Five Elements Videos

Here s a story we ve been told our whole life: ___ ___ You choose a career. You get a job. It pays the bills. Life is good. You live happily ever after. If you re lucky. Because If you re lucky, you love your job. If you re lucky, your work is stimulating. If you re lucky, there is room for growth in your chosen career. If you re lucky, you earn enough from your job to support your desired lifestyle. If you re lucky, your job also affords you time to enjoy the fruits of your labor. If you re lucky, you realize that luck is only a small part of all of these things. As the old saying goes, It s better to be lucky than smart. Lifestyle costs affect career decisions However, smart decisions often increase your chances of getting lucky. And who doesn t like to get lucky? You get a job to support your lifestyle. But how does your lifestyle affect your career? If the costs of your lifestyle put too much of a demand on how much you have to make, you may have to take a job that you don t love just to pay for your lifestyle. If your lifestyle consumes every penny you make, you may have to jump at the first offer that comes along instead of being able to select the job that fits you best. You may have to take a job that takes up all of your time. You have no time to do anything else including things you love to do or spending time with people you love. Find harmony between the two The two are completely interdependent. Your career choices affect your lifestyle. That s certainly true. But the piece that s missing is that your lifestyle also affects your career decisions. In other words, how you spend your money may determine how you earn money. Bigg success is life on your own terms. The five elements of bigg success are money, time, growth, work and play. The bigg idea behind bigg success is that there is synergy between these five elements. You are the entrepreneur of your life. It s implicit in our definition of bigg success. You and you alone are in charge. Successful entrepreneurs understand that their business finances and their personal finances are linked. Their business has to make enough money support them. But that s only half the story. They also have to be careful that they don t put too much of a burden on the business with their personal financial decisions. Even if you aren t an entrepreneur in the traditional sense, it s helpful if you see yourself in business for yourself. You may have just one customer your employer. Your lifestyle affects your career and your career affects your lifestyle. Find the harmony between them and you ll find bigg success! ___ Would you like more tips and tools to live your life on your own terms? Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thanks for reading our post today. Please join us next time when we discuss the one thing you need to face challenges with confidence. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00513-110209.mp3 Related posts Bigg Success Primer (Image in today s post by shho)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. There are five elements of bigg success money, time, growth, work and play. Today we ll focus on money. ___ ___ We hear a lot about climate change and its implications. It occurred to us that financial markets change much like the weather. So here are 4 tips for weathering financial climate change: Asset prices heat up and cool down Stock prices skyrocket. Then they fall. Real estate prices rise. Then the bubble bursts. Nothing goes up linearly. Yet most of our projections do. Plan for all weather diversify. You won t create much wealth without taking some risk. But you can manage that risk by investing across asset classes (e.g. stocks, bonds) and within asset classes (large cap, mid-cap and small cap stocks). Price movements can be extreme Experts are predicting more volatility in the years ahead. We don t mind it when prices are rising quickly. But we have to be prepared for the other side as well. Very, very few people successfully time the market period after period. So it s important to move your money to less risky assets as you near the date when you ll need it. If you ll need it in less than ten years, you may want to look at shifting money to something less risky. As we always say, talk with your financial planner about your specific situation to determine your best move. ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Watch your emissions By emissions, we mean money out the door. In our businesses and in our personal lives, it s much easier to spend less than to make more. When you re getting ready to spend it, think about how many hours you have to work to earn the money in the first place. If you really want an accurate picture, do this on an after-tax basis. Make the green house effect work for you When you re buying a house, ask some important questions. Do you really need that extra room? How often will you use it? You may decide to buy a smaller house and invest the green to further diversify your portfolio and increase your returns. Also, invest your green in energy efficiency. Improving the efficiency of your home pays you back month after month by lowering your utility bills. You can t say that about most outlays. Take these four tips and go green to build a sustainable future for yourself. That s bigg success! How are you weathering financial climate change? Share that with us by leaving a comment, e-mailing us at bigginfo@biggsuccess.com or leaving a voice mail at 888.455.BIGG (2444). Thank you much for visiting us today. Next time, we ll discuss a positively fantastic way to improve your bottom line. Please join us. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00496-100709.mp3 Related posts A Trick to Manage Risk Think Like an Entrepreneur (Image in today s post from tome123)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. The five elements of bigg success are money, time, growth, work and play. Today we want to focus on time. We re told to never mix business with pleasure. Is that really the best paradigm today? Our answer: it depends. However, we think that it is a good idea with a few exceptions. ___ ___ Be careful There are times when it s risky to mix the two. One obvious example is getting involved romantically with a co-worker. You really have to be careful here. It can come back to bite you. You also have to be careful if you go into business with, go to work for, or hire friends or family. ___ For example, it can really be tough to work with your spouse. ___ ___ Wait a minute, Mary-Lynn. I m not sure I like the direction this conversation is heading. ___ ___ It works just fine for us, but I can t tell you how many people have told me they could never do what we do. We re together almost all the time. It s great, but it does present its challenges. ___ ___ You have to be aware of that and do what works best for you. Mary-Lynn can t get enough of me so it works out well for her! ___ Work is play If your work isn t pleasurable, then don t do it. Work can be work or work can be play. If you love your work, it s like not working at all. You ll be more productive doing work you love. You re more likely to rise to the top of your field if you do work you find pleasurable. Fun people If you work with people with whom you don t enjoy working, work with other people. Life s too short. Build relationships with people who you like to be around. You may retort that you can t control who your co-workers are. We understand. However, if your company is large enough, you can choose who you spend the most time with when you re not on-task. Hang with people who are positive, forward-thinking, and fun to be around. Travel We often mix business with pleasure when we travel. Even if it s just sneaking away for some sight-seeing for part of the day, it makes the whole thing more fun. Mixing business with pleasure creates synergy the bigg idea behind bigg success. Keep both worlds at the top of your mind simultaneously and find synergies between work and play. It will help you reach bigg success even faster! How do you mix business with pleasure? We d love to hear from you. Leave a comment below, call us at 888.455.BIGG (2444) or e-mail us at bigginfo@biggsuccess.com. It s been a pleasure to visit with you about business today. Thanks for checking in! ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Please join us next time when our good friend, Jim Bouchard the Karate Guy talks with us about how to think like a Black Belt. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00457-081109.mp3 Related posts Why Work Life Balance Doesn t Work Mixing Work and Play Flipping Work Life Balance (Image in today s post by murielle)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. The five elements of bigg success are money, time, growth, work and play. Today we ll focus on money. You may have noticed that the market is up year-to-date. That s the good news. The bad news is that we re still off quite a bit from the top. ___ ___ The main market indicator, the S re up over 49% from that March low but we re still off about 35% from the high if we factor out dividends. The bottom line is that our portfolios have still taken quite a hit. It made us wonder Are there investments that don t lose value? It depends on your goal. Your investment goal Why do you invest? Obviously, you want more money. Why? For some people, it s the end. However, the end is pretty empty. For most of us, it s a means to an end. Instead of financial returns, we really want emotional returns. We want to be happier! If that s the case, research shows there may be a more direct path to happiness, assuming that basic needs food, shelter and clothing have been met. Invest time in work you love We tend to follow an indirect path to happiness. For example, many people strive to build a portfolio that allows them to retire when they want. One direct path to happiness is to do the work you love. Bea Arthur, the late-great actress, said: Actors don t retire. People who work in jobs they don t like retire. Invest time to find the work you love. Invest time doing the work you love. It s an investment with returns beyond your wildest dreams. Invest time in relationships Some people want more money so they can buy things. There is a more proven path to happiness. Invest your time in relationships. Research shows this delivers higher returns on the happiness scale than having more money. The direct path creates synergy Bigg success is life on your own terms. The bigg idea behind bigg success is synergy. One place to search for synergy is between the five elements of bigg success. Let s look at two of the five elements of bigg success money and work. You don t need as much money to be happy if you re doing work you love. The funny thing, though, is that research shows that doing the work you love often leads to more money. If you put first things first, you end up better off all the way around. That s synergy! Now let s look at money and play. Research shows that strong relationships lead to greater happiness than more possessions. You can save money by having friends. It s also interesting that, in our interconnected world, those relationships may very well lead to more money if you don t force the issue. Put the relationship first and let the money follow. Invest directly in happiness by investing time doing what you love with people you love. That s bigg success! ___ Would you like more tips and tools to live your life on your own terms? Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thank you so much for checking in with us today. Please join us next time when we discuss mixing business with pleasure. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00456-081009.mp3 Related posts Can Happiness Buy Money Save Money by Sharing Two Proven Keys to Happiness (Image in today s post by svilen001)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Our focus today is work, one of the five elements of bigg success. You may have heard about this. As cat-lovers, we found it fascinating. Researchers have identified a special purr they call it the solicitation purr which cats use to get attention. ___ ___ The researchers say the solicitation purr is a combination of a regular purr and a sound that resembles a crying baby. While cats purr with each other, it appears they really ramp up their solicitation purring when they communicate with us humans to get our attention. Almost all the people who listened to cats purring identified the solicitation purr as more urgent. So we have trouble resisting it. It made us think about networking. We ll talk about the three networking cats: The cat that meows As soon as you meet them, whether in the real world or online, they pounce. They re in your face making as much noise as they can. They want your attention and they want it now! ___ I remember getting a friend request in Facebook. I accepted. The next thing I knew, my new friend sent me a message that said, George, do you have any health problems? It turns out he was involved with a business that sold a product to improve your health. But isn t that a strange way to greet a new friend? ___ ___ Yet we see it all the time. I think it happens more with social networking. For some reason, it s as if people don t think they re communicating with another person. They think they re communicating with an object a picture or a computer. But there s a real person there. ___ Being too aggressive too quickly may occasionally produce results. But most of the time, we avoid these cats. If we do encounter them, we get away as quickly as we can. The cat that purrs These cats sit around purring, mostly keeping to themselves. They re content to let people come to them. They don t make an effort to meet new people or to extend their social circles. Because they re so content just living in their own world, these cats miss out on a lot of opportunities because they don t expand their network or it expands very slowly. The cat with the solicitation purr These cats want attention but they ve learned there is a better way to get it than meowing. They ve also learned that their regular purr doesn t get results either. So they ve evolved by creating a new purr. It has a sense of urgency along with a sense of calm. Think about attraction, not the law of attraction but what attracts one person to another. People aren t attracted to people who seem desperate. This is true in romantic encounters, but it s also the case for professional encounters. However, people also aren t attracted to people who seem aloof. Cats who just sit around purring may be perceived as snobbish. So evolve. Be the cat with the solicitation purr. Exhibit calm and urgency at the same time and you ll network your way to bigg success. ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thanks so much for reading our post today. Please join us next time when we ll talk about bigg water. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00439-071709.mp3 Related posts From Twitter to Star Trek - Out of this World Communication Who’s Kicking Your Cat? (Image in today s post by pelinbahar)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Our focus today is growth, one of the five elements of bigg success. We tend to avoid information that s not consistent with our beliefs. There s been a long-running debate between psychologists: Do people actively avoid contradictory information or is it a more natural process? For example, it may be that we don t hear opposing views because we hang out with people like us. ___ ___ Some new research [PDF] (led by a psychology professor at the best school in the world, the University of Illinois) has answered that question. If you seek opposing views, you re in the minority The research confirms that people do avoid ideas that disagree with their own. They did this study to see to what extent people are willing to seek out the truth versus just stay comfortable with what they know. The researchers found that two-thirds of us choose information that supports what we already think. However, the more interesting part of their research to us was this: They found that two types of people are more likely to listen to alternative points-of-view: People who are confident in their own beliefs We were out with a friend right after we read this research. The timing was perfect. She s very politically active politics is one area the researchers cited that we re particularly reluctant to consider the other side. Our friend told us that she no longer subscribed to a certain magazine. She said that she found she always disagreed with their point-of-view. After further discussion, it was clear that she s not confident in her opinions. If she had confidence in her opinions, it wouldn t bother her to read the other side. In fact, by reading the other side, she might gain confidence in her positions. Or she might change her mind, but be more confident in her new opinion. The best way to confirm your opinion is to continually test it against all the information available. Talk with people who hold counter opinions. Read everything you can. Try to balance opinions on all sides of an issue before arriving at a conclusion. Even then, continue testing that opinion with any new evidence you find, both pro and con. Then you ll have confidence in your opinions. People who have to defend their ideas in public It s interesting that the researchers cite the much-maligned politicians here. Politicians constantly have to defend their point-of-view. They serve as an example to us. Don t keep your opinions to yourself; defend them. We should point out two things here: You have to be careful discussing certain subjects with certain people. We ve talked about things here in very black-and-white terms. Obviously, many if not most issues are full of grey. That s what makes for interesting discussion! When you do discuss your ideas, you will hear other points-of-view that you can synthesize with your own. Your ideas will sharpen and grow. So will your confidence in what you believe. That s bigg success as long as you agree with us! ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thanks for reading our post today. Please join us next time when we ll discuss what we can learn from cats about communication. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00438-071609.mp3 Related posts A Sure-Fire Way to Stop Innovation The Logical Way to Rediscover Your Creativity (Image in today s post by adzica)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Today we ll focus on money, one of the five elements of bigg success. There s a tendency to define bigg success as having more money. ___ ___ ___ ___ But is it possible to have too much money? ___ I remember Donald Trump being asked about the difference between $70 million and $700 million. He said, A bigger boat. ___ ___ Some people don t need a bigger boat. Other people don t need a boat at all! ___ ___ That reminds me of something one of my mentors once said, There are two good days in the life of a boat owner. The day you buy it and the day you sell it! ___ ___ Toys are the fun side of money. It s the side we usually think about. But more money also means more responsibilities more legal issues, more accounting hassles, more management headaches even if it s just managing your portfolio. ___ A lot of people think you can just hire someone to do those things for you, but you have to be careful how much you delegate. No one will look out for your money like you will. A simple choice While our society often seems to equate bigg success with bigg money, it s important to determine what you want. Bigg success is life on your own terms. Live the life that makes you the happiest. For some people, there is such a thing as too much money. They choose a different path to bigg success. We can reduce this to a simple choice: adjust your lifestyle to your wealth or accumulate enough wealth to support your lifestyle. Now don t think it s a rags or riches mentality. You don t have to live like a pauper if you choose to adjust your lifestyle. Many people are perfectly content simply living simply, but comfortably. They have a nice house, drive nice cars, and take nice vacations. Of course, you get to define nice. Simply pick your number Let s look at the difference between these two choices. First, let s say you can live life on your own terms with an income of $100,000 a year. Financial planners tell us we can draw down our portfolio at the rate of 4% a year when we retire. So that means you would need $2.5 million of assets to support your lifestyle. Now, what would it take if you wanted to live large? We hear a $250,000 a year income is now considered rich here in the States. So let s use that as the magic number. Then you would need a portfolio of $6.25 million. Quite a difference, huh? You don t have to stress about accumulating such a large portfolio if you adjust your lifestyle to your wealth. Some people enjoy a higher quality of life by choosing to simply live simply yet comfortably. They worry about money less because they have less money. It s life on your own terms. You pick the path that makes you the happiest. That s bigg success! What about you? Are you happy living simply or do you want to accumulate wealth? Share that with us by leaving a comment below, calling us at 888.455.BIGG (2444) or e-mailing us at bigginfo@biggsuccess.com. Thanks so much for simply spending your time with us today! ___ Would you like more tips and tools to live your life on your own terms? Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Please join us next time when we ll talk about the one-minute layoff. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00436-071409.mp3 Related posts Live Like a King on Less 6 Paths to Financial Freedom Save Now Without Depriving Yourself (Image in today s post by ba1969)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Work is one of the five elements of bigg success. That s our focus today. Just a generation or so ago, entrepreneurs weren t highly regarded. The thought was that they were people who no one else would hire. ___ ___ Now it seems that most people want to be an entrepreneur. People think that climbing the corporate ladder robs you of your individuality. You become a mindless worker bee. People associate owning your own business with freedom. It can be liberating. Picture your typical day owning your own business You re the last one in every morning. It s not like anyone s going to fire you. Of course, you re the first one out the door at the end of the day. You re the boss! You take long lunches. Most days, when the weather s nice, you re out on the golf course. If only it were true! The reality for many entrepreneurs especially those with an early stage business is you re the first to arrive in the morning and the last one out the door at night. If you take lunch at all, you may eat it at your desk while you keep working. You re not out playing golf most afternoons. In fact, you re doing well when you can squeeze in a little play time over the weekend. Do you remember the BTO song, Takin Care of Business? They said that self-employed people work hard at doing nothing all day. Obviously they had never spent time with a start-up entrepreneur! It can be very stressful, particularly when you take on employees and have to meet payroll. You have fixed costs to cover every month. There are so many hats to wear, so many things to do, so much to keep up on. It s easy to feel like you re buried in work. Not exactly the fairy tale we often think about. We re purposefully painting a bleak picture. Owning your own business definitely has its upsides, but it isn t for everyone. Some people are much happier keeping their day job. However, we think there are synergies between the two. Here are six tips to become an entrepreneurial employee: Select the right career Bigg success is life on your own terms. It starts internally. Think about the three P s passions, preferences and proficiencies. We have a great personality test in The Bigg Success Store that will help you with this. It s free! Now you re ready to look outside yourself. Entrepreneurs look at 2 C s customers and competitors. As an entrepreneurial employee, your customers are potential employers. Your competition is other people who do what you do. You re looking for a mismatch too many employers and too few potential hires. Add value Don t settle for being average and ordinary. Set yourself apart from all the other potential hires by becoming an expert in your chosen field. Consistently deliver superior results and you ll become invaluable. Solve problems Take on projects that no one else wants. Be positive. See solutions where others see only problems. If you solve problems, money will follow. Work! Entrepreneurs work long hours, especially in their early days. Entrepreneurial employees do the same. If you can t work a little longer, work a little harder. Spend less time chatting and more time being productive. Embrace change Change creates opportunity. So welcome change. Continually reinvent yourself. Think about yourself at this time last year. If you don t have any new skills, if you can t add anything more, if you aren t producing better results why should you get paid more? Retain earnings Save means safe so save and invest. Entrepreneurs retain earnings to fund growth. You ll save to give yourself the liberty to get out of a bad situation as a last resort. And to help you survive through the inevitable downturns and associated layoffs. You can choose to be entrepreneurial in the traditional sense or by going the corporate route. You choose because bigg success is life on your own terms. Do you think employees can be entrepreneurial? Let us know by leaving a comment below, calling us at 888.455.BIGG (2444) or e-mailing us at bigginfo@biggsuccess.com. ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thanks for reading today s post. Please join us next time when we ll discuss a new trend that may affect your retirement. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00434-071009.mp3 Related posts Is Work Death One Career Path Leads to Another (Image in today s post by rob_gonyea)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Growth, one of the five elements of bigg success, is our focus today. If we re going to succeed bigg, we must learn to control our emotions. Otherwise, they will control us. This is particularly true for leaders. One of the emotions leaders must control is their anger. ___ ___ Anger works against communication ___ I know from first-hand experience because I used to have a temper. Over time, I learned to control it because I realized it was counter-productive. People don t respond well to it. ___ ___ That s the point. It seems that, in most cases, people either withdraw or they get defensive. Neither one is conducive to productive communication. ___ Getting it under control ___ What helped me the most in controlling my anger was taking a step back not necessarily physically, but mentally. Although, I have physically taken a step back when someone got too aggressive. It kept the situation from escalating. ___ ___ Of course, sometimes it pays to remove yourself from the environment altogether. Literally move to another space and relax for awhile before you respond. ___ Responding like Goldilocks ___ I ve coached a lot of people on just that issue. This is another Goldilocks principle. You want to get your response just right. There s a tendency to respond too quickly on the spot and with anger. ___ ___ You may win the battle but lose the war. The person retreats but the relationship is damaged. Or the other person comes right back and the conversation escalates to an even higher level of anger. ___ ___ Exactly. The other side of it is leaders who don t respond quickly enough. You have to get back to the person in a timely manner or you re essentially rubber stamping their behavior. As a young manager, I probably responded too quickly. As I got older, I may have been too slow at times. Hopefully, in my advanced years, I m getting closer to a good balance. ___ How you say it ___ Know the purpose of your follow-up communication. Understand that how you say it is just as important as what you say. If you want to build the relationship, talk in the third person as much as possible. This is not the time for you-view. Try to frame the discussion like a reporter. Remove the personalities to diffuse the situation. ___ Controlled anger can be a tool if brought out under the right circumstances: Focus on the situation When you express controlled anger, your people know you re serious. You have to be careful with this one, but it s okay to express anger about a situation. This is an important distinction be angry about the situation, not the person. You will keep things moving in the right direction with this mental shift. Use it infrequently This tool isn t productive is used regularly. It has to be the exception. Otherwise, you re the boy who cried wolf! If you only pull it out once in a while, it can serve a useful purpose. The bottom line is to be yourself. It s okay to let your anger show now and then. Just keep it under control and keep your purpose in mind when you respond. Then you ll build relationships rather than tear them apart. You ll build your people up rather than bring them down. That s bigg success! ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thank you so much for checking in with us today. Please join us next time when we discuss reasons why you should keep your day job. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00433-070909.mp3 Related posts 4 Types of Free Agents Picasso on Personal Branding (Image in today s post by atsoram)

Bigg success is life on your own terms. There are five elements of bigg success money, time, growth, work and play. Today we want to focus on time with growth factoring in throughout. It s important to look at how you spend your time to determine how to save time. One question to look at is how much time you spend putting out fires. ___ ___ Pause and reflect Certain jobs seem to require more reaction than others. The closer you are to the customer, the more you may respond reactively. If your direct charges are on the front line, you may spend more time reacting. In those cases, you need to allow for more reactive time as you plan out your day. However, bigg goal-getters try to minimize the amount of time they spend reacting. So if a large portion of your day is spent responding to situations, pause and reflect. Ask yourself what you can do about it. It s possible that nothing can be done about it, but in many cases there is more in your control than you might think. It s about moving from a reactive mode to a proactive mindset. That s the higher order of personal leadership. As a bigg goal-getter, you want more in your tool kit than just problem-solving capabilities. You also want to be a problem dissolver. Here are three ways to do that: Elimination The best way to dissolve a problem is to never have it in the first place. Look ahead and try to discover potential problems. If you think it s likely that you will encounter that problem, dissolve it by eliminating it in advance. Many future problems can be handled this way. For example, leaders who establish clear expectations for their people eliminate many problems before they ever happen. Preparation The next best way to dissolve a problem is to have an answer in mind before you need it. You may have thought about these problems upfront, but it s more effective to prepare for its eventuality than to eliminate it in advance. A great example of this is contingency plans. You have a path you re going down and you ve determined in advance it s your best path. However, as new evidence becomes available, you realize that you need to adjust. Planning that adjustment in advance helps you respond quickly if the time comes. Prevention Some problems just can t be anticipated in advance. However, bigg goal-getters dissolve them by solving the problem now and preventing it from reoccurring in the future. We have a tendency to rush to solve a problem, but oftentimes, with just a little more effort, we can keep it from happening again. Take time to figure out why it happened. Reverse engineer your process to see if you can prevent it in the future. As the saying goes, An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The best time to start prevention is right after you ve found the cure. You re motivated then! Use that motivation to your advantage to shift your thinking away from solving problems to dissolving them. It leads to bigg success! ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thank you so much for reading our post today. Please join us next time as we discuss an emotion that leaders must control. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00432-070809.mp3 Related posts Have A Problem? SOLVE IT! Solve All Of Your Problems With This Ancient Chinese Secret

Bigg success is life on your own terms. Our focus today is on money, one of the five elements of bigg success. Specifically, we want to talk about an asset that is particularly valuable now. Yet it doesn t show up on your Balance Sheet. It s your credit score. ___ ___ Target credit This was highlighted in a recent post over at Mashable about Google ads targeting people with high credit scores. People with good credit are positioned to take advantage of these times. Not just with consumer goods, but also with investment opportunities. There are some great deals out there on real estate and businesses. In addition, people with good credit will get better rates on the money they borrow. So if you have a good credit score, protect it like any other asset. FICO FICO was developed by the Fair Isaac Corporation. They have a great piece that explains how your FICO score is determined [PDF]. We ll summarize it here, but we highly recommend you read their article if you want to know all the details. Your FICO score can range from 300 to 850. Obviously, higher scores are better. Anything over 720 is considered SuperPrime according to the Mashable post. These are the people Google is targeting in their new ad program. We ll look at the five components of your FICO score (along with the weight given to each one for the general population). Your payment history (35%) Pay your bills on time. It s probably no surprise that this is the single biggest factor in determining your score. If you re not current, work hard to get current and stay there. The amounts you owe (30%) We found it interesting that, even if you pay your credit card balance in full every month, you may still show a balance on your credit report. It shows the balance posted on your most recent statement. One myth they debunk is that you should close accounts so you don t have too many credit cards. If you re in good standing with no balance on an account, it doesn t affect your FICO score. However, you are better off having fewer cards with a balance. It s also better to have a small amount outstanding compared to your available credit line. Be careful not to have too much credit available. It can actually hurt your FICO score. So don t get, or keep, credit cards you know you ll never use. Length of credit history (15%) Here they look at the age of your accounts in general as well as how long it s been since you used your account. One tidbit we found interesting: If you just established credit for the first time, you ll hurt your FICO score if you open too many accounts too quickly. New credit (10%) Here they look at what s going on now. What credit have you applied for recently? How are you doing on those payments? This is good news for people coming out of a period of late payments. Just remember, though, it gets a relatively small weighting. The types of credit you use (10%) You want a mix of both revolving credit lines and installment debt. For example, a credit card along with a car loan would include both types of credit. Your credit rating is an important asset. It affects your credit capacity. Your credit capacity may help you fund your next bigg opportunity! ___ Get the tips and tools you need to be a BIGG success. Subscribe to the Bigg Success Weekly it s FREE! ___ Thanks for sharing some of your time with us today. Please join us next time when we talk about a higher level of problem-solving. Until then, here s to your bigg success! Subscribe to The Bigg Success Show in iTunes. Subscribe to the Bigg Success feed. Direct link to The Bigg Success Show audio file: http://media.libsyn.com/media/biggsuccess/00431-070709.mp3 Related posts Savers Spenders and Investors Squirrels, Nuts and Business Cycles (Image by Andres Rueda,CC 2.0)

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.

This series of videos are excerpts from the author's book 'The Idiot Guide to Emotions' (2009), read by the author.