Monday, February 25, 2008

From Broke to Millionaire: A Simple How-To

I am often asked, "How can I get rich?". The answer is simple, to become wealthy, you have to think like a wealthy person.

For example: Everyday I talk with people who have dreams of becoming wealthy. Many of them are struggling with their current financial situation. I can easily predict the ones who will find a way to become wealthy vs. the ones who will continue to struggle and most likely end up broke or destitute.

The formula is simple.

The people who use being broke as a REASON to get started in business will find a way to financial freedom. They are self-determined, motivated and they will not allow thier current circumstances to hold them back. They are solution focused.

The people who say, "Oh, I'm too broke. I don't have the money." will remain financially defeated. They will use their situation as an excuse and will most likely never break free.

I think often of Donald Trump who at one point found himself $9Billion in the hole...personally liable for every penny. He made some poor decisions and bad business choices. He once pointed at a street bum and stated "that guy is $9Billion richer than me!". Rather than wallow in his situation, he chose to buy even more properties, finding the cash, convincing lendors to lend to him even though it was an absurd idea. His confidence, persistence and determination won them over. Because he believed in himself, had the guts to ask and was confident in what he could achieve, they believed in him.

Wealthy people think differently. They think in terms of "How can I" rather than "Why can't I". Many wealthy people started with nothing: Sam Walton - founder of WalMart, Bill Gates: Founder of Microsoft, The guy who started "Chik-fil-A", Oprah...etc. All had lots going against them, but the reason they found success when countless others gave us is they refused to accept less than their dreams.

I remember when John and I became entrepreneurs. We were behind on all our bills, both had paycuts and had over $50K in credit card debt not to mention our mortgage and car loans. When it came to finding $2000.00 for a business, we easily could have said, "we can't...don't have the money.". However, what would have changed? It's not like doing the same thing was going to miraculously produce more money for us or one day the money fairy was going to show up at our door and say, "Here pumpkin...I'm granting you money to start a business". Nope...we had to beg and borrow just like most entrepreneurs. But, we were willing to do it...we knew there had to be a way and we would find it. We were even going to sell all our furniture. It didn't matter if we lived in an empty house because we knew it would be a great investment in our future and we'd just buy new furniture (which we did!).

So the simple formula for going from Broke to Millionaire...think as though you are already the millionaire. Would a millionaire ever say "oh...I can't". NO!!! They say, "I'll find a way". That's the formula, simple and sweet.

Saturday, February 23, 2008

A Growing Trend

A few weeks ago, I featured a video "Meet Your Meat" on my blog. It exposed the meat-packing industry and was the primary reason I decided to go vegetarian.

This week the US was shocked by allegations of abuse at several meat packing plants. One in particular was shut down and the largest ever recall of beef was issued. It was shocking to hear that most of the meat from the plant goes to school lunch programs and had already been consumed by millions of children. Obviously the USDA is not to be trusted as was once thought.

So, it seems to be a growing trend; vegetarianism. Not because people are tree-huggers or environmental activists as was once perceived. People are cutting out meat simply because of the disgusting manner in which it is processed, the lack of safety, the harm to animals and the environment and because there is absolutely no verifiable evidence that there is any health value to it at all (other than being linked to obesity, heart disease, colitis, ulcers and,let's not forget: mad cow disease). People are waking up to the realities of the meat packing industry. There are tons of famous vegetarians and today baseball slugger Prince Fielder announced his move to a meat-free life. We hear everyday about the effects of oil consumption on the environment but little about the biggest culprit to global warming: cows (see article from the UN).