Men and Women Interaction

I found this article today.

I sent it to a couple of female friends to see if they agreed with it or not. Both of them did, which completely astounds me as a guy. Being a 5'10", small shouldered, 165lb guy, I've never considered myself much of a physical threat. To see that women think like this is pretty shocking. Frankly, more disturbing than shocking.

My favorite part was actually one commenter who wrote this:

"I have to admit I’m troubled by the idea that somehow every man should be viewed as a potential rapist. Yes, using common sense makes sense. But, to me, assuming that a guy who says hi to you on a bus may want to rape you is taking that a step too far, and isn’t much different from the parents who refuse to allow their 11-year-old to walk two blocks to the bus stop lest they be kidnapped by one of the child molesters hiding in the bushes. Child sexual abuse happens. It’s wrong, it’s tragic, and it should be dealt with so it becomes less common. But, viewing every adult or situation with suspicion is not the best way to go about that, and I think viewing every man or social interaction with a man you don’t know as a potential rape threat is also not particularly productive.

For me, I refuse to live my life in fear. I also refuse to let the fact that some men are rapists keep me from engaging in a friendly way in everyday social interactions with men, even if those interactions aren’t always the ones I’d most want to be having. Do I take reasonable precautions? Of course. If I get a genuinely creepy vibe off somebody, or I suspect I’m being followed, I take action. But, I just don’t get scared (or annoyed, or put out) because a guy on a bus or at a coffee shop or in the library starts talking to me. Because odds are they are NOT a rapist, odds are I’m in a situation where they could not do me any physical harm without causing a scene even if they wanted to, and I just won’t view others through the lens of fear.

I mean, yeah, it’s annoying when you are trying to listen to your iPod and somebody starts talking to you on a bus, whether it’s a man or woman. But, honestly, I feel like I see a little bit of trying to justify that annoyance at having your sense of personal isolation/space invaded by treating it as a genuine threat, when in most cases it isn’t. I don’t know, I feel like part of the price we pay for living in a society–like paying taxes–is having to at times endure social interactions we would rather not be engaged in. It means sometimes listening to the woman sitting next to you in the waiting room tell you about her daughter’s wedding or the guy sitting next to you on the plane tell you about his job even though you’d really rather not have to deal with either of them. We are not guaranteed the right, when we go out in public, to not have any social interactions we don’t want to have. We do have the right to not be harassed, of course. But, a guy (or women, or child) saying hello and trying to strike up a non-sexual conversation isn’t engaging in harassment, even if he is annoying. Some people just don’t have the same set of social skills that we might expect, and in general they mean no harm, and really in a public place they could do very little harm even if they did intend it, so I don’t really see why they need to be treated as a potential rapist rather than as a human being who might just want some human connection of some kind in a culture that seems to be sorely lacking in opportunities for it.

I just see so many people complain about having to deal with other people, and honestly I think it’s something we just need to suck it up and accept as part of life. Some people can’t stand ever having a child make noise around them. Some people (and I admit to being one of them, although I try to just get over it and deal) can’t stand having to sit next to somebody on a bus who doesn’t have the same hygiene habits we expect, or having a fat person near them on a plane. Some people don’t like men talking to them. And while people will have reasons of varying degrees of validity for those feelings, I’m not sure we can expect the world to cater to any of them, unless we go off to live in isolation somewhere, or that we should expect the world to cater to them. I may want to knit and listen to my iPod on the plane, but that doesn’t mean that I have some inalienable right to do so without anybody interrupting me, or that somebody is committing a grave wrong if they dare try to engage me in conversation.

I live in an area with a really high rate of property crime. And yet I’m not going to approach every male between maybe 15-30 (those most likely to commit the crimes) as if they may or may not be a purse-snatcher. I’m just not. I will not live my life in fear like that. I won’t demean the vast majority of men between 15-30 living here who aren’t thieves by doing that. That is, for me, no way to live. And it saddens me enormously that so many women seem to view every single man they don’t know as a potential rapist, just like it saddens me how many parents raise their children to view every adult they don’t know as a potential child molester. We do need to be aware and alert, but I also think we shouldn’t let that awareness turn into a paranoia that causes us to deny the fact that most people–male or female–are basically good people who have desires and intentions not much different from our own."

As a nice guy who this kind of behavior is outside the realm of possibility for, that just summed it all up for me.

Personality Theory

I've posted some before about Personality Theory. I even went through my period of denial about being an ENFP and claiming that I'm an INFP. Recently I invested more time into learning about some additional complexities that I hadn't though of before, which is how I determined my real type. I'll share the additional layers and how they work.

The first layer of the theory are the 16 different types themselves. They revolve around the four main categories that govern how an individual operates, mainly the I/E, N/S, F/T and J/P distinction. Rather than discussing each type, you can take the test or read about the different possibilities here.

The second layer is the interaction between the types. The same site I just mentioned includes a handy chart for determining the interaction between the types and how they work here. I was able to determine my type by taking various relationships I have and figuring out which relationships between myself and the other individuals fit correctly in the chart. Once I had solidified my type, I made a key insight.

Usually when you try to determine someone else's personality, you think of specific examples or general behavioral trends the person follows and map it to the right type. The problem with this is that there is a large bias based on the side of the person that you see. So you may be really introverted and then think someone else is just because you only see and interact with them in environments that accent those qualities in the targeted individual. Either that or your like/dislike of that person could influence you to project qualities onto them. So the only way to remove the bias is to look at the patterns of your relationship. Then you can map the actual pattern of your relationship back to the chart to determine what type they must be.

The third layer is the type of relationship you have with the person. The interaction may be a negative one, but if the person holds the right role in your life relative to you, then it could be just right for what you would want. An example would be a Mother having a supervision relationship with a child or a significant other being your duality type. I believe that when we line up the right interaction in the right role is where the idea of 'soul mate' relationships comes from. It's not that there is some uniqueness to the person that you were destined for each other, it's that you matched up all the components just right.

Clearly it is no simple task to engineer your whole social sphere. The nice thing about this knowledge is that you can spot problems early or open yourself up to possibilities that you would not have recognized otherwise. Maybe you know someone who is your duality type, but because you didn't hit off a great relationship right away you never invested the time to develop it further. You could be missing out on something truly exceptional, but with this knowledge you'll know it's worth putting in the extra effort for the potential of a rewarding long term relationship.

This is as deep as I have taken this at this point. There are a lot of other variables like background, interests, education, intelligence, environment, etc which play a role in the development of relationships. Those effects, like the effects of personality interactions, play a lesser role to the individuals desire to make a relationship work. Having the information provides a tool though for collecting information and using it to make more accurate decisions.

Personal Development

Just recently I ordered, received and started reading through Personal Development for Smart People, The Conscious Pursuit of Personal Growth by Steve Pavlina. Let me just say first, this has been the best personal development book I've read so far. I am only about 100 pages into the book, but already the format and explanation of concepts has been very clear and concise. Also, I've found what he writes about to be inline with what I've been intuitively learning through experiences and trial and error for the last few years.

What I find funny about the book is the logical building blocks he uses to formulate fundamental tenants for putting together a life that will provide you with happiness, success and purpose. It's almost like he is writing a mathematical proof, first defining the core tenants than using them to build higher. I mean, the approach really makes sense once you see it written out, esp since the fundamental tenants he has chosen seem dead on, but it's unexpected in this field since I imagine most people that gravitate to it don't have formal training in logic.

Also what I've found interesting is how much overlap there is between this book and the Rich Dad, Poor Dad coaching and philosophy. The terminology is different, but the concepts and general ideas are the same. Basically that you grow rich in life through development, hard work and working towards goals through experimentation, learning and perseverance through failure. Also, that people who are rich become rich by helping as many people as possible. I find the whole thing to be similar to the concepts in Maslow's hierarchy. (http://sagerave.files.wordpress.com/2008/01/maslow.gif)

I'm intrigued about what the rest of the book has in store since I haven't even finished the initial section about the principles. The second section seems to focus on application. That also seems like the Rich Dad program, but that is also where I struggled there, so hopefully I'll have better results with the exercises here.

Busy Busy

I haven't been posting much because things are shifting and picking up at work. Also, I'm trying to add some activities so I get more done, develop new skills and start working towards the future I want. Plus, I'd like to have more actual experience to write about because I feel it brings more value.

Currently, the biggest thing going on is that I'm coaching a basketball team. It's an all boy 5-6th grader team. It's a little unstructured but I enjoy coaching and seeing the changes in the players throughout the season. Our first game is coming up next Friday so I'm hoping that what we've done in the practices will make an impact on their play.

I started reading Having it All since I couldn't find anything at the bookstore and I happened upon it after reading a review of it on GeniusTypes (link). I'm not too far in yet, but I've seen a lot of the "big perspectives" promoted so far in other books. The most noticeable was the goal visualization, which is practically word for word from The Science of Getting Rich. The idea of the formless intelligence is also pretty much word for word. So we'll see if he comes up with anything original. Worst case scenario, he seems to include enough stores of his life that I might be able to learn from or get some better perspective.

On Monday I'm going to try and go to a meeting of the local Toastmaster's club. I don't really have a problem with public speaking, but I figure getting some practice might lead to more opportunities to use my skills, and being able to discuss your ideas in a large crowd is always a positive. The larger the crowd you can speak to, the more you are worth in the speaking world.

Before I picked up Having it All, I finished reading Made to Stick. I highly recommend this book. It helps to illustrate what really matters to another person when you are trying to get a message across. The idea they talk about that I really loved was "The Curse of Knowledge", essentially the idea that once you know something it's hard to imagine not knowing it, which makes it hard to teach someone else. The way they described it as moving from small, concrete examples to more abstract concepts, felt dead on to me.

I'm going to try to make a courthouse run tomorrow. Hopefully there will be some new listings in the right zip code and I'll have something to send out to my client. I want to get some feedback from him because that would help me get an idea of where I stand and if the information I'm obtaining and providing is valuable. So we'll see how that goes tomorrow.

Long Weekend

So the long weekend has come to an end. I knocked off a number of things on my "To Do" list including participating in the Buy One get One program for One Laptop Per Child. Also, I was able to test drive a few cars and focus in on what exactly I'm looking for in the one I end up buying. To top it off, the updated x-rays from the chiropractor looked good so I only need to go in every two weeks for maintenance. So, just like that a lot of my weekly routine is suddenly gone.

Disappointingly, I did not manage to get to the Real Estate Investor meeting I wanted to attend yesterday. I ended up with some schedule conflicts and difficulty finding the location the event was held. Next time I'm going to have to bring my A game and make sure to get everything inline before the date, potentially even making a dry run to the location.

I recently started reading Made to Stick, which is starting to feel like the next Never Eat Alone. It contains some solid advice about clarifying your message and saying something with meaning. I'm still early on in the book, but I like everything I've read so far. It seems to build off of part of The Tipping Point, where the idea of stickiness is introduced as part of process of viral marketing. I still have a few other books in my queue like The Art of the Start and True Professionalism, but currently they are checked out at my local library so they are pending.

The stock market has been choppy at best recently. I've taken huge hits the last three market days with a small rebound today. This market dip is actually a good thing, since a lot of stocks are dropping to under priced values. I wish I had planned to have more money outside of the market right now to move in, but since I'm still building a base I haven't reached that point yet. If I do come up with some extra funds, I'll probably jump in near the end of November when another big dip should hit, and then hang on as some resurgence comes from December sales.

I'm going to go through some local newspapers again today in an attempt to find new investors. I'm staying away from the major local paper since that seems to have little returns. Hopefully I'll have some prospects to send this weeks leads out to.

Weekend Plans

Another trip to the courthouse today. Rounded up 10 leads for my basic location. That's about average, and from what I've read the foreclosure rate is only going to continue to go up. The greater problem of nothing actually being done with the leads still exists, but hopefully I will make some new contacts on Monday that I can funnel the leads out to.

I've been rereading The E-Myth Revisited, and I hope that once I get a steady amount of investors who are producing sales, then I can really put a system around my business. The training that I read for how to be a Jobber was essentially all the system I need, but I hope to automate the process more and eventually move myself to more of a supervisor role. Eventually I should be able to get jobbers underneath me to go to the courthouse or be doing driving trips to find leads. Also, I plan to setup a website. Then I could have jobbers log in and input the data online, only to have the system then send emails out to the investors based on some rules that I setup. But that's all in the future for now.

Stocks are having a terrible day for the second or third day in a row. It just reemphasizes how important getting my business to a productive level is. With the business I actually have some control over what happens rather than playing the role of the middle man, hoping that the unruly mob that is the market continues to push up in my favor. Stocks are a great and extremely passive source of income, but when you're trying to get to a substantial amount of wealth, they are very slow and unhelpful. Getting a strong business cash flow is really the best fuel for filling up your asset portfolio.

The car hunt is continuing this weekend. I may just settle and buy the car I test drove on Wednesday. It seems the most powerful tools available for negotiating the purchase of a used car are the ability to walk away and the ability to buy the car outright on the spot. I'm hoping to use them to knock $500-1000 off the price tag. I figure if I can get the car for about $5K, then it's really a steal. So we'll see how it works out.

I've begun filling out some business school applications. The essay seems to be the hardest part because it's hard to write to a target audience that you know nothing about. Write now I have some basic framework for the content and a mild attempt to string it together, but nothing that would amount to a full first draft. If I don't finish the applications before the spring semester deadline then I'm not really going to worry about it. Usually bigger classes start in the fall which might play better into my favor.

Don't forget - One Laptop Per Child starts their Buy 1 get 1 program starting 11/12. So enjoy your 11/11 holiday and help some kids on 11/12!

Frustration

I'm making some small steps now. Today I was able to locate an investor's add in the local paper. I gave them a call at lunch but got the answering machine. I left a message with a brief description of my services and my number, so we'll see if I get a call back. Worst case scenario I don't hear anything from them and move on to looking for another investor's add tomorrow.

Also, I found a car that might be worth buying. I'm going to head directly to the lot to test drive it on Wednesday after work. I almost headed over there yesterday, but the lot closes at 8 and that's when I would have had the chance to get there by, so it didn't work out.

I finished some small things I was working on at work, but the results seem to point to bigger changes being made. I'm not sure exactly how those changes will be made and I can't get a hold of anyone who would have ideas. So right now I'm pending.

I read Orbiting the Giant Hairball over the past couple of days. It's basically a "look outside the box" book. It points the reader into these ideas that all corporations are the same rigid systems and only the author has the right path. This of course is a quiet rebellion, where due to his intervention all this "wonderful creative innovation" occurs and shakes up the business system. I have a feeling that if someone else wrote about his experiences from a perspective outside of his, there would be a completely different flavor to the book.

The problem with books like that are that they try to bring up a lot of questions but don't have any answers. It's nice to think outside of the box, but unless you have some kind of plan before going off the deep end, you're going to end up jaded against the idea of starting your own business or trying to do something different. The reason for this is because you're likely to fail. The statistic "9 out of 10 business fail" is correct. Either you have to be willing to start at least 10 businesses, or you have to have a plan of action going in where you take on the risk in increments that you can handle.

That's all I've got for today.

Finance

So this is more of a personal revelation rather than any advice or status update.


Today I was reading the Wikipedia entry for finance (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finance) when I realized, this is what I care about. While writing code has had an appeal to me in some elements, like taking a problem and slowly figuring out how to create the elements of a solution, it does not have the mass appeal that lures me to want to do it in my free time. Finance does. In some ways I'm almost obsessed with money. I keep track of where my money goes, how much I have, how my investments are doing almost fanatically. It's like it is what I was born to do.

At one point, in World without End, one of the characters is looking at the other as he is creating a blue print for something he is planning on building. She analyzes the look on his face of completely being engrossed in visualizing what he wants to build and comes to the conclusion that it's the look a person has when they are doing what they were born to do. I imagine when I'm updating my finances and analyzing numbers I have the same look.

The problem I have is that I lack the formal training to do even more in depth analysis and understanding. I feel like I'm right on the cusp currently, so close to bridging the gap between the reality of everyday monotony and breaking free to the world of wealth and abundance that I know exists. It's like the difference between looking across a landscape from a tall building versus looking down from a plane window. I have a general perspective but I need something to get me to that higher level of abstraction so that I can see the trends before they happen and jump in and ride the wave up. Right now I'm getting there a little too late but luckily, not at the same time as the people who jump in only to hit the downward spiral.

In reading The Pathfinder, it talks about how you should have a job that you truly love. Jobs like that do exist and you can get one. It's just a matter of determining what it is that you are really excited about, what you are already doing in your free time and you just don't know it yet. I always think of the Seinfeld episode where George has quit working as a Realtor and he's talking to Jerry about what he could do next. He lists different things he's interested in and Jerry gives him a little perspective as to why they might not work out (http://www.tv.com/seinfeld/the-revenge/episode/2252/trivia.html).

So now that I feel like I know what I want to do, the question is how to get there. I guess I should start trying to figure out where I could get an entry level position that will pay for me to get an MBA and then start applying or finding connections that can help me. Maybe I was right about my gut feeling that November would bring about some kind of inspirational change.

Weak Week

Courthouse

So I bailed on the second county today. I know, it's lame and I should have found a way to go. But I'm going to make some excuses instead.

I stayed up later than normal again last night. World Without End just has this power of sucking me in so that I keep reading, chapter after chapter, until it's late. I can't say I regret it because I'm too fascinated about what will happen next to care a lot about what's going on in my own life right now. Probably also because there isn't much going on in my actual life.

The courthouse I normally visit had about 10 leads today. I brought my new (old) laptop and used it. It was struggling because the battery doesn't hold charge very long, so I had to hunt around for an outlet. Also, the processor is pretty weak so Open Office did not open. I ended up typing the leads in notepad and then moving them to my Master Lead Log later.

I figure, since I'm not supremely confident in my investor right now and I don't have any others lined up, getting a lower amount of leads this week is not that big of a deal. Also, if he does get my emails, maybe he'll notice the lower amount and contact me back. That would be nice, since then I would know he's actually doing something still. I'm planning on going to the REI meeting I mentioned previously next Saturday regardless of his status. At this point I need to really focus on actually creating something out of this.

November

For some reason I'm really looking forward to the beginning of November. I can't put my finger on why, but I almost feel like something is going to change. It might end up being as little as me flipping the page in my calendar, but any change would be nice at this point.

I go to a chiropractor 3 days a week. My medical insurance covers the whole bill and back in July I figured, why not? I had been having some back pain and people had recommended it. The pain is gone at this point, but this process called "traction" that I do to correct the angle of my spine leaves me aching. I think that's part of the reason why I'm so tired. In November we'll be done the second stage of the treatment process and maybe I won't have to go as frequently. Going three times a week forces me into a pretty tight routine, esp with when I get to and leave work.

I'm thinking about getting season tickets for my local NBA team this year. It's $600 per seat for the season, which isn't bad considering the high part of the range is $32,000 a seat. My thinking is that when you have something other people don't, it can be used as an asset. If I get two seats, I can always try to sell the second one or both if I don't want to go to the game. If I do want to go, I can call up a friend and ask them if they want to go, so it's a way to reconnect. The final benefit is that I can give the second seat ticket away as a gift for different occasions, like birthdays or graduations. My brother-in-law has the local NFL team's season tickets and he does essentially that. Every year he seems to get his money worth, so I think it'll be worth it. I've built up all the money I need to purchase a car outright, so I feel like this is a good way to reward myself and make my life a little more enjoyable.

That's all I've got for today.

Phase 2

I picked up the laptop last night from the guy who I setup a deal with on Craig's List. It was a long drive out to the exchange location and back, but it was worth it since a laptop will be extremely valuable for storing leads. The only problems are that it doesn't have a wireless card or spreadsheet software and it smells like either coffee or some kind of tobacco or smoke. I can always pick up a wireless card at some point so that's not that big of a deal. I'm going to install Open Office on it tonight, so that'll fix the spreadsheet problem. I'm hoping over time the smell will start to fade and then disappear.

Tomorrow I'm going to do my new routine of going to another county courthouse as well as the one for the county I live in. From the articles I've been reading about housing prices and foreclosure rates, I'm guessing the average I've had for the last two weeks should remain consistent if not go up. Having a laptop will be greatly helpful when writing up 90 or so leads.

I still haven't solved the greater problem. Clearly my investor is not working out very well. I need to find more than one, as well as target ones that work specifically on foreclosure cases. Even if the agreed rate drops and I only get $500-1000 per sale, it still beats not getting anything. I plan on going to an REI meeting, like I mentioned previously, but the next one is going to be a week from Saturday. I'll have to scour the paper today and tomorrow and see if I come up with any ads that could lead me to investors.

Aside from that, I've been exhausted this week. I'm reading World Without End, the most recent Ken Follett book and sequel to Pillars of the Earth. It's an excellent read, but it entices me into reading for long stretches and staying up later than I normally would. I recommend it for anyone who is looking for a leisure activity. It's about 1,000 pages long, so based on how fast you read it could be a source of entertainment for a long time. Normally I read pretty quickly, I finished the last Harry Potter book in under 24 hours, but this book makes you think because there are a lot of intricate plot lines and you really get drawn into the environment and care for the characters.

Reader Feedback

A call out to the readers, if you know any ways of advertising a blog, finding investors, or just have interesting or helpful books that you suggest, please feel free to comment and let me know.

Habitually Automatic

First off, congrats to everyone who owns Apple stock. I wish I had more shares because today was a big day. I imagine it is only the first of many to come, so if you don't have any, look for dips and jump on in.

In some reading I did today, Get Rich Slowly did a review of The Automatic Millionaire ( link for the review). The review was excellent and the book seems to have a lot of good concepts. I think there are a few factors that are also important in the quest to becoming wealthy that were not mentioned though, so I'd like to build further.

What really matters? Four Points that really matter towards building wealth:

Point 1 - Your Net

First of all, it seems The Automatic Millionaire hits dead on with spending habits. What you do with your after tax money is extremely important. Of course you need to spend it to survive, but how and what you spend it on will determine, very clearly, your future. I like to think of it like every dollar you make, net (or after tax), is your employee. If you don't manage your employees well, the business that is your financial future will not continue to grow and may even go bankrupt. So setting up automatic deposits and planning for your retirement should be the first step. As they say, spend less than you earn, save up and start building wealth.

Point 2 - ROI

In line with this, the next point is what return on investment you are getting. Basically, measuring how well your employees are performing for you. If you read The Little Book that Beats the Market, it discusses how to determine a base line for your ROI. Basically, you can get a 6% ROI with little to no risk if you buy US Treasury Bills that are backed by the stability of the US government, or something to that effect. So if you aren't getting at least 6%, then you should change what you are doing.

The stock market indexes average about 11-12% over the course of their history, so with a little knowledge and a little risk, along with a long enough investment horizon, you can easilly get a better return than a lot of high fee mutual funds or leaving your money in a Money Market account will get you. But you should be able to get an even better return than that.

Point 3 - Your Time

The best and worst part of the stock market, is that you are not in control of your return once you've bought your stocks. For most people, this is good enough and they are content with leaving their future in the hands of other people that they believe are more competent than themselves. The rest of us are hungry to get even better returns. That's how point three comes in.

What better can you invest in than yourself? How you spend your free time will also determine your future. If you read my blog, you can see that I'm trying to build a business in my spare time. That's because I know that eventually I will start to create revenue with the skills and knowledge base, as well as connections, that I am building. Everyone who went through college and got a degree has already seen this process work. Putting the time in to study and learn is what got you the job that pays your bills and gives you the foundations for wealth already. Why stop there? Why not keep educating yourself towards the goal of being the guy at the top of a company directed towards your own interests? The only difference between the employee and the boss is the amount of time they've put into something and their persistence towards continuing to learn.

So just like your money being your employee and working for you, if you make your time work for you now, it will pay off in abundance later. I've said it before, but the one main commonality between the richest Americans is that they all started a business or own a business. The potential is there for everyone, it's just a matter of taking action. Your time can have exponential gains for you just like your money.

Point 4 - Multiple Streams of Income

The final point is the end result of all the previous. By making your money work for you, you start to develop a stream of income that is not reliant on your efforts but only your direction. As this grows, so do good habits and your knowledge and ability. As time is going by anyway, if you use your time and energy to build a business, eventually you will get to the point where you can hire people and promote yourself up the ladder. Eventually, you will promote yourself all the way up to a primary stock holder and not have to be actively involved in operations anymore. That frees you up to start again, setting up more and more streams of income. As you do it, it gets easier and easier and your have more and more time and freedom. This is why you hear the phrase, "the rich get richer", because as wealth grows it becomes easier for it to continue to grow. At the end, you're doing very little work but making more money than just your time and labor would ever be able to make alone.

Habitual Millionaire

If you're young enough, it's likely that changing a few spending habits and removing temptation by automating where your money goes will eventually make you a millionaire. In doing only this though, you are giving up your time. If you follow the rest of the points, both your time and your money will grow exponentially and you will reach your goals much faster. So while I definitely agree with taking the first step, I also suggest not making it the only one you take. The first step is always the hardest, so if you're going to take it, be aware that you're already well on your way.

A New Week

Last week's expeditions went very well. I was able to collect 93 leads for the week and send them off to my investor. Sadly, I still haven't heard anything back from him, which, along with a total lack of production, has made me lose all the faith I had in him. So I think I'm going to go back to the drawing boards and try to collect a bunch of new investors. Specifically, I'm going to target ones that deal exclusively or mainly in foreclosures, since they should be up to date with all the laws and capable of actually making deals happen. I figure, if I'm going to have the production like I had last week, I need to actually start capitalizing.

Today has been pretty depressing outside of potential business success. The stock market is taking a beating and there seems to be large amounts of talk about a recession. I've built my portfolio around some international stocks or at least ones that should benefit from international markets, but it seems that when the US isn't doing well, there is almost a gloom around the whole market.

The other thing I'm frustrated about is the lack of returns on my money. At this point I've built up a pretty solid stockpile of capital, but it's growing so slowly that it might as well be sitting forgotten in the bank. This, along with this book I'm reading, has me thinking about the "class system" that exists even today.

The Class System

Way back, there was a clear separation between nobility, middle class, and poor. The nobility were the lords of the land, who didn't do any of the work but rather played on people's fear of God and lack of education to get them to follow them without question, working their land and paying taxes to them for the privilege. The middle class would work through apprenticeships for years, slowly learning and practicing a skill, until they became a master themselves with their own business. Then, based on the type of work they did, their trade pretty much determining their income level and social standing. The poor, with little or no education, did the manual labor that was needed to supply the goods and food for society. I think that, while slightly different in form, the system still exists today.

The poor nowadays are those who are right at or around the poverty line. Maybe they don't have a college degree or maybe they just don't care about the quality of their work, but they sit at minimum wage or so, barely able to get by. The middle class are educated, usually with degrees, but end up working for companies, doing skilled labor but not having any real holdings in the assets that they are building. Content with their paycheck, they live through there days keeping up with the status quo and being entertained by sports and TV.

Todays nobility are the business owners. Those who, through whatever means, own the company they work at, or a large apartment or office building that generates revenue for them with little actual work needing to be done. They employ the poor and the middle class and keep them content with benefits and slow pay raises. Meanwhile, they're paying less tax and pulling in money just because they are willing to go outside the main society lines and do things differently.

Great, so now what?

So, the real question in all of this is, how do you cross the lines up the class system? I've struggled with this one for a while. I have I read numerous books, learned about many investment tools and had many conversations with various people of different social standing. There is only one way to do it.

People are a product of their habits and their environment. If you want to change where you are and who you are, you have to change who you spend your time with, what habits you foster and what thinking process you support. The three classes just think and do fundamentally different things. If you are always around people who think like you, you will continue to do things the way you do. If you have problems, you'll ask your close friends for help and they'll give you the solutions that will keep you where you started. The only way to break free is to change all of that.

It's not an easy path. Hard work and persistence are the habits of the rich and powerful. By the time they've reached a certain status that you are aware of who they are, they have already done the hardest parts. You see the end result, the wealth, the freedom, but all the extra effort and behind the scenes work that it took to get there is gone from view.

So don't be fooled. If you want to change, do it, be bold. Step outside the box, find those who want to help you and see you succeed, help them as they help you. For the rest, leave them behind and move on. You can't help them by lagging behind and trying to hold their hand. Be a beacon of success for them by being a success yourself.

Top 5 Most Useful Blogs

Today I present my top 5 most useful blogs (that I've found).

5. Cool Tools (http://kk.org/cooltools/)

Cool Tools updates almost daily. It's basically an advertisement for different things that you can buy that you wouldn't normally stumble upon, but have a great value for their price. I think the coolest one I've seen so far is an attachment for shovels that changes the angle you would normally be pulling at, greatly lowering the strain on your back.

4. I Will Teach You to Be Rich (www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/)

This guy is and writes like a Stanford graduate. He clearly has a large knowledge base about finance and managing a budget as well as getting strong returns on your money. He updates rarely, but usually when he does it is a well written and informative entry.

3. Get Rich Slowly (http://www.getrichslowly.org/)

An interesting saga about a man's quest to pull himself out of debt. Usually contains some useful advice on how to save money, various book reviews, guest posts from a wide range of perspectives and information about what is going on in his local area. While sometimes I find it hard to relate to, I find this inspirational.

2. Life hacker (lifehacker.com)

Being a geek like I am, I enjoy the tips and tricks as well as the downloads that these guys dig up daily. Usually they have at least one article worth reading a day that contains some tool or tip that makes my life a lot easier.

1. Genius Types (http://geniustypes.com/)

Genius Types is my personal favorite blog. It hits on all my favorite topics: relevant news, passive income, business statistics, personal experience advice. I've learned a lot from reading this and this was one of the first blogs I added to my Google Reader list. Definitely worth checking out and some of the archived blogs contain important advice for anyone who wants to move from the realm of working for money to having their money work for them.

I hope you add these blogs to your feeder and enjoy them as much as I do.

Short Follow Up

I'm feeling better today. I busted out my books this morning and did some review of the formula that I use for investing. The point of the formula is that it prides itself on its simplicity. The goal isn't to try to figure out all the trends and predict how specific occurrences in the market will effect certain stocks, but rather to make the process as easy as possible while still producing gains that beat the market average. The idea is based off of a combined approach of Benjamin Graham and Warren Buffet. You figure out the value of a company by taking the amount of assets and debt to determine it's actual per share value. Then, based off of last year's return on assets, you determine how good of a job it is doing with it's money. Each validation is used to give the stock a numerical rating out of the total subset that is measured. The stocks that have the lowest ratings based on the combination of the two scores are the better stocks to invest in. Another thing is that over a three year period you'll get a return that averages 30% or so, but 2 out of the 3 years could be terrible and then the following year be great.

I still need to learn the terminology better as well as learn how to do the financial analysis myself instead of relying completely on a computer's output. That way I'll start to understand the flow of money in a business. When you can read a financial statement it's a big confidence boost and you have a much better idea of what is going on inside a company.

Courthouse Sum Up

Courthouse results for this week were only slightly better than last week. Eight new listings for the county. In doing some checking, it seems that Monday will be a holiday for the courthouses and they will be closed. What I might do, is go to work on Monday and then take the holiday on Wednesday or Thursday since it's an optional holiday that I can move around. I'll have to see how I'm feeling on Monday.

Recently, the subject of retirement and investing has come up a lot in what I read and conversations I've had. A friend of mine said that his Financial advisor told him that with some smart planning he would be able to retire by the age of 50. This shocked me because the guy is an engineer, is already buying his own house and is putting money away towards retirement. You'd think he would be farther ahead than just 5 years. Apparently justification for only 5 years is based on theoretical expenses for children and some emergency funds in case something else comes up. I still think he should be much farther ahead than that.

Personally, I have three accounts setup for retirement saving. First is my 401k through my company. I have this balanced pretty well in some mutual funds that will avoid a lot of current USA domestic problems caused by the credit crunch going forward. My rate of return for the year is only 3% in this account, mainly because I set it up at the start of June and it got whacked pretty hard by the dip in the market before I did some more research and setup a better selection. Ever since I rebalanced I've been charging back and I plan on leaving this alone and letting it grow for the remainder of the year. The combination of not having to pay tax on what is put in and my employer matching really helps this grow.

I also have another 401k from a previous company that is averaging about 9% return so far this year. If last year is any view of how the last quarter will turn out, I should end up with about a 15% return for this year.

My second account is a Roth IRA that I setup last year. It's focused on some foreign markets that are mainly revolved around gold mining. It's been averaging 11% growth per year, so it seems fine to leave alone. I'm not sure how high the management fees are, but it's more of a bonus fund so I'm not tinkering with it much. I realize I can't touch this money till I'm 65, but not having to pay taxes on earnings is worth it since it's a solid long term setup.

My third account is my individually selected stocks. I'm taking the value investing approach and following the system of Joel Greenblatt, the investment stud who has averaged insane returns over the last 25 years. This is my pride and joy account that I've been priming for almost a year now. I've heard a lot of people talk about their failures in picking individual stocks, but I believe in value investing and I'm dedicated to sticking this out, esp since it's already produced 10% gains even during the dry period of the market and should really excel during the upcoming months.

The combination of those three accounts are the backbone of my retirement savings plan. My current goal is to prime them and let them compound over the next 20-30 years. The result should easily leave me in a comfortable position to decide if I really want to keep working long before the retirement age.

Like I stated previously, I'm trying to move away from saving now that I've setup the backbone. The greatest and worst thing that stocks have going for them is that they are so passive. While I don't have to do any work to see change, I also have no control over that change after the initial buy decision. I'd like to shift my money flow into priming other things that I have control over into a larger state of growth. The best example is the Jobber business I'm building. Eventually I would like to significantly increase operations by purchasing a laptop to use to collect lead information as well as start using some paid sources to acquire leads. At that point I will increase the number of investors I work with as well as pay to join some local REI clubs. But again, this growth hinges on some capital investment. But the nice part is that I have direct control over the results.

The final thing I want to mention is the use of mutual funds. My guess is that a large number of "investors" throw their money into a mutual fund and then go on with the assumption that someone's active management of that fund will lead to their profit. I'm warning that this is not the case.

Mutual fund management is a job like any other, and with any job there is always a range of how good or bad the person doing it actually performs. Just because they hold that position does not mean that they are really more educated about the market than you are. They most likely are just following a corporate system that does not take into account any of the real factors that determines how a business will perform. Warren Buffett follows the value investing approach of determining the actual value of a company and its shares. He takes it a step further than just that, though. He looks at the management and decision making and sees if they are intelligently directing the business.

I read the book Good to Great a year or so back. This book was a brilliant analysis of what are the differences between a company destined for success and one that will walk the average line. They are real, they are true and they are greatly overlooked. Never forget that what you are investing in is not just a name, it is a business. A business is only as strong and capable as the people who do the work.

Goals

Tomorrow will be my weekly trip to the courthouse. I'm looking forward to it because it will be a welcome break from my current work monotony. Based off of the real estate numbers from articles I've read this week, there should be a good number of foreclosures.

To date I've compiled a list of 71 foreclosures over the last month or so. Unfortunately none of this has led to any actual purchases or cash flow to this point. It is understandable why though, since I've only been sending leads to my investor for 3 weeks. The first round of leads contained some that were weeks old and potentially had gone bad. The last round I sent had a total of 6 leads, so there wasn't much help there.

Based on what I read in the Jobber information, you should expect something like 1 in 100 leads will produce a sale. Right now I haven't reached 100 and if you don't count the first few weeks that had turned stale, then I still have a ways to go. This serves as reinforcement to my idea that I should be going out to other counties to pick up my lead quotas. Currently, I'm still sticking with the plan of exploring during the holiday on Monday, but if the courthouse is closed then I'll have to make other arrangements.

One of my brothers is actually currently employed and I've played with the idea of recruiting him. I've tried to involve him on some ventures in the past with poor result, so it makes me hesitant to even offer up the suggestion now. Also, when you don't even have a flow of income it's hard to figure out how you would split it up. What I might do is offer him a flat rate for every lead that ends in a purchase, and then hopefully the deal I have setup with my investor will provide me some solid income over that. It's hard to say what to do though, since I don't have any precedent to use for measurement.

For now, my current plans remain at a trip to the courthouse tomorrow and one planned but unconfirmed for Monday.

In concert with the books I've been reading, I developed a few new goals yesterday. My first is to get a new job doing something more inline with my goals by January 1, 2008. This is a bit of a surprise since I just changed jobs at the end of May, but the daily grind at my current job has reached an unbearable point. It's not that I don't like the job, but the work is unfulfilling and boring. It's nice to have a certain amount of free time at work, but I don't have that feeling of freedom to spend the time towards something constructive. The environment of my cubicle has become mentally taxing to the point that I find it hard to accomplish anything, even just simple tasks because I'm so use to the lackluster stream of intellectually stimulating work.

The second goal is to build contacts, systems and ideas to the point that in 3 years I will be able to break off from any job I'm involved with and start my own business. I don't have a 100% game plan of how to do all these things yet, but the idea will be to find a mentor as well as start implementing ideas from the books I read, rather than them just remaining abstract ideas. I'm not sure if I'll take the route of going to get an MBA or just trying to find a job that will teach me how to run a business, but based off of goal 1's result, that should be easy to determine.

The third goal is to be a CEO of a successful business in 5 years. Either through the business I start reaching a profitable and successful level, or through the skills learned from the business opening up offers from other businesses for me to step in at the CEO position. This is a lofty goal, but I feel like completing the first two goals will put me within grasp of achieving this.

Now the problem I have is finding a path to reach each goal. For the first one, I've already started updating my resume, I'm going through the Pathfinder, and I've started looking into companies that seem to implement the business systems I would like to learn. The hard part is breaking out of this mental rut I'm stuck in and pushing myself to focus and make progress. I'm hoping that establishing these goals here will help me to do just that.

One final note, I've been doing some reading about how to build up traffic to your blog. Some of the stuff is really gimmicky and I really don't want to do. Like I could start putting together lists of things, but it seems to trivial and pointless. But I would like to keep increasing traffic. If anyone reading has some ideas or suggestions, or things they would like to read, leave some ideas in the comments.

Never Eat Alone

So right off the bat, my blog has reached the 100 page view mark since Adsense started tracking page views for me. I know, not as impressive as those guys who get 50,000 or 100,000 hits a day, but I'm happy. Thank you to all my visitors. By the way, feel free to comment or raise questions.

I read this guy's blog "I will teach you to be rich" (http://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/) every so often and today he had an interesting concept. The idea of doing statistical analysis of your daily life to see where your time and money goes. That way you can have a better understanding of what is actually going on, rather than what you think is going on. It also allows you to reflect back on what you could have done better and make some improvements.

Currently I have a few systems like that setup. The first one is my 'Engineering Log' for work. The idea is that each day I keep tracking of what I worked on, and various important information that comes up. That way I know what I did and when I did it, as well as having some CYA in case something happens down the road. It's probably the best idea that came out of my Software Engineering course that I took in college. My sister told me at one point that a colleague of hers did something similar, but kept track of the time she did things as well as how long it took her to do them. That way if there was ever a question about her time card she knew how to resolve it. Also, my brother told me that a colleague of his would make power point slides for each step of a project he worked on. That way he was able to sum up the main points, have something to remember what he did and why he did it by, and he could present on what he was working on at any time. Both additional tactics seem to be very valuable, but I don't have a busy enough or engaged enough work routine currently to implement them. In the near future I should be switched to a different project, so that may be the time to start incorporating those ideas.

The second system I have is used to track my finances. I made up what I call a "Financial map" which is basically a spreadsheet of the balance of my checking account over time. I have scheduled in different deposits and withdrawals that occur at certain fixed intervals. I then update it with recent transactions in a way that I can see what I'm spending my money on. Most financial software does this same thing and for a while I was using Quicken to manage my finances, but their auto-update feature did not work with some of my accounts so I went back to my old way of doing things. I've heard that Quick Books is better software and there is also Open Source software called "Mint" that will do a better job, but I haven't found the need to upgrade yet. What I also do about monthly is update a financial summary. This is just a list of the balance of all of my accounts so I get a big picture idea of what percentages I hold in different areas. For example, about 60% of my wealth is currently in savings accounts, 30% is in investments and about 10% is in very liquid accounts. My goal is to shift the balance so that my investing and savings are about equal percentage.

I do not have a system to track where my time goes. I feel like this would be very useful since I seem to waste a lot of my time. I'm ok with this to a point currently since in my long term goals this is more of a limbo period. Once I change my living situation I will no longer be ok with this and will make a push to start drastically changing how I monitor my time.

The other problem I run into is determining my goals. I'm re-reading Never Eat Alone since it's such a quality book and my brother thought it would be a good idea to review some of the concepts. It also emphasizes how important goals are, since you can't get somewhere if you don't know where it is. I've also been reading the Pathfinder intermittently in order to come up with goals, so I'm hoping that will help in that area.

Currently, my main goals are to finish my financial priming in December so I can shift my money flow into other investments. Once I have that base that I can build on, I'll be able to focus on life improvements, like putting together a website to use as a central brand building point and changing my living arrangement so that I can start having meetings. Also, I'll be able to setup work spaces like I mentioned in a previous blog so that I can focus better on different projects. Along with those goals is my continuing process of building the Real Estate Jobber business and this blog that I use to track it.

So again, thank you to my readers. This is the first milestone of hopefully many to come and I hope that my perspectives are adding value to you as well.

Weekend Escapade

So I managed to go to the courthouse again on Friday. It was a good thing I did since there were four more leads, which was double the previous total for the week. Six isn't really that much since before I was getting around 15, but according to articles I've been reading about foreclosures, the stream should be picking up for a while to come. I didn't get a chance to go into another county this week since I had to spend time packing, but I'll try to work something out for next week. Monday is Columbus day, so I'll see if the courthouses are closed or not and then plan a trip based on my findings.

My weekend trip went well. It wasn't a business trip, but rather more of a vacation so it was successful in giving me some time off to relax. I went out to visit my brother so I got to see his setup and meet some of his friends. He's got a good core group and a nice place. It's a good thing because the senior year of college is something you should really enjoy. I don't mean by drinking it all away or by blowing off class and work, but more just having a good group of people to spend time with as well as getting a real taste for living on your own before 40 hour work week grind sets in. The communal setting of living in an apartment is a lot nicer than living in the middle of the burbs miles away from your friends. Just the fact that you can pop in and out of people's places and just hang out for a little while or even for hours, kinda feels right. Either that or I watch too much Seinfeld.

I did make some interesting observations over the weekend.

Your environment is a simple, but accurate gauge of how productive you are. I don't mean that everything has to be spotless, but organization is key. That's why libraries are successful places to study. Information is accessible and all around you. You feel like anything that comes up you'll be able to find a resource for and it's motivating. If an idea comes to you, or you have a project to work on, being surrounded by multitudes of unfinished tasks is just going to overwhelm you. If you have a clear space to work and the tools you need to work on the problem you'll jump right in. As they say, action is the cure for procrastination. If it takes you 15-30 minutes to clear off a space and get together everything you need, the task it going to feel even more overwhelming.

I run into this problem a lot with my current living space. All of my stuff is crammed into spaces that are not large enough. Therefore, when I sit down and want to work on something, I almost feel like I'm trapped in too small a space. So I end up blowing it off. The ideal setting would be a place where I could partition off my different projects. If I want to work on my Jobber business, I sit down where all my files are and plug away. If I want to read some information about setting up vending machine locations, this should be somewhere else, and so on. Unfortunately, that is not a current option, but now that I know what would work and have a picture in mind, I can start working towards making it so.

Goal setting is very valuable. Almost every "Self Improvement" book I've ever read talks about goal setting. The best example I've seen was in The Science of Getting Rich, which discusses getting a clear vision of what you want and then focusing on it. By keeping that vision, your conscious and subconscious thoughts will start seeing ways for you to make it so. When you are that focused, you start to use your brain's natural pattern matching ability to filter out things that would distract you or become stumbling blocks and focus only on things that will lead to what you want.

Another observation I made is that illness always settles in when you relax. I've read things that discuss this before in a variety of places. I imagine it's because your body is always toggling between fight or flight mode and passive mode. Once you remove the daily stress and switch to passive, things jump up on you while you are trying to recover with your defenses down. Luckily I have some illness fighting tools. I usually take a multivitamin each day, and I have a neti pot that I use every other day as well as days when I start feeling pretty bad. Here is more information on what a neti pot is and how it works for those who are interested: http://www.healingdaily.com/exercise/neti-pot.htm

Finally, I was reading Genius Types ( a great blog about passive income as well as a good perspective ). The author mentions blogging as "Your Brand" which I completely agree with. I'm curious if he's read Never Eat Alone, but what he is saying is very much inline with what Keith Ferrazzi wrote about. In The World is Flat, they discuss how times have moved from corporations being able to do what only countries could before to the individual being able to do what corporations can do. So now each person is their own brand, has their own image and their own skills that they have to market to a global world. By having a blog you are able to do this. It takes a while to develop your ideas and methodologies, as well as how you are going to express them, but it is a more accurate depiction of the individual.

I had a conversation a few months back with my brother where I was telling him that perhaps he should divide his resume up by skills rather than by work experience. Focus on things like leadership, organization, persistence, and then list the jobs and activities at those jobs that developed those skills or showcased his use of them. It was a more human approach to a resume, rather than just a list of technical jargon to set off keyword searches. While it probably isn't the best approach for applying for a job, since so many companies focus on keyword searches, I feel like that is what blogging is becoming. It's a living document that shows the deeper aspects of the person rather than a list of time sensitive buzz words that show little about who you are or what value you will bring. I imagine in the future social networking profiles and resumes will merge to be a larger, more accurate viewpoint of an individual. I know employers already look at people's profiles before making hiring decisions, so I doubt this merge will be too far off. I'm not a member of linked-in, but since it's suppose to be social networking for professionals, this may have already happened.

Overall, it was a relaxing and thought provoking weekend. I hope to repeat it sometime in the near future.

Weekly Courthouse Visit

So today is Friday. I got up early and headed over to the courthouse before work. Ended up with 21 hits today. I'm not sure if that's really more than last week or not because last week I ended up stopping before getting to the end of the list so I wouldn't end up too late for work. This week I knew what I was doing so I got in, got what I needed and got out pretty quick. I did not end up looking up other types of leads other than foreclosures, but I will eventually.

I also setup a spreadsheet this week to help better organize the leads I've collected. I have papers where I wrote out all the original data still, but I feel like having it in digital form will be very helpful. Once I get a laptop I'll be able to enter and keep track of this information a lot easier. I would like to actually generate some kind of income before I make any business purchases though.

In order to continue to get closer to actually making some money, I filled out a contact form for one of the investors websites that I had found previously. They offer $3000 for a lead that ends up in a sale, so that would be a great payday. That's 3x as much as the REJ course talks about asking for a qualified lead, and these people only want some basic information about the potential property. So I'll have to wait and see how that goes.

It would be great leaps and bounds to get to a point where I feel like I can generate income outside of the normal work groove. Once I make that real connection then I should be able to start coming up with more ideas on how to generate money as well as fine tune the avenues I get to work. Back when I was doing a Quixtar business they did send me one check for something like $10. I didn't deposit it though because I felt like something was wrong. Normally they don't send you a check if you only purchase goods yourself, but my "mentor" did some shady dealing or something. I was really turned off to the whole thing and didn't want to start off on the wrong foot. I didn't like a lot of the things this guy was doing and that's what eventually pushed me to stop going to meetings or putting any effort into it.

I've been reading this guys blog (http://geniustypes.com/) where he (or I assume it's a he, might be a she), discussed different types of passive income as well as how passive they really are. It's really insightful and I feel somewhat like we are working towards the same goals. It's nice to feel like there is someone out there working with you, unlike the people I am use to who are sitting on the sidelines waiting to see if I succeed before offering any help.

I was talking with a coworker at lunch about potential business plans in the future. He was saying how no matter what you do there is a level of hard work you put into it. We always see the rewards people receive in society and think of them as gifts or just luck. The reality is that they worked hard to get themselves to the point where they could succeed, where they were in the right place at the right time. My Dad always says to get invested in what you are doing, become the go to guy, put in the work. I guess in a lot of ways I've been looking for an easy way out. I should really just be looking for what makes me happy, what gives me a sense of enjoyment and satisfaction.

My coworker also mentioned "The Art of the Start" by Guy Kawasaki. I'm going to look into that and potentially start reading through it. It sounds like a very positive and perspective changing book.

Scrolls and the Daily Grind

So tomorrow I will partake in my now weekly ritual of heading to the courthouse. I imagine there will only be a few new leads there, but it'll be worth it. I feel like going somewhere and doing something makes my business feel more real. Although, I am still having trouble with the concept of creating an income, rather than just putting in hours and working for one.

I think its because I look too intently at the current rather than seeing the long term potential. I get so stuck on trying to do something quickly because I want my current situation to change. I'm not sure exactly what is the cause of that, my best guess is because I still live at home.

Today was the start of my last scroll. In January I started reading the book "The Greatest Salesman in the World". It is a great story that contains 10 scrolls of wisdom in it. The first one outlines the process, which is just that you read the scroll in the morning, afternoon and out load in the evening for 30 days so that its message becomes a habit. In truth, I only read the scroll in the morning and outloud at night everyday. But I am finally on the 10th scroll after sitting on the other 8 habit scrolls for 30 days each. I bought the sequel book months ago, so once I'm done this scroll I can move onto reading that. I'm hoping it doesn't have the same kind of format though, since reading these scrolls everyday has become burdensome.

Sadly, I feel like I haven't really developed any of the habits it promotes. I was excited when I first started, and I really tried. The problem is the same as the problem I ran into with the Rich Dad coaching. You have to change how you think, but you also have to change who you spend your time with as well, otherwise you won't end up doing anything different. They give the example of crabs that, once you catch two, will remain in a small container. Even though they could climb out, once one starts to, the other one will pull it back. That's how I feel. Whenever I try to start changing the way I do something, my family routine and mentality pulls me back down.

If I bring this up to any of them they get insulted. I tried to explain it to my mom again this morning but she always get defensive. Then she proceeds to the "I'm doing what I want to be doing" and "you just need to get your head on straight" habitual defense. Then she starts with the guilt of "not appreciating what you have". After a while I've gotten extremely tired of having the same arguments. The problem is that I like to talk out my ideas, and while I live at home the people I talk them out to will always be the same and they will always say the same things.

Well, aside from all that, the routine marches onward. I started to reread "Never Eat Alone", the modern day "How to Win friends and Influence People". I almost feel like its a spit in the face. Clearly the author has had a lot of success, but he also has a different background and situation. His parents made large sacrifices to push him forward, plus they have personalities that support him and encourage him, instead of always thinking in conflict and promoting their own visions of success onto their child. Also, at this point I've been working towards some specific goals for years, it would be a huge waste to do something rash and throw it all away.

The other problem with a lot of these books is that they exist in their own time. They just jump over the hard parts and talk about the rewards. Positive change and success is a byproduct of habitual action over a long period of time. It's hard to do the day to day things and make those sacrifices with only the promise of rewards in the future, esp with the future always in uncertainty. Sure you should find ways to enjoy the present, but that isn't always possible when you get crushed by the quagmire of the normal routine. It seems so pointless to have daily time commitments just for the sake of having them, without any freedom to use that time towards something productive that would require being at another location.

I guess my frustrations really just come from a few specific sources. Clearly I have a conflicting fundamental viewpoint with my parents, and while I live at home this is a constant source of aggravation. Also, I am unhappy with what I do at my job since most of the time I feel like I am trapped at a location, forced to pretend like I am doing something productive when I have nothing productive to do and see little opportunity to find something. I guess that just leads to a continuing cycle of feeling like my talents and abilities go to waste as I sit in a constant state of on call.

I don't have much of a resolution to end with today. I'm just kinda tired and frustrated, trying to push forward to the holiday weekend ahead.