IT TAKES MORE THAN A’s

 “Go to school, get good grades and look for a good company that pays a good salary to work for”.

Simple and common as the advice is, it is very disastrous. It is what parents tell their children and children when grown tell their children too, on and on like that, creating a vast chain of ignorant generations of people.

It is the prevailing norm these days that a child should be enrolled into a nursery and primary school (as is the system in Nigeria), get promoted to a secondary school and finally finish from a university. Then the rat race begins. The child of yesterday, now a young man or woman gets employed in a company and starts to earn a fat salary with a company car to move around in. He (supposing the character in view is a male) rents a plush apartment in the “interesting” part of the city. He then buys his own car, meets a beautiful lady and they get married, move to a bigger apartment, have a child, buy a bigger car, more toys for the kid and more toys for themselves. As these happen, our young man decides to go back to school and earn a masters degree so he can earn more, so also does his wife. They return to work, earning more as expected and buying more adult toys for themselves. Gradually the children grow older and attend the best schools with their parents sweating it out at jobs they hate. They finish school, get a job and begin their own rat race.

This is just a mere description of what occurs in today’s world. People are not financially intelligent. They could be academic gurus with A’s all over their results and the highest C.G.P.A. in their faculties. They could even be PhD holders and professors but all those don’t matter. They don’t matter because money does not respect such kind of people. It takes more than A’s to acquire, manage and spend money. What then does it take to make money?

Making money and managing money has nothing to do with one’s certificate from a prestigious university. Certificates are dime a dozen. Some of the richest people today either never made it to the four walls of a university, or dropped out of one. School is a nice place to be, make friends, become a better person etc, but not a place for learning about money. You cannot become financially free and intelligent by going to the very best of schools. It goes beyond that. To make manage and make money requires one to be financially literate but not just to be literate but also to be intelligent. To become financially intelligent, you need to face the real world and acquire knowledge about how money works from real people, not from textbooks and lecturers. The worst kinds of persons to get financial advice from are your family and friends. To become financially intelligent, you need a team of people who have acquired experience in the field of finances and business. One of such people is a mentor. A mentor is a person that has done what you want to do and knows what mistakes are liable to be made. You also need to know the basics of personal finance like the differences between good debts and bad debts, assets and liabilities, balance sheet and financial statement. This does not mean you should be a genius in accounting, but that you should understand the simple basics of it.

When you go to the bank to say, borrow money, the banker will not ask you about your school report card or your C.G.P.A. He will ask for your real report card which is your financial statement. Every child should know how to write a financial statement and balance a balance sheet. But the truth of the matter is that only a few have access to such knowledge while the rest continue to struggle in meager lifestyles.

Principles of Success

Amassing wealth is not something that is actualised in a very short period of time but with consistent and conscious application of certain principles, that objective is surely realised. Here, I have culled some principles of success in any aspect of one's life from a website that I fancy very much for its continous flow of useful knowledge for impactful living. This principles are what people that have climed the ladder of financial freedom acknowledge to be true. So what are you waiting for?, its your turn to be as you grab a hold upon them and put them into action in your life!
Here they are:
1. Take 100% Responsibility of Your Life
If you continue doing the same things over and over again, you will get the same results. If you want to change or improve yourlife, you need to take different steps. You cannot achieve different things doing the same activities.
To change and improve your life you need to take full responsibility of your life, if things are not going the way you want then ask yourself “What do I need to do differentlynext time to get the result I want?”
Don’t complain or blame others for your poverty. If you are not rich and happy already, accept the responsibility to live a happy and rich life without complaining about taxes and politicians.
2. Be Clear Why You are Here
Each of us is born with a specificlife purpose. To be on purpose means you are doing what you love to do, what you are good atand what is important for you. You need to find out your purpose of life by discovering your talents and strengths.
Identifying, acknowledging and honoring the purpose is perhaps the most important action successful people take.
Try to find out which are some of the activities that you enjoy doing and you are good at? Successful people take time some time off to find their true strengths and purpose of life and then they act in alignment with their true purpose.
3. Decide What You Want
Once you have known what is your major purpose in your life, you have to decide what you want to do to achieve your life purpose. You have to decide where you want to be, what possessions do you want to acquire. Most people don’t get what they want because they never take time to define exactly what they want from their life.
You need to make a list of 30 things you want to have and 30 things you want to do before you die. It is not important to figure out how you will achieve these goals, You just need to write down your 30 major goalsyou want to do and have.
4. Unleash the Power of Goal-Setting
You can easily achieve your life goals if you do this simple exercise each morning, just write down your major goals each morning. It is important to re-write your goals, write your goals in the present tense as youhave already in the possession of the thing you desire.
For example if your goal is to have net worth of $1 million by the end of 2015, write down I have net worth equal to $1 million by the end of 2015.
5. Ask! Ask! Ask!
If someone has achieved the same goals that you want to achieve in your life, ask him to give you advice about how he has achieved that goal and whatactions you need to take.
Mostly successful people like to share their experience with others. Ask successful people thesecrets of their success, if someone refuses to tell you, don’t worry just ask someone else. Be clear and specific and ask repeatedly if you need to.
6. Use feedback to Your Advantage
You may wonder why some of the best players in the world have coaches, I mean who can teach them how to play better because the players are the masters of their game. But they do have coaches
because coaches can give them feedback. The players can’t see their own faults. They need someone who can tell them honestly where they are mistaking.
This principle applies in the same manner for you, you can not see what you are doing wrong; ask your spouse, co-workers and friends about the feedbacks. When you get feedback don’t feel bad, just try to improve yourself.
7. Commit To Constant and Never Ending Improvement
You must remind yourself this famous quote “the most unfortunate person is one who is not better today than yesterday.” You need to keep improving yourself each and everyday.
The study shows that on average we watch television for 3-4 hours daily, if you can cut just 1 hour of that time and dedicate that time to improve yourself. This one step can dramatically change your life.
You should dedicate 20 minutes on reading a book, 20 minutes on meditation and 20 minutes on health exercise daily.
8. Keep Your Eyes on The Prize
The last 45 minutes of your day before sleeping are the most important for programming your brain because it replays during the night the last input.
Instead of falling sleep watchinghorror movies or terrible news channels, read a motivational biography or a spiritual book or a book of your field. You will sleep well and your mind will become more sharp and active the next morning.

Culled from www.readtoawake.com

The Money Paradigm Shift of the 21st Century

Some years ago, I remember watching T.V in the new year 2000. I can remember as if it was yesterday, all the fuss there was about a new millenium. As I was quite young then I did not understand the significance of the season we just entered into. But as my learning has increased over the years, I have noticed a few things which I would like to share with you about changes between the last century and this as it relates to money.
Money, which is undeniably an important aspect of our lives, as evolved over the years and has brought changes upon our lives. Below are some of the changes between the 20th century and the 21st century economically speaking:
(1) Money had a stronger value. It could purchase more with less. The opposite is the norm today. The value of money has dropped drastically and its purchasing power(real value not money value) has reduced.
(2) Inflation was at a much lower level in most world economies. For instance, the price for a piece of land in Nigeria would cost less than a million naira. Today, that same piece would have risen high in value. Inflation makes investors win and savers lose.
(3) Money was in paper form,though it still is. But the difference is that money now is not 'money' anylonger but an I.O.U. Money today is knowledge. What you know is proportional to how much you earn.
(4) People depended on the goverment to take care of them when they retire from work. Not any more as employees now prepare for retirement by investing in retirement plans.
(5) People barely made a living out of being computer literate. Today, there are billionaires such as Mark Cuban and Mark Zukerberg who have greatly profited from the internet.
(6) The richest people of that age were people in their fifties and above. Now, millionaires who earned their money legally can be seen within the four walls of a secondary school.
(7) Finally, in those days,the best advice to give a child was "go to school, get good grades, earn a degree and secure a good job that will pay you a fat salary". That is a phantom today. Certificates are a dime a dozen. Its your financial knowledge that matters now. If you were to earn a million naira, how would you use it? Your answer to this question will show how quick witted you are with handling money. Money flows only to those who know how to use it.
Those and many more are just a few of the changes that have occured within that span of time and more is surely to come. So brace yourself up and prepare for the change!
To know more, read Rich Dad's conspiracy of the Rich- the eight new rules of money by Robert Kiyosaki.
Please post your comments and questions below. Thanks for reading.

Finally…7 Golden Rules of Money

Money is the medium by which the earthly success is measured. Money makes possible the enjoyment of the best things this earth can afford.
If you want to know how moneyworks and how your money can work for you then this is the best post you can read. After reading this post you will understand the fundamentals of wealth creation.
The Seven Golden Rules of Money
1. Start the purse to fattening by paying yourself first
2. Control the expenditure
3. Make the money Multiply
4. Guard the money from loss
5. Invest the money in safe andprofitable investments
6. Insure a Future Income
7. Increase the ability to earn.
“Money is plentiful for those who understand the above written simple rules of money and apply them.
01. Start the Purse to fatteningby Paying Yourself First
The theme line of this chapter is that ” A part of all you earn is your to keep.” Try to calculate If you keep 1/10 of all you earn and invest it wisely, how much money would you have after 10 years?
If you want to become wealthy then here is a simple formula – Save at least 10% of your income. In the starting you can start by saving 1% or 2% of your income. Then you should gradually increase this savings amount till it reaches at least 10% of your monthly income.
02. Control the Expenditure
This chapter encourages you to make some discipline in your expenditure. If you are not able to save 10% of your monthly income, it means you are spending money on the things you actually don’t need. No matter how much or how less you earn, Everyone can live with 90% of his income and save 10% each month.
To save 10% of your monthly income, you should make a family budget and stick with it.
Each month when you get your pay-check, You must put aside 10% of your income for your savings account and the rest 90% you should use to spend for your basic needs.
You should know exactly how much money you are going to spend this month on different expenses such as apartment’s mortgage or rent, car fuel, electricity, phone, maintenance and other household expenses.
03. Make the Money Multiply
This is my favorite chapter – the investing part. According to this book you should make your money your servant rather than being a servant for money.
Money will work for you happily if you can invest your money wisely with the advice of professionals whose daily work is handling other people’s money.
You can learn investing by reading books and by investing small amounts of your money in different assets. To invest your money, there are many different options available for you such asStocks, Bonds, Mutual funds, Fix-deposits, Etf's Commodities (Gold, Silver & Oil) and Rental properties etc.
04. Guard the Money From Loss
You should not invest your money in the risky investments. At least in your initial investing years, you should invest your money in safe and secure investments where you get a steady return and your capital is secure.
Meanwhile you should gain knowledge about different investments where you can get better returns with lower risk.
You should start investing small amounts of money and then grow gradually as you learn.
If you put your money in the investments where the risk/return ratio is high and you don’t have enough knowledge, Most probably you would lose your money.
05. Invest the Money in safe Profitable Investment
It is the fifth rule of money that says that money will come happily and in increasing quantity to you if you invest yourmoney in the investments wherethe risk is very low and you have no fear of losing your money.
There are many safe investmentslike fixed-deposits and government bonds where you get lower return but your capital is secure.
06. Insure a Future Income
This money law says that money comes happily and in excessive amount to the person who invests his money to buy a homewhere his family can live for years.
After buying your home, you caninvest your savings to buy other rental apartments where you can pay the monthly mortgage installment with the rent you getfrom tenants and insure a futureincome once the mortgage is paid off.
07. Increase the Ability to Earn
In this section the author encourages you to improve your earning skills so that you can get paid more. Here are important skills, you should consider improving.
You should invest your time to improve your communication, leadership, sales, relationship, computer, technical, language and other skills related to your occupation.
Once you have developed some of these skills, you can ask for pay raise to your employer. If your employer refuses to raise your pay, someone other will happily pay you more for your skills and services.
Please post your comments about how you feel about the post and what you have gained so far.

Introducing 7 Lessons Learned From Millionaires

Do you want to become a Millionaire?
The formula is simple. If you want to become cook you should study cooking, if you want to become lawyer you should study law. The same is truth with becoming millionaire if you want to become a millionaire…
you should study other millionaires and you should do the same things they have done to become millionaire.
1. Live Frugal
People who drives expensive cars and wear expensive suits are not millionaires, these people are usually in heavy debt. People who look rich may not actually be rich. They are just over-spenders.
On the other hand millionaires intheir early life do not buy expensive cars or expensive houses, they live frugally and try to save every cent they can and then they invest that money wisely.
2. Calculate your Net-Worth
Millionaires focus more on their net-worth rather than their paycheck. They invest 20% of their monthly income for the long term.
To calculate your Net-worth, you need answer this simple question – How much money will you have after selling all youritems and after paying all your bills if you have to move in othercountry tomorrow?
3. Make the Budget
The difference between rich andpoor is that rich people invest their time to create monthly budget and they spend their money according to the budget.
To become a millionaire, you should know how much money you are spending on home, car, education and household expenses each month and each year.
4. Set a Goal
Do you have clearly defined monthly, annual and 10 years goals? Set a goal to become a millionaire in next 10 years. Write your goal down on a paper and watch it daily twice.
Make short term and long term goals about how much you want to earn and where you want to invest your money to achieve your goals.
5. Own Your Home
Millionaires live in the same house for more than 20 years. You should buy a good home where you can live for next 20 years and where the value of your house will appreciate with the time.
6. Live Simple
Financial freedom is more important than social status. Don’t buy expensive items to impress other people. Buy only those things that you really need.
According to a famous book Stop Acting Rich! 86% of the luxury cars are bought by non millionaires.
Save your money every time you can and invest it wisely to get above average return with the help of professional investors.
7. The Rich are Happier than Poor
Millionaires live below their means this is the only reason they have bigger bank balances than others. Whenever they get into financial emergency they don’t get worried as they have money to solve their financial problems.
According to the research Financially independent people are happier than those in the same income/age cohort who are not financially secure.
Final Thoughts
With regularly investing your money and with the magic of compound interest you can become very rich in the long term.
If your household income is N40000 and you live below your means by spending no more than N30000, you can invest N10000 per year and achieve your retirement goals faster than someone who earns N50000 and spends N45000 annually.

What are the differences between the Rich and Poor?

We all want to become Rich, but most of us pass our whole life dreaming to become rich one day.
Have you ever wondered why some people are able to accumulate so much money and others suffers financially their whole life.
There must be some rules that Rich people are following to accumulate money that poor people do not know. According to a research on lottery winners they found that-
Poor people who won big money in the lottery became much poorer and even in debt after 5 years of winning lottery due to bad money habits. The reason is that poor people don’t know how to manage their money.
Do you want to know the 4 rules that Rich people are Following :-
1. Rich People believe they create their lives. They take control of their life. They invest their time to learn financial education. They make good financial decisions. They take fullresponsibility of their lives.
Poor People believe government,politicians and rich people are responsible for their poverty. Poor people don’t try to improvetheir skills and accumulate money by increasing their earning abilities.
2. Rich People focus on opportunities. They focus on finding the solutions of their problems. They find new and creative products to solve the problems. By solving problems of other people they get opportunities to start their own business and thus they accumulate a lot of money.
Poor People focus on problems. They blame others for their problems and don’t try to solve them. They don’t invest their money and time to start their own business due to the fear of failure. They block their creativity.
3. Rich People dream big, they think big. They think how could I earn one million dollars per year or how could I have a business chain of 20 restaurantsor shopping centers.
Poor people think small, they arehappy to find a steady job where they can earn enough to pay all their monthly expenses.
4. Rich People associate with other rich and successful people. They try to get to know what the other rich people are doing. You can do the same. Themore you mix with rich people, the more you will think like them. And if you think like Rich people you will find new creativeways to accumulate money.
Poor People associate with poor people, if most of your friends salary is less than $30000 annually, you will also have the same range of salary most of thetime. If you associate with people who are making$300000 annually, you will start to see the possibilities of earning $300000 annually.
Now you know the 4 main differences between Rich and Poor people. Do what Rich people do and avoid the habits of poor people. I am not suggesting that you should leaveyour poor friends, you should just try to know more about richand successful people by meeting them personally or by reading their autobiographies.

Denying is not the answer

Monday to friday, every morning, visiting the major roads in the city of Lagos, there is one paramount thing that you will notice which is a large mass of people stuck in the traffic, rushing off to do jobs most of them hate. Day after day,week after week, month after month and year after year, the vicious cycle trails on. Bankers, salespeople, teachers, lawyers, doctors, receptionists etc...all in the rat race. It's all a race in which every month end they get wages which barely satifies them. Many still go back to where they were coming from(school) to earn an higher degree which then qualifies them for a higher pay... And the cycle or race continues.
To get out of the race is simple. It comes first from stopping the denial that money is not important. Thats the trap many wage minded people fall into. When asked anything about money, they might reply 'its not important, besides money is the root of evil'. Now that's an error. Money is not the root of all evil, its two things that the root...first, it is the love of money and second is the ignorance(the second reason being the more dangerous). Its important for people to stop denying their need of money and start to get the relevant knowledge of how to acquire and manage it. It's easy,just as easy as learning the alphabets or numbers,though its not easy to learn even those at first. So start getting materials in that line; books,messages,seminars and most importantly get a mentor. With this, your journey to financial freedom through the ticket of financial intelligence,just begun. Welcome on board!

Business Quotes

Make sure to tell your team members what you appreciate about them. Letting them know what you value usually leads to them doing more of it! - Blair Singer

Change your focus, from making money to serving more people. Serving more people makes the money come in.- Robert Kiyosaki

Financial freedom is simply having more money coming in every month in cash flow from your investments than is going out in living expenses.- Kim Kiyosaki

The right decisions come from the right focus. You’ll succeed if your focus is on the mission, not the money.- Robert Kiyosaki

"Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning." -- Bill Gates

There’s too much money chasing too few good investments. Once you create a good investment money will look for you.- Robert Kiyosaki

One key to real estate investing is to buy the worst property in the best neighborhood. - Sutton Law Center