This morning there was a car accident outside of my house.  The two cars hit so violently that the back of one car spun around and hit a car parked on the side of the road pushing it 15 ft up the road and onto the curb.  Surprisingly, no one was hurt (a testament to the wonders of seat belts and air bags – God bless the engineers). 

 

The woman who owned the parked car came out about 20 minutes after the accident to find that her car was probably totaled.  She threw her hands up in the air and announced that this was just one more thing that had gone wrong with her life that week, starting with losing her job and her unemployment check being delayed.  She had that desperate look of someone life has just hit too hard. 

 

I thought about it though.  She’s lost her job.  Her unemployment check is delayed.  Her car gets totaled.  I see the final one as a gift.  You see, we live within walking distance of a subway stop and two blocks from the bus route.  She has easy access to alternate transportation.  With this one fell swoop she has been freed up from the need to pay for car insurance and gas.  It was an older model car, so it’s likely owned it outright.  She’ll get the settlement check within a week – which is probably faster than her unemployment insurance could show up.  It’s not one more thing that went wrong, it’s the universe finding a way to smooth the way for her. 

 

But that’s my perspective.  And you could say that my perspective is skewed given the fact that they missed my car by inches and it wasn’t my car that was totaled.  But I will tell you that when I was going on my walkabout a few years ago someone broke into my car and stole my laptop computer.  Thankfully, I had just backed it up, so I didn’t lose much data.  And it was an old computer that had been given to me by a friend who had upgraded.  It was worth about $50.  But my insurance covers replacement value, so they gave me $1700 for the computer.  I used the money to pay off my car loan and to fund my trip.  It was truly a gift from the universe.  And in the moment it happened, I knew that it was a gift.  I wasn’t sure how I knew, but I did. 

 

The key was for me not to be attached to how things were.  If I had replaced the laptop simply because I was used to having one, I would have been much worse off.  But because I was willing to let go of having it, other avenues were available to me.  If the woman across the street from me is open enough to accept not having a car for a while, she’ll have some money to tide her over until her unemployment check arrives.  If she is attached to getting back to her comfort zone, then she’ll probably have more expenses to deal with since replacing a car is almost always more expensive than the settlement money they provide. 

 

Where are you attached?  What is your comfort zone?  Are things breaking down around you?  Before you work too hard to replace what gets broken, think about whether you really need it.  Perhaps you could simplify your life instead.  For everything new you want to bring you’re your life, you will likely have to let go of something else to make room for it.  Sometimes that’s an easy sacrifice, other times it’s more difficult – but we usually have a choice.

 

Remember, everything around us happens because it happens.  It is a function of the energy we put out.  Our perspectives are what make things seem “goodâ€? and “badâ€?.  What perspective do you choose today?

Tomorrow I'll begin the Millionaire Mind Seminar based on the book The Secrets of the Millionaire Mind by T. Harv Eker. I'm going for several reasons. First, I love to learn. I love to soak up new ideas and see how those ideas affect my existing concept of the world. Second, I loved the book. It had a lot of really good points in it and I learned a lot from it, so I can only assume that three days of intense training (8am-11pm) will be edifying as well. And third - who doesn't want to improve their relationship with money? There's always room for improvement, right?

Besides, the wonderful thing about going to events like this is that it will re-invigorate me. Learning new things always gets me hyped up to create new products for you and teach you more stuff. There's nothing like wrapping your brain around something new to give fresh life to what you already know.

So - fair warning - I'll be in creative mode in the coming months. New products, classes and concepts will be coming forth. Watch for them. And while you're at it, go out and learn something new for yourself too. (I just love to share the wealth.) And pick up a copy of The Secrets of the Millionaire Mind while you're at it.

Boston Area:  Kathy Scheiern, PhD is considering coming to town to offer her Constellation Therapy Workshop on December 9th.  I've attended the other two events she's done in this area and they were amazing.  I highly recommend attending.  It's great for working on your family and personal issues.  I've even seen people deal with work-related issues in this context.  I don't endorse a lot of people, especially not for personal development related workshops, but this woman is da bomb!

If you are interested in attending, let me know ASAP.  We'd have to find a location in or around the Boston area (I have a few leads I could explore if people were interested).  It's a full day program for $99.00 per person, maximum of 12-15 people depending on the room size. 

If we can tell her that we have enough people, she'll book the flight from Cincinatti.  Otherwise, we'll be out of luck until March when she can make it again.  Call me ASAP if you're interested.  Or make a comment to this post with your contact info.

I spent much of my day today driving back and forth to the last place I lived. My change of address hadn't been processed yet, so I drove 45 minutes each way so that I could vote. I thought it was important to take the time out to exercise my civil duty to vote. (Plus I have a policy - if you don't vote, you don't get to complain if the person you didn't want wins.)

Voting is just one way in which we stand up and take responsibility for our lives, our businesses and ourselves. Did you vote today? What other pieces in your life would benefit if you stood up and took responsibility for them?

Remember, until you take responsibility for something, you can exercise no authority to change it. Step up and claim a part of your life that is out of control today and make a change for the better. And the next time you have the opportunity to vote - take it.

Today is my birthday and I promised myself that I wouldn't do any work today.  So this isn't work.  I just wanted to share something with you that happened to me this morning. 

I got up and decided that I wanted to do something fun for my birthday, so I went online to do a google search to find something cool to do.  In the process, I opened my email and found - to my great joy - an email box full of birthday wishes from people I knew! 

Now I know that almost all of these people had automatic reminders set to to tell them it was my birthday.  And I know that many of the cards I received were stock cards.  But the fact remains that they all put effort into creating a card for me.  They picked which card to send, they personalized the message.  It IS the thought that counts. 

So this morning, I got an email box full of love and good intentions.  Happy Birthday To ME!  Happy Birthday To Me!  Happy Birthday to Me!  Happy Birthday to Me!

Woot!  Whee!