Sometimes you get an email that is so powerful that forwarding to a friend or relative just doesn’t seem enough.

Today, I received one of those emails from my uncle. It is was titled “The Duck & the Devil.” I couldn’t even imagine what this could possible be about so I read in full…and Wow, it hit home.

It is a good reminder that no matter what we have done in the past or what we are doing now, God was and is there watching our every move. No matter the lye, if you cheated, in debt, scared, holding a grudge, have feelings of anger, hatred, bitterness, guilt or shame, no matter what you have done, God was there then and is there now, waiting for you to reach up to Him, ready to forgive - all you have to do is ask Him.

You may be surprised to know that the person you wronged, your friends, parents, spouse, whoever it is will also forgive you, if they haven’t already.

It is the evil one making you think that you can’t change your past, correct a wrong, go home. Whatever the issue, satan will make you feel through pride, guilt and shame that you are such a louse you could never go back to correct your wrong. That is so far from the truth!

The truth is, ask God for forgiveness and all wrongs will be washed away, give Him a chance and then give your family and friends the same chance, take a risk, you have nothing to lose and so much to gain.

Please read “The Duck & the Devil” - think about it, pray about it, live it.

There was a little boy visiting his grandparents on their farm. He was given a slingshot to play with out in the woods. He practiced in the woods; but he could never hit the target. Getting a little discouraged, he headed back home for dinner.As he was walking back he saw Grandma’s pet duck. Just out of impulse, he let the slingshot fly, hit the duck square in the head and killed it. He was shocked and grieved!

In a panic, he hid the dead duck in the wood pile; only to see his sister watching! Sally had seen it all, but she said nothing.

After lunch the next day Grandma said, ‘Sally, let’s wash the dishes’ But Sally said, ‘Grandma, Johnny told me he wanted to help in the kitchen.’ Then she whispered to him, ‘Remember the duck?’ So Johnny did the dishes.

Later that day, Grandpa asked if the children wanted to go fishing and Grandma said, ‘I’m sorry but I need Sally to help make supper.’ Sally just smiled and said, ‘Well that’s all right because Johnny told me he wanted to help.’ She whispered again, ‘Remember the duck?’ So Sally went fishing and Johnny stayed to help.

After several days of Johnny doing both his chores and Sally’s; he finally couldn’t stand it any longer.

He came to Grandma and confessed that he had killed the duck.

Grandma knelt down, gave him a hug and said, ‘Sweetheart, I know. You see, I was standing at the window and I saw the whole thing, but because I love you, I forgave you. I was just wondering how long you would let Sally make a slave of you.’

Whatever is in your past, whatever you have done the devil keeps throwing it up in your face (lying, cheating, debt, fear, bad habits,
hatred, anger, bitterness, etc.)…whatever it is…You need to know that God was standing at the window and He saw the whole thing.

He has seen your whole life. He wants you to know that He loves you and that you are forgiven. He’s just wondering how long you will let the devil make a slave of you.

The great thing about God is that when you ask for forgiveness; He not only forgives you, but He forgets.

It is by God’s grace and mercy that we are saved.

Reach up to Him today, ask forgiveness, go to those you have wronged. Start living a life free from guilt and shame.

I am pleased to announce this article has been featured on:

The 235th Christian Carnival 

Individual Character

It is really all we have in life that shows who we really are to others.

Dictionary.com defines character in part as: moral or ethical quality. Qualities of honesty, courage, or the like; integrity, reputation.

What does it mean to be of good character? Have you really thought how others view you and your character? Have you thought about the true character of those around you?

I believe that true character is what you do, when no one is looking. If you stand and “preach” about how bad it is to steal, deceive, look at porn, cheat on a spouse, etc, but when you think no one is looking, you choose not to tell a sales clerk they gave you too much change, or you don’t tell your spouse you spending two hours after work each day with a person of the opposite sex, or you wait until the family goes to bed before you go to internet sites that you don’t want them to know you visit, that is when you are showing your true character. Maybe not to those who know you, but to yourself, and to God.

You see even when we think no one is looking, someone is always watching our actions. God is always hearing our thoughts and knows our intentions. Many times, those around you may know what you are doing as well, they may just be to shocked or afraid to let you know they know.

Are we perfect? No. None of us is perfect, we all have character flaws. But what separates an individual of true character from one who “pretends” to have true character is in our ability to admit our flaws and attempt to correct them. To acknowledge we are not perfect.

I once heard a statement, we are only as sick as our secrets. That is so very true. The more you try to “hide” who you really are, the sicker you will become. But when we acknowledge our character flaws openly is when we can begin to overcome them, to heal, to build character. To improve who we are as individuals. It is a never ending process, but one that is essential for inner peace and future success, personally and professionally.

I have known people who on the outside appeared to be an individuals of character. They would say all the right things. Inside, they had many secrets. Only those very close to them, and there were few as they did not let people get too close, saw issues with deception and secretive behavior. Through the years this caused them to have failed marriages, trouble with family members, and more. Their character effected all aspects of their lives and the bad character caught up with them in the end in one form or another.

I write about this today because I think there are many who hide behind an appearance of good character. In order for any of us to be successful personally, financially and professionally we must first focus on our own true personal character and relationship with Christ. Look deep inside of who you really. What your true focus is on, not just who you portray yourself to be.

Are you trustworthy, loyal, a committed spouse and/or friend? Do you have a relationship with God? Can you deep inside know you did not do or think about anything you would be ashamed of if you did it or thought it in front of God? Are you keeping secrets from your spouse or significant other? If you are you must know, deep down inside it is wrong. After all, if what you were doing was right, you wouldn’t be ashamed to admit it to those who love you, would you?

Even I work on building my character everyday, right now, I am listening to the audio book “Become a Better You” by Joel Osteen. I highly recommend it as a great starting place to improve who you are, regardless of where you are starting from.

Today, think about who you are. What is your true character? Who are you when no one is looking? Where can you improve your life, and how would that improve the life around you with your family, friends and career? You and only you make the choice of who you are, and what your character is. What will you choose?

We all have life changing experiences. I believe that each life changing experience happens for a reason. I also believe that once the initial shock and hurt subsides it is a good time for self reflection. It is a good time for self evaluation, to determine how this change can improve who we are as individuals and how we can better contribute to our personal and professional relationships.

Many times these life changes involve relationships. Sometimes we are naive and trusting to a fault, and/or we have no real education in how to identify safe people verses unsafe people that come and go in our lives. Wouldn’t it be so much easier if we knew ahead of time if a person was safe or not before we invested our time, love and energy and sometimes money into them?

In order to have continued success; spiritually, personally, professionally and financially, we have to be able to identify what type of people we are allowing into our lives. Are the people close to us, those in our spiritual, personally and professional lives safe or unsafe? Do the people around you help you improve who you are as a person? Do they help improve you professionally? Do they help improve you spiritually?

Do you help improve those around you? You see, not only do you need to identify safe people to be around, but you too must identify if you are a safe person for others to be around. It is important to correct areas in your life where you are unsafe.

We are all unsafe in some form. Nobody is perfect. However, the first thing that starts to identify you as a safe person is that you can recognize you are not perfect, that you are open for self improvement and personal development. As we improve who we are, we also help improve the safe people around us. Those who are unsafe many times are unable to admit their flaws or if they can admit a flaw, they seldom, if ever, focus on personal development, behavior change or self improvement, they instead focus more on the flaws of others.

As you have probably figured out by now, I am a big fan of personal development/self improvement books, especially those with a Christian perspective. Recently I came upon a book by the same authors of the exceptional book “Boundaries.” This book, “Safe People: How to Find Relationships that are Good for You and Avoid Those That Aren’t” is also a must read.

I have always believed that there is good in most people, especially Christians. I also believed and know that life if full of hurts, people will hurt us , it is part of relationships. One thing that many of us sometimes get caught up in is that even someone who knows the word of God and professes to be a Christian can hurt and be untrustworthy. Sadly, even people who professes to be “Christian” can be unsafe.

Many of us do not recognize or acknowledging the signs of an unsafe person. Many of us just don’t know how to recognize an unsafe person. Instead we may focus on who a person may portray themselves to be rather than who and what their actions show they are.

Safe people help you to grow. They are constantly pushing you to extend yourself in new ways, and you are pushing them as well, a one-sided relationship is also unsafe.

The following are 7 key characteristics present in safe people, keep in mind that only time truly will tell if a person has these traits or not, many unsafe people will mask themselves for a period of time, but time will always show true character, and character is who a person is when no one is looking.

1. Safe people are non-judgmental.

When you get serious about dealing with a problem of any kind, you need people who are not spending their time judging you for your mistakes. Safe people don’t judge you.

2. Safe people listen.

When you reach out for help you need people who will really listen to your struggles. Safe people let you share your story and all the difficulty you have faced in carrying a burden. There is empathy with safe people. While they may not have experienced your specific trouble, they listen with their heart and want to truly help.

3. Safe people maintain strong boundaries.

One of the dangers of seeking out safe people is that you might be so amazed at their compassion and care that you begin to move too close too quickly, they encourage you to make a quick decision to commit to them, to make an investment, or something else that may truly need some distance, time and/or research before making a final decision. Safe people, however, also know how to establish and maintain healthy boundaries that represent appropriate interaction and assistance. They won’t push you to make a decision you are not ready to make.

4. Safe people are reliable and respect the commitments they make.

Trust, is critical in any relationship of any kind. Trust is easily broken when an unsafe person does not follow through on the commitments they make. Safe people can be counted on, keep their promises, maintain your confidence in them and don’t give you reason to doubt their words.

5. Safe people are honest and tell the truth in love.

Some people who may appear to be safe are really just looking for a way to present themselves as superior potentially to get what “they” want. Safe people know how to tell you the truth in love. They are not pointing out your weaknesses to pump themselves up, but rather to help you move toward improvement and personal development and a life that truly brings satisfaction.

6. Safe people pray for wisdom and are humble.

Anyone willing to help another person must understand that they need wisdom. And gaining wisdom requires humility. You can often spot the safe people by how often they ask God for wisdom, knowing that apart from His leading they could lead you astray. These are the kind of people you want around when traveling the road to recovery from any form of hurt or other problem you are attempting to solve in your life.

7. Safe people help you get help.

Finally, safe people know their limitations and have a heart of willingness to get you the help you need. They will walk with you as you expand your network of support to include a counselor, a good investment advisor or other individuals to help you reach your goal toward life success.

To put it all in one small package, safe people are not critical, but can lovingly point out areas where you can improve as well as suggest how to make those improvements when needed. They are reliable, trustworthy, honest, and consistent. If they have done something to hurt you, you should be able to share with them that hurt and have them understand and assure you the behavior will not occur again and it not occur, rather then them act out defensively, or “promise” it won’t happen again only to have it happen after a few weeks or months. Safe people can only be found over time, with proven, consistent behavior. Safe people are people with a good character, they are not perfect, they are open and honest about who they are.

After reading this book I have learned that unfortunately there seems to be more unsafe people around us then safe people. Many unsafe people are very good at portraying themselves to be safe. People who seem to be safe, sometimes have such emotional issues that they are unable to share their lives with others in an honest trustworthy relationship, these people many times go through life mimicking what they think a safe relationship should be rather than emotionally connecting. For these people time is their enemy as they can not keep up the “appearance” of a safe person for long and many times they hurt those who invest in them, those who are not educated in spotting an unsafe person.

“Safe People: How to Find Relationships that are Good for You and Avoid Those That Aren’t” should be required reading for everyone and I highly recommend it. It will help in all areas of your life, spiritual, personal, professional. And even though this book is in no way related to finances or money, it will help you in those areas as well because there are many “unsafe” people who are out to take money from those who can’t spot the unsafe person who may be out to scam you.

This book will also help you improve your own “safe” factor in how you relate to those around you, the more safe you are as an individual, the more you will be drawn to other safe people and the easier you will recognize unsafe people, maybe even those in your life right now.

As you walk through life, keep your eyes open for safe people. They will become your greatest asset next to God.

We have all done it, bought more car than we could really afford. For what ever reason we try to use in our mind to justify the purchase. I need a SUV to haul the kids around. My car was to small for the three car seats so I bought a new mini van. I just wanted a new car I was sick of the old one.

We get car fever and the dealers love it. Now I firmly believe you can get a great car with no car payments, you just have to be patient and look around a bit.

The average car payment in America today is $487 a month, think about it, that is $5,844 a year. For many people that would pay of a credit card or two. To make matters worse, most of those payments are financed out for 60 months, that is just for a $29,000 car. Once the car is paid for is usually only worth just shy of half that amount if you are lucky. As soon as you drive a new car off the lot, and I do mean the second you enter the road with your new car, it dropped in value by $2,500 or $3,000 and went from new to used all within a matter of minutes.

So what is a person to do. Well, first you have to look at a car for what it is, transportation, that is it. When you start looking at it as a “status symbol” or you go in for the “bling” factor you are going to get taken by some nice sweet talking sales person, you will throw money away instead of using that money to work for you. Take emotion out of the equation. Purchasing a vehicle is a business transaction. You need a ride to get you from point A to point B safely and successfully. And that can be done with a used vehicle, really it can, I do it everyday.

Oh I know what you are thinking, but I want it to be reliable and only new cars are reliable, they have a warranty if something goes wrong. If I buy a used car I will be fixing it all the time, throwing money into it to keep it going.

NOT!

Think about this, could you ever put $487 a month worth of repairs into a vehicle for 60 months? Of course not. Sure a three to five year old vehicle will have things go wrong, but repairs on a car you paid cash for will still be far less than a consent car payment for 60 months.

Now that you have the right mind set, focus on paying cash for the car. Do you know how many reliable cars there are that are $5000 to $7000, loads of them, they are all over the place, someone else has paid the depreciation, they are coming off of lease, they are really all over the place. And yes, they are reliable too.

Also, here is a little known trick, did you know when you walk into the dealer with cash in hand, you can get that $5000 to $7000 car for even less. These sales people work on commission, and when sales are down and they are looking at cash in hand they will make you a deal. Know your numbers as they relate to the car you are shopping for, look it up online at Kelly Blue book or NADA. When you shop with knowledge and cash, you shop with power.

Now that you bought your new “used” car, you do have to be smart and put some money away every month for general maintenance and the occasional repair. But you still don’t have to put aside $487 (although it would be nice if you did), you could budget say $250 each month to put in savings earmarked “car” and that can be used for your maintenance, repairs, and even for your new “used” car fund when you want to upgrade to a newer used car.

Again, and I can’t say this enough, it is all about planning and focusing on the big picture. A vehicle is just a hunk of metal to get you from one place to the other and a $7000 car can do that just as good as a $29,000 car.

Let me close with this thought, do you know the average millionaire, and by average I mean first generation, self made millionaire purchases a car that is two years old or older and pays cash for it. Now you know why they are millionaires, they know where to put their money, and spending it on a high priced car is not the place.

Becoming debt free, building wealth and taking control of your finances does not happen overnight, nor does it “just happen”, it takes planning, commitment, and dedication. It is important to set goals as I discussed in Debt Free Goal.

Setting goals requires you lay out and acknowledge your financial priorities, but how do you do that, start here:

1. Be realistic.

You probably won’t be able to achieve every financial goal you have ever dreamed of. Don’t just identify your goals, decide what is most important to you and your family. By concentrating your efforts, you have a better chance of achieving what matters most.

2. First goals are the one’s that matter.

It isn’t about what you want most, but rather what is most important. You may have to postpone the “fun” stuff like a new boat or a special vacation in order to pay off credit cards. This doesn’t mean you can’t have the fun stuff, it just means you have to do them on a different time table.

3. Prepare yourself for multiple goals with the same level of importance.

There may be multiple important goals which conflict with one another. When faced with such a conflict, you should ask yourself questions like: Which conflicting goal will benefit more people? or Which goal will cause the greater harm if it is deferred?

4. Time is on your side.

Building wealth does not happen overnight. Time is on your side. Money in interest-earning savings accounts or invested in mutual funds, stocks and/or bonds grows and compounds. The more time you have, the more chance you have of success. Your age is a big factor.

5. Choose carefully.

In drawing up your list of goals, you should look for things that will help you feel financially secure, happy or fulfilled. Some of the items that end up on your list may include building an emergency fund, getting out of debt, investing, paying off your home and paying tuition for your children. Once you have your list together, you need to rank the items in order of importance to you and your spouse.

6. Include family members.

This is very important, if you have a spouse or significant other, make sure that person is part of the goal-setting and priority process, if married, you cannot do this alone, it just won’t work. If you have children who are a little older, and are able to understand some basic financial talk, include them as well, it will be a good learning process for them in many ways, such as how to set goals, how to improve communication in a family unit, and how to manage money.

7. Tomorrow never comes - Start now.

Don’t put off to tomorrow what you can do today. The longer you wait to identify and begin working toward your goals, the more difficulty you’ll have reaching them.

8. Focus on your behavior.

Once you have prioritized your list of goals, build your budget and stick to it. Whenever you make a large payment ask yourself, “Will this purchase bring me nearer to my primary goals — or will it lead me further away from them?” If a big expense doesn’t get you closer to your goals then it is not in your best interest.

9. It is not all about long term planning.

Much of what I have discussed is based on long term planning and goals, however most of life is lived in the here-and-now. Most of what you spend be for daily expenses - including many that are simply for fun. Fun is okay, and should be part of your plan and priorities. We work hard for our money, and even though we have our financial goals and priorities, that doesn’t mean we can not have fun. Plan for the fun in your budget.

10. You change so should your goals and priorities.

Your needs and desires will change as you meet goals and as you age, I recommend you re-examine your priorities at the end of every year and possible re-adjust at least every five years so you stay in step with your life as you grow.

You will make mistakes, don’t beat yourself up to much when you do, but learn from them, and then get back on track as quickly as possible.

Frugal, not cheap, but frugal is an important trait in those who are working toward becoming debt free and living in financial freedom to build wealth. I promote frugality to my clients. It is important to price shop, use coupons, by generic, etc.

There is a time however, when being frugal turns into being cheap and it starts to cost you money. Like the old saying goes, “the bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.” With that said, it is important to know where that line in the sand is between frugal and cheap.

For example, I have a friend who will drive 25 miles out of her way to save three cents per gallon of gas, now when you think about it, that extra 50 mile round trip to save .51 cents on a 17 gallon tank of gas. The trip most likely used up and extra 3 to 3.5 gallons of gas assuming she gets 12 to 15 miles to the gallon. So that savings of .51 cents for the cheaper gas cost an extra $9.80 if gas is $2.80 per gallon. That is an example of frugal turning cheap and costing you money.

Another thing to take into consideration when being frugal is the value of your time. Many times referred to as soft dollars. Sadly, many people do not actually put a value on their time. But your time is valuable and must be used wisely just as money must be spent wisely.

How do you put a value on your time? One way is to take your gross (before taxes) annual income and divide that by 2080 (number of working hours in a year based on a 40 hour work week) this will give you your hourly rate of pay from your job, so that hourly rate is a good starting point for a value on an hour of your time. What if you are a stay at home mom? Well, it is near impossible to put a value on stay at home moms because your service to the home and family is really invaluable, but non-the-less, your time is of value and must be used wisely to not take away from the kids, and other duties around the home, so you must determine what it would cost if you had a sitter watch the kids for an hour as well as the hourly rate of someone cleaning the house, add those two amounts up and that is a good starting place of your personal hourly value (of course you are worth much more because you do so much more.)

Using this thought process will help you to insure you are actually being frugal and wise with both money and time, verses being cheap and just looking at the dollars involved in spending rather than the whole savings picture.