You heard it here first – Exercise increases your IQ!
Here’s how: [Read more…]
Choose Purpose Over Prosperity
December 8, 2015 by Leave a Comment
It’s not easy deciding what to do for a living. Parents and teachers do their best in steering young adults into jobs, careers or professions that offer the best compensation. This makes it possible for young adults to provide for themselves and, eventually, their own families.
Sounds like the right thing to do, but for most, it’s a recipe for disaster. When you choose a job, career or profession based solely on current of future compensation, you are choosing prosperity over purpose. At some point during your life it becomes evident that you do not like what you do for a living. That revelation typically manifests itself when you have young children, a mortgage, car loans and other bills to pay. Its hard to make a career change with adult responsibilities.
The correct approach is to choose purpose over prosperity. Doing something you love involves pursuing something that taps into your inner talents. We all have unique talents. The job of parents and teachers, instead, should be to inundate kids with a multitude of activities that expose their inner talents. This is the only way kids will find that thing they love to do. And when kids engage in activities that expose their inner talents, only then will they find their purpose in life.
Finding your purpose in life means you will never have to face the revelation that you do not like what you do for a living. When you pursue your purpose in life, the money eventually finds you. Always choose purpose over prosperity. It’s the only true path to success and happiness.
Gratitude – The Gateway to Optimism
December 3, 2015 by Leave a Comment
According to a 2013 Associated Press survey, 80% of America’s adults were struggling with unemployment, poverty or near poverty. That’s a lot of unhappy people. Unhappy people tend to have unhappy thoughts. Conversely, happy people tend to have happy thoughts. Cognitive psychologists call this tendency to see the world through either a negative or positive lens, mood congruency.
According to the latest science on the ability to solve complex problems through creative thought, better known as insight, negativity inhibits your ability to think clearly. When the lens through which you view the world is negative, you see nothing but problems. You become blind to opportunities. A negative mental outlook causes tunnel vision, limiting creativity. If you’re one of those 80% struggling in life, a negative mental outlook acts like gasoline, fueling the flames of negativity and perpetuating a life of unemployment, poverty or near poverty. Conversely, a positive mental outlook, according to that same science, enhances creative problem solving. A positive mental outlook is the only means to escape a life of unemployment, poverty or near poverty. But how do you flip the switch on your mental outlook?
Gratitude is the gateway to optimism and a positive mental outlook. Gratitude forces you to become aware of the good things about your life. My car started today, I was able to feed my family, I have a roof over my head, I’m healthy, I’m alive, I have a loving family, etc. When you shift your thinking to the good things about your life, you cause your brain to begin to shift from negative to positive. If you practice gratitude every day, eventually your positive mental outlook will overpower your negative mental outlook. Gratitude changes the lens through which you view your world, from negative to positive. And when that happens you’ll begin to see solutions to your problems. Ideas will pop into your head that will help you climb your way out of your unemployment, poverty or near poverty. Expressing gratitude every day is not some pseudo, new age b.s. Gratitude is the gateway to optimism and a positive mental outlook. It’s the means to transforming your life from one filled with limitations to one filled with unlimited opportunities.
Me First Results in You Last
December 2, 2015 by 1 Comment
In order to get, you must first give. It is one of the universal laws of success that has never changed. You must first give value to others if you want to succeed in life.
It was no surprise that 79% of the self-made millionaires in my study volunteered for charities or non-profit groups on a regular basis. Many of the individuals who run non-profits or charities happen to be successful people. Does that surprise you? It shouldn’t. Birds of a feather like to flock together. If you want to find out where many of the rich and successful congregate, join a community charity or non-profit. This is one of the avenues the rich use to develop relationships with other success-minded people. Those relationships often end up doing business together and helping one another thrive and succeed. You won’t find many selfish individuals volunteering at charities or non-profits. It goes against their me first philosophy.
Writer’s Digest Announces 2015 Award Winner for Best Inspirational Book
December 1, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Rich Kids – How to Raise Our Children to be Happy and Successful in Life has received the prestigious Writer’s Digest Self-Published Book Award in the How-To/Inspirational category. Writer’s Digest is the industry trade magazine for writers and is considered the bible among professional writers. It is, therefore, among the most prestigious book awards an author can receive in the book publishing industry. Below is the official announcement from Writer’s Digest: [Read more…]
Laughter Improves Health and Problem Solving
December 1, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Laughter is the best medicine. According to many studies, laughter has the following health benefits:
- Reduces blood pressure.
- Strengthens your immune system.
- Improves your breathing.
- Increases your energy.
When life is not cooperating and your day is not going well, find something that will make you laugh. It will act like a salve, reversing the damage to your health bad days wreak on your body.
Clarity of thought is critical to problem solving. Stress and negative events act like brakes on your ability to solve problems. They shut down your prefrontal cortex (executive decision-making part of the brain) and the primitive parts of your brain take over. Laughter is like a mental re-set button. It clears away the stress and negativity brought on by those bad days, awakening the executive decision-making part of your brain, enabling you to think with a clearer mind.
Success and Happiness
November 30, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Success doesn’t lead to happiness. Happiness leads to success.
One of my favorite series of quotes regarding this comes from Steve Jobs’ famous 2005 Stanford commencement address:
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living some else’s life.” In other words, don’t put your ladder on someone else’s wall. Pursue your own dreams and your own goals. Not those of your parents, teachers or some other significant influence in your life.
“The only way to do great work is to love what you do. You’ll know it when you find it.” In other words, you will know you found your passion, your purpose in life. There is no confusion. You feel it deep in your heart and soul. That thing you were intended to do for the rest of your life will occupy your thinking 24/7. You can’t escape it if you try. Until that happens, you are still searching for your main purpose in life.
Poverty by Association
November 28, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Financial success takes a long time. In my Rich Habits Study it took the average self-made millionaire 32 years to become “rich”. When I began my study I wanted to know the answer to one question: why are some people rich and other people poor? Five years, and 51,984 questions later I learned the answer – your daily habits. Habits dictate your circumstances in life. This is a truly groundbreaking discovery. Habits affect just about every aspect of your life. And there are many shades of habits. We have money habits, eating habits, drinking habits, exercise habits, sleeping habits, downtime habits, work-time habits, reading habits, relationship habits, happiness habits and thinking habits. We have morning habits, afternoon habits and nighttime habits. According to a 2006 Duke study, [Read more…]
Is There a Hole in Your Boat?
November 27, 2015 by Leave a Comment
It really doesn’t matter how much money you make if it goes out as fast as it comes in. When you buy stuff today with tomorrow’s dollars you are punching holes in your financial boat. The more you enslave future earnings this way, the more holes you create and eventually those holes will sink your boat, dragging everyone in the boat down with you. Start plugging the holes in your boat today by getting rid of the Living Beyond Your Means Poverty Habit.
Buying stuff never makes you happy in the long term. Building strong, long lasting relationships with family and friends is a well of happiness that never runs dry.
Carpe Diam
November 26, 2015 by Leave a Comment
Rich Habit # 6 says, “Everything in Moderation.” That also means, moderate your application of being moderate. Today is the day to take the brakes off of life. There is a time and a place for moderation. Today is not one of those days. Make today count. Embrace life as if your life depended on it. Eat, drink and be merry. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
