I’m a NERD. I love solving problems. My career is centered on solving money problems. What does your money tell me about you?

Show me the money!
Do you REALLY want solutions? The answer is usually ‘No’! What you really want is someone to remove the pain or salve your conscious. You don’t want a solution unless it is on your terms.

How do I know this? Well, I’m not a psychologist. However, I have folks come to me needing advice and solutions to financial problems. Here is what I ask;

• What is the problem?
• Do you want a solution?
• Are you willing to be a little uncomfortable?
• Show me the money! (Share your bank and credit card statements)

Money doesn’t lie
While you are telling me all about your problem and how badly you want help finding a solution, I’m looking at your financial statements. Why? How you spend and manage your money tells me more about you that you can. As is usually the case, you can tell me one story about you and your money tells me the truth.

Me, me, me
You have been conditioned by our self-centered culture to seek answers on YOUR terms. So have I. If finding answers means swallowing YOUR pride or enduring discomfort, you want no part of it. Neither do I.

So what?
Time to get comfortable with being uncomfortable. Track your spending for a month. If you spend more than you make and you have a bunch of credit card debt, you are not serious about solving your problem. You are looking for a way to justify your bad behavior. I’ve been down this road and I had to get over myself.

“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Mt 6:21

What does your money say about you?

Nelson demonstrating courage

Snippets, bytes and points of interest from the past week (June 14, 2013)

• The Beginner’s Guide to Goal Setting - Michael Hyatt
• Sure, but that’s not a plan- Seth Godin’s Blog
• Tapering- Cashion Financial
• Medicare does not pay for Long Term Care- Longtermcare.gov
• Video: Markets hate scandals & QE tapering – Our CIO on CNBC- CashionFinancial.com

Have a great weekend!!!

Joshua 1:9

I don’t know much but I know this statement is true. Every man and woman on this planet has a purpose. That purpose may not be immediately recognizable. It may be months or years before our experiences unfold to reveal that purpose. However, you must recognize it and seize it.

Ah-ha Moment
At some point you will reach that moment when you step into the place for which you were created. If you are aware, you will seize it. And like a professional golfer who seemingly places the ball where he wants with ease or concert pianist who allows the music to play her, your life culminates into one moment of precision and beauty where your light will shine.

Sir Winston Churchill is a perfect example. He was a poor student. He failed at business. People said he would amount to very little. However, when the Nazis attempted to conquer Western Europe, Churchill was the only man for the job. He was called to it. He shined in that moment and stood against the overwhelming forces of evil. Ironically, the man who lead his nation to victory was voted out of office by the people who once loved him.

William Wilberforce is another example. He was born in England in 1759. We was a small sickly child and would become a man of short physical stature with a hunch back. Wilberforce eventually became a member of British Parliament. He had an all consuming passion to abolish slavery on which the entire British economy was based. A fellow member of Parliament once described him as a ‘shrimp’ on the floor of the chamber but when he rose to speak, Wilberforce became ‘a giant.’ For 50 years, he railed against overwhelming opposition and threats on his life. On his death bed, he received word that the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 had passed. Wilberforce died three days after hearing the news.

I am convinced that if you are alive and reading this, you have a moment for which you were born where you will shine. It will be your finest hour! Perhaps, you are living it now. Maybe, it is in the future waiting for you?

Will you know it when it happens?

• Will you have the courage to seize it in the face of overwhelming odds, opposition and mockery?
• What if I told you that people are depending on you to seize your finest hour?
• Would you clear away all of the nonsense and trivial garbage of your life to lay hold of the moment for which you were born?

“The Matrix is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.”
“What you know you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life, that there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad.” – The Matrix

For the last 60 years in America, our reality has become increasing politicized. Our thinking has become ‘politically correct‘. Everything we say or do contains a political tone. This matrix extends into our families, relationships and shapes our reality. We have been conditioned to live in this politicized reality without realizing it.

Inside Job
Our schools, arts and media have implanted a distorted version of reality into the minds two generations of Americans. The hold on the psyche is so strong that when an individual makes a conscious effort to question this reality, he or she is slammed down into conformity of the politically correct narrative.

Unfortunately, folks are ignorant to the fact that they exist in this warped world. However, it’s time to pinch yourself and understand that almost everything you think, say or do is politicized. This distorted reality is not based in truth. Of course ‘truth’ itself is not of any value within the politically correct matrix. The politicized reality is devoid of meaning. Our minds are divided.

We go along quietly in fear of ‘offending’ someone with truth. The walls of the matrix are heavily defended by sentinels who are armed with language and legal weapons (aka name-calling & lawsuites). When we speak the truth, we open ourselves up to a barrage of loaded names and further intrusion into our lives designed to suppress the truth, crush our spirits and re-conform our minds and behavior to the narrative. Entire institutions are so invested in the politically correct matrix that they consciously choose to reject the truth and believe a lie in order to defend their investment.

“The Matrix is a system, Neo. That system is our enemy. But when you’re inside, you look around, what do you see? Businessmen, teachers, lawyers, carpenters. The very minds of the people we are trying to save. But until we do, these people are still a part of that system and that makes them our enemy. You have to understand, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged. And many of them are so inert, so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it.” -The Matrix

Is this the reality we want for ourselves and our children?

Your Choice
Just like the movie, ‘The Matrix’, the politically correct matrix of reality is a manufactured illusion. We must realize that. You can choose to turn back in denial or ‘see how deep the rabbit-hole goes’. The choice is yours…

Did You Know?
Neo’s room number in The Matrix is 101. Room 101 in George Orwell’s novel ’1984′ is where people are sent to be tortured and brainwashed into believing things that aren’t true.

Reasonable Lie: The Opposite of Love is Hate
Somewhere in my life’s journey someone taught me that the ‘opposite of love is hate’ and I believed it. It sounded reasonable. So, I went on in life with that idea imprinted on my mind.

It would be years later that I would come to the realization that I was believing a distortion/falsehood. Because when we believe a falsehood, reality eventually becomes disconnected and chaos ensues. We are left wondering, ‘what just happened?’

Often times we don’t realize that we were believing a lie. Entire institutions, philosophies and world views can be based on falsehood or a distortion of reality. Sometimes this is intentionally deceptive, most times it is not.

Truth: The Opposite of Love is SELFISHNESS
We have the freedom to choose to love. When we love, we engage our will to compassionately share in other’s sorrow, sickness, struggle, pain and disappointments. Love allows us to see past shortfalls, mistakes and flaws. Love is sacrificial because to authentically love someone else we must set aside our own rights, desires and agendas to focus on someone else.

I confess that I find it easier to look at myself in the mirror than look into the eyes of someone in distress or worse, someone who may dislike me.

This morning, I was reminded through reading a page from Billy Graham linked to these words of Jesus in John 15:
“Love one another as I have loved you.”

You don’t have to be a Christian to understand the truth meaning behind that command. If the opposite of Love is Selfishness, then what does that say about how you engage the world around you?

Do we show love by not hating? Or do we show love by being unselfish?

Snippets, bytes and points of interest from the past week (May 17, 2013)

1. (Legally) Cutting Out the Tax Man in Retirement – Fox Business
2. In Office – Slice of Infinity (RZIM Blog)
3. Consider the Alternative – Lance Cashion
4. Video: “Stupid Cheap Market Plays” on Fox Business feat. our Chief Investment Officer - CashionFinancial.com
5. BONUS: Music (Set download): Lance Cashion – The Sound 1-28-2005 Part 1 – SoundCloud

Have a great weekend!!!!

Press on….

What would you add?

The text below comes from my monthly E-News (more info here) The first person who comments with the man’s name winning the race pictured above, you win a prize of some sort!

Last night I was glued to my iPhone listening to police, fire and EMS frequencies on a scanner app and watching radar images. All this while we huddled in our laundry room which serves as our emergency storm site. The howling wind, rain and hail battered our home while thunder shook the earth. After things settled down, I fell asleep at 1am.

I awoke at 4:45am and all was well in our home. Kat and the kids were sleeping soundly. It was peaceful and quiet.

30 Miles away, families just like mine were suffering loss of varying degrees. I went to a men’s Bible study at 6:15am and arrived to a half-empty room. The teaching pastor mentioned that some of our people had been effected but there were no details except to say that whole neighborhoods had been leveled by 10 tornadoes last night.

I gave a ride to a friend to his home across town and drove past the Fort Worth hospitals where EMS were delivering the worst trauma cases from last night’s storm. I remembered my trip to Joplin MO in 2011 where the hospital took a direct hit.

Consider the alternative:
I came home after a breakfast meeting to my wife and children playing and laughing. Then, I considered the alternative…. If we lived just a short distance from here, my reality would be different right now.

Press on:
If you’ve been alive long enough to read this email, you know that life is challenging and in a constant state of change. I’ve found the last month of life extremely challenging. At every turn, I was met with some form of resistance or trial.

Comfortable goes nowhere:
On several occasions, people stepped into my world and told me to press on. An encouragement at the right time can push us beyond my comfort zone into a place of resistance and pain, or simply remind us to hold on. Either way, you can’t stay where you are forever.

Several of you commented, sent emails or called to talk about the blind triathlete in my post, ‘Is there anything left to say?‘ I had dozens of conversations about those two athletes. The story never gets old and the lesson is transcendent. Press On….

Where in life have you had to press on?

Snippets, bytes and points of interest from the past week (May 10, 2013)

1. Avoiding fear by indulging in our fear of fear – Seth Godin
2. Why Were Young People Hit Harder by the Recession? – NCPA
3. AAPL Debt, CNBC Feature and Medicare Rule Changes – Cashion Financial News
4. Do You Have a ‘What If’ File? - Lance Cashion
5. Bonus: Cook Islands (Photos) - Mark Tipple

Have a great weekend!!!!

2 Tim 2:4

What would you add?

Last year I met such a Marine at a charity event. During our short conversation, he inquired about my work. I told him about my passion for impacting lives in various ways through my work as a Financial Advisor.  Little did I know that I was about to be equipped with a valuable tool.  When I have the opportunity to learn a practical life skill from someone with a great deal of experience, I jump at it. Then, I like to pass along the information.

A good teacher must be teachable. I emailed him and below is the content of his reply.
(My additions/edited portions of What If File Essentials are in bold italics)

The “What If” File by LtCol. Mitch Bell:

This isn’t just for the Marine or Soldier going over to the War, it’s for everyone, guy or gal. We all believe that we’ll live forever! I mean it. When you are young, you are bullet proof and as you get older, you just never expect that you will die. Well, I am speaking as a guy who lost his sister while in college, his college roommate fifteen months later, and about a dozen guys in plane crashes over my adult life. With this in mind, I came up with a “What if” file.

The “What if” file is a complete folder for my next of kin on what to do if I get whacked by a drunk driver in the morning on the way to work. This is to ensure that my wife and parents would not have to search through old papers, files, boxes in the closet etc to track down my investments, mortgages, car info, work info, passwords etc. Now mind you, the “what if” file is a VERY important document, and should be placed in your fire proof home safety deposit box or gun safe, or with your folks and/or your wife in a safe, secure place. It would be bad news falling into the wrong hands with all that info in one place.

Here is what I did when I married my beautiful wife. I wrote a letter to her, very personal and with the intent that it would my last words to her. I also told her what needed to be done and in what order.

‘What If’ File Essentials:

• 
Copies of all bank statements
• Copies of your investment statements (IRA, 401k, retirement accounts, etc)
• Account numbers (these are required to cancel credit cards and find out what bills have to be paid)
• 
Copies of all life insurance policies (beneficiary information)
• All online passwords (Banks and Financial Institutions)
• 
POC’s (point of contact) include correct phone numbers
• 
POC within your state to retrieve death certificate (In order to claim insurance death benefit and notify Social Security)
• POC (supervisor/partners) at work to notify so they don’t call due to your absence.
• Passwords for email accounts & social media (Facebook), so that your family can send out an message via your address notifying all your contacts about your death or serious injury. Otherwise your family will have to provide your death certificate to AOL, Facebook, Gmail, Hotmail, etc to access your accounts.
• An envelope with $1,000 in cash to cover immediate and unforeseen needs
• Instructions for burial
• 
Copy of your current (valid) Will (Trust Documents)
• 
Copies of your Living Will/Advance Directive/and Power of Attorney (if needed)
• List of items of value in your estate (you don’t want them sold for pennies on a dollar at an estate sale)
• List 3 primary contacts (friends and/or family) who can notify others of the situation at the behest of your spouse.

This is just a start, a basic road map for you. There are many more things you can add to it. I’m death on Marines who don’t have this set up, and so is my Dad who has an extensive “what if” file. I’ve seen too many cases where a Marine has died, and he didn’t switch over his life insurance from his EX-wife who he hates, and she now has won the lotto with a tax-free check while his present wife gets nothing. That is pure laziness and I despise it.

Just remember that dying is the easy part of life; it’s the loved ones you leave behind that suffer. If you have your life tied together in a “What If” folder, when that unexpected time comes, it will make life so much easier for the ones left behind. If you care about your spouse/kids and folks, take the time today to start putting one of these together, and store it in your home fireproof safety deposit box(but watch out if you use a banks they will close those up tight till the probate of the will if you don’t clean it out fast).

I hope this post helps. Please copy it, and send it to your friends and family. I would be willing to bet you a beer that if polled, only about one out of ten will have anything remotely set up like a “What If” file.
-Semper Fi, Mitch

Do you have a ‘What if’ file? Would you add anything to this list?

Special Thanks to LtCol Mitch Bell for permission to share this material on my blog.

I am a man
I attended co-ed elementary, middle school and college
I attended a 4yr all-boys prep school (high school)
I have a 4yr old son
I was once an adolescent boy and act like one from time to time today, just ask my wife
I am not a ‘professional’ teacher or psychologist.
I have a degree in anthropology and have studied sociology.
I am a man

Can we agree?
I am not going to present you with a pile of research that clearly states that boys and girls learn differently. Let’s agree on that.

Boys get in trouble
Boys are often fidgety, disruptive and distracted in the classroom. That is the complaint I hear from teachers and fellow parents. “He just can’t sit still!” or “He’s very intelligent but he’s easily distracted” Here’s description that my parents heard hundreds of times; “He’d make better grades if he would just apply himself.” There are a few exceptions but this is the general theme we’ve heard for decades. Boys get into more trouble than girls. The problem is exacerbated when teenage boys reach puberty and bodies are drenched in testosterone.

Fix the boy – Not the Answer
For the last 50 years society’s answer has been to ‘fix the boy’. This is done in a variety of ways including harsh discipline and prescription drugs aimed at changing behavior. There is evidence that this strategy is effective in some cases (short term). But, long-term it is futile. If the discipline and/or drugs are removed, the boy defaults back to his natural state (undesired). Or worse, the discipline becomes ineffective, causing anger or he becomes dependent on chemicals.

Fix the school – the Answer
What if we sent our boys and girls to the same school but not the same classes? Remember, we agree that boys learn differently from girls. Why doesn’t our educational system reflect this?

I can speak for most males when I say that when I was a young adolescent in middle-school classes with females, the LAST thing on my hormone driven, overactive mind was learning math or science. I was more interested in ‘learning’ about girls and making sure I captured their attention by any means necessary (including but not limited to disrupting class, horsing around, etc).

The All Boys Advantage:
When I began classes at an all-boys prep school in Connecticut, I responded to a teaching style was completely different than I had ever experienced. There was no one to impress. So, I saved my antics for the weekends when girls were around campus. I found that I actually liked to learn. Teachers used the surrounding environment as a classroom. A teacher may take his literature class outside to a place on campus called the ‘Black Forrest’ and read portions of the Emerson or Robert Frost. A Physics class may be held on the basket ball courts. For a boy, American history is learned on a battle field rather than in a classroom. I know most schools don’t have these resources but boys learn through activities, competition and visual experience.

I know several women who attended all-girl schools. Their stories have the same thread running through them. There were no boys in class to impress or worry about. In either case, I have yet to meet anyone who experienced a single-sex education who believed that their education would have been better if the opposite sex was present in the classroom.

My college experience along with many conversations with men and women about this subject solidify my position. Girls and boys would be better served by putting them in separate classrooms at our schools.

We should shoot our sacred cows. There are a hand full of schools implementing this old way of educating and seeing positive results.

Why not give it a try? (Because what we’re doing is not working)