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Weekend Challenge #05 (02/22/2020): A FINANCIAL REVIEW

HERE IS YOUR WEEKEND CHALLENGE: A FINANCIAL REVIEW

you weekend challenge has arrived

 
Listen to this weekend’s Weekend Challenge

The weekend is the perfect time to get do a FINANCIAL REVIEW.

The way I see it, as part of being a leader in your professional life, you must be a great leader in your personal life. The best way to be a great leader in your personal life is to keep your house in order. The less you can stress about your personal life, the less you stress with your professional life.

YES, they are a symbiotic. The two live and exist because of the other. Do NOT kid yourself and think otherwise. Simply break it down, if you cannot manage your own person finances, how are you expected to be a good steward at work?

While I am a complete and total advocate for keeping WORK at WORK and HOME at HOME. You are still one person and the events of one will impact how you act and react with the other. That is why you have to be aware and cognizant of both.

So, what does this have to do with finances?

Simple. You have to ensure that you know how much money you have, how much you need, where it is coming from and most importantly where it is going. Stress levels decrease when finances are in order. In just about anything and everything we do, when there is less ambiguity there is more confidence. Having more confidence means being less stressed. Being less stressed at home means being less stressed at work. All that confidence means a lot less anxiety. Doing what it takes to be less anxious is key to being an Authentic Leader.

I hope you can see how that works?

Don’t worry this WEEKEND CHALLENGE is relatively simple.

  1. Make a list of all your money holding accounts (Savings, Checking, Stocks, Mutual Funds, ETFs, etc.). If you only have a couple well then things just got a lot easier.
  2. Determine the amount of money you have in each account.
  3. Make a list of ALL outstanding debt (who you owe money to): Credit Cards, Loans, Mortgage, Car, Liens, etc. (again, if you have a couple of these debt items, CONGRATULATIONS things just got a lot easier).
  4. Determine and list ALL your sources of income (DO NOT INCLUDE ANY ITEM FROM #1)
  5. Here comes the cold hard truth: Determine how much money you have and how much you owe. This is the one thing most people refuse to see and admit. For most of us, this realization is going to sting. Let it sting.
  6. Now, here comes another difficult thing to do. Determine what you need to do to increase your income and decrease your debt and NOT paying on your debt is NOT the correct answer.
    1. Create a budget
      1. Pay yourself first (if you can, make $100 your monthly allowance)
      2. Save some $$$ (buy assets (saving it in the bank is not an asset (remember your money in the bank is an ASSET FOR THE BANK!))
        1. Buy Precious Metals (I.e., Gold, Silver, Platinum, Rhodium)
        2. Buy Financials such as Stocks, Funds, etc. (do your homework)
        3. Real Estate (Rental Property)
      3. Live off the budget
    2. Create a pay-off debt plan
      1. I recommend the SNOWBALL plan
        1. Pay on all your debt the minimum
        2. Select the one debt (DEBT#1) you owe the least and pay extra until all paid
        3. Once DEBT#1 is paid off, take the COMPLETE amount you were sending to DEBT#1 and ADD it to DEBT#2 and keeping doing that until it is also paid in full.
        4. Now take DEBT#1 and DEBT#2 amounts and apply them to DEBT#3 and repeat the process until you are completely debt free.
      2. DO NOT CREATE ANY NEW DEBT.
        1. If your only reason to create new debt is because you are buying CRAP to impress not the family, not the friends, but totally complete strangers then you are WRONG and nothing anyone, including me, can say or do will help you become a Great Leader.
        2. However, if you must CREATE new debt then make absolutely certain it is for the right reason (such as):
          1. Transportation (old one cost too much to fix or constantly breaking down)
          2. Housing (previous one was TOO expensive to live in)
          3. Appliances (only if the previous item no longer works, buy the bare minimum (a.k.a., Absolutely NO touchscreen refrigerator)
          4. Clothing (only if you shop at Thrift stores, 2nd Hand, Goodwill (lots of great stuff there)
          5. Food (STOP GOING OUT TO EAT! Buy and Cook Your Own Food)
          6. Entertainment. Going out is OUT OF THE QUESTION! Stay in and save a ton coin by subscribing to Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Amazon Prime (this cost way far less than table service in the Velvet Room)
        3. STOP WASTING MONEY!
      3. LIVE LIKE A PAUPER until you are debt free, then you will be surprised how you will live like ROYALTY later.
      4. There is NO BAD TIME TO BEGIN on taking care of your finances. Well there is a bad time and that BAD TIME IS NEVER TAKING CARE OF YOUR FINANCES.

Remember, just because the app on your fancy schmancy smartphone says you have money does NOT mean you have money to waste.

NOW, GET TO WORK!

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Weekend Challenge #04 (02/15/2020): READ A BOOK!

you weekend challenge has arrivedHERE IS YOUR WEEKEND CHALLENGE: READ A BOOK

This weekend’s challenge is probably one of the most difficult challenges I have issued. It is difficult in that everyone (myself included) perceive ourselves as NOT having enough time to read a book.

Then comes the inevitable excuse of which book to select?

Then comes some other lames ass excuse of they cost too much!

Did you know in just about every town and city in the United States there is one building that people can go to and find a book to read?

The Public Library

The public library was set up on the premise giving people an opportunity to read any book in their stacks and the opportunity to check out (borrow) the book to read at home. Then two weeks later the book is returned having been read cover to cover.

But what if you do not want to go to the library because it seems beneath you or some other excuse?

As you are reading this challenge, I know you have access to the Internet.

Therefore, allow me to introduce you to Amazon dot com. Amazon not only sells books at price set by the author or its publisher. Did you know that many of the authors that are selling their books through Amazon also sell them for the deep discounted price of $0.00?

That’s right, you can sign up for the Amazon Kindle app and soon you can be reading books at no cost to you.

But what about those that do not want to share their private information with a large mega corporation?

Uh, let me let you in on a little secret: Amazon, Google, and Yahoo probably already know more about you than you know about yourself. The information about your online habits and such is already made available to them by the analytics they can capture when you visit any of their sites or use their services.

So please stop with the excuse of not wanting to share your information. If you do not believe me about how much information you are sharing take a look at the itemized receipt from you last trip to the grocery store. Trust me when I say, just by looking at your receipt your grocer knows your shopping habits better than you.

They have the exact same information on that receipt which in turn they use to predict how many turkeys to order in time for Thanksgiving and when the cold and flu season is hitting your home. They can also extrapolate information such as the number of pets you have, when your kids are entering the teenage years of their lives, they can also tell when your kids leave the home. Do you see where I am going with this? Face it, they have plenty of information on you already.

Still not convinced? That’s fine there is one more service I would like to share with you: Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/)

Project Gutenberg is an eBook service with over 60,000 FREE selections. Seriously, who can turn down a free book to read? You can read it on your smart phone, android tablet, iPad, PC, heck you can even read it off your Internet enable television. WOW! Can you believe that? We NOW live in a future that we can read a book using the Television screen. Folks, this is the future and the future is wanting you to learn, to empower yourself, to make you a better person. The Future wants you to be BETTER than you were Yesterday.

There is NO EXCUSE to not read a book this weekend.

The ONLY real excuse is there is NO Excuse!

Thus, I CHALLENGE YOU to get yourself a real or virtual book and READ something new and exciting!

I CHALLENGE YOU to LEARN something new this weekend.

I CHALLENGE YOU to DISCOVER something different this weekend.

I CHALLENGE YOU to GO ON AN ADVENTURE this weekend.

I CHALLENGE YOU to tell me know what you are reading this weekend.

I CHALLENGE YOU to DO WHAT IT TAKES TO BE BETTER this weekend!

Get to Work!
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Humans are Irrational and emotional. Focus On The Rational by David Guerra (06/100)

When we are young one thing is certain: WE HAVE HUGE EGOS! Our egos are so huge that it is a miracle that we survived. As Stinger (James Tolkan) told Maverick (Tom Cruise) in the motion picture, TOP GUN (1986), “Son, your ego is writing checks your body can’t cash!” Lucky for Maverick, he never cashed in or out (depends on how you look at it.)

It was a matter of time before our ego caught up with us or we out grew the false bravado and façades to be come the rational and in-control individuals we have become.

There is one thing to remember: we never grow up. There is always something or someone that will trigger your ego and there we go with irrational, emotional behavior. Sad but true. For some, it may be quicker and for others it may take a little more prodding but it will happen.

That’s OK, we are only human after all. We are not perfect. Sure, many want to believe they are perfect. Yet, perfection is subjective and thus; no one is perfect. I am not perfect; you are not perfect. Did I mention I am not perfect?

By recognizing we are not perfect and there will be times when we become irrational & emotional, we can then to work on improving ourselves. We can begin work on the rational. By being aware and cognizant that by being rational focusing on that, we can accomplish more, we can be more.

By learning the valuable lessons that come with falling into the trap of being/becoming irrational then we can focus on the rational. The focus we have, built on the mistakes and actions of the past, will only work if we can admit to ourselves that we messed up, that we fell victim to our ego, that we cannot blame anyone else for our own failures and shortcomings.

It is not easy for some people to confront themselves over the fact that the ego can be manipulated, easily triggered. Once we can overcome that hurdle then can we make some serious change to our life process. That is if you want to make a conscious effort to improve and leave the lack of focus, the irrational and emotion in the past, then be ready to work.

While, you will never be completely emotionless. Remember, in Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Spock could not complete the Kolinahr, the Vulcan ritual to purge all emotions. He was half-human after all. So, what did he do? The only logical thing. This was to admit that he was also human and proceeded to live his life with his emotions. The learned that emotions were part of who he is and what he will be.

However, because he worked at controlling his emotions, the character of Spock, went on to be better and do better. The same can work for you and you do not have to be half-Vulcan. As a matter of fact, you can be 100% human and work on being clear and level headed.

You can do this by committing to being better, doing better, and working on focusing on the rational. It will serve you well when it comes dealing with people and situations that will tax you. Avoid them while you start the process of focusing on the rational. Of course, you cannot avoid people all the time. However, you can avoid those individuals that would be considered bumps in the road to your success.

Do what it takes with what you have but do not give up hope, deny patience, and most of all stick to your commitment to being successful.