The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 30

Last month, my family and I went to Los Cabos, Mexico for a much needed vacation. Quite honestly, we didn’t do anything other than play on the beach for the first three days we were in Cabo! Finally, on the fourth day of the trip, I remembered to grab my video camera so I could shoot Episode 30 of The Unemployed Millionaire Show!

I’m not telling you about my vacation to impress you… I’m telling you about it to impress upon you how much your life can change when you finally break out of the mold society placed you in and start taking advantage of opportunities that will allow you to live your dream lifestyle!

My personal philosophy about life is this: Life is all about the experience of chasing peak experiences! Contrary to mainstream beliefs, I believe that it is possible to live life constantly wrapped up in joyous and exciting moments…

Years ago, I made the decision to become an entrepreneur so that my family and I could have the opportunity to live every day of our lives with feelings of intense happiness and well-being! That decision is exactly what separates the people who live an unconventional life with total lifestyle freedom from the people who don’t.

Most people don’t understand that in order to live an unconventional lifestyle – you have to do unconventional things (like  focusing solely on opportunities that offer you a chance to become wealthy.) Once you get comfortable with the idea of pursuing unconventional opportunities in life, you will naturally develop the ability to create an unconventional lifestyle.

Creating an unconventional lifestyle is not easy but it’s absolutely worth the extra effort… After all, life should be an experience in chasing peak experiences!

What are you doing today in order to live a life of peak experiences tomorrow? I’d love to hear your answer below in the comments section!

Motivational Monday #21

One of my all-time favorite books is The Magic of Thinking Big by David J. Schwartz, Ph.D.

The Magic of Thinking Big was one of the first books I read after starting my entrepreneurial career. I’ve re-read it every six months since the first time I read it over ten years ago. The book’s principles are that important!

In less than ten minutes, this week’s Motivational Monday proves exactly how far thinking big can get you…

26-year-old Kyle McDonald’s red paper clip was worth little-to-no value (and ‘little’ walked away); yet he was determined to trade it for a house. One year later, he traded that red paper clip for a white house with red trim.

At 21, I was homeless, $30,000 in debt, living out of my beat up Honda Civic and bathing in gas station bathrooms; yet I was determined to become a millionaire by the age of 30. By the age of twenty-four, I was earning a six-figure income as an entrepreneur and by the age of twenty-nine, I became a self-made millionaire.

If you told the average thinking person Kyle’s dream and my dream before we had achieved them, they’d likely retort by saying it would be impossible for us to achieve our dreams because average thinking people don’t have the ability to see what can be.

Big thinkers train themselves to see beyond what is – big thinkers develop the ability to see what can be. How are you developing your ability to think big? I’d love to hear your answer in the comments section below…

P.S. To learn the strategies I used to become a millionaire by the age of 30, pick up your copy of The Unemployed Millionaire here: http://www.MattMorris.com/blog. You’ll also receive over $2,000 worth of bonus success education!

P.P.S. If you missed the last Motivational Monday, watch it here: Motivational Monday #20 – Climbing Over Adversity.

Click here to view the embedded video.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 29

The first time I read Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, I paid close attention to finding the secret Napoleon mentions in Chapter One. I realized after re-reading Think and Grow Rich a couple of times, the secret is different for everyone who reads Think and Grow Rich.

For me, the secret turned out to be Leadership Law 7 which is Persistence and Determination…

In my first two to three years as an entrepreneur, I wound up $30,000 in debt and homeless. I experienced many sleepless nights in which I wondered if I was even cut out for a career as an entrepreneur. But ultimately, I knew that I knew that I knew, what my purpose in life is.

So I persisted, despite my failures and made it over the hump to create an amazing life. Alot of future Unemployed Millionaires consistently ask questions like: “How did you get where you are today?” “What made you decide to keep on going when you had absolutely nothing in the bank?”

The key is persistence and determination. I immersed myself in positive environments by listening to personal development audios and read personal development books constantly.

There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that if other people had become successful entrepreneurs, I could do it too. Once you develop that kind of certainty and decide that you will stop at nothing to become successful, you’ll be well on your way to success as an entrepreneur.

Because I didn’t give up, I haven’t had to think about money in years, because it’s just not a concern.

Here’s what’s important about a true leader: A true leader will always find a way over, around, or through any challenge that arises and will do whatever it takes to be a winner.

Successful people do what unsuccessful people are unwilling to do. Winners in life just don’t give up. Winners will never, ever let anyone steal their dream!

We’ve reached the end of The Unemployed Millionaire Blog’s Leadership Series and I want to learn from you! What leadership law benefited you the most? What leadership laws would you add to this series?

I can’t wait to read your answer!

P.S. For even more leadership development, get your copy of The Unemployed Millionaire here: http://www.MattMorris.com/book. You’ll also receive $2,000 in bonus personal development tools and help me feed 5 hungry children!

P.P.S. If you missed the last leadership law, check it out right here: The Unemployed Millionaire Show: Leadership Law 6.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 28

One of the most critical characteristics of a leader is a commitment to integrity and character. If a leader is willing to lie, cheat, or steal to get ahead, success is always short-term because no one will continue following someone who does not lead with integrity.

Integrity is the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles. I can promise you that nothing will break an organization down faster than a leader who is willing to sacrifice morality for money.

Another definition of integrity is the condition of being whole and undivided. It’s being the same person when you’re in front of your organization as you are when the organization isn’t around.

A cardinal rule that corresponds with this Leadership Law is: Never talk behind anyone’s back in your organization. When someone hears you bad-mouthing a colleague when he or she isn’t around, that person will forever wonder if you also bad-mouth him or her. If people in your organization have even the slightest hint that you are not a loyal leader, they will not follow you for much longer.

When you always do the right thing, your team sees that. They have confidence and faith and will follow you through thick or thin, no matter what the circumstances are.

No other leadership principle is as important as integrity. With that being said, what does integrity mean to you? I’d love to hear your answer below in the comments section.

P.S. To learn more about the laws of leadership, read Chapter 7 of The Unemployed Millionaire. *Be sure to take advantage of over $2,000 in personal development bonuses by getting your copy here: http://www.MattMorris.com/book.

P.P.S. If you missed Leadership Law 5, find out what it is right here: The Unemployed Millionaire Show: Episode 27.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 27

To be quite frank, nothing frustrates me more than a leader who cannot make a decision to act. With that being said, the fifth Unemployed Millionaire Leadership Law is: Be a strong decision maker.

Theodore Roosevelt once said: “In a moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.”

Managers are  often concerned with doing things right.  Too many managers focus on analyzing every decision to the nth degree and continually miss opportunities because they were simply too slow to act….

Leaders are more concerned with doing the right thing. Not all of your decisions will be correct. In fact, many times you may make the wrong decisions more often than you would like.

But as long as you are making decisions and making them for the right reasons, you will learn to make right decisions more often than not. I can promise you this – your decisions will get better as you gain experience in making decisions.

The most famous example of someone who failed often on their way to success is Thomas Edison. When Thomas Edison was only 7 years old, he attended school for three months before his teacher labeled him a slow learner. His mother promptly pulled him out of school and taught him at home, where he quickly developed an interest in science.

While working as a telegraph operator for Western Union near Wall Street, Edison repaired the Gold Exchanges new telegraphic gold-price indicator after it broke down. After studying how the crude stock ticker worked, he set about inventing a better one, which earned him $40,000 for his invention, known as the Edison Universal Stock Printer.

At the age of 20, Edison set up his famous laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey to begin work full-time as an inventor. In one year alone, he earned over 400 patents for his various inventions, which caused the local citizens to nickname him “The Wizard of Menlo Park.”

His greatest triumph came about in 1878 when he announced to the world that he would invent an inexpensive electric light to replace the gas light. This announcement was ridiculed…

Edison continued to experiment with over 10,000 different materials until he finally invented the first incandescent light-bulb on October 21, 1879. Like most legendary successes, Thomas Edison knew that the road to success is paved with failure.

The key to decision making as a leader is to strive for excellence rather than perfection. What is the greatest lesson you have learned through experiences with decision making?

Share your answer in the comments section below!

For more information on Leadership Law 5, check out pages 90-91 of The Unemployed Millionaire.

P.S. Did you miss Leadership Law 4? Find out what it is right here: The Unemployed Millionaire Show: Episode 26.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 26

Another cardinal rule in leadership is that “the speed of the group is determined by the speed of the leader.” A manager tells others how to do it and sits back and watches. A leader shows people how to do it and sets the example.

To set the right example for your organization you must take the lead!

Early on in my career, I learned this law the hard way…

Management is a Danger Zone

When I was 24 years old, I became a sales director in a travel company. In my first month with the company, I went out and personally sold 30 travel club memberships in 30 days, in addition to building my sales team. It was the company record and not one single person in my sales team surpassed me.

After that, I went into sales management mode and was working with my salespeople more than I was making personal sales. After about four or five months of this, I started to get frustrated. Month after month had gone by, but not one person in my entire sales team had made more than 30 sales. I had several who had done 20, but none had done 30 or more so I decided it was time for an experiment.

I decided I would be a leader rather than a manager and set the example to raise the bar to a new level. The next month, I went on a selling frenzy. I did whatever it took to push my sales up to over 40 personal sales by the end of the month and an amazing thing happened…

I was managing  my team less than I was previously, but everyone’s production went up! I had several people who had surpassed my original record and some even got close to 40!!

Nothing changed other than the fact that my sales team saw that it was possible to make more than 30 sales.

Shift The Paradigm

People have a paradigm set in their mind. The role of a leader is to break that paradigm, which, in turn, inspires confidence in others to believe they can do more than they originally thought possible.

True leaders lead by example and make it easy for others to see what’s possible. When others are inspired by your actions, that’s when you’ll know you’ve reach a new level in your own leadership ability.

What activities are you doing to inspire your team? I’d love to talk about it with you in the comments section below!

P.S. For even more examples of how to lead by example, read pages 88-90 of The Unemployed Millionaire. Get your copy and over $2,000 in bonus personal development education here: http://www.MattMorris.com/book.

P.P.S. If you missed the last episode of The Unemployed Millionaire Show, watch it here: Leadership Law 3.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 25

One characteristic of truly great leaders is that they have an unyielding positive attitude toward the success of their organization.

Have you ever heard this statement: “50% of your success is attitude. The other 50% is attitude.”?

Well, I can promise you that it’s absolutely true…

Attitude is a constant battle. Maintaining a positive attitude takes focus and extra effort but developing the ability to conquer negativity is so much greater than letting negativity conquer you!

As a leader, you must feed your mind with positive thoughts and information as much as you possibly can so you are consistently upbeat in front of the people you lead.

Leading Through Challenges

Experiencing disappointment, discouragement, and challenges that may seem insurmountable is a natural part of life for leaders. While those may be feelings in your heart, great leaders must keep those negative feelings to themselves. (I won’t lie – it’s tough to do some days but it’s your job as a leader!)

When people you lead see you visibly discouraged, they feel a greater sense of discouragement. When they see you visibly worried, they feel a greater sense of worry. Displaying your negative emotions will produce nothing but negative results for the people you lead.

A true leader will always see the solution and never focus on the problem. Your people look to you to help them overcome challenges as they arise so always be there to provide positive support!

Excuses, Excuses

Attitudes are absolutely contagious and leaders have an amazing ability to transfer emotion to their people – negatively and positively.  Negative emotions from you as the leader transfer those negative emotions to your people; which leads to negative results in productivity and loyalty.

Negative attitudes spread 10 times faster than positive ones!

People are always looking for excuses to quit or give up on their dreams so as a leader, you never want to be the culprit for one of your peoples excuse to quit!

Getting You and Your Team UP

Great leaders have an amazing ability to make people feel better about themselves. A major way to do that is through your positive energy.

When you’re positive and upbeat, you emote confidence and inspire people to move forward. Don’t worry about not looking ‘cool.’ If you’re excited about something, share that excitement and enthusiasm with everyone around you!

P.S. If you missed the first 2 laws of leadership, check them out here: Leadership Law 1 and Leadership Law 2.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 24

Over the years, I’ve learned that great leaders are not only comfortable sharing their vision, their passion overflows and spills out to others in such a way that everyone they share their vision with can’t wait to be a part of it. When you share your passion, you transfer that passion to others and inspire them to be part of something that makes them feel good about themselves.

So Leadership Law 2 is Convey an Inspiring Vision. The first step is to create a vision for all facets of your life (your company, your family, everything)… A vision doesn’t have to be strictly related to your business. I’ve created a vision for my family as well because I strongly believe that families rise and fall based on leadership…

Far too many families live by the philosophy that their success both financially, spiritually, and even in their love and harmony, is going to happen by chance. It doesn’t work that way! Your family’s success is going to come from leading your family to success. (Read page 85 of The Unemployed Millionaire for a deeper explanation of conveying your inspiring vision to your family!)

Carrots vs. Cause

The other important part of Leadership Law 2 is developing the ability to understand what motivates people to take action. Dollar bills are generally the most widely used carrot in traditional business.

What happens when you use money as the biggest motivator is that people will leave you in a second if they can earn more money somewhere else. If money is your carrot, you have no competitive advantage because just about everyone is using money as the motivator.

In general, people will be more motivated by a cause than they would be by money. If you look at many of the truly great companies in the world, you’ll see that their leaders inspired them to go after an inspiring vision…

The Vision Behind Microsoft

A perfect example of a leader using vision to inspire an entire team of people is Bill Gates. In the mid-1980′s, Bill Gates set a goal to have Microsoft software running on a personal computer on the desk of every person in the world. At the time, his goal seemed absurd since computers were ridiculously complicated to use and priced at a premium.

To reach his goal, Bill Gates had Microsoft develop Windows to make personal computers much more user-friendly. Windows also adopted the most popular productivity programs to run on the new system. This new combination of popular productivity programs and easier to use personal computers, gave more people a reason to buy a personal computer and use Microsoft’s software.

Today, over 90 percent of all computers run some form of Microsoft software!

Life is short; we all have a very limited time on this planet. I believe that if you want to experience fulfillment, it will not be created through any amount of money you can earn but by the impact you can make on this world.

How are you motivating the people you are closest to? I’d love to discuss it with you below in the comments section.

P.S. Want more information about the leadership laws? Get your copy of The Unemployed Millionaire and help me feed 5 hungry children right here: http://www.MattMorris.com/book.

P.P.S. Did you miss the latest episodes of The Unemployed Millionaire Show? Watch them right here: Intro to the Laws of Leadership and Leadership Law 1.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 23

Big dreamers inspire others to dream big so the first law of leadership is: Have a Dream Larger Than Those You Lead. A leader has to be comfortable communicating his or her dreams through the power of emotional intelligence – the ability to transfer emotion to your organization.

People are propelled to action by the height of your passion and inspiration. Most people want to be more than they are and they look for a leader who has a passion for greatness that will inspire them to greatness…

When you open yourself up and share your dreams, you transfer emotion. People want to be around a leader who’s transparent.

When they see transparency, not only do you transfer emotion, you also gain their trust. You’ll never be followed unless you’re trusted, and the more open you are, the more trusted you become.

My Challenge to You…

Get a BHAG! Since it doesn’t take any more energy to dream big than it does to dream small, create a BHAG… a Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal!

When I’m traveling around the world with the speakers and top salespeople in my company, I’m constantly dream building with them. I’m telling them how in just a few years, we’ll be flying in our own corporate jet rather than flying commercially.

Always remember – facts tell, but stories sell! So get into the details when you dream! My dream building stories go like this:

Instead of driving a car to the airport, having to be there an hour early, going through ticketing, fighting the crowds, going through security to take off our shoes, emptying our pockets, taking off our belts/hats/jewelry, and then sitting around waiting for our flights, we’ll be picked up by a limo. We’ll be whisked away to the private airport by our limo and be chaufferred right up to our own private jet. We’ll never even have to touch our bags – no security, now waiting, no hassles. Our own private flight attendants will welcome us with a glass of champagne and organic snacks. If we’re tired, we can go to the back of the jet and take a nap. When we land, we’ll walk down off the plane into the next limo which will take us to our luxurious resort.

The more vividly you imagine and picture yourself living these dreams, the more concrete they become in your mind and the more likely you are to turn them into reality.

When you feel that your dreams are within your reach, people around you feel that same energy and want to do anything they can to be part of your dream as well. With that being said, let’s get started dreaming right now!!

Leave your new, vivid Big Hairy Audacious Goal in the comments section below so we can talk about it together! I will be reading your dreams personally and I can’t wait to hear from you!

P.S. For even more insight to the Laws of Leadership, get your copy of The Unemployed Millionaire right here: http://www.MattMorris.com/book. Law of Leadership 1 is on pages 82-84!

P.P.S. If you missed the last episode of The Unemployed Millionaire Show, watch it right here: Introduction to the Laws of Leadership.

Click here to view the embedded video.

An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Lifestyle Freedom: Episode 21

A few years ago at a Yanik Silver Event, I had the pleasure of meeting one of my good friends and extraordinary marketer, Joel Comm. Last year, he released Twitter Power which is an absolute must-read book dedicated solely to sharing the most powerful techniques for using Twitter in your business.

Twitter has officially became an essential component of social media over the last couple of years. And Twitter Power: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet At A Time has been a vital part of my journey to becoming an expert on social media…

In Case You Haven’t Heard…

Twitter allows members to connect with one another in real time via short text messages–called “tweets”–that can be received either via the Twitter site or by e-mail, instant messenger, or cell phone. Tweets must be exactly 140 characters or less so they are a form of micro-blogging.

Who Gives a Tweet

Tens of millions of people around the world are using Twitter and the number gets bigger every day! Quite a few large corporations like Apple, JetBlue, and Whole Foods, are using Twitter as a resource to reach customers in a more direct, personal way.

And, if you’ve ever wondered what a day in the life of a celebrity is like, join Twitter and become a follower of your favorite celeb to find out!

Why You Should Read Twitter Power

Twitter allows entrepreneurs to add value and connect with people on a whole new level but it’s all about participation. Twitter Power lays out a phenomenal guide  for developing a strong, niche community through Tweets.

Joel also discloses tons of the best tools and strategies for taking full advantage of everything Twitter has to offer. In my social media research, I’ve found that there are few resources that focus solely on using Twitter as a business resource. Joel Comm’s TwitterPower is the definitive guide for using Twitter!

P.S. If you missed my other Social Media Book Review Videos, watch them here:  ProBlogger and Crush It! To make sure you don’t miss my next book review, subscribe to my RSS Feed on the left!

P.P.S. For even more secrets to success and a look at how I spend my day as an Unemployed Millionaire – Follow Me on Twitter!