I Wish Someone Had Kicked Me In The Butt 5 Years Ago

Your posts suck.

How's that for telling it straight?

Just kidding. Great point. "looks good" or "well done" said just to be nice isn't always helpful. Constructive advice mized in with a bit of praise for taking action goes a long way and is much more helpful than trying to be wary of hurting a feeling or two.

Sometimes being nice IS actually more hurtfull(long term) then being honest.

Keith

Many people get offended or insulted when they get "the truth". But they must remember that the advice is coming from someone much further down the path.

This is business folks. When a business works it puts food on the table. When it's not working you starve.

If you can't stand the heat this ain't the arena for you.

Great post Steven.

Bill

I can hear you thumping your head against the keyboard from here, Steven.

But enough of the masochism already! You weren't in the right place to hear the advice you were given - just at that moment. You're resourced enough to understand and take it on board now, be grateful for that, accept it and get on with it.

But you're right about offering other people advice. It's important not to hold back - cruel to be kind and all that. But let's not forget, we don't all have to be like Simon Cowell, let's remember that when we give advice we give it to help the other person, not to make ourselves look good. I've seen it happen on this forum, some folk use advice giving as a way to score points. They're nasty, rude and have delusions of grandeur. Civility and good manners cost nothing - and your point is less likely to fall on deaf ears.

Peter

I agree, but for most of us, if we say that, we get slammed for being negative or putting others down or things like that.

Great post, Steven. I completely agree. I wish I had truly gotten going five years ago...I'd be SO much further ahead than I am now.

There's no reason to be rude about it, but being honest is the very best thing, in my opinion.

Hello fellow Met fan,

Perfect post!

I started my first website in late 2000 and I failed miserably and just gave up in 2003. I took 5 years off and moved to California from Queens NY to make it in the mortgage business.

Then for some reason in February of this year I said the hell with it and went back to marketing online.

Gotta say I'm glad I did - now I do this P/T until it pays the bills and then some.

Andres

Steven,

Can you remember the responses we would get when we were trying to give you that advice?

Not from you but from bystanders watching.

"don't be so nasty to him"
"at least he's doing something"
"you have to start somewhere"
"if you can't be nice don't say anything"

etc. etc. etc.

I'm sure you remember it too.

John and I would be on Skype talking about how on earth we could get the message across to some people that their focus was like poison to their potential.

I know that it's common for people not to want to take responsibility for their situation not being as good as they would like it. Afterall, that's like telling a depressed person that they have the choice to be happy. It may be true (in some cases it is) but it's not what they want to hear and any advice about the detail of how to be happy will fall on deaf ears.

We all control our own destiny and I always knew that you'd ultimately be the only person who could ever change things and it would only happen when it made sense in your version of the world, but what used to make me keep trying was that because you post so much here, you were also leading newbies down the same path - and THAT was my biggest concer. It's one thing to try and give you advice to open your mind and to get ignored, but when you were simutaneously converting others to think the same, it felt like some sort of orwellian conspiracy. We see so many people in IM just regurgitating the same of crap that someone told them without any knowledge whatsoever of whether it's actually correct or not that sometimes it's un uphill effort to cut through the myths and get some critical thinking to happen.

I've always adversely impacted my own financial success by my focus on helping other people more than myself and I've been critcised for it many times, but I think that sometimes we have a social responsibility to try and get people to stop and think before they spread information that is fundamentally hurting others, whether they realise it or not.

Everyone gets to make their own choices but many people entering IM are looking outside themselves for answers, whether it's due to low self confidence or ignorance or something else - I still think we have a responsibility to tell them what we think they need to know rather than what we think they want to hear.

This applies on so many levels. I feel the same when I see people saying something in a thread that's been said 1000 times here before, and a couple of people respond with "you should turn that into a report and sell it as a wso". NO! you shouldn't turn it into a wso just because you know you can make money out of fellow warriors who don't realise they can read it in another thread for free. Sometimes when you hear something that sounds too good to be true - it's because it is. You can't take anyone's advice about any detail of IM at face value - you need to measure every strategy against whether it's right for you and your business. There is no secret to making money. There does seem to be a law that the more you use your own brain, the more likely you are to create something of true value. The more you look to others to tell you what to do, the more likely you are to create something less valuable.

We all need to travel our own journey but to truely help others along the way, our help should be based on what we believe to be in their best interests, no what we want to believe about our own version being the right one for others.

Andy

Good point.

I wish someone had given me a nice big kick in the ass 4 years ago when I first got here. I certainly would be making a heck of alot more money than I am now, that's for sure.

The truth really does hurt, but sometimes it really is for the best.

I'm actually curious to know what you were doing 5 years ago that was so bad?

Maybe we can all laugh at it