Jennifer Connelly Had Sex With a Dolphin

Despite the yellow journalism sensationalistic headline that it is, it’s also true.  On David Letterman last night, Jennifer related the story of how she was working a gig for a Fantasy Island episode and … oh I dont want to spoil it (find it somewhere else).

No blogging for a long time.  Been doing other things.  Might as well keep kicking in now and then, my online journal of sorts.

Gave up for now on having my own business and having speaking and writing and workshops work for me to pay the bills.  It can be done, I have really good material and my day will come.  I just happen to be really good at high end communication network engineering for the US department of defense … so that is what I am doing for now.

So there!  I did I did I did see a puddy tatt!

Plus, since I was going to make SO much money as a personal growth enthusiast, I would have EASILY got into the $250K and above “rich” people bracket that Obama has targeted to pay even MORE taxes.

He doesnt get it. Stoopid Democrat Tricks … try out for Letterman.  That discussion is for another day.

I’m just getting started.  Who cares if anyone reads this (how many times has THAT line been typed in a blog?)

More on Getting What You Want: The Living Wealth Plan

Continuing with my exploration of Jack Canfield’s Success Priniciples in my series: Mark & Jack.

As you may have noticed, it’s not working out to one a week either…so what?  When I work though each of these principles and figure out what they mean to me and how I can integrate my expereinces into what I teach others, THEN I move on.

Last time time I broke the different areas of our existence (ya know … life?) into 9 areas, physical, mental, financial, etc. (Mark & Jack post No. 6) to be used as categories for goal setting, etc.  You may have 5 or 16 or you might like 9.  It don’ matter tah me … do your own thing.

Set goals in each of these areas, implement an action plan (a HUGE factor in success … some of us are AWESOME at making To Do Lists and never finishing) and move on to the next fun thing.  Some of these can be brief.  A Physical goal for example might be “exercise 4 times per week” and/or “weigh 175 lbs. by Dec 31 2009″).

Could be complex too as you figure out your financial goals for different phases of your life.  I actually recommend this, SPECIFICALLY for financial goals.  If you say, “I want financial independence by age 48″, that is not specific.  It is much more realizable to look at the next 30 days, the next 6 months, the range of 6 to 24 months, 2 years to 5 years, etc. and identify things like net worth, cash flow, debt, hard assets, etc. for those time frames.

It’s OK to start with, “$2.5M liquid net worth by age 48″ but you will have to break that down to an action plan that is starts in immediately.  Then, and this is the good part, you tie that into the other aspects of your Living Wealth Plan and figure out where that monetary wealth is coming from (vocational), what you need to do to get to it (mental, realtional) and who you have to be (personal, spiritual) to get there.

Someone once said that the best thing about becoming a millionaire is not the million dollars but the type of person you become along the way.

Now that’s a plan.

Success Principle #2: Be Clear Why You Are Here

OK, week #2 and 2nd in the series “Mark & Jack: 52.4 Weeks of Living the Success Principles.”  This week we deal with purpose, significance, meaningful lives … lightweight stuff like that.

Some people drift aimlessly through life.  Others specifically state that humans (themselves included I suspect) have no purpose or that the question - what is your purpose in life - is meaningless.

I dont buy it. 

If you get into a spiritual arguement about the meaning or existence of God, free will and if you have a role as a part of God’s plan, I agree - this might make your head hurt.  However, if you are able to discover how your life has meaning and significance you are on the right track.  How do you do this?This is exactly what I teach people how to do in developing Your Inner Expert, my method of helping people to develop a niche that is willing and able to compensate you for what you do best: Be Yourself. 

The first step is to Identify Your Inner Expert - who you are, what you want and the passions and Read more

Creating Reality: Stimulus + Response = Outcome

Creating your own reality is not for sissies….

This is the last post for week 1: Mark & Jack: 52.4 Weeks of Living the Success Priniciples.  As such, it’s my final comments on Taking 100% Responsibility for Your Life (Success Principle #1).  In his book, The Success Principles, Jack Canfield notes a “formula” for success that he attributes to Dr. Robert Resnick, a psychotherapist in Los Angeles: Event + Response = Outcome.

If you look at my previous posts on this Success Principle, you’ll note that I have been talking about this to some degree: the only thing you truly control is your response to the world around you.  No one else will make you mad, happy, jealous, deranged, blissful or any of a number of others states of emotion and consciousness.  You do all of that.

What I think is even more powerful about this formula has to do with the realization I came to when I Read more

Success Principle #1: Take 100% Responsibility For Your Life

And so it begins…52.4 weeks of The Success Principles.

Taking responsibility for your life is a given.  I soooo get this one.  It is really easy to fall into a pattern where there is ALWAYS someone else you can blame for what has happened to you and where you are in your life.  And to complain about it.  You have said it yourself or you have heard it from others:

1. I had a horrible childhood (parents beat/abused you, i was raised by wolves in the forest, etc)
2. I have this … problem (fill in latest made up disease…can you even keep up with the acronyms?)
3. They (family members, kids, co-workers, Moms at the bus stop where you drop off the kids, the CIA) are out to get me.
4. Life is not fair … why do these thing always happen to me?

Get the idea?  Well then knock it off!  What we need to get is that we have the power to change just about anything in our lives.  No, you cannot grow another limb if you are an amputee.  No you cannot instantly have $1.237M in your bank account (I dont like round numbers).  But you can change your attitude about how you react to your circumstances and what you are going to do about it.  You can get a prosthesis, you can start working towards that $1.237M.

THIS principle is truly one of the secrets to success in anything: Accept responsibility for who you are RIIGHT NOW and pay attention to how you react to your reality on a daily basis … it is all you really control. 

Success Action For The Day: Think of the last time you got mad at someone for something.  Think about how you reacted and come up with at least 3 other ways you could have reacted.  Which option makes you feel better, emotionally or physically?  Which puts you closer to joy?  Is this the reaction you chose?  Think about - and commit to - how you will react differently next time.

Mark & Jack: 52.4 Weeks Living The Success Principles, pt. 2

In my last blog, I mentioned my new Crusade,  52.4 weeks of living The Success Principles as detailed by Jack Canfield in his book of the same name.   If you are someone who has done any amount of self-help type work, you know that not everything you read or someone else recommends - is going to work for you and your situation.  The purpose of this blog series is to help show other people how they can find out for themselves what really works.  

The other reasons I’m doing this?  Personal Growth.  It couldn’t hurt to set a goal of working through one of these Principles every week to integrate them into my life (there are actually 64 Principles in the bookso I will have to consolidate - or just ignore - a few to stick with my title).  I am NOT going to use much content from the book other than the title of the individual principles and how they apply, in my own words, to me.  Anything that is Jack’s … I will attribute to Jack (as I should).

I also plan on working up a process that I can use in my own coaching services (have to walk the walk) for helping people fine tune the behaviors and actions consistent with success that work in THIER lives.   I will integrate this into my system for creating wealth - The Wealth Manifesto: Training and Tools for a Thriving Life.

And finally (I’ll be honest), there is a marketing element to this.  I took about 4 months off from doing anything with my coaching and speaking business.  It’s time to get back into the fray.  This is a timely idea to play on the recent movie Julie & Julia (that’s where the 524 comes from … 524 recipes are included in the Joy of French Cooking).  Maybe I’ll even get Jack’s attention (and hopefully not that of his lawyers … hey, lighten up it’s good advertizing for Jack!).

This is a process … a work in progress.  It has a beginning - I am not sure about the end.  I’ll be getting started tomorrow with Success Principle Number 1: Take 100% responsbility for your life. 

We will see together where it takes us.

Mark & Jack: 52.4 Weeks Living The Success Principles

The new movie (based on the book) entitled Julie & Julia chronicles the events in the life of chef Julia Child, contrasting her life with Julie Powell, a woman who aspires to cook all 524 recipes from Child’s cookbook, The Joy of French Cooking.    Julie comes alive as she expands her view of life vicariously through … yes, you guessed it, the joy of cooking.

I’m going to do something similar.  Jack Canfield (and to be fair, co-author Janet Switzer) wrote a book a few years ago called The Success Principles, including in there all of the thinking, behaviors, actions, etc that the co-creator of The Chicken Soup for the Soul series recommends for anyone who wants to be successful.

I dont know about you but I have read plenty of books on success, talked with and even interviewed dozens of people about it and included part of a chapter in my own book (The Wealth Manifesto) dedicated to what it takes to be successful.

But, so what, ya know?  There are SO MANY principles for success, so many books (doing a book search on amazon.com for “success” came up with 856,592 results … Jack’s book was listed first BTW), how is anyone going to know what are the “best” principles of success?  What are the ones you just CANNOT be successful without?  I tried to do this in my book but really didnt have close to enough pages to cover all I thought was important. 

So I had an idea: Why not live The Success Principles as detailed by Jack and let everyone know what a (semi) real guy thinks of it, what really really worked for me and why.  And, most importantly, come up with my own method of discovery that you can use too to find out what success means to you?

My next blog will explore more on why I want to do this and what you can learn from it.  Talk soon!

“Men climb mountains because they’re there; men make art because it’s not.”
-Peter Voulkas, American Ceramic Artist

 

Slugs and Bodysnatchers: A Means to An End in the HOV Lane

I traveled last week to Andrews Air Force Base for the new job I have decided to include in my life (more on that later).  I was with a co-worker who used to be in program acquisitions with the Air Force, who, for many years, commuted to the Pentagon from Virginia. 

Like a lot of states, the Virginia/DC metro area have lanes dedicated to those commuters who car pool (3 or more persons for the High Occupancy Vehicle lanes here).  In a classic case of a high value need demanding an innovative solution, there were different car park areas that started to function like the Home Depot in the early mornings except instead of day laborers looking for work, people like my friend Charlie would hang out looking for someone who needed another person in there car to meet the HOV limit.

Riders are called ’slugs.’  Drivers are called ‘body snatchers.’  Slugs get to ride for free, body snatchers get to drive in the  rock and roll lane.  Everyone gets to work quicker.  Apparently the protocol is such that if the body snatcher strikes up a conversation, communicating is encouraged.  If they say nothing to you, you can go back to sleep and it is understood by all that’s the way it is.

This is an innovative solution to a need with benefits to all.  Unfortunately for many people, they are both slugs and body snatchers, driving their own numb bodies off to a job they disslike and get little more than a paycheck for their efforts.

It doesnt have to be this way; that is what The Wealth Manifesto training program is about, making a connection between personal fulfillment and how you make money.  Enjoy what you do FIRST, then figure out where your expertise can generate income.

It can be done.  That’s all for now .. ‘Sluggo’ (you know who you are).

Leadership

I was interviewed yesterday.  The conversation went really well with lots of interesting questions back and forth about my thoughts and experience in relationship building, energizing and motivating teams, delivering results and the like.

Then someone asked me the simplest question of the session and I didnt have a quick answer.  In part because I had too many answers to the question: “How do you define leadership?”

I thought about this for awhile afterwards: in addition to the many possible answers to the question, I came to the conclusion that part of my inability to articulate in words how I define leadership is because leadership is evident in the moment it is delivered, it does not necessarily lend itself to a simple verbal characterization.

Like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said about pornography back in 1964: I don’t know if I can define it but I know it when I see it.

When his engines stopped and he knew his plane was going down, did Captain Chesley Sullenberger (pilot of the US Airways jet that went down in the Hudson with no loss of life) think: “Wow, I really need to demonstrate leadership right now.  All these people are counting on me.”?

Of course not.  He did what needed to be done to save the lives of his passengers.  That’s what leaders do: Whatever needs to be done to complete the mission.

Be courageous, empathetic, persistent, fair, selfless, conscientious, enthusiastic, generous, impartial, decisive, visionary, joyful, adaptable, knowledgeable, and stable.

That is how I define leadership.

Go ahead, ask me that question again….

Your Inner Expert at College

I did a free program for a local community college the other day.  It was my main talk that I give on Why Choose a Career, Choose a Life with some modifications I am seeing a need for based on the chaos in the economy.

My platform to date has been:

1. Understand the Rules
2. Understand Yourself
3. Understand what you want
4. Understand what to do - apply Your Inner Expert to owning your own business or investing

At the end of the day, it’s about creating value and building wealth.  That is where the business owner and investor part comes in as a part of the applications noted in Number 4.  However, with the recession we are now in (tell me this is not news to you … please!), I have added a couple of elements to the program.  As a side not, I pretty much did this in real time during my presentation the other day - kinda scary but that’s why I am an entertaining speaker! Read more

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