Small Bites of Motivation

I want to continue with some of the comments made by Jeff Rahill of Kauai that I shared in last week’s post. These were from a letter to me that we jokingly called a “book report” dealing with specific parts of my book, How to Ignite Your Passion for Living, that he thought were particularly helpful.

Here’s some of what he wrote from different sections of the book:

On the subject of “The Bite-Size Miracle” Jeff said, “I definitely believe in achieving your goals, be it long range or the immediate task at hand, by taking it one bite at a time. I remember in the last half of the marathon at Ironman, telling myself that I just had to make it to the next aid station, which were one mile apart. Then I saw the handmade signs on the side of the road: ‘They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.’ Like you said, ‘Action is the key … keep moving.’”

That section of the book dealt with how to accomplish a goal by breaking it down into small goals so that, step by step, you would get accomplish that end goal. This can be used in almost any circumstances where the accomplishment seems too huge to tackle. In the book I used an example of a man who survived and literally dragged himself back from certain death by seeing each few feet he needed to cover to get to his base camp as one small goal. If you can just block out that overwhelming, seemingly impossible picture of the big goal by putting all your focus on the small goal, you can, one tiny goal after another, get yourself to that finish line.

I also really enjoyed Jeff’s comments on ‘The Surefire Way to Stick with Every Goal’ The secret is to know your benefits, reasons and motivations, and write them down.  Jeff adds a bit about his experience in how this relates to keeping fit. He wrote “I’m with you on the subject of fasting.  I’ve been fasting one day a week for over 40 years. It’s part of my health plan. Another part is being a vegetarian for that same period.”  By the way, Jeff looked to be in terrific physical shape and certainly seemed well aware of the benefits and reasons for his fasting choice.

Jeff had a few more choice comments I want to share and reflect on with you but we’ll save them for next time. These two lessons are big ideas that can make all the difference in reaching your goals. If you can just take and apply these to the things you are working towards right now, I bet you’ll see a big difference in just the one week between this post and the next one. Let’s see if that’s true!

A Passionate Book Report

Last week I had lunch at Duke’s on Kalapaki beach in Kauai.  If you have been to Kauai you probably know the place. A friend of mine in Salt Lake City, Tom Roughton, told his cousin, Jeff Rahill, that I was on the island and suggested we have lunch since we both had done extremely well by buying beat up properties and fixing them up.  At the end of our delightful lunch I gave Jeff a copy of my latest book How to Ignite Your Passion for Living and jokingly told him there was a  book report, double-spaced and graded on a curve, due in 2 weeks.  We both laughed but then would you believe, two weeks later there it was a 5 page, single-spaced, book report on my computer screen!

I was very surprised how well it was written and how it was spot on in commenting on the most important points of the book.  Reading Jeff’s comments reignited my own passion.  Of course part of it may have been the fact that he loved my book and that stroked my ego but it also motivated me to refocus on the book’s lessons—to do more, be more and stick with my big goals and even add more goals to my list.

So I thought I’d share with you some of Jeff’s comments and wisdom and see if it stirs you up as well:

“I wanted to tell you that I just finished reading your book and will at least give you my comments–even though it’s not exactly a book report.”

“I’ve believed for many years that goal setting is the key to getting what you want, so your book resonated with me in its premise and in many of the details.”

“’Return to Exuberance.’ Yes, I would like to get back the exuberance I felt at a young age, probably sixth grade, or in my twenties, for me. I agree that the dreams or goals have to be big.”

“’Short Life Needs Big Passion.’ The older we get, the more we realize how short life is.  We are here, and gone, in a speck of time.  I didn’t have a goal as a young person to have a million dollars or anything like that. It wasn’t until I was 25 that I even started to keep track of what I had, and at that point it was more ‘keeping track’ than setting a monetary goal. I kept track of my net worth every year, but didn’t hit one million until I was 50.”

“…..we all need a dream list.  I’ve often put pictures up on my bulletin board, in front of me all day, of the things I like. It keeps me dreaming, and that’s the first step toward it becoming reality.”

Next week I want to share some more of Jeff’s thinking and wisdom from his ‘book report’. Think on these initial comments in the meantime and see if it starts a spark of motivation in you. You can order the book as well right here on our website. Just click!

The Kind of People for You

I picked up a book yesterday written back in 2003 by an old friend. The book has a one-word title: Goals! The subtitle is “How to Get Everything You Want—Faster Than You Ever Thought Possible.” I’ve always felt it a privilege to call its author, Brian Tracy, a friend. He’s not only a warm, friendly person, but he’s also smart and wise. His advice in Goals! is fantastic. I read it back in 2005, and I have reaped huge rewards from following his wonderful and sage advice.

When I picked up the book up yesterday, I took a quick look at the handwritten notes and quotes I pulled that I had scribbled in the front blank pages of the book (with the page number references, of course!) I found myself immediately pulled back into the book to my favorite parts and what I thought was Brian’s best advice and ideas. Thoughts like: “Character is the ability to follow through on a resolution after the enthusiasm with which the resolution was made has passed,” found on page 263.

But what Brian wrote about the concept that gives a person a huge advantage to be successful that really influenced me was written under the subhead, “Get Around the Right People.” Brian goes on to say that we should “make it a point to associate with the kind of people that you like, admire, respect, and want to be like sometime in the future. Associate with the kind of people that you look up to and would be proud to introduce to your friends and associates. The choice of a positive, goal-oriented reference group can do more to supercharge your career than any other factor.”

When I set my goal to be a millionaire, one of the first things I did was to set in motion a plan to meet and get to know wealthy people. On that list were two billionaires who didn’t know me from Adam but who, with persistence and a plan, I was able to meet and get to know as well as get advice and financial formulas from them. My very first “adviser”, and a man who became a good friend, was a multimillionaire by the name of Larry Rosenberg. The two billionaires were Ray Kroc, founder of McDonald’s, and Curt Carlson, founder of the TGIF restaurant chain. Later I was fortunate enough to connect with businessman Paul J. Meyer, who built a half-billion-dollar fortune starting from zero. He shared many ideas and formulas for achieving success at a quick pace.

In the margins of Brian Tracy’s book, I found this note his words inspired me to write: “In order for me to be able to associate with the right kind of people, I must work hard on myself to be that likable and right kind of person. When I think about it I know that for me and most people, we would all much rather do business with people who we really like and we tend to shun people that are unfriendly, grouchy or that are too argumentative. I don’t even like to play tennis with people I don’t like, even if I beat them.” So the bottom line here is to meet the “right” kind of people you must work on yourself to become that same “right” kind of person.

 

The Story of a Millionaire Goal

Last week I posted the front page story that was written about me and my plight when I was a poor 21 year old and how that wonderful couple Phil and Addie DiBenedetto took me into their house and let me sleep in their basement even though they had just met me.  This all happened when I was working construction in Rockford Illinois back in 1965.  I was very lucky to meet the DiBenedettos not only because they gave me a place to stay and feed me for free as well but maybe even more importantly, they seemed to really believe in me.
Re-reading that article reminded me that even as a very young man I had set my sights on becoming a millionaire.  I must admit that I had a tough time staying focused on that huge million dollar number when I was physically working myself to the bone at a measly $4.50 an hour. I do remember that I tried very hard to make every single day count by continuing to search, in what little spare time I had, for the “million dollar secret”.

I don’t think the DiBenedettos, even though they believed in me, ever really thought I could reach the “millionaire status or level”.  In fact years later as quoted in the newspaper story when they visited me in Denver, Phil and Addie said they “still remember Haroldsen and his wife lived in a broken down house. Finally, the young man ended up in Salt Lake City, where he was eventually fired from his job and on his way to making his first million.”

I loved the next part of the newspaper story. “When Addie and Phil visited Haroldsen for the first time in Salt Lake City, they had no idea he had fulfilled his dream of becoming a wealthy man.” In fact they were even worried that I couldn’t afford the long distance calls that I had been making to them prior to their arrival.  The best part was how blown away they both were when I drove them through the gate and into the long driveway of my home. It wasn’t a huge mansion but it was close, with over three tree-lined acres surrounding it.  They were so very proud of me and I had always been so very grateful to them for their willingness to reach out and help a young man who needed a place to stay but even more so for their very kind, loving and friendly support of his dream.

Those 5,840 days (16 years) between my meeting the DiBenedettos and the publishing of that article, were used to search out and discover the financial formula that can lift an ordinary person from being a meager wage earner to being a millionaire and, yes, even a multi-millionaire.  What is the secret?

Well, first it’s setting your mind firmly on your goal and never giving up on your objective and then working your tail off–or I should say, working your brain off since physical work and an hourly wage will never get you to the big numbers.  Hitting millions and multi millions is done by using financial leverage and people leverage. If you are not sure what that is, you should go back and read some of my earlier blogs that address that specifically and in detail. The secrets are all here:

http://ignitemylifenow.com/2013/01/11/the-power-of-leverage-and-compounding/

http://ignitemylifenow.com/2014/06/14/the-final-step-to-wealth/

http://ignitemylifenow.com/2014/07/25/the-simple-wealth-formula/

http://ignitemylifenow.com/2014/11/07/leverage-to-lift-your-profits/

 

The Difference Every Day Makes

One day doesn’t seem like very much time and if we get a lot of good stuff done or we do nothing but watch TV all day it may not seem to make much difference in our world let alone the rest of the world.  Hey, it’s only one day. No big deal. I’ve got lots and lots of days ahead of me—like maybe 50 or 100 thousand more of those days before being blasted off this planet. But those single goof-off days can add up quickly and none of us have near as many days as we might figure to accomplish what we want, especially if we set our eyes and minds on big and lofty goals.

Yesterday as I was driving home from a great doubles tennis match I did some quick figuring in my head and was somewhat shocked at the number of days I had left in my life or I should I say the lack of number of days. Even if I made it to age 100 my remaining number of days, with me being almost 71, was only a little over 10,000, and that was IF I make it to age 100!

Even if you are only a mere 25 years of age, that still only gives you just over 27,000 days to age 100.  Now to some people that might seem like a lot of days but to me it’s a pretty small number, therefore I am inclined to think that to waste even one day is a very serious matter, unless of course you don’t have any big and lofty plans and goals.

The good news however, is that I am totally convinced from my experience in life that if you are keenly aware of your hours and days as you experience those days of your life then you will be much more likely to not only set good, worthwhile and important goals but you will be many times more likely to reach those goals.  And because we all have a limited number of days–whether it’s 10, 20 or 27,000–we need to put strict time deadlines on those goals, because if we do that then we are much less likely to waste those precious days and more likely to reach your goals.

Recently I came across an article about me that appeared on the front page of the Sunday Register Star of Rockford, Illinois and I was quite stunned at some of the things they quoted me as saying way back on November 1^st of 1981.

I was only 37 back when the paper ran the story entitled “He Quit Bragging after his First Million”.  As I re-read the story that they wrote about me, I must admit that I was a bit surprised that in talking about my beginnings as a construction worker 16 years earlier, there in Rockford, making only $4.50 an hour, that I had already set my sights on becoming a millionaire.  Plus, even at the young age of 21, I was acutely aware of this thing called “time”.

I had figured that even working as hard as I was, making just $4.50 an hour would only bring me a mere $9360 in a year and even after 50 years, I would only have made $468,000. Of course, when I considered that I would have to spend money to live, I quickly figured out that there had to be some formula or secret to becoming a millionaire because just working an hourly job wasn’t going to do it. I was to find out later, using each precious day to look for the answer, that there was, in fact, a formula to making millions and one that doesn’t require a person to invent Facebook or Amazon or some hi-tech computer program.

If I hadn’t realized how critically important each and every day was and how few days are in a person’s life, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have spent my days searching for the “financial formula”.  So please never forget the great and precious value of a single day in your life and use it accordingly.

Next week I want to share more of the newspaper article and more specifics of the “financial formula”.

 

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ALMOST 5 MILLION

I got a bit of a shock via an email I received last week. It came from “Fitbit”. It was a summary report of my fitness for the year 2014. It said, “Whoa, take a look back at everything you accomplished in 2014!” And I did.

The shocker was my Fitbit recorded me taking 4,980,169 steps in just one year. That’s 2,341 miles. The message went on to say, “You might not have noticed when you were running errands, chasing the bus or hitting the gym after a long day, but every single step you took added up to something big. Something really big. It’s a year to be proud of and we’re pumped to be a part of it.”

I would have never guessed a year ago, when my wife gave me this little tiny thing called a Fitbit that I ever could or would take almost 5 million steps in a single year!

I wrote about my Fitbit in a blog early in 2014 saying that when we take time to measure and keep track of most anything, we tend to get better at whatever we are measuring. This is because we are competing against ourselves and we can see our progress. We just want to do better or do more today than we did yesterday and with those records to keep reminding us, we then are driven to continue improving each day after that.

After getting the summary report from Fitbit I am certainly even more motivated to continue improving my fitness and have challenged myself to do much better in 2015. In fact my goal is now 7 million steps for this year.

As all of us begin this new year, I want to push and challenge you to start measuring whatever it is that you want improve upon. It could be your wealth, your health, your donations of time and or money to others or anything you would like to be doing more of or be better at. Start today to keep track and I promise that ‘keeping track’ will to keep you ‘on track’ and you will get better and better at whatever you are measuring.

Lesson from the Life of Billy Crystal

I want to continue discussing the theme we had last week on writing your thoughts, ideas and life into a journal. I have strong and passionate feelings about this process of making a record of your life, about having the ability to read over all those ups and downs and the lessons we learn along the way.

This past week, I read about the fascinating life and thoughts of Billy Crystal in his incredible autobiography Still Foolin’ ‘Em. He wrote the book when he was turning 65 and it’s really a great read. It’s packed full of very funny stuff but I was quite a bit more impressed by his deep thoughts and feelings on everything from his family including his wonderful wife, kids and grand-kids plus the big impact his father, mother and grandmother had on him, to his numerous famous friends and not so famous friends and business associates.  I’ll tell you, if you read his book you will quickly grow to love and admire this man. He inspires you and gives you some great insights into the human mind and behavior.

He and his famous friends certainly lived the philosophy of “feel the fear and do it anyway”. That is something we all need to remind ourselves to believe in and practice. I think most of us look at famous and really successful people and think that they don’t have great fears like us but nothing could be further from the truth. Everyone has fears, but the key to success and a great life is to plow right through those fears and “do it anyway”.

The other great lesson I learned from Billy Crystal, or I should say I re-learned and reminded myself to do more of, was the huge value of people networking. I was astounded at how many friends and business contacts Billy had. Even though Billy is super talented I don’t believe he would have soared nearly as high as he did without his people networking. I’m talking hundreds of incredibly influential people he got to know who helped him on his path to such tremendous success. And did he ever soar! His success was not only as a stand-up comedian but as an actor in all those wonderful movies, TV shows and even on the Broadway stage. He made us laugh which is so very good for our minds and souls plus he gave us so many hours of movie and TV entertainment. Now through his book, he is giving even more.

I certainly don’t think Billy is even close to being finished as he approaches his 67th birthday on March 14^th of this year. The biggest lesson I think we should take away from Mr. Billy Chrystal is that all of us need to record our life, our activities and, most importantly, our thinking. This can be not only helpful to ourselves when we re-read what our thoughts were at different stages of our lives but also that your autobiography will be equally helpful to others. So keep making those journal entries and leave a legacy for your family, friends and everyone to enjoy as well as learning some great lessons from your own life.

Great Insights from the Best Teacher

Have you started writing in your own journal yet? If you haven’t, I’m going to try to persuade you to start doing it. Why? Because of the many, many benefits you’ll get not just at the time you write them out, but also down the road. This will be especially true if you write more about how you are feeling and what is quietly running through your brain from day to day.

In addition to writing your thoughts down, you will also want to record what you are doing including those steps you are taking to reach your goals. By writing out your thoughts and feelings as well as your goal items, you will no doubt find, as I have, that the biggest benefits come later when you re-read and revisit those thoughts that were running through your brain at different points of your life. You really can experience some major breakthroughs and some life changing and life enhancing discoveries just by looking back and seeing where you were and what you were doing at various times in your past.

I’ve been keeping my “thought journals” since I was 19 years old. I will admit that as I go back and read some of my thoughts and reasoning it’s down-right hilarious, but I’ve been shocked more than once that some of my recorded thoughts as a young 19 year old are rather profound. It’s so interesting to me to actually learn from myself, from my own words, concepts and thoughts that I had long ago forgotten. Many of us try to learn more about ourselves and want more insights into our minds and our lives. With more insights into our minds we can make big improvements to our lives. And who doesn’t want to be happier, healthier and wealthier? Well, that is what journaling can help you with.

Now as we begin a new year I think it would be the perfect time to start your own “thought journal”. If you are already journaling your journey and recording your thoughts and feelings, keep it up. And maybe now it would be good to take some time and re-read some old entries and see what you can learn from yourself. You may even come across some old goals that you logged but forgot about and it will make you realize that it’s time to hit the reset button on those goals.

I just re-read some of my thoughts and thinking from early 2012 and they certainly got me jump started for this new year. Maybe the best teacher you will ever have is actually you! But you do need to pay close attention to yourself and to you inner thinking and be sure to capture and record those thoughts and feelings. Then you will be able to revisit in order to learn and discover great insights from you, one of your greatest teachers, at a later time.

Speaking of Determination

I just happened to pick up a little book today and it opened to a page that had this quote “some people succeed because they are destined to, but most people succeed because they are determined.” That was Elmer Towns Minute Motivators for Leaders by Stan Toler.  Great quote, a great truth and a great thing to think and about and do something about. Determination–what a great word and a great human attribute. That’s if you use it.

When I think about my own successes, whether they have been in my tennis tournaments and matches, or attaining great health or great wealth, I can clearly see the greatest common denominator for each one of my successes has been this great thing called determination.

But how does one boost or improve his or her level of determination? Researchers in human behavior studies have observed that most people can get a BIG BOOST in their own determination abilities and in their own self-control just by merely reading about or observing in other people’s examples; people who have expended a great amount of self-control or determination in various parts of their lives.  Just to know of those studies should motivate us to hang out with the kind of people that exert large amount of determination or at least we should seek out and read stories of people that use a ton of self-control and determination.

Personally I never seem to tire of observing and or reading those kinds of stories. They truly drove me to success, especially when I was in my 20’s, 30’s and 40’s. When I was younger it motivated me in sports. Later on it was all about making more money and, wow, did those people that I hung out with and the stories or others who made millions and billions push me to do more and more, and bigger and bigger.

Now at my age the people and the stories in the health and fitness department motivate me to stay the course of great health and try to do even better every day.  These stories lift me up and inspire me and even seem to give me more and more energy to do more with my life and do more to help other people with their lives.  If you really want to push and motivate yourself to levels beyond what you ever thought possible, try changing your thinking and convince yourself that your life is on the line, because in some ways our lives are on the line regardless of what we set out to do.  I’ll talk more about that next week. In the meantime, seek out stories and people who are all about determination and see if that doesn’t get you motivated to do more.

Wants are not Needs

Ok, let’s talk about money.

A few days ago I was thumbing through a book I wrote back in 1983, The Courage to be Rich, when, in Chapter 4–The Fallacy of Working for a Living, I found a quote from a guy by the name of Joe Karbo (who, sadly, passed away from a heart attack at the young age of 55). The quote was: “Most people are so busy earning a living they never make any money.” What Joe was saying is that most people are ‘wage slaves’ and never figure out that the key to wealth is really not your earnings or wages. Yes, wages have a part to play but only if you do the right things with a portion of your wages. Your wage doesn’t have to be huge but the key, of course, is saving some of it and setting it aside then letting it build up enough for you to make the right investments.

Of course, the problem with most people is they don’t use enough discipline to control their spending. They think there are things that they just have to have now such as a new dress or car, a fancy night out on the town, an extravagant vacation, etc. I find it very interesting that people choose words like ‘need’ rather than the more accurate word ‘want’ when talking about the things they spend their money on. There is a huge difference between our needs and our wants. Most of the things we think we need are really just things we desire. We all need water, food, shelter, clothing and a certain amount of security to survive and have the chance to thrive. If you take time to think it through, you will be able to see the difference and if you really see the difference, you can then choose to set aside those wants that you previously thought were needs. That will get you the money you’ll need to save up in order to invest and get ahead.

What I used to do when I was depriving myself of a lot of extras that I really wanted right then and there was to concentrate on the huge benefits that I would be receiving later on. I would focus on two wonderful words: ‘passive income’. That concept of having income that would come in automatically each month, whether I got out of bed or was vacationing in Europe, would really motivate me to not spend on things that were wants and to keep saving more and more of my wages. And it paid off big time. Now I spend a lot of time traveling the world and doing super fun things without worrying about the money. It comes in every month no matter where I am or what I’m doing.

It’s so funny how often I hear, “Oh Mark, you are so very lucky to have such a great life style.” They probably don’t mean that literally, but I always respond with the same thing, saying, “Believe me, it’s not luck. It was good planning and discipline over a long period of time.”

Friends, pretty much anyone can do what I did. It does take time but it’s so very worth it. If you think you are too old and don’t have enough time to do it at least pass the message on to your kids and grandkids. They will thank you and greatly benefit for many generations to come!

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