BLESSINGS COME IN MANY WAYS

BLESSINGS CAN COME IN MANY WAYS...

Many people have many difficult times in life. Very few of us have lives that are streamlined and golden without many tribulations or hickups along the way.  While we are going through our times of trouble it serves us well to understand that blessings come in many ways and to  note two things primarily:

1. We are not the only one struggling with a huge problem or life issue or tragedy.

2. Good things can result from our times of difficulty if we are open to it.

One major key to a successful life is having a mindset of "turning lemons into lemonade" and making the best of bad situations. As a Christian I also take comfort in the promise of God in Romans 8:28 where Paul tells us that "all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose." 

Sometimes we can only be comforted with faith in the hardest of times and I have meditated on this passage of scripture more than once. I also am reminded to pray often and give thanks in all situations and we do well to  realize that what we think is best is not necessarily really the best thing for us. Kind of like a child and chocolate cake and icecream. A little bit is satisfying, but a child may just want the whole thing and even eat till they become sick. When we say no to them knowing that it is in their best interest to limit the intake of sweets they cry and whine only wanting what they think is "good for them".

I wrote the other day of my mother who has dementia and was the care taker of my sister for her whole life.  (READ "THE UGLY FACES OF MENTAL ILLNESS") My sister has some legitimate health issues but my mother actually made them worse in her effort to protect my sister from the outside world. My sister began to use her allergies to manipulate mom and had my mother caring for her every whim and desire ...to the point of allowing her to eat a completely unhealthy diet full of simple carbs and chocolate and milk with few vegetables. My sister became extremely obese and began to have diet related skin and stomach problems. My mother would clean my 40year old sister up after she went to the bathroom because she couldn't do it herself. My mom lived her whole life for MY SISTER and about her.

Recently my mother had a successful hip surgery and this meant getting care for my sister. As the state had recently taken full guardianship away from my mom they put my sister into an adult care home which turned out to be the  best thing that could have happened. Previous to this happening I thought it would completely destroy my mom to not care for my sister as she had built it into her mind that she was the only person capable of this task. I visited my mom yesterday and she is recovering nicely. We informed her that she would not be going home and that she needed to focus on getting well.  We told her that the state was taking her house and that Karan was placed into an adult group home"for the time being".

BLESSING IN DISGUISE

I really thought this would literally kill mom. But now ... the blessing in disguise....she was relieved. She knew that she couldn't care for the house, bills, cooking, cleaning, and proper care of my sister. Once mom found out that others could properly care for Karan and that she was actually doing quite well and was happy apart from her she said that it was a miracle from God. 

My brother and I had been trying to orchestrate this miracle for the last 15 years, but until mom was finally taken to a place of incapacity she would not listen to others. Now the force of nature and a seemingly tragic incident of her falling and breaking her hip has led to the freedom and a better life for my sister and a freeing up of my mom to relax and have some time to herself to recover and just "be". I call this a blessing in disguise and see so many silver linings you can't even know.

My point is this...no matter how bad a tragedy or situation seems it is very possible that good will come of it for someone. We can learn and grow through these times and lean on faith and the promises of God to see us through.

REVENUE SHARING-THE NEW INTERNET INCOME MODEL

REVENUE SHARING-The new internet income model

  As long as the internet has been in existence people have been making money buying, selling and trading goods and services. With the advances in technology many affiliate marketing programs have surfaced whereby one can join a company and refer others to that company and earn from the referral. This is called the affiliate marketing model. This is a great income model and has literally exploded on the internet in the last decade.

There are however, a few draw backs to the affiliate marketing model, chiefly, there are so many programs available that there is a lot of competition for new members. This competition is driving program features and benefits through the sky as new member sites pop up daily with better and better sales benefits, conversion rates and income opportunities.

I believe there is a shift to a new internet income model -revenue sharing

One of the biggest difficulties facing most aspiring internet marketers is getting others to join your chosen program. Many people jump from one opportunity to another trying to find the golden egg. As new programs show up they are the next best thing for 6 months then they get abandoned. People also are joining free programs and not upgrading. There is a glut of "free programs" that people join expecting to make money and then do nothing with. It is apparent that there is a flaw somewhere in this model. Even as tech teams and admins work to make easier programs to earn with people still will not join as they are too busy promoting their own program(s). 

This has caused a whole new Internet income model to be born. Revenue sharing or Earning through revenue sharing when you purchase advertising. Most of these companies offer ad ad packs which allows you to advertise your premier program and earn from the revenue or profits shared with other paying members. One such example is "Profit Clicking" which began in 2006 and is the recognized leader of this income model. Others have taken and improved on their model to share profits from forex trading which the companies do professionally with the advertising revenues then they pay a percentage back to the members in the form of rebates or ROI based on the ad pack purchase. One high quality example of this is Hourlyrevshare which has seen its membership grow from 0 to over 20,000 in 84 days. I like the new internet income model of revenue sharing and will mix my program portfolio to include a heavy mix of these programs to diversify my income from multiple different sources. Read my honest review for hourly rev share.

My own internet income model is evolving 

My own strategy is evolving to include passive programs as my number one source of income. My favorite programs for passive income are:

HOURLYREVSHARE- a newer advertising membership that pays up to 6.5% compounded hourly

Once I help people make money with these programs my desire is to help them understand the value of diversifying into residual streams of income using monthly recurring programs like:

STIFORP- which is a worldwide and solid company with a great comp plan and powerful business building tools and training.

Ultimateteamsuccess- which is a membership based advertsising site with recurring residual income.

I believe that the knowledge I have attained in the last 4 months has helped me grow into a more dedicated and responsive marketer. My evolution continues and I am getting away from a "shot gun" approach and will focus on my chosen main program. If you are serious about internet income and really want success...I encourage you to look at BIM. (training included from one of the top marketers in the country).

Once you have these easy and inexpensive basic programs stacked you are set and you get to build your business and advertise with the tools as well. It has been a great symbiotic relationship between the programs.

THE UGLY FACES OF MENTAL ILLNESS

THE UGLY FACES OF MENTAL ILLNESS ARE MANY FROM DEMENTIA TO HOARDING.

Mental illness has many faces and impacts around 54 million americans each year. It is estimated that 20% of all families deal with some sort of mental illness. It was not recognizable in my own mother until after I noticed her hoarding all kinds of items usually from 2nd hand stores. It began with crockpots mostly and spread to cheap toys and yard tools...although, I should have taken a clue when I was in the car with her and my brother and sister and she was driving over cape Horn in the Columbia River Gorge with her eyes closed and screaming at the top of her lungs. Or when during an argument with my dad she would hurt herself by pouring boiling water over herself to make a point or get sympathy.  We were too young to note that her and my sister's pattern was almost an exact replica of the relationship her mom had with my mom's sister even down to the name "Karen" whom my sister was named after. 

As a guardian for my sister my mother had complete control over my sister's life and began to use her allergies and slight Autism to separate the two of them from society. As they spiraled downward into a cataclysm of co-dependency, my mom being the trigger for Karan's supposed allergy attacks at the slightest hint or breath of a word from my mom, the sickness progressed until no one was allowed inside the house because Karan might "have an allergy attack" she was known to have allergic reactions to people she didn't like including me at times if I crossed her.

As the ugly face of dementia and hoarding mixed with social reclusiveness began to rear its head the true impact still was to be unknown to me as my brother and I tried to help and did yard work to help mom in the house she owned. Even though I talked her into buying two new toilets 12 years ago and had my own plumbing business she wouldn't let me in the house to install them and so lived with a toilet that she had to pour water into the bowl from a bucket to make it flush.

One person who did work his way into her life "Junior" got into her good graces and was able to get her to give him 70,000 over 14 months in 2010 to 2012 to do odd jobs around her house. She had always kept the money safe and in cd's. She was always frugal and never ever got a real vacation and just let him bilk her out of all of it. Unfortunately her naivete was rewarded by a complete and total loss of everything she had saved to the point that when she couldn't pay him for that leaking faucet he had installed he helped her open a line of credit for $5000 so he could get paid $5,000 to fix the faucet. Thank God the law got him before I did.

From this point forward, the State of Washington became involved and my brother and I tried to work with her to clean up her house explaining how it would be if she didn't let us help her. We took 12 truckloads of sellable junk and had a garage sale to get her money to pay taxes on her home. We cleaned and distracted her so the other one could slip past her with some prized possession of hers like an old aluminum dog watering bowl (her dog had long since died and the beat up old bowl was intended for the scrapper) she could not let go of it even against all logic and reasoning, "mom, are you going to use it today?"  "Well, no," she would answer. "How about tomorrow?" I asked. No...cant I just keep it?" she would say.

We spent countless hours there and you couldn't even tell. We noticed that some lights weren't working and went about replacing them and the light switch in my sister's room that wasn't working only to come back days later to find the new light switch smashed with a hammer. "What happened to the switch?" We asked. "Karan didn't like it." she said. It wasn't smooth like the other one.

THIS MENTAL ILLNESS is ugly in all its forms and seeing it is like seeing a demon straight in the face.
My mothers sickness grew worse as she didn't eat because some item she needed like canned meat might cause a reaction in Karan so my mother slowly was dying and ended up in the hospital 4 months ago getting 5 pints of blood. The poor thing ended up back in the hospital on Feb 18, 2013 after she fell in her house and broke her hip. Unfortunately, unknown to her as the State guardians of her finances and my sister's guardian finally made it inside the house they determined together not against mine and my brother's position that they could not return to that living arrangement. My mother just could not work with my brother and I against the powerful and sick dynamic she had built around my sister. My mother's whole raison d'etre is Karan to her ultimate downfall as now the state is taking Karan and placing her in an institution and mom doesn't know this yet either. Yesterday 2, 19, 2013 was the successful surgery, today she thinks Karan is at home under our watchful care and tomorrow or the next day mom will be hit between the eyes with the fact that she can't ever go home again and may not see her daughter again (anytime soon anyway).

I know that many families have similar stories. I share this not for sympathy but to show how screwed up we all really are in our own ways. I hoard food. I see symptoms of her in me. I encourage you next time you see a weird co-dependent relationship or a sick or handicapped person to treat them with respect and love as they are human, have feelings, desires, dreams and a life that you know nothing about. Seeing my sister in the Emergency room last night on the gurney as she scratched and had her problems and knowing that she would never go back home again, and also knowing what I knew was heart breaking for me. I still see her in my mind sitting there as I tried to talk to her. What do you say to your sister who "is allergic to you at a moments notice" to  manipulate her environment and my mother for some amount of control in her own life. What do you say when you learn about the abuse "perceived or real" by doctors and dentists and others in society who treated them as second class citizens because of their "differentness".

I have learned "there but for the grace of God go I".

HAVING AN ABUNDANT MINDSET

Having an abundant mindset is not a natural thing for some people. Our thought processes and perceptions say a lot about us. we can think negatively and have a "broke" mentality or we can think positively and have a glass half full mentality. It is a matter of training the mind and habit forming to retrain our minds.

The power of core beliefs for life success

Core belief systems are fashioned from a young age and are critical to the ultimate life success of individuals.  It is a much studied area of social science and it is well recognized that while many people believe many things it is important to have a standard to guide you. Much like travelling in the open desert would be with out the north star as a point of reference, if we go through life without a spiritual foundation or core belief system to have as a reference point we will surely be tossed to and fro by every challenge that comes along in life.