Not only one of my favorite actors, but also one of my biggest inspirations, Will Smith is one of the most successful people on the planet. I found this pre-compiled set of clips and decided to share with them with you.  Will shares his is great wisdom on life and the long, yet simple path to success and happiness.

I hope you enjoy it!

Ron

My friend Craig Smith sent the following message on Leadership and it hit home as a reminder of what we - “The entrepreneurs” have to offer - HOPE! Hope to families looking for a second income, or even a first and I believe that the dreams of thousands even millions are relying on our decisions to be leaders right now!

Here’s an excerpt from Craig’s email:

During times of economic scare, global turmoil, and pandemics, leaders naturally rise to the surface. Someone who grew up on a Wisconsin dairy farm said, “Cream always rises to the top - and sometimes pops the lid off the can!” Now more than ever we must engage in and create leadership in our families, communities and our businesses, effectively blowing the lid off the can.

We as leaders have the obligation to help others turn their perspective or “channel” from the Doom, Gloom and Fear Network (DGFN) to the TCB - Taking Care of Business station. I’m told that The Hells Angels motorcycle gang uses as its core credo T.C.B. Now we might not interpret T.C.B. the same way as they do, but the message is clear to me - Take Care of Business, and your business will take care of you!

I believe that as we take care of business (whatever that business entails, from family, to work and even play) that we will have little, if any time for doom, gloom and fear.

John Kenneth Galbraith, U.S. economist (The Age of Uncertainty)
said,

“All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.”

Leaders do not run from “the major anxiety” of their people, but instead they embrace, confront and even challenge people to see with new eyes how their fears may be turned to hope, even opportunity.

I challenge you to confront any anxiety or fear with hope and faith. A wise man once said that doubt and faith cannot exist in the same mind at the same time.

Craig

Over the next several weeks let us each look at our key leadership qualities that will help us all Take Care of Business.

To our success,
Ron

Here’s a copy for you:

Thousands of people are eager to buy what you sell. They want the benefits, the convenience, the comfort or prestige that you can provide. Human beings are an “acquisitive” bunch. We want stuff!

Of course, consumerism can be abused, but buying and selling is the process that creates the life (and the lifestyle) we all want. The “desire to acquire” goes deep, and it’s a good thing.

So, if you aren’t making as many sales as you would like, let me suggest that the problem is not with your customers, but with you. The problem is likely one of the following:

1. Not enough potential customers know about you or that your product could enrich their lives. This is a marketing problem, and as a business leader it is your job to solve it. Let people know! Get out there and get in the game!

2. Or, the other possibility, is that you’re trying too hard to “sell.”

Personally, I have a deep-seated aversion to being “sold” anything. I see websites that seem manipulative or dishonest. I see sales techniques that fail to build trust or credibility, and definitely do not attract me. That’s one reason I’ve turned down the repeated suggestions to use high-pressure conference calls to sell my World Class Life Conference. Calls can be good, but I’ve never liked the sense that they are used to “drive” sales. People don’t like being sold.

But people are eager to buy benefits! They buy solutions to their problems. They buy things that make their lives better, easier, simpler, healthier or more comfortable. They buy stuff that makes them happy. And they buy from people they know and like and trust.

If enough people “know and like and trust” you, they will listen when you offer a product or service that will make their lives better. If they “know and like and trust” you, they will flock to your door and you’ll make all the sales you need.

***Copyright (c) 2009, all rights reserved.
U.S. Library of Congress ISSN: 1529-059X
You may copy, forward or distribute TIP’s if this
copyright notice and full information for contacting
Dr Philip E. Humbert are included. Contact him at:
www.philiphumbert.com  or email to  Coach@philiphumbert.com

What I would like to point out specifically is what he said about “The ‘desire to acquire’ goes deep”

Those of us applying the simple actions concept to business might recall an earlier message about desire. “People will spend money they don’t even have if they desire the item enough and the state of the current economy proves it!”

We, and a society have over-spent, over financed, and maxed-out our future due to a desire to have more than our means. So, If you are marketing a product or service like I am… doesn’t it make sense to educate your prospects and create desire? I think so.

I’ve always heard; “The bigger the problem, the bigger the solution… The bigger the solution, the bigger the profit” The key is that the profit only comes by helping the people that are looking for the solution in the first place!

A lot of what Dr. Humbert is saying about over selling is due to the fact that you might be presenting to someone that isn’t looking for what you have to offer. This is why I look for people who what what I have… They are looking for it because they have experienced something in life that obviously created a huge desire.

The trick, if tricks exist… is to ask questions, listen to what people need… and offer anything you have that will help them. Even if it means you need to send them to a competitor to help them. They will remember that for sure!

To your success,

Ron Maurer

Lists give you the big picture.  So now you have a whole bunch of stuff that you are going to do, it is all in front of you, and you are present to “How am I going to get them all done?”!  The answer is to schedule it.

Scheduling actions gets things out of your head.  Create the specific time period when you are going to do it, and then do it when you say you are going to do it.  You also want to schedule catch up time and your free time and recreation time and anything else that is important to you.  These times are SO important if you want any balance in your life.

Now you might be thinking “I don’t want to be slave to my schedule!”.  Just remember that YOU made up the schedule.  You made it up based on what results you are committed to and what is important to you.  Know that it will only be your thoughts and feelings that will get in the way and notice how those specific thoughts and feelings leave you disempowered and distract you.  Remember, you are just having them.  Let them be there, thank them for sharing, and kiss them good-bye!

Schedule the stuff you don’t want to do along with the stuff you want to do.  Just do it.  Since you have already scheduled the things you want to do that inspire you and will move your dreams forward, you know that they will get done (and when!).  Doing the stuff that you don’t want to do is NOT sabotaging your dreams, it’s being responsible.

To finish up, the most important thing to know is this…  You will only get done what you got done today and you won’t get done what you didn’t get done.  Acknowledge yourself for what you did and didn’t do.  Nothing is wrong, it is just what is so.  Then review your lists, schedule your actions and get some good sleep.  Sweet dreams!

Russ, Once again…Thanks for your timely words, wisdom and consistent willingness to share it!

Yours,

Ron

Thoughts and feelings will never get the job done.  Worrying and rolling things over and over in your head will never get the job done, and you will lose sleep and productivity.  Actions get things done.  A structure for existence is a system or tool you use to get all those thoughts out of head and into the world of action, and discipline will be required to manage your actions.  Your memory is the worst place to keep lists and is totally unreliable.  We WILL forget things.  The structure allows you to be totally present to what you are doing when you are doing it.

The first step is to make lists; three of them.  #1 What I am going to do now, #2 What I am going to do later, #3 What I am never going to do.  Face it, there are a lot of things that we think we have to do and we don’t, really.  Eliminating them right up front will unload a lot of burden.  Then prioritize your remaining two lists.  The first one will be short, the second very long.  As things on list #1 come off, things on list# 2 come on to list #1.  And since life will continue to life us, there will always be more things going onto both lists.  Just write the new stuff down during the day and do nothing with them until you add them to your lists.  You want to review and update your lists every day and have only ONE time during the day to do this.  I recommend the evening.  Plan the next day, not the one you are in.  What would it be like to wake up and know what there is to do today?  What would it be like to go to sleep knowing what you are already going to be doing the next day?

We’ll finish up things with more from Russ on lists tomorrow, Stay tuned!

Thanks for your valuable insight and advice Russ!

Hi Ron!
Good to hear from you.  I’d like to add a little to what you said in your post.  There is tons out there to help manage one’s time.  Companies, businesses, systems, hundreds of books all created to deal with that.  Not all are the right ones for certain individuals; I recommend Mission Control, and some of the content below was learned there.  What is important is to understand your story or interpretation of how time occurs to you.  Creating an empowering context is always the first thing to do.  For instance, if your story about time or yourself is “I don’t have enough time” or “I can’t get it all done”, guess what?  That’s what you will get!  You are always winning the games you are playing, so if this is your game, you will win!!  Create an empowering context for yourself and give up any attachment that you know how to do it.  If you did, you would have already done it.  The space of not knowing how is the space that you will grow into and expand yourself, allowing others to contribute and creates a clearing for new ideas to arise.

Overwhelm is quite distinct from performance and I will only deal with overwhelm for now.  Like everything in life, it is actually very simple in nature and we make it complicated.  Overwhelm is simply the lack of having a structure for existence that is big enough to manage the games that you are playing.  The bigger your games, the bigger a structure is needed to disappear overwhelm.  (You might want to consider that if you never find yourself in overwhelm, you might not be playing a big enough game.)  Overwhelm is an opportunity to expand and get bigger than you know yourself to be.  It is not a bad thing, and we will make it bad if we don’t expand the structures that we use to get out of it.  Over and over again.  You may already think you have a great structure, but are you using it?

I’ll post more from Russ tomorrow when he reviles “The Key to eliminating overwhelm”

It’s amazing, the SimpleActions concept continues to attract people looking to improve one area or another to the site. And even more amazing is how great that makes me feel. Thank You!

Over the last few weeks I have been in a state of overwhelm. Yesterday, with the help of a very dear friend… I went to my own site and reviewed the “Overcoming Overwhelm” post from January 18th, 2009.

Yes, I actually re-read and re-applied my own advice! It was cool. [and it helped]

Another friend suggested that the list created in this process of brainstorming be called your “Success List” rather than calling it a “task” or “to-do” list. And I truly felt Successful yesterday and today as I checked off some of the success items in my new success notebook. [Might as well call it that, right?]

So, if you are feeling a bit of overwhelm in these strange economic times… I suggest you go back to the post and give it a try.

Please feel free to share the site with friends, buddy up and hold each other accountable to the SimpleActions it takes to achieve your goals together.

As always…
Yours,
Ron Maurer

Here’s what you do; Write down what you don’t want first, then as I covered in the “Contracting” blog entry, use that list to mirror or reflect the opposite of what you don’t want.

You can learn more about this in Michael Losier’s book: “The Law Of Attraction”

But what’s this have to do with taxes?

I thought I had a system… Never again would I have to crunch at the last minute to get it all together… Instead, what I did get is a topic for my blog to offer you.

Here’s the deal; I have everything set up so each day, each week, each bank statement, or at least, each month I would have the opportunity to input each transaction for my business (and my personal items) into my quick books system.

The goal? Apply my own simple actions to the task at hand and this year I would be ready with time to spare… All I can say is “Not!”

So, here I am admitting to you that with all the opportunities that I have had to keep ahead of the curve this year I blew it!

Technically; I did get through March… but a hard drive crash took me off track. Then the whole month to fix it took me out of “habit”. And now, it’s the power supply to that computer. All excuses aside; What a perfect example of what not to do.

I didn’t re-set my priorities to fit the circumstances I was up against! If only I had a proper back-up. If only I would have taken April, May, & June to re-do Jan-March.

This is what I turned simple actions into… look close:

A simple action, inconsistently or not done, compounded over time, created a predictably out of control result! Grrr!

So for me, once again… It’s tax season with one catch. I have the crunch coming up to get it done. (the CPA is already ready and waiting for what they need)

A lesson learned about the very thing I teach as admittedly a hard lesson to learn!

Always yours,

Ron

This story by Amy Anderson is definitely one of the best blog articles that I have read in many years.  It covers the story and George’s principles of success that we can all apply to our business and life:

Thanks Amy!
_____

George Foreman has three fundamentals of business success: selling, integrity, and “the shotgun tactic.” Over a lifetime, Foreman has created the kind of well-rounded success that most people dream of. He is a profitable businessman, a community leader, a husband and a father. His life is full, but more importantly to Foreman, his life is meaningful.

With nearly 100 million George Foreman Grills sold since 1995, Foreman has had enormous influence in the wellness industry. He is also one of the highest-paid and most recognized celebrity endorsers in the world.

In 1999, Foreman signed a $137.5 million deal with Salton Inc. (recently merged with Applica Incorporated), entitling the grill manufacturer to global, unrestricted use of Foreman’s name in marketing the Lean, Mean, Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine and related products. The deal made Michael Jordan’s $40 million deal with Nike look small by comparison.

Before his endorsement of the grills, Foreman made business deals based primarily on a desire for income. “I was so successful,” he says. “All the ads I had done for sausages, you name it, [I was] mainly thinking about money. But then I went into the grill business.” He took the grills all over the country, making personal appearances and boosting sales. “I was meeting people who would say, ‘The doctor told me to get a George!’ I’m like, what are they talking about? Get a George?” He realized his product was making a difference in people’s health, and his perspective changed. “From that point on, you know, I can never go back to what I used to do where I just sell and sell,” he says. “Now everything I do has to be connected to something healthy.”

The Importance of Selling
Of course, Foreman’s business success started with his success as an athlete. Born in 1949 in Marshall, Texas, Foreman, nicknamed “Big George,” was one of seven children in a struggling home. By the time he was 15, he was a street thug and mugger in Houston’s dangerous 5th Ward. His life changed when he left for California to join the Job Corps and was introduced to the discipline of boxing. In 1968, Foreman won the Olympic Gold medal in Mexico City, in only his 25th amateur fight. A world champion was born.

Within a few years of turning professional, Foreman’s record was 37 wins—most by knockout—and no losses. In 1973, he defeated Joe Frazier to become heavyweight champion of the world. Despite his fame, he maintained a cold distance from the public, and his surly demeanor earned him occasional boos in the ring. He defended his title twice before losing it to Muhammad Ali in the “Rumble in the Jungle” in 1974.

A few years later, Foreman announced what he thought was his retirement. A religious awakening led him to pursue a life in the church. He didn’t know at the time that the seeds of his business success lay in these days of personal transformation.

“It started because I left boxing in 1977 and worked in evangelism at a church in Marshall,” he says. Foreman had made a fortune in boxing, but now turned his attention fully to his faith. “I spent all my time preaching with lots of money. Lots of money.” But he didn’t preach like a rich man. He spent countless nights out on the streets of Houston, in all weather. Just as in his boxing career, he was relentless.

He also made good on a personal pledge to help at-risk youth, just as he had been helped during his early days as a teenage thug. After he joined the Job Corps, a counselor saw young George’s potential and got him involved in boxing, possibly saving him from a life of crime or jail or worse. Foreman wanted to provide the same kind of opportunities for young people and in 1984 founded The George Foreman Youth & Community Center, which offers scholastic and athletic activities including, of course, boxing.

But 10 years after he left boxing, he says he looked up and was on the verge of bankruptcy. “I had to go back into boxing for our survival, to feed my family.” Fortunately, his years spent preaching on the streets of Houston had taught him valuable lessons that would carry him into a second career as a businessman. “What I found was the 10 years I was out of boxing, I was preaching on the street corner and I’d make people stop. They didn’t know me,” he says, “the old George with an afro and all that. So I realized I could stop these people, who are always headed somewhere, for a second and sell my message. That’s what I learned to do on the street corner.”

He tried applying his newfound skills in the boxing world. “So I went back to boxing trying to sell the old George Foreman heavyweight champion of the world,” he says. “Nobody wanted to buy it, though.” Foreman was 38 when he returned to the ring, a tough sell for any athletic comeback. But the man in front of the camera this time wasn’t cool or removed. He had a gentleness about him that contrasted his toughness in the ring, and that appealed to the public.

“In time, I learned the importance of selling,” he says. Foreman realized he had power outside the ring to influence how people viewed him. In 1994, at the age of 44, Foreman reclaimed the heavyweight title. “That’s when people started to say, ‘This guy can sell himself. Let’s let him sell Doritos or Kentucky Fried or McDonald’s.’ ” And sell, he did. In addition to promoting these companies, Foreman became the spokesman for Meineke Car Care Centers. The boxer and preacher was now an advertiser’s dream come true.

But he says his athletic ability was less a factor in his business success than his selling skills. “If you learn to sell, it’s worth more than a degree,” he says.” It’s worth more than the heavyweight championship of the world. It’s even more important than having a million dollars in the bank. Learn to sell and you’ll never starve.”

Integrity: His Greatest Asset
“The greatest asset, even in this country, is not oil and gas,” Foreman says. “It’s integrity. Everyone is searching for it, asking, ‘Who can I do business with that I can trust?’ ”

By 1994, Foreman’s life was again on the upswing. When he took the opportunity to endorse what is now the George Foreman Lean, Mean, Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine, he found a new drive to help people improve their lives by improving their health. Now he won’t settle for anything less when it comes to endorsements. “One of the biggest things is to fight,” he says. “Just don’t go absolutely for the buck.”

Foreman learned after his fi rst retirement that to go back into boxing he had to protect the brand of George Foreman. “So now I understand you must preserve the quality of your name, your integrity,” he says. “You don’t want to lie about anything. And it’s something that people will be happy about once they get to know you. Because people count on you. You know, a contract you can easily break. I’ve found in business, everyone signs a contract to make a business deal, and they always leave a loophole so they can break them.

Foreman says people with integrity are in high demand. “There are a lot of guys who are successful, they make a lot of big money, I mean millions overnight with a contract, and they don’t understand the evaporation. It evaporates. You’re always back to square one. I found that out, so integrity is how I do business. That’s my main asset.”

This attitude is one he intends to impart to his kids. He has 10 children—five with his current wife, Mary “Joan” Martelly. George III, nicknamed “Monk,” is Foreman’s business manager. “Your children are looking at exactly what you do,” he says. “You’ve got to believe in something. And you’ve got a line that you can’t cross. I point this out.

“I’ll give you an example. I had the opportunity to go into the restaurant business. A chain of restaurants, the George Foreman restaurants. And it was an opportunity right out to make lots of money.” But Foreman is opposed to selling liquor in his establishments, in accordance with his religious beliefs. “And they said, ‘Well, this is what will make more profi ts. You can just donate them to charity.’ I said, ‘No, I can’t do that.’ And my sons, who were in business with me, watching me put this deal together, they could not understand it. They just couldn’t understand. Not to say that they have to have the same feelings I have about things. But at least have something you believe in and you cannot be talked out of by dollars and cents. And that’s what I try to pass on.”

The Old Shotgun Tactic
Foreman is approached by hundreds of potential business partners every year. He reviews offers daily with George III, and asks for input from his wife and children before he signs a deal. So how does he choose from all the opportunities he sees? “I call it the old shotgun tactic,” he says. “My grandfather used to go out hunting during the days of the Depression. The good shooters, the marksmen, shot with one shell.” But during the Great Depression, you couldn’t put all your bets on one bullet because those bullets were expensive. “If you missed the squirrel, so to speak, you don’t have anything but an excuse on the table,” Foreman says. “But if you buy these cheap shots, which are buckshots, they scatter. You come back in with a squirrel. Although you got a lot of buckshot in it, you got a decent meal on the table.

“So now I use the same thing, although you’ve got to be selective because you have a name to protect.” Foreman believes that one of the many opportunities he investigates will hit it big. “You know you put out a lot of buckshot, you’re going to strike one,” he says. “You’ve got to start out early in the morning and look at hundreds, literally hundreds of things, looking for that quality. And it may take a year, it may take three or four years, but you’re going to hit something so you have something to put on the table for your family.”

Foreman’s company, George Foreman Enterprises, consistently strikes new deals for products and services that meet Foreman’s requirements of being high-quality and beneficial to the consumer. He has lent his name to a line of clothing for big and t a l l men sold by Casual Male and endorsed a new brand of shoes for diabetics by InStride as well as a health-food restaurant chain called UFood Grill.

“And then we have the green cleaning products, which I’ve been working on for a couple years,” he says. “We finally got it absolutely, totally biodegradable.” He hopes that using biodegradable products, like George Foreman’s Knock-Out Household Cleaning System, will help preserve the land for his grandchildren. His other hope is that the established cleaning-product manufacturers will follow suit. “This is going to be so good it’s going to make the big companies jealous, and they’re going to outdo me. And I still win,” he says. “I still win. Because it makes the planet much better.”

But it doesn’t end there. Through Foreman’s Web site, visitors can purchase cookbooks, memoirs and autographed boxing gloves. His 10 books, three of which were published by Thomas Nelson in the last two years, offer inspirational insights into life, comebacks and fatherhood. And then there are the grills. The newest version, the 360 Grill, is selling well and is one of several George Foreman brand small kitchen appliances, including the Lean Mean Fryer for reduced-fat frying and the Grill & Roast for convection cooking.

He’s also become a star of the small screen; his reality series Family Foreman starring him and his family debuted in 2008 on the cable channel TV Land, and an ABC sitcom starring Foreman ran for nine episodes in 1993-94.

Foreman has succeeded in creating more than a brand. He has created a relationship with consumers based on integrity and a gift for making the sale. This relationship allows him to transfer his brand to a wide range of products and succeed in staying diversified. “The bottom line is, you make a decision you’ll be able to sleep with, wake up the next day, look in the mirror and feel good about yourself,” Foreman says.

“You want to leave something, you really do,” he says. “I mean, in the end, statues and all those things, that doesn’t mean anything. Leave something that we’re all going to benefit from. I think that’s what I’d like to do.

Apply Foreman’s philosophies for success in your life:

1. Belief: “You have to have something you believe in. It could be someone you believe in, too. But at least have something you believe in and you cannot be talked out of by dollars and cents.”
2. Integrity: “You must preserve the quality of your name, your integrity. You don’t want to lie about anything. And it’s something that people will be happy about once they get to know you. Because people count on you.”
3. Sales: “Learn to sell and you’ll never starve.”
4. Resilience: “You’re going to fail if you do enough business. But you can always come back because you’ve got some integrity, and people need that.”
5. Persistence: “It may take a year, it may take three or four years, but you’re going to hit something so you have something to put on the table for your family.”
6. Legacy: “You want to leave something, you really do. I mean, in the end, statues and all those things, they don’t mean anything. Leave something that we’re all going to benefit from.”

You must be wondering about the title of this post; “Lucky Dog!” It’s based on one of those conversations I had the other day with a great friend whom I rely heavily to share ideas with. I rely so heavily on what this particular friend has to say about my ideas even as many interoperate his views as fairly negative.

This is very important to me as his cautious view can actually complement my creative and sometimes over exuberant view of a particular idea that is in the midst of excitement!

As we walked, I shared a plan to bring a powerful health and wellness product I have found to the market through creating a direct sales company or some sort of affiliate program.

What I find so interesting is what my friend said when I asked if he could see himself helping in some capacity… He said; “It’s easy for you, I’m sure it would be successful. After all, you have a knack for finding these products. You have a special talent of connecting people.” He added “ You have built a network of tens of thousands of people dedicated to improving their lives through your website and the products you offer” And that’s not all… “You have the ability to see into the future a predict what people are going to need” (Ok, that one blew me away!)

Then the negative part; He said “I don’t”

I couldn’t believe it! I didn’t have a large network when I started, I don’t have some “special talent”, It hasn’t been easy!, and for the last time let’s get something straight; I do NOT own a crystal ball!

So, I told him exactly that!

Honestly, It would have really ticked me off had I not thought of you! Yes, you… the one reading this right now. I realized that many people look up to successful people in this way. Like they are some kind of “Lucky Dog” that somehow didn’t have to earn their way to that success like everyone else.

Here’s the secret to creating a large network of people; Simple Actions - Start now and don’t stop.

Here’s the secret to finding products or services that you can offer to others for a profit; Simple Actions - Start looking, start sharing what you find… and don’t stop.

Here’s the secret to creating special talent; Simple Actions - Start practicing and don’t stop.

And on that crystal ball; You’re looking at it! Simple Actions - Re-read the concept:

A simple action, consistently done, compounded over time, creates a predictable and controllable result!

Doesn’t this mean that YOU create YOUR future? And if it’s true that our thoughts and actions shape our futures, isn’t that better than a crystal ball? I think so!

Successfully yours,

Ron Maurer