About

WARNING: If you’ve come to this site to find some “secret” to success, then this probably isn’t the place for you. I don’t want to burst your bubble, but simply put, there are no secrets to success. None whatsoever. Just principles that, if followed, make life work and if not, make life miserable.

Believe me, it’s so easy to succumb to the expectation of others or to some external definition of success. Doing so, however, will turn you away from your inner voice and violate your inner convictions. That will really damage you. I know. It caused me to fail, miserably, twice.

The first time was because of rank hypocrisy. I tried to enter the self-help market because it was a “booming” market and I thought I could “make a killing”. Yeah, right. I was 402 lbs. and single because I was a cynic and nobody could stand being around me. But on the Internet “nobody knows you a dog”. And I was going to tell people how to improve their lives — uh, huh. Eventually the guilt and effort of trying to hide who I was ate at me and wore me down until I finally admitted the truth to myself and shut down my site. I was an idiot and a hypocrite and I quit because I needed to pay attention to what I was “saying” and start living it. Since then I’ve lost over 130 lbs. and am still losing. I’m still single, but now it’s by choice and not by driving people away (at least I hope).

The second time was because I pushed too fast following all the “advice” from the blogging gurus. Publish every day, and do all this social media stuff and do this and do that etc., etc., etc. Unfortunately, attempting to do all that stuff completely exhausted me and sucked up every ounce of creativity I had in me. I totally burned out, and my blog has been shut down for over a year because of it.

So I took another break, only this time I looked at all I had been told to do and all I knew about myself, sat back and used my brain. I actually thought about things instead of blindly following or reacting to the “experts”. As a result, I came to the following conclusions:

1. People want to be free to pursue the things that make them come alive. When they are not, they slowly shrivel up and die inside
2. I truly believe that people want to positively impact their world in one way or another. They want to have influence, be remembered, touch lives, leave a legacy.
3. I believe that the best way to achieve #2 is to use our minds to create value and, with that value, engage in trade with others
4. I believe passionately that freedom is vital to creating a healthy environment where we can create value and engage in trade
5. Though I believe charity has a place, trade is superior because it allows all parties involved to maintain personal dignity and a positive self-image
6. I believe that the Internet allows us to trade the value we create on a scale never before achieved by mankind
7. I’m not a guru. I don’t have all the answers. I don’t claim to. There are principles I’ve learned both in the personal development arena and the online business arena. These principles I’ll share on this site. But I view my purpose as helping you discover and implement your own answers
8. People need encouragement and an environment that is safe for them to do their own explorations. In order to do that they need a place where they can discuss ideas, get feedback and encouragement to continue until they reach their desired success. They need a place where they can “think out loud” and get the support they need for doing so. I’m building this site in the hope that it will be that place for you

I invite you to explore the site and feel free to contact me with questions or ideas of your own. If there is anything I can help you with as you go on your journey, please let me know.