Dear ETR Reader,
You fully intended to follow through on your New Year's resolutions. So what happened? Today, Dan Kennedy has 8 ideas to restart your engine.
- Suzanne Richardson
ETR Managing Editor
The Internet's
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www.earlytorise.com
Thursday, March 23, 2006
Message #1684
WEALTHY: Spinning profits into your portfolio
HEALTHY: Is non-stick making you sick
WISE: Pablo Picasso on goals
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
Resurrect your New Year's resolutions (Dan Kennedy)
Show 'em the money! (Michael Masterson)
Add the word "inscrutable" to your vocabulary
*Highly Recommended *
Does the Title of Power and Persuasion Scare You Off?
What's that? You're not interested in becoming "powerful," so you figure you don't need to read Michael Masterson's new book?
Don't misunderstand the word …
The Sporting News recently asked several influential athletes what "power" means to them. New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady said that power is "being strong enough to get what you want, and smart enough to know the best way to attain it."
Brady's right. The kind of power you will gain from Michael Masterson's book isn't about bullying or bossing people around.
It's about becoming more effective and more successful in every aspect of your life by using the techniques he's discovered from being in business for almost 40 years.
Power and Persuasion will show you how to garner the kind of power that gives you options … choices … and freedom. When you have this kind of personal power, you get to decide what you're going to do … who you're going to do it with … and when and where you're going to do it.
If that sounds like something you'd be interested in, you'd be crazy not to take advantage of this opportunity.
The "Sector Rotation" Trading Strategy
With the emergence of global investment opportunities at a time when commodities are going strong, "sector rotation" (moving in and out of sectors based on how the market is doing) as a way to manage a portfolio has gone from overrated to irrelevant.
We've been in a series of mini-bull rallies since the middle of 2002. And now the economy is showing signs of wear and tear that indicate a recession is not far off.
Sector-rotation theory tells us that as the bull market tops off and heads back down, staples, services, and utilities should emerge as strong sectors, with the high-flying energy sector falling back.
But here are the only two things you need to know about the way sectors behave as the market goes from bull to bear.
1. In a bull market, practically everything is going up. In a bear market, practically everything is going down. It's hard but not impossible to lose money in a bull. In a bear, it's awfully hard to make money. Some sectors will do less badly than others, but unless you're a wiz at picking stocks (or get my Money Insight newsletter), you're going to be in for a rough time.
2. In a bull market, growth stocks do somewhat better than value stocks. In a bear market, value stocks do much better than growth. In the last three years, they've been pretty evenly matched. But as we head into a bear market, value companies will surge ahead.
As the bear market draws near, I suppose you could diversify into staples, where margins are razor-thin … or you could go into utilities, where small profits and limited upside are protected by government-backed rate regimes. But I wouldn't recommend it.
Better to put more of your money into gold and silver, global equity and bond funds, and some up-and-coming resource and value companies. If you want to be more aggressive, you could play the S&P 500 index short. You can get expert advice on exactly what moves to make by getting David Nichols' Fractal Market Report, which has an excellent track record of predicting where the S&P is heading.
- Andrew Gordon
(Ed. Note: Andrew M. Gordon and his staff, along with Dr. Erik Epp, have created a new free weekly e-letter called Money Insight: Useful Ideas for Growing Your Money Quickly and Safely . Every week, they decipher the best safe-money strategies from the deluge of mainstream financial news and uncover undervalued opportunities for quick profits)
"Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success."
- Pablo Picasso
8 Resolution-Rescuing Strategies
By Dan S. Kennedy
Resolve comes easily on December 31st.
But by April of the New Year, the resolutions made are in disarray, compromised, abandoned. And the resolute determination to make this year, finally, the year you stick to them, forgotten altogether.
The point of this essay is not to make you feel guilty. Instead, it is to identify the real reasons resolutions and the determination to achieve them are lost, year after year after year – and to help you get on track to systematically set and achieve your goals.
Big Idea #1: You Can't Achieve New Goals or Make Desired Changes Without Allocating Time to Do So.
Many resolutions never become reality, simply because no room is made for them on the daily schedule. If your days are already full and you resolve to get in a half-hour a day on the treadmill or writing your book, that half-hour has to come from somewhere. Something's gotta give! You have to find one or two or three things that you can cut 5 or 10 or 15 minutes from.
Big Idea #2: Priorities Should Govern Your Schedule.
The vast majority of business owners and entrepreneurs make the same mistake: They operate like workers instead of bosses and leaders. They report to a workplace, then they allow people and events and interruptions to take control of their day.
You have to wrest control away from the priorities of others and govern by your own.
Big Idea #3: Resolutions Aren't Resolutions Without Resolve.
Only you can decide what really matters to you. Don't bother with faux resolutions made to appease or satisfy others. Being honest with yourself is a pre-requisite for success.
Big Idea #4: Resolutions Require Resources.
Almost anything you decide to do … any change you decide to make … any goal you set out to achieve … requires new or different resources. That might mean investing in a piece of home exercise equipment, stocking different food in the cupboard, or establishing a private workspace outside the office. You can't be serious about a resolution unless you have what you need to make it happen
Big Idea #5: The "Do One Thing Every Day" Rule.
In talking about how he built The Sharper Image from a college kid's coffee table start-up to a nearly billion-dollar business, founder Richard Thalheimer says he did it by taking "baby steps" – and still approaches every new project that way.
I used the same approach to write four books last year and four more this year … putting in one hour a day to produce a handful of pages.
The idea is to refuse to end the day without doing something, no matter how small, that moves you toward your goal.
Big Idea #6: Who Motivates the Motivator?
Paul Meyer, founder of Success Motivation Institute, posed this provocative question: As an entrepreneur, as the leader, you may be doing a lot to motivate others. But who motivates you?
For the most part, you need to motivate yourself.
As Michael Masterson advises, it's a big help to create structure for yourself by breaking down your goal into monthly, weekly, and daily objectives. But you can also get into a coaching group or tele-coaching program, hire a one-on-one coach, or just pair up with a like-minded buddy. That way, there will be somebody to hold you accountable … somebody to report your progress to. And as any professional sports coach will tell you: Measurement automatically improves performance – and measurement monitored by someone else improves performance even further.
Big Idea #7: Build Up to Change.
I neglected the treadmill for six months, but on January 1st, I went back to it.
My goal was to do 30 minutes a day. But I knew if I tried doing that out of the starting gate, I'd be a goner. So I started with a measly 5 minutes a day for the first half of January, 10 minutes a day for next 15 days, 15 minutes a day for all of February, then 20 minutes a day in March. I'll be up to the full 30 minutes in another week – and, as of right now, I haven't missed a day.
Easing into goals like this is a good way to make them more achievable. Say you resolve to get up an hour earlier every morning to work on an idea that you hope to turn into a side business. Start by getting up 15 minutes earlier for two weeks. Then 30 minutes earlier for a month. Then 45 minutes earlier for two weeks. And so on …
Big Idea #8: Make Better Use of Your Time.
Resolve weakens under pressure, under stress – when you feel you've lost control of your time. To keep procrastination from gaining a foothold, you have to practice sound time-management strategies. I wrote an entire book on this subject (No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs ). But it starts with this: training (or re-training) all the people in your world to respect your time, to co-operate and facilitate your peak productivity.
(Ed. Note: Dan Kennedy is the author of nine business books, a busy entrepreneur, consultant, speaker and direct-response advertising copywriter. For a limited time, you can take advantage of "The MOST INCREDIBLE GIFT EVER" ($798.89 worth of money-making information).
Today's Action Plan
Take a good look at the New Year's resolutions you made at the beginning of January. Are you still on track to achieve them? If not, don't worry. It's not too late to regroup. Block out a couple of hours, bolt the door, and unplug the phone. Pick the resolution that means the most to you, and figure out how you can take advantage of Dan Kennedy's advice.
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Do You Have the Symptoms of Teflon Flu?
In Message #1416, I wrote about the potential dangers of non-stick cookware. The Teflon coating can release toxic fumes when heated. When these fumes are inhaled, it can cause a condition known as "polymer fume fever."
Not surprisingly, the manufacturer, Dupont, claims that this off-gassing only happens during "abnormal use," and that the symptoms of "Teflon flu" are only temporary. This is contradicted by a number of studies that show the harmful fumes can be released at normal cooking temperatures, and other studies which indicate that permanent lung damage – even cancer – can result. In fact, just last month a group of science advisors to the Environmental Protection Agency voted unanimously that one of the chemicals used to manufacture Teflon should be considered a "likely" carcinogen.
GP, an ETR reader, posted a message in the ETR Speak Out Forum regarding his own experience:
"Back in October 2005 … I started developing the strangest symptoms. Although I was running and stretching, my energy levels dropped dramatically. I developed a horrendous headache for about a week. Also, although I felt hot and started to sweat, I had no fever. My back had excruciating pains. Everyone said it was the Texas allergies because it was a new place for me. (By the way, I'm 23 years old.) I also was highly disoriented and started to forget things. I could be in the middle of a conversation and would forget what I was saying! So I did a Google search of all my symptoms and found ONE consistent answer: Teflon flu!
"I realized that for the last 5 years, I had used nothing but stainless steel cookware, and I had recently started using Teflon cookware.
"I've gotten a cold or flu in the past, and this definitely was abnormal. It seems that my body was reacting violently to the new toxin invaders. By the way, since I started on stainless steel again, about 4 months ago, I haven't been sick once."
I can't say that GP's self-diagnosis was correct, but his symptoms were consistent with what has been written about this condition. If you have similar unexplained symptoms, you might consider changing your cookware. Stainless steel, cast iron, or ceramic-coated metal are safer alternatives to non-stick. And if you do use non-stick cookware, NEVER leave an empty pan on a hot burner.
- Jon Herring
Worth Quoting: Jeffrey Fox on Selling
Most people, most of the time, buy things not because they need them, but because they want them. And because a customer's wants are often inscrutable and/or ephemeral, a good salesperson or marketer must think beyond the obvious when he figures out how to sell things.
Jeffrey J. Fox makes the point this way in How to Become a Rainmaker
"Rainmakers don't sell fasteners or valves or washing machines or double-paned windows or tax audits or irrigation systems or training programs or golf clubs. Rainmakers sell money!
"Rainmakers help the customer see the money. Rainmakers turn benefits into dollars. The plumber who generates the most revenue doesn't charge $50 for a service call, he sells a clean, dry basement for $100, saving the customer a thousand-dollar carpet."
- Michael Masterson
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Word to the Wise: Inscrutable
Something that's "inscrutable" (in SKROO-tuh-bul) is impenetrable; hard to understand.
Example (as I used it today): "Because a customer's wants are often inscrutable and/or ephemeral, a good salesperson or marketer must think beyond the obvious when he figures out how to sell things."
Michael
Masterson
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2006
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