If you want to live a rewarding life beyond the ordinary, average, everyday humdrum that most people cling to you must make your own set of rules.

Following the pre-determined rules will only get you one thing: nothing that you actually want.

There is one absolute rule of the universe: People who follow all the rules never get what they want. People that break all the rules get everything they want and more.

You’ve heard people cry about it a million times “but I did everything I was supposed to! How come I things don’t go my way?! He doesn’t do anything he’s supposed to and everything goes his way!”

Many think that following the rules is the best way to gain acceptance and respect. That could not be further from the truth. The only people who gain respect and admiration are those who go their own way and forge their own path.

Think about all the hero’s you’ve ever had, all the famous people you have admired and envied, how many of those men followed societies rules? Zero.

No famous man took the course of action prescribed by society. None of them went to college, got a safe degree, got a safe job and then lived life as the international playboy every man dreams of being. They didn’t choose the boring path and a boring life as their reward for not daring to be bold.

If you want fame and riches you have to break the rules. No one ever got rich with their human resources job.

If you want a beautiful woman or many beautiful women you have to break the rules. No one ever had the love of a beautiful woman by taking her to dinner and a movie and bringing her plenty of flowers.

If you want a life of adventure you have to break the rules. Taking a cruise every five years is hardly a life of adventure.

If you want happiness you must break the rules. Who could ever be happy following another’s set of rules with all the limitations that come along with that?

Break the rules. Make your own rules. Be your own man. Forget everything you have ever read, heard or seen. Everything you have ever been told is a lie. Forget about it. It doesn’t mean anything because you don’t need any of that bullshit to forge your own path.

Next time someone tells you what the rule is in any particular situation do the opposite and watch the admiration flow your way.

She asked “Why do you hang out with a 21 year old and you’re 33?!”

I replied: “Cause who else is free? You ain’t free. You’re wearing the same scrubs you put on 16 hours ago. Who else is free?”

Age is real, but it’s not a deal killer. It’s not everything. Maturity knows no number.

I was a late bloomer. Some people are early bloomers.

I know 35 year old 18 year olds and I know 18 year old 35 year olds. Maturity is not bound by age. But then again, what’s so great about maturity?

Who’s free is free, who’s not is not. Who’s free is who can hang with me.

Who’s willing is willing, who’s not willing is not willing. Age? No, friend, it’s mindset. It’s that simple.

Old people like me are usually set in their ways. They say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. But you could spend hours teaching a puppy.

So don’t get me wrong, youth and immaturity is fantastic. Young people can’t help but smile.

I hate to keep harping on Thailand, but over there a 31 year old man with an 18 year old girl is no big deal. A 33 year old man with a 21 year old protégé is no big deal.

So why is it a big deal here in the land of the free? I don’t know, man, I never bothered to ask what the correct ages are I can spend time with.

I should really find a nice girl my own age who I could complain about things with. Right? Yeah right.

I don’t like all young people, of course. I don’t like all old people either. I don’t really like most people, so if I like you I’m not really concerned about the date of birth.

Because there’s so few of us.

It’s us vs them.

I only really have 3 friends in the world. Here are the ages of my 3 friends: younger than me, same as me, older than me.

And they all do what I do. That’s the glue that holds us together. Everybody else is an acquaintance.

Everybody comes for the advice, everyone comes for the know-how.

But nobody stays for the follow-through. Only those 3 ever did.

Those who stay for the follow-through get the benefits and the rewards.

You see, it’s time. You don’t just get the knowledge and then receive the reward. In between the knowledge and the reward comes time.

It’s time that you are required to give. Time time time. Time and content. That’s how I do it.

Time + Content

How do you put out the content? What do you do to create the content?

You spill your guts and then you edit. That’s it, man.

If you write, write the way you speak. If you video, video the way you speak.

Speak the way you speak and talk to one person.

How do you change lives? You talk to one person. All my content is for one person.

If one person reads it and follows it and follows through and has a success story then that piece of content has been a success.

If one person watches how to make money by being yourself and follows through then hey, they might end up on the beach with me.

People want to meet me all the time. “Victor, I’d love to buy you a drink and hear you talk.”

But the reality is that when I meet people it has nothing to do with how accomplished or not accomplished or how young or how old they are….

It’s destiny. It’s always destiny.

If people are meant to find you they will find you. This is why I don’t advertise B&D. If you’re meant to find it you’ll find it.

Don’t ask me how to change your life, seek to find the answer yourself.

Don’t email me bleeding your life story. Email is free. When you bleed, don’t bleed for free. And don’t bleed for me cause I don’t care.

I don’t read your blog, I don’t watch your videos, I don’t even hear you, but other people do. Bleed for them.

Why don’t you show other people what you know. Bleed for them.

If you need to know it, someone else needs to know it. If you found out, tell them the answer.

I needed to know “How the fuck do I get free? What do I do?”.

I didn’t email strangers on the internet asking how, I just went out and found out.

I said: “I don’t know how to do it but I’m gonna go on this journey and I’m gonna find it and I’m gonna show you how to do it.”

Be a lone wolf but don’t be alone

Cut the bad relationships out and keep the good ones.

Honestly truly it’s really hard to be alone. It’s a lot easier when somebody’s in your corner.

What to do if you don’t have somebody in your corner?

You always have somebody in your corner, you. Your business is first. Business comes first.

If you are your business and your business is you and business comes first what does that mean? It means you are first.

If someone wants to come in and be the navigator and let you be the driver, that’s great. They are the passenger and the navigator and they can helpfully read the directions for you – so you can focus on driving.

You don’t want a backseat driver telling you how to drive your car even though they’ve never driven your car. It’s like saying…

“I’m going to tell you what you should do even though I don’t know what your thought process is or what your plans truly are. But I don’t believe in you and I’m going to tell you what to do.”

Friends, family, mom and dad, girlfriend, wife….

You shouldn’t expect other people to change as you change, that’s not their job. Your job is to guide them and lead them and their job is to follow. They don’t need to change, they simply need to follow.

Their mindset won’t change, at least not right away. The only thing that should change is their admiration for you.

They’re them and you’re you. You go on your adventure and take them with you. They won’t change, but their respect will grow. “I’m so proud of him. I wish I could do what he does”.

And if that doesn’t happen, if their respect and admiration doesn’t grow, it means you haven’t completed the metamorphosis yet. Give it time.

Eventually it will happen. You’ll molt and they’ll know. When they sheepishly ask to borrow a few dollars to cover a family emergency, give them a whole lot extra and they’ll know.

And if they are there, if they followed you into the dark, if they didn’t nag, if you made it and they helped you – take care of them. Let them taste the good life. They deserve it because they invested their most important asset into you – their time.

Support, love, care are so important so if you got it from them you had an advantage.  Be grateful (after you’ve made it through) because it’s only after you’ve made it through that you’ll realize how great they were.

The Metamorphosis

You should be changing, you’re not the old you anymore, you’re not Joe Schmoe anymore. You’re bigger than that.

And if you’re not bigger than that then you’re not doing what I’m telling you to do.

You will change when you change. That’s when. It won’t come sooner. The change will come right on time.

From a caterpillar to a butterfly. Everyone starts as a caterpillar so don’t feel bad. If you want to become a butterfly, you will become one so just relax and be patient.

(But not too patient – money never sleeps and you barely will either).

You gotta have a little patience in this game. Your time will come. Believe it and reality will bend to your will.

When it does come, everybody from your past will tell you you’ve changed and, with a big smile, you’ll say thank you for noticing.

You’ll say: “Thank you for noticing my metamorphosis. Thank you so much for noticing. Glad you’re able to see what I can do and thanks for the support.”

They don’t need to support you at first. They don’t know your vision.

Nobody knows your vision except for you. They don’t even need to believe you.

All they need to do is get out of the way and let you do your thing and not nag and be a drag, that’s all.

They don’t know your vision and they won’t know it until they see it with their own eyes.

You know why they don’t know your vision? Because they don’t have your eyes.

The world looks different from my eyes than it does from your eyes.

So what do her eyes see now? Who cares. She can think whatever she wants to think but what she can’t do is nag or be a drag. Thinking unsure thoughts is forgivable, being a nag and a drag is unforgivable and is punishable by abandonment.

What will her eyes see in the future? That’s what counts. Past is nothing, now is nothing too. What will she see in the future? You already know, she doesn’t yet, but she will.

Her eyes will see a man who started from nothing and achieved everything. And her eyes were there to witness.

Nobody knew what I was doing. Even I didn’t see the grand scope. I didn’t see the big picture.

It’s hard to see the masterpiece on a blank canvas, it’s much easier to see the first pencil stroke, then the second, then the third. Eventually the masterpiece reveals itself.

All I knew at first: this is what I’m gonna do. This is it. This is what I do now. This is it.

No back up plan

I’ll be poor forever doing this before I go back to State Farm insurance, I thought. I’ll be poor forever.

I will live in china on $800 a month for as long as it takes. Thankfully it only took a year and a few months, but I could have spent years trying.

I have the will to endure forever.

“Just endure”, like I told Mikey C. five years ago. And he did. Like Drake said, he started from the bottom now he’s here.

But don’t forget to do the work. Endurance becomes stagnation if you don’t do the damn work.

Live Well

I like to live well. I’m not living on a budget and I’m not trying to save nickels and dimes. I like to live well. I don’t own much still and never will but I live well.

Years ago the lady at the private airport in the Philippines asked me with sincerity: “Do you live well?”

I answered yes but I was wrong. Now I see. I can see now. I still lived in a tunnel then and only a little light was visible, but I can see it all now. Now I live well.

“You’ve changed, your old articles are not like your new articles! It’s like you’re not still living in a $400 apartment in Dallas in the ghetto, or a $100 apartment in China. What gives bro, did you change?”

Yes I did change and thank you so much for noticing.

What do I do everyday? What always comes first? Work and make money.

What comes first? Business.

It’s almost like it’s easy, isn’t it? It’s almost like its easier than working a real job.

It’s almost like all you gotta do is be you and live your life and then give people the information and the knowledge.

Am I arrogant to point out that people ask me in person every single day how they can do what I do? Is that arrogant?

I don’t know if it’s arrogant but I know that it’s funny – none of them even know what I do.

I don’t tell anyone about B&D. But they ask me, every single day, to teach them what I do.

What do they know? They know the aura. They can smell it.

I don’t tell them about B&D. If they really wanted to know they would’ve found it.

It’s my job to create, it’s not my job to advertise to 9-5ers who want out. It’s their destiny to find B&D.

My job is the work, your job is to find it. If you don’t find it, you either didn’t try or it wasn’t meant to be. Maybe you belong in your 9-5.

I’m not the work. B&D is the work. Leave ME alone and find B&D, if you were serious. If they were serious they would’ve found B&D. But they’re never serious.

They would’ve been on their computer searching for the answer. They would’ve been searching for the answer and the answer was right in front of their faces, but they looked away.

Where do you look? You look forward. You don’t look behind you. The past is the past. That’s gone my friend.

You look forward. You look for it. You know what I do when I want to find some information? I find it.

You figure it out. If it’s your fate, you find it.

What do girls always say to me about their job?

“Ughh, I hate it! I wish I could do what you do!”

And I say, “I know you do”.

Everyone wants to do what I do because I still have my soul. I sold pieces of it for a long time because I didn’t know any better.

I didn’t know what the other option was. But goddamnit I knew it was there, some damn where. It just took me a long time to get there.

Years in the making.

8 years ago I quit my job at State Farm. I called my girlfriend at the time 8 years ago and I said:

“We’re probably gonna have some hard times ahead, but this is what I’m gonna do. I’m letting you know in advance. Hard times or not, this is what I’m gonna do.”

She said: “Ok. I trust you.” And she meant it. She was terrific. She supported me fully.

And you know what happened 30 days later? Within 30 days I made $4,000.

I’d never had more than about $1,800 before that in my bank account, even though I always had a job.

When I quit my job I focused 100% of my time on the business. I’d never been so focused on anything in my life and I made $4,000 in 30 days.

Since that day I’ve been way up and I’ve been way down. But I’ve never had to go to anybody and say:

“I have to be at work tomorrow. I can’t fly away tomorrow, sorry.

I can’t fly with you, I can’t go play with you. I can’t just pick up and go.

I have to be at work tomorrow and all week, but if you want to get drunk on Friday night and Saturday night with all the other soulless and miserable people, then I’m your man!”

I’ve never had to say that.

What do they always say? They say:

“Hey, a day off! A holiday! A 3-day weekend! Let’s spend it drinking, dude! Hey girl, let’s spend it drinking!

Work on something on my off-time? No way! I hate my job, you don’t understand. I hate work! Why would I work on my day off?

I hate my job, I would do anything to quit and have my own business and now I have 3 days off so let’s drink! I don’t want to think about work! Let’s spend it drinking! 

Monday’s gonna suck! Monday’s gonna be awful. Can’t wait till I have another 3-day weekend! Can’t wait ’til my own business picks up! Can’t wait………..”

But you know what?

It’s hard to build a business when you have to spend so much time doing something else.

It’s hard because it takes time. You have to give it your time and you don’t have the time if you’ve given your time to something else.

If you don’t give it your time, you don’t get nothing in return.

When I worked at State Farm, I spent all my time researching my other business. I didn’t want to work at State Farm, cold-calling and selling insurance, but I wanted that steady paycheck.

You know what I realize now? I realize now that I stole the owner’s money. He owned that State Farm. It wasn’t a corporation, it was a franchise. He owned it and he had to pay all the bills.

I stole that man’s money because I didn’t really work for him. I lied to his face, I told him I would but I didn’t really. I spent my time there researching my other business.

He didn’t know it, but that man gave me the opportunity to research and spend my time doing my other business while I pretended to work for him.

I was just a kid then, I had no idea about business. But now I know, I stole his time and his money. He gave me a great gift. I should mail that man a check for every penny I stole from him, with a sincere thank you…

“Thank you for showing me the way” it would say.

“It wasn’t your intention to show me the way, but you showed me. You were the last step because I hated it there. And I found my destiny there.”

That job was like school for me, because I found it. I found the answer. It was there that I found the answer.

I had a job before State Farm where I spent all day surfing the Internet. That’s all I had to do, literally. They paid me just to do that. So everyday I surfed the internet.

It was there that I should’ve built my business, but I didn’t because it was too easy. They paid me enough money that I was fine.

So I just surfed the internet. Did I try to build a business? Yeah, right.

I just waited till 7PM, till I could go home and hit the gym, fuck my girlfriend and watch movies and drink.

That’s the life, huh? Getting paid to do nothing? Yeah, it’s alright. Not bad, as far as jobs go.

Better way, though, is to get paid for being YOU.

More money in it. More freedom in it.

Certainly more isolation in it. Nobody talks about that, the isolation of growing.

Who do you relate to? You don’t relate to the people at your job, but here’s a secret:

If you related to the people at your job in the first place, then that’s where you belong.

Do you feel that’s where you belong? If you feel it, it’s probably real.

I never related to my “co-workers”. They were like aliens to me.

And you know what’s funny? You know what they always said to me? You know what they knew?

They knew that I didn’t belong there.

They would say, “Why are you working here?”

I would say, “I need the money” and shrug.

But they knew. Their inflection told me. They said, “Why are YOU working HERE with US? You belong in, like, Hollywood or something.”

They knew better than I did. They knew much better than I did. They even believed in me more than I did. I always thought I needed a job as a safety net until I “got my big break”.

I simply didn’t have any understanding then, I didn’t realize what it took (everything), I didn’t realize big breaks don’t happen randomly. You make your own luck and then you get lucky.

I knew all too well that I didn’t belong there. But what the hell else do you do? That’s what I didn’t know.

I’m a late bloomer. It takes me a long time to realize things. I just endure until a solution presents itself. Sometimes the solution presents itself a bunch of times before I see it. Late bloomer and all.

I would have done it when I was 18 but I didn’t know. I didn’t know nothing about nothing. No one told me, just like no one told you.

I just knew I didn’t want to be like them. Well, that’s a lie. It’s not that I didn’t want to be like them, I knew I wasn’t like them and that I could never be like them. I never “fit in” anywhere in my whole life.

“But what the fuck do people like me do?” Who knows.

When I was young, we didn’t really have the Internet. We didn’t have YouTube. There was no Bold & Determined. There was nothing like that. We had to read books and figure it all out. But books didn’t know either.

I’ve said it a thousand trillion times: I just didn’t know. But now I know. It’s so simple and always was. And now I put what I know into B&D so you can know too.

You, sitting alone at night on your computer, now you can know.

Do I lay it out step-by-step every inch of the way? No I don’t. There’s no such thing as a step-by-step plan to freedom and wealth.

Success flows like water. What did Bruce Lee say? He said be like water.

The principles are the same. The principles never change.

Everybody who ever did anything did it the same way: Time, dedication, obsession, focus.

What did they do when they lost focus? They drifted off. Their art wasn’t as good anymore.

But maybe you only have a period of a certain number of years with that intense focus, so when you’re in that period, what do you do?

Content. Art. Deals. Keep the momentum going.

Don’t break the momentum. Don’t stop. For the love of God, whatever you do, don’t stop.

What happens when you stop? You stop, that’s what happens. Everything stops. And that’s the worst thing that can happen. So if you never stop, it never stops.

You know what is more important than money in life? Having a mission. You cannot be aimless and be fulfilled.

But here’s something maybe you don’t know: You cannot be on a mission and be fulfilled either. There’s no end to this mission, it never stops.

If I could just make $100 a day I’d be happy, until I made $100 a day.

If I could just make $1,000 a day I’d be happy, until I made $1,000 a day.

If I could just make $1,000,000 I’d be happy, until I made $1,000,000.

That’s the beauty of the mission: it never has to stop. That’s the beauty of it. The fun ride never stops.

And even if it did stop, you can’t be driven for so long and then be happy when the ride stops.

I always wanted my jobs to stop, I always wanted school to stop. I never want this to stop.

When you love something you don’t want it to stop. When you need something you don’t want it to stop.

It’s only when you don’t want something, when you don’t like something, that you wish and wish and wish that it would stop.

Well, you can make it stop, if you so wish. Anyone can make it stop.

If you’re under 18, here’s what you do:

JUST ENDURE.

You know what happens when you’re 18? You’re an adult and you’re legally free.

You want to make it stop? OK, make it stop. There’s no excuse for an adult to not make something stop.

Children must endure until they are adults. Children have a valid excuse for not living the life they want. Adults have no excuse.

So if you want it to stop just make it stop. If you want it to stop, that is.

But the beauty of living life on your own terms is that you don’t want it to stop. You’ll even beg God to never make it stop.

The biggest fear of people who live on their own terms is that it’s going to stop.

Regular people wish for it to stop. Exceptional people lay awake at night hoping and praying and asking God to never make it stop.

You don’t think it’s going to stop, see, you’re afraid it’s going to stop. It’s your biggest fear: that it stops and you have to go back.

You know in your head that if you don’t stop, that if you flow like water, it wont stop because you have the momentum going.

But I never said you logically think it’s going to stop, I said you’re deeply afraid that it’s going to stop.

And it’s fine to be afraid. You can let that fear drive you.

It doesn’t matter what drives you. It doesn’t matter what the motivation is. Fear? Courage? Who cares.

It doesn’t matter what drives you as long as you’re driven.

The eyes don’t tell lies.

When you talk about your work your eyes should be wide, like a crazy man.

Crazy eyes and deaf ears.

You can talk to me but I won’t hear you. See the whites of my eyes? That means I can’t hear you. It means I’m busy with my own thoughts.

When you talk like that with crazy eyes and deaf ears that’s when you know you’re on fire.

Crazy eyes and deaf ears – that’s when you know you’re on your mission.

I’ll tell you about my business with crazy eyes and you’ll respond but I wont hear you. Your response doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter what you think.

You don’t have crazy eyes. You don’t have my eyes. You don’t know the vision. I could tell my plan to you or to a brick wall and it’s the same outcome – I won’t hear a response.

Talk talk talk talk talk all you want, it won’t matter.

My eyes are open and my ears are closed. I don’t need your input because I already know.

In my eyes it’s as clear as the ocean blue water in the Philippines in July 2013 when I had my epiphany.

What was it? That’s for me, that’s not for you.

I could tell it to you but it would sound like Mumbo Jumbo. It’s clear to me but to you it would be Mumbo Jumbo.

What’s your epiphany? What’s your plan?

Figure it out but for the love of God don’t tell me about it because I don’t care. It’s your plan. It’s for you. Tell it to a brick wall.

My plan is for me. Your plan is for you. Got it? Good.

If you tell me about your plan with crazy eyes I’ll believe you. I’ll believe you if I can see the whites of your eyes because the eyes don’t tell lies.

I won’t hear you but I’ll believe you. If you ask me 5 minutes later what your plan was I won’t remember. But if you tell me with crazy eyes I’ll believe that you believe it. I’ll see it in your eyes when you talk about it.

If you don’t have the eyes you don’t have it. Not yet.

So what if you don’t have it yet. What did I already say? It takes time.

If you talked to me at 21, I didn’t have it, I didn’t know. I was a late bloomer.

If you talked to me at 25, 26 the eyes started getting crazy then.

You talk to me at 31…. just kidding you wouldn’t talk to me at 31. I wasn’t there. I was too deep in it.

I wasn’t there, I wasn’t a person. I was not a person when I was 31. You couldn’t talk to me.

Now I’m here. Five years of crazy eyes and now I can truly live well.

“Wow that’s so great the way you live, that’s so awesome what you do, I wanna do what you do! How do you do it, can you teach me?”

Yes, I can teach you but you won’t follow it. You won’t like it.

5 years of crazy eyes and deaf ears. Can you do that?

“Oh no, I don’t wanna do that. I wanted to make money tomorrow!”

And I’ll say “yeah, I understand. Five years is a long time to live free and live well. After all, you already put in 4 years for a promise of a job and weekends free”.

So who in their right mind could expect to work for 5 years to achieve something? Who would do that? That’s too long.

Instead, here’s an idea: Go into debt, spend 4 years learning nothing from nobody’s in a university and then go find a job, go pay back that debt, and meet me when you’re 27 and say, “I wish I could do what you do.”

And I’ll say “if you truly wished you could then you would.”

Cause when I was 27 I spent five years in a tunnel, I saw the light at the end of the tunnel but I didn’t see anything outside of the tunnel.

You ask me about a movie, a musician, a book that came out in the past 5 years, I don’t know about it.

I don’t know about it because I had crazy eyes and deaf ears. I lived in a tunnel and all I saw was the big bright shining light at the end. That was my destination and I didn’t stop to catch the latest movie.

If it wasn’t in that tunnel I didn’t see it and I didn’t hear it. You had to be in my tunnel or you weren’t alive. You had to have an invitation to my tunnel. Almost nobody had that invitation.

Give all to get all. I gave all to get all and now I live well.

So you wanna do what I do? That’s great, I love it. Start today and spend everyday for the next 5 years thinking about it.

“Thinking isn’t work.”

Not true. It takes brain power. Thinking is 90% of the work. You gotta use your brain.

How do you make money by being you if you don’t have a brain? You don’t and you won’t.

Yes, thinking is work. And you’ll never be able to take a break.

You wanna know the negative part, the side effects of living life as a free person? You’re never free from the thoughts.

Go sit on a beach with pretty girls and pina coladas and blue waves and servants serving you whatever you like.

Great life, isn’t it? You’ll be thinking about getting back to work. You’ll be thinking about content.

How can I turn this into content? Stupid question. You already know how to turn it into content, you don’t need to think about the how.

When you can afford a real vacation you’re already an expert. Everything is content in your life. So you never think “how can I turn this into content” because it’s as automatic as taking a pee-pee in the morning.

Everything is content. If it’s good content, release it. Bad content, don’t release it. But file it away in the back of your mind with all the other memories that you have turned into big business.

When you’re on the beach and you see these young street performers having a great time on the beach, performing an amazing show for a large crowd, you think….

….these young performers are lean, young, athletic, fun, sexual, free, well maybe, actually not really free. Not like you.

It’s clear at the end of the show, before the big finale, when they beg the audience for money. They’re free in other’s eyes, but not in your eyes.

You know that these young, free, tan, lean beach bums need money like everybody needs money. It costs money to be a free and lean beach bum. Everybody needs money.

Does money buy happiness? Don’t give me your dumb answer because it’s a dumb question asked by dumb people. Any answer to the question is a dumb answer.

You need money like you need air and water and food. Money is the 4th element. You don’t live without it. You need it as much as you need air and water and food and that’s a fact.

Another fact: the more you have of it the better you live, the better you live the happier you are. The happier you are the…… wait…… so does money actually buy happiness?

I already told you, don’t ask me that question because it’s dumb.

The young and happy street performers gotta beg for it. It puts a little smile on your face knowing that during the show you got email after email after email after email saying….

New message: You have received money.

You watched the street performers show and you watched them beg for money. You probably made more money in that hour than they did. All you had to do was sit there and all it took to get there was five years of obsession.

To outsiders, it looks like all you did was play with your phone a little bit and check your emails.

But where were they when you were in your tunnel? Where were they when you didn’t watch a movie for 5 years?

They were probably at their jobs. They probably thought they had it all figured out.

“I went to school, I got a great degree in blah blah blah! Now I have a great job making 150k a year!

All I had to do was spend 4 years, go into debt and sell my soul to have other people tell me what to do and all I do is complain about it and get drunk on the weekends!”

But there is a way. You’re gonna spend five years working on something that’s ridiculous. Yeah it is ridiculous. You gotta be a little crazy to play the game with no net.

What was my backup plan? That’s a joke. Make the choice. Backup plans are for people who don’t make choices.

You can always make money doing something. You can always get a job doing something. You don’t need a real backup plan. Jobs are always there.

You need that focus. Focus and time. Focus and time works for any business that you want to do. The principles are always the same.

But the method that you use to get there is not going to be drawn on a map for you.

Just kidding, there is a map. It’s called Bold and Determined.

The map is in front of your eyes, it just takes crazy eyes to crack the code.

Can you hear what I’m saying to you?

If you can hear me, you weren’t listening.

Until next time,

Your man,

Victor Pride

P.S. – Start your fucking blog right now because I said so.

Don’t ask me why. Don’t ask me any questions. Just do it.

Start your blog right now and spill your guts. Spill your guts, and in five years you’ll have all the bucks in the world.

Spill your guts and make some bucks. It’s the easiest fucking thing in the whole world.

And I just gave you the easy, step-by-step blueprint to cracking the code, living like a King and being free for a lifetime.

In case you didn’t figure it out by now, here it is in the simplest terms I could ever say:

Live the way you really want to live.

Actually, that’s a big fat fucking lie. This is what you do instead…

Have a vision in your head of the way you really want to live. Imprint that vision in your mind. Think of that vision every day and every night.

That vision is your life goal. Now you have a goal. A mission.

You will never truly be able to live exactly the way you want to live. And that’s the beauty of the Victor Pride Patented Plan For Success ™.

You’ll always have something to work for and you’ll never want to stop. I don’t want to stop, ever.

It’s never enough and it never should be enough.

More more more more more more more.

I swear to God I lived Spartan so I could get everything. I didn’t know it then but I know it now.

Start your blog, make your videos, if that’s your goal, and start now.

If you ask me in the first year how its doing, I’ll ignore you.

If you ask me in the second year how its doing, I’ll ignore you.

If you ask me in the third year to fly out to your private villa in Greece which you have paid for using the age old wisdom of “do the work”, and you ask me to be your guest, well, I just might respond.

Adios, amigos. See you in Greece. Maybe I’ll see you in Spain. Maybe I’ll see you in Cartagena.

Maybe you’ll come see me in Venice Beach for the Patented Victor Pride Shut The Fuck Up Don’t Ask Me Any Stupid Questions Seminar ™.

Here’s what you do at the weekend retreat for killers and real-dealers: _______________

Just kidding. I wouldn’t trade a weekend in exchange for money. I don’t have the time.

I can’t trade my time for money. It’s not possible because I already traded all of my time that I will ever have.

Sign up at BADNET and stop asking me questions.

Close your ears. Open your eyes. Do the work.

Next time you ask somebody that you don’t know a question about your life crisis, this is what you do: write it and then delete it cause you already know the answer.

You just want confirmation. You just want the confirmation that it’s the right thing to do. If I tell you that it’s the wrong thing to do, you’ll ignore my response. You’re gonna do what you’re gonna do anyway. So just do it in the first place.

You’re like the people that wanna do what I do but they don’t really wanna do it. They just wanna do it if they don’t actually have to do it.

So don’t waste my time. Cause my time is already gone. Its been spoken for and I’ve already told you everything you needed to know about everything about life.

When you reach that point of no return, maybe you can be like my friend Mike C. and come out and see me.

If you haven’t reached that point, start now because it takes time. It takes a lot of time, friend.

Time time time time time time.

All you have is all the time in the world and all it takes is all the time in the world.

It takes all the time in the world so you’d better start right now.

Click here to start right now.

From the desk of Victor Pride

Monday, May 20

Subj: Control, options, ownership

—————

ABC. The most important rule for being a winner.

Always.

Be.

in

Control.

ABC. A- Always, B-Be, in C-Control.

Be in control of everything in your life, leave nothing in the hands of others, and always keep options.

Control your money, control your earning, control your woman. Leave nothing to chance when it can be controlled.

You have to have money and money making ability to control your life. You cannot be in control if you’re broke, you cannot be in control if you beg your boss for your bi-weekly paycheck that has been thoughtfully taxed in advance for you.

Control your earning

When you have a job as a wage slave you don’t pay taxes. You aren’t a taxpayer. They take taxes. They say “oh, that’s mine. Here, you can have the leftovers“.

And, as a wage slave, what do you always say? “Damn taxes! Barely leave me any room to breathe!” and then you dutifully go back into work day after day, again and again, complaining the whole time, and waiting with your handout for your de-taxed paycheck.

When you are in control of your money, as in you do not have a boss, you pay appropriate taxes. Taxes are not taken from you they are given.

As a self-employed man of destiny, an entrepreneur, you control how much or how little you earn. You don’t call anyone boss, you don’t run in fear of disappointing your boss. The world is on your shoulders, and that’s the way it should be.

Control your money

Never leave all of your money in the hands of others. Never fall into the trap. “Oh, I have a company 401k, I’ll be fine“. With your money and your future you’ve got to take action and keep a watchful eye on your money and not let a team of complete strangers control your investments.

What is it they say? Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. For your money you can multiply that rule by 1000. Never, ever, ever, ever keep all of your money in one spot. It cost me $7,000 to learn this lesson and it was worth every penny because I didn’t lose $70,000 or $700,000.

Always keep multiple bank accounts with a balance and always keep cash around the house. Cash is king and you never, ever know when your bank accounts are going to be inaccessible. Put your cash in a safe or otherwise hide it.

It pays to be a little paranoid because you never know what will happen. When I was in China my bank just decided to close my account. Huh? Yeah, it’s just closed now. I called them to get it fixed and they said sure, no problem, just come in to the nearest branch and we’ll get it fixed.

Oh sure, I’m only 7,000 miles away. I lost a dollar for every mile through late payments because it was a business account and obviously business payments stopped until I could get it fixed. Thankfully I was ok because I had another bank account and I had cash, but I was still out 7 G’s.

Because of that little lesson I now have 7 bank accounts spread across 3 countries, an additional two nominee bank accounts, credit cards and prepaid debit cards. I keep balances spread out, I am not playing around and you shouldn’t either. Never let one bank control your finances.

Pay in advance

Whenever you can, don’t pay anything on credit, do the opposite and pay everything in advance. Don’t put anything on credit. When you have bills you are a slave. Pay everything in advance and you have peace of mind and no one is going to give you the old “you owe me money” bit. Paying in advance is power, paying on credit is slavery.

Think of a credit card only as a delayed payment debit card. I have my gym membership, my web hosting and one other bill directly billed to my credit card every month and I pay it each month before any interest is due.

You can also use your credit card to take advantage of frequent flier miles and other nice programs, but never, ever, ever use your credit card just to buy stuff you can’t afford to pay cash with. IF! you are to use credit cards it should only as a strategy to build your credit or to get a bunch of free stuff with your credit card points.

Live below your means

You don’t have to live like an animal but you should not be stressed or anxious about paying your monthly bills. If you pay everything in advance you don’t even have to worry about the big bills. But if you aren’t in a position to pay everything in advance you need to choose your home and your automobile wisely.

A house and a nice car is not worth the anxiety if you are living beyond your means. Always pay cash for your car. I had a 5 year note on my pickup truck, that’s 5 years of payments to drive from A to B. Never again will I have a car payment, and since then I have bought 3 or 4 cars and always paid in cash in full.

A car is a car is a car, paying monthly when you can pay once is stupid. If your car costs 2k or 30k it doesn’t matter, only buy what you can afford. If all you can afford is a 2k car then buy the car and work your ass off until you can buy that 30k, 40k, 50k car. Let that motivate you to achieve but don’t go beyond your means.

Back in the States I had a $1600 mortgage for a 3 bedroom house. It’s stupid to pay so much for one person so I rented a room out to a local college kid and got a little money back. Now I have a central condo in a large city and my rent is paid up through the end of the lease and I have less stress.

You need to live below your means so you have some padding in case of hard times, especially if you are an entrepreneur. As an added bonus when you live below your means you have money to buy anything you want. When I had a job and a set income I was always poor and had to save up to buy anything.

Now I don’t “save up” for anything, if I want something I just buy it. That’s because I live below my means and don’t spend haphazardly. In a regular month I buy food at the grocery store and pay monthly bills like electric and internet.

I’m not throwing money away on a car payment, house payment, the newest electronics, restaurants, or all that stuff that today’s modern enlightened man can’t live without.

That means when I want to buy something I just go and buy it and don’t fret. When I want to go on vacation I just go and don’t worry about saving pennies. Of course it should go without saying when I buy something or go on vacation I always search for the best deal.

Control your intimate relationships

Getting married is an act of surrender, of defeat. When you get married you give 100% of your power to a woman. Women only respect you when you have power over them. That is as true today as it was in 1950 or 20,000 BC. That’s why married men walk around like broke-dick dogs, because 99% of them are broken dogs.

That’s what happens when you give your power away. A married man has no power whatsoever, his wife and the courtroom have 100% control over his children, his income and his assets. In return for what? There isn’t a single benefit for a man to get married. When you get married you sign away control.

What is it the feminist pigs always say? It’s not the 1950’s anymore! And they’re right. You don’t have to have a job, you are free to do as you wish, to go where you wish, to make as much or as little as you wish. Today anything is possible.

The irony is that living like a modern man, in debt up to his eyeballs, married to a good for nothing slob, working a job he hates, fat as can be on his way to diabetes, is probably a lot worse than a life in the 50’s.

Personally, I live a sort of alternate reality version of the 50’s. I keep a woman around and pay all the bills and she does 100% of my housework and everything else I tell her. I rely on her to cook, clean and suck. She relies on me for safety and security. That is complete control and I could find a new girl in a nano-second but I am happy and she is happy so there is no need.

Now I know there are a great many websites telling you to never, ever provide for a woman, never be a beta provider, never give money yadda yadda. These websites are written by guys who have a very hard time attracting women but they are 50% right.

I would NEVER give money to or financially support a modern western woman. If I were a western man I would be a cad until I found a non western, non feminized, non empowered, non undignified woman. If you find the correct woman it is not only acceptable to provide it’s also the only way to have complete control of your relationship.

The reality is that money is power, women are attracted to both money and power and when you are the sole source of $$ for a woman you have complete control over her and, if you are appropriately selfish, she will dote on you all day and night, just like in days of old. It’s completely true that modern women make money and have options, and that’s a huge reason why they are terrible as wives and girlfriends.

You need to have options for other women, at all times. That doesn’t mean you always need to have 10 girls in your phone or your instant messenger ready and waiting, it just means you need to keep yourself in a state where it’s easy to attract and keep women.

The reality is that I am blessed to be tall and handsome BUT! if you are not so handsome there is hope and I mean that sincerely. Money and a dominant disposition is your salvation.

Women are attracted to men with money and always will be. That doesn’t make them gold-diggers, it makes them women. Men love titties and ass, women love money and that’s life, baby, no need to cry about it.

OPTIONS!

Always keep options open. Options, options, options. Options are how you stay free. Keep many bank accounts with balances spread over each. Be an entrepreneur and make your own income.

Stay out of debt always. Don’t leave your investment strategy in the hands of strangers. Keep options with other women. Have options and ideas for making a real income, not a “dream job” but a real way to make green dollars and red pennies. Your other options don’t need to be acted upon, they just need to be there, in your mind, ready to go if a change is needed.

I have two options for making money if for some reason Bold and Determined doesn’t work out for me. I can build another online venture that I’m positive will provide for me. Alternately, I can move to any mid to large size American city and make money in real estate within one month.

Even though I am putting all my effort into Bold and Determined, and it is providing me a nice life, I have the other options in my head at all times, ready to go if need be. And both options are completely under my control.

I’m not relying on interviewing with some little girl in HR, going for a second interview with the gay Mexican HR manager, and then going through sensitivity training all so I can receive a tiny little bi-weekly paycheck already de-taxed. Not for me anymore, no thanks.

Until next time, friends.

Your man,

Note from Vic: Out of the blue I got en email from a fella named Ludvig Sunström asking if he can make a guest post on Bold and Determined.

I gave my usual answer, a polite no, but then he did something unexpected. He sent me FOUR! articles and asked me to critique his writing.

He got me to do him one small favor – critique his writing (and we made one little tweak and his writing instantly went from good but blah to wow).

Ludvig wanted to be published on Bold and Determined and now he is. The name of this piece is “The Shockingly Easy Way to Get People to do What You Want“.

Does his advice work? And can you use his “bright idea” to get people to do what you want?

You be the judge.

Enter Ludvig…..

—————–

[OPEN INBOX: EMPTY]

Dammit! Why is no one getting back to me?

What am I doing wrong here?

I used to wonder why people didn’t get back to me after we’d had – from my point of view – an interesting conversation.

I used to wonder why the other person wasn’t as interested in the interaction as I was.

Why was it that I was more interested in the other person than he or she was interested in me?

I’ll tell you why.

The reason why these people didn’t care about me was because I’d brutally failed to get any kind of investment from them.

Fortunately I don’t have that problem anymore.

Right now you’re probably wondering:

What do you mean by investment – and what can I do to get it?

For me to tell you about that I first need to explain to you about the Benjamin Franklin Effect.

The Benjamin Franklin Effect

The Benjamin Franklin Effect states that once a person has done you a favor they will be more likely to do you another favor.

This stands in contrast to the popular belief that if you do someone a favor they will feel inclined to return it.

The reason it’s called the Benjamin Franklin Effect is because Franklin used the strategy to turn a hostile legislator into a friend by asking to borrow a book from him. In other words, Franklin got his enemy to do him a favor.

You can use the Benjamin Franklin effect to do two things:

1. Investment. If you can get another person to invest in you somehow they will afterwards post-rationalize their decision to do a thing for you, even if they initially didn’t want to.
2. Establish behavior. If you can get someone to do a thing for you once you dramatically boost the chances of them doing it for you again by establishing a pattern of behavior.

I’ll go into these two aspects and break it down into actionable advice that you can put to use in your life by getting people to do what you want more easily.

1.    Investment

When I say invest it can be anything fromtime, emotions, moneyor even material objects.

The important thing is that you must get the other person to put at least one of these things into the interaction or the relationship.

Why must you do this?

Because when you get someone to invest in you, they will start to care about you.  They will like you a lot more if they have formed a personal interest in you – and this happens when you get them to focus on you for a prolonged period of time.

Let me give you an example.

Do you like Bold and Determined more or less compared to when you first started reading the site?

You like it more.

You like Bold and Determined more now because you’ve invested a lot of time and energy in understanding the material, the philosophy, and the peer group of the site.

We’re always Investing in Something

We’re always investing in something whether we know of it or not – and this is continually sending feedback to our brains.

The more we invest in something the more we care about it as a result of getting increasingly committed. This is because the brain is wired to think in terms of sunk cost related to energy spent on a thing.

Now tell me:

What kind of feedback do you think you’re sending your brain if you waste time or invest emotionally in TV series?

This is how You Use the Benjamin Franklin Effect to Gain Investment from People

It’s crucial that you start thinking in terms of investment when it comes to situations such as social events or business conferences –places where you meet lots of people that you won’t remember.

The Benjamin Franklin Effect is a very useful trick for getting them to remember you.

Here’s what you need to do to get investment from people:

Get them to do you small favors as quickly as possible after meeting them.

• Ask to borrow a pen, a book, or a movie – any material object.
• Ask for their advice or expertise on something they’re interested in and they will want to tell you all about it. Remember, the longer you keep them talking and the more time they invest in you the more likely it is that they will like and remember you.
• Give them a reason to chat with you or get back to you about something, then get their contact information or give them yours. When I say a reason I mean literally anything. Find something that you both have in common or find a thing that they are interested in and use it as leverage. This is a good way to gain emotional investment.

After you’ve done any of these things let them know that they’ve done a nice thing by doing you a favor.

You need to reward their good behavior and make them feel good about themselves.

People love being thought of as helpful.

Why Does it Work?

Why does it even work in the first place?

That’s an important question to ask.

It works because people do less thinking than they think they do. Most of their decisions are governed by heuristics – mental shortcutsused by their brains to save time and energy.

The thinking part of their brain – the neocortex, is manipulated by the emotional part of their brain – the amygdala. In normal language that means that logic occurs after emotional desires and that they post-rationalize their behavior by coming up with logical explanations after they’ve done a thing.

(Watch this video if you want to know more about post rationalization)

Even if a person is unknowingly tricked into spending time or energy on something, that person will unconsciously post-rationalize it by thinking:

If I did that, then I must have wanted to do it. Otherwise I wouldn’t have done it… Yeah, that’s what happened. I must really like this thing!

So – just like the curious case of Benjamin Franklin – even if a person doesn’t initially like you, by doing you a favor of some sort, this person will like you more afterwards as a result of post-rationalization.

The person unconsciously thinks:

I only do favors for people I care about, so there’s no way I would’ve done this guy a favor unless I liked him…

2.    Established Behavior

The other way that you can use the Benjamin Franklin Effect is to establish behaviors between you and another person.

Remember, if you can get someone to do a thing once they’ll be a lot more likely to do it again.

Once you establish a certain pattern of behavior it becomes increasingly hard to break the more you do it.

This is also true for social dynamics.

Think of it this way:

The Benjamin Franklin Effect is a lot more effective when you use it on people that you don’t hang around too much, because with these people you have already established a strong social dynamic.

Get it Right from the Get-go

First impressions matter – a lot.

The reason for this is because once we’ve formed an opinion it’s challenging and energy-demanding to change it.

Therefore it’s really important that you deliberately manage the first encounter.

You can and should use the Benjamin Franklin Effect to make a stronger first impression.

I want you to try it out and see for yourself the next time you meet a new person by deliberately getting that person to do something for you.

It doesn’t really matter what they do for you as long as it’s something.

If you repeat this process the first few times you hang out with the other person you’ll quickly establish that as a part of the social dynamic. You could literally get people to keep doing things for you more or less on automation.

By deliberately giving people small orders from the get-go you will quickly establish a very dominant social position.

So get it right from the get-go.

How to Use the Benjamin Franklin Effect to Establish Behavior

Here’s when and how you should use it:

• When you meet a new person you should establish a certain pattern of behavior as soon as possible by getting them to do small things in the direction of your goal with the interaction.
• You don’t necessarily have to get the other person to do things for you, it can also be that you want to establish your own behavior in a certain way and be perceived differently than usual, for example when moving to a new town. In either case, you must implement this behavior from the get-go.
• You can establish patterns of behavior linked to specific environments as well, for example in your house, in the bar, in the gym, at work, in school, etc.

How to Use the Benjamin Franklin Effect Correctly

The Benjamin Franklin Effect is massively useful – but only when used correctly.

This is not a strategy that you can use ten times in a row; you can’t ask people for favors ten times in a row and expect them to comply– that’s just going to make you seem like a greedy value-leech.

At some point you will have to return the favor or people will think that you’re a manipulative person who’s just using them!

The correct way to use the Benjamin Franklin effect is by using it sparingly.

This is only supposed to be a small trick in your toolbox of charisma and persuasion that you use to get the initial attention of the other person, but as soon as you’ve done that you still need to provide value and be cool.

Look at it this way:

The Benjamin Franklin effect is an efficient way of turning the spotlight onto you so that the other person can see you more clearly; but once the other person sees you clearly you better be a badass and contribute some value.

Do you have any methods of your own for getting people to do what you want?

About the author: Ludvig Sunström runs the practical self-development blog Start Gaining Momentum and has written the book Breaking out of Homeostasis. Apart from success and self-development, he is passionate about learning, reading, philosophizing, eating healthy and hitting the gym. You can get in contact with him on Twitter and Google+.

f you say you are going to do something you had better follow through with it.

When you do not follow through, the people whom you told of your plans will think “that’s what I thought. He could never accomplish that.”

How many times have you heard a motormouth talk about all the things he was going to do and he never did any of it?

When you don’t tell anyone anything and then you accomplish something those same people will look at you with a sense of awe and respect. And jealousy.

When you speak of your plans, your brain feels like you have already accomplished your goal and you have less drive to finish what you start.

When you don’t speak of your plans to a single soul then your brain has no reason to think it has been accomplished.

You will still have that fire and passion for success.

Lesson: Don’t say nothing to no one!

Stop talking and start doing.

Explanations are for the weak. Actions are for the strong.

Historically, fortunes have been made more so in times of great economic downturns than in times of great prosperity. We are in the midst of the worst depression in most of our lives. And there has never been a better time to make a lot of money and do some good in the world at the same time.

Most people will tell you that now is not the time to start a business. Now is not the time to take a risk. You need to hold on to that crummy J.O.B. (just over broke) because it pays and it’s hard to find a job right now. These people will tell you that you are crazy for taking a chance.

Everyone is one of “those” people at some point. Scared to take a chance. But not you. Not anymore. In fact, it is precisely because of “those” people that now is the time to start your own thing. Why? Because no one else is. Everyone is scared to think outside the box.

And that’s why you’re going to make your fortune and they are going to toil away in the “safe” jobs with all those great benefits (insurance that they pay for, loss of time and freedom, bending to the will of others, paying more taxes than the average millionaire etc..).

So what should you tell those people about why you’re starting a new business and what it’s all about? Nothing. Don’t tell anyone anything about your plans. There are two reasons for this.

1)      Statistically you are less likely to follow through with your plans if you start blabbing about them. The reason is that you subconsciously feel like you have accomplished them simply by talking about them and are less active in actually fulfilling them. How many times has someone told you their great plan to make money and then never followed through with anything? My guess is a million.

2)     People will tell you that you are crazy or dumb or both. They will come up with all kinds of reasons and excuses to try and talk you out of doing anything. Deep down no one wants their friends and co-workers to do better than them. That’s why you simply don’t say anything.

So now you know what not to tell people. Now you’re asking yourself what kind of business to start and not tell people about. Well, I could give you all kinds of ideas about businesses to start but they wouldn’t mean anything. Deep down in your heart of hearts you know what type of business you want to start. You may not be able to put your finger on it but you will, eventually.

I spent years trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I knew what I didn’t want to do. I didn’t want to wake up every morning,  put on clothes I didn’t want to wear, rush out the door to sit in traffic for an hour, get to a job I hated, let them tell me when I can take my break, sit in another hour of traffic to get home. All for – what is now in hindsight – a crummy, crummy paycheck.

Now I wake up when I want to, which is way earlier than I ever wanted to wake up when I hated my job. I work from my home office and I generally wear a pair of black shorts to work. I get most of my business done in the morning and do whatever else I want throughout the day. Which is mostly work related. You’ll find you work way harder when you love what you do.

Anyway, back to what type of business to start. What I used to do is visualize what I wanted to do. I didn’t know exactly what type of business it would be but I would visualize myself dressed very well and spending most of my working day driving around to various appointments.

I’m a real estate investor so most of my work is spent driving around to peoples houses to see if I want to buy them (the houses, not the people). Before I knew what I wanted to do I had a vision in my head of how I would do it.

I used to live in a tiny little one bedroom apartment. Technically it was the worst place I ever lived. It was actually the best though. That was my laboratory. I would sit around and write out lists of what I could do and what I couldn’t do. Trying to figure out where I could start a business and how. I would write notes to myself that had my goals on them and tape them all over the walls.

People who came over thought I was crazy. But those little notes worked. I suggest you do the same. The motivation from these notes is terrific. The best one I had was a note taped across my computer monitor that read “I will be in business for myself by such and such date”. And you know what? I was in business for myself by that date.

For those wanting to start their own business I would suggest leading a very Spartan lifestyle. I don’t mean by killing Persians, but I do mean getting rid of things you don’t need. There is no point in paying a $1500 mortgage if you can rent for $400. There’s no point in leasing a Jag for $700 a month if you can buy a running Toyota for $2,000.

No point in going out to eat every night if you can survive on a can of soup and a cheese sandwich. Now is not the time to be wasteful with your money. You need every dime you can get your hands on and it’s ok to live like a bum. It will pay off in the end.

Ask yourself these questions:

Will this $100 cable bill with 500 channels help me reach my goals?

If the answer is no, cancel the cable!

Will going out tonight with my friends and spending $75 on food and drinks help me reach my goal?

If the answer is no, don’t do it!

As your business you need to either pick something you love or something you are en expert at. You need to devote all of your time and energy to that endeavor. Start reading books every single week. I don’t mean the new Michael Crichton or the new Stephen King, or that new romance book you saw at Wal-Mart.

Those books don’t exist anymore. Start reading auto-biographies of successful people. Start reading books that have to do with your chosen field. Start reading business books and motivational books. Read all of those books you can get your hands on. Never stop reading those books.

Start exercising! A healthy body is a healthy mind. You will need to be in good shape to start your own business. There will be very, very stressful times ahead and it will help if you are in good physical shape.

Lay off the cigarettes and booze too. Those do nothing to help you achieve your goals. They only help to kill you faster. Even if you don’t have a business idea yet, you ARE waiting for the opportunity. Opportunity comes to those who are prepared.

In fact there is an opportunity out there waiting for you right now.

What are you going to do when opportunity presents itself?

I had 3 dogs. After a breakup I now have 1 dog. When I had all 3 I was fascinated by their behavior and the way they presented a unified front against any perceived threat.

Dogs have a pack mentality. That means that they are happiest when with their pack, or as humans call it, family. They are not happy when they are alone or away from their pack. Dogs all know their place within their pack. They may test their status every now and again but they know where they belong.

Dogs love to play and fight with each other. When one of my dogs had a toy he was playing with, the other dogs immediately wanted that toy. Even if there were several other toys available they had to have the one that their brother had. This fascinated me that they could be so selfish one moment and want to take away the toy the other dog had.

But what really fascinates me is that in an instant the dogs behavior can change and they present a unified front. Say they heard a sound in the backyard, they would all run to the backdoor and bark together.

It didn’t matter what they were doing, or if they were fighting with one another, if one dog barked or sensed a threat they would all 3 jump in and immediately help their pack member.

“Don’t ever take side with anyone against the family…ever.” – The Godfather

This is why I love dogs. They are 100% loyal to their pack without question. Doesn’t matter if they are barking at a squirrel, a bigger dog, a bear, or a neighbor, they are all there together to protect each other. A dog will die for his pack.

Because of my dog’s unquestioning loyalty he isn’t just ‘my dog’, he is part of my family. Because he is part of my pack his loyalty is returned with my unquestioning loyalty and companionship.

Primitive tribes had the same structure as a dog pack. Each tribe had it’s de-facto leader(s), the Alpha Male and Alpha female, the followers, the beta males and females, and the weak, crippled, sick, and young, the Omegas.

They would have had to present a unified front in the presence of danger – other tribes, large carnivorous animals etc.. If they did not remain loyal to their tribe they risked being ostracized and banned from the tribe.

Humans, like Dogs, need companionship, security, comfort, and a sense of belonging to be healthy and happy. Think of the dogs that have been chained in a backyard for their entire life without much human contact or care and without another animal to interact with.

These are not the dogs you want to stumble upon unknowingly. Those of us without a tribe, pack, family, to give us a sense of belonging and purpose are like these chained dogs. We may be content but we can’t be truly happy without a purpose.

Young men who do not have a strong family life, or sense of purpose, will get together with other guys from the same background and form gangs. In interviews these guys will repeatedly say that they joined because they had a sense of family and loyalty for the first time in their life.

These guys would unquestioningly inflict violence against anyone who harmed (real or perceived) a part of their tribe, or gang. These guys referred to their gang buddies, which they really felt like were their family, as their “dogs”. These guys are the true backyard dogs who have been chained up for their whole life – and this is what can happen without a strong sense of loyalty and belonging.

In our modern world of celebrity gossip and other BS, loyalty is not a common trait. Just take a look at the latest divorce figures. 50% percent of first marriages, 67% of second and 74% of third marriages end in divorce.

What it would take for me to get married is 100% unquestionable loyalty from my spouse. If you don’t have your spouse or significant others back 100% of the time and don’t present a unified front it can never work. You can’t have a fulfilling relationship without loyalty.

This is not easy to find. In fact, you have to treat your s/o like you would your dog. If she is good you reward her (attention), if she is bad you punish her (withdraw attention) until she learns what you demand – loyalty.

To be a real man you must be loyal to those you love and you have to demand loyalty right back.

You must be willing to die for what you believe in.

Tomorrow doesn’t exist. Yesterday doesn’t exist. There is only the now. The right here and right now.

When we wake up ‘tomorrow’ it becomes the now. Because there is only the now we have to make the most of it. We cannot rely on ‘doing it later’. It must be done and it must be done right now.

The past is the past. We cannot live in the past, it’s over. Let go of it. We have to look back on our successes and mistakes and we have to learn from them, so that we can do the right thing right now.

The future doesn’t exist. We can’t rely on the future. No one is guaranteed a tomorrow. If you say “I’ll do it tomorrow” you might as well say “I’ll do it in 7 years”.

Learn this phrase:

“I’ll do it now!”

The most successful, happiest people in the world get that way because they don’t put anything off until later. They take care of business right here and then.

You won’t hear a top CEO say “oh, I’ll take care of it next week. I want to watch this TV show now”. You won’t hear a top bodybuilder say “Oh, I’ll work out in a few days”.

Are you living in the now? Are you TRULY living in the now or are you just going through the motions? Do you love your work? Or are you filled with dread every day?

We only get one shot at this life, just one chance. We have to make it count.

Is there a girl you like but you’re too scared to call, or you think you’ll call later? Drop everything and call her this very moment! Maybe this very moment she is waiting for you to call.

Is there a business you have been dying to start but “it’s just not the right time”? There is only ever one right time and it’s right now!

Are you sick of your flabby gut but you’re waiting to go to the gym? Get up off your ass and go to the gym right now!

Quit your soul-stealing job now!

Paint a picture!

Make a movie!

Write a book!

Do it right now!

Go out for a jog!

Go talk to the pretty girl that works at the coffee shop!

Change the world!

Change your world!

Sell all your worthless electronics, sell your house, buy an RV and drive across the country!

Go to the airport right now and book a flight!

Take your dog for a long walk, get your thoughts clear and figure out what you really want!

Figure out who you really are and what your life’s purpose is! It certainly isn’t to work for someone else, come home to watch the idiot box, eating chips and soda pop.

Your life has a purpose, a meaning. You have goals and dreams.

Quit whining and complaining, quit procrastinating, don’t give in to apathy – go do something this very instant!

You are ALIVE!

Get out there right now and live your fucking life!

The things we think about are the things that we eventually become. They are the things that consume us. As long as we’re going to think we might as well think BIG instead of small.

Let your small-minded co-workers fret about the small things. You’re on a road to bigger and better things and you now have better things to do than to be drawn into some petty quarrel.

If you aren’t yet self-employed the only thing you should be thinking about right now is how to make that reality.

You need to visualize yourself as you want to be and you want to lock that image in your mind and think of it frequently. The things we think about the most more often that not end up true in the end.

If you are self-employed then you should think about the big picture and not the small little details that seem big, but really just sap your creative and physical energy.

If you’re out of shape and want to get in fantastic shape then you will need to imagine your body as you want it to be. Fix that image in your mind everyday and especially while you are at the gym. Know the outcome before you even get there.

If you’re bad with women, imagine yourself as the suave James Bond type you know you can be. Don’t fret about getting a girl’s phone number, think about getting a thousand girls’ phone numbers.

If you worry about getting one phone number and don’t get it you will be sad and frustrated. If you aim for a thousand numbers and only get a hundred, well that’s a pretty good deal in my book.

Always view the BIG picture.

Look over at the guy in the cubicle next to you.

Does he look impressive?

Do you envy him?

Does he look like he has his shit together?

Is he living his dream?

Did he enjoy his one week vacation last year when he stayed home and watched TV?

Does he constantly amaze you with all the new ideas he comes up with?

Is he in peak physical condition?

Can he walk up 2 flights of stairs?

Can he take 3 months off and do anything he wants?

Can he do 5 pushups?

Does he eat donuts for breakfast and McDonalds for lunch?

Is he married to a beautiful wife who supports him 100%?

Does he enjoy paying the mortgage and taxes on his house in the ‘burbs?

Take a long, hard look at this man. Take a long, hard look at him and then take a look in the mirror. Can you convince yourself you aren’t just like him? And is he thinking the same thing about you?

Bite the Bullet

Accept the inevitable pain and hardship with fortitude and emerge stronger, tougher, freer and richer than you are right now.

Next year Joe Schmoe Company Man will still be sitting at his cubicle. You can sit right alongside him or not. No one is putting a gun to your head.