Million Dollar Portfolio

There’s been a lot of talk at work lately about goal setting. Not just business but personal and it got me thinking. How often do we set goals?

If you are serious about making money online, especially with blogging you have to set goals. I don’t mean setting a goal of making a million dollars. Sure, that’s a great goal to set, but try starting a little smaller. I’ll give you an example. I’ve been going to Weight Watcher meetings for almost two years and it’s not always easy. In fact, losing weight is probably the hardest thing I’ve done in the past 10 years. It was much easier when I was younger because of several factors. Before, I was single, I had an easy job that didn’t take up my whole day and didn’t have the overhead I do now. 10 years later things are much different. I’m married, I have a baby boy, add on to that bills and credit card debt, a car payment, rent, etc. When exactly am I supposed to work out and lose all this weight?

That’s where goal setting comes in. At the beginning of the year I told my wife I wanted to aim for a pound a week. So far, I’ve managed to average about a half a pound a week. That’s not bad and it’s healthy because I’m not losing too quickly. Even half a pound a week would come out to 25 lbs by the end of the year. That’s pretty cool.

Other goals I set at the beginning of the year included boosting my RSS subscriber numbers. By the end of the year I’d like to see 500 subscribers, so if I break that down monthly it’s roughly 40 new subscribers a month…I have yet to hit that but I’m working on it. As far as making money goes, I’d like to see this blog make $100 a month before I set a new goal. Once I hit that $100 month I can revisit my goals and set new ones.

So, are you setting goals for yourself? Once you hit those goals do you set new ones? Success isn’t a destination and you probably aren’t going to really know when you become successful because once you do you will realize that it’s the journey that’s important and not the destination. By setting smaller goals for yourself you can enjoy little successes and that keeps you motivated toward your big goal, whatever that may be.

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Taking a small amount of money and turning it into a fortune is every sane person’s dream isn’t it? I can’t think of a time when I didn’t consider what I would do if $1.5 million fell into my lap. A windfall of that amount of money is sure to change a lot of people’s lives instantly.

You can turn $150 into $1.5 million (potentially). You see, where I live there is another house being given away as a fundraiser for a local school.

Unfortunately, because the bank i work for is a corporate sponsor, I am ineligible to enter. Tickets are $150 and the house is incredible.  Find out more the Mount Madonna School Raffle site.

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You may not know this, but I like puzzles and games a lot. I also like challenges and although I’m not a cryptographer or cryptanalyst myself, I have always been fascinated by it. One of the more famous public encrypted sculptures sits at the CIA headquarters in Langley, Va.

Kryptos is now world famous mainly because the 4th “section” of it has yet to be solved. Supposedly the whole thing can be figured out with pencil and paper if you know what you are doing, and if of course you know the encryption techniques used to encrypt in the first place.

What I thought would be fun is to throw out a challenge to my readers in homage to Kryptos. Below I have an encrypted block of text. I’m not going to tell you how I did it though. That’s for you to figure out. It shouldn’t be too complicated and I’ll even give you the location of a site you can use to try and decrypt it.

Here’s the puzzle in two parts. Decipher the first part to figure out the next part:

.. -. -- --- -.. . .-. -. - .. -- . ... .. -. ..-. --- .-. -- .- - .. --- -. ... .--. .-. . .- -.. ... .-- .. - .... --- ..- - ..-. .- ... - . .-. - .... .- -. .-- . -.-. .- -. -.- . . .--. ..- .--. .-- .. - .... .. - - .... . ... . .--. . --- .--. .-.. . -... -.-- .- -. -.. .-.. .- .-. --. . .- .-. . .-. . ... .--. --- -. ... .. -... .-.. . ..-. --- .-. - .... . -.. .. ... ... . -- .. -. .- - .. --- -. --- ..-. -. . .-- ... .. - ... . .-.. ..-.

FZRPORWREBXHBQMZVCSTRCHJRRGBOMZPOZVI
YAKHZMWKSDJPBIWANPQNRMQBKXHMRLZAYFBV
OQNDKANASZLWFYTCZQAIZDPTIACSYKLSJKBO
SIRWGPLFYZEGKVDKANZHSUOEKANOQMPEOUBE
TNCRMLXMTLMYGFLIDJPHAXNHJIQKTDSYQRPD
GYBDQUNILTTKYRIIJIXBUJAODXFBVKWYGUW.

I know you are looking at this and thinking, what? What the heck is this and what does it have to do with blogging or making money? I guess you will have to figure it out to find out. So, the first one to figure out what the plain text is should comment on this blog. The first person with the right answer will win a $25 Visa Gift Card.

Both of these encryptions can be solved using the tools here:

http://members.aol.com/scirealm/CodeSystems.html

The contest ends February 29th and the winner (if there is one) will be announced March 1st. Good Luck and have fun!

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That’s it.  I’m done. No more for me. I’m tired to trying to make money online.

Just yesterday I said it was easy but I’m throwing in the towel.  It just can’t be done. There’s too many other successful people in my niche. I don’t have what it takes. I have nothing original to say anymore.

Yeah, everything that works has already been done.

Is this what you hear every morning you wake up? Are you like a broken record of negativity…just droning on and on and on about how you are never going to make anything? Well tell yourself to shut up already.

I don’t think I would be half as successful or smart as I am today if I had ever listened to anything others told me.  I’ve heard everything. Especially when it comes to internet marketing and MLM opportunities. Everyone seems to have an opinion about things they know nothing about. You know your cousin Joe who works at McDonald’s slinging burgers? He is 100% sure that you are going to fail in your new business venture. You know how he knows? Because he tried the exact same thing a year ago and nothing ever came of it.

You know what Joe didn’t tell you? He didn’t tell you that he never actually told anyone what he was doing.  Yeah, that’s right. He didn’t bother to tell anyone about this great opportunity he was involved with and so he didn’t make any money so he just knows it doesn’t work. I mean, if he couldn’t do it…it’s gotta be impossible! I’ve practically handed jobs to people that pay twice what they are making now…real jobs…and been declined because it would mean they had to travel an hour and a half further. Can you imagine? I offer to hook someone up with an $80k a year job if they are willing to travel just a bit further…”no can do, friend. I’d have to get up early and make that trip…it just can’t be done. I’m happy with my menial job making half as much.” Wow. And I thought I was crazy for trying to think up a way to quit my high paying job so I can spend more time at home doing what I want to do.

I don’t know about you, but I’m more inclined to listen to and trust advice from someone who actually has some success in their line of business if that’s something I am interested in pursuing. Can you imagine if Donald Trump or Robert Kiyosaki listened to their naysayers when they were getting started?

The point is, you might have a crazy idea and you might be spending some money that at the time seems like a bad idea but any good business has an initial investment and then over the long run will produce income in proportion to how well you market it. Bill Gates was crazy to think that people were going to pay for software. Steve Jobs was insane to think anyone was going to want a computer in their home.  That was only 30 years ago…look where they and the rest of the world are today.

Maybe you are a little crazy…but I’ll invest in crazy any day of the week because the potential upside is much more exciting than the alternative.

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There I said it. I’ll say it again. Making money online is easy.

It’s true. There are so many ways to make money online using a blog or website its as if anyone can do it.  I make money on several things I do online. The kicker is that it takes a little time, some effort and yes, sometimes an investment of your own before you reap the rewards.

I can already hear you disagreeing with me. You’re thinking…I’ve tried all kinds of things and nothing has made me rich yet. Hold on there, pardner! (in my best cowboy accent) I didn’t say nothin’ ’bout you gettin’ rich. I didn’t even say gettin’ rich online were easy.

I think you might have misunderstood me. Anyone can make money…even a few pennies, but hey that counts. Getting rich…now that’s the part that takes work. If you are anything like me you’ve probably bought some affiliate marketing programs thinking they had all the answers. After all, you saw those sales and that huge paycheck…it must be true. While there are a handful of bloggers, entrepreneurs, website owners and affiliate marketers that have made money and yes, some are even very wealthy (rich is always subjective). The truth is, you, yes you in the blue t-shirt are more than likely to fail.

Did you know Thomas Edison failed 1000 times before he successfully created the light bulb. When asked how he could fail so many times and not give up, he said “I didn’t fail…I discovered 1000 ways not to create a lightbulb.”

Read the rest of this entry »

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Whew! That’s some prize.

What I love about the blogging community is the giving spirit so prevalent. When you really examine it closely you realize there is a very tight knit community and we love nothing better than to give something away. I’ve said it before, and John Chow has said it countless times…and every single millionaire I know has said it.

In order to receive you must be willing to give.

How does that work? Well you see, when you are willing to give of yourself to someone else, it creates positivity. That in turn helps someone who needed it, and they in turn are likely to help someone else. In a roundabout way you are helping yourself…but it has to begin by helping others.

That being said, the awesome guys over at Business Blogger are giving away not only $500 cash, but also an awesome BFG NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT OC 512MB PCIe Graphics Card. If you game like I do, you know that card is also worth a couple hundred bucks. The contest runs the entire month of February and the winner will be chosen at random. After you check out the contest, make sure you list your blog or website on Business Directory which is accepting new submissions this month.

I’d love to win this contest because it would give me a chance to give away the video card which I don’t really need. Good luck me!

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