Now some of you are looking at this post title and saying to yourself “What the heck is Dave calling me?” I’m not saying that you are using social media to sell your body to others for money but, a lot of people are using social media to push their businesses to make a quick buck. To me, this is very similar to a “Street Walker” asking every John that passes her what can I do to get your money? When it comes to social media, are you going to be a force for good? Or are you going to turn to the dark side – ruining your chances and infuriating those who cross your path?

Are You A Social Media Prostitute?

Social media when used properly is about building relationships and not about instant money. I’m sure all of you see it time and time again, but maybe you don’t realize that you may be doing similar things. Selling your reputation for a quick sale in social media will be your demise in the future. Just like a prostitute, many people on the internet are looking for the quick buck! For those who use this approach, the money will come from time to time, but in the end, do you really think these people can hold their heads high? Building integrity should be first and foremost and then the monetary rewards will come in the end.

Unfortunately too many people using social media don’t understand these basic concepts. Everyone is looking for that Winning Lotto Ticket and will do almost anything to hit those winning numbers. Social Media is not a sprint. It’s a marathon! Building relationships for the future should be our focus and not about some small instant gratification today.

Now what do I mean when I say “Are You A Social Media Prostitute?” Let’s take a look at it from a funny comedian’s perspective to keep it lite and humorous. As Jeff Foxworthy might say:

Do you add friends on Facebook and then immediately pitch them on your business? Then you might be a Social Media Prostitute!

Do you upload videos on the internet mainly about your opportunity? Then you might be a Social Media Prostitute!

While building your relationships on the internet, you’re thinking how can I sell this person! Then you might be a Social Media Prostitute!

If you have more than two posts on your blog about your business and give links to your biz site. Then you might be a Social Media Prostitute!

When you post a Tweet that redirects them for a way to make you money, then you might be a Social Media Prostitute!

Dawn and I see this all the time and most of us don’t like it when it’s done to us PERIOD. We know how a lot of people feel out there. Times are tough and we see all this potential to make money because we have all these friends We are probably in the top 10% for the most friends and followers on the internet, but Dawn and I don’t use this social media spamming approach to make money. Don’t get me wrong. I would love to make a lot of money right now, but social media spamming isn’t going to make this happen. Your reputation and the way you treat others in life is what should come first and foremost! I struggle with this every day myself and want that winning lotto ticket, but I am not going to become a Social Media Prostitute in order to achieve it!

Do me a favor and leave me your thoughts on this post. Am I on target or should we cave in and become a Social Media Prostitute like over 90% of the rest of the people on the net?

Thank You!

Yes, Bill Gates used more than his own abilities to reach his incredible success. In actuality, Bill Gates used several opportunities that allowed him to succeed.

Before we continue, we have to give full credit to Malcolm Gladwell and his book The Outliers – The Story of Success. This post is based on a portion of what we’ve learned from Gladwell.

We’re sure that you’ll agree with Gladwell that Bill Gates is an Outlier. The term “outlier” is a scientific phenomenon that lies outside normal everyday experience. Individuals who are so successful that their story demands a more complete explanation are “outliers” .

Now let’s list some of the opportunities that came Gates way that he took full advantage of:

1. His parents were well off. So when Gates was bored in public school his parents could afford to put him in a private school called Lakeside.

2. The moms of the Lakeside students chose to spend their annual rummage sale proceeds on the school’s first computer terminal (this state of the art computer terminal allowed for real time programming using time sharing) in 1968. In fact, this opportunity was so monumental because Lakeside was the only non-university school to have a terminal computer which was linked to a mainframe in Seattle. Gates found his love of computers and programming when he first sat down in front of the terminal.

3. Lakeside moms to the rescue again. They could pay for the expensive computer user fees to allow students, mainly Gates, to use the terminal for countless hours.

4. As young as an eighth grader, Gates could do real-time programming rather than using the very slow punch-card programming.

5. Gates could spend all his time in the computer lab. By high school, he was able to program eight hours a day seven days a week.

6. At Washington University, he could program for free for hours during the night when the mainframe was not scheduled for any other use.

7. By the end of college, Gates had already spent more than 10,000 hours programming. Below we’ll explain how Malcolm Gladwell performed research to determine that 10,000 hours is the minimum required to master any skill.

8. Gates was born on 10-28-55. Now you may be how your date of birth can be an opportunity. Well, the January 1975 issue of Popular Electronics was the first publication about the very first personal computer kit. So in reality, this was the very beginning of the personal computer industry. According to Gladwell, the best age to be to take advantage of this opportunity was 20 to 21 years of age. Backing up, that means those born in 1954 and 1955 were the perfect age in January 1975.

We were amazed to learn that Bill Gates was lucky in many ways and without some of these great opportunities, he may not be the richest man in the world. We do know that Gates did work very hard to make these opportunities work like everyone must. Gladwell, through the example of Bill Gates and many others, has shown us that taking advantage of opportunities is just as important, or more so, as innate talent to achieve success. In fact, innate talent is not required.

Of all the opportunities that Gates had, Gladwell focused highly on the need for 10,000 hours of practice to guarantee success in any area of skill. One of the success stories he studied to prove his point was about The Beatles, and we’d like to briefly explain how The Beatles, by chance, had accumulated 10,000 hours of practice before they arrived in America for their hugely successful British Invasion. Where did The Beatles have the chance to put in 10,000 hours? It was when they were sent to Hamburg, Germany in early 1960 where they had to play for seven days per week for eight hours per day for nearly a year. So they were not overnight successes. They were incredibly successful because they had put in their 10,000 hours.

So how can we apply this new knowledge to ourselves and our desires to succeed? Well, for starters, we can know that success is not limited to the few individuals who have innate talent. It is available to all of us who look for and take advantage of opportunities.

Second, we all have 10,000 during which we can prepare for our ultimate success by practicing the particular skills that our opportunity requires. Many of us are already well on our way to hitting our 10,000 hours so we just keep doing what we’re doing because we know that time is on our side. Success is not a get-rich quick scheme. 

Success is a 10,000 hour journey during which we take full advantage of every opportunity we find.

Are you going to be the next Bill Gates in your endeavor? You certainly can!!

If this peaked your interest of learning more about this great book, you can visit the following link for more information. http://daveanddawncook.com/31/our-mentors/malcolm-gladwell-outliers/

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Today I was at one of our business locations when I thought of this topic. Picture this; there was a group of young elementary students on a field trip at The Pier in St. Petersburg Florida. While getting ready for their trolley ride, I heard one of the group leaders yelling at the children and telling them to get in an orderly line and be quiet until the trolley gets there. Either DO IT or we’re not going on the trolley. And guess what, the children all got in line and quieted down. Why? Because they wanted something and unless they did what they were told, they thought that they might not be able to do it.

Using threats or other ways of persuasion has almost always been a factor in most of our lives for years. As a matter of fact, did you know that an average child growing up is told the word “NO” approximately 40,000 times compared to the word “YES” at only about 5,000 times? No wonder so many people struggle to become financially successful. We have been programmed to think that we cannot achieve certain things throughout our entire lives. Unless you overcome all this negativity, you will become like most of the masses just getting by.

I don’t know about you but, I don’t think that just getting by would be very much fun. If you want more in life you have to find out how to play by the rules but make the rules work for you. Now if one of those children I talked about earlier stepped out of line and wasn’t quiet they would have gotten in trouble. But the real question is, are you still standing in the line and being quiet yourself as an adult? In order to become successful you need to step out of that line and find a different trolley of your own. Following the group you now follow will get you the same results tomorrow and the day after that and the day after that! Now, do you want to stay in line with the masses or find a different trolley that will take you to success?

Ask Yourself One (Not Very Easy) Question. Who are the people I hang around with most and what are they doing to me?

Do your parents still tell you not to take chances or it’s too risky? Remember these are the people that probably told you “NO” 40,000 times and matched that with “YES” only 5,000 times.

Do you still live in your home town and get together with your old friends and only talk about the good old days?

Are you rushing off after work to Happy Hour vs. going to the Library and picking up a good book that could possibly change your life?

As they say, you become the average of your five closet friends/family members and etc… Think about it for a second. Have you ever caught yourself in that moment and thought to yourself, WOW I just sounded like my Mother/Father? Years of programming my friend, years of programming.

To become successful in life no matter what you consider success to be, you need to surround yourself with those people who are already successful in that area. If you want a great relationship, learn and surround yourself with people that have accomplished just that. If you want a healthier lifestyle, then go to the gym or health food stores and find some new friends. If you want to become a millionaire, then you had better start hanging out with millionaires too.

So in order to be successful you “MUST” surround yourself with those five people in whatever category you desire. (Here’s a hint to find them: They are the ones who stepped out of line as an adult and found their own trolley to success.)

If you want success in the financial category, do me a favor right now. Grab your cell phone and count all the millionaires in your contacts.

Do you have any?

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It sounds like a strange question, but do you know where you are going? Have you made any decisions for yourself in the areas of personal development, finances/wealth, health, relationships, spirituality and lifestyle?

What kind of person do you want to be? How much money do you want to make? What priority will you give to taking care of your health? What kind of relationship do you want with your mate and your family? Etc…

If the answers to these questions are No, then are you going anywhere?

According to all the reading that Dave and I have done from great self-development authors such as Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins, John Maxwell, Jeff Olsen and many others, the answers to these questions comprise your goals. With defined goals you have determined where you want to go and what you want to achieve. Without goals, there is nothing to strive for and you’ll end up stuck in the same spot in many areas of your life.

What we’ve learned from these self-development experts is that well-defined goals with lots of specifics and details and an assigned deadlines must be written down. Writing down your goals with the added detail and due date is the first step to achieving your goals.

An advantage of having your goals written out is that you can review them (and adjust as needed) every day so that your subconscious mind can be put to work to help you reach your goals. Our mentors have said you’ll be quite surprised on what your subconscious mind can contribute when it is focused on your desires. This daily practice of reading your goals will also keep your focus on the major priorities in your life rather than unconsciously focusing on minor things.

The specifics and details that you’ll define for each goal will include the daily action steps that you can apply each day so you can always be progressing towards the achievement of your goals. The only way to reach your goals is to take small steps forward every day.

In closing, determine your goals in all areas of your life since each area is equally important, write those goals down on paper with specifics, details and a deadline, and then document the daily action steps you will do each day for each goal. Then before you know it, you’ll have reached those goals and will be ready to start the process again for your next set of goals for future achievement.

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Dave and I were amazed by the fundamental points that Jeff Olson made in his book The Slight Edge. If you haven’t read it yet or listened to the audio book, we highly recommend it. The audio CDs are great since there is a 20+ minute exclusive with Jeff Olson at the beginning.

Jeff so strongly believes in and has used this slight edge philosophy to create success in all areas of his life. Like us, Jeff has allowed Jim Rohn to be one of his mentors and The Slight Edge is based closely on the philosophies of Jim. One of Jim’s philosophies that Jeff uses is that success occurs over the progression of time. You must plant, cultivate and then harvest to follow the journey to success. In Jeff’s mind, planting and cultivating involve making every decision with your desired result in mind since every decision you make either takes you up the success curve or down the failure curve. You can’t stay in one spot; you are always moving either up or down.

Successful people are willing to do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do and according to Jeff, the things that successful people do are mundane and easy to do. The factor that turns these mundane easy things into success is the progression of time and the resulting compounding of the results. Successful people just keep doing these chosen proven actions over and over again until success comes.

The problem that most people have that are not successful is that the easy mundane decisions and actions are also easy not to do as emphasized by Jeff Olson & Jim Rohn. It is easy not to do these easy things because the results do not happen quickly since there is the old progression of time factor that always comes into play. With no immediate results many people give up when if they continued over time success would come.

There are numerous slight edge decisions that push you up the success curve as well as many slight edge decisions that pull you down the failure curve. The slight edge decision to eat a Big Mac is made because there are no immediate negative health effects. But if that poor slight edge decision is made again and again, over time there will surely be a negative health consequence. As Jeff stresses, we must know that every decision we make matters. Therefore, we must make every decision that will better us and move us closer to success. If we remain consistent in our proper use of The Slight Edge philosophy on a daily basis, we will be will on our journey to success.

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Jim Rohn - One of the Best

I remember back in my corporate life I used to listen to some great mentors.  Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and others just to name a few. But never in my life has anyone changed my thoughts and beliefs like Jim Rohn. Mr. Rohn has given us so much wisdom over the past few years that we could never begin to thank him enough. He has changed our lives.

His passing was a great loss to us all but his legacy will never die.

The most powerful message I remember receiving from Mr. Rohn was his talk on “Why Not You?” He has always been such an inspiration and was always the best at explaining things in such a simple manner. “Why Not You?” really hit home with me and I’ll cherish those words for the rest of my life! Thank You Jim.

He approached this topic by asking four questions: Why? Why not? Why not you? Why not now? As he mentioned over and over again, anyone can change their lives in any two given years. Why not you?

Why not you living in a beautiful beach house in Hawaii?
Why not you traveling to Paris for a weekend getaway with your friends and family?
Why not you becoming smarter because you have read the greatest books in the world?
Why not you having all the money you ever need to live a full life?
Why not you spending all the time you want with you children or grandchildren?
Why not you living a with family that loves you so dearly?

Ask yourself, Why Not You?

That is the key to life. Believe you can do it and, as they say, you can achieve it.  Most of Mr. Rohn’s teachings were so simple that, they were easy to do and easy not to do.  Just continue to learn and grow. That will be the best tribute we could ever offer back to Mr. Rohn’s legacy and teachings.

“It is the set of the sails, not the direction of the wind that determines which way we will go.” – Jim Rohn

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Ostrich Syndrome

If a person doesn’t change themselves, they’ll always get what they got. Period. I’m sure you have heard something along those lines before? And it is very true.

Say a person goes through life doing the same thing over and over again. Do you think they are going to get a different result? Of course not! That would be foolish.

People that do the same thing expecting different results are just plain Stupid!

People go to work at their job everyday doing the same thing day after day but for some reason they can’t figure out why their life Sucks! As our mentor Larry Winget would say, “Their life Sucks because they Suck!” Period. No other reason. It’s that simple. No explanation needed.

The first thing people have to do in order to improve anything in their life is for them to change. Nobody is going to do it for them. The government isn’t. Your boss isn’t. Your preacher isn’t. There is nobody that is going to help you change but YOU.  Think about that for a moment…

If a person’s job sucks, then they need to do something to improve it.

If a person’s love life needs improving, then they need to work on it.

People have what they have all because of them and nobody else!

People for they most part would rather get home from work, have a little dinner, then sit on the couch, watch TV and then go to bed just to wake up and do it all over again.

So just remember, it’s YOU and ONLY YOU that can make a difference in your life.

And if not YOU, then Who?

And if not NOW, then When?

By: Dave Cook

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