Time & Money. Sonja Becker

healthy and trim, conduct a project around fitness. Your body and face will conform to your function.

      What is the activity that when you are engaged in it, makes your whole life fall into place? Once you realize your function, you want to perform it. Structure business projects around that activity. The best investment of your time and money is on projects that will earn you money for doing what you love.

      There is a popular myth that entrepreneurs are risk takers. The opposite is true. We are the least inclined to bet on anything we can’t control. The majority of people who invest in stocks will eventually lose their investment. If you gamble in Las Vegas, you will inevitably lose money. And while creating your own business projects is risky, at least you control the risks.

      Bet on yourself and your talent. Invest in your education and development. Invest your time and money in activities that build an exciting career. When you are doing the things that release you, people will pay you to do it.

      So explore yourself more deeply. It can take years to discover the many dimensions of your gifts. Be willing to admit what you actually are. Don’t fear your greatness. Even if it shocks your parents or society, you must face your true nature. When you see what you love doing, it will consume you. There is no greater feeling than knowing you are living your dream.

      The best possible plan builds community along with financial success. It grows your web of friendships right along with your fortune. Discovering your craft means finding the kind of people you want around you in your later years. Great friendships ensure the respect and appreciation that keeps your heart warm all the days of your life.

      Your existence is a matter of great importance to a few people who resonate with you. On a larger scale, your life matters to all of mankind. Remember that the mere possibility of finding healing plants in the rainforests makes those forests important. If we lose them, we lose essential matter that may solve problems we haven’t even experienced yet. Your life is equally important when considering the larger scheme of things. If you fail to actualize your potential, we all lose. The rest of us need your talents for handling problems we face today and those yet to come.

      Mother Nature designed you to produce a thing of great value, something that brings a bit of understanding to the evolution of intelligence. Society cannot live fully without your contribution. We may get by, but without your light we are impoverished.

      VALUES

      The following seven chapters will outline the stages that precede the launching of a new venture. The preparation phase is not just a time of planning. It is also a time to discover your mission, set goals, and try out a series of learning projects to test how your ideas will hold up in the real world. These projects will provide vital experiences and give you feedback that will let you know when you are growing your project or business in the right direction. But before you begin these activities, you must look deeply into yourself to understand the reasons for choosing a particular course of action. These reasons reflect your values.

      Figure 2 lists the specific growth patterns of developing a business. Starting from the bottom, the words on the chart correspond to the titles of the following chapters. Each chapter is devoted to a specific stage of business.

      We will present the stages of business in a linear, sequential order. In reality they overlap. Each stage occurs within the others, just as each section of a holograph contains images of the entire structure.

      Values are the reasons behind your actions. Knowing yourself means knowing what really matters to you. You are happy to the extent that you are true to your values. When you conform to your own inner truth, your mood is light and cheery. To the extent that you remain true to your values, you will avoid disappointment. Values give direction to your intellectual and emotional intelligence.

      Most decisions are emotional decisions. Your feelings decide, then your mental processes kick in to give logical reasons for your decisions. When you aren’t clear about your values, unpredictable feelings run your life. When you outline clear, coherent values, you become decisive. Your actions are integrated with your nature.

      Success is built on a foundation of clarity. So unless you have a clear perception of reality, your business will get bogged down in fantasy or pessimism. Values are the foundation of clear perception.

      The next time you find yourself in a particularly lucid state of mind, ask yourself honestly what really matters to you. What is most important? What do you consider desirable? Value is often used to describe the tangible cost of something. But clarifying your values goes beyond cost and return on investment. Values are the measure of the relative meaningfulness of things more important than money alone.

      What value do you assign to health? When you don’t have it, it is worth far more than fame and fortune. But is health more important than family? And where does freedom fit into your evaluation? People raised in a middle-class environment might aspire to wealth, only to find it incongruous with their self-image. A radical environmentalist may be unwilling to lead a corporation that wastes natural resources.

      Some personal values shift with the wind, while others are deep and abiding. Some values apply to all people, while others are unique to each individual. Some values are universal. Without exception, people are born sweet and loving. Our pure human nature is happy and optimistic, but that natural aliveness erodes over time. Each person must find his or her own path to restoring and maintaining that quality.

      An active person might find happiness through action, while a passive person might find it through rest and contemplation. Each person has a built-in temperament. Every parent knows that two children sharing the same mother and father can have radically different dispositions. There are strong variations in sensitivity, character, and activity level. Yet all people share an innate respect for life. Our need to grow and to connect with others is hardwired into our systems.

      Personal values appear in early childhood. They are woven into the fabric of our muscles and nerves as we grow. Much of what is considered our mind is muscle memory. From our parents and community we learn to define ourselves with certain attitudes and beliefs that become deeply held convictions. We view time and money through the filters of our culture. Hopes and fears create deep moods which form our personalities. People who suffer poverty early in life often feel insecure as adults, even if they are actually successful. Unconscious feelings color every transaction.

      Personal values are the secret ingredient in wealth. If you can train yourself to have courage, alertness and humility you can win the success game. Those who were raised by entrepreneurs in a stable family environment are likely to have more of the personality characteristics required for success. The rest of us have to find role models to help us develop that perspective. Too many people have trained their minds to make excuses and blame their situation on others. If they spent half as much time getting results as they spend fabricating reasons for failure, they would be rich.

      Each time you approach success, personality glitches surface to destroy your best laid plans. There simply aren’t enough years in a lifetime to correct all of these flaws. However, you can compensate for your weaknesses by building character as you earn. The first challenge is to uncover your true values, both positive and negative.

      Your talent determines your potential success, but it is your personality that determines your actual achievements. You can change your personality if you are willing to go through a powerful crisis. It requires facing up to how wrong you are and it goes against your deepest feelings of what is right. Right now, the final conclusion of all of your thoughts is that you are right and everyone else is wrong. It is an expensive argument. You can be right or you can be rich. Ultimately, you will be one or the other.

      Personality values are stubborn traits because we believe they reflect who we really are. If you identify yourself as a nice person, you probably believe your own press. Unconsciously, you expect other people to act nice as well. The trait of forcefulness becomes taboo, rendering you unable to lead people in a difficult or dangerous situation.

      Negative personality