In this post you will learn seven proven steps to help you become the entrepreneur success you were born to be and live the life you have always dreamed of.

My Entrepreneurial Journey

I have co-founded two 7-figure per year companies in the past eight years.  One focuses on providing digital marketing services to online and offline clients while the other develops products in a variety of Niche related markets.

My entrepreneur success began around the same time as I began working harder on myself, than on my business. There were so many ‘ah-ha’ moments for me as I dove head-first into a constant and never-ending self-improvement in the areas of health, finances, success, relationships and pretty much anything that could lead to a better quality of life.

Of course it wasn’t always peaches and cream when it came to results. I’ve probably made more mistakes along the way to success than most people will make in their entire life.  I made a fortune, I lost a fortune and I even ended up dead broke and out of work for awhile – but I never quit on myself.

No matter how hard it got, how frightened I was, or how badly I messed up, it was the knowledge that I was gaining and applying that kept me going. It’s because I was learning new things every day that I never fell into the trap of feeling sorry for myself.

Consistent self-development keeps your brain agile which helps problems to get solved in new and different ways that would not have been possible if they were approached with the same level of thinking that they were created by.

Knowledge of itself is not enough though to bring you entrepreneurial success. You also need experience. It’s when you apply knowledge that it becomes powerful for you – even if that means you mess up at first. It’s far better to apply new ideas and make a mistake, than to not try at all and stay the same.

The key is to not give-up after your first attempt. That’s what quitters do. If you’re someone that gets scared the first time the going gets tough, then becoming an entrepreneur is definitely not for you. You’re better off finding a job you can tolerate so that you at least have some money to live by.

But if you want more than just a pay check out of life and working to make someone else rich who most likely couldn’t care less about you or your dreams, then watch the video below to learn the seven steps to grow a 7-figure a year business.

Entrepreneur Success Tips: Seven Steps To Seven Figures Audio

Well, how did you do? I hope that you are now a lot clearer about the exact steps you can take to help you get focused and start taking massive action towards starting your entrepreneurial journey, or taking it to the next level.

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Skype: michaelatma
Email: Michael@MichaelAtma.com

“I Teach You how to live a Happier, Healthier and More Fulfilling Life in Just 5 Minutes a Day!”

PS: If You Want To Enjoy An Extraordinary Life, This is the Book you Should Get – Master Your Mindspace

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There are some simple steps you can take to help smoothen the transition from wherever you are now in your work and life to becoming a successful entrepreneur. It’s not always easy to know what those steps are when you haven’t climbed them before which is why I decided to spill the beans here.

Is It Difficult to be an Entrepreneur?

I wasn’t always an entrepreneur. In fact, I’ve had around 17 different jobs over the lifetime of my so called ‘careers’, the longest of them was working as a marketing analyst for an International airline. While some of them were okay, for the most it really does

As far as if it’s difficult to become an entrepreneur, what I can say from my own experience is that the hardest part for me was breaking free from the ’employee’ mindset.  If you’re not familiar with what that is, let me explain.

Society trains us to be good employees. Our entire education system shapes our minds around getting a job so we can become a useful part of society. But what about those that want to do more with their lives than build someone else’s dream and make them rich?

I believe there comes a time for most of us when we scan no longer kid ourselves that we are either happy or fulfilled by what we do for a living. I know when I got to this space, each day at work was unbearable. It took me two years of planning and preparation before I took the leap from employee to entrepreneur and in that time I’d never worked harder in my life.

The only thing that really holds any of us back from living the life of our dreams and taking our financial and business destiny into our own hands is fear. Fear of failure, fear of the unknown and most of all fear of change. But guess what, change is going to happen anyway. Job guarantee is a thing of the past and it’s only going to get worse.

More people than ever are now yearning for lifestyle first, business second, and for many, this means working from home, or even being location independent so they can travel and get paid for what they love to do.

In the video below I’m going to share with you the five steps you can take to help make the transition from employee (or unemployed) to entrepreneur.

5 Steps to Being an Entrepreneur Video

Well, how did you do? Did the video help you to have a better idea of what steps you can take towards becoming a successful entrepreneur starting today? If you are inspired to take more action then know that now is always the best time to get started and that there will always be good people who are more than willing to help you along the way.

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Michael Atma’s Blog
Skype: michaelatma
Email: Michael@MichaelAtma.com

“I Teach You how to live a Happier, Healthier and More Fulfilling Life in Just 5 Minutes a Day!”

PS: If You Aren’t Living Your Full Potential in Business or Life, This is the Book you Should Get – Master Your Mindspace

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I have to say that when I was working as an employee and trading time for money it would never have occurred to me that this was even remotely possible. But now that I have my own companies and have figured out how to develop systems that can run my business without me, it all makes sense.

What It Takes To Make It happen

These days there is definitely a rising trend in valuing performance over presence.   The days of being ‘on-the-clock’ from the moment you start until your ‘shift’ has finished is slowly starting to give way to being about getting a set amount of work or projects done within a deadline.

This means that if you have four projects to complete for the month and you complete them in 1 week, then you can take the rest of the time off. And if you get your weeks worth of work done in 1 hour, then you can have the rest of the week off.

It’s irrelevant what hours you work or don’t’ work as long as your assigned work load gets completed to satisfactory levels. So this obviously only matters if you work for someone else. If you work for yourself, then it’s a bit easier. It’s the same process really, except you need to becoming good at outsourcing.

Building Your Outsource Force

If you want to live a 5 hour work week then you MUST get good at outsourcing those things about your business or life that you shouldn’t be wasting time on anymore. I now have a full time Virtual Assistant (VA) and about 50 part-time VA’s all helping to run several companies.

My only wish is that I’d though of it sooner in my business. It has freed up my time so completely that if I wanted to take a year off and come back to my business in better shape than when I left – I could do it easily. At first it started out as a process of delegation.

I delegated those tasks that I didn’t really need to do myself, and in fact hadn’t needed to for some time. This initially freed up my time to work ‘on’ my business to develop better systems and procedures for handling everything that Ii was doing, or that would be required to be done at some point.

Building a Remote Controlled Business

Initially, it takes time to train people in how your business works.  Even showing a VA how to do your work initially takes time. But, here’s how to do it smart. When you train them, instead of doing it ‘live’ you make a training video, then catalog and upload it to wherever you store your video’s. You can even use You-Tube for this purpose – and it’s FREE!

Then, you have an ever expanding training resource that you can re-use anytime you like… And, as you train up people and your business grows, you train trainers to take that workload off you as well. It’s really the most awesome way to free up your time and  remove the need for you to do all the work.

This doesn’t mean that you HAVE to let go of doing all the work if you don’t want to. You may be happy working a four day work week, or a three day work week, or a ten hour work week. It really doesn’t matter as that’s your call. What matters is that the process to make that happen is the same.

It requires you to get REAL good at outsourcing all those tasks that you either don’t want or need to be doing.  You’d be surprised at what can be outsourced. The latest list I saw showed 784 tasks that can be done by VA’s for pennies on the dollar.

From answering your emails and phone, to doing outbound sales call, to customer support and website maintenance, there’s no limits to what you get done for you by an outsource team. It really is rapidly becoming the best way to run a business because of the relatively low cost of hiring people full time.

By the way, you can also hire the same people to help you out if you are a full time employee. Especially if you can get your company to rate you work based on performance rather than attendance. Then, it’s a no-brainer to hire some remote staff to help you out.

If your boss won’t come to the party, then it may be time to sack your boss and look elsewhere,or even better start-up your own business.

The bottom line is that it has never been more real to create a lifestyle based work or business setup. All it takes is enough self worth to believe that you deserve to live a better life followed by unstoppable action to make it happen.

Then, whether you dream is to travel the world while getting paid to do it, or you just want to free up your life to do what you want, when you want and with whomever you want, then you can have it.

This means that if you are experiencing a moment filled with joy, then you are abundantly joyful; if you are experiencing a moment filled with sadness, then you are abundantly sad; if you are angry, then you have an abundance of anger.

Life Is Naturally Abundant

In my experience there is an unlimited supply of everything that we will ever want or need in life. From money to motivation, health to happiness, energy to creativity – it’s all there for the taking. All you need to learn to do is to be open to receive it.

If every thought you think, word you speak, and action you take is focused on abundance then you can expect that you will instantly start to attract more abundance into your life. This is by far the simplest and quickest way to go from a life of lack to a life of plenty.

However, if you’re always checking out your bank balance or focusing on what’s not going well for you, then you can expect to attract even more to be unhappy about. The universal life law that I’m talking about here is ‘what we put out energetically is what you get back’

And the two main energies you can focus on are an energy of lack in your thoughts words,or deed, or the energy of abundance.

Tapping Into The Ocean of Abundance

There is such a vast opportunity for growth in this area that the question is not so much how can you become more abundant in your life. It’s more how abundant and prosperous do you desire and deserve to be?

Without fail, if a person isn’t doing well financially it’s because they’ve bought into beliefs of lack. Prosperity of course in not just about money it’s so much bigger than that. It’s about  being rich in mind, body, spirit and money.

I view prosperity or prosperous thinking as the river that flows to the ocean of abundance that both surrounds us and lives within us. By building beliefs of prosperity into every area of your life and eliminating any beliefs of lack you will not only change your circumstances you’ll also have a richer and fuller life than you ever imagined possible.

A financial survey recently revealed there is enough resources on the planet to evenly distribute at least one million dollars to every man, woman and child! These are interesting facts when you consider the unequal distribution of wealth that currently exists.

The wealthy play a numbers game in which actual dollars and cents are rarely seen and the dividends they receive through superior money management skills far exceed the almost worthless interest that the average person gains through local bank rates.  The good news is that these skills can be learned.

The Secret To Financial Abundance

Along with learning these skills you will also need a mindset of abundance. Without it, all the skills in the world won’t matter as any money you do acquire will surely be lost.

To have financial wealth you must first release any addictions you may have to poverty. These addictions are found within your limiting belief systems regarding money. If you grew up in an environment where your parents constantly reinforced hardship, lack and struggle, then this is the first hurdle you need to navigate.

The way to do that is to educate yourself on how financial independent people achieved this state of prosperity and then start doing what they did. Take baby steps if you need to but just keep moving. Eliminating old habits of lack are as simple as creating new habits of abundance.

Practice thinking and speaking abundantly in everything you do. Learn business skills to help you make money faster. Learn how to effectively manage and invest money. Then you will have all the essential ingredients for abundant living in every area of your life.

Once you achieve this then teach it to others. This is how the rich at heart become richer. .

Is this even possible? yes it is!

How do I know? Because I did it in 6 years.

Why Retire Young or Quickly?

Well, that’s really a matter of personal preference. If you’re like me and you don’t want to wait until your 65 to enjoy the freedom to live your life as you see fit, then this is for you.

Most people don’t think about retiring until it’s almost too late. Or, they plan on retiring once they have finished their working career, which for most is around 65, health permitting. This was never attractive to me because I wanted to get the full benefits of a retired lifestyle while I was still young enough to enjoy it.

Why spend your whole life working to pay bills when you could be travelling all the time, having fun, pursuing hobbies and leisure activities you love, or simply giving back to your community? I see so many people whose bodies are either worn out or broken down by the years of working hard for a living.

And all to often their reward for all their efforts is to spend their days, weeks, months and even years going from one doctor’s appointment to the next, which means their quality of life sucks.

Wouldn’t it be better to have a plan to retire young and wealthy and get the most out of life while we can? Let’s face it, it your a workaholic and don’t have a real life, then the idea of retiring early probably is of no interest to you.

That’s okay, as there are many business out there that need worker drones, so there’ll always be a place for you as long as your health hangs in there. But for those of us that want to have fun, live with purpose, follow our dreams, and be free to enjoy a rich and full life, we want more than an early death sentence.

4 Steps To Retiring Young

1. Plan for it.

Like anything in life,if you don’t plan for it, it will most likely never happen. Writing down when you want to retire by and how much income you will need to have to be financially free is the first step. Also write down what your ideal lifestyle would look like to make it more real.

At this stage it’s just an idea but it gives you something to focus on to begin with.

2. Believe in yourself

The biggest limiting factor that could hole you back from achieving the plan that you have made in step 1, is your self doubt. You will need to be willing to constantly be living outside your comfort zone if you are going to have any chance to make it happen.

Your doubts and fears are the only thing that can prevent you from succeeding at any goal. They are fueled by years of conditioning that limit your power to be, do and have anything you focus on. They cause you to give up before you even get started in many cases, or quit when the going gets tough.

To succeed at retiring rich at an early age you will need to push through any limitations you may come across that might tell you that your not smart enough, or your too poor, or it’s not possible. They are all self defeating beliefs designed to keep you small and powerless.

Life rewards people who are risk takers and action takers. It doesn’t reward those that are lazy or unmotivated. Laziness and lack of motivation simply comes from limiting beliefs about yourself. Be willing to face them and break through them if you want to have it all sooner, rather than later.

3. Know your why

One of the biggest factors that will help you mentally, physically and emotionally to achieve financial freedom early is to have really compelling reasons why you must change yourself in order to make your plan work. To find your deepest ‘why’s’ or reasons for changing your life you need to dig down deep inside.

And by digging down deep inside I mean hooking into the most powerful and compelling reasons you can tap into that has your strongest emotions attached to them.  From your kids and spouse, to your need to feel like a success or never be financially dependent again, they have to matter to you.

My very first ‘why’ was to never have to work for someone else again. It didn’t even matter at that time if I became financially free or not. What really mattered was that I hated working for other people so much that I was willing to do whatever it took to get control of my life back.

That’s all I could think about day and night. It was like a fire that raged inside me and it gave me the ‘juice’ I needed to power up each day and do what I had to do to make it happen.

Then, when I finally got back control of my life, I realized that I wanted to be completely free to be, do, and have whatever I wanted. Then my ‘why’ became about proving to myself that I could do more with my life than just being average.

4. Figure out your ‘how’

The how is actually not as important as your why. Your why is the fuel that will keep you going long after your resolve starts to wain or things get challenging. There are an infinite number of ways to become financially free but at the end of the day they all revolve around:

• Improving your business skills
• Learning how to effectively manage your money
• Become good at investing

Whatever ‘vehicle’ you choose to be your path to financial freedom it will require you to get better in these 3 areas. Do that, and the world will eventually become your biggest playground to have fun in.

1. Choose what you want to do and stick to it.

There are so many ways to make money online that you can easily get side-tracked going from one shiny object to the next without ever really achieving anything except wasting your time and most likely a lot of money on things you’ll never need or use.

No matter whether you want to brand yourself, develop your own products or services to sell, become an affiliate sales superstar or setup an Amazon store, the opportunities are endless. The main thing though is choose a path you want to follow and stick to it.

Building a 5, 6 or even 7 figure business online takes time and consistent effort. Don’t allow yourself to get off track and then step-by-step success will come your way.

2. Have a Backup Plan

As mentioned already it takes time and effort to create ‘overnight’ success making money online. If you think you’re going to do it fast and easy because that’s what some of the so-called ‘guru’s’ are telling you that can happen, then my recommendation is don’t give up your day job just yet.

By having a backup plan it means that if you plan to go full-time building an online business, then have at l;east 6 to 12 months worth of savings put aside to live off while you work on your business. It’s 10x harder to focus and make smart decisions when your back is against the wall financially.

Giving yourself a financial buffer will give you a sense of security at least for a short while. But you will still need to work your butt off to make it happen even in a 6 to 12 month time frame.

To work out how much money you need to put aside just multiply your normal monthly living expenses by 12 months and you’ll have your figure. Of course, if you already have savings, or a partner that is willing to continue working and covering expenses while you work on your dream, then that can also work.

3. Find a Mentor.

Most of the time there’s really no need to reinvent the wheel. Find someone that is already succeeding online doing what you want to do and  either buy some of their courses and training, or get ion touch with them to see if they offer coaching or mentor programs.

By doing this you will find that you’ll be able to copy a lot of what they are doing and not have to waste time and effort by doing things the hard way instead of the smart way.

4. Plan Your Approach

You MUST have a plan in place. It can’t be some pie in the sky idea you have that has not been well thought out and researched. You need to have financial targets that you are aiming for, and a breakdown of how you are going to hit those targets from your products or services sales.

This will also include how you are going to build your list (if you require one, which 99% of people will), what traffic strategies you will use, what you USP is (unique selling proposition), who your ideal target market is (customer demographics) and what your sales funnels look like.

5. Have a Compelling Reason Why

There is a reason why 95% of people who try to make it online fail. The reason is because they lack the self discipline and character required to work harder than they have ever worked before until they make their dream happen.

When I started out, I was working a full-time job and built up to $10k per month part-time working after hours and on weekends. Basically, I had no life for the first 6 months until I could afford to hire people to do the grunt work.

Being a business owner is a far cry from having an ’employee’ mentality which to me is one-step above laziness. You just turn up for a set amount of hours and get paid for your time and then forget about it. Whereas a business owner knows that the buck stops with them.

Whether their family eats or doesn’t and they have enough money to live or not is up to them. No-one else is going to do it for them now, they are on their own. The sales, the customer support, the admin, the financial systems, collecting debts, delivering products and services, and so much more is in your hands.

Now, I’m not saying this to scare you off but if it doesn’t, then that;s a good thing because you would never have made it anyway if you can get scared that easy. Building a business whether it’s online or not is never a walk in the park and is for people who are 100% committed to never give up on themselves, or their dream.

A compelling reason is one that hits you right in the heart and triggers powerful emotions to help you to stay motivated and focused no matter what obstacles come your way. I find that if you write down your most compelling ‘Why’ you have-to succeed and read it to yourself every day, then you are on the right track.

6. Have a Supportive Partner

It really helps if your partner supports you (if you have one) while you are starting out. Having someone whinging about how much time you are not spending with them and how much money you’re not making in the initial stages can be a real downer and de-motivator.

If you have a significant other that tends to behave in this way, then you need to sit down with them before you get started and make an agreement on how things are going to work. If that agreement gets broken by either of you, then you have to renegotiate it.

I wouldn’t recommend you even get started online if you have a partner that won’t get off your back as it’ll probably destroy your relationship. However, if the relationship is already rocky, perhaps it’s time to move on anway and then work on your dream.

7. Become Like Water

If you find that what you are doing is not working, instead of quitting, keep looking for another way to get the result you are after. It may be that you are missing one thing that will make all the difference, or you just need someone else’s feedback to point you in the right direction.

Never be afraid to ask for help, search forums, or do whatever it takes to get the answers you need to make the right decisions for your business growth. Even teaming up with someone that you know, like and trust who has skills you don’t and vice verse can be a very smart thing to do.

8. The 4 Hour Work Week

If you haven’t already read the book ‘The 4-Hour Work Week’, by  Timothy Ferris, then I highly recommend it as it will help you focus on the right way to setup your business from the start so that you free up your time to live an extraordinary lifestyle.

You see, after saying how hard it is to get your business running, the fact is once you succeed in it, then the next stop is to develop system that let your business run without you. This is actually easier than it sounds. I’ve done it in my business and now it pretty much runs itself.

The beauty of having a business that runs on auto-pilot, especially and online one, frees you up to live anywhere and do anything you like. My days are filled with doing things I really love, which includes writing, creating, helping people to have a better life and living in a relatively stress free way.

Imagine what your life would be like if you only had to work 1 hour or less a day? What would that mean to your health, happiness, relationships and quality of life. So, even though I kept it real earlier on about what it takes to make money online, I can tell you for a fact that whatever sacrifices you need to make, do it!

There is no better or bigger opportunity in the world right now to create a business that can give you your life back than the Internet. It only requires that you treat it like a real business, instead of some ‘get rich quick’ scheme and you’re sure to achieve your victory.

4 Steps To Turn Your Idea Into Reality

Here’s the only 4 things you need to do to take anything at all that pops into your head and make it a reality. I love ideas because they start with imagination and then finish with something real. To me, imagination is worth more than gold because if you use it right, it can blossom into the most wondrous trees.

1. Write it down

Once your idea comes to mind – whether you’re positive it’s a great idea that you want to pursue or not – write it down. Without this, it’s just still floating around in your head, and as long as it stays there, you won’t take action on it.

Be as detailed as possible so that the next time you look at what you wrote, you’re not left wondering, “Wait, what exactly was I thinking again?”

This is especially important if you see this idea linking in with other things you have going on currently, or if you already have a specific goal in mind (i.e. I think this idea is so great because…).

2. Ask for feedback

Before you leap into taking the next step and start working on an action plan, share your idea with people you know and get some feedback. You want to be sure that whatever you’re about to devote your time and energy to is going to impact others as much as it is impacting you.

Don’t just ask 1 person – ask several people what they think of your idea. Also, make sure you spend some time asking yourself for feedback, too. The best way to determine whether or not an idea is worth pursuing comes by way of asking yourself a single question:

Will this help me get 1 step closer to my overall goals?  

If the answer isn’t YES!, then re-focus on what’s most important.

 3. Create an action plan

 If step 2 worked out for you, then start putting an action plan in place. Before you can start doing something, you need to have certain things in place, like what your goal or purpose is, and a timeline/deadline to help hold yourself accountable.

Action plans don’t need to be hard work or take up a bunch of time. In fact, the more concise the better. Start off with the end in mind and then work your way backwards.

For example, if your idea is to write a book on ‘Healthy Sweets Recipes’, then write down the date you want to complete it by, and then under action steps write down the milestones you need to achieve to turn it into reality.

The milestones might look like:

• Come up with a title
• Write down the chapter headings
• Write a chapter a week
• Decide on whether to self publish or find a publisher
• Find a good editor
• Design a cover
• Decide on marketing budget
• Where to market
• … and so on

4. Just start

What I’ve found is that the sooner you get started, the sooner you will get results.  Success with anything begins with taking the first step and then taking consistent action until you get the result you wanted. Anything less is to kid yourself that it ever really mattered to you.

Don’t let procrastination or fear of failure be the reason you give up on your dreams. This will only lead to a life of regret and the one thing that is for sure is that regret is one of the most useless human traits that exists.

Why? Because it is 100% preventable and totally pointless wallowing in what I call the, “I wish I had” syndrome. This leads to feeling sorry for yourself which is a waste of time and energy, which you could instead be using to enjoy your life and do more of what you love.

The next idea you have get real with yourself and take that first step to making your idea a reality as soon as possible. Don’t put all the work in from steps 1 – 3 only to let it sit and rot in the corner somewhere. Even if after moving forward on your idea you decide it’s not worth pursuing, at least you gave it a shot.

The sooner you take the first step and invest your time in your idea, the more likely you are to actually continue working on it. It might be drawing out a mind map, creating an outline, researching data you need, or any other small piece of the pie. Whatever it is, don’t wait a week to start – start right away.

Firstly, can money buy happiness? Well, that depends. It depends on whether what you spend your money on brings more happiness to your life or not.  For example, a shopaholic who spends all their money on ‘things’ will get a momentary spike in ‘happy hormones’ when they buy something but it certainly won’t last.

This type of happiness is fleeting and simply fills a need for emotional nurturing, which could be gained in countless other ways.

What is ‘Enough’ Money?

Again, this will vary from person to person but for the moment lets say that ‘enough’ money is when the money you make is more than the money you spend.

It certainly doesn’t mean living pay-check to pay-check and just scraping by while your credit cards are maxed to the limit and bills just keep mounting up. That to me is financial suicide which all too many people get stuck in the habit of.

Sometimes, having enough money to take care of all these things and not have to worry about bills, mortgages and everyday living expenses may not necessarily make you happy, but will ensure you are less financially stressed and have more peace of mind.

Above all though, having enough money to never have to worry about it again will give you a feeling of freedom in the world that very few people get to know. The freedom to be, do and have whatever your heart desires.

Money Doesn’t Grow On Trees

This is what my parents taught me about money as it was their mantra whenever I wanted something. Needless to say, there are about as many different beliefs about money as there are people on the planet. Some believe it is the root of all evil, while others believe that lack of it is the reason they suffer.

Money is neither good, nor bad – it is just a form of energy exchange. We exchange money for goods and services. What we choose to do with our money is what determines whether it will bring more joy to our lives or create more suffering.

The formula is simple, if you want more money in your life then you need to have a powerful set of beliefs to support it. Then, as you take actions to reinforce your beliefs of greater prosperity, your money tree will start to bear fruit.

How Does Self Sabotage Work

What’s important to understand is that the amount of money that flows into and out of your life is primarily determined not so much by your physical efforts, but by invisible scripts (like “I hate money”) that sabotage any attempts to have more.

We all have scripts running in our head. Some of them are helpful, while others aren’t. These scripts come from what we learned about ourselves and the world around us as children, which conditioned us to think and behave in set ways about money as we matured.

These scripts, or belief systems as they are also known, are held in place by emotion. In other words, the stronger an emotion we have around something, the stronger the belief. That’s why the topics of politics, religion or sex can always be guaranteed to start fires because our beliefs around these things are typically very powerful.

Self sabotage comes from the scripts in your head that hold you back from living your full potential. This is the part of you that comes into play whenever you try and better your life. It’s the part that when you try to lose weight, quit smoking or give-up something that is not good for you sabotages your attempts at lasting change.

The same thing happens when it comes to your money beliefs. If you have a script in your head like, “I don’t deserve to be rich”, or, “I never have enough money”, then this is where you will stay stuck at until you break free from these limiting beliefs and the emotion that holds them in place.

How To Break Through Limiting Beliefs

Willpower and desire are not enough to help break through the scripts that limit your money, happiness or any area of your life. It needs to be a process. By that I mean you need to follow a step-by-step road map to financial success that has been successfully used by others to  overcome your limiting beliefs.

The same can be said for any area of your life that you want to eliminate self sabotage from. Follow the steps that others have taken to successfully lose weight, stop smoking or get rich and you’ll be able to do the same. What you do need to be mindful of though is that you choose the right process for you.

Once you get clear about what your financial goal is, then you can find the perfect process to help achieve your goal. If you don’t have a financial goal in mind, then there’s nothing to start as everything we achieve

Building Better Money Habits

There are three steps to turn the art of making money into a habit that you can rely on for the rest of your life. They are:

Step 1 – Make more money than you spend.

While this may sound ridiculously obvious it may not be a surprise that most people are in debt up to their eyeballs and have no back-up plan should their income suddenly stop. If you simply focus on increasing your income, while reducing your expenses, then you are on track for step 1.

This may mean asking for a raise at work, finding a job that pays better money, or starting-up your own business where your income level’s do not need to be capped.

If you’re so inclined, then setting up a budget to live by week-by-week or month-by-month is an awesome idea. Budget’s aren’t that popular with many people,probably because they don’t want to feel like they have to go without something if the budget doesn’t allow it.

What i can say about budgets though is that they are a a great habit to get into so you can see exactly where your money is being spent and how it needs to be distributed. Then, when you want something that is outside of your budget you need to figure out a way to afford it.

This is a powerful way to take financial responsibility and develop a powerful money habit for life.

Step 2 – Save a percentage of every dollar you make.

This is incredibly powerful when done correctly. I remember when I first started doing this I made sure to always pay myself 10% of every dollar I made. I didn’t even put this money in the bank. Instead I put it in an envelope so I could count it once a week. Just by doing this I managed to save $25,000 in 12 months.

The key to the success of a savings plan is to never touch it, no matter how tough things get. This is more an exercise in self discipline than anything else. Saving 10% of every dollar you make may not be doable for you so just pick a percentage that works for you and start there.

I would sometimes put aside more than 10% of my earnings depending upon if I could afford to or not that week. So set a minimum percentage you are okay to start with and then be flexible in putting aside more if you can. This leads us to the next money habit.

The key to making this work is to pay yourself first before taking care of your bills and expenses.

Step 3 – Invest your saving’s

Real wealth happens when you have good cash flow PLUS assets that eventually produce income for you. It is said that cash flow is king, and I tend to agree. I have many friends who are asset rich and cash flow poor and still they struggle to live a good lifestyle.

Whereas, if your cash flow always exceeds your expenses then you are in a good position, even without assets, as long as the cash flow continues of course.

Investing is a skill that anyone can develop. In fact, it is essential to become a good investor if you want to become financially free. To leave it in the hands of other’s could be potential financial suicide,

My recommendation would be to seek out a financial planner who is a successful investor themselves and have a meeting with them to determine a strategy you are happy with. I personally love property and business. I invest in both of these and they have not let me down yet.

Regardless of what you decide on make sure you take the time to learn about the different areas of investing, how they work and get especially knowledgeable about the ones you are keen on. In the investing world, knowledge is power. The more knowledge you have about how it works and what to do, the smarter your financial decisions will be.

It’s never a good idea to put your financial destiny into the hands of people who ‘say’ they can help you. Just ask the millions of people who have been screwed over by fraudulent investors who are all too happy to take your life savings and run with them.

That’s why part of becoming a successful investor you should be reading books on investing, going to seminars, and developing your own skills in your area)s) of interest.

Making Money Is Fun

Making money should be fun. If you look at it more like a game that you can easily get better at over time, then your thinking in the right direction. I’ve always used the affirmation, “I love money, money loves me and I am a money magnet”, to help build a positive script in my mind around money.

If you follow the three steps above you will rapidly start to develop a powerful set of money habits that will help you to break free from limiting scripts and habits you may have adopted around money. Most of all, try not to take money too seriously as after all it’s really just a piece of paper with ink on it or some numbers on your computer screen.

If you look at making money as something fun to master and have an attitude of abundance in all that you think and do, then you’ll soon start to see more of it in your life to enjoy.

Richard Branson, for example, has setup his businesses now so that employees can take as much holiday as they want.  This came about when he heard of another company whose morale, creativity and productivity went through the roof when they did the same.

The policy that the company ‘Netflix’ adopted was that salaried staff could take off whenever they want for as long as they want, without the need for prior approval or for the time to be tracked. Instead the focus is on developing a culture of ‘Freedom and Responsibility’ which then regulates productivity.

Netflix themselves went on to say, ‘We should focus on what people get done, not on how many hours or days worked. Just as we don’t have a nine-to-five policy, we don’t need a vacation policy.’

Imagine, a business world where freedom and enjoying life are more important than adherence to outdated policies and procedures aimed at running a tight, yet fragile ship.

Times and Tides Are A Changing

Let’s face it, so many old paradigms just don’t cut it anymore. From our education and political systems through to our business and management structures, there’s a massive opportunity for more ‘enlightened’ entrepreneurs to blaze a new and more exciting trail for others to follow.

Just because things may have worked a certain way in the past, doesn’t mean that we should just blindly keep doing the same thing into the future.

It’s incredibly refreshing to see that progressive minded companies are starting to switch onto the fact that lack staff loyalty and motivation are costing them millions. From low productivity to high turnover if your staff are not happy in the workplace, then the numbers will show it.

Not only is it a massive headache to keep on trying to replace good people, the amount of time and money that goes into training just one person is very costly to any business.

Imagine a business model, like Netflix uses, where they are virtually eliminating this from happening. Who wouldn’t want to work for someone that encourages you to bring out the best in yourself and your team, and rewards you with incredible flexibility of hours and days as a reward.

 What Does The Future For Workplaces Hold?

It’s already happening. When people like Richard Branson do something in their business that is cutting edge, the world watches and learns. You don’t get to be so successful at everything your do by accident.

Another company that is leading the way  and reinventing work is ‘Mindvalley‘. At Mind Valley  they believe that work needs to be fun, educational and something that you are so enthusiastic about that you can’t wait to go to work each day.

They have said, ‘screw-it’ to the conventional 9-5 paradigm and instead encourage their people to be creative, learn new things, develop themselves and treat it more like play time – all the while getting paid for it. They have already won several awards for having one of the most desirable and different work cultures anywhere in the world.

If this trend continues, then the future of workplaces is looking a lot brighter. I still believe that we will see a massive surge in people working from home even with larger companies as they cotton onto the fact that giving employees a chance at a better lifestyle while staying productive in work is a no-brainer.

Even more than that I see a rise in Entrepreneurs hitting the world market as more and more people start wanting to become the master of their own creative and financial destiny.

Being able to have as many holidays at work as you like provided you are getting your projects completed is a super-smart idea. I apply something similar to my own business where I reward myself for productivity and gives those that work for me total freedom to set their hours and days as long as they get their weekly tasks completed on time, every-time.

At the end of the day you really want to have people working for you who are able to hold themselves accountable. If they are the type of person that needs their hand held everyday just to make sure they are doing their work, then they are not a good fit for your or anybody’s business really.

Never hesitate to let go of people who are holding your business back and replace them with people who can help you build your vision with ease. Most of all though, always reward people who are loyal and trustworthy. Too little of this happens which is why so many employees are demotivated by going to work.

It’s a brave new dawn in business and I can’t wait to see what the future brings.

The qualities that an entrepreneur possess that make them stand out from the crowd of wanna-be-preneur’s is that they are fast decision makers, massive action takers, innovators, leaders, risk-takers and work on themselves harder than they do on their business.

Anyone who has ever thought about starting a business knows that they are in for a marathon event. If you were thinking that you could get rich quickly with some fancy idea you have, forget about it – it’s just a pipe dream.

Unless you have tremendous tenacity and resilience to bounce back from the inevitable mistakes that can and will happen along the path of success, then living the entrepreneurial dream may not be your cup of tea.

How To Become an Entrepreneur

If you are the type of person that can follow your passion and trust your gut feeling, then you are mot likely already on your way to becoming an entrepreneur.

With that in mind here’s six essential traits that you will consistently find in successful entrepreneur’s.

1. They think beyond the mindset on an employee.

Good employees can often evolve into great entrepreneurs but for that to happen they have to have a bigger vision of themselves than just being an employee and then look for roles that will help them to break out of that mind-set.

Employees tend to follow other peoples rules and prefer to stay within their comfort zones both professionally and financially. To break free from this mind-set you need to have a bigger vision of a world that included you sharing something in the marketplace that fulfill’s a need. Ideally, this vision will come from an opportunity in a Niche that you are passionate about and that you have imagined something that fills a real need that is not currently being met.

2. They are confident in who they are.

It takes confidence to let go of the security of being an employee and then sticking your neck out to work for yourself. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea but it is essential if you are going to make the jump from having a job and financial security to the uncertain world of being an entrepreneur where you are often found flying by the seat of your pants.

Confidence is something that can be developed and is essential to success at any level. Confidence can be gained by facing challenges and then gaining strength and belief in yourself as you overcome them.

3. They walk their talk.

It’s so easy for people to sound like they know what they are talking about or big-note themselves to others even though it may all be a figment of an overactive imagination. An entrepreneur is willing to put in the groundwork to be successful in their endeavors.

They take responsibility for getting things done and they take pride in knowing that they will handle any problem that comes their way not by trying to pass it off to someone else but instead by taking ownership over results. Because they have this focus they are able to teach others how to take charge and foster a culture of accountability in both individuals and teams.

4. They are passionate about learning.

That follow a philosophy of ‘constant and never ending improvement’ in both personal and business skills that will help them to become a better in every aspect of their business and life. They are willing to learn on the run rather than in a formal classroom setting by seeking out information, asking questions, and doing personal reading and research on whatever is relevant for their business model.

This might mean that they spend 80 hours a week on their business but it’s no big deal for them because it’s their passion. They understand that in the beginning they may be overworked, underpaid and living on the edge, but as long as they are following their true passion, then this is all they need to see them through the initial challenges.

5. They value happiness as a way of life both at work and home.

There are many ways that being an entrepreneur can bring more happiness. The first is that being your own boss can be a massive happiness catalyst. If you’ve ever worked for someone that made your life a living hell, then you know what I mean. If job satisfaction matters to you, then this characteristic is right up there.

Happiness can also come from being able to take charge of your life, set your own hours, work from home, and feel like you are doing something meaningful with your life by doing what you are truly passionate about.

6. They see life as an adventure to be enjoyed.

If you take yourself too seriously then your most likely better off staying employed. The reason is that not everything en entrepreneur does is going to work or be perfect so if you can’t handle pain, rejection, making mistakes and the pressures of being responsible for your success or failure, then it probably is not a good fit for your.

Conversely, entrepreneurs are sincere in all they do and they remain optimistic regardless of how many setbacks they face. They work on fostering a positive mindset so that they can deal with things as they happen, find a solution and then move on without needing to drag the past along with them to bog them down.

Life and business is an amazing adventure if we choose to look at it that way. Especially as an entrepreneur because you get to be creative, innovative and looking to find better ways to improve on things that already exist.

Over The Top

Above all an entrepreneur leads by example and is not afraid to take risks. Many people could easily be successful with their business ideas if they were just willing to take risks.  This is why being an entrepreneur may not be for everyone i because some people just can’t handle the insecurity of not knowing what the future holds or they get overwhelmed too easily.

If you’re sitting on the threshold trying to make up your mind whether to take the leap of faith into the entrepreneurial void then that last piece of advice I would give is that if you are the type of person that takes massive consistent action and have a ‘never-give-up’ attitude, then see you on the other-side of success!