Create and Design Your Life

Try and ask yourself this question, "Are you going with the flow or making the flow as you go along?" Successful people tend to have an attitude of delayed gratification. Every action they made takes into consideration of short term and long term gain. Think wisely of any actions you made as some actions would lead to instant gratification but in the long term will cause negative outcome. For example, the attitude of buying the latest brand new car or the latest gadget available in the market. This are in the short term gratification as you only can enjoy it in a short term duration only. The misery of losing a huge chunk of money will cause negative consequences in the long run. The money spent can either wise be invested in a long term gain that will last much longer. Learn the attitude of the rich so that in return you will become one.

Are you an "I create my life" person? or are you a "Life happens to me" person? The "I create my life" person is a proactive person who does not wait for any favors. This type of person always believes that wealth will come by active action by their side. Misfortunes or problems arise from their own doing and it is up to them to resolve it without blaming on others. In a work environment, this type of person will always climb the corporate ladder fast as he does not blame others but only themselves in moving upwards in their career.

The "Life happens to me" person is a passive person who always tries to blame others for their misfortunes or problems. They believe that if they are poor, it is because it is destined that way. They always treat themselves as victims. In a work environment, this type of person will not move very far in their career. They will always complain about office politics or not being appreciated for their work. They will always have a victim mindset.

The Analogy of a Frog and Personal Finance

If you were to pick a frog and put it into shallow hot boiled water, the frog will instantly leaped from the pot and jump out to safety. However, if you were to pick up the same frog a little later and then put it into a shallow cold water, the frog will not react to it and will be comfortably be sitting there as it is a cold blooded animal. But, if you were to do experiments by heating up the cold pot with a very, very slow fire with the frog still sitting in it. The water will eventually rise up to 100 degrees. As any cold-blooded animal, the frog’s body will adapt to the rising heat and will adjust its blood temperature to the environment. Eventually, when the water reaches boiling point, the frog will die as a result of adapting itself to the environment without even realizing it.

So, what’s personal financing has have to do with the frog story? A lot. People who started off their career start just like the frog in the shallow cold water. The money they received by the end of the month is enough to get by since their requirement for life is low. But, as your career and salary increase so does your desires and lifestyles. As you start to buy your first car, buy your first house, started to use credit cards, your lifestyle will change incrementally but not as fast as your salary increase. As same with the frog, you will not notice that you have a debt problem since the increment is not sudden. And when you realize it, it is too late and you will end up with a huge pile of debt.

There are many paths for us to achieve financial freedom, but the majority of us choose the path of job security. How can we blame them? The education system was shaped to produce workers and not entrepreneurs. Many people realized that as the company their working with starts to prosper, the owner of the company is the one who eventually benefits and the employees usually are not much richer compared to the first day they started working there. The reality is that the boss is not responsible to make you rich, but their responsibility is just to make sure you got your paycheck by the end of the month. It is your responsibility to make sure that you will end up rich and not somebody else.

Don't Worry Be Happy

Here is an estimate of the things most people worry about:
40% - Things that have not happened yet
30% - Past things that already occured
12% - Health conditions that may or may not be true
10% - Petty things, such as office gossips or etc.
8% - Real problems

Based on this percentages, the only real reason for people to get worried is only a mere 8%. Therefore you have another 92% for you to free your mind from worries and simply to be happy. Happiness is a choice made consciously and subconsciously in our mind. If you have set your mind to focus on all the negative and shortcomings of your life, the mind will be set to autopilot and be on worried mode all the time. But in the otherhand, if you learn to master the focus of your mind, then you will free yourself from needless worries. As the law of the universe stated, an empty gap will always be filled by another matter, the same goes with our mind. As the negative thoughts been weed out, this will leave a gap in our mind for the positive thoughts. Happiness is the pre-requisite for success. Happiness will set the foundation needed for a higher level of success.

Set your goal and achieve it

Goals are a powerful tool in shaping your future. Therefore plan your goal carefully and aim towards achieving it. Goals that are too high can cause self paralysis and a sense of failure while goals too low can make it easily achieveable and does not promote significant growth. Therefore goal-setting is a critical decision that will ultimately impact your action and success.

You can overcome the obstacles to your goal by having a positive attitude and believe that the goal is achieveable. Passion, determination and discipline must be strong in your heart and mind for you to achieve the goals that you have set for yourself. And finally, do not let anyone tell you that you cannot achieve your goal, even yourself.

Passion overcomes Procrastination

"Procrastination is the thief of life" - Edward Young

"Procrastination is the bad habit of putting of until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday.” - Napoleon Hill

Everyone procrastinate. It is a fact in life. But successful people procrastinate rarely then ordinary people do. The reason for that is simple, successful people usually are doing things that they are passionate about. Every action brings joy to them and therefore it creates them no reason to procrastinate. So, the key to avoid procrastination is to learn to enjoy what you are doing. If you do not like what you are doing but it is important, try making fun out of it. Time is the only thing that we cannot get back once it is lost. Therefore, procrastination can be consider one of the culprit of our life that steals the most important treasure from us - 'Time'.

No 1 reason why we mess up our finances

"Financial education needs to become a part of our national curriculum and scoring systems so that it’s not just the rich kids that learn about money.. it’s all of us." - David Bach

"Money is plentiful for those who understand the simple laws which govern its acquisition." - George Clason

The number one reason majority of us end up with financial mess is simply this - No one taught us how to. Even though money plays a very important role in our daily life, our schooling system is not emphasizing enough on financial education. Therefore, people usually graduated from school or college with little or no formal education on managing their finance. When they ended up with credit card debts, mortgage loan or car loan, they are wondering why they are not making enough money even with all the education that they have received. No wonder some star athletes or big celebrities who make big money usually ended up with a huge debt. The money is a tool for happiness but only if it is handled with care. Use the tool improperly, it would end up hurting yourself.

Pursuit of Financial Freedom

"If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability." -Henry Ford

The pursuit for financial freedom is actually a pursuit to self actualisation. By achieving financial freedom, you will in the same time break the normal boundaries and stretching the limit capability of yourself. This character is basically the essence of a true millionaire. The knowledge gained during the pursuit of achieving financial freedom is much more priceless compared to the destination that you want to achieved. That is why individual who comes from rag to riches are legendary individual as these people have truly walk the golden path and gain wisdom along the way. Therefore, pursuit wealth, gain knowledge, and achieved happiness along the way.