The Value of Life

Why is it that when you really need more business, it is very difficult to find; and when you don't need any new business, it seems to come at you from every direction? Anyone who works in a sales position or runs a business has probably experienced this.

When you have plenty of business, and things are going great, you naturally attract people to you. All your activity stirs up even more activity. You're more confident, and people can definitely sense that. Nothing succeeds like success.

Many people operate from the perspective of need. They try to use their own need as a way to convince people to do business with them. That is a recipe for failure. No one wants to buy from someone who is desperate.

Don't ask or expect people to take pity on you. You might find some who will, but pity is the last thing you want. Pity is one of the most degrading things you can experience. When you accept pity, you are admitting to yourself and others that all hope is lost. That kind of mindset won't get you very far.

It is far better to be challenged than to be pitied. Challenge forces you to grow, to build, to create, to excel. Challenge can motivate. It can teach you new skills and help you make new contacts. It builds confidence and competence.

Seek out challenge, put forth the effort to meet the challenge, and you'll soon have more business than you can handle.

We are now operating in an information economy. What does that mean? Does it mean that material things are no longer important? No. Material things are still vital.

What we mean by an information economy is that we define and create value based on information content, rather than on physical properties. In an information economy, the information content is what gives value to most products and services.

The most extreme example is probably the silicon computer chip. The chip itself is very small. The materials contained in it are of very little value. The incremental cost to manufacture it is small. The thing that gives a computer chip its value is information. The information that went into designing and producing the chip, and the information processing ability of the chip itself.

But it is not just in the high tech world that information plays a key role. I heard an ad the other day on the radio for a car leasing company. The company was making money by arranging leases on cars. However, the value of their product came in the information content. They advertised that they would find the lowest price on the car you wanted and provide you with all the reports, ratings and magazine articles available on the models that you were interested in. They may be in the car leasing business, but their product -- and the way they distinguish themselves from the competition -- is pure information.

There is only so much time available each day. The choices you make about how that time is used, will determine your situation in life. You create your own future by your actions, and your actions are, ultimately, under your complete control.

So how do you make the right choices? Remember that you have a choice, not only to do something or not to do it, but also WHEN to do it. The sequence in which you take action, is a key component of success.

Successful people do the important things first. Inevitably, when you do the trivial, non-productive things first, there is often no time left to do the important, life-enhancing activities. S learn to focus first on the things that will ultimately make a difference in your life.

The winners in life are people who have the discipline to eat dinner before dessert. Imagine for a moment how you would feel each evening if you ate a big piece of chocolate cake, and a bowl of ice cream, before you had your dinner. Would you then feel like eating a nutritious, well-balanced dinner? Probably not.

Doing the "fun" things first, takes away our appetite for doing the "hard" stuff that really needs to be done if we're to make progress in life. Better to get the important things done first. Then the "fun" is even more enjoyable.

There's nothing wrong with dessert -- just remember to eat dinner first.

It's usually a waste of time and energy to put a lot of effort into assigning blame or determining who is at fault. Because fault exists in the past, and the past cannot be changed.

Figuring out who is at fault will do nothing to improve the situation. What really matters is not who is to blame, but who is ready to take responsibility for moving forward.

When you become too focused on who is at fault, you can easily lose sight of the positive actions that can be taken. Once you let go of the need to assign blame, you're much more likely to see the positive possibilities available to you.

The thing to be concerned with is not what happened, but what you're going to do about it. Put your focus not on what should or should not have been done, but rather on the best of what can now be done.

There is no sense in fighting battles that are already over. Instead, put your energy into finding and following the best of the choices that are now available to you. Let your thoughts be guided by the best you can do. And you'll be creating a future that's the best you can make it.

Think about what you're doing now and where you're going. Most people live in a constant state of self denial. And after years and years of just barely getting by, they finally resign themselves to just that -- barely getting by. They give up on their dreams. It is so sad.

But it doesn't have to be that way. You can take control of your life, of your future.

Look at what you're doing now. Is it getting you where you want to be? If not, what are you going to do about it. Are you going to keep living in a state of self denial until it's too late and you finally just completely give up on your dreams and resign youself to an empty life of just getting by?

Or will you take control of your life. Live life to the fullest. Enjoy making a difference in the lives of others. There's nothing noble about being poor and lonely and depressed, and life does not have to be that way. Successful people are the people who help others the most, and network marketing an opportunity for you to do just that. To help other people. That's what life's all about anyway, isn't it? We tend to forget that with all the stress and complexity of daily life, but when you stop to think about why we're all here, isn't that really it? To help each other.

When you were a child, you could imagine unlimited possibilities. You were happy and creative and you dreamed of big things. But then about the age of 6 you started getting into the "system." And gradually, little by little, every day, the system began to wear you down, to strip your dreams away, to make you conform to the mediocre standard. Your dreams are still there. They're probably buried under a thick layer of sludge, but they're still in there somewhere. Life has beaten you down, over and over again, but your dreams are still there.

Try reaching through all that and touching your dreams again. See how it feels. Imagine, just for a moment, that you can live your life to the fullest and be all you ever wanted to be and do all the things you ever wanted to do. Just imagine it for a moment.

The choice is up to you. You can continue to do what you're doing, resign yourself to a lifetime of diminished expectations, or you can grab the opportunity to be the best you can be.