LivingReal

In a world filled with so many choices and options it becomes proportionately more difficult to clarify our wants dreams and desires.

As it is now not only acceptable but expected that a woman would have a career outside of the home, those choosing the position of full time mothers are looked upon oddly. And still the woman who drops her child off at a day care provider on her way to the office often struggles between her desire for success in the marketplace and her maternal instincts. The same can be said of fathers who have come to cherish their role in the nurturing process.

These difficult choices extend to seemingly less important areas of life while creating decision making dilemmas everywhere we turn. What to order in a restaurant, which toothpaste to use, where to go on vacation, which television channel to watch, whose opinion to believe, what do I want to be when I grow up?????

H ow is one to plan a strategy for life when the choices are so numerous and our ability and willingness to make decisions are exhausted and drained by the simple act of going through the day?

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Getting from point A to point B is the overall purpose.

Point A is where things are at today.

(Things = income, emotions & feelings, workload, time constraints, personal and family situations)

Point B is the clear vision of the life you want to create for yourself within the framework of family, career and personal dreams wants and desires.

We must not let the burden of or the reality of Point A to hinder the development of the vision of Point B. In other words, dont let the muck of everyday life clog the gears of your mind in developing a clear vision of where you want to be in the future nor the creative flow required to plan the course to get there.

In addition to muck is fear. Lets recognize it and face it. Fear will often back down when faced head on.

Fear of: Family reactions

Income disruptions

Failure

Disappointment

Client reaction

Employee reaction

Personal discomfort

On one end of the scale is fear. Balanced on the opposite end of the scale is the muck of life today. True along with the muck are all the benefits and accolades that come from providing a good life and living to yourself and your family. But it feels like muck, the continuing demands that grow each day that become toxic. Muck has the tendency to grow and spread and infect and suck you in further.

Clarifying Point B and making it so big & bright & colorful & attractive is step one

Now climb out of the muck by facing the fears

Get Rich Slowly has written a great review of a new documentary about the credit industry, Maxed Out.

It’s a sort of Super Size Me, but with credit cards instead of hamburgers. Here’s the trailer:

What I liked
Maxed Out peeks into all corners of the credit industry. It shows us borrowers and lenders, payday lenders and pawnbrokers, commentators and collection agents.

We meet Chris and Bob, for example, the owners of People First, a Minneapolis debt collection agency. They claim their company takes a kinder, gentler approach, but then gleefully compare their tactics to those used by pirates. We also meet Lynn Stavert, a California woman whose husband recently died, leaving her unable to make the $4,000/month mortgage payment. (She used credit card cash advances for a while before giving up.) The various stories illustrate how our lifestyles have become thickly entangled with easy credit.

The film notes that lenders make money from poor credit risks. Banks don’t give you credit because they think you can repay it — they give you credit because they think you can’t.

Read the rest at Get Rich Slowly.

A good friend has always had the dream of raising dogs. Whether he would do this as a full time endeavor or a hobby isn’t clear, but the experience of being involved on a daily basis with the birthing and nurturing of quality dogs has always intrigued him – for years. With a full time career and an above average income this family man with home and cars and yard work and marriage doesn’t have much time for his family dog, let alone a whole pack of young pups.

But life is meant for living and enjoying and experiencing. If my friend finds himself one day, at age 60 or 65 or 70 and still has not tried his hand at dog raising there is a very great chance that he will look back with regret and remorse.

Tom was trained as a carpenter, and he was good at it. Ran his own show and was never lacking for work as word of mouth always brought new customers. He enjoyed the freedom of being his own boss and doing work that he loved. A look into the future gave Tom a reality check that his chosen profession was not the best choice for his future career. First there was the physical side. What his young 20 something body could handle his 30 something body was starting to feel. Then the freedom. Every day he took off from work was a day without pay. He recognized and accepted his lack of desire and ability to manage employees, he just did not fit into his paradigm of enjoyable work.

So —– in his early 30’s he made a switch, learned finance, followed his love of cars and now, in his 50s he is well established as the finance manager of a successful auto dealer, a career from which can retire or work for many more years. He has found time for many of his hobbies and his growing family.

John was not so visionary in his profession. A well respected and skilled painter and wall paper installer, John hired employees on a regular basis but his skill and speed at paper hanging always called for hands on work. His solid income, good reputation and enjoyment of his work caused him to never stop and consider the future. After his second knee operation and constant neck pain from the demands of the job he realized he could no longer continue his chosen profession.

Waiting until his 50’s when his body was giving out made his transition much more difficult. The need to return to school was not easy and the course work was incredibly difficult.

A strategy to prepare for the future which recognizes a person’s desires, dreams and physical realities becomes the plan to assure a fulfilled life of satisfaction and happiness rather than regret and remorse.

From Steve: Visionex is a product I have just ordered for the first time. Having had lasik surgery two years ago and needing to use ‘reader’ glasses more and more often, and then hearing from friends about cataracts – it is only prudent to do all i can to protect my eyes – I plan on using them alot in the future

USANA Health Sciences announced that its supplement Visionex™ has been evaluated and approved by ConsumerLab.com, LLC. A leading provider of independent test results and information, ConsumerLab.com (“CL”) helps consumers and healthcare professionals evaluate health, wellness, and nutritional products.

In a recent blind study, CL purchased and evaluated lutein and zeaxanthin products from various nutritional supplement manufacturers to determine whether they contained the amounts of the compounds as stated on their labels. Upon completion, CL announced that USANA’s Visionex had “met [its] label claim and ConsumerLab.com’s standards for lutein and zeaxanthin products.”

“ConsumerLab.com is an organization at the forefront of research in the arenas of nutrition and health,” said USANA’s Executive Vice President of Research & Development Tim Wood. “USANA takes great pride in the quality systems and manufacturing practices we have established, and we are honored to have obtained this qualification from a company as reputable and highly regarded as CL.”

According to its Web site, CL publishes results of its tests at www.consumerlab.com, which receives more than 3 million visits per year, as well as in its acclaimed book, ConsumerLab.com’s Guide to Buying Vitamins & Supplements, and in special technical reports. In the past eight years, CL has tested more than 1,900 products, representing hundreds of different brands and nearly every type of popular supplement. Its research is cited frequently in the media, in books, and at medical meetings.

Over the years I have been given the opportunity to work with many different populations of people. This has been both an education and an honor. I realize from time to time how fortunate this has been to connect with people from a variety of backgrounds and cultures.

‘Variety’ is a way of saying from the full strata of economics, race, culture, education, intelligence, common sense, sense of humor, contentment, family background, criminal records, haves and have nots. These experiences and meetings have come about through managing a non-profit organization and owning a staffing business.

Currently my family is hosting a young engineering student from Spain who is in America for two months to improve his English. His curiosity led me to share that we have hosted five French students and 2 ladies from Korea prior to himself. We are also supporting a young girl in Nicaragua through World Vision and previously supported a girl in Thailand for over 15 years.

But I transgress

My point is that this exposure has shown me the importance of financial and physical fitness as the firm foundation of success in other areas of life. This goes deeper than saying that a person has to have money and be in good health.

Having money is different than managing money. I know many people who have the uncanny ability to make money. Far larger sums have flowed through their hands over the years than most average folks, but there is little to show for it. This is not to say that the accumulation of material possessions is a sign of wealth, nor large bank balances.

He &/or she who controls money, rather than be controlled by money has developed other traits and skills. Sound money management requires and develops wisdom, a sense of right and wrong, an empirical knowledge and gut feeling. Wisdom comes from above.

Sound money management develops a sense of priorities. It teaches patience as we make one choice over another, unaffected by Wall Street, Madison Avenue, advertising and peer pressure. It maintains control through learning wise decision making.

Wisdom, a sense of Priorities, good Decision Making – don’t these traits have an impact on other parts our life? If we lack these skills will this not cause a negative impact?

Physical Fitness on the surface is important as it helps us move around easier, pain free and avoid illness. A person who controls their eating habits and maintains a regular exercise routine has developed other very useful skills and sense of self. Self Discipline is the first and most obvious.

A person who can say no to tempting foods, who wakes up and goes to sleep when the rest of the world is resting and partying has developed discipline over them self for a greater purpose. The byproduct of this discipline is a strong sense of Self Worth, Self Esteem and Self Confidence - traits that bolster all other activities and endeavors in our life.

Financial Fitness leads to

• Wisdom
• Patience
• Sense of Priorities
• Wise Decision Making

Physical Fitness leads to

• Self Discipline
• Self Confidence
• Self Esteem
• Self Worth

For these reasons I focus a portion of the coaching process in these areas, building a solid foundation.

Thoughts?

Picking up from a previous entry – let’s provide an explanation of the commonly marketed methods for a person to get out of debt.

One method offered by companies that earn their income through the sale of mortgages is “consolidation”. The premise here is to roll all your unsecured debt (such as student loans and credit cards/things that have no collateral covering them) into your home mortgage. It has also been suggested to roll secured debt, such as a car loan into this consolidation.

This assumes your home has equity to borrow from. The theory here is that these funds, the money you previously paid to the credit card companies you will now pay to the mortgage companies, which is okay because then you can write it off on your taxes. The problem with this method is that while it may drop your monthly payments a little, and save you a small amount in annual taxes, you are no closer to being out of debt.

In addition, your student loans, credit cards and car loans are now part of a payment schedule that may actually have you paying them off longer than before, or longer than the car lasts. You have also given up the equity in your home, which is not a bad thing if it is part of an overall strategy to reduce the time in which you are in debt, but not a good thing if it is used as a quick fix to have more money to spend each month.

Another method highly marketed is ’settlement’ or ‘negotiation’. In this case you enlist the services of a company that contacts your creditors for you and negotiates lower interest, a smaller monthly payment, freezing fees or any other method to help you to not have to pay. This method has fault on many levels.

“There is no doubt that debt settlement with any company does hurt your credit – it is the downside to the process of reducing your total debt using this strategy.“   an email response from a debt settlement company

Of immediate concern is how this affects a person’s credit score. Any company that agrees to a negotiated payment will enter this information into a person’s credit history. This information is now there for all other potential creditors to see. Landlords, retail stores, auto loan companies etc now know that you failed to pay back your debts as agreed. This can haunt you for many years to come.

In addition – negotiation may not work. Companies may not agree to new terms, they may agree to terms that are less than desirable, and this will still become part of your permanent credit history. The settlement company is also not in business to lose money and your fees to them must still be paid. I have heard horror stories of unscrupulous companies who were supposed to pay a client’s bills for them and just kept the money or held it for a time before paying it to collect the interest for themselves.

Lastly – where is the morality of not paying your debts? While there are instances of ridiculously high interest rates, and yes – today’s world seems to suck us into buying more than we need or can afford – how can we as adults accept an agreement to purchase something under certain terms and then squirrel our way out of paying for it? I came across a company which claims to have found a loop hole in banking laws and is using that as a way to ‘help’ their clients end all payments to bank provided credit cards.

When I asked what lesson he was teaching his children by sitting on a couch watching a television, both of which were purchased on a credit card which he now feels he does not have to pay back – he had very little to say.

In summary – consolidation, settlement and negotiation, while maybe the last resort for some, fail to effectively eliminate debt for ethically minded families.

It may seem true that there are a lot of choices about which supplements to take until you set certain standards, trust certain sources & stop listening to Kevin Trudeau and other television robber barons.

Marketing controls what people think which leads to how they act and ultimately the decisions and purchases they make. For this reason Centrum has become one of the leading vitamins people purchase. And yet this highly publicized multivitamin is lacking in much of what a body needs.

A telling demonstration was seeing what happened when pieces of cut apple were placed into 2 glasses of water. One of the glasses contained a crushed Centrum vitamin and the other contained Mega Anti-Oxidant from USANA.

A quick explanation (more in future postings). Oxidation is rusting. A shovel left in the rain, an apple turning brown, our body’s cells breaking down are all the negative side of oxygen. Fighting oxidation within our bodies is crucial to avoiding illness and aging.

After an few hours in the glasses the apple floating in the Centrum was just as brown as if it had been left on the counter. The USANA protected apple slice was as white as it was when it was first cut. That is true anti-oxidant protection, the same that will occur in your body.

Most vitamin supplements are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration. The standards here are the same as regulating a can of peas. If it doesn’t harm you it passes. A higher standard of regulation is Pharmaceutical Grade. Items that are Pharmaceutical Grade show up in the Physicians Desk Reference. Two of the important aspects of being Pharmaceutical Grade is that the pill dissolves completely and is available to be used 100% by the body.

Nurses refer to most vitamin supplements as ‘bedpan bullets’ since they fail to dissolve and show up in bed pans in the same condition they were ingested.

A second aspect of Pharmaceutical Grade is that each lot of the product is the same as the last. In other words there in no range of quality and quantity of the ingredients. It does not vary from month to month. This is not true with most products and even some generic over the counter drugs.

USANA was the first and still one of only a handful of companies which voluntarily submit their products to Pharmaceutical Grading.

comments?

There is an avalanche of offerings recently from companies that claim to be able to consolidate, negotiate, reduce, settle and eliminate a persons debt load.

This is exciting for anyone who owns a home. Unfortunately many people will overlook these offerings since they fail to recognize themselves as a candidate for this service. The fact is that if you still are paying a mortgage you have debt and could benefit greatly by paying your loan off quicker. Wouldn’t it be better for the interest you are giving to the mortgage company to go into your retirement savings?

The bad news in all of these offerings is that a person must be astute in understanding the difference between the processes of ‘consolidation’ versus ‘negotiation’ versus ‘elimination’. It is another case of Buyer Beware and the necessity to be wise and educated about the choices you make.

I will discuss the differences over the next few days.

Be wise and have fun!

This will certainly not be the first time you have heard it said that “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day” and yet for many of us our morning routine does not lend itself to fulfill this reality in our life.

The most important word in the above sentence is ‘routine.’ While I strive to make my life anything but routine – morning and evening routines set the pace for the quality of the rest of the day. More on this later.

Rehydrate! - get in the habit (its all about habit – 21 days to create a new habit so be patient and consistent with the things you know are right) of drinking water as soon as you wake up. Throughout the night your body lost lots of water through respiration and all the metabolic activity it performed. This lost water needs to be replaced as soon as possible. By drinking a large glass of water you are also turning the wheels and getting your body into motion – waking it up and preparing it for the day ahead.

My routine begins when nature calls, around 5:30, to use the toilet and then fill the large tumbler I always leave in the bathroom with water and gulp it down. I then return to bed, or not. Over the next half hour as the water makes it way through the digestive system and rehydrates the body I begin to feel more and more awake.

Within the next hour I will make breakfast. I want to finish this entry by suggesting the simplest and fastest breakfast I normally consume. This choice is effective in fulfilling my nutritional needs as well as setting me up for most of the morning. In other words shutting down any desire for other foods until late in the morning or near lunch time. Give it a try and we’ll talk later about the whys.

Oatmeal - a half cup with 2/3rds cup water (I eyeball the measurements, but used a measuring cup at first) in a large cereal bowl. One minute in the microwave. Now forget the honey cinnamon and raisins (Okay, maybe sometimes) and mix in a serving of protein powder. The product I use calls for 2 scoops to equal about 25 grams of protein and comes in either chocolate or strawberry.

Couldn’t be any easier and now I have a protein rich complex carbohydrate to which I add my vitamin supplements and I am set for the morning. This is a fairly easy meal to grab and eat in the car. No buttery things to hold in your hand, no milk sloshing around so if you are in a hurry there is no reason not to eat a good breakfast. Our cars often have an empty bowl and spoon with dried oatmeal stuck to the sides rolling around on the floor. A small concession for a proper breakfast. – Priorities!

Protein Powder – Many brands

Vitamin Supplements – One Brand

Have a Fit day!