True to the company culture at CastleWave, when time came for Rich and Ron to give me the next round of assignments, we sat down and planned. That said, there were no battles fought with flying memos, no flurries of emails, and no two-hour meetings. What we did–what has to be done–was to sit with a pen, paper, three minds, and the list of tasks at hand.

There is a giant whiteboard in the hall at CastleWave. Ron has a big one in his office, as does Rich (not to mention Rich’s little one on the other wall). There is planning software, people who work on planning, and notepads and Post-Its galore. With all of this potential for planning, how do things move forward? Simple: by prioritizing. “It’s so easy to get caught up in all the superficial things,” Rich says. The fluff has to be cut, and it has to be known to be cut. ”It doesn’t matter what mechanism–Palm Pilot, task manager, Franklin Covey, whiteboard–do it weekly and daily, if needed.” Overplanning is dangerous, but not planning can be even worse. The whole purpose of these tools is to know what needs to be done when, and what fluff needs cutting. That sort of planning empowers you. It makes tasks happen.

“It’s important that you get them out in front of you,” Ron adds, “so you can say, ‘Yeah, that’s it, I’ve got them all. I’m considering everything, seeing the full picture, and not just running after something without consideration.” In their book, Get a Life, Rich and Ron talk about something called the 80/20 principle. “Twenty percent of the effort always yields eighty percent of the results,” Rich says. “The trick is identifying the twenty.”

Young startups need life to roll forward. Life isn’t found in carefully orchestrated and thought-experimentally-tested business plans; the juice for bootstrapping comes from cash, action, and customers. “Do the things that bring the biggest fruit first,” Rich says. Brainstorming, whiteboarding, planning, pow-wowing–each of these means the same thing. You have to find what brings the biggest fruit. You do what I did with Rich and Ron. You sit down, create a task list, find the crucial twenty percent, and set your priorities from there. Nobody will be judging your business plan before permitting you to enter the entrepreneurial scene. Good, old-fashioned bootstrapping is only good when the boots fit the foot and the foot starts walking.

Rich closed his thoughts on this by talking about quarters in a Coke machine. If you’ve got four quarters and the first one doesn’t bring anything from the first machine, you don’t stick the other three in three separate machines. You feed that first one until it pays out. Prioritizing is a must. “Lots have written and talked about it,” Ron added, “but boy, it’s even more critical nowadays.”

In my life, I have got to know what constitutes my twenty percent. With everything I get up to, I would be helpless if I went in firing blindly. Poring over trivial details would be just as crippling. When you look at Rich and Ron (or any bootstrapper) and throw in their added responsibilities–family and full-time work leap to mind–it’s no wonder that they are adamant about this principle. Going through eighty percent of the motions does nothing for the momentum. Twenty percent of the effort yields eighty percent of the results. No matter how fast the world is moving, finding your twenty keeps you on pace. Perfection is nice, but success is better.

Bootstrapping my freelance writing career took (and takes) just as much genius, grit, gusto, and gumption as bootstrapping a business. In their upcoming book Get a Life, Rich and Ron call this having a “fire in the belly” and “nerves of steel.” Don’t worry if you weren’t born with those. I wasn’t. There’s no fire until you light it, and there’s no steel until you forge it. Once you get to work on a dream, genius, grit, gusto, and gumption are sure to follow.

Genius has nothing to do with your IQ, GPA, GMAT, or even the New York Times crossword puzzle. Genius is taking a good idea and creating something. Whether you came up with it, caught a wave, or picked a brain, having the idea and taking ownership of it is what makes it genius. Once you’re willing to work at it, time, effort and a little luck will allow it to fall into place. My genius was no different than yours. I had an idea. I owned that idea. It was my dream: pay my way through school as a writer.

Genius does you no good without grit. Simply having an idea is no excuse to quit your day job, so you have to buckle down and work. As a student, my “day job” involved not only classes but also a custodial position. I needed money. I was already working hard. In the face of all that had to be done, it might have been easy to give up on the dream, or at least shelve it for a more convenient time. That’s where determination came in.

More than just determination, though, bootstrapping takes a special fire. It takes gusto! This is your dream that we’re talking about; imagination is no good if it stays inside your head. You don’t buckle down to just stay put. No amount of resolve would have done me any good unless I moved forward with all my heart and soul. Building your idea is exciting! Enjoy it. True, dreams are a tender thing, and so is the heart. It may be safer to put only part of it in, but no half-hearted genius ever realized his dream. You’ve got to light the fire.

Forging nerves of steel is different from having grit. Grit gets you going, in spite of opposition; nerves of steel keep the momentum, in spite of fear. This is the gumption I mentioned. It’s not brainless courage or stark raving foaming-at-the-mouth valor. It’s okay to have a little fear. Bootstrapping will be terrifying. It will hurt. Your heart is on the line. Nerves of steel allow you to see the initiative, forget your fear, and take it anyway. It was scary for me to press “send” on my resume, but it would have been scarier just to leave my heart out there without gumption to back it up. Instead, I am living my dream. Genius, grit, gusto, and gumption grow your venture and they grow your soul. Go on—light the fire. Forge the steel.