Pick Up A Reason To Change In The New Year

The end of an old year and the beginning of a new one is the best time to pick up a few good reads that are both inspirational and encouraging. Here is a list of all of the books I have written to help improve the lives of those who read. I have written on topics such as strategic planning, financial management, spiritual growth, and even a couple of books of poetry. There is something for everyone so why not take the time to realize that financial wellness encompasses personal and spiritual growth.

The Plan is a book packed with information that will improve your relationships and equip you to be an agent of restoration. The information contained within this book will change how you view those around you who are struggling with life's difficulties. It will open your eyes to see the needs of others in ways you never knew you could.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1544874758  

The Plan Supplement: In his blockbuster book The Plan, Ken Rupert walks you through the dynamics of building relationships that are focused on restoring broken people to wholeness. The Plan Supplement provides you with the logistics of how to develop M.E.N.S. Network groups within your church or organization.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1546655115  

Simple Wealth Building Strategies: What you do today will have a direct impact on where you end up tomorrow. In a world of uncertainty, having a strategy for building wealth is a necessity. Wealth is less about how much you earn and more to do with what you do with what you earn. It is behavior that is predictive of a person's ability to turn the average income into a lifetime of wealth.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1530482259

The Change Quotient: Change is everywhere and if you learn how to welcome it into your life, you will accomplish things you once only dreamed were possible. This workbook walks you through a rather detailed process of learning how to manage change with an optimal mindset. Those who can optimize their performance, create focus, increase accountability, and drive results all have one thing in common. They welcome change as a path to achievement.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1502481057

The M.E.N.S. Network 31 Day Devotional Book 1: This devotional has been writing with men in mind. Each passage of scripture has been carefully selected to speak to the hearts of men who seek to image Jesus Christ. The purpose of The M.E.N.S. Network is to Mentor, Encourage, Nurture, and Strengthen men to live beyond themselves and influence others with the word of God.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1507778805

God, I was wondering… Assuming that God exists and you were to meet Him face to face, what one question would you ask Him if you had the chance? This was the premise upon which this book was written. Atheists, agnostics, and theists contributed by submitting questions that they would ask God if they had the opportunity. Each question is answered and probes the depths of God's word. Although this is not a doctrinal book, it is written from a Christian perspective.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1499248113

Empathy: "Don't do for me, that which I can do for myself. Do for me what I am incapable of doing for myself." This is the heart cry of someone who is struggling with life's problems. This is what God did through Jesus Christ when He set aside His glory, entered into the reality of His creation, and provided a path of reconciliation for you. In this is the heart of empathy.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1494227258

10 Aspects of Finding Your Niche: When I was in my twenties, a colleague of mine said “eventually you will find your niche.” He was referring to that place where who you are aligns with what you do. For me, the journey has been a long and arduous road, filled with potholes, debris, and wrong turns. However, after years of studying and gathering information, I have learned that it is not about aligning who you are with what you do. It is actually quite the opposite. Finding your niche is about aligning what you do with who you are.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1500373486

Strategic Goals: Personal success doesn't just happen. This book guides you through the process of developing a strategic plan that allows you to succeed. These principles are tried and true. You will learn how to create a consistent structure to your success by using the model for strategic goals outlined in this book. You will learn concepts such as Roadmapping, Scorecarding, and Paradigming. You will also learn the three pathways of strategic goals that move you towards your success.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1493783734

10 Ways to Maximize Your Income: Living paycheck to paycheck might be a reality for most people, but it does not have to be for you. Having a strategic financial plan gives you the ability to achieve more. The Comprehensive Asset Management Plan (C.A.M.P.) might be the tool you are looking for to maximize your income and achieve your goals.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1497466598

10 Ways to Improve Your Retirement Planning: In today economy there are a number of pressure points that squeeze the life out of retirement savings. Although it is a difficult task to manage the external pressures, we can begin to learn and practice behaviors that ultimately position us to win from a financial perspective. Ten ways to improve your retirement planning is focused on providing you with practical behaviors that impact the planning process. It is often not how much you earn, but how you manage how much you earn that makes the difference.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1494227231

10 Ways to Improve Your Goals: Ten ways to improve your goals provides you with a number of practical principles that will assist you in taking your ability to achieve your strategic goals to the next level. By understanding the cause and effect continuum and practicing the ten concepts that are consistent with high levels of achievement, you will learn new ways to think about and approach life. Any life plan faces challenges, so Ten ways to improve your goals gives you four axioms to help you change your thinking and overcome these challenges.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1494351331

Reflections in Time: Echoes In The Mind Of A Poet: A collection of poems that captures the struggle of a young man who is transitioning from the teen years to adulthood. The poems written in this volume covers a wide variety of topics such as love, loneliness, faith, and others.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1726238199

Poetry and Proverbs: Thoughts Of A Creative Intellectual: Written between 1991 and present, these poems and philosophical thoughts capture the emotional journey of the author through the up and downs of life. Many can relate to moments of joy and experiences of sorrow and sadness. Like most poetry, the real value of this material is under appreciated. However, if a reader looks behind the walls he or she has constructed to protect the soul, the value contained in this second book of poetry is immeasurable.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1727325656

Overcoming Emotionality

Part 2 of 10

If there is one roadblock to successful investing that is timelier than any other, it would be this one. Emotionality! With the broader S&P 500 losing nearly 7% in October and the DOW index dropping 1,300 points, or 5% in October, there is cause for fear. November was relatively flat for the indexes and December has turned out to be a total meltdown.

The combination of tariffs, interest rate hikes, political unrest in Central Europe and the continued political division in the United States, which now includes a government shutdown, the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming freight train. And it appears that we have no way to get off the tracks. It is the perfect storm and none of us can shelter in place.

With all of this uncertainty, there is little doubt that the pressure of a recession is mounting. Fear is all around us and the most important thing to keep in mind is this. “Investing is emotional… It can’t be, but it is.” Let me unpack that a little bit before addressing the broader topic of emotionality and how to overcome this particular roadblock.

First, Investing is emotional. Just as the market responds to Geo-political events, investors tend to be driven by emotions, with fear being the primary driver of most investing decisions. Now it is important to develop the following core value when it comes to emotions. Emotions are real, and you have to acknowledge them, but emotions are also real bad decision makers. Decisions that follow emotional inputs often lead to losses.

Investing is as much of a psychological game as it is a financial game. You can learn how to play fear if you understand that Geo-political events can spoke the market into deep discounts on good companies. However, in order to play fear, you have to understand the types of fears you, as an individual investor will experience during times of market volatility.

There are four primary fears (in no particular order concerning the current market volatility) that an individual investor can, and often will, experience over the course of his or her investing lifetime. The first fear is known as FOMO, or the Fear of Missing Out. If an investor has been sitting on the sidelines, meaning that he or she has a lot of cash, he or she might become fearful about missing out on a market rally.

When the market is in full growth mode, an investor needs to be more cautious because it is easier to make bad decisions. It is hard not to get caught up in market exuberance. When the market is hot, there are always people warning of a correction, which makes it harder for the investor to know when to enter the market. This obfuscation is directly related to the second type of fear; FOGI (pronounced “faux gee”), or the Fear of Getting In.

When the fear of getting in is greater than the fear of missing out, the investor will miss market opportunities. When the fear of missing out is greater than the fear of getting in, the investor can end up overpaying for a stock. This principle is known as the pain / pleasure threshold.

This principle basically states that when the pleasure derived from an action is greater than the pain associated with the action, a person is more likely to commit to the action. However, when the pain of an action is greater than the pleasure derived from the action, the person is more likely to abstain from the action.

Applying this philosophy to FOMO and FOGI, when the fear of missing out is greater than the fear of getting in, an investor is more likely to make an investment. When the fear of getting in is greater than the fear of missing out, the investor is more likely to abstain from investing. This principle can be applied broader when the market experiences any emotion associated with investing.

When you think about it, FOMO and FOGI are truly opposite fears. However, there is another set of fears that are common ancestors. FOGO, or the Fear of Getting Out and FOSI, or the Fear of Staying In, have their root in the fear of losing money; even money that is not yet realized by the investor.

Let’s assume that you purchased a stock at $35 per share. The following week the stock drops 6.5% to $32.275 per share on bad forward guidance. You had purchased 500 shares for a total of $17,500. You investment is now only worth $16,137.50 for a total, one day loss of $1,362.50. FOGO, the fear of getting out, will cause an investor to hold the stock until it comes back to at least the purchase cost before selling. FOSI, the fear of staying in, says to the investor “cut your losses and run.” Both of these fears are driven by the exact same root; the fear of losing money.

If you stay in, the stock might rebound and if you had sold it, you would have lost the money (the emotion of regret, which I will discuss later).  If you get out, you guarantee a loss, but not as bad as it could be. Jim Cramer often says “Your first loss, is your best loss.” I do not necessarily agree with that philosophy, but it does have some validity if you invest with emotions.

The fundamentals of a company do not change hour to hour. The valuation of a company does not change hour to hour. What does change from hour to hour are the emotions that drive investing decisions. You need not fear market downturns nor should you try to ride a cresting wave. The best way to begin to overcome the roadblock of emotionality is to begin to understand the drivers and invest appropriately.

Whenever there is a Geo-political event, you can bet portfolio managers are going to react. News that is perceived as negative will result in a sell-off and news that is perceived to be positive will result in a market run-up. Usually this happens disproportionately to the news. In other words, money managers tend to over-react in an effort to satisfy the IGMBYGY rule. That is the “I’ll Get Mine Before You Get Yours” rule.

They sell on perceived negative news to capture gains or they buy on perceived good news to get in early before the market runs-up. Warren Buffett says “Be Fearful When Others Are Greedy and Greedy When Others Are Fearful” which amounts to “Buy when everyone else is selling and sell when everyone else is buying.”

Therefore, the best days to buy tend to be when the markets are selling off and the best times to sell are when the markets are euphoric. However, it is rarely good to sell a winning stock on an up day or to buy a losing stock on a down day. You have to do your homework and make wise buying decisions devoid of emotional drivers.

So, how does an investor overcome the veritable plethora of emotional drivers that lead to bad investment decisions? Three simple things.

1.                Know thyself. Temperament can limit one’s ability to overcome emotionality. It is about balance. Using your head and using your gut in unison will cause you to not follow the herd mentality of the market makers. The best word picture I have heard is this. Be the center of the teeter-totter where neither up-ness nor down-ness exists, but both run through.

2.                Know the markets. If you can anticipate how the market is going to react to Geo-political events, you can learn when to buy and sell to increase your success. The key to knowing yourself is honesty. The key to knowing the markets is study. If you take the time to study the markets and how Geo-political, financial, and other world events affect the markets, you have the potential to become a successful investor.

3.                Know the company. Knowing the markets happens on the macro level. It is the big picture or the 35,000 foot view. Knowing the company is the micro level. It is the down in the weeds, where the rubber meets the road view. If you are invested in a company, it is in your best interest to stay current on the news and direction of the company.

Worry and anxiety can foster the four forms of fear; FOMO, FOGI, FOGO, and FOSI. Ironically, fear can foster a stranger emotion known as regret. If you have the fear of missing out and you invest heavily, without doing your homework, you might end up regretting doing so. This regret will then drive you to sell at a non-advantageous time.

You have to learn to not have any regrets. Don’t regret staying in a losing position too long. Never regret exiting a winning position too early. Jim Cramer has a great saying that I believe reduces the level of regret in these two scenarios. He says “Bulls make money, Bears make money, and Pigs get slaughtered.” It is okay to exit a position and move on. A gain is a win and a loss is a lesson. Both can be invaluable.

Fear and exuberance are the two basic emotions investors can experience. If you understand the fundamentals of the company and learn how to read the market and its reactions to geo-political events, you will be able to overcome these two emotions. 

You overcome fear with knowledge. You overcome exuberance with patience. You overcome depression with encouragement. You overcome doubt with the confidence in the strategy you are executing and you overcome the urge to quit by marking the progress you are making.

The final thought is this. The best way to navigate the emotional swings in the market is to have a strategy that remains consistent through the market cycles of fear and euphoria. Strategy is the “dollar-cost-averaging” of market emotions as it flattens out the sine wave. Emotions cause money to impact your life. Strategy causes you to impact your money.

Ignorance Is Not Bliss

Part 1 of 10

I want to start by asking you a question. How long does it take an average person to become a millionaire? This might seem like a silly question, but the answer will give you a new perspective on how building wealth is less about your assets than it is about your asset management. The truth is “An average person does not become a millionaire.” To become a millionaire, you have to do the extra-ordinary; often times with average resources. You have to do things differently.

Applying the aforementioned statements to your situation, consider this additional question. “What stops YOU from becoming a millionaire?” In this series, I plan on addressing ten roadblocks that stop the average person from excelling at building wealth. I want to encourage you to recognize that we all struggle with these roadblocks. However, those who can overcome these roadblocks have a greater propensity to become millionaires.

So, let me begin with the most common roadblock of Ignorance. Ignorance is simply the lack of knowledge. Stupidity is the lack of application. The question that must be asked is “If every person knows that he or she should be investing, and he or she isn’t, do we have a stupidity problem or an ignorance problem?”

I believe the number one roadblock to successful investing is ignorance; ignorance of how to invest successfully, not whether or not one should invest. Knowing that you should be doing something and knowing how to actually do it are two separate things. Stupidity would be knowing how to invest and making a willful decision not to. Is it possible that most people do not invest because they simply do not know how to?

There is no easy way for an individual to become a financial guru overnight. However, with enough work, the average person can learn how to manage his or her own investment accounts. Learning how to invest strategically requires three elements: time, resources, and desire. You have to commit the time necessary to learn how to preserve the resources you have and not give in to the desire to exchange your future security for today’s pleasures.

Statistically speaking, most people are not prepared for retirement, let alone a major negative financial event. It is common knowledge to first, have an emergency fund to second, have as little debt as possible and to third, spend less than you earn. So, if you do not have an emergency fund, have high levels of debt, and spend more than what you earn, you cannot claim ignorance. You know better, but you choose to ignore conventional wisdom. That is not ignorance, that is just plain stupidity.

Have you ever heard the phrase “You don’t know what you don’t know yet?” I was once told that by a supervisor and, without even thinking, I snapped back; “I know what I know and anything outside of what I know that I know, I do not know. Therefore, I do know what I don’t know. The key is to seek after the knowledge of the things I know I don’t know so that I can know them.” Choosing to not learn something just because you know you do not know it is a back door to stupidity.

To overcome the roadblock of ignorance, as it pertains to successful investing, there are ten bits of knowledge a perspective investor needs to pursue, the depth of which cannot be adequately addressed in a blog. I will give you the macro-view and allow you to dive into the micro-view on your own. Remember, no one will ever plan for your future better than you and if you fail to plan, then you plan to fail. So, let’s get started.

1.     Understand the company. Knowing what the company does and how it makes money is very important. It is important to know how being a shareholder will impact your return on investment and taxes.

2.     Understand the P/E ratio. A high P/E ratio in relationship to the broader industry might mean the stock is more expensive even if the share price is lower than other companies within the same industry.

3.     Study the financials. Knowing where a company was is important, but knowing where it is going is the real key to making an investment decision. Since the economy is always changing, the historical data can only provide so much insight. You have to understand where the company is headed and understand how it plans on getting there.

4.     Understand the dividend cycle. Does the company pay dividends monthly, quarterly, semi-annually, or annually? Know when these payments are made can help you plan when to add a few additional shares at a lower cost.

5.     Understand the impact of dividends. There are three important dates to remember when holding dividend stocks. Those are the Ex-dividend date, the Record date, and the Payout date. Of these three dates, the most important to keep in mind is the ex-dividend date.

6.     Subscribe to investment websites. Before you become a shareholder, it is important to read about the company you intend to own. Beyond that, it is equally important to continue to stay abreast of the news surrounding the companies you own.

7.     Know the financial facts. You want to look for companies with a history of EPS (earnings per share), revenue, and dividend growth. The earnings per share and revenue growth are important, but the best companies often outpace the industry averages in these two categories.

8.     Get comfortable as a contrarian. This particular behavior will take years to master, but with good research, a person can learn when to be conforming and when to be contrarian. To master this behavior, a person needs to be able to look beyond the risk and see opportunity.

9.     Understand the value of arbitrage. Arbitrage is nothing more than the spread between the stock price and value of a company’s stock. This is where mergers and acquisitions, spinoffs, special or irregular dividends and stock splits can provide unique opportunities to investors.

10.  Know the market in which you trade. Most every trade happens in the secondary market. IPOs (initial public offerings) make up the primary market where the money used to purchase shares of a newly trading company goes to the company and its underwriters. When you purchase shares of a publically traded company from a broker, you are buying in the secondary market where supply and demand rule the trade.

11.  Bonus: Know the market influencers. While supply and demand can drive the price of stocks, keep in mind that shorts, options, and margin traders have a strong influence on the price of stocks. Increased activity on the part of these types of traders can increase volatility.

I hope this short post has given you something to think about concerning your financial future. You do not need to depend upon others to manage your financial assets. You can learn how to do it yourself. It’s going to take time, but if you are willing to do the work and preserve the resources, you can become a successful investor.

How Employers Can Improve Their Bottom Line With Financial Wellness Training

For most people, money is emotional. In my Financial Self-Defense Training Series, I asked each attendee to place a $10 bill on the table in front of them. As I walk around the room, I randomly take a $10 from one person and give it to another. It doesn’t take long before other begin to protect their $10 bill and for those whom the money was taken, to become upset.

Money is emotional; or should I say people are emotional about money. The number one reason why people resist financial wellness training it that they do not want to be told that they have been managing money incorrectly. It would appear that the only thing worse than not knowing how to handle money is to be told that you are the cause of your own poverty.

So the only question to ask is not “Why the Financial Black Belt’s Financial Self-Defense Training Series?” but rather “Why not the Financial Black Belt’s Financial Self-Defense Training Series?” The relationship between financial literacy and wellness is one that is so obvious, but also so often overlooked. And it is overlooked because people do not want to be told that most of their financial problems are directly linked to their actions.

Money is the leading cause of stress in today’s marriages. Money might be second only to infidelity and infidelity often involves money. This article is not about the latter, it is about why financial literacy training is so vitally important in today’s economy.

Financial-related stress impacts an individual’s health and can cause an increase in a variety of troubling physical symptoms such as migraines, as well as emotional symptoms such as depression and anxiety. Financial stress doesn't discriminate. It impacts everyone, regardless of an individual’s age or income level. In addition to affecting the overall health of an individual, it's been found to negatively influence an individual’s performance in his or her relationships, social interactions and in the workplace.

Financial stress can reduce an individual’s focus, weaken his or her morale and increase healthcare costs. Given its overall impact on an individual and his or her work-place performance, employers have an important role to play when it comes to an employee’s financial literacy.

The good news is that there are many things employers can do to support financial wellness in the workplace. Financial literacy training in the work place can lead to a vast array of organizational benefits such as: increases in brand recognition, better staff retention, lower absenteeism and higher productivity. Individuals tend to be receptive to receiving financial wellness support in the workplace, because they do not feel as though they are a target of a sales pitch.

Is it time for your organization to partner with the Financial Black Belt in 2019 to launch a workplace initiative that provides better tools to support your employee’s financial wellness? The content of the Financial Self-Defense Training Series is based on financial literacy and strategic planning, and will provide both employers and employees with strategies to improve their financial well-being.

When it comes to physical wellness, the health insurance industry has recognized that prevention is a key priority. Of the three well-being pillars (physical, mental and financial) some are more naturally thought of than others—but they're all interrelated. As a matter of fact, five modifiable risk factors for chronic disease (i.e. excess weight, unhealthy diet, physical inactivity, smoking and excessive use of alcohol) contribute to hefty costs to the healthcare.

However, financial health is just beginning to be recognized as important. People are increasingly aware that financial problems are a significant driver of stress, and financial hardship can lead to significant mental health issues. Financial challenges tend to manifest first in emotional issues and then in intellectual and physical issues. This clustering of symptoms create a downward spiral that affects the total life experience of an individual.

When an individual falls victim to financial challenges, he or she will try to medicate the pain away by turning to additive behavior that result in insomnia, low energy levels, and even an initiation or increase in alcohol and or illicit drug use.

Tackling these issues requires employer investment. Doing nothing is no longer acceptable and the most natural resource for individuals are employer benefit programs. If for no other reason, employers bear the brunt of employee’s poor health, absenteeism, short and long-term disability and premature death

While it can be a challenge, a personalized intervention, such as the Financial Self-Defense Training Series, supported by a well-organized employer benefits program, can help reduce these risks.  
Behavioral change requires a program that educates, identifies drivers and motivators, builds skills, provides support, and measures results. The Financial Black Belt’s™ Financial Self-Defense Training™ Series does all of this.

Today's technology allows us to apply these proven techniques in tailored ways for more effective health interventions and sustained health behavior change in employees. The Financial Black Belt™ program is a Personal Financial Self-Defense™ strategy that applies the structure and discipline of martial arts training and the financial literacy and behaviors needed for one to become a millionaire.

Financial Self-Defense training™ gives employees a life-long strategy for building wealth, gives employers extra value for their HR dollars, and improves the employee – employer’s ability to give back to the community and help others. Financial Self-Defense Training™ provides basic and advanced financial training, teaches employees how to prioritize life to build wealth, and is a proven process that results in positive financial behaviors.

Training is delivered in person by a 2nd Degree Financial Black Belt™ through a series of presentations based upon belt levels and financial milestones. There are thirteen modules providing instruction on basic, intermediate, and advanced financial concepts. Seven modules are directed at Beginning belts and six modules are directed at Intermediate and Advanced belts.

Jim Rohm used to say “Everyone should set a goal to become a millionaire; not to have a million dollars, but because of what it makes of you in the process of becoming a millionaire.” This course teaches individuals character, discipline, and strategic thinking using a cross pollination process of martial arts and financial acumen.

The individual will gain competency in financial matters, have a broader understanding about economic drivers, have a written strategic goal for his or her life, make better financial decisions and be better positioned to build wealth and give back. The responsibility we have as a society is to ensure the success of the next generation in becoming productive members of the world in which we live. This program is a great place to start that process.

The Financial Black Belt™ program was developed over many years using strategic planning skills and life-tested financial literacy. The program was conceptualized in 2009 and each belt rank has been tested and proven by the developer. The developer is a 2nd Degree Financial Black Belt™ (Financial Assets Millionaire), financial mentor, and a Strategic Financial Life Coach who has used these strategies to secure financial independence.

This program offers the following benefits.
Sets a life-long strategic goal to achieve the rank of 6th Degree Financial Black Belt™.
Uses concept association to enhance financial acumen, receptive language skills and positive financial behaviors.
Builds financial discipline, effective financial decision making, and productive financial problem solving abilities.
Is strategically developed to help an individual achieve the financial level of millionaire before retirement.
Is a life-long strategic plan for achieving financial freedom that once implemented, will help individuals work through some of life’s most difficult financial challenges.

If you are ready to offer your employees greater opportunity for success, contact me to schedule a personal meeting to discover how the Financial Black Belt™ program can change the trajectory of your employees’ future. Email me at financialblackbelt@gmail.com.