ThrivingTwogether

A new, warped angle

Last night I talked with one of my favorite mentors. He taught me something profound. We had been discussing the difficulty of helping people change poor behaviors. He said something like, "maybe we can help people change by changing the angle their head hits the wall."

In other words we often don't change until we see things differently. Break traditions, break-through.

A new favorite book of mine, Smartcuts, explains how thinking laterally (using a new angle) causes massive breakthroughs. Remember warping in Super Mario Brothers? Warping was a new way of looking at accomplishing a traditional task. Lateral thinking often trumps linear thinking. 

Next time you feel like you're banging your head wall, try a new angle. Maybe even use your Mario hammer and break-through to a Warp Zone!
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LeRoy Road dream home

I recently visited with my two best childhood friends, Gene and Tim, on a visit to Palmyra, New York.

Tim and I reminisced about my childhood home. It was built in 1974, the final year of The Brady Bunch.

My parents had it built after buying an investment property. And they built it after planning and buying sufficient land.

They planned my childhood home, bought the land and then built a 2,000 square foot home with a 1,000 foot garage (huge for when it was built in the 1970's).

In the basement we had a used, free pool table. We had a dartboard and two bedrooms that my dad built. Also we had a large storage area for food and water.

In the family room we had built-in book shelfs lined with encyclopedias and several other books. We also had free standing bookshelves with perhaps 300 non-fiction books. That's where I fell in love with business books, religious books and self-help books.

In the third of four levels we had one of two fireplaces and a large kitchen and living room. There in the kitchen my mom was known to secretly "stretch" our milk by adding water.

And in the upstairs section we had three more bedrooms including my room.

The total cost of that house? $30,000.

Throughout the years we added a pool and a paved driveway and many trees. My parents sold it for over $80,000 about 17 years after they had it built. Now it's worth $139,000.

What pops up when your head is down

A few years ago I decided to get an MBA degree. For years I had felt the need to further my education in order to provide for my family and learn about money and business.

But where should I get my degree?

I knew many big names in business had attended Wharton (Jon Huntsman, Sr., Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Warren Buffet, and Donald Trump to name a few) and so that became my goal. I had a plan and wanted to stick to it: An MBA from Wharton. 

I then put my head down and plowed ahead. I studied everything I could about Wharton. But costs and time commitments seemed overwhelming. I began to search for alternatives.

Stanford, Marriott at BYU, and several others began to emerge as options.

Eventually a friend suggested WGU because he had reviewed WGU curricula. In then end I saved $165,000 and two years of time. 

A great idea emerged, while I applied my original plan. 

Clayton Christensen  beautifully explains emergent ideas in his reflective book, How Will You Measure Your Life?. We must move ahead with ideas yet remain wide open to new emerging ideas.

Most growth in marriage comes from emerging ideas. As you lovingly, kindly strategize and brainstorm with your spouse new, better ideas will always emerge.

Emergent ideas  are what pops up when your head is down plowing towards objectives. 

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How I roll

As I sat at the dentist today I thought of my daily routine. It's full of disciplined actions calculated to make me more useful to others.

An influential friend once taught me how to maximize each day. And for the last 22 years I have worked at it.

Each day I start with an hour long Spiritual devotional. Sometimes I listen and other times I read to uplifting literature.

Then on my daily commute I listen to part of a transformational book. It may be Percy Jackson, a Seth Godin book, Eat to Live, or Heir to a Dream.

During the work-day I listen to one complete book.

When I need creativity I turn to Pandora while I generate, curate and synthesize ideas. Ideas flow freely when I have inspirational music alternated with pure silence.

On my lunch break I spend 45 minutes at Golds Gym. Cardio, weights, and stretching are my three key focuses. Five or six workouts each week with a week off every few weeks.

Then in the evening I seek to unplug and relax with my family. The six of us eat together most nights. We talk, attend Scouts, visit with friends and read.

Many people wonder how I read/listen to 200 or more books a year, travel several times a year and keep fit.

The secret lies in being inspired by a higher power and then doing daily disciplines that shape my destiny.

A friend shared his formula with me. And now I share it with you: daily develop your body, mind, Spirit and relationships.

Your life will transform into greatness streaming from your small acts of greatness.

A faster train will solve that

How do you get more people to take mass transit?

Advertise? Enact laws? Lower prices?

As I tried to keep up with a commuter train today, I determined to take the commuter train if it could get me to my destination twice as fast as my car.

I could be persuaded to take the train if my outcome (early arrival, speed) was built-in.

Same goes for money. Don't make prosperity difficult.

Build abundance into your lifestyle. Make it easy for you and your family to win financially.

Examples:

Want children to save? Buy them coin collection kits/open bank accounts. Match the money they save.

Want children to spend less? Get rid of commercial TV (Roku anyone?). Buy or borrow their favorite books.

Want more time together as a family? Invest in more family gadgets such as trampolines, board games, ping pong, Foosball  and books.

Most people aren't bad, they just need good systems.

Make change easy. Embed greatness into simple systems.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Image courtesy Wikipedia)

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My new eBook is now available. It contains several of the best blog posts from the first year. Feel free to share.

7 Deadly Financial Sins

1. Rarely review your bank account
2. Make unilateral decisions for your family
3. Don't look around for good deals, buy the first thing you see
4. Give handouts to your children (especially when they get older)
5. Blame spouse for any monetary problem
6. Cease looking for better income opportunities
7. Never study a book on frugality or abundance

 

(Photo credit: freedigitalphoto.net)