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

The 9 Steps to Wealth, Part 3

This is the last in a three part series of the 9 steps to wealth where we are going to finish up with Steps 7 through 9.  Check the archives for the other installments.

Step 7: Develop Your Entrepreneurial DNA

Author and speaker Jim Rohn once commented that the best thing about being a millionaire was the type of person you had to become to get there. Being a successful entrepreneur is sort of like that as well (even if you have not yet got to millionaire status). You have to be clear on what you want, willing to use everything you got to get there and rely on proven entrepreneurial skills and systems to streamline your path.

Once you get through all of that, you are likely to be a heckuva fine human being!

The principles of entrepreneurship help you to monetize Your Inner Expert.  You don’t necessarily have to take a lot of risks, you don’t have to be a “techie” or invent something (the latter wouldn’t hurt however).  You don’t have to be lucky (although that doesn’t hurt either).  What you do have to do is find the market niche that is willing to pay you for your expertise.  Do you remember Venn Diagrams from 5th or 6th grade math?  You have to look for the “intersection of sets” between the expertise you have to offer and the market need you have identified.

For more on what I think are the essential entrepreneurial skills, check out Chapter 11 in my book, The Wealth Manifesto.

Step 8: Apply It To The Market Read more

Article 10: Money is Potential Energy

You don’t want money. I don’t want money. WE don’t want money.

About now, you may be asking, “Who is this clown?” OF COURSE WE WANT MONEY.

Nope…we want what money gets us. Whether it is the Hawaiian vacation (that I just returned from), the new leaf blower (sounds like work, eh?) or peace of mind (now we’re talking!), we want what money gets us.

Money is a useful tool, a medium of exchange, a currency (we’ll get back to that in a minute) agreed to be “legal tender for all debts, public and private.” It keeps us from having to barter dry cleaning services for apples or trading a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle rookie card for a car. It also provides us with a way to energize and contribute to causes we believe in and want to support.

In this sense, money is a form of energy … it can make things happen, in your life and the lives of others.  This gets right back to some of the fundamental laws of building wealth that I teach in my speaking and training programs: what goes around comes around. Once you have your basic survival needs (food, shelter, security) met, you should be doing two other things with your money: giving it away and investing it.

You can start to understand the true nature of abundance when you examine the the word affluence. It comes from the Latin affluere which means to flow to. This is what needs to happen with not only your money but the rest of the wealth and abundance in your life, including all of the talents, passion and expertise that anyone can bring to the market to make all the difference - and all the money - in the world.

Building wealth involves all dimensions of our life that are important to us. And this definitely includes money … if for no other reason than for all the good it can do in helping you towards contentment and purpose in your life.

Article 9: Passion is the Emotion of Wealth

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs, ask yourself what makes you come alive, and do that.  Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

- Dr. Howard Thurman: Author, theologian, educator and civil rights leader

You here a lot about passion these days. Everyone wants to follow their passion and do what they love.

Cool. Really. That’s cool. That more people are becoming aware of what they love, what brings them joy … makes them come alive.

Where does passion come from? Why are we moved to the point of tears or agitated to the brink of madness about certain topics? Our passions are the present-moment manifestation of our underlying attitudes and emotions, connecting our heads with our hearts. They don’t come out of the blue, but are shaped by our beliefs and values. Understanding this helps us to know not only what we’re passionate about, but why. Read more