How the hell….

…am I going to make a million dollars this next year? It is seriously daunting. I am scared. That is a stupid large sum of money. 1 million divided by 365 comes out to $2740 dollars a day – which means that I don’t want to calculate how much a day that will be if I take off weekends. Jesus.

1 in 1,000,000^******? Thats me.

I hate long math problems. Even if the math is simple, the act of computing numbers over and over again has just never appealed to me. I don’t think I have done my own math homework since 6th grade. I took calculus in 11th. Yes, that second fact is in there just to make me feel special. Anyway, all I am really getting at is I won’t be doing the math for this, I just want you to think about it.

I am lucky. I was born lucky. Let me break it down for you: How many people live on earth now? 6.7 billion? I think its something stupid large like that. Well, I was born in Hawaii, raised all my life in Seattle. Nice place to live given that its without sun three quarters of the year. I guess I am saying I got it good. My family has never been rich or wealthy, but I have never experienced a time of dire need. Ever. To top it off, my family is awesome. Quirky, but supportive and loving. I don’t know how to begin quantifying that. Regardless, of all the places in the world I could have been raised, it was in the United States. When I was born, my parents were poor but are now comfortable in the middle class. When I was born, I was already in the top 0.001% of all people in the world. Maybe even better, but thats just getting started.

There is an estimated 5 to 30 million species on earth. This incldues insects and bugs as well as mammals, reptiles, and the like. My brain can’t think small enough (or large enough in terms of numbers) to include micro organisms, so I won’t even go there. But imagine how many animals there are on earth. It has to be more than a trillion, and thats the number I use because I don’t evem know what goes beyond that. What are the chances that I would even end up as a human? Shit, I am not doin the math for that one. Not only that, I am probably in the top thousandth percentile of humans. Shit, hundred thousandth, millionth? Which makes me a one in a (insert stupid big number) or puts me in the top 0.000000???? percentile of all animals in the world.

This may all sound silly to you. Maybe you think those flies have a good life landing on shit all day long. But I am happy I am a human – though I think being a bird would be fun too – and concider it superior than being, say…. a lion - and they’re then king of the jungle. Humans rule a bit larger of a domain anways. So yes, if you look at it that way, I was born into some amazing luck. Damn amazing. I am guessing you were too if you have a computer and the time to read a blog. Point being?

I am privliged; not only was I born healthy, into an awesome family, with all the intelligence I could ask for; I am here in the United States. As much as I hate it, its the best place in the world to make it for yourself. Seriously. It is the land of opportunity. Question though, why even bother doing better, like said, I am already in the top jizzilionth percentile of all animals? Bad question because that is the reason. It is not that I am in a good position, its that I am in a position with opportunity to help myself which means that I am in the very best position I can be in to help others. The opportunity to make things better in a big way is in my hands. Opportunity that I was lucky enough to be born into. Shit, its like I pulled 6 aces in a game of 5 card stud without a wild card but somehow still only having 5 cards – who would I be to not go all in?

I want to do things. I want to make a change. Make people smile, give people hope, let forests grow – all that optimistic bullshit is me. Its not optimism though, I am the most pessimistic person when it comes to human society and where we are headed. Call me a realist in that sense. I just don’t know what one can do with their life thats real other than help others; to bring joy into the world on whatever level you can.

Remmber Tony Montana? ‘In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you’ are able to make things happen plus ‘get the women’.

The possibilites for what I can do with my life are endless, the changes I will make – unimmaginable. Remember? I was born lucky. What about you?

Simple math about charity:

I don’t think I am the first to come up with this, but the thought was my own. This is almost like compound interest for giving:

If at every increment of having 100 thousand dollars you give away 10% until you reach your first million; by the time you have your first million but just after giving away 100 thousand of it, you will have donated 500 thousand dollars. Jesus – thats a lot of money. Yes, that means you actually have to make one and a half million dollars by the time you get to have your own million; at the same time, 10% is not a whole lot. Here’s how it breaks down:

(100,000 x .10) + (900,000 x .10) = 100,000

(200,000 x .10) + (800,000 x .10) = 100,000

(300,000 x .10) + (700,000 x .10) = 100,000

(400,000 x .10) + (500,000 x .10) = 100,000

1,000,000                                      = 100,000      Total = 500,000

I plan to do this. No, come the end of the year I wouldn’t have a million dollars in cash… only $790,000. Boo hoo? I don’t think so. I could smile about that, and I wouldn’t be smiling alone – that is for sure.

I’m back

I am not sure from where, but I am back. Once I missed one day, I guess I decided to go on vacation or something. From blogging, not doing stuff. I plan to try and blog at least 5 days out of each week.

Since last time: Most of my focus lately has been upon trading and working on the creation of a website for the non-profit. I would post a link but I’d rather wait for the new website to be up first. To give you an idea, the non-profit provides minor health care, education, and soon to be an orphenage for extremely underprivliged kids in Cambodia. I’ll be sharing more about this soon enough.

My biggest conciderations of late has been how to share my knowledge and skills in trading stocks. I want to provide the information in such a way that my readers will be able to learn. I am not quite sure what the best format for this will be yet, there is a lot to it and Its not something I can just jump right into.

This is my last week of planning before things kick off after the 25th. My goal for the week is to provide – for both my readers and myself – a good outline of my thoughts, goals, and projections for this upcoming year. Stuff along those lines.

Oh, and if you don’t already know, Mexico won.

Another step

Mexico vs China tonight. I will be there. Call it a step forward – gotta keep my life balanced.

The Whole

Here is what my business plan will consist of by the time I am ready to look for investors:

• Executive Summary
• Background
• Business Concept
• Market Analysis
• Objectives and Strategies
• Financial Projections and Statements
• Technology/System Summary
• Company Organization
• Apendices

Yup. Thats about it. 9 parts to it. Word of advice: write the executive summary last. Many times that is all that will get read, if even all of it. That is the section where your business gets sold, especially in my case. For my internet marketing website, it does have other functionality as well, I know it won’t be the fine details in the subsequent sections that matter. However, they are formalities that must be there. I will talk more about each section as I go about writing them, but for now I figured it would be good to just throw this out there. Later.  

Business Plan: The Plan

Remember I said one of my future streams of income will be my business plan for an Internet Marketing Website? If you were thinking I may have forgot, well, thats not the case. I will admit, however, that of all my ‘projects’ (if you will), this is the one I have neglected the most. Why? Because I don’t like writing (says the guy who posts twice a day on his blog).

Here is how it will go down: I will write one section of the business plan twice a week. Every Tuesday and Thursday. Ideas are taken down in between. Why two days a week? Why those days? Because thats what I just decided 5 minutes ago. However, I just wrote it down in my blog and I didn’t just say that for the sake of something to write – I have now committed to writing 2 sections of my business plan a week. That is 5 weeks (given the business plan template I plan to follow), one day off, and a completed business plan.

Wow, that is really just sinking in with me as well. 5 weeks - long time? Somewhat, depends on how you look at it. Yes, it will feel like a long time., but how many people get to writing a business plan, or anything else equally productive, in the span of 5 weeks? Yeah… and I am only doing this twice a week, and probably for less than 2 hours each section. I would be angry with myself if it takes any longer than three.

Come the end of 5 weeks, no, I won’t have a finished product. I will not be ready to present to any board of whatever. But after revisions, editing, critiquing, and more revisions (the planning for this goes in after its written) – BAM, finished business plan. I won’t be killing myself thinking about it during this time either.

You didn’t expect me to start up on my Business Plan without planning it out first, did you? Thats how robots find themselves in the closet with only a torso, two arms and a leg. Without planning, your projects will find themselves half done in the gutter.

Less talk, more play

Thus far there has been a lot of blogging. Good stuff, bad stuff, who knows what. I enjoy it. Here is the deal though, I did not begin this blog to compile thoughts and the like – this is about my projects. Almost a journal for me, and hopefully a guide or at least inspiration for you. At least thats the idea. I am still developing ideas and plans. Setting up goals and ramping up determination.

Picture: You build your dam. You fill your dam. You control the flow of water from then on out. Well, my dam is my goal of a million dollars this year. Right now, I am letting it fill with ideas and direction. Come the 25th, things are gonna begin flowing. Don’t get caught downstream.

Why? Pt. 2

Looks like ‘tomorrow’ has finally made it.

I state the question ‘Why?’ in regards to why I intend to go about making a million dollars in the next year. There has to be a reason, whats driving me? whats the motivation?

Someone once said ‘I want to become a millionaire not for the money, but for the person it will make me become.’ Personally, thats not my mentality, but I can see where they were coming from. Yeah, once you become a millionaire, if you obtain it through a means of working your ass off, yeah, you will have picked up some good habits and a damn good work ethic as biproducts. Not my cup of tea however.

Frankly, I do want to become a millionaire for the money. Remember how Al Pacino put it in Scarface?  Thats more headed in the right direction. But rather than power - I truthfully can’t say I don’t want the women - I am interested in making change. Making a difference. Doing something good in this world where there is so much need.

Do I need a million dollars to make a difference in this world? NO. Not at all. But to make the changes, the impact, the difference that I desire – I do. Money gives me leverage. Leverage means more of what I want, and I want what I want in a big way. For me, money is the way to do that.

I have begun working for a non-profit. They do the sort of thing that I like: providing opportunity to those in need – bringing hope, bringing joy. What do I do for this non-profit? I will be revamping their fundraising campaign. In other words finding them money.

If creating joy in this world is what I want to do, to make people happy and provide opportunity; why skimp on my level of impact? Do you realize volunteering at the food bank, or whatever other little petty volunteer work people end up doing, is the easy way out? Yes there is a need for it, yes it is a good thing, but if you really want to make an impact on the world, for as many people as possible, it is necessary to find a way to leverage what it is you do. For me, for what I want to do, money is going to be my lever.

What about you, do you have dreams of change, visions of a better world, thoughts of bringing joy to others? What is it that you want to do in life? Then find a way to do just that.

There is nothing spiritual about being poor. Enough said.

Back. One step and a half.

I think I made some good headway last week. Not just on getting myself blogging, but on the projects themselves. It is not all apparent here because I am still in organization process, but believe me, shit got done. Well, until around comes the weekend.

Progress came to a complete halt. Bam. No progress for two days. I can deal with that. What I can’t deal with is the time it takes me to get up and running again. Come Sunday evening I find myself trying to catch up with where I was last Friday. It took me time to get back to a point where I had already been. If thats not taking a step or two back, I don’t know what is.

Now I am headed back in my forward direction, but I must remind myself to not let my activities vacate my mind completely; even if the first day of summer comes to tease us here in Seattle.