by Nicola Cairncross

So what are the Entrepreneurial Traps?

Jaworsky talks about a book called "The Hero With A Thousand Faces" by Joseph Campbell, where Campbell talks about the heroic quest or journey, describing the changes that people and organisations alike can go through.

The picture begins with the "wasteland", the inauthentic life where nothing feels good, everything feels empty; before you receive the "call to adventure", to become what we are meant to become, to achieve our "vital design".

It may take years and we may ignore it for a long time, but if we hear and respond to the call we cross the threshold and begin the journey, into the unknown. This is when the "predicable miracles" start to occur, like unseen helping hands. This is the point at which our freedom and destiny merge, where we encounter a series of traps, trials, tests and "ordeals".

These traps, trials, tests and ordeals test our commitment to the direction we have taken and they provide opportunities to learn from failure. This is probably the most useful part of the journey as it teaches us different ways to think. Remember in "Conversations With Millionaires" where they say that the best reason to decide to become a millionaire is because of what you will learn along the way?

The traps along the way can cause you to regress to your old ways of thinking and acting. They hinder the process of your becoming part of the unfolding of the universe and it’s abundance, and we fall into those traps principally when the stakes are really high, when lots is happening, things going beautifully and a lot of money is involved.

When we fall into a trap, Jaworsky says, a vicious circle can begin to operate and things go from bad to worse very quickly. But if we are aware of our traps and remain alert to their danger, we can largely avoid their consequences.

The Trap of Responsibility
is where you…

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by Diane Lance, Graduated Money Gym Platinum Member

Hi Nicola

Just thought you’d like to know I’ve taken the plunge and I am buying a new family home in Lewes, and I’m going to rent out my property in Brighton. 

A scary prospect for me as money is going to be tight for a while.  I bounced my fears off to our very own Maria Davies and she came back with some wise words - I’ve copied the email trail below and wondered if any of your readers would benefit from them as many people must go through the same feelings and fears.

I’ve come a long way since we first made contact in July 2005, you told me then I could be financially free with a bit of work and bottle but at the time it was too new and I didn’t have the b*lls to do it.  Well, if this new deal all works out then we will own about £920K worth of property, two thirds of which is self- financing. If we can get through the short term cash flow issues then I’m hoping in a few years’ time we should be very comfortable.

I hope the story is of interest.
Love, Diane

continue reading this story by clicking the link below!

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by Perry Marshall, Google Adwords Guru

Twelve differences between those who dream and those who act:

1- Wanna-be’s obsess about ideas. Entrepreneurs obsess about implementation.

2- Wanna-be’s want more web traffic. Enrepreneurs focus on sales conversion.

3- Wanna-be’s focus on positive thinking. Entrepreneurs plan for multiple contingencies.

4- Wanna-be’s want to get on TV and get "famous." Entrepreneurs build their list.

5- Wanna-be’s seek a perfect plan. Entrepreneurs execute and adjust the plan later.

6- Wanna-be’s wait for their lucky break. Entrepreneurs engineer four, five, six plans and execute them in tandem, wagering that at least one plan will get traction.

7- Wanna-be’s fear looking stupid in front of their friends. Entrepreneurs willingly risk making fools of themselves, knowing that long-term success is a good trade for short-term loss of dignity.

8- Wanna-be’s shield their precious ideas from harsh reality, postponing the verdict of success or failure until ’someday.’ Entrepreneurs expose their ideas to cold reality as soon as reasonably possible.

9- Wanna-be’s put off practicing basketball until they’ve got Air Jordans. Entrepreneurs practice barefoot behind the garage.

10- Wanna-be’s believe what they’re told, believe their own assumptions. Entrepreneurs do original research and determine what paths have been already trod.

11- Wanna-be’s believe they can do anything. Entrepreneurs do what they’re gifted for and delegate the rest.

12- Wanna-be’s think about the world in terms of COULD and SHOULD. Entrepreneurs think in terms of IS and CAN BE.

If you’re a real entrepreneur - and if you qualify - you can be admitted to Roundtable, a forum where #1 players in many realms gather three times a year and sharpen their games.  It commences in Chicago next month with a 2-Day, Four-Man marketing intensive. You and three others will have run of my office, with access to any and every success tool I’ve got. The rest of the world and all its distractions will be shut out. In less than 48 hours, see your web traffic and sales spike. Apply here:

http://adwordsstrategy.com/renaissance/roundtable.htm

SECOND LIFE  by
SL Money Gym Wealth Coach, Hermione
Watanabe

Nicola’s phone and broadband crash is
holding up the lettings of my new luxury
apartments in

Second Life a bit; I had "To Let"
signs to put up (my first attempt at 3D
Modelling, please notice!) on the
windows of the luxury new build
apartments and wanted to show my sister,
Larimar Watanabe, around the show home,
the decor of which the architect
FenwayMonster Greene described as
"awesome".

Shopping in

Second Life is such fun and the new
man had some very helpful suggestions on
where to go - saved me hours!

The realtor, Gwendolyn Fonck of Fonck
Realty, has been over and had a look,
and likes them a lot apparently. I have
been doing some research on rents for
beachfront property, and am thinking
they’re worth between L$1000 (US $3.70)
and L$1500 (US $5.55) a week, for a long
term let, perhaps? More for short term.
Difficult to tell, as property is so
diverse, so we will see what Gwendolyn
says.

I need L$584 (US $2.16) a week per unit
to cover the land tier fees on the three
parcels (I get my own parcel for free
then) so anything over that is profit.
L$1500 per week x 8 units would bring in
US $120 a month profit to spend in world
on more land, new builds and SHOPPING!

Talking of virtual cash, Business Week
have just published their first "Virtual
World Rich List". Douglas MacMillan
reports…

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by Nicola Cairncross

Well, we are in the new house! Steve
organised everything with military
precision; the home line and broadband
was working before we had even moved,
even the surround sound on the TV was in
and working - the only thing we had to
wait for was for BT to install Steve’s
office line.

So on the fourth day after we moved in,
enjoying the sea views from three rooms,
instead of just one, the extra space,
the fitted wardrobes (I never knew you
could get so much joy from fitted
wardrobes! the mirrors double the
feeling of space….) the engineer
arrived and after much gadget beeping
and scratching of heads, Aaron from BT
announced that there was a problem
finding the connection to the road and
the "Outside Team" would have to be
called.

Not a good sign, after last year’s
experiences.

At about 4.30pm, a lone man in a van
arrived and started digging up the
pavement. Leaving a hole and some
"Beware" signs, he duly departed for us
to discover…. that we had no domestic
phone and much, much worse, NO
BROADBAND!!!!
Argghhhhhhhhh!

And they are now saying (after hours
waiting on the phone and navigating the
automated system) they can’t get anyone
back here till tomorrow - 2 whole days!

This is hell for us. And totally
unacceptable considering Steve went to
such pains to make sure there was
broadband before we moved in.   
Steve was immediately asking that he
come back and fix it NOW!, but to no
avail. Typical! The first night with
everything all straight and no kids and
neither of us could get online! Steve is
so FED UP!

Add that to the fact that we are both
dieting for summer and there were some
pretty grumpy faces around!

Talking of which, I’ve lost over…

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by Hermione Watanabe

Nicola says:  We are starting to get questions about
Wealth Creation in Second Life (SL) at our Money Gym office (teleport to 61,158,58). A number of people have
joined the Money Gym Club in SL, and this week, we received
our first "burning question" from a Second Life
member. People in SL are just
as keen to make money as people in Real Life (RL), as the Linden Dollar
has a real monetary value, and people making a living in SL/RL
is growing (see the Note From Nicola further down).

Nobby Negulesco asked his burning question:

“I have decided I want to be wealthy one day (the sooner
the better actually!) but, I would really like to know,
where do I start?”

Hermione says:

“Great question! Deciding that you want to be wealthy is
a fantastic starting place, as many people never even get to
that point.

Next you have to decide that it’s OK for you to be wealthy;
it’s not wrong or immoral or evil in some way. That, by
becoming wealthy, you won’t be depriving someone else, who
you may perceive as "more worthy".

Decide that you will become wealthy by serving others,
filling a need or fixing a pain for as many people as
possible, by providing a product or service that is needed,
and that you will not put money in your pocket by depriving
someone else of value.

At the same time, you will recognise that money is just a
way of exchanging energy, and recognise that your future
customers are grown ups and that they will make their own
buying decisions, and they will decide if your product or
service (your energy) is of value to them, and they will
decide if they can afford it, and how much they can afford
to pay (their energy).

Then you need to realise that there are only four ways to
become wealthy (the Four Lanes of the Wealth Highway), and
that the ideal scenario is to work on a primary one and a
secondary one. This may be as well as your day job (which
just pays the bills) and if your day job involves very long
hours, or if you have a family as well, I would recommend
picking just one to get you started.

The Four Lanes are: Business, Property, the Internet and the
Stockmarket, and which one you choose will depend on your
personality, strengths and interests.

You will also need to get some education about how to do
those four things properly (successfully) and you will want
to find a mentor, who can guide you and save you making all
the awful mistakes that a new person in those four fields
can make - and believe me, I’ve made some horrendous
mistakes in all four, due to lack of education or a mentor.

Then you must ask yourself "Do I have surplus money and no
time, or do I have surplus time, but no money?".

If the former, then you are ready to invest in one of the
Four Lanes, you just need to decide which, and find out how.

If the latter, then you need to decide to make more money
(that is, above and beyond your everyday needs) in one of
the Four Lanes, and then to decide to invest it in income
producing assets, not spend it on shoes and holidays.

Delayed gratification is crucial at this point!

For example if you are highly analytical, and good with
numbers, and in a hurry, you might like to try trading on
the US stock markets. If you already have some money to
invest, but no time, you will need to find out how to invest
in the stockmarket for the long term (there is a great,
proven strategy in The Money Gym book that takes a Sunday
morning per year, and returns over 20% year on year).

If you are an "early adopter", love learning and find the
internet fascinating, and pick things up very quickly, then
you might want to learn how to make money online. You could
start with making money from recommending other people’s
products or services and earning an affiliate commission,
then move on to building a long term, sustainable internet
business.

If you love the idea of property, you will need to educate
yourself about what makes a GREAT property deal. Then you
can either find great deals and sell them on to cash-rich
but time-poor investors, or do a 50/50 deal, where they put
the deposit and fees down, and your 50% is earned by finding
the deal in the first place!

** Just for today, Friday 20th April
2007, you can buy Andy Shaw’s great book **
on Property
Investing and educate yourself on how to build a
multi-million property portfolio in 180 days… visit the
following link for more info:
http://www.AskNicolaCairncross.com/Recommends/AndyShaw

If you have the cash yourself, find the deals and JUST BUY
THEM. One x 1 bedroom flat a year for the next five years
will make you…

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Marion Ryan says:

Have you come across The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D Wattles?  I’m just re-reading it and had forgotten what a treasure of a book it is.  And guess what? You can download your own e-book copy of it right here completely free.

WW wrote this classic back in 1910 and the reason I’m talking about SOGR today is because so many of us feel guilty about wanting to make money.  Is that you too? 

At some level we believe that there is something virtuous or spiritual about our money bucket having just enough to cover the essentials but not too many luxuries.  After all, not only are babies starving in Africa but closer to home, many people live below the poverty line so it seems kind of greedy or grasping to want more than our ‘fair share’.

And some of us decide therefore that if we commit to invest in property, create a portfolio of shares or build up our businesses, we must justify this to ourselves by telling ourselves it will enable us to help those worse off.  So our wealth creation is only valid if we keep altruism to the front of our minds.

Wallace Wattles thinks otherwise - he says eat, drink and be merry!

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By Marion Ryan

It’s hard to beat being present when a coaching client has an insight about the workings of the universe.

She came on the call buzzing with energy despite the late hour and a long day at work.  Things were falling into place so neatly, like when you get near the end of a thousand piece jigsaw and are finally able to see how those last odd pieces fit together.  So I asked her what she’d been up to.

And she told me about all the successes she’d been having.  All those areas which just a few weeks ago had seemed like giant obstacles, she had now found creative solutions for.  And what was happening was far better than she could have hoped for.

But the point was this.  Nothing she had wanted or planned for at the beginning of the year was coming to pass.

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Written in 2004 by Judith Morgan

It’s all about money… or is it?   Why did you set up in business for yourself?   In my own case it’s because I was unemployable.   I thought I was smarter than everyone I had ever worked for, I was bored in most of the jobs I had, and I thought I was worth a lot more than I could earn in a job.   

At the age of 22, when I first became self-employed as an accountant, I was terrified but exhilarated, ambitious, hungry and I had lots to prove.   But mainly I wanted to make lots of money for myself and that hasn’t really changed much. 

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Douglas MacMillan reports…

"Their avatars and names are fictitious, but their bankrolls are plenty real; get to know Second Life’s top earners and find out how they did it

Meet the virtual world moguls. The number of Second Life residents generating more than $5,000 in monthly income has more than quadrupled to 116 in the past year, according to San Francisco’s Linden Lab, owner of Second Life.

BusinessWeek.com made a stab at finding out who’s raking in the most, and how.   Virtual real estate has been the most lucrative industry from the start.

The top land baron, Ailin Graef, became the first Second Life millionaire in November. Some Second Lifers are making a mint off consulting fees from the real-world corporations that are entering the virtual world.

And there’s a rapidly growing industry in designing clothes, accessories, and animation for avatars."

READ MORE HERE >>>>

Picture courtesy of Second Life Herald www.SecondLifeHerald.com