Previously posted on May 1, 2015

One week ago today I had the honor of kicking off and acting as emcee of an event known as the Wealth Summit for my good friends at Life Benefits.  The Summit was well attended and considered a success by both the attendees and the organizers.  This is not because of the emcee, mind you, but I mention the success for a reason.  Virtually everything that was presented and discussed focused on how to improve the lives of the attendees.  The primary driver of the event was how the organizers could add value to the lives of others, not a celebration of how successful they have been.

This may not seem like a big deal, but it makes all the difference.  I learned from one of the organizers that it was also done intentionally.  Dr. Tom McFie is an extremely successful individual who has started and sold several chiropractic practices, and is now a prominent promoter/user of the Perpetual Wealth Code.  Dr. McFie pointed out how speaking about “I” first is doomed to fail and gave a very dramatic example.  Paul Allen, co-founder of Microsoft, informed Mitt Romney that he was going to lose the 2012 presidential election long before the votes were cast.  Mr. Allen’s reasoning did not relate to poll data, but his observation that Mr. Romney spoke too much about what he believed, what he was going to do, what he thought about something.  After talking about his views, Mr. Romney rarely made the connection to the audience about what it meant for them and how they were all part of the team.  Sadly, Mr. Allen was exactly right and we have been suffering through more Obama years, but that is another post.

When you think about it, it seems obvious that focusing your attention on the needs of your friends/family/customers/clients/co-workers would help you achieve more in life.  This is just a friendly reminder that we can easily slip back into the “me first” mentality, so it is a good idea to purposefully think of others on a regular basis.