More Economic Woes; Are You Prepared?

More bad news for employees...massive layoffs from companies who've been riding high for the past several years.

And worse news...companies shutting their doors.

Over half a million new requests for unemployment benefits that will stretch state resources thin.

But there is good news... There are more and more entrepreneurs making a successful transition to their own home businesses. And that trend is expected to continue for some years.

If you've ever thought about starting your own business, there's not a better time. Look at just a few things that you gain:

• control over your time, so you can watch your son's soccer game or check in with his teacher

• the tax advantages of a small business that can save you money

• you're building a business for you, not for your boss
  

There are scams out there...it's just not easy to navigate what's real and what's not. So remember:

• just because "someone" wrote about it, doesn't make it true

• if that "someone" gave up, that "someone" can never succeed

• look beyond the hype; figure out for yourself what you can do and whom you can trust
  

Because there are also real opportunities out there.

And it's worth your time and effort to find the business you can work at home, on or off line, that fits your personality.

Home businesses are work. But it's work you do for you, for your family, and for your future.

The economic news gets worse by the minute. It doesn't have to get worse for you.

Start a home business.

My husband and I have been where you are. We know you you have it in you.

Blessings,
Judy

Law of Attraction or Browbeating? The Result...

I'm a pushover. I too easily think I can travel several paths at once. Which isn't necessarily a good thing when it comes to creating a home business. I've heard before, and I've said before, that you need to be careful, thoughtful, as you choose what direction to head towards your dreams. It's just not a good idea (so they say and so I'm learning) to work "horizontally" on lots of different projects instead of "vertically" focusing on one.

But I want to try this product. It's a bit about the desperation one who has a chronic, off-the-radar, health challenge that often gets in the way of substantial and persistent effort.

My friend is sure that this product will be the answer I've been looking for. The problem is I just don't have enough skepticism, and healthy skepticism is an important quality when looking for either the cure to a chronic problem or the right fit in a home-based business.

The Sponsor was tough...I took a bit of a browbeating. She was interviewing me for this spot, and she wasn't sure and still, apparently, isn't. Ah, well. What can I say.

My friend is willing to take a chance on me anyway; a bit of desperation, I think. But should I again take a chance on a kind of home-based business I've tried before...unsuccessfully?

What would you do?

At the last minute, I honored the lesson I had learned. I'm just not suited for multi-level marketing. My friend was disappointed, and I can't blame her. But neither could I go ahead with a business I finally knew had no place in our overall strategy. Instead of veering off the path we had determined, I remained steady. Phew!

Blessings,
Judy

Law of Attraction? Or Browbeating. What's Your Style?

Hey. I know that there are still people out there who haven't gotten the "law of attraction" message. You know, the one where you attract people into your business by addressing their concerns, answering their questions, and offering solutions to their problems? Gently? With honesty, integrity, and trust?

Some people just haven't gotten the message.

Like yesterday.

I'm looking at a product that I hope will help some of my nagging, chronic, and sometimes debilitating health problems. My friend swears by it and offers great testimonials. I'm well versed in alternative treatments, and I recognize the product's possibilities.

And, she offers a position to me, for a fee I'm willing to pay, that will put me in her group with enough volume to pay for my product. A win-win.

But, my husband and I are involved in developing other businesses, selling our home (and taking a HUGE hit), and relocating from Florida to Virginia in the next few months. I'm willing to give a few hours a week to this new business, but no more.

Red flag! Should I really get this position? Let's three-way with her sponsor...

I really like my friend and value her low-key approach to her business. But her sponsor subjected me to an hour of browbeating. (Why I listened for an hour is another story.)

*network marketing only works face to face...online marketing doesn't work
*you don't need to spend money on coaching or marketing programs or, or, or... (I've loved my coaching with Bob Proctor, Mary Manin Morrissey, Ellie and Charlie Drake; and I've devoured all I can about marketing from the best)
*you need to focus all of your attention on THIS company
*you need to prove yourself to get this position
*you should consider going to convention in two weeks (half way across the country, when I've booked a T.Harv Eker seminar nearby)

Whew!

Now, I don't think Ms. Sponsor would normally have been so tough, so hard, or so, frankly, off-putting. I don't fault Ms. Sponsor for what I see as her protecting her protege who really shouldn't sell the position to someone who will let that leg of her business slide. After all, it's my friend's business, her livelihood. She's spent two years building to this point where she said goodbye to her W-2.

So, a warning. When you're looking for a home-based business, the people you work with are key. The products can be great, the training awesome, the compensation plan the best. The company can be top-notch...and there are a number of terrific companies on all counts.

But it's the people you work with on a daily basis that are key. Pay attention. Browbeating just doesn't fly in this day and age.

Let me know what you think and what you're experiences are.

And I'll let you know how this story ends.

How Do We Help Our Aging Parents? With a Home Business.

Early in October, we were in Virginia for my step-son's wedding. There were yellowing leaves on the birches, yellow day lillies clumping beneath, and a hint of the changing season in the evening air...beautiful.

This was home until just a few years ago when we thought we'd try the sun and surf of Southwest Florida. This is where most of our family now lives.

Like my father-in-law who is nearing ninety. He lives in the home he bought brand new more than fifty years ago, where he raised his four children, and where watched his wife succumb to breast cancer a year after he retired early so they could finally travel.

But he needs help, and his youngest son, my husband, is a thousand miles away. We need to move closer, and we'll sell our home at enormous loss to make that happen.

Fortunately, we have a family of home-based businesses that allow us to work anywhere we can get online. We need to be near his dad, and we can make it happen.

My friend, who also lives in Virginia, cares for her father in her home. She works as a home health nurse, and because she's in business for herself, she can schedule her time around his needs. She and her husband are at a time in their lives where they have money and time to travel, but they feel that her father's care comes first.

We're the lucky ones.

I watched a news report recently about a woman who worked more hours to pay for the care her father required in her home. Did you see it? She set up cameras and filmed the woman she hired beat her father in his bed. This was a woman she trusted. Now, I don't know if this dutiful daughter (bless her heart) could work her job from home, but I bet she wishes she could so she could better oversea her father's care and spend time with him before he dies.

And I watched a giant moving truck today packing up my elderly neighbor to move her to her daughter's home after a serious stroke now prevents her from living in her dream retirement home here in Florida. I don't know how caring for her mother will affect her family.

How about you? Are you in a position to help your parents if they were to need you?

Now, I know that working from home is not for everyone.

But in these economic times a home-based business provides us with so many more choices.

We're thankful that we can make the move, that we can be around to help his dad and keep him company. We saw on our visit just how much that meant.

How much would it mean for you to have that flexibility?

How much would it mean for you to be in a position to care for your parents?

Look carefully at yourself...you can have what it takes.

Blessings,
Judy

Whew! What a Week in Washington! How will YOU Weather the Storm?

We're getting ready to bail out Wall Street. Wow. The words "crisis" and "not since the Great Depression" and "imminent collapse" worry us, even terrify us. Are our jobs safe? Our retirement funds?

And all the talk about us...the American workforce...as the strongest, most productive, and most resilient in the world.

Yeah, butter us up. Just before you cut our medical benefits, our retirement benefits, our hours, or send our jobs overseas and leave us to fend for ourselves.

Now, more than ever, the idea of a home-based business provides an alternative.

A recent Fortune magazine cover story stated: "Forget the paycheck; your W-2 days are over. It's a 1099 world now."

A recent Gallup poll found that 61% of Americans prefer to be their own bosses. They realize they want more control over their time. They are less willing to work the extended hours their jobs require while their children grow up without them. And they simply don't trust that their loyalty will result in a secure retirement.

Experts, like Robert Kiyosaki, best-selling author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad; Oprah's financial guru, David Bach, author of The Automatic Millionaire and Smart Women Finish First; Stephen Covey, author of the legendary book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People; and the persistent billionaire Donald Trump all agree that direct sales in the form of network marketing offers a practical and accessible way for anyone who chooses to start their own business or earn extra income. Trump says, in the book he wrote with Kiyosaki, Why We Want You to Be Rich, "Network marketing has proven itself to be viable and rewarding source of income, and the challenges could be just right for you."

Women in traditional jobs still earn on average less than men for the same work. Astounding. But the Direct Selling Association reports that in direct selling 79.9% are women who have the exact opportunity as men to create an income that supports their dreams for themselves and for their families.

Direct selling is also a business that doesn't require you to have umpteen college degrees to create a successful business. Nearly one-fourth have a high school diploma or less, and 32% have some college or trade school. But college graduates, about 35%, choose direct sales over more traditional jobs. Maybe because there aren't any. And 8% have post-graduate degrees. (Maybe, like me, they've been in jobs, and now they're choosing another, more life-pleasing route.)

The news is scary. It affects our future as a country and creates a debt, already outrageously, unnecessarily high, that will extend beyond our lifetimes.

But we are the most productive, strongest, and resilient workforce in the world. And, even more important, we are creative, persistent, and determined.

We are the entrepreneurs that can and will rebuild the financial security of America...one family at a time.

What Do IBM, Ford, AOL, Gap, Blockbuster, and Sears Have in Common?

According to the latest financial news, all of these companies (and a few more big names) are in a bit of a mess. And all will need to restructure, file for bankruptcy protection, or send jobs overseas in order to remain in business.

Whatever they do, it will mean layoffs. Lots of layoffs. The article I read suggested 10,000 or more per company.

Last month's unemployment figures were the highest in several years.

Layoffs are already at about 500,000 per month.

Now, some of you may have the kind of jobs that remain no matter what the economic news. I used to think that as a public school teacher, I was pretty safe. After all, people are still having kids and those kids need an education. Most go to public schools. But last Spring, hundreds of teachers in my one little corner of the country did not have their contracts renewed for this school year. It's not that the schools don't need teachers, it just means that school systems can't afford to hire them. Class sizes increase, services are cut...you know the drill.

Funny thing is that for the past two decades, schools have suffered a teacher shortage.

Okay, but you're not a teacher, and I'm ranting a bit.

Fortunately, we've had a lot of big box stores open in this same little corner of the country. (We have the same stores just a few miles away, but that's, apparently, too far.) So some of those laid off teachers may have found work there...although they would have had to compete with thousands of others and take a significant pay cut to a just-above-minimum hourly rate.

Rah.

What is your w-2 job? Do you feel secure?

Or do you think it might be time to be a bit pro-active. Maybe it's time you seriously looked at creating your own financial security.

There are lots of great ways to make money from home...leave the commute and stay with your family. You need to do your research, and you need to look carefully at your qualifications.

Better now, however, then when you have no choice.

Judy

Do You Have What it Takes for a Home-Based Business? Three things to look for...

So you're thinking about it. A home-based business. You're tired of the whole J.O.B. thing, the commute, the low pay...you name it. You certainly didn't dream of overtime and overdue house payments and orthodontics for your kids. You know there's lots out there...you heard about the mechanic who went from broke to gazillionaire in a matter of months. Can't be that hard...

Or can it?

You know you want it, but what does it really take to succeed in a home-based business?

I'm going to suggest a few quick and general things...

First, take a long, hard look at you. Yes, you. Do you whine and complain about your station in life? None of it's your fault...things just worked out the way they did. If that's you, you'll first need to change your mindset before you take on a business. No matter how easy it seemed for Joe Mechanic, his success, I guarantee, came when he determined to take responsibility for his life...and his success. There's lots to do to change...but you need to start with an honest self-assessment. Ask your spouse, your co-workers, or your friends what they see as your strengths...and your weaknesses. Be ready for their answers...

Okay, you've done some thinking here, and accepted who you are. Now you're ready for the next reality check.

Second, to work for yourself from your home, you need to be focused and disciplined. Before you quit your job, you may have to give up those hours of television in the evening and the idea that weekends are free. Later, when things are rolling and you no longer need the W-2, it's okay to decide that your work hours are before the kids get home from school and after they're in bed, but you do have to set aside regular work hours. And, you'll probably have to take some crash courses in putting together your business plan, from filing papers with the IRS and your State Business Office to accounting to marketing. It may seem easy to make lots of money at home, and it may come quick, but it takes work...that's the part that often gets overlooked.

You've got it scheduled...great.

Third, what is it that you really want to do? Whether you're working for someone else or yourself, you won't truly be happy unless you're doing something you love. Something that makes you excited to get started each morning. Take a look at your life now. Are there hobbies you spend all of your time either working on or dreaming about? My youngest son has a small construction company, plays the saxophone in club bands, and makes custom frames. But what he really loves is bar tending, because he loves being a host.

That's a short list. But it's a start.

Remember what a home-based business can do for you...no more forced overtime, your house paid off, and the best orthodontists for the kids.

But it takes a certain mindset, discipline and focus, and work that you're passionate about.

You have it in you; now go for it!

Blessings,
Judy

Three Reasons Why You Need a Home-Based Business Today

So, you have your life dream drawn in technicolor. The house, the car, the travel, time with your family, and the financial freedom to do and be whatever you can hold in your thoughts.

Now, is your current job your ticket to your dream?

No? Thought not.

But, wait, there's hope...A HOME-BASED BUSINESS!

Here are three reasons you need a home-based business today...

1. the economy
   
2. taxes
3. flexibility

THE ECONOMY
Do I need say more? Our economy is in turmoil. Big companies...Starbucks, Circuit City, Rite Aid, to name just a few who've been in the headlines recently...are either closing their doors or are close to it. Where are all of those employees going to find jobs?

But it's not just the closings...it's the layoffs and down-sizing, the lower wages and the disappearance of benefits.

All at a time when gas prices and food prices eat huge holes in family budgets.

How secure are you?

I was a teacher for 14 years. I voluntarily left to pursue a greater dream. But thousands in my Florida county no longer have teaching positions even though our student population is growing.

TAXES
There are 300 or so tax deductions available for small business owners...including small home-based businesses.

One of our dreams was to travel. And we have. Every trip we've made this past year...from a cruise in the Mexican Riviera to Universal Orlando and Blue Man Group...were tax deductible business expenses. All according to the IRS code.

And that's just a small part of what the government has available for small business owners.

You can't afford not to have a home-based business.

FLEXIBILITY
Your home-based business gives you the flexibility to arrange your business activities around your family.

If you have small children, keep them home with you. Save on day care and travel expenses. Give them parenting you know they need...you.

If you have school-aged children, be home for them when the bus drops them off. Help them with homework (if you get that new-fangled way of teaching algebra!), play that game of Monopoly, read that book together.

My husband still holds his W-2 job. Until the end of this year. Then we'll have the flexibility to travel where we want, when we want. Our home business is portable. All we need is our lap top and wireless Internet access...

Hey, I remind you. We're not there yet. Not at financial freedom. But we have a plan. And we've already worked through lots of mistakes to get where we are. I'll tell you about those, so you may not have to repeat them.

But we still have our dream.

So, dream your technicolor dream. A home-based business can be the way you step into financial freedom.

Go for it!

Blessings,
Judy

About me...

I'm a not-too-proper Bostonian by birth, without the accent.

I've been a beer tender, construction supervisor, tavern singer, administrative assistant, teacher, writer, entrepreneur. I can hang drywall, grow a mean organic tomato, chop wood, lay tile, refinish furniture, sew, bake bread...even drive a cement block-laden dump truck (but you ask me to do that again at your peril). And I sing better now than I did when I got paid.

I'm a wild and free-spirited, Beatles-crazed, guitar-toting, folk singing '60s hippie flower child.

I'm a Pisces water child, born on the waning cusp. I'm Spring...the promise after each winter of a rebirth of all things growing, and signal for a renewal of faith.

I proclaim God, the Divine, Buddha, the Universal Consciousness as the reason for my life on earth; for the earth itself to exist. I speak to the goddess within, the holy spirit who longs to lead me to my rightful place.

I'm mother of four sons, grandmother, great grandmother. They're distant in too many ways and more than close in so many others.

And I'm on a journey that began when my book clubbies watched the Rhonda Byrne movie that took the world by storm just two short years ago.

Let's start with a story.

I came of age in the '60s. I remember exactly where I was and how my world...the world...stopped, then forever changed on 11-23-63, just as 9-11-2001 is etched in current memory.

President Kennedy asked us what we could do for our country and offered the Peace Corps and the space program.

Then he was murdered.

Reverend King asked us to dream about a future when all were free and led us in non-violent protest.

Then he was murdered.

Robert Kennedy offered a glimmer of the peace and prosperity we could achieve together before he, too, was murdered.

We passed civil rights legislation. We ended the war in Viet Nam. Not the government...but, us, the people, rising together in one voice.

We felt our power grow strong, but, with our leaders dead...well, some went underground and some deferred to something less controversial.

I wanted to be the guitar toting, folk singer, tie-dyed wearing hippie flower child. I wanted to go to Antioch or Berkeley and become part of the counter culture. I felt my passion to teach, to sing, to love...

Instead, life happened. You get that.

Remember the Robert Frost poem? The one from English class? Frost comes to this place in the woods, in his life, where he sees two paths. He chooses the one less traveled and "that...made all the difference."

You talked about it. Yeah, you did...this was one of the easier poems to figure out. The message is you get to choose whether to go the traditional path of financial security...college job, family, house the 'burbs, retirement in Florida...or something less secure but where you felt passion and purpose and you knew it meant something.

Problem was, no one ever told you how to find that "something different." We were even warned that "those" careers would surely leave us anything but prosperous, and we could forget Florida. (That is the muffed job of education, by the way; but that's another story.)

So, if you're like me, you started off in one direction or the other, only to find out that it's not always that simple. It's more like the path chose you, but it wasn't either of Frosts's. It was more in between. Not really a path at all, but brush, or dark forest, or mountains, or raging rapids...lots of jobs, divorce, kids who meander themselves between paths.

And here we are. More bad news every day. We've been in recession for a year now...good to know that the experts finally figured that one out. (We've lost our jobs, our homes, our 401ks, our health insurance, but it took the experts a year. So glad they're in touch. Or was it another political cover-up?)

Now what?

Hey, look. We're here again at those two paths. The one, the traditional worn path, is pretty much gone to seed, so to speak.

It's time to try the other. The one where you find what you're passionate about and how to turn that into prosperity.

As for me, that hippie flower child is on the loose. I may not yet be financially free, but I've at least headed down the right path with a machete. My passion to teach, to sing, and to love is released, and I welcome you to share my journey in these pages.

But why leave the classroom? Hint…it wasn’t retirement!

To my class of wonderful students; juniors in high school just awakening to the reality that “adult life” is just around the corner. It was a joyful moment, as you can hear on the video below.

I also taught the seniors. Since we were a new school and had few seniors, I taught all but a very few.

I promised them all at the beginning of the year that I would help them to see the possibilities for that “adult life” that would soon be upon them. I would offer them a curriculum beyond that of “American Literature” and “British Literature,” beyond what the county and the state had in mind for them, and, probably, beyond what they would find in any school in the country. I would carefully construct a bridge for them, from the sheltered life of home and school to the more impersonal and less-forgiving real world.

We had an exciting journey. At the end, they agreed that I had fulfilled my goal. They saw a different reality than the one they’d grown up with and a different possibility. Life as an adult no longer frightened, but presented them an invitation to live their dreams.

(I’ll soon post an article about those “bridge” lessons. Check back…)

Buy why leave the classroom?

I didn’t retire. I’d been in too many school systems for too few years to collect. From middle school to high school, from seashore to mountains, from snow to sunshine. Wanderlust.

But, no. Not wanderlust. Searching.

Where is the right place for me? Where can I really have an effect? When will I feel fulfilled?

I bet you’ve had those questions, too.

Well, I don’t have all the answers. But I can share my journey.

First, I took out plastic boxes of crayons and markers and colored pencils I’d collected for my students and a big, big piece of paper…

Then, I began to draw my life. In detail and technicolor. A vision emerged. And a purpose.

The walled classroom, with whatever old or new technology, curriculum, or teaching strategy, could no longer contain me.

This is my new classroom. This new technology of computer and Internet. This new strategy of connecting through blogs and articles and video. Wow!

I’ve awakened to the life that’s possible for me. I invite you to share my journey.

Judy

www.wildwealthwoman.com

After Teaching for 14 Years, I Say Goodbye to My Last Class… June 26th, 2008

Welcome to My Wild Wealth Woman Blog!

Are you ready for freedom?

Okay, good.

So, first take a piece of paper. A really big piece. Next, get out one of those boxes of Crayola crayons that you have stashed away for the grand kids (or, if you’re the parent of those grand kids, scattered among the toys). You know, the ones with the gazillion colors with names someone spent way too much time inventing.

Now, draw your life the way you want it to be. Not the way it is now, but the way you dream it could be, if only…

What’s the car you drive? A sparkling red Porsche? A sexy black Mercedes? Both?

What house do you live in? A timber frame in the mountains with snow piling up all around while you sit in front of a roaring fire sipping Glen Fiddich? A beach house surrounded by dunes, crashing waves, and the sun reflecting from wispy clouds each sunset as you lounge on your porch cooling down with minted iced tea? Both?

Can’t do it?

Why?

Not enough colors? No paper?

Or, no belief?

Freedom starts with a dream. Remember? You’ve heard that before, right?

So, dream…and dream in Technicolor. Dream on paper. Post it on the wall where you’ll see it.

If you really want it, I’ll help with the “if only.” Really. I will. And the belief.

Not just me alone, but with others who’ve been there done that and have a passion to share with you their journey to their life of abundance and joy. I’ll tell you about them.

I’m Judy. Welcome to my WildWealthWoman Blog.