do it. Do it now! It's that simple!

I'll be back soon with something (hopefully) worth reading.

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published eight books, which you can find here.

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The Business

This is a confession.

Too late. You're here now. You must listen to my tale of woe. To do otherwise, to turn away, would be indecent. You are a decent person... aren't you?

There are two sides to being a writer. There is the hard part, which is the actual writing. Then there is the harder part, which is selling yourself. I like sharing my experiences. I really do. What I don't like is the business of selling those experiences once they are bound in a book or put in an e-book.

Don't get me wrong, I want to sell the books. I want to sell millions of copies of my books. In my other life,  I sell for a living. I understand the science and the art of sales. I've just never learned how to sell myself and my creations, and that is exactly what selling books is. It is an author selling bits of himself.

Every story I've written is personal, even if not autobiographical. They came from inside of me. It's easier to write about these things than it is to talk about them.

So, I've spent the greater part of the weekend, studying and creating a marketing plan. I am all over social media and I am compiling a list of independent bookstores and book clubs that I will be visiting. If you're reading this, and I am ever in your neighborhood, please stop by and say hello.

I think I may continue the theme I've started here. It ought to be fun. Who knows? I may end up not hating the business of selling my writing after all!

Adolfo Jimenez is an author, poet, and blogger. He lives in Hollywood, Florida. He has published eight books, which you can find here.

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A Clean, Well-Lighted (Quiet) Place

You need a place to write. Writing is a job like any other job. What happens if you don't show up for work? You lose your job. You are unemployed. You are pounding the pavement. There may seem to be no consequences for you as a writer if you choose not to write because no one will fire you, but if you don't make time to write, you will not make it as a writer. I know that seems obvious, but sometimes the obvious things are the hardest to see.

Too many people are in love with the idea of being a writer. They want to tell people they are working on a novel or two. They want to be seen in Starbucks, staring off into the distance with their laptop at the ready, standing by to capture their genius. They want to do the writerly things. They just don't actually want to write.

I have a close friend who is an incredibly talented individual, who could own Hollywood (the real Hollywood, not the South Florida shithole where I live) but he doesn't do the things that he would have to do in order to succeed. His reasons are personal and real and I don't bust his balls about it anymore. I used to, but I'm not his agent. I have no place telling him what to do. It's his life, not mine.

The point is that you have to do what you have to do if you want to succeed. Fuck the attention. The thing about being a writer is that attention ruins everything. Don't believe me? Ask Hemingway. Never mind, he's dead. Read The Snows of Kilimanjaro and he'll explain how every day of comfort and betraying who he was contributed to the end of his career as a writer. He was telling the story of a man named Harry, but he was seeing his future.

So find a clean, well lighted place to write. Or find a noisy, dim place to write. Just find a place and do your thing and do it.



Adolfo Jimenez is a writer living against his will in Hollywood, Florida.  His latest release is Scenes from a 1979 Ford Fairmont, a short book of poems. Get it on Amazon!

Check him out here!

When to Steal

This is not about plagiarism. That kind of stealing is never cool. If you do it, you deserve a fate worse than death. Something really horrible, like having to spend eternity in the waiting room of a clinic in Hialeah where the old ladies complain about their aches and pains and how little their social insecurity checks are.

This is about stealing experiences. Hemingway said that you had to really know a thing to write about it. He was right - for himself. Tell that to Tolkien or Lewis or to George Lucas. These men created new worlds that simply didn't exist. Worlds they only knew inside their heads.

How can a man write about the experiences of a woman? How can a woman write a man? By learning. And how do we learn? By paying attention. There are seven billion people on this planet and every one of them is having an experience every moment. I am experiencing the writing of this blog post. You are suffering through the experience of reading it. So, let's do a little exercise...

What am I wearing?
Where am I sitting?
Is it day or night?
Am I showered and shaved?
Do I have a cup of coffee or a glass of whisky nearby?

I don't care about your answers anymore than you should care about the correct answers. You decide what I'm wearing, what I'm drinking. You decide everything about it. Steal the experience of me writing this and make it your own. Steal it as you would steal the experience of a cop chasing a bad guy or a caveman hunting a woolly mammoth.

You don't need to experience all there is to experience in order to be a writer. Imagination trumps all.





Adolfo Jimenez is a writer living against his will in Hollywood, Florida.  His latest release is Scenes from a 1979 Ford Fairmont, a short book of poems. Get it on Amazon!

Check him out here!

Little Notes

I've been married to Abby for nineteen years. Long time. Love her more each day. Though, there are times when I remember that if I'd killed her the day I met her, I'd probably be out by now.

We have good times and bad times though more good than bad. We put effort into getting along and being happy and I don't mind saying we have a damn good sex life after all these years. We are lucky, we are fortunate; in a word we are blessed.

It's not easy, but it's not hard. We do the little things. We sometimes write each other little notes. Sometimes on paper, sometimes by text. We listen to one another. We make time for each other. We support each other.

Why do you care about this? I don't know. I don't care if you care about this. I do. It's good to have some stability. She is my rock. She gives me space to be myself and listens to me bitch and moan when being myself becomes too much to bear. I'd like to think I do the same for her.

I'll admit I have the easier end of the bargain. She's an intelligent, normal, stable person. I'm a writer. I'm manic-depressive. I'm temperamental. I'm an idiot.

So this post is a little note to my wife. The woman who took everything from me except my name, and gave me so much more than I could have reasonably expected and more than I could ever deserve.






Adolfo Jimenez is a writer living against his will in Hollywood, Florida.  His latest release is Scenes from a 1979 Ford Fairmont, a short book of poems. Get it on Amazon!

Check him out here!

Doing Writerly Things

I got a rare Saturday afternoon to myself today. My wife and older daughter are out of town. My younger daughter was at a party which I was not invited to. Rubber chicken and no booze. I'll get over it. I dropped her off and found a local bar. I sat down and ordered a very tall beer and lunch.

I was halfway through the beer before the food came. It was not yet noon. This is new to me. Not the eating. Not the drinking. The drinking before lunch before noon could be a thing, though I doubt it. Still, I ate. I drank. I was merry for a while.

I had one more very tall beer and finished my lunch but before then, I did a little writing. In my head and on my iPhone. I took notes for what may or may not become a poem, a short story, part of a book or nothing at all.

I texted a writer buddy of mine and told her this drinking alone at a bar before noon is the most writerly thing I've ever done. She agreed that it did indeed sound writerly. Whatever that means.

In Paris in the 20's, writers hung out in cafes not to be seen, but to take advantage of the heat. Now, people crack open their laptops in Starbucks because writing, it seems, is the least important part of being a writer. What matters is that you are recognized as a writer. It seems to be an excuse to be eccentric or not have a good job, or to drink on someone else's tab. I don't know how eccentric I am, but I pay for my own drinks with money I earn from my job.

Writerly things vary. Hemingway liked hunting and Fishing and Travel. Bukowski drank wine and loved L.A. Hunter S Thompson did every drug imaginable.  Two of these great men committed suicide. Is that writerly?

So go on and hang out in bars. Drink coffee, write in full view of the public, or pretend to write as you read Facebook posts about writing and answer idiotic questions posted in writers' groups. Perhaps you'll post some idiotic questions of your own.

But I would advise you to lift your head now and then. See what's happening around you? That's life. That's the stuff of literature. The world is what you need to understand if you really want to be a writer. Not the look, the looking. The listening, the watching. Soak in the smells of a place because they tell you as much about what's happening around you as anything else.

What it comes down to is that if you want to be a writer, there is only one thing you must do, and that is write. The rest is pretentious bullshit.




Adolfo Jimenez is a writer living against his will in Hollywood, Florida.  His latest release is Scenes from a 1979 Ford Fairmont, a short book of poems. Get it on Amazon!

Check him out here!

Trusting Your Gut

You ever get that feeling? You know the one. Down in the pit of your stomach. Sometimes it's positive. Sometimes, it's a bad feeling. It's a real thing and you ought to listen to it. Let it guide you. Think of yourself as a Jedi and that feeling is The Force.

I don't know how to explain that feeling. Maybe it's God. Maybe it's the lizard brain. Maybe it's luck. Maybe it's something we all imagine. All I know is, it's usually right.

I believe it's the accumulation of experience. I think all the mistakes we've made, conversations we've had, books we've read, and advice we've received, go to some place in our being and create that feeling. I think that's why it becomes louder and more reliable as we get older, and I think that's why we ought to listen to it.



Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of Le Velo Macaron

You can find him on Instagram and LinkedIn

The Need To Manage

There is management. There is micromanagement. There is the laissez faire approach to management (my personal favorite - more on that below.) And there is what I think of as The Need To Manage.

The need to manage happens when you have a competent, experienced team, and there isn't much for managers to do in the way of coaching them. Of course, no one wants to feel unneeded, so the managers manage or micromanage or worse, mismanage, what needn't be managed at all.

I have found myself on the managed side of this equation and I can tell you it's demotivating. Don't tell me what I already know just because you have no value to add. If you are a manager looking for an opportunity to manage, build your own value. Make yourself better so you can make those you manage better.

Laissez Faire basically means hands off. It's a wonderful thing. If you hire well, train well, and support your staff effectively, you may enjoy the fruits of your labor, only getting up from your lawn chair when trouble arises.

Pretty boring, huh?

How about... hire the right people. Train the people to be their best. Guide them as necessary. Train yourself and increase your own value so you can train them and increase their value.

The Need To Manage is real. Don't fight it, but understand that the most important function of a manager is to add value to his team. You're success as a manager is measured in the success of your people. Their results, good or bad, are a reflection on you.

Work on you... so you can work on them.

Let me know how it goes.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 

You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

The Secret Law of Attraction?

A lot has been said about the law of attraction. Most of what's been said is nonsense. The thought that thinking about something will make that something happen or appear is quite simply bullshit.

This is not to say you shouldn't think about your goals. Hell, you should obsess about them. How else will you achieve them? But don't expect things to happen because you think about them.

I have a friend who is a talented writer, filmmaker, editor, etc. He could be a Hollywood start director and producer. But he's lazy. He thinks about his dream career all the time. He's watched more movies and knows more about movies than anyone I know. He watches every TV show. He knows the bios of the directors and actors.

But he's waiting for Hollywood to magically appear on his doorstep. He will wait until the end of his days. That type of thing doesn't happen. Ever. Not even in the movies.

You can attract success and blessings by working hard toward them. Like attracts like. If you work hard, create and exploit opportunities and create successes, more successes will become available to you. Then, all you have to do is pick them up.

Think positive, but know your thoughts are just a map. You have to get off your butt or nothing will ever happen.



Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 

You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

Who Are You?

Who are you?

Not your name. You.

When people see you, what do they see?

What is your brand?

These are questions everyone in the business world needs to answer. Whether you are an entrepreneur or you're selling cars or driving for Lyft or Uber, you need a brand.

I am a creature of habit. I go to a rotation of restaurants near my office for lunch. There are two in particular that I visit once a week. The waitresses know my name and they know what I like to eat. I'm not special. I'm sure they do this for every one of their regulars. They've branded themselves as being better than other servers. I'm sure their pay reflects this fact.

These ladies have branded themselves. Shouldn't you? What do you want to be known for? Do you want to be just another car salesman or do you want to be "My Guy down at the Chevy Dealership?" Do you want to be a dental hygienist or Britney, the amazing young lady at my dentist's office?

Decide who you want to be and resolve to become that person. Share your journey with the world and you are taking your first step toward branding yourself.

Let me know who you become.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

Round Up The Posse

Jim Rohn said you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with. That might be a scary thought. But it's also a thought that can open you up to all kinds of new possibilities.

I spend a lot of time with my wife. This is good because... well, she's my wife. Also, she and I are of the same mindset. We work hard. We share the same values. We encourage one another. What else do I need?

Now, throughout the course of my day I come in contact with scores of people. Some are my colleagues, some are my clients. I try to approach every interaction with the greatest amount of positivity I can. I try to learn from everyone I meet or spend time around. If this possibility doesn't exist, I coach them and try to add value to their lives. If that's not possible, I limit contact.

I have friends I care about deeply who want to go to lunch with me a couple of times a week. I limit it to once a month. There are two reasons for this. The first reason is that I often work through lunch. The second reason is that they will ruin my lunch with their complaining and I don't want to fill the second half of my day with negativity. Why poison my mind when I still have work to do and money to make?

Drive time is reserved for phone calls to family and to audiobooks. I see no point in listening to news. It only brings me down or pisses me off. I'd rather spend drive time listening to books and improving myself. I occasionally listen to some music when I feel the need to decompress. The folks at CNN and Fox ain't part of my posse!

The craziest thing I do is drive in silence. I'll do this once or twice a week. No music, no books, no calls. Just the sound of the engine and my thoughts. Try it sometime. It's therapeutic.

All of these things are better than being in the presence of people who bring me down. They also allow me to populate my posse with people who are successful like Gary Vaynerchuk or Jim Rohn or even George Washington.

Try any of these techniques and let me know how it goes.


Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. He is the owner of www.levelomacaron.com 
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/

It Only Happens Once

Today. You get one crack at it so it'd better count. Feel free to waste the day. Not a problem for anyone else but you. Just as you own your successes, you own your failures.

There is one question I ask my coaching clients: What are you doing today to make yourself better? It's a simple question. You don't need to improve by 100% every day. No one is capable of that. But making little changes every day, replacing bad habits with good ones, is really all you need.

If you're out of shape and haven't exercised in years, you can't wake up tomorrow morning and start training for an Ironman Triathlon. But you can take a walk around the block. If you eat greasy fast food three times a day, you can replace one of those meals with a salad. Maybe a bowl of oatmeal or some fruit for breakfast.

Today only happens once and while you do have another shot tomorrow, you're going to run out of todays sooner or later so why waste a single one of them?



Adolfo Jimenez is an executive coach, entrepreneur, book club nerd, and family man living in Hollywood, FL. Adolfo owns www.levelomacaron.com and other businesses.
You can find him at https://www.instagram.com/adolfo.jimenez/