Marriage Assassin or Economy Assassin.

In his book, Right People, Right Place, Right Plan, Jentezen Franklin exposes things which can destroy a marriage.

He lists number 8 as Economic Pressure.

"Arguing about money can destroy a marriage. The thing that bought you together didn't have anything to do with money. When you were first married, life was all about being together. It's so easy to lose sight of that.

For many marriages, I highly recommend plastic surgery. That's when you cut up those plastic credit cards that are charging you 18% interest. Put yourself on a budget. Don't try to keep with the Joneses, because by the time you've finally caught up, they will have refinanced."

Good, simple advice.

It's interesting that the Western economy is teetering on the brink of recession largely bought about by people like you and me wanting more and more, so that we may keep up with the Joneses.
Banks and other lender have been more than happy to supply money to people like us because they were charging us ludicrous interest rates and, for quite some time, we were paying.
Then suddenly, well some would say not so suddenly as a fall had been predicted by those bold enough to say it up to 2 years prior, people could no longer afford to pay.

The Sub Prime fiascio hit the U.S.

This quickly spread across the world as the lenders in the States started revealing the depth of their exposure and the amount of their losses.
Banks in other countries slowly began to state possible losses because they too had exposure to the Sub Prime market. They too had been pouring money into, what had seemed, great cash producer.

Investors became nervous and started selling stocks and they kept on selling. The oil price rose and kept going and base metal prices started going south. The stock market is now a shell of its former self. Investors have lost millions and many Superannuation funds are a shadow of their former glory.

Would it be too bold of me to suggest that the state of our world economy today has been bought about by our need to over use that piece of plastic that we have secreted away in our wallet.
The world economy consists of a whole lot of smaller economies and they consist of smaller and so on, right down to us and our household economy.

How well do you manage your economy?

Time Warp

"People who I hung around with ten years ago are still doing the same things today. They still frequent the same bars and still do the same silly things. I'm not sorry I did those sorts of things ten years ago but I've moved on they, on the other hand, have not. It sad really to see them, they haven't grown, I can't stand to be in their presence now".

This was quoted by a friend of mine recently when speaking about his life over the last decade or so. I've spoken about it also.

We all have significant events that happen to us, trouble is some of us cling to those things and so we become that event, we become known as that person who loves to party or whose parents split up when he was young or whose brother was killed tragically.
All these events are life changing but we have to move on, we have to stop being recognised as this person, and instead be recognised for who and what we are.

At 87, George Burns said "I look to the future because that's where I'm going to spend the rest of my life".
He lived to be 100.

Forget the past, significant though it may be.

Get on with living life now so you may make a better future.

Happiness

"The less you think about yourself, the happier you will be."

Joyce Meyer

Is close enough, good enough?

"Excellence is an attitude not an event.

We shouldn't accept close enough as good enough.
We won't be perfect but we should aim for the best.
In the U.S they measured some things where, if you accepted 99.9%, this is what you would get.

2,000,000 documents would be lost by the I.R.S. each year,
22,000 cheques would be deducted from the wrong bank account in the next hour,
12 babies would be given to the wrong parents every day,
268.000 defective tyres would be sold this year,
2,500,000 books will be shipped with the wrong cover,
3,000 copies of tomorrows Wall Street Journal will be missing three sections,
18,000,000 pieces of mail will be mishandled in the next hour,
291 pacemaker operations will be performed incorrectly this year.

If you think close enough is good enough just ask these 291 people if they agree with you."

Peter Irvine Co-Founder, Gloria Jeans Coffees.

So often we bounce through life believing our mistakes will have no impact on others.
You see, the above example gives an indication of what would happen if they accepted 99.9% as good enough. Obviously they don't.

In six months last year British Airways lost the bags of over 550,000 passengers.
They cap restitution at $1,500.00. Get your calculator out and examine how much this would potentially cost the airline.

We Aussies have a saying "she'll be right".

Will it?
Is it?

Is close enough, good enough?

Battlers get a win.

King of Castle defies Gladstone airport
Author: Peter Morley
Publication: The Courier Mail
Date: 10 September 2008

The following story highlights what can be achieved when, in unity, we stand up for our rights and fight the battle that lesser people would walk away from.

A family of real-life "Kerrigans" have won the battle to keep their castle beside Gladstone Airport safer - and a great deal quieter - for the family of seven.

Gladstone Regional Council had wanted to use a taxiway as a temporary runway while the main one was upgraded and lengthened.

But the Civil Aviation Safety Authority has ruled this would be unsafe, exposing the Chinerys and other residents to possible danger and unacceptable noise.

Like the Kerrigans in the classic Australian movie The Castle, Jamie Chinery and his wife, Tasha, had threatened the highest legal action to stop an airline using the taxiway while they lived in Aerodrome Rd, just 75m from the proposed temporary strip.

"It has taken since April but we have stopped this threat to our safety from a plane veering off the taxiway and ending up in our lounge room," said Mr Chinery, a father of five.

A CASA spokesman said: "We knocked back the taxiway's use for a range of safety issues, one of which was proximity to homes."

The council said it was "disappointed" CASA had not accepted consultants' reports that QantasLink could safely use the taxiway while the runway underwent a $60 million redevelopment.

The problem facing the council is how to upgrade the runway while maintaining regular services to the industrial city where passenger numbers are increasing.

Strength or weakness?

John Maxwell says "One of the ways that you can tell your working in an area of strength is that it actually gives you energy. Even if you are in the early stages of your career or are starting out on a new venture and your not very good at something your doing, you can still tell it's an area of strength by paying attention to how you respond to your failures.
Mistakes that challenge you show your areas of strength.
Mistakes that threaten you show your areas of weakness."

We're told that we should always work to our strengths. This is another way of identifying those strengths

Have you ever thought about how your reaction to mistakes and failures may point to your areas of strength and weakness? It's an interesting thought.

Some mistakes motivate us to get it right, to do better, while others seem to make us defensive, unmotivated or angry.
Paying attention to the mistakes that challenge and motivate us will help us focus on our areas of strength.
Continuing to work in areas where mistakes threaten us will only succeed in making us unhappy and unmotivated.

When you encounter mistakes or failures that appear to motivate you take note, as they could be an area of strength for you and one which you can continue to focus on.

Change for the better.

Our society is continually on the move. Life is always changing and we feel have to change in order to keep up. We change schools, we change jobs, we change friends, we change opinions, we change homes, we change cities where we live and we even often change our spouse.

Why are we doing this?

John Maxwell in his book titled Today Matters, suggests one reason is that we are looking for success. 

He says " We believe success is impossible, so we criticise it. We believe success is mystical, so we search for it. We believe success comes from luck, so we hope for it. We believe success is productivity, so we work for it. We believe success comes from opportunity, so we wait for it. We believe success comes from leverage, so we power up for it. We believe success comes from connections, so we network for it. We believe success comes from recognition so we strive for it. We believe success is an event, so we schedule it."

Dale Carnegie, author of How to Win Friends and Influence People quotes "Many people think that if they were only in some other place, or had some other job, they would be happy. Well that is doubtful. So get as much happiness out of what you are doing as you can and don't put off being happy until some future date."

How often do we see people change jobs because they're "not happy". They start the new job and in a short time they're again "not happy". They change homes for the same reason and with the same result. The list of things that they change goes on and on, all with the same result, they're still "not happy". They want success in their life, yet it is elusive.

If one of the reasons our society is continually changing is that we are looking for success then I certainly believe in knowing what we want and going for it.

Change for the sake of change doesn't do it for me.

The correct use of positioning can however, be of great value.

Positioning is about being in the right place to allow a positive change to take place.

If you have a problem with alcohol and wish to correct this area of your life, then it would make sense not to continue frequenting bars. However, it is sometimes not that easy. You must position yourself so that going to the bar is not an option. Sadly this may involve changing friends. This is where most people have trouble because it is in their friends that they find their own identity and changing friends means they will lose that identity.

People who are not happy in their job often cite poor pay or conditions as the reason. I often find that it is their attitude that is poor because other things in their life are not going well.

We need to look at ourselves and ask, Why am I having a problem in this area?

If it's your attitude then get a better one. Stop confiding in negative people. 

As Dale Carnegie, also quotes: "Any fool can criticise, condemn and complain, and most fools do."

Find someone to whom you aspire and get alongside them.

Stop watching negative shows on TV and stop reading the gossip magazines. 

If it doesn't have a positive influence in your life then get rid of it.

Sometimes in our quest for greater success we take a job in another city. Where's the problem with this?

When we are successful, it is often as a result of not only our input but also the efforts of many other people who are alongside us. Put simply, they make us look good.

Take yourself out of this environment and go elsewhere and you will not have this same support network which you previously relied upon. If we haven't recognised the fact that others have contributed to our success then we may be setting up to fail.

Position yourself in such a way that you will have a good support network of friends and mentors. If you don't already have this network, then start getting one today.

Position yourself in such a way that you will have every chance of becoming a better person, leader, parent, spouse, sibling or friend.