Oprah’s Success Factors

The fastest way to accomplish a goal is to find someone else who has achieved your goal and do what they do.  Simply copying is not sufficent. You must understand the process behind the sucess.  Let’s take a look at Oprah’s process.

Source: Motivation and Strategies for Entrepreneurs

Oprah’s success has not come easily, but rather as the result of a number of crucial factors:

  • A Goal-Oriented Focus: “You become what you believe,” says Oprah. “You are where you are today in your life based on everything you have believed.”  Oprah’s single-minded focus allowed her to concentrate all of her time and energy into achieving the life of her dreams.
  • The Ability to Overcome Diversity: Having experienced much abuse and adversity as a young child, Oprah developed the survival instinct at an early age.
  • The Ability to Recognize and Seize the Opportunity: “I don’t believe in coincidences,” says Oprah. Listening to her gut instinct has allowed Oprah to take advantage of numerous opportunities, which otherwise might have gone unnoticed.
  • A Sense of Responsibility to Others: Early on in her career, Oprah asked, “How can I be of service?
  • The Courage to Follow her Passion: “I was called to talk, to use my voice in some way,” says Oprah. From the very moment that Oprah discovered her natural flair and passion for broadcasting, she directed all her energy toward feeding that passion. It was her passion for what she was doing that drew people in and made her so appealing to audiences worldwide.

Knowing it’s Time to Quit Your Day Job

There are many that can relate to the following: For Carla, a producer at Microsoft working with the tour, “I was miserable. I had a sexy, ego-stroking job that made for great bragging material. But I was being eaten alive by all the work, and drained by the politics of working in a large company.”

I am going to skip right to the conclusion of this article.  The more conservative types can read the entire article at startupnation.

“But Carla’s story certainly illustrates a couple of important points about deciding when to quit workin’ for the man. Making sure that there truly is interest in the market for your product before you cut the strings is vital. But perhaps even more importantly, listen to that little voice in your head and make a choice that’s in line with your long-term health and well-being. Starting a business that you’re passionate about can only do great things for your mental and physical health. Maybe you’ll be able to take a leave from your job, like Carla, to have some time to plan your business, or maybe you’ll need to start your business part-time while still working your job full-time. No matter which path you take, there’s no better time than now to start your dream business!

The perfect time to start your business is a fantasy. Be like Nike and Just Do It!

Main Stream Thinking Will Not Lead to Financial Freedom

If main stream thinking would lead to financial freedom – wouldn’t there be many more financially free people?  Most of us are taught to go to school – get a good job and climb up the corporate ladder.  How many that have followed that path are financially free?  It is hard to tell, because there are many different definitions of financial freedom.  If I were to make a guess – I would guess that fewer than 5% of the people in the U.S are financially free. I would also guess that very few of those became financially free by climbing the corporate ladder.

I submit that your chance of becoming financially free employing mainstream thinking is fairly slim.  If we can agree on that fact, then the converse must be true.  In other words, your chances are greatly improved by going against the grain or thinking differently than the masses.  Now, that doesn’t mean that you will become financially free, but your probability of success is increased.

Since I realize this fact and believe it I am constantly seeking words of wisdom from the contrarians.  A contrarian is someone who takes the opposite position or attitude.  An investor who buys stock when most others are selling is a contrarian.  How else can you buy low and sell high?    Stocks are only at their lowest point when no one wants to buy.  The real estate market was red-hot in 2004, because everyone wanted to buy or trade up.  Contrarians sold and are renting now.

Some of my favorite contrarians are:

I read these people often are regularly.

Financial Freedom Requires a Plan

Once you get pass all of the food analogies, Robert Schlesinger makes some very good points about the benefits of having a Financial Freedom plan in his article “Sometimes You Have to Have Dessert.”

The problems with not having a plan are many, but ultimately the real downfall is not knowing the feeling of success. You can’t possibly know when you succeed if you can’t measure it against something. If you don’t keep score, you will never know who wins. If you don’t have a plan and you hit an unexpected soft spot, you won’t know how or what to adjust to get through the problem, mainly because you won’t know you are having a problem. Last but certainly not least, without a plan, you can’t deviate (have a fruit tart) and then get back to accomplishing what you hoped to accomplish: getting on the road to financial freedom.

In March, I resigned from a software sales job.  There are many pros and cons to sales, but it was the ideal job for me.  What I liked most, besides the money, was that it was measurable.  If I exceeded quota I had a great year.  If I didn’t – I had a not so good year.  Our yearly performance reviews were not very elaborate.  What’s the point of making subjective statements – when the results speak for itself.

How can you measure your success without a plan? Develop a Financial Freedom plan.  Make adjustments when necessary and enjoy the ride. 

Would Steve Jobs Have Kick-Started Your Quest for Financial Freedom?

I have a bachelor degree and two master degrees.  I can’t remember one word from the Commencement addresses. Actually I skipped two of the ceremonies, but from the one that I did attend – I can’t remember a word.  I wonder if someone like Steve Jobs had spoken – would it have had an impact on my pursuit for financial freedom. The following is an excerpt from Jobs’ commencement address to Stanford’s class of 2005.

“I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle. “

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