In Making a Living Without a Job, Barbara J. Winter described the idea of Multiple Profit Centers: “I think of creating profit centers,” she wrote, “as being akin to what a juggler does when spinning plates on top of sticks. The juggler walks out on the stage with ten sticks and ten plates but doesn’t begin spinning them all at once. Methodically, he or she positions the first plate on a stick and gets it into motion. Once done, the juggler moves on to the next, then the next, and so forth. Eventually, all ten of the plates are spinning away, each with its own momentum”

Creating multiple streams of income is key to sustain and secure your message. When one of the streams faces a hard time, others lift you up.

When it comes to creating multiple streams of income (or multiple profit centers as Barbara likes to call), people are divided into two groups:

1. Dominant Passion:

Those are people who have one dominant passion and would like to spend the rest of their lives pursuing that single passion.

Around this dominant passion may revolve several streams of income.

I belong to this category. I’m extremely passionate about the field of success and motivation. Now, I’ve three major streams of income: speaking, life purpose coaching and motivational information products … and I’m always looking out for more.

2. Passion Mix:

When you have several passions, which I call the passion mix, you can turn each one of them into a stand alone stream of income.

Think of Sir Richard Branson!

Beside success & motivation, I have a strong passion for Chess. I’ve not considered creating a profit center around it yet. However, if I do, I will belong to this category of people pursuing different unrelated passions.

The secret to making the idea of “multiple streams of income” successful is to follow the juggler example.

Start with one plate, get it into motion and then move on to another plate.

Don’t start everything all at once.

You’ve to focus all your efforts on starting and building momentum for your first business idea. Then, when it acquires the momentum that makes it stable enough, you move on to build your next business idea or stream of income.

Now, what possible streams of income can you create around your passions? Let’s continue the discussion in the comments section below.

Mohamed Tohami is a bestselling author and the creator of “The P.A.S. Technique: The World’s Easiest Way To Find Your Passion and Purpose In Life”. If you want to set your heart & soul free from the prison of the paycheck and discover how to proudly follow your passion, give a visit to his Transformational Motivation blog now.

Everyone has up’s and down’s in their love lives, most commonly there are “those relationships” you’d rather forget, but should you forget them entirely? Why not use negative experiences from your love life to prevent you from making similar mistakes in your career? At least you’ll have something to show from those lousy relationships!

Although using a one-night-stand in your work environment isn’t recommended, there are some popular relationship problems which can be likened common career complaints. You can learn from these mistakes to resolve pressing issues in your career.

The Stale Marriage

Much like a weathered marriage, you’ve hit that point in your career where you generally feel BORED. You may feel that there’s no opportunity for progression within the company you work for and getting out of bed to go to work has become more challenging than the role itself. You feel you can’t just quit because you have financial outgoings and a family you need to support but the job is making you miserable.

In this situation you have 3 options: to stick it out and remain miserable and unfulfilled but financially sound; try relationship counselling to mend the damage or file for a divorce.

If you’re constantly miserable you’re not helping anyone; yourself or your family. It can also have effects on your health such as depression and fatigue. Taking no action means things will only get worse.

Trying “relationship counselling” with your boss is a viable option. Speak to your boss and say how you feel your skills would be better utilised in a higher role with more responsibilities. If you work for an organisation which values its employees then they should be open to negotiation (providing you’ve proved your worth), if not then maybe you should consider whether a job elsewhere would be more fulfilling and gain you more respect.

If the counselling really hasn’t worked then it’s time to file for a divorce. Your health and happiness is more important than the money your job brings – you have to take a few risks in life to be successful. To avoid putting a financial strain on your family, continue your employment in your current role until you’ve been accepted for another position elsewhere.

The Comparative Couple

This situation is similar to when you compare your relationship to other friends’ or family member’s relationships, common thoughts are “why’s my relationship not as passionate as theirs?”, “why don’t we do things as a couple like them?” This can also happen in your career if one of your friends or family members gets a new job, jealousy can rear its ugly head and occupy your mind.

This can be a dangerous situation to be in as you may begin to question your career or feel dubious about your job. The first thing to consider is why you are feeling jealous of other people’s jobs. Perhaps there’s more of an underlying issue; are you feeling undervalued at work? Do you need more feedback on your development from superiors?

The key here is to address you own issues and forget about your friend’s passion for their new job. Focus on what drove you to apply for your current job in the first place. Perhaps you’re feeling complacent in your role and need a new challenge, talk to your boss about the possibility of taking on new responsibilities that will challenge you. You’ll soon forget about your friend’s career as you buzz off your new accomplishments.

The Honeymoon Period

When you first start a new job you’re filled with excitement; meeting new people, learning new skills and taking on new challenges can all be exhilarating. Much like newlyweds however, this honeymoon period has to come to an end as normality sets in. For some people this isn’t a problem, for others it can cause them to come down with a crash and feel bored, stressed and even miserable.

As routine begins to set in you have to accept that certain aspects of the daily grind will begin to irritate you – the same commute will bore the life out of you and your colleagues will irritate you beyond belief but that will probably happen with every job and usually wanes with time! If you really feel like you’re not fitting in after a considerable amount of time then maybe you could ask for a transfer or look for a new job elsewhere.

When it comes to relationships there’s plenty to be learned from bad experiences. Rather than dwelling on them and feeling filled with regret, you may as well use them to build on in the future. Prevent the same mistakes from happening in your career as well as your love life!

This was a guest post written by Stephanie Staszko who writes career building tips and advice for Blue Octopus. They can help you to find a job if your current one’s driving you stir crazy.

These days job dissatisfaction is one of the most common problems among people.

Many people are either dissatisfied with their jobs, hate the tasks they are assigned or  find it boring.

Just ask 10 people on a Sunday night how they feel and you will discover that the majority of them are feeling really bad because they will have to work the next morning.

Yes we all love to have fun and to wake up late but the reason many people hate Mondays is not that they want to rest but it’s because they hate what they are going to do on Monday.

In this post I will tell you about some tips that can help you find the perfect job for you.

5 effective tips for finding the perfect career for you:

1) Know yourself: One of the biggest reasons for job dissatisfaction is that people find themselves doing things that don’t suit their personalities. As a simple example if you are an introvert then certainly working as a sales person or in any job that forces you to interact with dozens of people each day will leave you feeling overwhelmed and under-productive at the end of the day. Understand your personality well to know what career suites you the most.

2) Don’t follow the crowd: The second reason people hate their jobs is that they follow the crowd without really thinking about what they want. A common example is when a person who prefers to work alone find himself in a job that requires team work. Everyone says that team work is amazing but for that specific people team work will lead to job dissatisfaction.

3) Handle unwanted emotions: Sometimes people don’t hate their jobs for the tasks they do but for the emotions they experience while doing the job. For example, some people hate their jobs because of the amounts of stress they experience while doing them. In such a case learning how to handle stress will help you become more satisfied with your job.

4) Find your hobbies and stick to them: The best thing you can ever do for yourself to find a great job is to develop your hobbies and to try to make a career out of them. I used to love computers and psychology very much and that’s why I was very happy to end up running a psychology related internet business.

5) Its ok to change your job: Some people will give you a shocked look when you tell them to change their jobs. What’s the point in sticking to a job that is making you sad while you can take a single step towards a job that can make you live a happier life?? You must weigh the fear of uncertainty of changing careers with the fear of what certainly be a lifetime full of dissatisfaction and frustration by spending the majority of your life at a job that you detest. Do the math.

M.Farouk Radwan is a guest blogger for PickTheBrain and the founder of 2KnowMyself.

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Do you want to follow your passion?

How is it going?

If you’re like most people, it’s not going so well.

Most of us expect a white knight to swoop down and lead us to glory once we’ve found our passion, but it doesn’t quite work that way.

Following your passion takes hard work, but it’s immensely rewarding. There are a lot of lies people tell about following your passion.

But in this article you’ll get nothing but the stone cold truth, so keep reading.

1. Hard Work

Realizing your passion takes a lot of hard work. You have to figure out how to do it, and what truly works.

If you want to make a living with your passion, you have to take action, and made a lot of mistakes, because you have to figure out how you’re going to make your endeavor profitable.

You have to find a market for what you’re doing. It will take longer than you think, but less time than you fear.

2. Persistence

This is where persistence comes in, because you have to keep moving forward to succeed.

The only way you can fail is by giving up. You will run into obstacles, fear, and other bumps in the road, but they do not matter if you keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Sure, it won’t be fun at times, but nothing is. Do you really want to stay where you are and look back at your life in the future and regret not having taken the steps to go after your dreams?

3. Fear

Fear lurks everywhere. When you venture into the unknown, you will be afraid, and you will want to seek security and comfort to get away from that fear.

This is the worst thing you can do, because it is through facing your fears that you will succeed.

The people that are willing to face fear head-on are also the ones that make the fastest amount of progress, and the ones that are most fulfilled, because they realize that fear is only an illusion – albeit a powerful one.

4. Confusion

Another common stumbling block is the confusion that happens when you first start following your passion.

You don’t know what to do, when to start, or even how to do it. The simple secret to achieving success despite this is to take action now.

It’s counter-intuitive, but it works. When you take action, you’ll gain clarity, and you will learn what works and what doesn’t.

You don’t have to be crystal clear about that in order to follow your passion.

5. Action

And this brings us to the next harsh truth, which is taking action. Iíve been mentioning the value of taking action throughout this article, but I think it deserves its own spot, donít you?

Most people get stuck in analyzing and trying to make things perfect before they take action, but it gives them false hope, because nothing happens.

Stop planning, put down your pen, and take action right now.

What can you do today that will make a difference in your life?

You may be scared, and you may even be confused, but you can still take action. Once you start moving forward despite all the negative feelings you have, you will see that they aren’t so bad after all.

6. Determination

There will come a time when you are incredibly frustrated and want to throw in the towel.

This is when you need the determination to keep moving forward. Make sure you’re doing something that you’re passionate about.

When you bump into challenge after challenge after challenge, use your determination to get you where you want to be.

The tough times you will face are merely signs that you’re getting closer to your goal. And when you get through these tough times, you will be even stronger and move towards your passion even faster.

It’s a vicious cycle that keeps going on and on. You get more excited, become stronger, and accomplish more.

And it doesn’t hurt that you enjoy life.

7. Fulfillment

What would an article like this be without at least something positive? Although, most of these harsh truths are positive, it all depends on your perspective.

Even though there are a lot of tough things you have to do in order to follow your passion, it will lead to fulfillment, at least that has been my experience.

Doing what you love is not easy, but for me it’s the only thing.

I will not settle for mediocrity, and I refuse to stand down.

I will follow my passion, or die trying.

What about you?

Henri writes at Wake Up Cloud, where you can get his FREE life-changing course right now: Find Your Passion in 5 Days or Less.

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Tell me if this sounds familiar.

You walk into work a couple minutes early and head straight to your desk.  You open your inbox, take a look through your to-do list, and get ready to start the day.  You try to plan your day as quickly as possible to insure you get everything finished early so you can meet friends for drinks after work.

You’re particularly motivated because you have plans, so you knock out your first three tasks in record time.  Then all hell breaks loose.

All of a sudden you’re fielding emergency phone calls with one hand, answering emergency emails with the other, scheduling two hours worth of meetings and just like that you have to cancel your plans.

“I guess that’s just how the world works sometimes,” you say to yourself.  I say – that’s exactly how the world works if your job owns you.

If You’re An Employee, Your Job Probably Owns You

Let’s be honest, as much as we want to be defined by our family, friends, hopes, and dreams, in the real world we are largely defined by what we do for a living.  That’s nothing new.  Throughout history and across cultures the follow-up to the question “what’s your name?” has been “what do you do?”  Think of the last time you met someone new.  How much of that initial introduction was spent discussing careers?

It’s definitely a turn-off thinking about your job as among the most defining forces in our lives.  Virtually no one wants to be tied to that.  We want to be acknowledged for our intrinsic worth, our intelligence, our potential, and our past successes.  “I’m so much more than what I do for a living” we say, and that’s basically true.

But jobs are sneaky.

They have a way of infiltrating our lives so completely that we don’t realize they’ve taken over.  Worst still, they’ve infiltrated the lives of everyone around us, so being owned by your job is “normal.”

They say the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.  I say the first step is noticing that there is a problem.

Here are the 11 warning signs you’re owned by your job:

1.  Most of Your Waking Hours Are Spent At Work

Jobs own a huge percentage of our time.

Most of us are awake for about 16 hours a day or 112 hours a week.  Of those 112 hours, generally between 40 and 60 are spent at work.  If you factor in a couple hours for commutes, we’re looking at about 50 to 70 work-dedicated hours every week.

The bottom line is for most people around half of their entire waking life happens at work.  Calculate the percentage of waking hours you spend in work-related activities and see where you fall.

2.  Without Your Job, You’d Have No Money

For most people, their job is their sole source of income.  If you’re in that situation you’re trapped doing whatever your company requires.  As much as we’d like the world not to rely so heavily on cash, the simple fact is that without some, we’re severely limited in what we’re able to do.  If you have multiple income streams, your dependency on your job significantly decreases.

3. Your Job Determines Your Market Value

Most people’s resumes are filled almost completely with job descriptions and work experiences.  Their job security and personal market value is almost completely dependent on what opportunities their employers had let them have.  It shouldn’t be.

Think of it this way – if you can remove work experience and still have a compelling resume, you win.

4. Your Biggest Source of Negative Stress Is Your Job

Owning your time and owning your money is one thing.  Owning your emotions is quite another.  If you’re in a situation when you’re waking up in the morning in a cold sweat with the thought of going to work or hate going to sleep knowing that waking up means going back, your job has infiltrated your emotions.  It’s just work, it shouldn’t have to be that big of a deal.

5. You Talk About Work All The Time

What percentage of your day-to-day conversation is focused on job-related topics?  At the bar are you talking about how much your job sucks?  At home are you talking to your girlfriend about the project you’re in the middle of?  Sometimes just diversifying our conversation topics can open up our world and loosen our job’s control.

6. You Keep Deciding Not To Do Things You Want

We’ve all had to tell a friend we can’t hang out because we have a work conflict.    It may be an issue if it happens frequently.  If you start to become the person who is known to be super busy at work all the time who probably can’t make it to things, then your job probably has too much control over your life.  It may be more of a priority in your life than you’d like it to be.

7. You Can’t Wait to get a Certain Promotion

A driving motivation for most people to succeed at work is to get a promotion.  Not just any promotion, but that certain level in the corporate ladder where everything will be better.  We all have to go through hard knocks before we get to the good stuff, after all.  But if a work promotion starts becoming the door to happiness and freedom in your mind, then your job starts owning your ambition and starts owning your goals.

8. You Cannot Wait For Retirement So You Can Start Living

It’s a bizarre world when most peoples’ main motivation to work is to eventually stop working.  Retirement is the end goal for many folks.  When that’s the mindset, it’s almost like admitting that your job owns your life until you’re almost 60 years old.  Work should be an element of your life.  It shouldn’t be your life.  It shouldn’t delay your life.

9. You Have to Be At Work Even If You’re Not Productive

So you’re at your desk at work and you have nothing to do.  You’re reading Google News and watching YouTube and just generally killing time.  Even though you’re not productive, you still have to be there.  In theory, the reason you should be at work is to contribute to making your company money or making your company more efficient.  When work owns your time by forcing you to be productive, that’s bad.  When your work owns your unproductive time too, that’s worse.

10. You Check Work Emails/Voice Mails/Texts After Work Hours

When you leave work do you actually leave work?  Or does it follow you home?  If work owns some of your life, have you found a way to keep it trapped in it’s own box, or are the lines between your career and personal life blurring?

11. You Learned Anything Valuable Since School

What’s the last useful skill or important piece of information you’ve learned?  What’s the last thing you’ve done to meaningfully improve your capabilities?  In your career if you don’t feel like you’re consistently improving skills, learning valuable new information, and becoming a more valuable person, then your job may not be letting you grow.

Of all the parts of your life, it’s your personal and professional growth that you should never let your job control.  You should do everything to own that.  If you’re not getting the opportunity to grow at your workplace, you need to find a different job or strike out and learn new skills and information on your own.

Your Life is Yours to Own

The simple truth is that the majority of people are owned by their job.  At the same time, most people don’t realize it because being owned by your job is common.

This article isn’t meant to be doom and gloom.  It’s meant to challenge you.  If you’ve decided that your job has too much control over your life then it’s time for you to change that.  But it’s completely up to you.  Your life is yours to either own or rent out to your employer.

So you have a couple of decisions to make.  First, decide if you comfortable with how much your job owns you?  Second, decide what are you going to do to change it?

Go out and reclaim your life.

Joey teaches people how to improve themselves while getting paid to do it (that sexy intersection of personal development and online business) over at www.FindYourDamnPurpose.com.  If that sounds interesting, check it out by >>Clicking Here Now<<

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“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery.” (Mr. Micawber, in David Copperfield by Charles Dickens – 1850)

You already know this secret, really.

But maybe you don’t like to think about it.

If you’re trying to improve your financial situation, you need to either:

• Spend less
• Earn more

Even in the post-credit-crunch world, it’s all too easy for us to put items on a credit card. It’s all too easy to run up thousands of dollars of debt – with our spending constantly outstripping our earning.

I know how it feels. At times in my life, I’ve carried on spending and spending, hoping, like Mr. Micawber, that something will “turn up”. But eventually, I’ve had to cut back hard on my spending – knowing that the quick, temporary thrill of spending isn’t worth the months or years of misery that debt can lead to.

You can buy dozens of books on financial management (and I’m sure you’ll learn a lot along the way) – but ultimately, nothing can really help you unless you end up spending less than you’re earning.

Almost all of us can cut back a bit on our spending – and this is often easier than earning more.

Step 1: Figure Out Your Current Position

Maybe you try not to think too much about your spending – you just carry on, and hope for the best. Or maybe you’re already trying to cut down on what you spend – perhaps by eating out less often, or buying generic products rather than branded ones.

Either way, you’ll find it really helpful to figure out your current position. How much are you spending every month? And how much of that is essential (e.g. rent, electricity) verses non-essential (e.g. TV, broadband connection, gym membership)?

By keeping track of what you spend over a month or so, you’ll almost certainly find a few surprises. The first time I did this, I was really shocked by how much I could spend in a (quite sedate!) afternoon and evening out. Little costs – coffees, sandwiches, drinks – can really add up fast.

Step #2: Work Out What to Cut Back On

Once you’ve been tracking your spending for a month, start going through this list. Cut out things one by one until your spending is less than your monthly income:

• Anything which you didn’t need to buy and didn’t really want to buy. Can you cut this out altogether?
• Anything which you wanted but which didn’t really bring you all that much pleasure. Was it really worth $39.99 for that new computer game that you’ve barely played?
• Anything expensive which you needed but which you could cut back on. If your rent is really high, could you move? If you spent $200 on clothes, could you get something just as functional for $50?

I wouldn’t recommend trying to cut out everything but the bare essentials – there’s nothing wrong with spending money on things which you enjoy. The trick is to stick to a few purchases which you really want, rather than chucking cash away on stuff which doesn’t matter to you.

Step #3: Create a Budget

I don’t believe that a budget needs to be fiddly or complicated. All you need to do is work out what you should be spending in different categories. Some costs will be fixed (e.g. rent, and some bills) – others will fluctuate.

You might want to use an envelope system: take out cash each week for your variable costs, and divide it into envelopes for:

• Groceries
• Household supplies
• Entertainment / eating out

…and so on.

You can only spend the money in that envelope – leave your cards at home. You can carry money over to the next week (or month) or even transfer it between envelopes – but you can’t go over your total budget limit.

Step #4: Take Care of the Money You Save

If you’re in debt, you can put your savings towards paying it off. It’s also worth considering an emergency fund – sudden, unexpected expenses do crop up from time to time, often at the worst possible moment. If you’ve got $500 or $1,000 tucked away in the bank, you can cope with emergencies without having to rely on credit.

If you’re not in debt and have a healthy emergency fund, make sure you put your savings into a safe place, like a separate bank account. There’s not much point keeping a budget and watching your spending if you end up blowing it all at the end of the month.

Remember – the one true secret of financial happiness is spend less than you earn.

How could you start doing that this week? (And if you’re managing your finances well, we’d love to hear your tips in the comments!)

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If you want to excel in your career path to the point that you pass even your dad, who has obviously spent a few extra decades in the job field, work will be involved. It takes a whole lot of effort to move up so rapidly that you condense a few decades into a few years.

Get ready for the role reversal, dad.

But it’s not necessarily back-breaking work. In this instance, it’s a case of working smarter, not physically harder. If you wish to rise quickly, here’s a trajectory to consider, complete with some necessary steps.

1. Always focus on resume building. Every employer uses a resume to quantify job candidates, and an outstanding resume quickly starts you out on the path to superstardom. Every opportunity that comes your way should be thought of in terms of whether it’s something you’d like to see on your list of experiences. Whether it’s volunteer efforts or investment club attendance, think carefully about how you spend every second of your time. Wasted time will hold you back in achieving your goal to be your dad’s boss in five years!

2. Develop the skills that your dad’s present boss brings to the table. If possible, meet the boss. Emulate his or her apparent characteristics, and he or she will be more likely to notice you. Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but it also gains you attention from those who influence hiring decisions.

3. Find your weaknesses. No one rises quickly when they exhibit flaws of character, judgment or work ethics. Identify yours and write them down. Hang them up in a visible place, such as on the refrigerator or bathroom mirror. Being reminded of them will help you to direct your efforts towards fixing your shortcomings while retaining your positive traits.

4. Build on your strengths. Every leader has some natural gifts that help them get to the top. Sometimes it’s a quick thinking ability, sometimes it’s charm coupled with a ‘can do’ attitude. Whatever your gifts, become the master of them by getting a sound education. That mastery will serve you well when you can execute your embellished natural gifts without apparent effort.

5. Be broad in both your study and your interests. Knowing every single detail about tires, if that’s the business you’re in, isn’t enough to land you the ‘boss’ position. You must also be able to handle workers, salespeople, repair people, problems and every other eventuality. While it’s important to know the tires too, they’re not the only things to stay current upon.

6. Learn to handle issues smoothly. Negative news pops up all the time in the business world, and an effective boss is adept at handling the situation before it becomes a crisis.

7. See where the trends lead in the industry. It’s not a case of learning about what’s important now; it’s a case of seeing what will be important in a few years. By being ahead of the curve, you can position yourself to thrive when your knowledge comes into heightened demand.

It’s not simple, but with a lot of work and career focus, you can rise quickly to a position that your dad has not yet attained.

Jami de la Cruz is a personal trainer and an entrepreneur. You can find her work at http://personaltrainerz.com/ or follow her on Twitter @jamiDLcruz.

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Let’s face it; many people would love to be rich. Few people wouldn’t want to jet set around the world traveling, attend the most coveted premieres, drive their dream cars, lavish gifts upon their love ones, etc. However, there is limited value in even thinking about riches until you can become and stay financially solvent. Solvency isn’t about income. No matter whether you make $40,000 a year or $400,000 a year, you can still be broke. Solvency is simply your ability to meet your entire financial obligations with some money to spare. It is the degree to which your current assets exceed your current liabilities.

Solvency exists on a continuum. For example, some define their ability to meet obligations as being able to afford their credit cards, student loans, and car payments. Nonetheless, these people are generally a lot less solvent than someone who is debt-free, has a sizable emergency fund, is consistently investing, and can afford some fun. These two extremes differ profoundly but the financial vulnerability of the former scenario may only become evident during a time of financial adversity. While a great starting point, having just enough to pay ones bills today typically doesn’t provide enough of a buffer during financial crisis. As nearly 61% live from paycheck to paycheck, lack of solvency has placed many in a very risky position. If you haven’t structured your finances to decrease your economic exposure, your solvency may be very fleeting! It is imperative to build long-term financial solvency, so let’s discuss why.

1) Job Security is an Illusion

No amount of experience, natural talent, or education can guarantee that you will have a job tomorrow. Thus, your only job security is your ability to get another job. It is critical to recognize the precarious position insolvent wage-earners are in. Any employee is constantly interviewing for his or her job: every single day! Use this as a motivator to make wise but sometimes painful financial decisions. It’s not about fairness, or even initial comfort, as much as it is doing what’s necessary to put your family in the best financial position. This may mean delaying or even foregoing some fun on occasion, especially while becoming solvent. For example, if the only way you can have such fun is by counting on money that you have yet to earn, then perhaps the purchases are beyond your budget at this point. Remember, future paychecks are not promised, and believing otherwise is typically evidence of denial.

2) Life Happens

Regardless of whether it is right or wrong, an uncomfortable reality is that money influences many of life’s decisions. It affects things such as whether we choose to work a job or start a business, where we live, how much we invest, and sometimes even who we marry. Additionally, the one thing that we can count on in life is change. I recall a situation where a seemingly insignificant clerical error caused six consecutive paychecks to be missed over a three month period. Being solvent in that situation made the difference between going into debt and thriving. Also, while I was paying off my debts years ago, my neighborhood HOA decided that it was time to replace the roofs. Although I had no problems with my property, we all had to fork over a sizable chunk of money unexpectedly. Although I was displeased, especially with the timing, I wrote the check and moved on.

Regardless of whether you want to have children, go back to school, or capitalize on unique business opportunities, you don’t necessarily have to derail your finances because of transient nature of life. Having long-term solvency decreases your financial risks because you have more resources available to you. Thus, when life happens, you’ll be ready.

3) Solvency is the First Step Towards Independence

The Rat Race refers to a pattern of behavior where we work for a living but barely make any progress financially. It’s actually a misnomer because even rats have more sense than to stay in this ridiculous model. There’s nothing wrong with having a job, but depending solely on a job for your financial provision is a very risky proposition (see Job Security Is an Illusion above). Do you long to break free from your golden (or copper) handcuffs? Then, consider that long–term solvency lays a necessary foundation to pursue independence. Financial solvency combined with consistent investing and/or running a profitable business places one in an enviable economic position where he is no longer dependant on earned income (from a single employer) for his financial provision. In short, solvency can be an invaluable foundation to your wealth plan. Embrace it!

4) Solvency is Honorable

Financial solvency can be a reflection of your sense of responsibility. True financial responsibility means you can afford to pay all of your bills in timely manner. I mention this not to place those who face hardship under condemnation. However, it is evident that some people never truly take ownership of their finances and how their decisions affect their finances. Some have incomes adequate to meet their financial obligations and invest for the future yet instead choose to spend it irresponsibly. Have you ever met someone who wears brand new tennis shoes but can not afford food or those who take vacations but cannot afford clothes and school supplies for their children? Unfortunately, financial education is often not taught, and sometimes we just prioritize badly. Nonetheless, there is real honor in financial solvency, as it indicates that maintaining your good name by respecting your commitments transcends all the other things that you could be spending your money on. Making strides towards achieving solvency reflects maturity that goes well-beyond the financial sphere.
Thus, the next time you dream a little about your financial future consider dreaming of being solvent. If you have a reasonable income and expenses, not only is solvency totally achievable, but you will likely become solvent before you become rich anyway.

Pursue solvency today, and you’ll be in a better position tomorrow

About the Author: I’m Roshawn Watson, and I write at Watson Inc on eliminating debt, investing money, and building wealth. Get my free eBook Your Foundation to Wealth by signing up for my email updates (no spam I promise). Get my RSS feed and connect with me on Twitter @roshawnwatson too.

Whether you’re deep in debt or just having a few financial hiccups, it’s almost certainly the case that you’re spending more than you’re making.

A lot of personal finance writers will advise you to cut your expenditure. Eat out less often, downgrade your cable package, stop buying pricy coffees, and so on. There’s a strong focus on getting rid of unnecessary, day-to-day spending – sometimes dubbed “the Latte Factor” (a term coined by financial adviser David Bach). Wise Geek explains it like this:

The Latte Factor® is a euphemistic label for all that extra money we spend daily on nonessentials such as candy, bottled water, doughnuts, muffins, soda, cigarettes, magazines, newspapers, and yes, lattes.

It’s good advice, as far as it goes. Daily amounts do add up fast, and by cutting out a regular “nonessential” you could probably save at least $50 each month.

But however much you cut out the fat of your spending, you’re going to pretty quickly hit a wall…

You Can’t Go That Low

All of us have certain fixed expenses. Typically, these will include:

• Rent or mortgage
• Groceries
• Utilities bills (water, gas, electric, broadband…)
• Travel to work/school
• Clothes, personal hygiene products, etc.

It is certainly possible to spend very little by living in a radically different way – moving in with parents, for instance, or becoming a freegan. But you might well feel that you don’t want that sort of lifestyle.

So, however much you cut down on all the little luxuries of life, a big chunk of your paycheck will still be going on costs which you have to meet.

Employed or Self-Employed?

When we’re trying to improve our financial situation, most of us focus first on cutting our spending because that’s more within our control. However, we all have some influence over our income.

If you’re traditionally employed – paid a salary or an hourly rate by your boss – then there are a couple of straightforward ways to increase your income. You could ask for a raise, work overtime, or switch to a different job which pays more.

If you’re self-employed, it gets easier. Increasing your income is often just a matter of working more hours – or increasing your rates. You may well find that, when trying to improve your financial situation, spending less means earning less. For instance, if you’re cooking from scratch rather than eating out (and saving $5 per meal), is that really worth the hour of lost work time?

It’s a very rough rule of thumb, but if you’re employed and you’re spending more than you’re making, look first at cutting your spending. If you’re self-employed, look first at how you can improve your income.

Increasing Your Income Alongside a Day Job

Even though the 9-5 worker may be becoming a thing of the past, most people still have day jobs. So how can you increase your income while working full time?

A few great ways are:

• Take on a Saturday job. You might only do it for a few months, but it could be enough to plug the hole in your budget and get you back on track.
• Freelance. You can use your professional skills as a contractor, not just as an employee. For instance, if you work for a magazine as a graphic designer, you could set up a simple website offering freelance graphic design. This might mean spending an hour each weeknight, or a few hours at the weekend.
• Sell stuff on ebay. Almost anything – clothes, books, DVDs, electronics – can be sold second-hand. Some items will be worth more than others, but if you’re not using it, anything is profit.
• Start an online business. You could sell crafts on Etsy, sell webhosting through a large web host, sell digital products like ebooks and audio books … almost anything!

If you know you’re wasting money on things which you don’t need and which don’t really bring you any pleasure, then by all means cut down your spending. But if you feel there’s no slack left in your budget, start looking at ways to increase your income too.

Got an income-generating idea to add? Share it with us in the comments.

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I’m not sure if we should call it the “new” job market or the reduced, redefined, elusive job market.  Too many people who have worked for years with relevant skills and valuable experience now can’t find employment where once their talents were in demand.  This dilemma isn’t limited to the industrial workforce that has watched American production ship out to foreign shores. For twenty years there has been public debate and wringing of hands over teacher shortages and the lack of trained nurses.  Today there are licensed teachers and RNs that in some regions, can’t find work.

This condition of not-quite-depression and not-quite-recovery has created a job market where employers are reluctant to hire, government agencies are facing budget cuts, and talented people are running out of unemployment benefits.  A lot of frustrated unemployed people have had to redefine their goals.  When it comes to looking for work today, sometimes that means redefining your personal skills.  Instead of looking for a position that fits your experience, try redefining your skills to fit what’s out there.  Here are a few suggestions for realigning your abilities to match a morphing economy.

•    Conduct an Inspection of the job market: You can get a pretty good idea of what job titles are in play by combing online listings, which is worthwhile just to learn what’s out there.  Those listings aren’t the best option for seeking work but they provide the skills associated with the jobs that are open.  For example, a lot of companies are looking for “organizational development” professionals.  Never heard the term?  In many cases, it’s code for someone to manage a downsizing project that requires distribution of an established workload to fewer employees.  In other cases it means cranking up a business function that is new to a company trying to navigate a newly flattened global business climate.  Anyone who has managed a staff, has written an operations plan or has simply devised a daily work plan in an office can illustrate their organizational development skills by adopting the language these job descriptions are written in.

•    Talk to a placement specialist and learn what sells: This is the other part of your research assignment.  Spot a job listing on a recruiter’s website, send off a resume and follow it up with a call.  It has been my experience that these people talk to professionals for a living and they are generally willing to talk to one who may not fit the position they are trying to fill.  They’re always looking to add contacts and people with placement potential, so they’ll spend some time talking to a person who isn’t on their radar screen currently.  That’s how to learn what you’ve got in the job market or some sector of it; and what skills are critical for consideration.  If you’re going to become a chameleon in the job market, you need to know what colors are popular.  Recruiters are great resources for resume keywords, for a snapshot of local hiring trends within their specialty, and for a sense of where you might best fit.  In this case, it’s free advice with some value.

•    Decide what is within reach: When you begin to understand the language of the jobs marketplace you’ll begin to grasp where the opportunities lie and what might match your skills, your experience, your interest – or hopefully, all three.  You may also find that there are NO jobs that meet your existing curriculum vitae, which means that you begin to downsize your own expectations to match the market.  That doesn’t necessarily mean collecting shopping carts in the parking lot because you worked as a mechanical engineering tech; it means accepting your limitations as perceived by potential employers and working to convert those skills, that experience, into working capital when you’re shopping for a job.  There are a few ways to do that.

•    Turn your resume upside down: This suggestion means stressing skills instead of work experience.  Back in the Twentieth Century I was taught to write a resume that presents a chronology of jobs, hopefully showing increasing levels of responsibility, followed by a few sentences about skills and interests.  The number of resume experts online today approaches infinity, but some portion of them suggests that it makes more sense to tick off your skills at the top of the page and couple them to a generic description of accomplishments.  The bottom of the page is reserved for a list of employers and the ubiquitous “references available on request.”  It may sound counterintuitive to people who have spent ten or fifteen years in a profession, but the idea is to catch the resume reader’s eye with talents, not training.  You already know that professional experience is getting you nowhere.

•    Go back to school, in affordable bites: Sometimes you can substitute a little education for a lot of job description.  Because of the tectonic shifts in the economy and employment, hundreds of schools are offering programs for the tens of thousands of unemployed people who have chosen to return to school.  There are part time degree options, evening classes, and online degrees that allow you to study and continue a family life – or if you’re fortunate, maintain your under-employed job.  It depends on what you need to accomplish, but public universities are still a real bargain and online programs are offered at cost-per-credit, which means you can work towards a credential or degree on a pay as you go basis.

If you’re an unemployed accountant, see what it takes to obtain CPA licensure.  If you used to manage a warehousing operation, look for a program in supply chain management.  If you majored in psychology, take a look around for a program in HR specialization or training or recruiting.  There are master’s degree programs that can be completed in a year or less, and certification options that don’t require a degree.  The challenge after a long, frustrating, fruitless job hunt is bringing a new career into focus because it requires hope and a little confidence.  If you can incorporate those elements into a change in career track, you can add a few components and then reassemble and repackage yourself to match a niche in the market.

Bob Hartzell writes on jobs and education at Masters Degree Online.com and several other college oriented websites, addressing the issues confronted by would-be college students and professionals returning to school trying to find career options in a chaotic, unpredictable job market. He recently wrote the Top 5 Masters in Education Programs online.

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