The best bridge between despair and hope, is a good night sleep.
“The best bridge between despair and hope, is a good night sleep.” E. Jospeh Cossman.
Mr. Cossman was an American business man, he’s best know for co-creating of the ant farm and stud gun toys.
Here’s an excerpt from his LA Times Obituary, this man would be a force to reckon with in any generation, clearly ahead of his time during his.
Mr. Cossman was door-to-door salesman who perfected mail-order salesmanship and pioneered the television infomercial, then wrote books and conducted pricey seminars to demonstrate the route from rags to riches. Nothing seemed to escape Cossman’s notice. He once was at a trade show selling reproductions of famous artworks for 50 cents each, pitying his next-booth neighbor, who was touting shrunken heads at a whopping $2.98. But in three days’ time, Cossman also noted that he had sold about two dozen Da Vincis and Van Goghs while the other fellow had sold 3,000 shrunken heads.
So, as he later would advise those attending his seminars, he acted. Fast. He formed a partnership with the seller of shrunken heads, abandoned cheap art and in a year sold 2 million of the little skulls.
Cossman was offered tooling for making the “spud gun,” a toy pistol that fires pieces of potato, for $500 by a toy maker who had made 100,000 but sold only 10,000. Dubious, Cossman checked with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and learned to his delighted surprise that the country was in the middle of its biggest potato glut in two decades.
Cossman bought the spud gun-making machinery and solicited potatoes from growers, promising the toy would solve their economic problems. He had more than five tons of spuds delivered to him in New York City, dumped them on a sidewalk and got arrested. Predictably, the publicity got him on the morning network television talk shows, where he gleefully discussed his potato-firing pistol.
He sold 2 million of those, too -- in six months.
“I’ve had 20 big winners in my lifetime -- ones I’ve sold 1 million or more of. I only created two,” he told the San Diego Business Journal in 1989. The two inventions were the ant farm and a fishing lure that smelled like meat.
For the things he didn’t invent, he said, “I contacted the manufacturers and got exclusive rights in writing. Then I’d market it as if it were my own product.”
When Cossman turned his own marketing success into daylong $595 how-to seminars, he aptly titled segments: “How to Profit From Trade Shows,” “How to Get Free Publicity” and “How to Find a Product or Service.”
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Mr. Cossman came to my attention as I was researching ways to improve my focus and energy and learned about the benefits of a good night sleep. How was it that Mr. Cossman was able to be so productive, for such long period of time , what was this man’s longevity secret?
A good night’s sleep.
A good night sleep and a daily walk are simple but highly effective ways to give yourself an advantage in the business world today. Developing a healthy sleeping habit is harder today than ever before, we are required to use blue light screens and have to battle sensory input from a variety of sources throughout the day.
Start with a few numbers to develop the discipline required for this life changing personal wellness routine.
Try to go to bed around the same time every night.
Stop drinking caffeine / coffee a good 8-10 hours before bedtime or better yet, get yourself hooked on matcha tea and add local honey.
Stop eating and drinking alcohol 3 hours before bedtime.
Stop working and or engaging in anything that may produce a stressful interaction 2 hours before bedtime.
Stop looking at blue light screen / put away your phone and turn off the TV, 1 hour before bedtime.
Spend 8 hours in bed and get bat cave obsessed over the light in your bedroom, light is bad, dark is good.
Bonus hack * get up with the sun and get outside within the first 90 minutes of the day.
There are fewer and fewer Cossman’s today and the reason may just be found under the covers.