The Circle of Life
Archives: Daily Issues
Issue #2535
- WEALTHY: Profits calling… (Rick Pendergraft)
- HEALTHY: Is surgery the only option? (Kelley Herring)
- WISE: Buddha on the source of wisdom
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- Searching for miracles in everyday life (Robert Ringer)
- Sprinkle your sales copy with plenty of these (Suzanne Richardson)
- It’s Good to Know… 5 useful Latin phrases
- Add "svengali" to your vocabulary
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An Oldie but Goodie for This Market
When the market is behaving badly and all the Johnny-Come-Lately stocks are getting beaten down, the best thing you can do is go with a tried-and-true company. And there aren’t many companies that are more tried-and-true than AT&T.
The biggest domestic telecom is an attractive play right now. The company may not be super-exciting, but with a long-term growth rate of 6.74 percent and return on equity of 12.16 percent, slow and steady will win the race.
AT&T has pulled back with the rest of the market, but the stock found support near 22, just as it did in ‘05. The best part about this pullback is that the stock is now yielding 5.6 percent and the dividend looks safe. Though many companies are cutting their dividends, it looks like T will hold steady.
With safety being a major concern right now, AT&T is as safe as they come. Sometimes it is better to bet on the tortoise than it is to bet on the hare.
[Ed. Note: The market may not look so hot right now. But you should be ready to take action when the moment strikes. Some incredible opportunities are headed your way, and market analyst Rick Pendergraft has put together an educational program that lays out the simple steps you need to take advantage of them. Not only do you get three months of Rick's best recommendations, you also learn how to make good investment choices yourself. Get the details here.]
"Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind."
Buddha
The Circle of Life
Throughout much of my life, I paid little attention to the miracles that surrounded me. I was too busy thinking about business and money… too busy being annoyed by annoying people. I had no time to think about the real world – the world that matters. Nature and I were perfect strangers.
Funny how life plays out. Who would have thought that some of my best friends would turn out to be trees?
I know that people often say a dog is man’s best friend – and I like dogs… so long as someone else feeds them, walks them, and, well, does all the rest of the stuff that goes along with having a dog as your best friend. But what I like best about trees is that they take care of themselves… and, unlike dogs, they usually outlive you.
My favorite trees are the 75 or so that jut out from the back-left corner of my house at a 45-degree angle, like a perfectly drilled platoon. I visit my leafy pals – who shield me from the outside world – just about every day. In the slightest breeze, they whisper their secrets to me.
A few weeks ago, my trees were having a special evening. Their leaves had turned multi-shades of gold, brown, and reddish-purple. There was a chill in the air, and it was as though they were letting me know they were packing it in for the winter.
On this fine evening, Ravel’s "Bolero" felt right. I hadn’t played that CD for more than a year, but for some reason my hand pulled it off the shelf. As I watched my trees and listened to the music, I thought about the man I used to be. Then I thought about my new best friends… whispering to me through their fluttering leaves… with Ravel’s "Bolero" capturing their message symphonically.
The magical music also brought to mind Dudley Moore in the classic film 10. Remember Dudley Moore, that funny little English guy with the club foot… obsessed with Bo Derek… and, his ultimate fantasy, ending up in bed with her in the posh Las Hadas Hotel in Manzanillo, Mexico… with Ravel’s "Bolero" playing triumphantly on the soundtrack? How in the world could I have possibly known that less than 10 years later I would live in a villa right next door to that very hotel, and that my son would be born in Manzanillo?
Hard to believe, but Dudley Moore has been dead for more than six years now. And Bo Derek, the 23-year-old "10" in the film is now 52 years old, a grown woman fending for herself… her outrageously handsome svengali of a husband, John Derek, having passed on a full decade ago. These wandering thoughts brought a nostalgic smile to my lips. Yet, at the same time, made me feel sad about how relentlessly life moves forward.
My eyes and thoughts shifted back to the trees.
Soon, I thought to myself, most of the trees will be bare and their appearance will once again be somber. Happily, they are reborn every spring, live life to the fullest in the summer, enter the twilight of their lives in the fall… then, finally, they seemingly die. But not really. In truth, they merely hibernate. It’s more like recycling than death.
Death is but an illusion. And not just for trees in the winter. When a human being dies, he, too, is recycled. Not one atom of the body is lost. The atoms are simply rearranged when the soul moves on. How are they rearranged? It’s not our job to figure that out. As Deepak Chopra put it in his book Life After Death:
"A drop of water becomes vapor, which is invisible, yet vapor materializes into billowing clouds, and from clouds rain falls back to earth, forming river torrents and eventually merging into the sea. Has the drop of water died along the way? No, it undergoes a new expression at each stage. Likewise, the idea that I have a fixed body locked in space and time is a mirage. Any drop of water inside my body could have been ocean, cloud, river, or spring the day before. I remind myself of this fact when the bonds of daily life squeeze too tight."
When Chopra says "the bonds of daily life squeeze too tight," it sounds very much like the pressure I felt back in the days when business and making money were the only things I thought about… and still feel occasionally. Perspective is a magic tool for easing those bonds.
Which brings me back to my Ravel’s "Bolero" evening a few weeks ago. My thoughts drifted away from the movie 10, and I began thinking about the recently deceased Paul Newman and a scene from one of his most memorable films, Cool Hand Luke.
Newman’s character, Luke, had escaped from a prison chain gang earlier in the day, and a posse was closing in on him. He takes refuge in an old abandoned church and begins talking to God about what a hard case he has been all his life.
Finally, he gets down on his knees and asks God what he should do. Just then, his fellow escapee, Dragline (George Kennedy), bursts in the side door and frantically warns him that the police are outside. Whereupon Luke, displaying that classic Newman grin, looks up at the ceiling and says, "Is that your answer, Old Man? You’re a hard case too, ain’t you?"
I’ve thought about that scene many times over the years, because the truth is that none of us has a clue about what the "Old Man" has in store for us, and it seems to me that it takes a great deal of arrogance to claim otherwise.
I often think that the world we are so bogged down in is nothing more than a gigantic hoax that nature has played on us. I’m talking about the world we spend most of our time focusing on – the world of media pundits who spew the same old cliches at us day after day… politicians who offer to give us more of our neighbors’ wealth if we will just agree to give them power over our lives… multi-millionaire athletes who lead us to believe that their triumphs will somehow make our own lives more worthy and fulfilling… nonsense and illusions that must surely cause nature to smile at us condescendingly.
In my heart of hearts, I believe that what we normally think of as the real world isn’t real at all. It’s as though we’re all children acting out a play on a spherical stage spinning around in space.
But the trees… and everything else that we call "nature"… perhaps they know the answers to all the questions whirling around in our heads: How did we get here? Why are we here? Where are we going? The fact is that we just don’t know. Walt Whitman may have come up with an answer that transcends all others when he wrote, in his poem Miracles, "To me, every hour of the light and dark is a miracle, every cubic inch of space is a miracle."
And speaking of miracles, the miracle of spring isn’t as far away as you might think. I love spring, because it invigorates the soul by serving as a reminder that nothing ever really dies. If you, too, sometimes feel the need to ease the bonds of daily life, I highly recommend that you start taking a closer look at the real world – the world that’s all around you – and spend less time thinking about the shallow, insane world that most of the human race only believes is real.
[Ed. Note: Improving your life starts from the inside out. Yes, you need to take action in order to move yourself forward to success. But sometimes you need a little push to get yourself going... and some simple techniques to help you accomplish your dreams. Discover 189 ways to get everything you want out of life.
For a treasure chest of proven ideas, strategies, and techniques for increasing your income many times over, check out Robert Ringer's best-selling dealmaking audio series. And be sure to sign up for his Voice of Sanity e-letter.] http://www.robertringer.com/]
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4 Simple Ways to Make Your Writing More Readable
Getting your prospective customer to start reading your sales copy is your most important task as a marketer. But if your readers get turned off just by looking at it, you’ve lost them – and any potential sales – for good.
One of the best – and easiest – ways to make your writing more readable is to add more white space. But Charlie Byrne recommends four other super-simple "tricks":
1. Use dashes.
2. Use bullets.
3. Use ellipses.
4. Occasionally bold and italicize key words and phrases.
Solid blocks of text look boring. Worse, they look like work. Sprinkling your text with bullets, dashes, ellipses, and bold or italicized words breaks up the text and makes it look easy to read… which automatically makes it more inviting to your reader.
Then, once you get your prospect to start reading, you can win her over with your persuasive, compelling sales copy.
[Ed. Note: Writing well is one of the most valuable skills you can learn. And if you master one type of writing - copywriting - you can persuade and influence others... sell more for clients who hire you (and command top dollar)... start your own business... and much more. Get all the secrets behind mastering this skill right here.]
Dear ETR: How Can I Clean Out My Arteries Without Surgery?
"I need your advice. I had an angiogram and I have 3 plugged arteries. The doctor at Stanford hospital said the dye they use in heart surgery may damage my kidneys to a point where I might need dialysis from then on. I am hoping you have a suggestion to clean out my arteries without surgery and kidney damage."
Peter K.
Manteca, CA
—
Dear Peter,
You might want to look into chelation therapy. While it is widely used to remove heavy metals from the body, it has recently been successfully used as a non-surgical treatment for clearing the arteries.
Chelation (from the Greek word "chele," which means "to claw") uses a chemical reagent – ethylene diamine tetra-acetic acid (EDTA), tetrathiomolybdate (TTM), DMSA (succimer), penicillamine, metallothionein (MT), and others – to grab onto a mineral and cause the body to excrete it in the urine. And there are several theories on how it works to clear the arteries.
One theory is that chelation directly removes calcium found in fatty plaques that block the arteries, causing the plaques to break up. Another theory is that it may stimulate the release of a hormone that, in turn, causes calcium to be removed from the plaques or causes a lowering of cholesterol levels. A third theory is that chelation therapy may work by reducing the damaging effects of oxygen ions (oxidative stress) on the walls of the blood vessels. Reducing oxidative stress could reduce inflammation in the arteries and improve blood vessel function.
Chelation has been found to be a safe, effective alternative to coronary bypass surgery or balloon angioplasty. The average cost is about $100-$125/treatment, with 20 to 30 treatments normally prescribed. It is typically not covered by insurance (which means $2,000-$4,000 out of pocket), but is far less costly or invasive than bypass surgery.
The Integrative Medicine Group at Stanford may be able to help you find a physician in your area offering chelation therapy. Also, you may be interested to know that a clinical trial is being run by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The "Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy" will involve more than 2,000 patients at more than 120 locations (including Stanford). You may be eligible. Find it online at clinicaltrials.gov. Frequently asked questions can be found at nccam.nih.gov/news/2002/chelation/q-and-a.htm.
Remember, chelation is not a cure-all. Like surgery and drugs, it doesn’t treat the underlying cause of the problem. That’s why it is essential to embark upon a full-spectrum wellness program that includes healthy dietary changes and exercise. I’m not a physician, so make sure you check with your primary care physician about all your options.
- Kelley Herring
[Ed. Note: For expert advice on the best foods to eat, easy exercise routines you can do, as well as how you can apply the latest health breakthroughs to your own life, sign up for ETR's natural health newsletter. Get your free roadmap to feeling better and living longer right here.
Who says dessert can't be healthy? Nutrition expert Kelley Herring's brand-new recipe e-book, Guilt-Free Desserts, reveals 40 easy-to-make, mouthwateringly delicious, 100% healthy desserts you can make at home. Order today, and you'll receive the e-book Healthy Holiday Hors d'Oeuvres for free.]
It’s Good to Know: 5 Useful Latin Phrases
• ne plus ultra (nay ploos UL-trah) – literally "not further beyond" – is perfection, the highest point of excellence or achievement.
• persona non grata (per-SOH-nah nohn GRAH-tah) – literally "person not pleasing" – is someone who, for some reason, is not wanted or welcome.
• quid pro quo (kwid proh KWOH) – literally "something for nothing" – is an equal exchange or substitution.
• sine qua non (sin-neh kwah NOHN) – literally "without which not" – is an essential, crucial, or indispensable element or condition.
• sui generis (SOO-ee JEN-er-is) – literally "of its own kind" – describes a person or thing that is unique, in a class by itself.
== Highly Recommended ==
So Simple, You’ll Wonder Why You Didn’t Think of It!
What if everything you want to do could be just a little bit easier?
• That raise you’ve been gunning for could be suddenly within your grasp…
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Sometimes, the most powerful strategies for achieving success are the simplest ones.
But once you’ve mastered them, success is right there in front of you.
Word to the Wise: Svengali
A "svengali" (sven-GAH-lee) is a person who completely dominates another, usually with selfish or sinister motives. Svengali was the name of the hypnotist villain in the novel Trilby by George du Maurier.
Example (as used by Robert Ringer today): "Bo Derek… is now 52 years old, a grown woman fending for herself… her outrageously handsome svengali of a husband, John Derek, having passed on a full decade ago."
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker ... build your self-confidence and intellect ... increase your attractiveness to others ... just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR's new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2008
I am so happy you brought back the artical about Gene Schwartz,I wanted to order it when I saw it some months ago but at the time I didn`t.Then when I wanted to find it I couldn`t. Thanks again
I am trying to desperately start an online
marketing business because I am being too old
or over qualified. I have made $10,000 a month
selling power supplies for a distributor/ I should have been doing something like this 15 years ago. But I feel great and am healthy. Your articles are very inspiring to me as they are more of a specific nature. Everyone has a website that will make you a million. But how do you chose the one out of all those that won’t?
Again very Informative, Thank You,
Timm Timmermann