The thing you set your mind on is the thing you ultimately become.

~ Nathaniel Hawthorne

What more needs to be said?

In this Age of The Secret and The Law of Attraction—much.

Age-old wisdom has been mainstreamed and popularized. As with most concepts, mainstreaming and popularizing means losing some important components.

I am much more comfortable with the term “Law of Intention” than “Law of Attraction.” I believe effort is required. Intention focuses the mind so your efforts are more productive. When you focus on your goal, your mind at many levels starts listening, gathering information, and solving problems. You see patterns you didn’t recognize before. You become aware of resources you hadn’t thought of.

You see paths to your goal that seem like they pop into your mind. I think there’s a part of the brain that’s working hard putting pieces together, and when your unconscious mind delivers the “finished report” to your awareness it seems like it comes from outside your own thoughts. But I believe it’s processed in your own mind.

Intention is the difference between wanting to be a famous actress and meditating on it each day, and planning to be a famous actress and finding every opportunity to improve your craft and be seen by other people. Intention looks for opportunities to earn money instead of visualizing checks arriving in the mailbox. Intention seeks the path to the goal.

It reminds me of the classic joke about the man who prays diligently each week to win the lottery. After months without winning, he’s beseeching and yearning and pleading with God. Suddenly he hears a voice from above. “Help me out a little. Buy a ticket.”

I think that visualizing the end goal helps make it more real and more believable. I think our minds pursue what we believe is possible and avoid what we believe is impossible. So meditating and visualizing the goal are useful. But even more important is what occurs when you focus your thoughts on <em>the next steps.</em>

It can be helpful to meditate I will be successfully self-employed in five years, or even Money comes to me easily and regularly.

But it’s much more powerful to meditate I will see my next step to discovering and starting my own business, or to think Every day I see more ways to create income from ideas.

It is focused attention that brings information, awareness, and opportunities to you. It is effort and intention that turns thoughts into reality. That happens when you set your mind to discovering your path, finding the next step, and taking it.

With intention, The thing you set your mind on is the thing you ultimately become.

The Mentorship Approach With Kids & Teens

Hanukah, Christmas, and Kwanzaa are coming. Are your kids making lists of things they want? It’s a season of giving, and they know there’s no giving without receiving! Aren’t they helpful?

If you want to help your children see life more from the giver’s side, here are some conversation starters you can use:

· We donate to charities at this time of year. Is there a particular charity you want me to know about?

· A lot of people make room for the gifts they receive by clearing out some used things they can give away. Let’s look in your room. What are you ready to donate?

· It might be hard for you to believe, but when adults think back on Christmas (or Hanukah, or Kwanzaa), they hardly remember the gifts they received. They remember special holiday treats and hand-made things. Is there something you want to help make this year that you can share with the family or your friends?

· We’re going to pick a child from the Angel Tree this year. I think we’ll pick a boy/girl around your age. Can you help me make a list of things a child might need and want if his/her family can’t afford presents?

· My group is collecting donations for the food bank. Can you help me think of some ways to encourage more people to donate?

· There are some lonely people at this time of year because their families are far away or they don’t have any family left. How can we reach out to them?

· How can we share our happiness and excitement with other people besides giving gifts?

Enjoy your Holiday and share it with others.

Mine’s Christmas. Merry Christmas!

The Mentorship Approach With Teams & Groups

Getting your team on board with a new program or project can be a challenge. When it comes to motivation, there isn’t one answer. What works best for you, or even for most people, won’t work for everyone. Get familiar with your team members and the things that encourage their best performance.

Money: It’s true that many people are motivated by money, and we all pretty much need money. But be careful. Many people are generally motivated by money, but not by bonuses and incentives. In sales, performance and money are aligned, so it’s easy to think all workers will do whatever it takes to earn a bonus. They won’t! If you discover that your team member is motivated by money, find ways to offer bonuses for deadlines, volume, customer satisfaction—anything you want to improve. Emphasize the earning potential with each new project or program you introduce.

Recognition: Some people will do much more for public acknowledgement than they ever will for bonus pay. If Debra likes to be recognized and had the big idea that made the project work, or put in lots of extra hours, let everyone know. And don’t think that a private acknowledgement will be the same. Don’t “spare” other team members’ feelings at the expense of Debra’s. And don’t try to get her to accept another reward in exchange for giving up her recognition!

Responsibility: Do you know people who like to be in charge? They want to show what they’re capable of doing, and handing them a larger responsibility after successfully completing a task is like candy to them—or ice cream! If your team member is motivated this way, pay attention when a project ends. Make sure he has more opportunities to be in charge and be successful.

Personal Improvement: It might sound like a fable, but it’s true. There are people who seek out new and different kinds of work just to challenge themselves and learn new things. This sort of team member might take on a project just because it’s intimidating. Or she might like coordinating with the graphics team just so she’ll learn about graphics. Make sure you offer her variety or she’ll be bored.

Flexible Schedule: We all want more time off and freedom to do things we enjoy. But for a team member who values balance in his life, this can be the key motivator. He might not be willing to put in six weeks of extra-long days for a bonus or recognition, but he will do it in exchange for flex-time to be with his family or enjoy his hobbies. He won’t consistently work extra hours for bonuses or overtime, like the money-motivated members. But he’ll give his best when he commits.

Prizes: This motivator is pretty similar to good old-fashioned money, but there’s a difference. A woman might work much harder for a nice company car than for a car allowance because she has something to show off. A man might work towards a possible ten thousand dollar bonus, thinking the money will pay off a loan or go towards a home improvement project. But offer him the exact same value as a trip for the family to Hawaii and you might see amazing effort. The prize is exciting and it’s shared, so the family gets into the enthusiasm. By the way, you’ll be able to tell the difference immediately. The money-motivated will grouse and ask, “Can’t I just get the cash?”

The Cause: You’ll find this motivator in many fields, not just with volunteers or non-profit employees. Shauna volunteers another hour each week because there’s a waiting list of children in the reading program. Ted puts in weeks of long hours to be sure the agency gets the grant that will serve the elderly. Janet goes above and beyond on the marketing campaign because she wants her company’s shoe sales to beat their top competitor for the first time in history. The big warning—The motivation has to be built-in. Otherwise, people say “yes” out of guilt and then burn out.

It crossed my mind during the Veterans’ Day celebrations that in the many years I have been focused on the field of creative career choice I can’t remember any discussion of the military.

For some people, joining the military is just a means to an end. It might be a decent job with skills training instead of college. It might be a way to go to college for people who can’t afford it. It might be the way to get specialized training that leads to a chosen career, like an airline pilot.

But for many people the military is their calling. There is a special bond that career service men and women talk about. There is a particular sense of pride that comes from valuing duty and honor. There are opportunities that no other job in the world can offer. I have heard tales of security and rescue operations for the State Department, intelligence gathering by monitoring broadcasts from stealth locations in submarines, and large scale construction projects that can only be planned and accomplished by the military.

Military service is certainly not right for all people. But for some, a career in the military gives meaning, fulfillment, excitement, challenges, and adventure. In an age when all the armed forces are volunteers, I am especially happy we are protected by people who are called to defend the freedoms and rights of our republic, including Life, Liberty, and

The Pursuit of Happiness.

One of the big questions that comes up whenever you decide to change your life is, “Can I afford to do this?” This is especially true when you’re thinking about a career change or becoming a stay-at-home parent. There are lots of recommendations about cutting back to save up for a period of lower or unpredictable income, or to afford training or education. But they assume people know what they’re doing with their money each month. Most of us don’t.

I started doing a basic budget decades ago for one main reason: to see how much money I could spend on fun after I paid the bills! If we were thinking about buying something, we compared the payment to the money left over after the basics. “Can we afford it?” meant, “Can we afford the payment?” That included taking four or five months to pay for a VCR bought on the credit card.

With pay increases my wife and I paid off student loans and started paying extra on the mortgage. We even started setting aside money for retirement. Finally, piecing together different bits of advice (much of it conflicting), we paid off the credit card debt and started saving up to buy things instead of putting them on credit. We aren’t the greatest role models, but we use a budget to reach important financial goals. Here’s what we’ve learned:

• Start by listing the known things, like rent or mortgage, utilities, food, car payments and insurance, and gas.

• Develop categories for other predictable expenses, like buying clothes or eating out or fees for children’s sports or activities.

• Track your actual expenses for the past three to six months. (Suze Orman says that people consistently underestimate their expenses when she is working with them, so count everything.)

• Look at your take-home pay. (If you get a big tax refund each year, adjust your deductions so less is withheld and more comes home.) Total the amount you bring home each month: four weeks if paid weekly, two pay periods if paid semi-monthly or bi-weekly.

• Total all the things you have to pay, including rent or mortgage, car payments, insurance, and minimum payments on outstanding consumer debt. Look at how much is left over.

• Compare your history of spending by category to the amount of money available. If you use a credit card to help you spend more than you bring home, that’s a warning sign! Your clothes, food, eating out, entertainment, and “fun money” cannot total more than you have or you’ll go deeper in debt.

• Plan all your spending for the coming month. Dave Ramsey calls this “giving every dollar a name.” This is where intention comes into play. You make a commitment to yourself, and you and a spouse or partner commit together, not to spend money if it’s not in the budget. Budget everything, including “fun money” and entertainment, until every dollar is targeted.

• Follow the budget and keep track of your spending. Since utilities can fluctuate, wait until those bills come in before you spend much “fun money.” You might have to move money from there to help cover a high electric bill. Ouch!

• Review your budget towards the end of the month and start planning for the next month. Adjust your numbers as you get used to patterns. Plan extra for groceries if you’re having people over, and maybe adjust by doing less for entertainment that month.

At the end of three months, you’ll have a very clear idea of how much it costs to cover your basics and how much you’re spending for enjoyment. Using a budget, most people pay attention to where all their money is going for the first time. When you pay attention, you don’t spend it frivolously. It feels like a pay raise.

With your budget set you’ll be able to evaluate your priorities. You see that it’s possible to pay off debt or save up to pay for training, for a trip to explore options for your life, or to have a six-month cushion during a career transition. You budget for the basics, then for your priority, and you spend less on “fun money” or entertainment to be able to afford to pay for your dream.

It’s a short-term sacrifice with a long-term payoff. When you take charge of your money, you’ll know you can afford to pursue your dream. When you start putting money towards your dream, you put the power of intention on your side.
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NEWS FLASH! Seems this is a popular topic. Valerie Young of Changing Course just published her bi-monthly newsletter and the lead article is about lots of ways to move out of debt. It’s available on the internet. Click here. And while you’re at her site, sign up for her newsletter and check out the other resources.

This month I asked a colleague, Sarah Sharp, to write an article for this section of the Blog-Zine. Sarah has an exceptional telcourse she offers about simplifying your life by focusing your time, energy, and commitment on things that align with your mission. Enjoy! –Steve

We only have one head, but most of us have too many hats. Our society tells us that multi-tasking is the only way to get things done, so the more hats we can wear at once, the better. We get so busy planning and coordinating, running and supporting, heading up and volunteering, we end up with our heads spinning and the hats falling all around us. All of us, at some point, get caught up in the hustle and bustle of life; we lose sight of why we are here and what is important. I’m not talking about the meaning of life for all humanity, though that may play into it. I am speaking of what you, as an individual, value and desire, what you want to contribute to the people in your circle of influence – a personal mission statement.

A mission statement that summarizes your core values and how you exercise those values in your daily living can vastly simplify your life and de-clutter your calendar. It gives you a standard by which to measure the worthiness of an activity, position, or any decision which would require your valuable and finite resources of time, energy, or finances.

Ask yourself, the next time someone is asking for time, attention, or money from you, “Does this request honor my life’s mission?” For example, if your mission is teaching children, do you have the time and resources to support adult literacy? The answer may be no. Is it a worthy cause? Most definitely. But I am willing to wager that someone else’s life mission encompasses what yours doesn’t, and it will all work out in the end.

Saying no to worthy causes just because they are not your #1 passion may seem selfish and cause false guilt; however, saying no to other things opens up your resources to pour yourself into the things you really have a heart for. When you are working at what you are passionate about, you do not burn out as quickly, your enthusiasm spreads to others, and more work gets done for that good thing that you are truly here to contribute to the world. So, find your mission for your life, and live it!
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Sarah Sharp, Personal Life Coach, has made it her mission to help unite people with their fullest potential, and then teach them to do the same for others. She is available for individual coaching, group coaching, and speaking engagements. Her clients find focus, motivation, confidence, and the power for sustainable change. She is especially passionate for helping ministry and volunteer leaders and organizations, and people in crisis and life transition. To learn more or to receive a complimentary one-on-one coaching session, please contact Sarah at (608) 516-3256 or sarah@amostexcellentway.com.

I grew up during the Vietnam War being very worried as a young child about the draft. I remember the draft being ended, but I was also one of those eighteen-year-olds who were required to register “in case” there is another draft. This skewed my view of the military for a long time.

In the decades since, I have met and had the chance to talk extensively with people who served in the military, including career military personnel. I learned two important things from hearing their experiences.

First, most jobs in the service are not directly in the line of fire. I’ve met people who coordinated transportation, provided medical service, analyzed and decoded messages, provided maintenance for airplanes and helicopters, and provided security for our embassies. There are many kinds of jobs available in the military.

Second, for decades now, the armed forces have all been volunteers. Some people join for a chance to travel. Some join for a decent paycheck and a chance to learn a skill. Some join for help going to college. But many join for experiences they can’t get anywhere else.

A very sincere, heart-felt “thank you” to all the men and women who serve, and who have served, to be ready at a moment’s notice to protect our freedom, and the freedom of people around the world. And a special “thank you” to the families who also sacrifice when their mother and fathers, their brothers and sisters, their sons and daughters choose to serve.