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Are you a wiz at getting your tax forms filled out accurately on time or early without much stress? Do you have any specific tips or preferred software you use to make your tax magic happen?

Tax time is in full swing for most American readers. While your tips and tricks for stress-free filing of American taxes are much-needed and appreciated, how cool would it be if we could get some tips from across the world? Do you have an odd tax tip that applies only where you live? We’d like to learn it!

Make sure to include a link and name with your tip so we can give you proper credit if we use your tip in a future post!

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Another year is winding down, and that means it’s time to take a look back at what we’ve done here at Lifehack over the last 12 months. 2009 was a scary year for a lot of people – corporate layoffs, a shaky global economy, stunningly vicious politics, old wars grinding on and new ones flaring up. In the midst of all this, though, many saw opportunities; with the myth of life-long corporate employment shattered as some of the world’s biggest companies teetered on the brink of collapse, entrepreneurship enjoyed a major resurgence. This rise in self-reliance extends beyond our work life, too – people are embracing a do-it-yourself, person-to-person lifestyle where status and the display of wealth matter much less than authenticity and social interaction.

All of this is reflected in the posts that went up on this site over the last year. What follows is a list of the 90 most popular, most commented on, and most talked-about posts from 2009, and as you can see, in addition to our usual mix of posts about personal productivity, organization, webware, and creativity, a large number of posts about personal finance and self-employment made the top of the list. It’s not surprising that Lifehack’s staff and contributors would write posts that reflect the tenor of the times, nor that such posts would resonate most with our audience.

What emerges from all this is a treasure trove of good advice, ranging from the lofty and idealistic to the immediately practical. We promise to continue to provide quality tips and advice about work, technology, money, and just plain living in the new year and beyond. If you haven’t already, make sure you subscribe to our feed and follow us on Twitter so you don’t miss any of the great posts we have in store for 2010!

Software and Technology

2009 was notable for the maturing of online applications, the explosion of applications for mobile phones, and the mainstreaming of social networking services like Twitter and Facebook. Popular stories at Lifehack covered tips for the use (and not abuse) of social networking services, tips on using your computer effectively and securely, and recommendations for applications online, on your PC, and on your Android phones.

Getting Productive with the Webware 100 (Dustin M. Wax)
Searching for a Shared Virtual Workspace? (Clemens Rettich)
Is Google Ready to Handle Your Business? (Part 1) and (Part 2) (Dustin M. Wax)
From Here to Tweeternity: A Practical Guide to Getting Started on Twitter (Dustin M. Wax)
Six Ways to Transform your Presentation (Paul Sloane)
Managing Your Social Network Addiction (Ibrahim Husain)
8 Keys to Internet Security (Dustin M. Wax)
The First 10 Free Apps to Install on a New Windows PC (Dustin M. Wax)
12 Free Android Apps to Help Get Things Done (Part 1) and (Part 2) (Dustin M. Wax)
Your Guide to Apps that Eliminate Distractions (Joel Falconer)

Lifestyle: Family, Fitness, and Finance

Money issues were on everyone’s minds this year, and our writers served up plenty of advice about managing both your money and your expectations. Advice about families and parenting was popular this year – or sometimes controversial, like Craig Harper’s poorly understood advice to take ownership of your past and recognize that whoever wronged you in the past, only you can set things right for yourself. And, since today’s worker is all-too-often someone who spends most of her or his day sitting, our writers’ advice on getting some activity into your life was well appreciated.

How to Stop Yelling at Your Kids (Erin Kurt)
If Your Childhood Sucked – It’s Time to Stop Blaming Your Parents! (Craig Harper)
How to Recognize Imminent Danger: 7 Essential Safety Rules (Mary Jaksch)
30 Money Sites to Check Out in 2009 (Thursday Bram)
3 Scary Misconceptions About Money (Joel Falconer)
Great Ways to Become Poor and Stay Poor (Paul Sloane)
How to Start Running – Without Feeling Like a Failure (Mary Jaksch)
Pain and Posture: The Basics (Jamie Nischan)
How to Start Running – Without Feeling Like a Failure (Mary Jaksch)
A Workout for Geeks (Daryl Furuyama)

Personal Productivity and Creativity

Advice about getting productive makes up the core of Lifehack’s content, so naturally our most popular and most talked about posts this year were just that. From developing the right mindset to promoting creativity to finding inspiration and motivation, we offered tons of advice on getting things done.

12 Lists That Help You Get Things Done (Dustin M. Wax)
Procrastination – NOT a Problem! (Francis Wade)
10 Best Productivity Books of 2009 (Dustin M. Wax)
11 Ways to Think Outside the Box (Dustin M. Wax)
8 Ways to Kill Clutter in 5 Minutes (David Pierce)
Reaching Your Goals – Dutch Style (Christine Buske)
New Year’s Resolutions Don’t Work – Here’s Why (Steve Errey)
How to Make Decisions Under Pressure (Joel Falconer)
Limits and Creativity (Dustin M. Wax)
The Daily Grind: A Matter of Momentum (Joel Falconer)
4 Pocket-Sized Tools to Help You Generate Killer Ideas Any Time, Anywhere (Chuck Frey)
How to Think What Nobody Else Thinks (Paul Sloane)
9 Lists To Keep Updated, and Keep Handy (David Pierce)
10 Reasons Paper is The Most Flexible Productivity Platform (Joel Falconer)
3 Tips to Improve Memory Quickly (Steve Martile)
How to Wake Up and Instantly Achieve Something Everyday (Paul Dickinson)
Stripped GTD: 3 Habits That Make You More Productive (David Pierce)
Ten Great Ways to Crush Creativity (Paul Sloane)
Scoring 100% in Time Management (Francis Wade)
7 Steps For Making a New Year’s Resolution and Keeping It (Annabel Candy)

My incomplete series on getting back on track with a productivity system, “GTD Refresh”, was quite popular but was never completed. The next step for me was supposed to be eliminating my email backlog and adopting an “Inbox Zero” approach, but frankly, email won. This year – I’m going to try again in 2010 and so you may well see more “GTD Refresh posts in the not-too-distant future.

2009 was bookended by two publications with something to offer the would-be personal productivity expert. David Allen’s Making It All Work revisited the core concepts of GTD and expanded on elements that had been weakly developed in his earlier work. You can read my lengthy review here: (Part 1) (Part 2) (Part 3)

And our most popular series, my “Back to Basics” posts from 2008, were collected, revised, and expanded (with 2 new chapters) in the release of Back to Basics Productivity which will be joined in 2010 by several more ebook releases.

Work and Career

With the economy huddling in on itself this year, even non-entrepreneurs had to learn to be more entrepreneurial. Promotions, raises, or just holding onto your job and pay level, required a demonstration of unusual career intelligence, and our writers offered a heaping portion of it. And for those in our workforce who took the plunge – voluntarily or not – into self-employment, advice on personal branding, small-business promotion, and entrepreneurship were in no short supply.

What to Do if You Don’t Get Along with Your Boss (Paul Sloane)
Darth Vader’s “Management” Secrets (Art Carden)
21 Entrepreneurship Websites Worth Checking Out
3 Areas You Must Invest in During an Economic Recession (Dan Schawbel)
Personal Branding Basics (Dan Schawbel)
Seven Great Questions to Ask at a Job Interview (Paul Sloane)
Why A Good Web Site Matters To Your Business (Susan Baroncini-Moe)
How to do Good AND Make a Profit (Arvind Devalia)
12 Tips for Better Business Writing (Dustin M. Wax)
10 Questions to Ask Yourself About Your Job (Paul Sloane)

Productivity Pr0n

It may seem distracting, even materialistic, to drool over office supplies, but let’s face it: I do it, you do it, and geeks around the world do it. And with good reason, actually: the right tool can (in David Pierce’s words) make all the difference. Moleskine’s were popular as always, but a list of alternative notebooks caught the eye of those put off by the style or cost of the famous pocket notebook. Pens also got a lot of attention – it may seem silly to those who are (or pretend to be) perfectly comfortable with their 12-for-a-dollar stick pens, but there truly is no feeling quite like that of a quality writing instrument gliding over the page. And for funsies, there’s are review of the Prada Link, because gadgets are way cool.

10 Great Moleskine Hacks (Dustin M. Wax)
Stationery Pr0n: Japanese Pens and More from JetPens.com (Dustin M. Wax)
Why a Great Pen Makes All the Difference (David Pierce)
5 Reasons to Pay Good Money for a Moleskine (Dustin M. Wax)
13 Things to Do with a Moleskine Notebook (Dustin M. Wax)
10 Great Moleskine Hacks (Dustin M. Wax)
9 Places to Always Keep Pen and Paper Handy (David Pierce)
10 Affordable Pens Geeks Love (Dustin M. Wax)
10 Great Notebooks Productive People Love (Dustin M. Wax)
The Trend of Productivity Accessories is Here (Leon Ho)

Life Lessons

Finally, the catch-all for what’s left. There are some brilliant people writing on Lifehack – small business experts, marketing gurus, life coaches, creativity specialists, and so on. It stands to reason that not all their advice could be slotted into easy categories. So below you’ll find advice on relating with others, mastering your own weaknesses and giving rein to your strengths, developing a charitable mindset, dealing with hardships, and more.

10 Small Ways to Make the World a Better Place (Dustin M. Wax)
Have You Started Planning for a Successful 2010? Here’s How! (Susan Baroncini-Moe)
Rethink the Season of Giving (Dustin M. Wax)
7 Ways to Deal with Annoying People and Still Get Things Done (Dustin M. Wax)
12 Personality Types to Avoid to Make 2009 Your Best Year (Craig Harper)
Life Lessons of the Dread Pirate Roberts (Dustin M. Wax)
Six Great Ways to Vent Your Frustrations (Danielle Marie Crume)
How to Stay Motivated and On-Track When You’re Struggling (Susan Baroncini-Moe)
Change The Way You See Fear And Change Your Life (Susan Baroncini-Moe)
The Five Reasons Why You Are Not Fulfilling Your Potential (Paul Sloane)
How to Be Offended (Dustin M. Wax)
Improve Your Charitable Giving: Let Not Your Left Hand Know What Your Right Is Doing (Art Carden)
10 Things in Life That Aren’t Fair – and What to Do About Them (Part 1) and (Part 2) (Dustin M. Wax)
7 Steps to Start Lucid Dreaming (Steven Aitchinson)
Changing Your Personal Reality (Part 1) and (Part 2) (Craig Harper)
Dating, Living, and Being Your Best Self (Dustin M. Wax)
Go on a Date with Life and More Ways to Go on a Date with Life (Dustin M. Wax)
Being a Man in the 21st Century (Part 1) and (Part 2) (Dustin M. Wax)
The Work of Worry (Dustin M. Wax)
Your Happiness Plan (Craig Harper)

Were there any other posts here in the last year that helped you or gave you a new perspective on your work, life, or the people around you? Let us know in the comments!

Finally, I want to take a moment to recognize all the staff writers and guest contributors who worked hard to provide our readers with wisdom and insight in 2009. On the staff, there’s Leon Ho (site owner), myself (project manager), and our staff writers Joel Falconer and Thursday Bram, now departed. Our contributors and guests consist of:

Steven Aitchison
Susan Baroncini-Moe
Christine Buske
Annabel Candy
Art Carden
Kit Cooper
Danielle Marie Crume
Arvind Devalia
Paul Dickinson
Steve Errey

Chuck Frey
Daryl Furuyama
Danny Gamache
Lisa Gates
Elisabeta Ghidiu
Craig Harper
Liora Hess
Ibrahim Husain
Mary Jaksch
Erin Kurt

Angus Lau
Alexandra Levit
Steve Martile
Jamie Nischan
David Pierce
Clemens Rettich
Dan Schawbel
Paul Sloane
Mike St. Pierre
Francis Wade

Thanks to all of them, and to you, our readers, for making 2009 a great year!

Dustin M. Wax is a freelance writer and project manager at Stepcase Lifehack. He is also the creator of The Writer's Technology Companion, a site devoted to the tools of the writing trade. When he's not writing, he teaches anthropology and gender studies in Las Vegas, NV. He is the author of Don't Be Stupid: A Guide to Learning, Studying, and Succeeding at College.

Follow him on Twitter: @dwax.

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You should become an outrageous giver. An outrageous giver is someone who gives beyond expectations. If you are going to give more than others expect, you should also raise your own personal expectations. Lift your expectations about how much you are going to give both now and into the future. Set your goal to become an outrageous giver.

WHY GIVE?

There are many reasons why you should give money away. The first is that you will make a difference. Giving money away allows you to contribute to the lives of others in a special way. This might be other people, or other organizations. Often you are able to make your money work in a way that is bigger than yourself; to multiply the effort of your money.

Secondly, giving is fun. It is fun to hand money to someone or some organization and to see the joy that you are giving. It is fun to see the smile on faces, or to hear stories of what your money is allowing others to do and achieve. It is satisfying to be making a difference in people’s lives.

Thirdly giving helps you to be more thankful. As you give money away you are doing so in recognition that you have received good things. You can be thankful for those good things by giving them away. Being thankful is an important step in being happy in life.

Giving also helps you to create an abundance mentality. The act of giving is an acknowledgment that you are ok without the money. If you are giving abundantly, that means that you are confident that you have enough money without it. You are portraying the mindset that money is in abundance. Note that this happens even if you don’t have a lot of money. The act of giving sets your mind to believing that you do; that money is abundant. And if you believe money is abundant you will more likely act in ways that create that abundance.

There is a clear connection that occurs between giving in receiving. The people that give money away tend to receive more back. I don’t think there is some magic reason for this happening, but I do think it works in our psychology. The combination of an abundance mentality and thankfulness puts you in a better attitude and state to attract money and opportunity to yourself.

HOW TO GIVE?

Get started - No matter whether you earn a lot of money, or very little, you should start giving now. Some people decide to wait until they are making a certain amount of money, or reach a certain age. Almost every time they express regret that they didn’t start giving early. You can make a difference by starting to give money away now. Even students living on very limited incomes benefit by giving money away.

Pick an amount - You should pick an amount that you want to give away. You may want to do this on a weekly basis, or monthly basis. You may choose an annual goal, but if you do be sure to break it down into monthly targets. It is often easiest to start with a percentage of your income. A good place to start is by giving 10% of your income. For some, this may seem like a lot, and yet if you set it up as an automatic gift each month you will hardly notice it. And yet, it will be able to make a significant difference in the lives of others.

Set goals to increase the amount – Once you have chosen how much you will give away to start with, set goals to increase that over time. You may be giving away 10% now, but you may have a goal to increase to 20%, 30% or even more over time. This increase may take many years to meet, but it can be an important motivator as you work towards bigger life goals.

Be anonymous – In your giving there are really two types of anonymity and both are valuable. One type is where no one knows who it was that gave the money. There is no record of the person giving the money. The only person that knows is you. The other type of anonymity is where you know and it is registered that you gave the money, however it is not made public. The benefit of this is that you receive a tax receipt. For example when I give to my church, they gift is recorded and a tax receipt is issued. Only a couple of people involved in the accounting process know about my gift. It is never announced or acknowledged otherwise. The government offers tax deductions for charitable donations because it is a practice that they want to encourage, and it is good stewardship to take advantage of those tax breaks. If you want, you can turn around and give your tax return away also!

More than money – you don’t need to give just money. You can give away possessions. This might be giving away used clothes to the Salvation Army or Goodwill. It might mean donating something around the house that you don’t use anymore. Someone I know recently donated a drum set that their kids didn’t use any more to a church. You can also donate your time by volunteering. Look for places to contribute with an investment of your time. This can often be extra rewarding as you are connected directly to the work that is taking place.

WHERE TO GIVE?

Support a meaningful cause – you may have a cause that is meaningful to you and that would be a great place to start with giving. Perhaps you lost a family member to diabetes and so supporting diabetes research would be a great place to start. Look for ways to give to that cause. Be sure to find something that is meaningful or passionate.

Support your local church, synagogue or worship community – if you attend a church, synagogue or similar community you should be involved in supporting it. Not only does it support the ongoing functions of the group itself, but faith organizations often provide an opportunity to pool funds and use them to accomplish things that individual donors would not have been able to do.

Support a microcredit entrepreneur – Microcredit is the issuing of small loans to people in poverty. They then use those loans to create businesses called income generating activities. It may mean purchasing a cow, or buying a sewing machine. This kind of entrepreneurship can play an important roll in poverty alleviation. While this is often done by large organizations, you can contribute as well. Kiva.org partners individual lenders with entrepreneurs in developing countries. You loan a small amount to them, and it is repaid back over the next year. You are then able to take the same money and loan it to another person.

Sponsor a child – There are many organizations that allow you to sponsor a child in a developing country. This can be a very rewarding form of giving. Your funds go to help pay for food, clothing and education for that child. You are able to send and receive letters from your sponsor child providing a hands-on connection to your giving.

Random acts – Look for opportunities to give as part of a random act. This might be giving a gift card for groceries to a neighbor who lost her job or box of diapers to new parents in your community. It might be buying flowers for someone or just giving money when needed. There are lots of opportunities to give as part of a random act.

You now know the why, the how and the where of giving. The next step is up to you. Just get started and you can become and abundant giver.

Danny Gamache, the Success Professor, is committed to teaching others principles of success for life and business. Danny is a business professor at a private college where he equips students for careers in business and success in all areas of life. He can be found at www.successprofessor.ca

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In the year since I started blogging, I’ve gotten a bunch of freelance writing gigs and regular jobs writing all over the Web. But, initially, no one offered them to me. I had this blog I was proud of, a super-cool design, and yet the offers didn’t flood in. Crazy, right? Tell me about it.

I finally decided that if I wanted something to happen, I had to go and get it. So I did the simplest thing I could think of: I just asked for it. I wrote to a bunch of different sites, and asked if they needed writers. I pitched a few ideas, used my blog as a resume, and offered my services.

I couldn’t give you an exact number, but the response rate to my emails was extraordinarily low. Let’s just say that if I were a baseball player with that batting average, I wouldn’t be a baseball player much longer. Only a couple of people responded at all, and a few of those turned into the jobs I got initially as a freelance blogger. But my batting average wasn’t high.

And it didn’t matter. For the opportunities that didn’t come my way, all it cost me was a few minutes of my time to send an email. The hour it took to write ten emails, even if it only generated one response, was well worth it just for that one response.

I got my dream job this summer from exactly the same thing: I sent an email. I can’t explain why it worked, or why I got a response instead of the hundred or so other people my boss got applications from. It worked, though, and for one reason: I asked. If I never heard back, so be it; it’s a wasted ten minutes. But I did, and it became a fantastic experience for me.

Simply asking is the most useful marketing tool I’ve ever discovered. You can have a spectacular resume, the most polished skill set, and the perfect passions for a job or opportunity, but if you don’t ask for it, who’s going to know you want it? Asking, handled the right way, leads to nothing but positive results.

If you’re anything like me, you’re afraid of asking for things – especially things you really want. I think the problem is that we so fear getting turned down that we run away, in order to be able to somehow hold out hope that we’re good enough for it. Asking, and getting rejected, would somehow only prove our failure and our ineptness for what we really want.

The reality, though, is that there are a ton of reasons why an opportunity didn’t come along, most of which have nothing to do with you being a failure: there’s timing, restrictions, personality issues, and a whole litany of other reasons why the opportunity’s not right for you at the moment. Maybe your email just got lost, or maybe the person doesn’t like people with your name – whatever it is, not winning mean doesn’t mean you’re a loser. That can be hard to understand, but not getting down because your batting average isn’t perfect is key to success.

The more opportunities you put yourself out for, the more you’ll get. Do you want something, whether it’s a job, a cookie, or something else? Ask for it. Do it in a respectful, productive way, and you’ll get a response in kind – even if it’s no. Don’t let the no’s bog you down, and remember: the second “Yes!” is always easier than the first.

Thanks to simply asking, I’m now writing for ten or so websites I never dreamed would care what I had to say, working for the man with the career I want, and loving every minute of it. All because I asked for it.

What can you ask for? A better job, more responsibility, more fun, more money, something else? What is there to lose?

David Pierce is a college student, freelance writer, and lover of all things Web-based. He blogs about the digital world at The 2.0 Life, and can frequently be found on Twitter .

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