How would you like to win with money?  Did you know that winning with money is simply a matter of having a financial plan?  Have you always said that “I’ll get around to it someday”?  Where are you now financially?  Are you where you want to be?

If you answer no to the last question and yes to some of the others then this article and other past posts have the information you need to put together a financial plan that will help you win… IF YOU follow the plan!

So, where does budgeting fit in.  Budgeting is the cornerstone or foundation of a solid financial plan.  You may be one of the few who are able to completely win with money and not have a budget.  However, that’s very unlikely.  In fact, I am confident that I can say Everyone needs a budget.  Everyone and every business needs a budget.  You will NOT win or achieve on the same level that you will achieve when you have a budget and a plan.

So, what is budgeting.  Simply put… it’s you deciding where your money is going to go.  It’s sitting down at the table before the month begins and writing down every single expenditure from rent to gas for your car along with your income.  The difference between the two has to be zero.  You can’t have a negative budget for long before your world will fall apart.

The formula is straight forward:

Income - expense = zero.

That’s it.  Not too hard, of course there is a little bit more to it than that, but realistically you don’t need a fancy computer or even a calculator.  To budget you need three things, first, a piece of paper.  Second, a pencil or mechanical pencil.  Finally, the ability to add and subtract. 

So how about it?  Are you ready to win with money?  I want you to win, I want you to succeed! You can do it… but YOU need to take the first step.  Start today, commit to trying it for three months.  You can always quit after three months.  What’s holding you back?  Do it!  Start today and take the first step and begin winning with money… today!

What a crazy weekend…

• Ran a 5K on Friday, turned out someone didn’t quite get the course length correct.  As a result it was something less than a 5K.  Just not certain how short it was!  Well, I ran whatever it was in 21:44… not bad.  I found myself both a bit depressed and motivated by the winning times for my age bracket.  They were all under 18 minutes or so… Let me know if you have any ideas on how to train for a 6 minute mile… I can use all the help I can get.
• Watch the fireworks in the Olympic Centennial Park in Atlanta… the crowds were crazy, the heat almost oppressive.  I think I’ll grab a room at the Westin or Omni the next time I have the urge to see the fireworks.  On a positive note, the fireworks were incredible! Very nice!
• Enjoyed hanging out with a few relatives on the 4th.
• Saw Wanted.  Total man movie… so I enjoyed the action and special effects.  Was disappointed by the gratuitous sex scenes and over the top swearing that seemed forced at times.  It did, however, have some great takeaways for living life.  I may write something about it later this week.
• I was all ready to start my creativity blog… however, I’m having trouble finding a theme which expresses the blog’s concept… I may start it later this week without a special design…
• I’m frequently reminded how glad I am to be out of debt except the mortgage.  It means we can do and buy things and not worry where the money is going to come from.  Choose freedom.  Get out of debt!
• Church freaking rocked today.  Have you ever been to a church where someone was given a real tattoo during the service???  I can just about guarantee that you will NEVER see that in any other church. (And you may never again in ours… too bad you missed it!)  Check it out!
• Other than that I somehow managed to waste the rest of the weekend.  Not one of my shining moments… For some reason Friday was a long day and took the wind out of my sails for the rest of the weekend.
• Tomorrow night I’m going to go to do some demolition work to help built out the new church facility.  How often do you get to hang out with a bunch of people and tear stuff apart.  I have a nice big pry bar, small sledge hammer and regular hammer… Let me at it!

I think I’m going to talk a bit about budgeting later this week.  Budgeting is really the cornerstone of a good financial plan.  You need a solid financial plan.  If you don’t have one then it’s unlikely that you will succeed at the level you could achieve if you had a plan.   A good plan contains budgeting your spending, savings, insurance and getting out of debt.  Have a great week!

Have you ever had a dream that you poured all of your time and effort into achieving?  Things were going well, success was happening and then… a train wreck.  Something unexpected came up, a relationship crumbled, a business began to sour, and slowly, right before your eyes, your dream like water poured out on the desert floor began to evaporate.

If you’re over five, you’ve probably experienced your dreams evaporate.  Life changed, circumstances changed and you began to doubt that it was possible.  What once was excited energy, and perhaps a joy became something to dread.  What do you do when it all begins to fall apart, when it feels like you’ve lost it all?

My first reaction is… I don’t know.  I’ve had dreams fall apart.  I’ve been there, yelling at God, asking why.  Crying out in frustration and anger. 

My second reaction is to tackle it head on.  There are times when you need to throw in the towel.  However, before throwing in the towel take the time to assess the situation.  Is it recoverable?  If it’s a relationship, is the other person will to work on whatever is causing the problem.  If it’s a business, can something be changed about the way it’s being done? 

Perhaps a new marketing strategy.  For low cost marketing ideas I recommend Guerrilla Marketing.  Do you have too much overhead, perhaps you’re over leveraged and need to take a part time job to help pay it down?  The purpose of assessing the situation is to determine what exactly is causing the failure.  It may be one thing or multiple things.  Be brutally honest.  What is in between you and success?  It could be you.  You may need to change you in order to succeed.

My third reaction is to throw in the towel.  If you have assessed the situation and determined that there isn’t anything that can be done to keep the dream alive… it’s time to bury it.  I wish you didn’t have to.  However, if it’s truly gone then it’s time to put it to rest.  As you close the door on this particular dream, do take the time to understand what went wrong?  What caused the failure?  Taking time to do this will help you make experienced decisions the next time opportunity knocks.

How about you?  Where are you at?  Are your dreams evaporating?  Take action, only you can decide what your path from here on out will be.  And let me know if I can provide any advice.

I wish you all the best as you seek out your dreams!  Go DO IT!

Warning!  Spoiler Alert.  If you have not seen Iron Man and plan to there may be possible spoilers in this post.

Iron Man freaking rocked.  It was an incredibly well done movie from both a cinematic and script perspective.  I look forward to any franchise movies that follow and hope one is in the works.  Note: I do not consider this movie appropriate for young children, primarily for mature content included a sex scene and violence.  People, there is a reason it has a PG-13 rating.  I personally wouldn’t take my sons until they are closer to 7-9, depending on their maturity level.  Anyway, ‘nough said, and on with the discussion.

There were several things that stuck out to me.  First, motivation.  When Stark was captured and realized that his weapons were being sold under the table to terrorists he initially wanted to give up and just rot in a cave.  Funny how quickly his perspective changed when he was told he had a week to deliver a new weapon system or be killed.  It energized and motivated Stark to take action and do what was necessary to escape.

Second, Purpose.  Prior to Stark’s capture and subsequent escape, he seemed to have a playboy life and drifted without a sense of purpose.  That all changed after his escape when his purpose became to find and destroy those who were using his weapons to destroy innocent civilians.  He became so laser focused that nothing would deter him from his end goal. 

Third, Tenacity.  He failed frequently and kept on going.  As Stark’s focus drove him to build the best suit he frequently experienced setbacks and failure.  And yet, he was not deterred from what he considered his purpose in life.  He learned from his failures, adjusted and tried again, until the final version of the suit was produced.

There are other parallels that could be drawn, however, I believe these three embody the keys to being successful in whatever you’re doing.  Initially, Stark didn’t have a purpose.  It was the motivation to live that helped him find a purpose to live for something worth living and dying for.  It was finding his purpose that gave him the endurance to continue through numerous failures and setbacks as he developed the suit. 

How about you?  Have you found a purpose that gets you up and keeps you going in the face of adversity?  I know I struggle with this and believe that many others do as well.  Keep on trying, keep on learning.  You will find it and you will succeed as your purpose drives you to your goal.  Nothing worth doing is easy.

I leave you with a quote from Theodore Roosevelt:

Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led diffcult lives and led them well. 

It’s been a busy couple of weeks and I’m just now taking a few minutes to write a quick note.  Okay what really happened was a crazy MySpace app that I started using… anyway, I’m slowly weening myself off of it.

Now, for today’s note… I just read an article about how some of the youngest boomers are struggling financially.  The article goes on about the difficulties facing them in such harsh economic times.  My primary criticism of this article is mostly lacking key to solving the whole thing.  Personal Accountability aka Personal Responsibility.  I don’t mean to be harsh.  In fact, if you’re hurting financially I hope that some of the advice I’ve provided in other prior posts will help you devise a good financial plan for your life. 

So, what to do when you’re struggling financially?  First, admit that the problem is not more money, the economy, gas prices, your mother-in-law, spouse, children, etc. etc.  Admit that the problem starts with you.  If you’re married the problem is both you and your spouse.  Admit that you have a problem.  Decide to do something about it.  Then commit to the following:

1. Budget ruthlessly.  Learn to scrape every last penny out of your budget.
2. Emergency Fund.  Get a thousand bucks in savings and then come back later to beef it up to 3-6 months.
3. Pay off all debt except the house.  List in order from smallest to largest.  Then beef up the Emergency Fund.
4. Save:  for Retirement and kid’s college.  Experts suggest 10-15% of gross going to retirement.
5. Pay off the mortgage.
6. Invest: the mortgage payment and become wildly wealthy.

How cool would it be to retire without a house payment, without a car payment, and a couple of million in the bank?  It’s entirely possible.  It’s not fun, it’s not glamorous.  Your friends will probably thing you’re a bit strange… sorry, this isn’t get rich quick,  but it is a plan to become very wealthy so you can enjoy the retirement years.  I personally don’t plan to retire but do plan to own my own companies that are managed by good people I trust so that I can travel and do other things.

It’s your choice.  Do you want to be a broke boomer?