Homeschooling for 3

In order to accomplish our goals we need persistence. If we are persistent we can accomplish anything. However, we will only display persistence if our goal is something that we feel is as important as air itself. When our goal is defined, important and subjected to a laser focus it is easier to display persistence.

Unfortunately, getting distracted by criticism or fear of being criticized will undermine your willpower. Also, being indecisive, spending time wishing that circumstances were different or looking for shortcuts will doom our efforts. We cannot worry about how others perceive us or our stated goals. I’ve found that the people who are the most critical and negative have never stretched out their hands to receive anything.
So their opinions should be ranked as beneath consideration.

I am working hard to maintain a persistent level of “money consciousness.” I am finding this to be difficult because my mental habit has always been to desire enough to pay bills and be able to be a stay-at-home mom. I have a research job that is helping to bring money into the home, and it would be very easy to slip back into complacency and say that the money that I’m making is paying the bills and start relaxing. I recently had to remind myself that if I can spend hours compiling research for the company that is paying me, I should spend that same effort to find the organizations and leads to create my business so that I can get rid of the research position. By saying my motto, or self-talk, thinking about what I’d use my new income to achieve and studying “Think and Grow Rich” I am at making baby steps to being money conscious on a daily basis.

I have also been evaluating other things in my life that work to undermine my persistence to achieve the level of success that I know that I am capable of achieving. As a homeschooler, a lot of time is spent educating my children. However, once upon a time I had complete control over their educational schedule and activities. But I enrolled my daughter into a cyber charter school when I became pregnant with my son. Anyway, the schedule and other things inherent to the cyber charter environment are hampering my efforts, not only to educate my children, but to do my business effectively. So my husband and I are planning to get through the rest of this school year, but not re-enrolling her next semester. The artificial schedules create unnecessary stress in my household, which in turn drains energy from my efforts and endeavors.

As suggested in this chapter, I am now a part of a Mastermind group that meets once a month at a local McDonalds. Our first meeting was really encouraging and we brainstormed some strategies that we can engage in together. We also had a local business owner (my best friend) and a soon-to-be new business owner in our group. We came up with some goals and deadlines to help move our businesses forward. We’ll reconvene next month and check our progress and make more plans. It was really refreshing to be able to focus on a single goal with a group of women who also want to move forward in their lives.

The review of the 8 necessary steps (definiteness of purpose, desire, self-reliance, definiteness of plans, accurate knowledge, cooperation, willpower and habit) to achieve success was also a good reminder for me of what I need to keep in the forefront of my mind. I realize that I need to work harder on creating habits that support my desire to be financial successful. By doing activities that help put my opportunity and products before people, I will be able to achieve my goals through baby steps that will eventually grow up and make me proud.

I learned a lot in this chapter about American History and about myself. I am pleased to note that procrastination is not one of my pitfalls. That’s not to say that I couldn’t do better in this regard, I think we’ve all been guilty of procrastinating about one thing or another. However, I would like mention a few things that struck me as important to think about.

I’ve had the “privilege” of having a sister who takes twenty-two days to decide whether to wear a red dress or a blue dress. Watching my sister live her life in an almost perpetual state of indecision has led me to do the exact opposite. So, I’m pretty decisive about what I’m going to do or no do. That doesn’t mean that I always make good decisions, but I try to stick with them as long as it is feasible. One of the things that took me a very long time to appreciate (and practice) was to keep my decisions to myself and just do what I need to accomplish. I’ve learned that those outside of your “mastermind group” usually don’t prove to be very helpful. On the contrary, they seem to spend their time sowing doubts in my mind, berating ideas and undermining my resolve.

One of the best things that happened to me was being excommunicated was one of the best things that happened to me. It cut the last strangling cords from around my neck. I was cast adrift from everyone, my childhood friends and my family (at least the ones that were members). But, this was inevitable – once I divorced the man that was in the organization I knew I’d be an outcast. And I think even then, a part of me looked forward to it. I know that sounds strange, but these people, although they cared about me, spent all of their energy boxing me into a life that didn’t make sense to me. Maybe it makes sense to them, but their efforts to “help” me just crushed my spirit and made me doubt my own mind. Since I no longer have their “helpful” advice, I find myself thriving in my life. I still have hard times, like everyone else, but I know that I’m doing the right thing for myself. And that is a great feeling.

The information about the founding of our country and the founding fathers was very interesting to me. Besides expanding my American history portfolio, it helped me to understand that making quick and decisive decisions is also a matter of courage. Procrastination is actually a form of cowardice. When people do not make decisions, when people allow others to make decisions for them they are engaged in an act of cowardice. Even if a decision turns out wrong, the fact that a decision was made is something to be proud about. I remember when I was taking online college classes I always seemed to be the team leader. Actually, I never wanted to be the team leader, but these guys couldn’t get anything done. Just the act of choosing which segment of the paper the group would be a part of was something that would take days (that’s what happened in my first class). After that, I just took over, assigned portions and got to work. But I was truly amazed at how much shilly-shallying adults could do over something as simple as which subheading you want to do research and write about.

I have not been aware of the how powerful the ability to make a decision is before reading this segment. I will strive to always be decisive and not be afraid to make a choice, whatever that choice may be.

Respectfully,

Cheryl Henderson

Wow! Chapter 7 of the Think and Grow Rich was looong. It was filled with so much information that I’m going to have to reread it in smaller bits. So, for this chapter I will focus on the subheading dealing entitled “The Thirty Major Causes of Failure – How Many of These Are Holding You Back?”

This was an interesting portion because this section really required me to ask hard questions of myself. Why is it that each time that I start making progress in an endeavor I allow something to derail me? This list of reasons really has helped me to see what I need to improve on. For one thing (maybe the biggest obstacle for me) is the lack of self-discipline. When I am focused, I get so things accomplished and I do it in a short period of time. I have witnessed this when I attended online college courses and in other endeavors. However, when I let my “flesh” (that lazy section of my brain) take over everything goes down the tubes. And I realize it is because of my focusing issues. I allow myself to be distracted by other people’s drama and that takes its tolls on my goals. So, I have to be more aware of this awfully big pitfall.

Although this isn’t a problem now, I can attest to the wrong selection of a mate to being a big hindrance to achieving success (or anything else for that matter). Without the support and love of someone who “gets you”, it is impossible to succeed. I’m not saying that single people can’t succeed, but if you marry someone they should be your biggest cheerleader. It’s bad enough having to deal with the negativity of the rest of your blood relatives and friends whom you’ve grown up with through the years. When you add the negativity of a spouse that you have to deal with intimately on a daily basis, it is extremely difficult to put yourself in a positive mindset and to produce positive things for yourself and others.

Then there’s the ever present problem of making a Wrong Selection of Associates in Business. My main concern has always been to earn enough money to do what I wanted to do, however I wasn’t the best researcher when it came to work-from-home opportunities. Most of my “choices”, if you could call them that, were made out of love and wanting to support my niece as she ventured from one company to another. The decisions were based upon emotions and not knowledge. I think that one of the best improvements that I’ve made so far in my journey is to start learning about the network marketing business from the ground up. It is helping me to be comfortable with my company choice and giving me the confidence to speak to others. But if you don’t realize that you don’t know how to choose, or who to choose for your business partners, this mistake will cost you a lot of money and hard feelings.

Coupled with my lack of self-discipline is my lack of concentration or effort. I have a very bad habit of switching gears in midstream and that has cost me a lot of money and opportunities to excel in one field. Out of all of my networking adventures, the only industry that actually interested me involved health and nutrition. However, I have allowed myself due to the reasons I mentioned above to move into different industries which I quickly lost interest in after spending money to invest into the company. So, I have resolved to keep a simple eye and concentrate on what I’ve started. I can be a patron of other great ideas without trying to participate in the business end of it.

After reviewing this information I agree with the author that by taking annual assessments of ourselves and asking a friend/mate/relative who will be honest with us about our progress is so important towards reaching success. I was listening to an interview with Teresa Romain, and she mentioned how adults don’t benchmark their lives. She gave an example of how each birthday her friend’s family would measure how tall she’d grown. One year, they included Teresa in the ritual and at first all she could see was how much smaller she was than her friend. But the next year, when they measured her again, she wasn’t interested in how tall her friend became, but how much she had grown. From this chapter, and her example, I can see why I need to put pen to paper and record what I’m doing. When I go back and review the information a year later, it can only serve as an inspiration (and perhaps a warning) that I’m on my way to my ultimate goals, without stressing out about week-to-week progress. And although I’m not one to really care about what everyone else on the planet is doing, it will also help me to focus on my growth and not to get distracted by other people’s drama. So, this week I’m getting a journal to mark my progress down for my first annual review next February.

There is so much more to this chapter than the little pieces I’ve touched on, but I’m learning that little bites are better than trying to choke down the whole enchilada. Not only will it sustain me longer, but I can manage my new insights in a more productive manner.

Respectfully,

Cheryl

Genesis 5:5-7, states that God created multiple languages at Babel to prevent the post-Flood humans from building a huge tower. The Creator acknowledged, at that time, that there was nothing impossible for people to achieve if they set their minds to a project. This is significant to me because a large percentage of religious people that I know insist through their words and actions that they have no control over their lives. Everything that happens is because God is in control. I personally believe that God actively presents us with situations that will help us to grow, if we step up to the challenge. But ultimately God has given us the power to change our lives if we dare.

We have all been blessed with the gift of imagination. This facility to dream and imagine is what sets us apart. Imagination is developed by regular usage and, I think, fueled by a curiosity about the world in which we live. I think that the main reason that there seems to be a stagnation of imagination is because of the myopic viewpoint that is taught to many of us since birth. We’re taught to only be concerned with our own immediate interests. We’re taught that we are superior to others, so why bother associating or investigating other cultures or customs. And even when we learn about history, it’s never taught as a dynamic living process. The points are isolated and sucked dry of anything that would cause us to question why events transpired as they did. So, in order to create something great for ourselves, we need to cultivate our imaginations. Only by doing so will we be able to break free of the shackles of indifference and start building a life that we know should be our own.

The one point that really stands out in Chapter 6 for me is the need to harness my imagination and channel towards a specific goal. In this case, I have to channel it towards a financial goal that will allow me and my family to live in the way that I know we deserve. I have lots of imagination and lots of ideas, but if I don’t set a specific, concrete deadline to achieve these goals, I will always be floundering.

The story of Frank W. Gunsaulus is one that I will carry with me forever. He had a great idea. He saw a flaw in the educational system and thought for years about what he would do if he had a million dollars. He thought about it, prayed about it, but it wasn’t until he finally stood up to himself and said “I want that million dollars by the end of the week” did he actually accomplish anything. So, I have set myself a definite date to achieve my financial goal. Doing that has forced me to put a course of action together to meet this goal. It is truly amazing how setting the date has fired my imagination towards accomplishing that goal. I’ve made appointments to work with people who will be able to assist me in creating fundraisers for school and homeowner associations.

Before reading this chapter, how I was going to reach my financial goal was nebulous. I knew what I’d do with the money, but it was still in the daydream stage. Now, I’m doing concrete actions which will lead me to the life that my imagination conjured up. Now that I am working on a course of action, I am noticing the many opportunities that are, and probably always were, before me. And I thank Mr. Hill for reminding me that our imagination is an important gift that needs constant cultivation. And when we couple our imagination with desire and action we be will lead to the proverbial promised land of success that we all want.