The Pursuit of Happiness

“The Secret gives you anything you want: happiness, health, and wealth.”
– Bob Proctor, Philosopher, Author, and Personal Coach

…or does The Secret give you false expectations? The answer is: “it depends.” Most everyone is familiar with the mega hit DVD and best selling book, “The Secret.” If you’re not, go to www.thesecret.tv to learn more.

The basic premise of the secret is “the law of attraction.” This is, that which you think about you will attract into your life. Think positive thoughts and you’ll attract positive into your life. Think negative thoughts and you’ll attract negative into your life. The basic premise is sound.

So when I recently was told by a friend, Dave Blanchard, that The Secret has done more harm than good, I was a bit surprised. Dave is the CEO of the Og Mandino Group which teaches people how to live successful and abundant lives through the teachings and principles of Og Mandino www.ogmandino.com

The problem that Dave shared with me is that only about 3 percent of the population knows how to properly visualize and correctly implement the law of attraction. The other 97 percent think they’re visualizing but in reality they’re fantasizing. These people end up spending their lives in frustration because “this stuff doesn’t work.”

There is a big difference between visualizing and fantasizing. A person who visualizes knows that effort is required to turn a mental picture into a reality. A person who fantasizes thinks about having whatever it is they want but put little or no effort towards obtaining it. They think that by sitting around watching TV at night, that checks will start coming in the mail instead of bills; that their old car will magically change into a new car; and that they’ll wake up one morning in the home of their dreams. That is fantasizing.

Here’s an example of how visualization and the law of attraction has worked in my life. Many years ago I received a sweepstakes postcard in the mail. It had a picture of a cabin in the mountains. The caption read: “Scott, is this your dream cabin?” With a red felt tip marker I wrote under the caption “YES!” I kept that postcard sitting on my desk at home and would look at it every evening when I went into my office to work new business ideas and preparing myself for success.

Having a cabin for my family to spend time together was part of my bigger vision of providing a better quality of life for my family. It’s what helped me to discipline myself to read books, listen to audiotapes and watch videos on self-improvement and work on ideas for new business ventures rather than do time-wasting activities such as watching TV at night.

When one of my earlier business ventures started doing well, the first thing I did was look for property in the mountains that fit my vision of where I wanted to build a cabin. Within days of telling myself that I was ready to buy cabin property, I saw an ad in a local magazine advertising mountain property for cabins. I made an appointment with a sales person. He showed me many lots that didn’t fit my vision. When I told him what I was looking for he said he knew of a piece of property that had just come available in a different development that had been sold out for years. The minute I saw this property I knew it was what I was looking for and bought it.

I didn’t have enough money to build the cabin yet, but I had the most important element, the property to build it on. And although it took several more years to finally build the cabin of my dreams… which by the way ended up being much nicer than the cabin on the postcard, I did turn my vision into reality.

A person fantasizing about having a cabin might have a picture of it in his mind, and even may see his family roasting marshmallows in the fireplace on Christmas Eve while the snow gently falls outside. But if he puts no effort into achieving this dream, just sits around every night watching T.V., it’s not going to happen.

You can know if the picture in your mind is a vision or a fantasy by the amount of effort you’re putting in to make it a reality. Little or no effort… then it’s a fantasy and it’s not going to happen. There must be movement and effort for “The Secret”, the law of attraction, to work.

Next week I’ll share with you the three word secret to turn a vision into reality.

Your Friend,

D. Scott Elder

“No Man is Rich Enough to Buy Back His Past.”
– Oscar Wilde

Each of us has said or done something that we regret. One regret that many people have as they approach their retirement age is that they wish they had invested more money when they were younger. You don’t have to have this regret. If you’re not already investing in the stock market, start now. If not now, when? The last thing you want to do is get down the road a few more years and have an anxiety attack because you don’t have enough money to retire. You may be able to keep the job you have, or find another job, and never really retire. But what fun would that be?

Now is the time to look ahead in your life and determine what regrets you could have. Now come back to the present and decide what actions you can take to not have these regrets. If one of these regrets is not having prepared for retirement sooner, then now is the time to build your retirement nest egg.

With the Stock Investor software and the 3-Step Investing Process you have what you need to build wealth and become rich enough that you won’t need to buy back your past. Well, at least not for the reason of regretting not investing enough to enjoy a financially rich retirement.

Your Friend,

D. Scott Elder

“Energy and Persistence Conquer All Things.”
– Benjamin Franklin

Procrastination is an enemy to building wealth. It’s too easy to put off working your brain and resting your body at the end of a long day at work or taking care of the house and kids all day. But then days turn to weeks, weeks turn to months and months turn to years. And before you know it you’re seeing your retirement years quickly approaching on the horizon. Will your retirement be coming in a luxury cruise ship bringing travel, leisure and financial security? Or will it be a rubber raft with oars, requiring you to continue rowing through your retirement in order to keep afloat on the waves of life? Or perhaps it’s something in between.

Whatever ship, boat, or raft you end up boarding when your retirement arrives, it will be of your choosing. But the choice won’t be made at the day of your retirement… or even 10 years before your retirement. It will be made daily. You’ve already been making the choice and each day you continue to choose how your retirement will be. What kind of retirement you have will be the result of the choices you make each day compounded over weeks, months and years.

It takes “energy and persistence” to conquer procrastination; your enemy to building wealth and an early and rich retirement. Your desire to enjoy a retirement of leisure and financial security can be your fuel. Each day make the choice to use your Stock Investor software to go through the 3-Step Investing Process. Persist in doing your searches, research and portfolio management on a daily basis and you will end up on the luxury cruise ship of retirement.

Your Friend,

D. Scott Elder

“Formal education will make you a living; self education will make you a fortune.”
– Jim Rohn

Colleges and Universities are good places to learn about a lot of things. And a lot of what you learn can help you make a good living. But the one thing that these institutions of higher learning are not good at teaching is how to build wealth… real wealth.

Wealth-building skills are usually learned on your own. They can be learned through self-learning programs, in seminars, in workshops and through one-on-one mentoring from an expert or coach. These skills usually involve leveraging and compounding your money in some fashion. Common ways to do this is starting your own business, investing in real estate and investing in the stock market.

Most people consider anything that involves leveraging money as risky. Risk is a relevant concept. The amount of risk involved in any venture can be inversely proportionate to the amount of knowledge you have regarding the venture. The more you know about the venture, the less risky it is. For you, building a hotel and casino costing several hundred million dollars would be a huge risk. For Donald Trump it’s not… he knows the hotel and casino business. For you, trading calendar spread options may be a big risk. For Ross it’s not… he’s an expert options trader. But neither one was born with the knowledge and expertise they each now possess. And neither one learned these skills in college. They both learned these wealth-building skills on their own and from others who possessed the expertise they wished to acquire.

Recently a friend, whom I’ve known for many years, said to me “It’s been fun watching your success grow over the years. I wish I were a risk-taker, but I’m not so I’ll never be as successful as you.” I told him I wasn’t a risk-taker. Actually, I am extremely conservative and risk-adverse. I told him the only thing I risked was my time. We all have the same number of hours in a day. I determined how many of them I needed for sleeping, eating and family and used the rest to learn how to build a successful business and invest in the stock market. I then told him that anyone can do it… I’m living proof. I don’t think he liked my response because it put the burden of responsibility and accountability squarely on him.

I have a Bachelors degree from a top University. I also have an MBA. So I can speak from personal experience. My formal education could have made me a nice living. But I chose to add to it self-education through home-study programs, seminars, workshops and mentors to learn how to build wealth. Here’s something else I learned, and for you to consider: My formal education cost a lot more than my self education. I’m getting a much higher return on my investment in self education. You can do the same. You can build wealth investing in the stock market. The more you learn about investing, the less risky it will be for you and the more successful you’ll become. It’s really that easy.

Your Friend,

D. Scott Elder