It’s easy to be spiritual when you’re rich

Have you ever noticed how many of the people who give up the trappings of the material world to walk the earth in search of their higher selves have a pile of money in the bank?

For the rest of us we seek enlightenment and peace while contending with mortgages, school fees and a seemingly endless stream of bills. As they say on the commercials: fees, charges and limits may, and do, apply.

So how do we manage the complexity of modern life? The answer is in discipline and focus, which is something I‘ve been getting wrong of late and this was the result of trying to do too much not too little.

We need to focus on what’s important and realistic and not beat ourselves up for not working during every waking moment. It isn’t healthy to go through life like an Amway salesman on speed so we need to decide what’s important and allow ourselves the mental space to tackle it.

We talk frequently about balance but few are able to achieve it. This was brought home to me last week when a close friend died suddenly aged 44 from heart failure. He spent the last 10 years building a successful business for a wonderful retirement which sadly that will not happen. He missed out on much along the way.

Ideally we should be balancing work, family, health, friends and our current favourite project, enjoying each one while keeping them in proportion. It takes discipline to enjoy the activity at hand without allowing your mind to wander back to the office or the pile of bills on the living room table.

The price of discipline is always less than the pain of regret.

To be more disciplined:

· Get up early for 30 days
· Surround yourself with inspiring people
· Finish what your start
· Keep your promises
· Be punctual
· Set and realise small goals frequently
· Control your reactions
· Visualise your dreams to make them real
· Exercise for 30 minutes a day

The smallest of actions is always better than the noblest of intentions. High performers have a bias towards action. There’s great power in just starting. Taking a single step towards a goal creates a result. Small daily improvements over time lead to outstanding results.

The Best Water is Upstream

In speaking of wealth creation, many people complain of a mental ‘block’ when it comes to success, recognition and (especially) attracting money. This is common and it takes a lot of unlearning and acceptance to achieve the ‘flow’.

I didn’t believe in myself, thought myself unworthy of success and expected failure, though I never used these words.

It often felt ‘right’ if something didn’t work and I was happy that I’d at least ‘had a go’. Rubbish! I was setting myself up to fail from day one. When it didn’t work, I was able to retreat to my safe, comfortable, familiar, little world.

Some friends offered sympathy and said they’d known I wouldn’t succeed but that I had to find out for myself. Later, I realised they were actually happy I’d given up. When I did start to have success, they intensified their efforts to make me stop. Why? Because my success, even at a low level, highlighted their lack of achievements.

Why had I let their opinion matter? Because lack of confidence made me think they must know better.

I therefore learned to share with supporters, not hinderers, and gain confidence in my value as a person who didn’t need constant validation from untried non-achievers. I put up a barrier and kept swimming upstream – against the current.

Eventually, my momentum began to propel me and I was able to leave the negative ones behind. When I hit clear water, the speed of my success accelerated until my wake was impacting the shore.

Success breeds success and confidence lets opportunity meet preparation. People say I’m lucky because I grasp opportunities as they fly by. Yet this course of action is open to everyone: most simply are (or choose to be) blind to it.

I now look at those who warned me off property – said I couldn’t afford it and wouldn’t make any money. Many of them still own nothing. But for a long time I listened and assumed they were right because I had no faith in myself. Now I think: Great! That’s one less competitor on the road to success (though there is enough for everyone). With nine properties to date, I’m very glad I changed my mindset!

The key is taking action, not giving up and sometimes taking a huge bite and chewing like mad. There’s no secret formula or magic bullet other than hard work, determination and willingness to try new things. Effort and commitment are a price few are willing to pay.

Everything is created twice: once in the mind and again in reality. The first step is easy; everyone knows what they want. But it takes skill and time to put belief and passion into it, and let the Universe provide it, without sabotaging yourself.

The place to start is belief and acceptance. Learn to be a success; it can be done! Read or listen to The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles. It holds a powerful message and is a great place to begin. Written in 1910, it predates (and remains greatly superior to) almost every other self-help book.

Download it free at www.xtrememind.com/science.pdf
I dare you!

I'm a very lucky man.

My life has taken off in a magnificently really positive direction and I have been richly rewarded with the accomplishment of several major goals and a noticeable increase in the speed of positive outcomes materialising in my life. It started in January when I carefully considered and recorded my goals with a strong belief and emotion attachment to their achievement.

A major part of this was for the first time acknowledging what I'm truly grateful for. What a break through! It was like I had reacheding a plateau and was allowing myself the time to enjoy the view, take in and be grateful for what I had achieved, before reaffirming the next step, my new higher goals and setting out on the next phase of my journey.

By acknowledging my successes I grounded myself at that level, a new foundation from which to grow. It replaced a feeling of not having achieved enough, wanting more and missing out to one of enjoying what I had achieved with pride. I had to allow it.

Since then I have been promoted to CEO of our company, drive a beautiful new Mercedes and am enjoying the challenge of making a real difference. At the same time several of my part-time business ventures started to fire, returning a regular and passive income stream. Somewhere in all this I decided that I could actually play in the main game, increase my expectation as to the level of return and finally (believe) understand that I can create value without having to swap hours for dollars.

With this came a flood of success from all directions. It was almost like the Universe said 'Finally you get it so here are the rewards that have been waiting for you’, suddenly I had money appearing from multiple sources and growing each month.

I have just returned from a business trip to Hong Kong and China and as well as being highly successful for my company it was also great fun and I benefited from a venture started last year to which my contribution was intellectual capital.

But it's not all about the money. The weather was magnificent and on the last evening a typhoon was approaching so we enjoyed a strong warm wind as we stood in a bar overlooking Hong Kong harbour with the front of the bar open to capture the atmosphere of this wonderful city. I was enjoying a few drinks with friends and was standing next to the owner of the bar, our largest customer for Snatch Chips. We had come from a meeting with a European distributor who is interested in developing our Ozone Surf brand and launching it later this year.

Standing in the bar (Sticky Fingers in Wan Chai) we were enjoying a cover band playing brilliant covers from the ‘70's and ‘80's and we were rocking out to AC/DC, Led Zeplin and Pink Floyd. People were making requests so I wrote 'Smoke on the Water' on a coaster and threw it onto the stage and then, after 24 years of standing in pubs yelling out ‘Play Smoke on the Water’ it actually happened. The band launched into a note perfect rendition with a small Filipino man absolutely slaying the guitar solo in what was one of the best displays of playing that I have ever seen. I was in heaven. Does it get any better than this?

Hello and welcome to the first blog of The Success Surfer.

The aim of the Blog is to assist you in life's journey and encapsulates all that I want to achieve with success, wealth, business, spirituality, life balance and the enjoyment of life. Having your cake and eating it too. Living a relaxed life of prosperity, health and wealth.

Doing what you want when you want with no limitations. It's called 'The Success Surfer'. It's about creating momentum and riding the wave of success, building your personal power and achieving the results that are there for the taking. Success is a skill and is available to everyone; you just have to know how to find it.

I will show you.