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#1 Keep the first date short. This one is nearly impossible for me, especially if things are going well. I want the night to go on forever and may try to make that come true. Usually sending the prospective partner practically running out of the car for her front door.

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The acquisition creating a catalyst to inspire a thriving business flipping storage units “Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.” ― J.K. Rowling Running Out of Options Back in early 2005, I had a hole to crawl out of. Without getting too far into the details, struggle, a major injury and a geographical transition led me to a place with little resources. Still having rent to pay along with food to buy and other expenses. My bank account had a meager $150 left, I was unemployed, no benefits or help was available. It became clear I had to do something and do it fast. Literally living in what used to be a chicken coop, one day during a brainstorming session, an idea arrived. The website eBay, had been my friend, knowing how to list, sell and ship, my efforts were focused on finding something to sell. But how, with only $150 left and food needed in the pantry? My memory does not serve me well enough today for sharing exactly how I came up with the plan, but here it is. “If you have never reached rock bottom, you have never attended the school of greatness.” ― Matshona Dhliwayo Dialing for Dollars Sales were easy with my knowledge of selling online and an established eBay account with several thousand positive ratings from selling my art. Products can be turned into cash in just a few days. If you have the inventory, but I didn’t. AContinue Reading

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Just my luck literary pursuits can bring about a whole series of dangerous maladies “Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness.” — George Orwell The Roller Coaster It’s been a full 10 months since I seriously took on this writing journey. The addition definitely filled in the last bit of available time. Just in the last few weeks, I doubled my efforts, while noticing some new health issues. As usual for me, living leads and informs the writing, a story idea appeared. Doing some research, some of the findings have been troubling, to say the least. Franz Kafka apparently put himself through both physical and emotional turmoil while trying to write. His work took 10 hours out of his day leaving little time for writing. All the activities he jammed in pushed him to the verge of collapse. In a weakened state he unfortunately contracted Tuberculosis which lead to his throat swelling until it closed. He died. Leo Tolstoy of War and Peace fame, suffered from depression. As he aged and his questions became more serious about inquiries into the human condition, the debilitating depressive episodes worsened. He died shortly after collapsing at a desolate train station. And then, there are all the suicides to consider. Hunter S Thompson, Virginia Woolf, Earnest Hemingway, and many more. What is it about seemingly innocuous writing that can create depression and suicide? My own issues have seemed to pop up since taking writing seriouslyContinue Reading

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How to put your writing in front of a new market in the eBook format “Lovers of print are simply confusing the plate for the food.” ― Douglas Adams Leaving Money on the Table In years of creative and business experience I have found myself sometimes leaving money on the table. Usually by failing to see possibilities or take new action. This reality has me looking at the library of my authorship with new eyes. Up until now it has been exclusive to Medium, but changes do come, humans tweak things and income invariably slides south. However, we are not powerless and the first step in taking new actions may be to assign the proper value to our creative product. “The secret to success is no secret. Be honest in your words, be trustworthy and share value. Most people won’t tell the difference, but those that do are your readers.” ― Robin Sacredfire Being meticulous when creating our file system can make it fairly easy to multi-propose content to other media platforms. My practice is to name folders just like each article and also save copies on a separate hard drive. All the text is saved in a Word Document and the pictures are placed in the folder as well. This habit makes it very easy to copy and paste creative content already produced to a new platform, blog, website, eBook or audio-book. The folder names can also help me keep track of other details as well, like if narrationContinue Reading

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Study and measure before you take the dive a follow up how to on creating wealth and growing your money “In investing, what is comfortable is rarely profitable.” — Robert Arnott Taking Action Several readers kindly commented and asked for follow up information after reading my article A Practical Entry Point to Stock Market Investing. Thank you Linda Levitt and Meg Stewart. It’s no wonder it took me so long to become an investor, my Dad had a palpable hate for the stock market. The apple doesn’t fall to far from the tree, he passed it on to me. Well, he tried. Somewhere along the line, I realized he had taught me all he could, I sought other mentors. That’s when I found many ready to help, including Robert Kiyosaki the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad. “You get recessions, you have stock market declines. If you don’t understand that’s going to happen, then you’re not ready, you won’t do well in the markets.” — Peter Lynch 4 Ways to Earn Robert made most of his money in the early days investing in Real Estate. He went on to write books, create a board game, begin podcasting and educating around the subject of creating wealth. He even wrote several books with Donald Trump. It was Robert who introduced clarification for me on the four ways to earn money. E — Employee Most individuals only earn in this way. You work for a company trading your time for money. To earnContinue Reading

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Liver disease kills approximately 90,000 people each year in the USA don’t be one of them.   “You will find, Brumm,” said Earl Lavender, “that one of two things must be sacrificed by every man who lives to be over sixty — the mind, or the liver.” ― John Davidson The Trauma of Life Just a few years ago life educated me on Liver function through a painful experience, the loss of my only sibling. A beautiful bright whimsical girl, who had helped me through 53 years of life, gave me an opportunity to watch her die. The call came from my Mother informing me that Carrie had been admitted to the hospital. Sadly, none of us seemed to get it at that time, how sick she was. Even though everyone now seemed to notice that they had thought she seemed discolored, her skin losing it’s rose glow even 6 months earlier. It was serious, they were keeping her. Weeks went by with me calling from 2300 miles away asking for reports and talking to her on the phone. Soon, she was available to be on the phone less and less. My Mom finally said, if you want to see her again, you better come now. They had flown her to a hospital in Madison, Wisconsin, rumored to be skilled at helping with livers. And made the doctors there made it a practice to help even those that could be alcohol related. Or so they told my Mother. So, IContinue Reading

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Finding one good quality in all things and people transforms outcomes, how we feel & attract. “There is an innocence in admiration: it occurs in one who has not yet realized that they might one day be admired.” ― Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche It’s me who needs this, not you I’ll have to admit, I’m in a bit of a funk with now way to create attract ion from anything good. Maybe it’s more like a funky rut of no gratitude available, the law of no attraction.. Yesterday, I received a bill from Amex for a card with my name on it that I have never had. During the several hours of phone calls trying to uncover the reality of the situation, I was not grateful. As a matter of fact, I was downright rude. The event left me with a physical and mental hangover, my own actions creating complete de-motivation. No wonder I did not get the help needed in the end. I was asked to email a copy of the bill to the the fraud department and have not heard anything back. My mistaken choice was to name the whole encounter bad or unacceptable. That cemented my mindset and it hit every person I spoke with like a brick. Part of their listening had to be taken up by processing my stuff. I made them less effective in this encounter by taking that stance. A little voice whispers to me right now, “Let go of what you can notContinue Reading