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Welcome to Your Achievement Ezine
Issue 358 - April 9, 2008
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"It takes time to build a corporate work of art.
It takes time to build a life. And it takes time to develop and grow. So give
yourself, your enterprise, and your family the time they deserve and the time
they require."
Jim Rohn
Today's issue includes:
1. Your Achievement Article - How to Become Rich and Retire
Young by Robert Kiyosaki
2. Your Achievement Quotes - Worry/Fear, You are Unique and Action
3. Your Achievement Tips - The Secret Life by Stephen R. Covey
4. Robert Kiyosaki had two dads...
5. More Information
1. Your Achievement Article
How to Become Rich and Retire Young by Robert Kiyosaki
The following is the story of how my wife Kim, my best friend Larry Clark and I, began our journey from broke, to rich, to retired in less than 10 years. When Kim and I started, we were nearly out of money and filled with doubt. We all have doubts. The difference is what we do with those doubts.
In December 1984, Kim, Larry and I were on a skiing holiday. At night we would discuss our plans for the future. Kim and I were on our last few dollars and Larry was in the process of building another business. On New Years Day, we tried to set some goals. Larry wanted to do more than just set goals for the coming year, he wanted us to set goals that changed our lives.
"Why don't we write a plan on how we can all become financially free?" he urged.
I had talked about it and dreamt about it. But the idea of being financially free was always in the future, not today.
"Let's write it down," Larry said. "Once we write it down, we have to do it, and we'll support each other on the journey."
Kim and I looked at each other doubtfully. "It's a good idea but I think I would rather just focus on surviving for the next year."
"Come on," said Larry. "Let's go for freedom. I don't want to spend my life working just to pay bills. I want to live. I want to be rich. I want to travel the world while I'm young enough to enjoy it."
I recalled the words of my rich dad: "The biggest challenge you have is your own self-doubt and your laziness. It is your self-doubt and your laziness that define and limit who you are. It is your self-doubt and laziness that deny you the life you want."
It was time to choose. "OK, let's set the goal to be financially free." That was New Year's Day 1985. In 1994 Kim and I were free. Larry went on to build his company, which became one of Inc. Magazine's fastest growing companies of the year in 1996. Larry retired in 1998 at the age of 46 after selling his company.
How did we do it?
It's not about how we did it. It's about why we did it. From 1985 to 1994, Kim, Larry, and I focused on rich dad's three paths to great wealth:
Increasing business skills
Increasing money management skills
Increasing investment skills
The why is because I wanted to challenge my own self-doubts, my laziness and my past. It was the why that gave us the power to do the how.
My arguments against Larry's idea were things like: "But we don't have any money"; "I can't do that"; "I'll think about it next year, or once Kim and I get settled".
Rich dad had told me: "Whenever someone says something like 'I can't afford it', or 'I can't do it' to something they want, they have a big problem. Why in the world would someone say 'I can't afford it' or 'I can't do it' to something they want? Why would someone deny themselves the things they want? It makes no logical sense."
My own whys
I was fed up with being broke and always struggling for money.
I was tired of being average.
My parents had struggled under a mountain of bills.
Most painful of all, my beautiful wife Kim was in this financial mess because she loved me.
Things got worse for us before they got better. Kim and I lived in a car for about three weeks after our money ran out. So things did not get better just because we made the decision to retire rich, but it was the reasons why that kept us going.
Rich dad used to say: "If you want something, be passionate. Passion gives energy to your life." Passion is a combination of love and hate. "If you want something you do not have, find out why you love what you want and why you hate not having what you want. When you combine those two thoughts, you will find the energy to go get anything you want."
For example, I would create the following list:
LOVE
Being rich
Being free
Buying anything I want
Expensive things
Having other people do what I don't want to do
HATE
Being poor
Being required to work
Not having what I want
Cheap things
Doing things I don't want to do
So sit quietly to find and define your loves and hates. Then write down your whys. Write down your dreams, goals and plans on becoming financially free, retiring early and retiring as young as possible. Once it is in writing, you may want to show it to a friend who will support you in achieving your dreams. Take a look at this paper with your dreams, goals and plans on a regular basis. Talk about it often, ask for support, be willing to continually learn, and before you know it, things will begin to happen.
I have heard many people say: "Money doesn't buy happiness." That statement has some truth to it. But what money does do is buy me the time to do what I love and pay other people to do what I hate doing.
Robert Kiyosaki
If you missed it, there's still one day left...
How to get started on the path to wealth and financial freedom!
This man's extraordinary programs are a radical departure from traditional thinking on education and traditional ideas on money.
And right now three of his most popular programs are all available to you for a special price (individually or as a package and SAVE more)!
Go to http://richdad.yoursuccessstore.com to learn more.
View, listen to and study Robert's programs to acquire the knowledge, the tools and the new state of mind that'll start you on your journey to financial freedom!
© Robert Kiyosaki, 2001
"A decision is made with the brain. A
commitment is made with the heart. Therefore, a commitment is much deeper
and more binding than a decision."
Nido Qubein
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"All great masters are chiefly distinguished
by the power of adding a second, a third, and perhaps a fourth step in a
continuous line. Many a man had taken the first step. With every additional
step you enhance immensely the value of your first." Ralph Waldo Emerson
2. Your Achievement Quotes
WORRY/FEAR
"We promise according to our hopes and perform according to our fears." -- Francois, Duc de La Rochefoucauld
"I don't believe people die from hard work. They die from stress and worry and fear -- the negative emotions. Those are the killers, not hard work. The fact is, in our society today, most people don't understand what hard work is all about." --A.L. Williams
"Do not give any time to your past, you can't change what happened 5 minutes ago." -- Jan Ruhe
"The fear is worse than the pain." -- Shannon Bahr
YOU ARE UNIQUE
"You can't think about things you want to change. Just be yourself." -- Ethan Embry.
"Remember always that you have not only the right to be an individual; you have an obligation to be one. You cannot make any useful contribution in life unless you do this." -- Eleanor Roosevelt
"You are nature's greatest miracle. There never has been and never will be anyone just like you." -- Brian Tracy
"You were born rich with 18 billion bountiful, beautiful, totally available and in all probability under-used brain cells awaiting your desire, decision and directional compass to take you onward, upward, goodward and Godward." -- Mark Victor Hansen
ACTION
"It doesn't matter how strong your opinions are. If you don't use your power for positive change, you are, indeed, part of the problem." -- Coretta Scott King
"Luck is the by-product of busting your fanny." -- Don Sutton
"The most drastic and usually the most effective remedy for fear is direct action." -- William Burnham
"Take action every day - some small dose at a time." -- Jeffrey Gitomer
"If you don't make a total commitment to
whatever you're doing, then start to bail out the first time the boat starts
leaking." Lou Holtz
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"I was taught that the way of progress was neither swift nor easy." Madame
Marie Curie
3. Your Achievement Tips
The Secret Life by Stephen R. Covey
The secret life is the key to a quality life and that in turn is the key to a quality culture, products, and services. Once in New York City, I attended the Broadway play, The Secret Garden. The play was particularly poignant for me that evening because my mother had just died.
The Tony Award winning musical is the story of a young girl whose mother and father die of cholera in India as the play begins. She is sent to live with her uncle in a large British manor. The old house is filled with romantic spirits. As the restless girl explores the grounds of the estate, she discovers the entrance to the magical secret garden, a place where anything is possible.
When she first enters the garden, she finds that it appears to be dead, much like her cousin, a bedridden boy, and her uncle, still haunted by memories of his lovely wife who died giving birth to the boy. In harmony with natural laws and principles, the girl faithfully plants seeds and brings new life to the garden. As the roots are warmed and the garden cultivated, she brings about a dramatic transformation of her entire culture within one season.
In my many years of teaching and training, I have seen several such transformations brought about by proactive people who exercise principle-centered leadership and the Seven Habits in their secret, private, and public lives.
When I returned home to Salt Lake City the next day to speak at my mother's funeral, I referred to the Secret Garden, because for me and many others, my mother's home was a secret garden where we could escape and be nurtured by positive affirmation. In her eyes, all about us was good, and all that was good was possible.
Our Three Lives
We all live three lives: public, private and secret. In our public lives, we are seen and heard by colleagues, associates, and others within our circle of influence. In our private lives, we interact more intimately with spouses, family members, and close friends. The secret life is where your heart is, where your real motives are the ultimate desires of your life.
Many executives never visit the secret life. Their public and private lives are essentially scripted by who and what precedes and surrounds them or by the pressures of the environment. And so they never exercise that unique endowment of self-awareness the key to the secret life where you can stand apart from yourself and observe your own involvement.
Courage is required to explore our secret life because we must first withdraw from the social mirror, where we are fed positive and negative feedback continuously. As we get used to this social feedback, it becomes a comfort zone. And we may opt to avoid self-examination and idle away our time in a vacuum of reverie and rationalization. In that frame of mind, we have little sense of identity, safety, or security.
Examine Your Motives
The most critical junctures in my life take place when I visit my secret life and ask, "What do I think? What do I believe is right? What should my motives be?" These are times when I choose my motives. One such time occurred when I first heard Dag Hammarskjold say, "It is more noble to give yourself completely to one individual, than to labor diligently for the salvation of the masses." That statement had such a profound effect on me that I started to say to myself in regard to my relationships with other people, "Wait a minute it's my life. I can choose whether I want to make reconciliation with this person or not. I can choose my own motives."
One of the exciting fruits of the "secret garden" is an ability to consciously choose your own motives. Until you choose your own motives, you really can't choose to live your own life. Everything flows out of motive and motivation that is the root of our deepest desires.
Now, when I get into a frustrating or perplexing situation, I enter into my secret life. That's where I find not only motives but also correct principles; that's where the inner wisdom is. As I learn to be proactive in exploring the secret life, I tap into self-awareness, imagination, conscience, and into the exercise of free will to choose another motive.
People who regularly explore their secret life and examine their motives are better able to see into the hearts of others, practice real empathy, bestow real empowerment and affirm worth and identity.
A healthy secret life will benefit your private and public lives in many ways. For example, when I'm preparing to give a speech, I read aloud a favorite discourse on faith hope and charity because it helps me to purify my motive. I lose all desire to impress. My only desire is to bless. And when I go to a public setting with that motive, I have great confidence and inner peace. I feel more love for the people and feel much more authentic myself.
Executives who attend our leadership training in the mountain setting of Sundance often tell me, "This is the first time in many years that I've done any soul searching. I've seen myself as if for the first time, and I've resolved that my life is going to be different. I'm going to be true to what I really believe." Recently, many people have written me to say, "Your habits and principles have made the difference. I'd never really thought about some of them before, but I resonate with them." That's because these principles are found in people's secret life.
And yet most of us spend our busy days privately doing our thing, never pausing long enough to enter the secret life, the secret garden, where we can create masterpieces, discover great truths and enhance very aspect of our public and private lives.
Having a healthy secret life is the key to having a quality private and public life, as well as a quality culture, product or service.
To order Dr. Covey's New Release, "The 8th Habit" as an Individual Set (contains one DVD of the speakers 'live' performance) at a special offer or to view and learn more about our unique collection including 34 incredible DVD programs in all PLUS, find out how to receive the FREE Bonus 3-disc DVD program Move to Lose by Chris Freytag! Each of these 33 powerful DVDs delivers unique ideas and inspiration to engage you and move you to positive action.
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"There are only two options regarding
commitment; you're either in or you're out. There's no such thing as life
in-between." Pat Riley
4. Robert Kiyosaki had two dads...
If you missed it, you still have 1 day...
How to get started on the path to wealth and financial freedom!
This man's extraordinary programs are a radical departure from traditional thinking on education and traditional ideas on money.
And right now three of his most popular programs are all available to you for a special price (individually or as a package and SAVE more)!
Go to http://richdad.yoursuccessstore.com to learn more.
View, listen to and study Robert's programs to acquire the knowledge, the tools and the new state of mind that'll start you on your journey to financial freedom!
"Make a total commitment to your company,
your job, and your career. Uncommitted people have no future."
Brian Tracy
5. More Information
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Your Achievement Ezine - Issue 358
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"Reality forms around your commitments. The
achievement of your goal is assured the moment you commit yourself to it."
Max Steingart
Make it a Great Week!
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