In an economic downturn with many companies re-thinking their strategies and implementing cost cutting measures to prepare for the tough times ahead and to re-position themselves for the 21st century, how are you preparing yourself for the times ahead and the future? The economy fluctuates. Like the stock market, we quickly grow to expect that just as there are good times, there will also be "not so good" times. What we would like to do is to be able to sail smoothly through the cycles, come what may. Whether we can ride out any storms, tempests and hurricanes depends on what we do today.

"An investment in knowledge always pay the best interest." And the best investment we can make is an investment in knowledge about money, and our attitudes towards money.

Do you have a prosperity consciousness?

Prosperity consciousness is a belief system about money; that says you can control your own destiny. Your financial future is not in the hands of others, nor in the hands of fate. You deserve to be prosperous. You can achieve great financial rewards in more direct methods than winning the lottery. Your income or wealth level is only limited by the limits you place on it. Unfortunately, many people do not have a prosperity consciousness. They cannot see themselves as wealthy unless they win the lottery or somehow strike it rich on a get-rich-quick deal. Why is this so? There are many reasons and they have much to do with the way we were brought up and our perceptions of wealth. Money was often equated with evil and wrongdoing. Most of the things we hear about wealth are negative. Roughly nine out of ten wealthy people we see in movies or in television shows are unsavoury or unbalanced characters. And most of us are taught, all wealthy people got that way by cheating someone else. We have often heard people said "I'm not interested in money," or "Money doesn't matter," yet it is ironic that these same people spent most of their waking hours working hard for money and worrying about not having enough money. A negative attitude towards money is often our own rationalisation for the fact that we don't have any. Somehow it makes us feel better to say that we don't really want it. We need to find out where the negative thoughts lie and how we can channel them into new positive thoughts. We need to be re-educated and to re-define what money is and reframe our views of wealth. And as we gain a new understanding of money, we need to take positive steps to put us on the track to financial success.

What is Financial Success?

Financial Success means being in control of your money. It means enjoying a comfortable lifestyle and paying your bills on time. It means having money set aside for small emergencies and having adequate insurance coverage for major disasters. It means having the resources to buy a nice house, educate your children, or start a business. It means preparing to achieve and maintain your chosen lifestyle throughout your retirement years. It means freedom from financial stress and worries that interfere with your relationships, personal happiness, and physical well being. Financial success means peace of mind. How much you earn does not determine whether or not you are financially successful. We can think of the many movie stars, professional athletes, or lottery winners who earn and spend a million dollars a year and end up with nothing. Millions of people earn comfortable incomes but spend as much, if not more, every year until they arrive at retirement with virtually nothing to fall back on. Yet there are many ordinary people with ordinary jobs who have achieved extraordinary financial success through careful planning and personal incentive.

How is it that these people, having spent more than 40 years working hard, ended up working harder in their retirement just to survive?

Unfortunately, many of these people didn't believe that they needed to plan for any other retirement income. Theirs is the sad case of failing to plan. Had they taken advantage of their earning years, they would not need to spend their twilight years impoverished and struggling to make ends meet. Unfortunately for the unprepared, old age can truly be the winter of life. But for the prepared, it is the season of harvest. Only you can determine whether your old age is the winter of life or the season of harvest. You can either enjoy your retirement; or retire from enjoyment. What you do today is significant.

Financial success is attained through what you do with your income, not through how much you earn. Secrets to Financial Success During your lifetime you will earn a sizeable fortune. What you do with your earnings determines how much you will accumulate. Regardless of how much you earn; only what you save is really yours. You can always spend what you save, but you can never save what you spend. We would like to share with you the secrets to financial success. These are simple proven principles that have helped many achieve financial success.

The secrets are:

1) Set Your Financial Goals
2) Pay Yourself First
3) Invest Money and Time
4) Diversify Your Investments
5) Manage Your Credit Wisely
6) Protect Your Future

The secrets are revered principles for creating and managing personal wealth. They are principles that have stood the tests of time and are not really secrets at all. They are common knowledge - not commonly applied. Those who applied them will be effective in building financial independence regardless of the amount of money available to work with.

1) Set Your Financial Goals Goals are the starting point of all achievement. They are the blue prints, born of ideas and dreams, which should be fully stated before the first shovel full of dirt is ever moved Setting goals is no secret. We do it all the time. In our jobs, we set sales and production goals. And it works, doesn't it? Achieving those goals brings in revenue for the company or business. The secret is to apply the goal-setting process to our personal spending and saving. Do you have a financial goal? Is there something that you are saving up for? It could be that dream house you always wanted, university education for your children or a certain sum of money to see you through your golden years. Whatever it may be, you need to quantify it and implement a plan to achieve it. Some of the goals may be time critical and you cannot afford to procrastinate. Remember, time and tide waits for no man. Study financially successful people and you will find their achievements are driven by their goals. These high achievers write down their goals and stick to them through changes and setbacks. Goals are the target. Successful people aim, and keep aiming until they hit the mark.

2) Pay Yourself First The secret is to make savings the first item in your monthly expenditures, then do whatever you like with the rest. Have fun, live it up and enjoy the fruits of your labour. Once you are saving part of your income first, before spending anything, financial success is virtually guaranteed. Whatever you have left is yours to spend. The amount you need to save depends on the financial goals you have set. We generally recommend saving a minimum of 10 per cent of your income. Initially, that may seem very difficult. If so, start with 5 percent, or even less, then increase it. Paying yourself first requires real commitment. The fundamental decision that you must make is whether or not you intend to live within your income. If so, it means you cannot spend more money than you earn. You realise you cannot have everything in life, that you must make choices. Which of your wants do you desire the most? If you want something badly enough, isn't it worth sacrificing something else now so that you can acquire what you really want later?

3) Invest Money And Time Time is Money's best friend. The two work together like a river and a mil wheel to generate amazing results. A dollar today doesn't have the same value a dollar tomorrow has. For instance, when you invest $100 at 6 per cent interest, your $100 isn't worth $100 at the end of the year; it's worth $106. If you have kept the $100 in your drawer for a year, what would you have? That's right - $100! The point is the value of your money in any situation is determined by time. In the real world of money and investing, your money rarely earns simple interest. Instead, it earns compound interest. Compound interest picks up speed over time, becoming more dramatic over long periods. Assume four friends of ages 25, 35, 45 and 55. Each invested $10,000 in a financial instrument, which yield 8% interest annually. Amy, 25, has twice as much time as Catherine and four times that of Daniel. Logically one would expect Amy to accumulate two times more money than Catherine does and four times more money than Daniel. However, thanks to the miracle of compound interest, Amy actually accumulated nearly five times more than Catherine and 10 times more than Daniel did. The morale of the story: Time multiplies the size of your nest egg! In the above example, we used 8 per cent. What if they had invested in a financial instrument that yields 10% or 12%? Had Benny invested $10,000 in an instrument that gives him 10 per cent returns instead of 8 per cent, he would have make 1.7 times more. Once you understand the effect of time on the value of money and the miracle of the compound interest, you will realise that when it comes to saving and investing, procrastination is your biggest enemy. Putting off saving money will cost you dearly for the rest of your life. In fact, procrastination is the number one reason why people fail financially.

4) Diversify Your Investments There is no such thing as a perfectly safe investment, free from all risk. All investments carry with them varying degrees of risks. When considering investment, one must be aware that the general principal to follow is returns commensurate with risks. The higher the returns, the greater the risk. In selecting an investment, one must consider the following: Savings/Investment Objectives - What is the purpose of the investment? Was it taken to take care of your retirement or was it for your children's education? Time Horizon - How long are you prepared to wait before realising the profits? Is it a short term (1 year), middle term (1- 5 years) or long term (over 5 years) investment? Level of Risk Tolerance - How risks adverse are you? In considering this question, one must take into consideration your age, the number of years to your reserves and resources. Level of Liquidity - How soon do you need the money? Not all investments are liquid. For example, it may take up to six months to liquidate an investment in real estate compared to an investment in stocks and shares. Rate of Return - What is your expected rate of return? What is your required rate of return to achieve your financial objective achieved?

5) Manage Your Credit Wisely If you spend more than you make, you are spending your future income. You are committing money you haven't yet earned. You are taking on a future obligation. If these commitments are monthly instalment payments, you are obligating yourself to earn more in the future so that you can repay what you have already spent. There are two main reasons to borrow money: · Borrowing to invest · Borrowing to consume Most of us at some point in time need to borrow to invest. If we did not borrow money to buy a home, most of us would not be able to afford one. This is a necessity and in the long run, hopefully the house will appreciate and we can get a return on our investment. Unfortunately, for most of us, we borrow to consume where there is no or little returns on our consumption. The key is to live within your means. This requires you to plan and be disciplined and determined to control your wants.

6) Protect Your Future Life is full of risk and financial pitfalls. Emergencies come up, as do opportunities. When they do, you don't want to be forced to use a credit card or be forced to sell your shares during one of those "dips" in the market. Either option will increase your stress level, reduce your financial peace of mind, and move you farther away from achieving your financial goals. Safeguard your future by managing risks and setting up an emergency cash reserves. There are four ways you can handle risk: Bear it - you take your own chances and you become, effectively, your own insurer. Share it - you share the risk. For example, to keep the premiums low, most medical insurance capped the medical claims and often requires the insured to bear part of the cost. Transfer it - you pass the risk on to the insurer. Life insurance is an example where you transfer the risk to the insurer. Avoid it - where you take the necessary actions to avoid or reduce the risk. Insurance is the best instrument for risk management. For a certain premium, you are guaranteed an immediate financial protection should adversity strikes. However this does not mean that you should be covered for all perceivable risks. There will be certain risks that you may be prepared to bear and can afford to pay. The general guideline is to transfer the risk that you cannot afford, share those you can and bear those that are unlikely to happen. Emergency cash reserves are an important part of financial planning. These are liquid investment people hold in anticipation of planned or unplanned expenses. How much money you decide to keep in cash reserves depends on your particular situation and financial temperament though our recommendation is to keep three to six months of living expenses. If you have a cash reserve deficit, you need to increase your savings. Don't wait for extra money to come along before beginning to build your cash reserves. There is no such thing as extra money.

What you do today is important. Your future is determined by what you do today. Do not procrastinate. Implement these secrets and move on to financial success.

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