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Seriously, do you believe in yourself? Do you have the self-confidence and desire to really push yourself outside your normal limits? This is a rather simple question but one of the most important to investigate on your own as it bases the entire foundation of your current life.

Why is belief in self important?

If you believe in yourself, then anything is possible. You have no need for external validation, external praise, external conditioning to pursuit the life of your dreams. You are simply a bird that knows where you are flying to regardless of the terrain below you… you are able to stay on course! If you want to become somebody of great importance on this rock, you MUST believe in your abilities no matter what others say.

The problems that arise from a lack of confidence

Believing in yourself, your abilities, your physical as well as mental being is something that I believe should be taught at soon after one is born. Believing in yourself has such a huge effect on your life as you develop and grow. From your social circle to who you end up spending your live with. If you lack confidence, you will more often than not, take the easy route through life. If you are offered a challenge, it’s always simpler to ask others to help guide you through a situation instead of standing tall and charging forward. I believe it’s important to get information from others but too many people take this to an extreme. They are unable to make a decision in life without talking to somebody to confirm their initial thoughts and inspirations. If you believe in yourself, you are so far ahead of many other people it really isn’t comparable!

What does belief in self bring?

If you belief in yourself, you will not require others to prop-up your self-esteem. You will not be concerned with how others view you nor how they react to your actions to the detriment of your goals. Basically, if you can grow from within instead of asking for help from others to improve yourself, you are an incredibly powerful being capable of turning even the most impossible of dreams into a reality.

Belief is a powerful thing

I must warn you, once you come to the realization that you can do ANYTHING in life without regard for what others may think of you, not only are you powerful but you become the absolute master of your destiny. Seriously, if you don’t need others to confirm your decisions, life suddenly becomes far easier and enjoyable. The reason being, most people what to be around “the same” just like dentists have other dentists as friends. If you truly want to achieve a lot in this, your only life, you have to be willing to drop people who cannot or worse, prevent you from succeeding. Sometimes people stop talking to you because you achieved a great success, you have to realize that this is their primal reaction brought on by jealousy and loss. You are and will become a different person.

How do you come to the point of believing in yourself?

How do you become good at riding a bike or passing a test, you study and practice as much as you can! If you don’t believe in yourself, others cannot help you, this power must be nurtured and grown from within to shine outward. You cannot have others “tell” you or “convince” you to gain self-confidence… you must do this yourself and stand-by it!

The Bottom Line

I am Jon Cantin and I believe in myself!

Anybody who tells you that you cannot do this or that because of “blah, blah, blah” have no idea what they are talking about… NONE! If YOU want to make something happen, it’s up to you and only YOU to make it happen.

Barriers to making things possible

No matter your handicaps, no matter how severe they are, don’t let them get in the way of your dreams. For instance, look at the incredible success that Steve Nash, the NBA player has in his career considering how short he is… sure 6ft3 isn’t short but by NBA standards, he is surrounded by giants! How about Richard Branson? He is dyslexic yet is a self-made multi-billionaire traveling the world and outer space! The world is full of unlikely success stories that blow people away due to their ambitions more than their talent.

Beware of what you wish… it may come true!

More than once in my life, I have experienced both personally and through others that what you wish, even for a small amount of time, may actually come true! The most apt example of this was a few years back when, on a long walk, I was wondering what it would be like to be arrested (completely out of the blue), little did I know that a few minutes this “wish” would come true! My life is full of examples of this along several time lines and I am absolutely sure I am not alone. I am not psychic (this is “impossible”) but I do seem to be rather good at seeing the future of decisions I make now in a flash with very little though involved.

So what is impossible?

To be honest, the only limiting factor for most people is the size of their dreams. If you told somebody a thousand years ago that they would be talking through a small portable box to people on the other side of the world, you would be crucified as insane yet with satellite phones this is possible from ANYWHERE. I have come to the conclusion that EVERYTHING and ANYTHING is possible, screw the laws of physics or other limitations brought-up by “smarter” people… if you think it can happen and put enough sweat and tears into it… it WILL happen.

The more you know, the less you know

Why do I think that even “impossible” things are completely possible no matter what the geniuses in this world say? Well, because they have an incredibly BAD track record. I honestly cannot think of an invention, from the press to the automobile where the geniuses at the time put pressure on the creator to give-up these “silly” and “impossible” thoughts! If you told me you where working on a time machine, I would say your chances of accomplishing this are near zero but NOT zero. Look at Thomas Edison who toyed away for years on a light bulb with endless prototypes before he achieved what the geniuses at the time said was impossible! My friends, if you remember anything from this blog article it’s this, the more somebody knows about a subject, the less they actually know about it.

Why do I say this? Well, knowledge is biased information, no matter its origins, how many times it has been proven, there is always something that is missed or mis-interpreted… throw enough of this stuff together and you end-up with a rather impressive body of knowledge that is so full of holes that it becomes a self-supporting yet rather hollow structure.

Ah, the problem with Religion

This is one of my largest grievances with religion… it doesn’t teach you that “anything” is possible, it puts the explanation of “God” as the answer to EVERY question you don’t know the answer to. How did starts form? Well, God did it. Where do babies come from? Well, God does that. Why did I get a C in my math test? Well, God wanted it to be so. What do you notice? Well, the utter LACK of curiosity. If religion teachings one thing, it isn’t to expand your mind, it’s to accept things as they are and stifle creativity in the young minds that need it the most. How did stars form? Well, this is a question that continues to take generations to discover the answer to yet religion says essentially “don’t bother, God did it and that is all you need to know… move-on”. Even though I say this, I do think it’s ironic that our understanding of DNA comes from a monk who studied peas, that religion played a pivotal role in the development of the printing press and many other things we take for granted as scientific fact. Hence, my indecision on this matter which will probably continue until my last breath. I am well beyond the question of whether there is a God or not, I have “advanced” now towards thinking of whether we are better off with or without religion.

The Bottom Line

Nothing is impossible unless you allow it to be so.

Update: This past week a “man” gave birth to a baby and a 72 year old woman gave birth as well… both thanks to the advances in medical knowledge. Both of these where considered completely “impossible” just a few years ago.

From my extensive business experience, if there is any one thing that leads to a slow (sometimes quick) demise of a startup or an established company, more often than not, it can be traced to greed.

The root causes of greed

When you first start a company, the pricing is usually insanely competitive even to the point of undercutting your main competitors. Many people believe that price, and price alone is the way to compete directly against the “big boys”. While this does work for a certain period of time, and can actually be profitable, eventually, overhead such as staff, phones, office space etc. all begin to take their toll leading to you having to raise your prices just to break-even. The root cause of greed for most companies starts-up this way, simply trying to stay afloat… I have yet to meet an entrepreneur who got greedy out of desire. It’s usually caused by something far more urgent, survival!

When greed gets out of hand

Alright, you have a rather new company, you hiked prices and can now afford to pay yourself somewhat of a living wage… great! This should be where things stop but inexperience (myself included) makes you wonder, “hey, that went so well, let’s hike things up a bit more so I can buy xyz”. Your clients grumble but the costs involved with leaving your company for another aren’t large enough to warrant a new fishing expedition. Hey, you got away with it! Hmmm… let’s do it again!

Greed catches-up with you sooner or later

Alright, you are living “large”, move to new offices, hire a bunch of new staff, get a new car, start-up some new (expensive) hobbies and life is amazing! What you fail to realize is that you are slowly pricing yourself out of a market that you helped develop. Sooner or later, the contracts that use to be “guaranteed” begin going to other companies, out of desperation, you match their price but in reality, you cannot. You see, your overhead has taken a toll on how “low” you can go while still breaking even! You have nice new offices, guess what, your clients notice this as well and if “entrepreneur to entrepreneur” you see this, you quickly realize that you, as the client, are the one paying “extra” for these digs. Most entrepreneurs are cheap when it comes to spending money, they have no problem buying a plane and other gadgets but when it comes to business, every penny counts! This is when things begin to go downhill.

Excuses Excuses

First you realize that your sales staff is spending A LOT of time on the road trying to close deals that just aren’t going the way you had hoped or experienced in the past. Your subcontractors, realizing you got a bit of money, begin hiking their prices (making your prices higher) and worse, you begin living project by project. You hear all the excuses but they always seem to come down to price and customer service. You want to hire more people to handle the work flow but your overhead is already too high, you want to fire some people but cannot afford the severance, you need to give your sales staff higher commissions but with lower prices, you are being squeezed from all sides. Throw-in a natural disaster and you are really screwed big time!

What to do?

Well, the above happened to me, it took me years to recover but I wouldn’t have wanted things to happen in any other way. The lessons I learned from my past failures have made me who I am today, far smarter with my money, far more efficient with my time and a miser when it comes to Return On (potential)Investment. Well, how do you avoid a business and the personal failure that comes with it? Here are some tips:

• Only hire staff you absolutely need and not before you have at least a few months salary to cover them in your bank account, in other words, don’t count your eggs before they have hatched.
• Subcontract as much as you can, I have found that you will always PROFIT from subcontractors, when you don’t have a project, they don’t cost you anything and when you do, you will always make a net profit at the end of the day.
• Sales people, unless you can afford otherwise, should have the vast majority of their compensation based on commission, sure you can help with gas and other expenses but it’s up to them to make a living off your product/services, not you.
• Learn from your failures and try to constantly improve not only yourself but how things run in general. I believe in a constant improvement philosophy and it has served me very well in both up and down times.
• Listen to your clients and always try to ask a “lost” client why you aren’t working for them anymore or why a negotiation for a new one didn’t go anywhere. Knowledge is power, especially when it can have a very large impact on your bottom line.
• Accept that chance will play an ENORMOUS role in whether your enterprise succeeds or fails. Entrepreneurs who say they are successful or wealthy because of them and had nothing to do with luck are so full of shit that they can build a mud house out of it. Just about every entrepreneur (successful and otherwise) has been deafly affected by luck.
• Don’t give up! If there is one thing you remember from this blog posting it is that you should NEVER GIVE UP on your dreams. Hope, no matter how small, is still hope. The minute you give-up the only guarantee you will have is failure! Sometimes it is good to refocus your energies elsewhere, learn from your mistakes and move on… but never loose hope on the bigger picture to improve the lives of you, your family and those you care about.

The Bottom Line

Greed is one of those dragons that every entrepreneur has to learn how to slay.

Throughout my entrepreneurial journey, I have come to the realization of a number of facts, some of which I will share with you today. Instead of seeing these things negatively, people saying bad things about you or your products/services actually represents a fantastic opportunity!

Jealousy

When ever something “new” come onto the main consciousness of many people, the first thing they do is reject it even when this act completely defies logic. For example, if you start a new business and you all of a sudden have a number of people calling you a loser, that you will never amount to anything or worse, try everything in their limited powers of persuasion to convince you that everything will fail. What they are really telling you is “Geez… I wish I thought of that” followed by “Well, I’ll be damned if you succeed at something I -could- have but chose not to. In other words, the people out there with the greatest angst about you are the very people who are extremely jealous of your ambition and willingness to succeed where others haven’t.

YOU WANT LOSERS!

If you are developing something that sparks no emotion even in those who wish for your spiraling downfall it means one of two things, these losers either have no clue what you are doing or worse, you haven’t hit their “jealousy” buttons. Why is this bad? Well, it means that the general public, those who have a neutral stance on your success or or failure may also have the same blahze reaction to this idea as well. The quickest death of a company is indifference, you can succeed with huge negative and positive reaction but neutral sparks a quick death. Essentially, you WANT to receive a reaction - at both extremes, otherwise, you may be going down a dead-end.

YOU WANT TROLLS

The difference between a loser and a troll is quite simple, one usually uses their reputation and contacts to bring you down publicly while the other hides behind the anonymity of the internet to speed-up your failure. Losers are easy to deal with, if you have logic on your site, stand-up for yourself, present the facts (and only the facts) without any negative emotion or “talking-down” type behavior and generally losers will slowly fade into the background. Of course, you have to thank these losers because usually they bring-up a lot of attention to your cause which you may not have had otherwise. A troll on the other hand, well, you need to deal with them in a respectful manner now matter what they have said or done as, let’s be honest, you don’t know who they are or the possible influence they may have on you. I have found the easiest way to get rid of them is with a quick message acknowledging their “grief”, saying how you don’t agree with them and essentially telling them you will no longer participate in their games once you have summed-up a reply. Trolls need a reaction to succeed, don’t give them this pleasure and usually they will fade into the background as well.

Summarize

I know it’s tough to hold back your emotions and especially your tongue when attacked, but from my experience, if you handle it in a very civil manner and always maintain a certain state of decorum, others will come to realize that you where wronged and you will WIN! Every actions has a reaction, by blunting your reaction, there is nothing left to react against, as such, a developing negative situation can quickly be dissolved with little grief.

The Bottom Line

Trolls and losers are an indication of success, NOT FAILURE!

Montel Williams has accomplished a heck of a lot in his life and continues to be a force to be reckoned with in both the entertainment and health care industries. He doesn’t fear going against convention, fights for what he believes is right and is an incredibly intelligent man willing to debate issues that others wouldn’t ever touch. His live can be summed up using his favorite quote by Winston Churchill:

“We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.”

Montel Williams Early Years

Montel Williams was born in Baltimore, Maryland on July 3rd, 1956. He enlisted into the United States Marine Corps in 1974 and progressed into the United States Naval Academy, graduating with a degree in Engineering and International Security Affairs. He was awarded a number of honors during his 22 years of military service which include the Meritorious Service Medals (2), Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal, Humanitarian Service Medals (2), Naval Achievement Medal, Navy Expeditionary Medals (2) and the Navy Commendation Medals (2). He had a distinguished career and retired as a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy Reserve.

Montel Williams Changes Television

Although he was known for his lack of hair among talk show hosts, he fought incredibly hard to garner the attention and loyal viewers that made him a household name. He began “The Montel Williams Show” in 1992 putting him head-to-head against heavy hitters such as Geraldo, Phil Donahue and the Goddess of talk show hosts, Oprah Winfrey. He successfully mixed the strengths of his competition and thrived. He has also appeared in a number of very popular television shows such as “Jag”, “All My Children”, “Wheel of Fortune”, produced a number of television series, directed and acted through a very broad spectrum of entertainment media. He changed the face of entertainment, as a result, both Montel Williams and “The Montel Williams Show” where nominated for “Outstanding Talk Show Host” by the Daytime Emmy Awards four times, winning them once.

Montel turning challenges into opportunities

Montel has had three wives through his career in an industry known to be extremely difficult on relationships and has four children. By far, the most difficult issue he has had to deal with is his personal bout with Multiple Sclerosis, being diagnosed with MS in 1999. That same year, he was honored with the PRISM Award and Inspiration Award by the Entertainment Industries Council for his incredible leadership and role model status within the entertainment industry. He has, ever since his MS diagnosis, faced this incredibly challenging disease head-on by spreading awareness about this auto-immune disease on country-wide tours, his talk show and creating “The Montel Williams MS Foundation” to help raise funds to fight this horrible disease. His tireless activities garnered “The Montel Williams Show” the “Beacon Award” by the New York State Psychological Association (NYSPA). He was also awarded the AFTRA Disability Awareness Award by News & Broadcasting in 2003. He is also a published author of several books including “Mountain, Get Out Of My Way”, “Life Lessons and Reflections”, A Dozen Ways to Sunday”, “The 21 Day Fitness Program for Changing Your Body and Changing Your Life” and “Climbing Higher” and helps bring influential pieces to life through “Mountain Movers Press”. Montel Williams is also a national spokesman for the “Partnership for Prescription Assistance (PPA)” which helps those who can least afford to be sick an affordable mechanism to get the drugs they need to remain healthy.

The Bottom Line

The doors of new opportunities in life are always opened by the keys of unforeseen challenge.

Buzvia: The Montel Williams MS Foundation, Montel Williams on Wikipedia, The Montel Williams Show

I am sure there is enough worthless commodities in our universe to create an identical copy of our entire galaxy using just rubies, diamonds and gold… why are these commodities that can be found EVERYWHERE used as the foundation of our economy?

The true value of mineral resources

I find it interesting that the worlds economies are based on, to be quite honest, things that have absolutely NO value! Let’s look at gold, you can’t eat it, you can’t bring it with you when you die and mores importantly, it can’t do a damn thing! When was the last time you saw a piece of gold cook you super or better yet, provide your family sustenance to keep you alive for yet another day. You could say the same thing about diamonds, rubies and many other minerals… whose value is perceived (brainwashed?) rather then real. If I had to choose between a certified check from Google for one billion dollars or a half-rotten fish in a survival situation, the half-rotten fish wins hands down unless I was looking for something to start a fire… in which the check may have some value
Why do we value gold, diamonds and rubies so much?

Did you know that diamonds and rubies can now be created by man for a fraction of the price both environmental and financial? Did you know that the vast majority of diamonds are actually used as industrial polishers and cutting tools? Now you do, all that marketing crap about “diamonds are forever” is just that, marketing of a product that is essentially worthless other then for industrial applications. The reason why we value these minerals is simple, we are groomed at a young age to attach value to it, just like we do with paper money where there is no difference between a million dollar bill and a one dollar one, they are both just paper. Sadly, our entire economy is based on useless substances. Paper grows on trees, yet just because it has a picture of some dead guy on it, it’s worth now many times the value of the tree it came from? This is just silly. I am not even getting warmed up, consider the stock market, “virtual” currency and God knows what else we attach value to.

Are we really smarter then our closest cousins?

Let’s look at the plight of our closest genetic cousins, Chimpanzees. They live out their lives rather happily when not being killed off by humans as we clearcut their habitat. They multiply and are born in the same way we do it, they eat leaves, sometimes go hunting for insects and are relatively peaceful, living within the means of their local environment. Now, look at us, running around with our head chopped off buying our food, buying cloths, buying gadgets and widgets… working our entire lives towards the goal of accumulating the most gold which we cannot bring with us when we die anyhow. Now, who is really smarter? I go with the Chimps, they have a lot to teach us, if we can just open our eyes that other methods of existence are not only possible, but better for us!

How much Gold, Diamonds and Rubies are there anyways?

I haven’t a clue how much of these self-perceived valuable resources actually are, but considering there are trillions of stars out there in the universe, each with the possibility of some sort of planet made up of carbon (essential building block of these resources), I can easily assume that there is an unlimited amount of each that we could never run out even if our species lives on for billions of years. Gold, diamonds and rubies are not a limited resource, they are an unlimited resource.

What does this all mean?

Think about this, who benefits from making an unlimited resource perceived to be limited? Hmmm…. I don’t know… other humans? I have never seen a squirrel go to the bank to buy some jewelery using the nuts it has picked up over the previous season, only us humans attach value to worthless commodities. Back to the original question, what does this mean? Well, most of us have bought in to the myth that wealth itself has some value, that it creates happiness (you don’t buy diamonds because your sad do you?) and most importantly, the only way to ultimately succeed in life is by accumulating more resources then your fellow man.

Wealth is worthless?

Well, YES! Wealth itself, defined by “financial freedom” has the same value as a rock falling down a mountain. Wealth itself has absolutely NO value, as stated before, wealth is the accumulation of an unlimited resource that is given value by our society that brainwashes all of us to give it value. How can an unlimited resource have any type of value? Only limited things can have any type of value, not unlimited ones.

What’s your point?

Well, once you realize that financial wealth is worthless, you should be able to make sound decisions based on what is best for you and your family not on artificially created nonsense. The pressure to get a higher paying job, getting a mortgage that you cannot really afford nor need and just trying to best others just dissipates. We are pounded on a daily basis that the only true way towards ultimate happiness is the pursuit of wealth, what I am saying is that this way of thinking is all wrong, not only that, it’s based on flawed fundamentals. Don’t base your life around something that is flawed!

The Bottom Line

The sharing of love, experiences and life is the only true method of achieving happiness and fulfillment in life.

ps: Oil isn’t mentioned because it has no value what-so-ever, it’s a toxic soup that simply comes from decayed organics (vegetation, bacteria, animals, birds… ) and cannot be found where life does not exist. The extraction of oil is equivalent to digging up our ancestors from a graveyard and shoving them into our gas tank.