Or are we naturally caring and creative? Do normal, everyday people create a world based on integrity, freedom and compassion as long as they’re healthy and have what they need to live?

Which of these 2 worldviews will shape our future? That is our choice – right now.

The agenda of the ruling political class is the product of a destructive world view, based on their beliefs that there’s not enough to go around, that some people are more deserving than others, and that their own safety depends on maintaining absolute control over the rest of us. Their worldview is based on scarcity and fear – and they hit us with it every day on TV, newspapers, magazines and the internet.

But as powerful as they are, their success depends on OUR cooperation – stopping them starts with waking up and taking action.

There is only ONE candidate out there who respects you and me enough to let us make our own decisions – who respects our soldiers enough not to send them off to 10-year undeclared wars based on lies and propaganda – and who respects our future generations enough not to saddle them with even more crippling debt created by printed money backed by nothing more than empty government promises.

Ron Paul is the ONLY pro-individual, freedom-loving candidate who doesn’t want to RULE YOUR LIFE. He just wants to let you LIVE your life.

Ron Paul is the ONLY candidate who believes the only purpose of government is to protect individual rights. All the other candidates (especially Newt and Romney) shake their head at this statement and laugh like this a childish thing to say. Here in AMERICA, the politicians are standing up there on TV, laughing at individual rights. When they do that, they’re laughing at all of us.

We’ve got the government trying to CENSOR the spread of information on the internet with the new SOPA law. We got the TSA groping us at airports – molesting old ladies – confiscating cupcakes from schoolteachers because the gel-like icing was a “security risk.” We’ve got our banks and credit unions reporting us to the government if we withdraw “too much” cash from our accounts. We’ve got the FBI spying and turning against the people they’re supposed to protect. We’ve got a Congress who recently passed a Defense Authorization Act declaring U.S. soil a “battlefield” and gives the military permission to capture and indefinitely hold any American citizen without due process or trial. And we’ve got a President who recently stated he can have any American assassinated at his sole discretion. Right now this very moment we are witnessing the establishment of a police state in America! THIS IS POWER HUNGRY GOVERNMENT RUN AMOK AND IT MUST BE STOPPED AT ALL COSTS!

That’s why this is no ordinary election. Given the insanity of what’s happening every day all around us, it is completely absurd to discount Ron Paul on one or two issues you disagree with when he so heavily outweighs all the other candidates on economics, individual rights, and a philosophy of freedom that will back EVERY decision he makes to put an END to tyrannical government and and END to corporatism and to RESTORE the validity and sanctity of our Constitution.

With freedom, there’s a whole new world completely within our grasp. We can create a world where ALL people can live happily and pursue their own talents and ambitions. Where we can feel safe and secure. Where the air, water, and food are clean. A world where communities are capable of producing their own energy and food, and trade is open and fair. Rather than focusing on punishment, justice restores lives and losses. Insurance pays doctors to keep you healthy, not just treat symptoms when you’re sick. Education is voluntary and serves the needs of INDIVIDUALS, not the government and corporations. We’re free to get honest feedback from independent media. There are no special privilege subsidies or corporate bailouts. Imagine how, with an honest money system based on gold, little or no taxes and low electric and fuel bills you would have the money to pay off your home and car and be free to save and invest. You would enjoy more wealth, freedom and security for the future.

These are the ultimate effects of Ron Paul’s Liberty Perspective. He’s NOT the one who makes all this happen, rather it is he who allows each and every one of us to be FREE enough to BUILD IT OURSELVES! There’s a simple principle that underlies this approach – non-violation – which means no one gets to violate you or your property and you don’t get to violate anyone else, except in genuine self defense. Non-violation is the TRUE NORTH of humanity’s moral compass – our core navigating insight. This insight can guide us and protect each and every individual as we set up voluntary self sustaining systems. And even though he’s not always the most eloquent public speaker, it is a way of living Ron Paul stands for wholeheartedly and without reservation.

Ron Paul isn’t perfect – he’s only a messenger. There will be a couple issues you disagree on. Some people out there seem to want the perfect candidate and guess what? That unicorn isn’t gonna appear. For years we’ve had to choose between to non-choices; plastic little politicians who told you want you wanted to hear and then when they got into office, they ignored all that and just did whatever they wanted anyway (or what they were pressured to do). This cycle of endless lies and corruption is what’s caused millions in this country to just stop caring altogether. They’ve given up, because THEY KNOW they’ll get the same bullshit no matter who they vote for, and you can’t even talk to them – because the very thought of politics makes them want to vomit!

All of this is also why the swing vote dominates American politics today. Many of us had stopped voting and when we did that, we let a small minority decide elections for us. We stopped because there was no one WORTH VOTING FOR. But now there is. FINALLY there is someone who deserves our vote!

This is a first for a presidential candidate; Ron Paul has never backed down from his beliefs. He has never buckled under pressure and voted against his conscience. And through the years he’s never given in to bribery and changed his message because some pressure group or corporation wanted him to.

The reality is this single man, Ron Paul, is standing up to a political establishment machine that’s crushed this country into the worst disaster since the Great Depression. At first they ignored him. Then they belittled him. And when none of that worked, now they’re vilifying him. And through it all, his supporters have only grown stronger. We are more dedicated than EVER BEFORE!

Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by phone banking. Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by holding up signs over highways. Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by passing out brochures. Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by giving their money. Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by posting online and making support videos. Some of us choose to stand with Ron Paul by calling into radio shows.

Personally, I’m willing to donate money and drive out of my home state of Missouri to the individual caucuses around the country to do what I can to help the campaign. I’m willing to stand out in the freezing cold snow holding signs. And I’m willing to join Ron Paul’s phone banking system to help locate and organize scattered supporters so we can rally to action at the caucuses and beyond.

There are so many ways that each of us can stand with Dr. Ron Paul. Let’s make sure we are all using our talents and abilities to do our part, and to have fun with it!! We are SO CLOSE to winning – and the other side’s running scared. We need to fight harder for this man than we’ve EVER fought before. Let’s WIN this fight so that our families, and our children, and future generations can experience Liberty and be FREE from the insanity that our corrupt government has put us through!

It takes a brave man to stand for what he believes in, despite strong headwinds from his peers. They laughed at Ron Paul when he predicted the financial housing bubble. They laugh at him now when he advocates a return to sound money based on gold. The main difference between now and 2008 is that far fewer people are laughing and more people are listening.

Again and again throughout history when people have recognized tyranny rearing its cruel head they’ve come together to stand up for Liberty. I’m confident humankind will look back on this time and be proud that when we saw, we acted.

In the end – even if the depressing, unthinkable happens, and Ron Paul doesn’t become our next president – he will lose as one man – but he will come back in millions. I’ll be one of them. They can’t stop us. Eventually we will win.

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They say government-created lending institutions were a “dumb” idea; FEMA’s waste of half a trillion dollars after hurricane Katrina was due to “ineptitude”; the war in Iraq is “idiotic”; the state-controlled educators are “incompetent”; the military is “mismanaged”; the subsidy of ethanol is “a colossal failure”; the Fed is “foolishly” inflating; the welfare system “doesn’t work”; the immigration department “can’t do its job”; the war on drugs is a “failure”; and so on.

Be that as it may, perhaps we’re asking the wrong questions.

Consider this: Over the past 40 years, members of the House of Representatives have enjoyed an average re-election rate of 94%! In the last few elections, they have enjoyed a re-election rate of 97%!

What is stupid about that?

Obviously, politicians are not wasting a dollar on mismanaging anything. Government is designed to serve the people IN it, and for that purpose it works great. The public gets fleeced, cheated, punished, and crushed, but that’s just a side effect.

The favor-trading process, in which special interests fund campaign coffers in exchange for pet legislation, is a form of unnatural selection that weeds out those who are unwilling or incapable of predictable, reliable and discreet power brokerage, which is a rare, delicate skill. People who can rob their fellow citizens blind, throw their money down rat holes, plague them with endless rules and punishments and simultaneously get their victims to confer upon them society’s highest level of respect are in some intuitive way, geniuses.

Members of Congress may be short-sighted, dishonest, corrupt, pragmatic, hypocritical, immoral or amoral, but they are not stupid. They know exactly how to influence voters, hand out tax stolen money and manipulate the political system to enhance their personal, social, and financial status while making it look as if they are upstanding citizens trying their gol-darndest to provide services.

And the public buys it.

So… which group is stupid?

Until this crony system of control is shattered, electing your favorite politicians each time will just be like loading a different bullet into the same gun, sighing “I hope this one doesn’t kill so bad.”

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“OF COURSE it’s not!” they’ll protest, “Just look at ____” and then they’ll rattle off whatever their favorite Utopias are they’ve read about recently. “We’ve GOT to do something about this,” they’ll add and proceed to explain how if people weren’t so damn “greedy”, we’d be able to pull through this “together” etc etc.

To add insult to injury, a group called Mercer just published their 2011 Quality of Living Survey results, showing the absolute best (and worst) places to live in the world.

But you would have to go all the way down to #29 to find your first U.S. city, which is Honolulu, Hawaii. Even our beloved New York, the great American powerhouse, ranks a pathetic #47.

Most other websites looking at this report would start going into all the statistics, economics and political differences that make for a great place to live.

I’m not going to do that.

Instead, there is a much more simple way to gauge whether the United States is still for you, or whether you should consider taking your business to greener pastures – like some of my wealthier friends have started to do.

When you ask, “Greg, is the U.S. still the best?” Here is my honest answer:

I’m still here. We got a ton of problems but nothing that can’t be fixed, eventually. Problem is, I don’t want to be the freest, happiest 90 year old, I want it now We all need it now, because we have to consider our life span. What’s most important in a country is how well you think you can achieve the things you value. We still live in a place where I think its possible for me, but that may change. The moment it changes and you no longer think you can get what you want, it’s time to go somewhere else.

Changing human nature ain’t gonna happen. And changing society takes more time than most of us have got. But you CAN change your personal circumstances if they don’t suit you, by voting with your feet to a place that allows you to be a happier more fulfilled person.

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Before you answer that for certain… have you ever asked yourself what is the root of all money?

Money is a tool of exchange, which can’t exist unless there are goods produced and people able to produce them. Money is the physical form of the principle that people who want to deal with each other must deal by trade and give value for value. Money is not the tool of those who claim your product by tears because they “need” it, or of those who steal, who take it from you by force. Money is made possible only by the men and women who produce.

Is THIS what you consider evil?

When you accept money in payment for your work, you do it only because you will exchange it for the product of the effort of others. It is not the government, politicians, or thieves who give value to money. An ocean of tears or all the guns in the world can’t transform those pieces of paper in your wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow. Those pieces of paper (which should be gold) are a token of honor – your claim upon the energy of the people in this world who produce. Your wallet is your STATEMENT OF HOPE that somewhere in the world around you there are people who will honor and uphold the freedom of trade – that moral principle which is the root of money.

Is THIS what you consider evil?

And what is the root of production? Have you ever looked for it? Take a look at an electric generator and dare tell yourself it was created by the muscular effort of unthinking drones. Try to grow a seed of wheat without the knowledge left to you by men who had to discover it for the first time. Try to obtain your food by means of nothing but physical motions – and you’ll learn that man’s mind is the root of all the goods produced and of all the wealth that has ever existed on earth.

What’s that, you say? You say, “But Greg, money is made by the strong at the expense of the weak!”

What strength do you mean?

It is not the strength of guns or muscles. Wealth is the product of man’s capacity to think. So does that mean money is made by the man who invents a motor at the expense of those who did NOT invent it?

Is money made by the intelligent at the expense of the fools? By the able at the expense of the incompetent? By the ambitious at the expense of the lazy?

No. Money is made – before it can be begged for or stolen by force – made by the effort of every honest person, each to the extent of his or her ability. An honest person is one who knows he can’t consume more than he has produced.

To trade by means of money is the code of those of good will.

Money rests on the ETERNAL TRUTH that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort. Money allows no power to prescribe the value of your effort except the voluntary choice of someone else who is willing to trade you his effort in return. Money permits you to obtain for your goods and your labor that which they are worth to the men who buy them, but no more. Money permits no deals except those to mutual benefit by the unforced judgment of the traders. Money demands of you the recognition that men must work for their own benefit, not for their own injury, for their gain, not their loss – the recognition that they are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your misery – that you must offer them VALUES, not wounds – that the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of goods.

Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men’s stupidity, but your TALENT to their REASON; it demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the best that your money can find. And when men live by trade – with reason, not force, as their final arbiter – it is the best product that wins, the best performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability – and the degree of a man’s productiveness is the degree of his reward. This is the code of existence whose tool and symbol is money.

Is THIS what you consider evil?

But money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace YOU as the driver. It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with desires.

Money is the scourge of the men who attempt to reverse cause and effect – the men who seek to replace the mind by seizing the products of the mind.

Money will not purchase happiness for the man who has no concept of what he wants: money will not give him a code of values, if he’s evaded the knowledge of what to value, and it will not provide him with a purpose, if he’s evaded the decision of what to seek. Money will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or respect for the incompetent. The man who attempts to purchase the brains of his superiors to serve him, with his money replacing his judgment, ends up by becoming the victim of his inferiors. The men of intelligence desert him, but the cheats and the frauds come flocking to him, drawn by a law which he has not discovered: that no man may be smaller than his money.

Is THIS the reason why you call it evil?

Only the man who does not need it, is fit to inherit wealth – the man who would make his own fortune no matter where he started. If an heir is equal to his money, it serves him; if not, it destroys him. (This is also why you see so many lottery winners hollow, broke and shattered versions of their former selves… and sometimes even dead!)

But you look on and you cry that money corrupted him… did it? Or did HE corrupt his money? Do not envy a worthless heir; his wealth is not yours and you would have done no better with it. Do not think that it should have been distributed among you; loading the world with 50 parasites instead of one, would not bring back the dead virtue which was the fortune. Money is a living power that dies without its root. Money will not serve the mind that cannot match it.

Is THIS the reason why you call it evil?

Money is your means of survival. If you damn the source of your livelihood, you are damning your own life. If the source is corrupt, you have damned your own existence. Did you get your money by fraud? By pandering to men’s vices or men’s stupidity? By catering to fools, in the hope of getting more than your ability deserves? By lowering your standards? By doing work you hate for customers you curse?

If so, then your money will not give you a moment’s or a penny’s worth of joy. Then all the things you buy will become, not a tribute to you, but a reproach; not an achievement, but a reminder of shame. Then you’ll scream that money is evil. Evil, because it would not pinch-hit for your self-respect? Evil, because it would not let you enjoy your depravity?

Is THIS the root of your hatred of money?

Money will always remain an effect and refuse to replace you as the cause. Money is the product of virtue, but it will not give you virtue and it will not redeem your vices. Money will not give you the unearned, neither in matter nor in spirit.

Is THIS the root of your hatred of money?

Ohh, wait… I know what you’re thinking now, “Greg, it’s not money, but the LOVE OF MONEY that is the root of all evil.”

Well, ok. Let’s go there…

To love a thing is to know and love its nature. To love money is to know and love the fact that money is the creation of the best power within you, and your passkey to trade your effort for the effort of the best among men. It’s the person who would sell his soul for a nickel, who is loudest in proclaiming his hatred of money – and he has good reason to hate it. The lovers of money are willing to WORK for it.

They know they are able to deserve it.

Here’s a quick key insight into men’s characters you can always rely on: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.

Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil.

That statement is the sure sign of an approaching thief. So long as men live together on earth and need means to deal with one another – their only substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun.

Money demands of you the highest virtues, if you wish to make it or to keep it. Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it as they defend their life, men who apologize for being rich – will not remain rich for long. They are the natural bait for the swarms of government goons that hide under rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will quickly relieve him of the guilt – and of his life, as he deserves.

Then you’ll see the rise of the men of the double standard – the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their stolen money – the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the CRIMINALS, and the laws are written to protect you against them.

But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and thieves-by-law – men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims (think of ALL the government agencies, lawyers, men in black suits, men in SWAT gear – think about what happens when you don’t pay your taxes – think about all the fees, fines and regulations – it’s all the same)  – then money becomes its creators’ avenger.

Such thieves believe it safe to rob defenseless men, once they’ve passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes, not to the best at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.

Do you want to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Because money is the barometer of a society’s virtue.

When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion…

…when you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing…

…when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors…

…when you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you…

…when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice…

…THEN you may know that your society is doomed. Money is so noble a medium that it does not compete with guns and it does not make terms with brutality.

It will not permit a country to survive as half-property, half-loot.

Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men’s protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to “produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it bounces, marked: ‘Account overdrawn.’

When you have made evil the means of survival (as what is happening now here in the United States), do not expect men to remain good. Do not expect them to stay moral and lose their lives for the purpose of becoming the fodder of the immoral. Do not expect them to produce, when production is punished and looting rewarded. Do not ask, “Who is destroying the world?” It’s simple. You are – if you believe money is the root of all evil.

RIGHT NOW you stand in the midst of the greatest achievements of the greatest productive civilization EVER IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND and you wonder why it’s crumbling around you, while you’re damning its life-blood – money. You look upon money as the savages did before you, and you wonder why the jungle is creeping back to the edge of your cities. Throughout men’s history, money was always seized by looters of one brand or another, whose names changed, but whose method remained the same: to seize wealth by force and to keep the producers bound, demeaned, defamed, deprived of honor.

That phrase about the evil of money, which people utter with such righteous recklessness, comes from a time when wealth was produced by the labor of slaves – slaves who repeated the motions once discovered by somebody’s mind and left unimproved for centuries. So long as production was ruled by force, and wealth was obtained by conquest, there was little to conquer. Yet through all the centuries of stagnation and starvation, men exalted the looters, as aristocrats of the sword, as aristocrats of birth, as aristocrats of the bureau, and despised the producers, as slaves, as traders, as shopkeepers – as industrialists.

To the glory of mankind, there was, for the first and only time in history, a country of money – The United States of America – and I have no higher, more reverent tribute to pay to America, for this means: a country of reason, justice, freedom, production, achievement. For the first time, man’s mind and money were set free, and there were no fortunes-by-conquest, but only fortunes-by-work, and instead of swordsmen and slaves, there appeared the real maker of wealth, the greatest worker, the highest type of human being – the self-made man – the American entrepreneur.

If you ask me to name the proudest distinction of Americans, I would choose – because it contains all the others – the fact we were the people who created the phrase “to make money.” No other language or nation had ever used these words before; men had always thought of wealth as a static quantity – to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted or obtained as a favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created. The words ‘to make money’ hold the essence of human morality.

Yet these were the words for which Americans were denounced by the rotted cultures of other continents. Now the thieves’ credo has brought you to regard your proudest achievements as a hallmark of shame, your prosperity as guilt, your greatest men, the entrepreneurs, as dishonorable, and your magnificent factories as the product and property of muscular labor, the labor of whip-driven slaves, like the pyramids of Egypt. The rotter who simpers that he sees no difference between the power of the dollar and the power of the whip, ought to learn the difference on his own ass – and I think he will.

Until and unless you discover that money is the root of all GOOD, you’re begging for your own destruction. When money stops being the tool by which men deal with one another, then men become the tools of men. Blood, whips and guns – or dollars. Take your choice – there is no other – and your time is running out.

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This sort of thing eventually led you to roll your eyes and zone out anytime someone started talking about things like “government”, “freedom” and all that stuff.

Don’t. Not this time.

You see, I used to be just like that. I used to not care about ideas of government, took any notion of freedom for granted and hated the very idea of politics and wanted to avoid it at all costs. That stuff was for “other people” to complain and bicker about while I just tried to get on with living life and having fun.

All of this began to change when I seriously got into business for myself and started to make my own money. And all of it permanently changed when I began to see with my own eyes how powerful these ideas are – how the right ideas can uplift you to the highest pleasures of your existence – or the wrong ones can utterly destroy your soul and will to live.

And even worse – there are people out there right now at this very moment, hard at work dedicating their time to ensure your soul is crushed and your will to live is numbed so you just don’t care anymore.

That, my reader, is evil.

I’ll do whatever I can to stop it. Not for your sake, but for mine. Because it makes me feel alive and happy to live surrounded by other other people who also feel alive and happy.

The whole thing starts with ONE IDEA: knowing (and understanding!) your rights.

FIRST AND FOREMOST… you have a right to your own life. Sounds simple at first but this means a whole lot of different things. The right to your own life is the only fundamental right – and all other rights are based on this one.

It means you have the right to do everything in your power to PRESERVE and ENJOY your life to the fullest extent. I’m sure you’ve heard many young women (and some guys too) say they want to “live life to the fullest” – it’s obvious people adore and want this idea in their lives…

…but how to do it? I mean, how do we ACTUALLY live our life to the fullest? By what means?

One answer (and this may sound strange at first, but listen carefully) : The right to Property.

Without property rights, none of your other rights are possible. We live in a world where each of us has to sustain our lives by our own effort. And if you do not have a right to the RESULTS of your own effort, then you have no means to sustain your life. A good example of this is owning your work. If you create something and do not own it, and someone else benefits from it, you are a slave. It’s also like if a skilled contractor came over to my house and installed a bathtub, and if I denied him ownership of his work and did not pay or reward him, he is a slave.

But don’t make this mistake: the right to property does NOT mean you have a right to a particular piece of property or some object. It is not a guarantee you will earn anything, but only a guarantee you will own it IF you earn it. This is the right to gain, keep, and dispose of material values.

The right to life also means you have the right to support yourself by your own work, AND MAKE AS MUCH OR AS LITTLE MONEY AS YOUR SKILL  AND ABILITY WILL ALLOW. It does not mean other people will provide you with the necessities of life, but that no one can take away your ability to provide for yourself. You also can not be deprived of your life for the benefit of anyone else.

You have the right to liberty. Really, what does “freedom” actually mean? Freedom from what, exactly?

It’s simple. It is freedom from ANY kind of force. Freedom from any kind of rape. Freedom from being forced to do anything you did not AGREE to.

It does NOT mean freedom from your landlord, freedom from your employer, or freedom from laws of nature which do not provide us with automatic prosperity. It simply means freedom from being forced to do something at the threat of a gun or being thrown in jail.

Your knowledge, your ability to think and act on your thoughts do not happen automatically. You must CHOOSE to do these things and choose to do them well. And your survival as a human being absolutely DEMANDS that you are free to gain knowledge, think and act without interference from anyone else.

None of us are perfect. We make mistakes. That is why we must be free to agree or disagree with each other, to cooperate or pursue our own individual plans, all according to our own individual judgment.

If someone pointed a gun in your face and screamed “BUILD ME A HOUSE!! And I want it to be the most CREATIVE, AMAZING house EVER built or else I’ll BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT!!”

This is impossible. Even if you’re a very skilled home builder, it would be impossible to do this. Your mind, a rational mind, does not work under force; it does not subordinate its grasp of reality to anyone’s orders, directives, or controls; it does not sacrifice its knowledge, its view of the truth, to anyone’s opinions, threats, wishes, plans, or “welfare.” Your mind may be hampered by others, it may be silenced, proscribed, imprisoned, or destroyed; BUT IT CANNOT BE FORCED; A GUN IS NOT AN ARGUMENT!!

ALL of our knowledge and achievements we have today – ALL of the things that allow us to live here in the United States and around the world better than kings did long ago (yes even the poor here in the U.S. can enjoy more luxury than the king of France did hundreds of years ago) – ALL of it has come from the dedicated work and integrity of FREE MINDS.

America’s abundance was not created by public sacrifices to “the common good,” but by the productive genius of free men who pursued their own personal interests and the making of their own private fortunes.

And this is so important because we owe our very survival to great minds… and our future survival DEPENDS on how free we allow great minds to roam and play right now. This isn’t dusty old history in some boring school textbook. This is HERE and NOW. Everything depends on our freedom.

Now don’t fall for this trick, either: some people will try to fool you and say that we are not “truly” free because we have no right to murder. They go on to say that since we can not kill, freedom is not determined by right, but by whatever society says we are free to do.

But this is silly and ridiculous. It is not society that forbids killing, but the other person’s right to their own life. So goes the saying “you are free to do anything you want as long as it doesn’t infringe on the rights of someone else.” Within your own rights, your freedom is absolute.

You have the right to the pursuit of happiness. This is SO IMPORTANT – the pursuit of happiness means your right to LIVE FOR YOURSELF and choose what private, personal, individual happiness means to you… And then have the freedom toward achieving it. Different things make different people happy. There is no one-size-fits-all life and our Founding Fathers knew it. We are all happiest and most creatively productive when we are let loose to run free with our minds and abilities.

This is no guarantee you will achieve happiness. No one can guarantee you that. But you can be allowed the freedom to decide what happiness means to you and go after it with all your might. If you’re wrong, you can change and go do something else. If you’re right, the world will be your oyster.

Where do your rights come from?

It’s not a law, or president, or king or society that gives us our rights. Rights don’t come from anywhere, they just ARE. You and I are human beings and our rights are required by conditions of our existence for our survival on this planet. If we are to live here, together, it is right for you to be free to use your mind, to act on your own free judgment, and to work for your values and keep the product of your work.

If living a happy life on this planet is your goal, then you have a right to live in this way. And any group, gang or government who tires to take these rights away from you is wrong. They are wrong and they are evil. They are against you living your life and must be stopped at all costs.

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And barely any of it actually works.

Well, I’ve solved this problem. Doing it my way will cost you around $88, with $50 of that being a one-time cost.

I used to keep wild hours that fluctuated weekly, if not daily. I could never seem to get to sleep at the same time every night, so I’d stay up later… which would screw me up for the next day and I’d feel horrible… then I’d go to bed too early (or too late) again… which would mess me up for the NEXT day, and on and on and on…

It was a vicious cycle that saw no end in sight. I couldn’t get any meaningful work done and never seemed to have enough time in the day to do the things that really mattered.

Until about 3 months ago, when I stumbled across some experiments that have literally changed my life.

Here’s your New Plan, all laid out nice and neat for ya:

Step 1. California Poppy Extract – Cost: $8.95/oz

Go to Vitacost.com and get a 1 oz bottle of California poppy extract. Before bed each night, put 20 drops in a cup and then put a little water in the cup. Just a LITTLE water – enough to swallow in one gulp. Swig it down and continue on to step 2. (California poppy extract will increase your deep wave sleep on average by around 20%)

Step 2. Almond Butter (I prefer Barney Butter – smooth – $7.72/jar) and Flax Oil – $16.89/bottle

Eating two tablespoons of organic almond butter on celery sticks before bed eliminated MOST of the mornings where I woke up feeling like shit. Ever wonder how you can sleep 8–10 hours and STILL feel tired? The likely culprit: low blood sugar. Make a pre-bed snack part of your nutritional program. One to two tablespoons of flaxseed oil (120–240 calories) can be used in combination with the celery-and-almond-butter to further increase cell repair during sleep and thus decrease fatigue.

Go see BarneyButter.com for the almond butter (12 pounds of the stuff just arrived at my doorstep the other day) and Vitacost.com for the flax oil (I get the 32 oz because I like bulk and it saves precious money)

Step 3. Cholesterol! (yay!) – Cost: depends

Eat at least 800 milligrams of cholesterol (about 4 or 5 large whole eggs) and 40 grams of protein within 3 hours of going to bed. This will allow you to go to sleep FASTER, and combined with the other steps basically knocking you out cold when it’s time to sleep.

Personally I do not eat eggs every night because good eggs are expensive when you eat that many all the time, so I’ve engineered my evening meal to contain the necessary protein (via chicken breast) and cholesterol to see me through the night.

Oh, and if you’re one of those fossils who still think cholesterol is bad, you need to do some reading up on HDL versus LDL cholesterol.

Step 4. Cold bath or shower – Cost: Free

Take a cold bath or shower 1 hour before bed. I didn’t believe this at first and resisted it… but after I actually started DOING it, the results are amazing.

Don’t fight me on this, just TRY it and you’ll see. Freeze yourself and prosper.

Step 5. Use a WakeMate – Cost: $50 one time

When it was first released to the public, I was among the first people to get a WakeMate. Basically the WakeMate is a little wristband you charge up during the day and wear during the night while you sleep. It monitors my movements while I sleep and then communicates via Bluetooth to my iPod Touch to wake me up at a time when I’m in a lighter phase of sleep and thus will be more likely FEEL BETTER the second I wake up.

I’ve been using it for about 45 days now, and I can say that IT WORKS. Get one. Despite some recent software bugs they’ve had lately (all of which have been fixed), the device and concept WORKS.

What you do is set an alarm for a time you want to wake up – then the WakeMate will use that time as a target to wake you up sometime within a 20 minute window, no later than that target time. You can also add tags to your night’s sleep so you can look back on your sleep history and see what sorts of variables affected your sleep positively or negatively.

The online “analytics” feature allows you to upload your sleep stats to your own account on the WakeMate website every morning so you can graph and analyze your sleep data over time. This has been VERY helpful for me to nail down exactly what is helping me and what isn’t.

Step 6. Sleep in a cool room – Cost: Free

Use a single bedsheet with room temp of 67 to 70 F – as low as 65 but test different socks to keep your feet warm. Lately I’ve been profiting from this colder winter by turning my central heat OFF and just letting the temperature do whatever it wants.

The results have been good, I’m saving heating bill money and I realize that I sleep better in a cold room as long as my feet and hands are warm and my blood is circulating well.

Side note: Taking cayenne pepper every day (40,000 BTU) lately has allowed me to let temperatures in my home reach what would normally be extremely uncomfortable levels. In fact it’s so cold in here right now, no one else can stand it! No one but me of course. With all the things I’m doing and experiments I’m running, my body is generating so much excess heat that I actually feel like I need ICE PACKS on my neck in 65 degree rooms! This is awesome and combining this with what I’m doing to make my testosterone levels skyrocket makes me feel like some kind of superhuman who can melt stuff with his eyes… or… something like that

Step 7. Wake up with (natural) UV light shining in your face – Cost: Free

We are evolutionarily programmed to respond to and feel AWAKE and ALERT when the sun comes up and hits our face in the morning. But so many people (me included) live in houses and apartments that are shut off from natural sources of light by curtains, shades, etc.

You must make certain you do NOT wake up each morning in a DARK room! That is very bad for your brain, because you’re essentially “tricking” your mind into still thinking it’s night time, thus your mind will keep you groggy and sleepy.

But when you start waking up to real UV light, you will train your body back into its natural habit of revving your engines to start the day. Combined with all the other stuff on this list, you’ll feel ready to go INSTANTLY when you wake up. Gone will be the “yawn, stretch, think about going back to bed, slog outta bed, etc” phase and you’ll hop out of the sheets and get moving right away. Also, this will help you go to sleep much faster the following night.

The source of your UV light doesn’t have to be natural sunlight but it helps. A good alternative are those little lights they use to treat SAD (seasonal affective disorder.) They are high-end blue light emitters and work just as good.

And there you have it; 7 real life steps I personally follow every day that have changed how I sleep and how I feel every day, thus truly changing my life and allowing me to get more done and feel better about it.

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They are responsible for a huge chunk of our economy. Many are run by good, courageous heroes who are on their way to bigger and better things in life. However, many are run by fools, and will stay small and insignificant for the rest of their pathetic days.

Small mind = small business, unless you are limiting your growth by lifestyle choice or pure laziness.

In any event, you will inevitably have to deal with many of these people on YOUR way to bigger people and better opportunity. Some will help you get to your goals faster. But the idiot small businessman is an automatic dead end. Unless you know how to handle him, he will rise up from his little swamp, wrap his slimy arms around you and drag you back down to the depths from which he came.

You’ll choke, suffocate, and drown in his puddle of half-baked business ideas, wildly inaccurate visions of reality, unrealistic profit projections, and total lack of proper funding.

This is preventable and avoidable. I’ve dealt with so many of these guys in the past 10 years I’ve now created a set of rules that weeds them out permanently – fast and forever.

Here then is my own personal set of rules I consider before I get involved with ANY new business deal or venture:

Rule #1. NEVER deal with anyone who is broke. Period.

If they have no money, run. Simple as that. People who are serious about their business ventures and passions will find a way to get the necessary funding and be prudent about its use. If they have no money and haven’t risked anything trying to get some, then you should write them off as dreamers who need to get their head screwed on straight.

What’s more is people with no money tend to have scarcity mindsets that cause them to make BAD decisions much more frequently than someone who knows he’ll have enough to eat and have a house for the next 3 months. The person who is comfortable financially will make more calm, rational decisions, especially when under pressure.

Bad small business people also typically create projects in which the cash flow is either undefined or so far into the future as to be unknowable. Only get involved in projects that can SCALE. That means they’ll make a small amount of money almost immediately and then be able to grow revenue from there by expanding the efforts. Special Note: I don’t mean profitable almost immediately, I just mean somebody needs to be paying for something the project produces within a short period of time. There needs to be revenue. Real money needs to exchange hands. This keeps people realistic and gives you something to work with.

As Gary Halbert always said, “You can’t multiply zeroes.”

Rule #2. Ask for 3 people who have done business with them before, who would do so again.

If the person you are considering working with can’t produce the names and phone numbers of 3 people who have done business with them before, who would do so again, that should set off more Red Alerts in your mind than a nuclear attack. Something is definitely wrong here.

And if they don’t have 3 people who would deal with them again… guess what? YOU’RE NOT GOING TO BE THE FIRST. Life is too short to experiment with your own livelihood in this way. People typically do what they’ve always done and if this guy is a screwup or a cheat, he’s going to treat you the same way.

This one simple rule will eliminate most of the bullshit in your business life. (Now if I could just get women to produce 3 letters of recommendation from 3 guys who would date them again, we’d be rockin’ HA!)

Rule #3. NEVER take ownership “sweat equity” as your only compensation

Early in my career, I broke this rule often and it was ALWAYS to my peril. One sure sign of a joker businessman with a bullshit project is how willing he is to throw around “ownership” but how UNwilling he is to part with any actual green, spendable dollars.

You need to arrange the deal to where you get paid SOMETHING, even if the project is a complete failure… which it probably will be. YOU MUST ALWAYS COME OUT AHEAD, WIN OR LOSE. Stack the deck in your favor from Day-1. You should not have to suffer for his own bad judgement and lack of foresight.

That’s not to say you should never take ownership equity. In the off chance the project actually succeeds, you don’t want to be kicking yourself for not taking a piece of the action. So yes, get as much as you can, but never take ownership as your ONLY form of compensation.

Which reminds me…

Rule #4. Get paid SOMETHING up front

I can’t be any more clear than that. Make sure you get paid real, spendable money up front. The more you get him to pay, the more he will personally invest in you and the project and therefore the more successful the project is likely to be.

This goes hand-in-hand with the “never deal with anyone who is broke” rule. When people pay for something, they value it more than if they got it for free. I run into this all the time in the information business. There is a lot of information and resources out there that are free… but hardly anyone uses them because “since they’re free, they’re can’t be as good as this other more expensive option” – even if people don’t think that consciously, it’s going on somewhere in their minds.

Likewise, people will respect and value you and your time more when they pay you more money. They have more invested and they’re more serious about making the relationship work.

Rule #5. Ideally, arrange for small monthy payments

Sometimes you’ll find it lucrative to get involved with a businessman who is competant, knowledgeable, and has money, but just not a LOT of money. Instead of asking for some larger sum up front (and lose him because he cannot pay), in this case what you should do is arrange for smaller monthly payments to be made to you – preferably by his credit card.

If he balks at this, get suspicious. Explain to him that even though this monthly amount is much less than your normal rate, the retainer keeps you on staff and available for action and advice. And during the months that he does not “use” you, the recurring payment makes up for any money you would normally get, but spread out over time to MAKE IT EASIER ON HIM.

Keywords there. You’re doing this because it “makes it easier on him” because you “want to work with him” but still “need to get compensated for input in the meantime until the project launches.” Of course in reality this is to benefit you too because he will most likely forget about the monthly payments ticking away on his credit card, gracefully blended in along with his strip club visits and a ton of other monthly payments he racked up and forgot about. And another reason you want it on his credit card instead of payment by check is because he never actually SEES the money leaving his hands each month so therefore it is LESS REAL to him. It’s also automatic which means he has to confront you to NOT pay you, which if he’s a chickenshit, will most likely not do.

Rule #6. NEVER take advice from someone who makes less than you do at the same goals you’re trying to accomplish

There are many non-expert experts out there who love to hand out bad advice.

There are people who will tell you how to make money on the internet and when you go look at their website, its a piece of turd that gets no traffic at all when you examine the traffic statistics. (Even worse, they expect you to not notice this or too dumb to notice it themselves, which is even more damning to their credibility.)

There are graphic designers out there who say they know how to create the best product packaging, the best websites, whatever – and many of them haven’t sold a damn thing in their lives.

And finally, among the worst in my opinion are investment advisors and financial planners who AREN’T RICH (they SHOULD be if their advice was any good), real estate agents who are timid terrible negotiators, and bankers who don’t even understand their own business.

A good example: Very often whenever I go in to my bank, the teller sees that I have extra money and tries to get me in to see one of their investment advisors. I usually say “no thanks”, do my business and leave. One time I said “sure lets see what they can do.”

First question I asked was “Are you or your family rich? Or at the very least, do you have what you would consider to be ‘a lot of money’ at your personal disposal?” Of course the answer was various excuses and flavors of “no.” Then why would I want to invest my money with someone who himself isn’t where I want to be in life? The purpose of investing is to make the highest return in the least amount of time while keeping the principal safe. If they can’t do that for themselves, they sure as hell ain’t gonna do it for me. I left his office by adding, “The main reason I have the extra money in the first place is because I stay the hell away from ‘investments’ like the kind you promote.”

Then I said “poppycock”, looked at the time on my pocketwatch, adjusted the monocle in my eye, and marched off gripping my lapels. (Not really.)

Rule #7. Chuck ‘em like an empty soda can as soon as it’s clear they’ve lost all commercial value

Sometimes good, well-intentioned projects go south. Fast.

It can be anyones fault, but the result is always the same; the project, idea, relationship has taken an irreparable turn for the worse and therefore has lost all commercial value to you.

That’s why you need to keep one hand on the ripcord to your Golden Parachute at all times. Winners are winners because they cut their losses short and let their profits run. Losers do the opposite. Don’t stick around and beat a dead horse; have that backup plan ready, pull your ripcord and FLY AWAY. Fly away to somewhere, anywhere else.

At the heart of it, this is a relationship with a commercial purpose. That purpose was to enrich you and anyone else involved on the project. But now it is headed for an inevitable crash. And commercial relationships need to be treated coldly and calculating so that no one loses sight of what reality actually is. Cut it off at the knees.

“But,” you might ask, “how would I know if it is just a temporary problem or that some inevitably fatal error or flaw has been made or discovered?”

That is where confidence in your own business knowledge, competancy, and ability to reason come into play. You have to sharpen these skills every day or they’ll start to get dull. You’ll never know when you’ll need them.

So read the works a lot of (real) experts who have already been where you want to go, study the past history of your busness and industry, and keep a pulse on what’s happening now and into the future. Be amazing. Because only the strong survive. And only the strong should.

As an extra piece of advice and probably THE most important rule of success I can give to you: Never… ever… EVER… allow yourself to be put into a position of need. That is my personal #1 rule. Because when you need something (be it money, a home, or even a boyfriend/girlfriend/wife/husband) then you will always be at the mercy of someone else. You’ll be under their power. Your personal power will be limited. Some part of you will be controlled.

The man who does not “need” the business deal to happen, holds all the cards.

The man who does not “need” the bank loan, is free to buy whatever home he chooses however fast he chooses. (And if he chooses a loan anyway, he can get one at the best terms with least hassle.)

The man who does not “need” a woman to feel like a whole human being, can attract the higher value women in the area and choose from them those which he enjoys most.

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One day he was exploring the 804 area code in Virginia and discovered the strangest thing. Every time he dialed up any number on the 840 exchange, he’d get a recording as if the exchange didn’t exist. However, if he dialed 804-840- and then 4 rather predictable numbers, a lonely ring sounded on the other end.

After a few seconds, somebody picked up.

Being the experienced phone enthusiast he was, he could tell the call didn’t “supervise”, meaning, no charges were being incurred for calling this number. He knew calls that get you an error message or some special operator generally don’t supervise.

A female voice, with a hint of Southern accent said, “Operator, can I help you?”

“Yes,” he said. “What number have I reached?”

“What number did you dial, sir?”

He made up a number that was similar.

“I’m sorry, that’s not the number you reached.” Click.

Fascinating. What in the hell was this? He knew he was going to call back, but before he did, some info-gathering experiments were in order. He tried the 840 exchange in several other area codes. In some, it came up as a valid exchange. In others, exactly the same thing happened – the same last four digits, the same Southern belle. Even stranger, the areas it worked in seemed to travel in a beeline from Washington, D.C. to Pittsburgh, PA.

He called back from a payphone. “Operator, can I help you?”

“Yes, this is the phone company. I’m testing this line and we don’t seem to have an identification on your circuit. What office is this, please?”

“What number are you trying to reach?”

“I’m not trying to reach any number. I’m trying to identify this circuit.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t help you.”

“Ma’am, if I don’t get an ID on this line, I’ll have to disconnect it. We show no record of it here.”

“Hold on a moment, sir.”

After about a minute, she came back. “Sir, I can have someone speak to you. Would you give me your number, please?”

He had anticipated this and he had the payphone number ready. After he gave it, she said, “Mr. XXX will get right back to you.”

“Thanks.” He hung up the phone. It rang. …Instantly! “Oh my God,” he thought, “they weren’t asking for my number – they were confirming it!”

“Hello,” he said, trying to sound authoritative.

“This is Mr. XXX. Did you just make an inquiry to my office concerning a phone number?”

“Yes. I need an identi—“

“What you need is advice.” The man almost spat the words, “Don’t ever call that number again. Don’t even think about calling that number again. Forget you ever knew it.”

At this point our friend got so nervous he just hang up. He expected the phone to ring back again… but it didn’t.

Over the next few days he racked his brains trying to figure out what this creepy number was. He knew it was something big – that was for certain. But what? It was so big, the number was programmed into every central office in the country. He knew this because if he tried to dial any other number in that exchange, he’d get a local error message from his central office, as if the exchange didn’t exist.

Finally, it came to him. He had an uncle who worked in a federal agency. He had a feeling that this was government related, and… if it was… his uncle could probably get to the bottom of it. He asked the next day and his uncle promosed to look into the matter.

The next time he saw his uncle, something was wrong. He was visibly trembling. “Where did you get that number?!” he shouted. “Do you know I almost got FIRED for asking about it?!? They kept wanting to know where I got it!”

Our friend couldn’t contain his excitement. “What is it?” he pleaded. “What’s the number?!”

“It’s the President’s bomb shelter!”

He never called the number again. He figured he could probably cause quite a stir by calling with a line like, “The weather’s not good in Washington. We’re coming over for a visit.” But our friend was smart. He knew there were some things that were better left unsaid… and undone.

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Seriously.

Not even a sniffle.

It was at least 12 years ago since I had a cold and even longer since I came down with the flu. And except for a couple checkups, I haven’t been to the doctor in a decade.

Normally I don’t think about stuff like this, but looking over my notes today I was reminded of an old blog post written by my friend Jason where he talked about how a lot of people have commented to me that I’m “lucky” or that “nothing bad ever happens” to me. Sickness and disease are often among those “bad things” they mention.

Well, I need to set the record straight: bad things happen to me all the time. The only reason most people don’t notice is because I’m often fairly well prepared when Lady Fate drops by to sprinkle some shit on my parade.

Like a hitman silently slitting the President’s throat, it is preparation and prevention that lets me deal with my problems quickly, quietly and without fuss.

Since nature trapped us in these damn bodies of ours, we’d better take good care of them for as long as possible. Even if you’re a worshiped genius who uses $100-dollar-bills as toilet paper, life’s no fun when you’re fat, sick, and ugly.

So here are 3 things that slimmed me up, sculpted my body, and beefed my immune system into a cigar-chomping badass motherfucker.

#1.General Eating Habits

I eat two low-calorie meals per day. In rare cases when I’m especially hungry, the third meal is always very small. And since they’re usually the same, I never have to worry about portion sizes, fat, cholesterol, or any of that other nonsense. Template the meals once and never worry about them again.

My main food mostly consists of 90% lean beef (with the remaining 10% almost entirely cooked out by my Flavorwave infrared oven), sometimes Alaskan salmon, sided with vegetables like corn, green beans and spinach. Sometimes I swap out the meat with a small helping of Stouffer’s Meat Lasagna. I never snack in between meals or in front of the TV.

You might think I’d get tired of this after awhile. But in 4 years, that has never happened. Why? Well, I discovered that if you eat only when you’re absolutely starving, you train your body to a Pavlov’s dog-like response to the welcome relief the meal inevitably brings. That way, you’re always satisfied.

When I eat alone, I usually do not drink while eating. Doing that weakens the stomach acids and makes it more difficult for your body to digest the food. So I do my “heavy drinking” after the meal and throughout the day. I’ve found green tea (with lemon juice added to increase absorption), MateVana, and Samurai Chai to be the best drinks. They’re all either low-calorie or no-calorie and the latter two jumpstart your brain similar to coffee, but without the jitters and unhealthy side effects. I never put additives in my drinks.

After eating in the morning, I then mix up a glass of whole milk (yes, whole) into a chocolate whey protein shake, which gives me an added boost of about 26 grams of protein and a few more calories. This is also the drink I use to wash down my buckshot load of nutritional supplements that we’ll talk about here in a minute.

Then I pour a mug of tea and get to work.

By the way, have you ever looked at the whole milk label? It’s not that much different than 2%. One of my friends thought for years “whole milk” meant something like “100%” or some other obscenely high number. No no no… whole milk is about “3 1/2%” – only 3 more grams of fat and 20 more calories per serving. Hardly the heart-stopper many believe. Still, why whole milk? Because that’s how it comes out of the cow. In other words, it hasn’t been messed with as much as the other milks. Skim milk is “ok” but I find it too watery for my liking. Surprisingly, Sam’s Club sells good milk guaranteed to have no hormones or any other crap in it… for about $2.20 per gallon. (Aside: Funny how right next door at Walmart, the milk DOES have hormones, costs more, and tastes worse… incredible how screwed people are when they don’t want to pay the $45 annual membership fee.)

As for alcohol, I seldom drink. When I do, it’s usually wine which has about 12-18% alcohol. At that level, the worst case scenario is you get a little loopy after downing a bottle. It’s the easy-going, fun kind of loopy. No big deal. The hard stuff leaves a dry-as-dust trail of fire down the throat, makes you look and feel like shit, and wrecks your body over time – not fun. The only mixed drink I really like is the White Russian or Irish Cream.

#2. Nutritional Supplements

Our bodies are just one big chemical cocktail. A chemistry experiment that doesn’t function properly without the right molecules floating around in the right places.

That’s why I’m big on supplements. You can’t get all the weird mix of stuff your body needs just by eating the food you find at the store. Even if you’re rich and buy all the best stuff, it’s still damn near impossible. There’s a lot of reasons for that, but it has a lot to do with how our food is grown and processed these days and also because you can’t possibly scarf enough of all the stuff you’d have to eat to get every single nutrient.

That’s why it’s good to supplement. Here’s a complete list of what I take every day:

500 mcg B12 (in liquid spray form) – This is AWESOME for energy. If you’re a slug in the morning, start taking this and you won’t even have to “wake up” – you’ll hop right out of bed, ready to do whatever.

5,000 to 10,000 IU Vitamin D3 – This makes depressed people happy, boosts the immune system and helps with tons of diseases, including all kinds of cancer and many virii. Your body makes a certain amount of vitamin D whenever you’re exposed to the sun, but many of the soaps people use when bathing cause it to leave the skin before it has time to be carried away by the bloodstream. Also since most people work indoors, they’re never exposed to the right amount of sunlight for it to do them any good. Certain people (me included) get depressed in the winter time for lack of sunlight. Supplementing with D3 solves these problems.

2,000 mg Vitamin C - I shouldn’t have to tell you about vitamin C. You should already know how much ass it kicks, but you probably aren’t getting enough of it. I’ve found 2,000 mg (that’s 2 grams) per day to be the ideal for me. I used to have a problem with bleeding gums whenever I brushed my teeth, but since I started doin’ C, I have healthy strong gums. This one alone is also a major factor into never catching cold or getting the flu. Hell, I can even hang around sick people and not get anything. You betcha.

Misc assortment of B1, B2, B6 - The additional B vitamins link up the nervous system with the rest of your body and helps it all communicate with one another. This solves a bunch of muscle issues and boosts your energy even more.

1 standard multi vitamin with everything - There are a lot of trace minerals that are hard to get in food and expensive to buy separate supplements for, so a good gel-cap multi-vitamin is a one-stop-shop to cover all the miscellaneous B.S.

800 IU Vitamin E - Actually this is the only supplement I take where I’ve not noticed any sort of tangible benefit. There was some study published awhile back where they said vitamin E made people slightly more likely to die sooner, but then some doctors called bullshit on the study citing bias, incomplete facts, and an inherent flaw in the study itself. So who knows? The only reason I still take it is because the bottle isn’t empty.

Calcium, Magnesium and Zinc combo - Now THIS one is awesome. Taking these 3 separately won’t do you nearly as good as taking them all at the same time. That’s because they all rely on and enhance each other in various ways. The calcium is great for bone-strength, the magnesium keeps the calcium from turning into arthritis (and a lot of other good benefits) and the zinc… well, let’s just say the zinc helps certain parts of a man’s body perform with absolute reliability and precision

2,600 mg Flaxseed oil - Flax seed is a great source of omega-3 fatty acids, which help your brain perform at its best and antioxidants help slow down the oxidation process that slowly damages your cells over time and eventually kills you… literally. The more we can slow down this oxidation process, the longer we’ll live and the better we’ll feel while doing it.

3,000 mg Fish oil - More antioxidants and omega-3′s. Actually now I’ve replaced my traditional fish oil with a mixture of several oils (including fish oil) that provide omega-3, 6, and 9 all in one.

1,200 mg Sun Chlorella - These are weird little green crumbly bits of a type of single-cell plant organism grown from freshwater green algae. It contains tons of amino acids, vitamins, and minerals. Awesome little plant. Helped improve my mood and clean out my digestive system when I first started taking it.

26 extra grams of protein via shake - I already talked about this one in the food section above. The extra protein from whey builds muscle much faster when combined with a good workout. Actually this 26 grams is pretty small compared to what I should be taking if I were more serious about bodybuilding. I’ve heard some meatheads say to inhale the same number of grams of protein as your body weight per day. So if you weigh 150 pounds, you take 150 grams of protein.

All that may sound like a lot to you, but this is real life and most people don’t even get a fraction of what they need. A lot of young people (up to age 34) eat junk and don’t notice many side effects, so they think it’s fine… but the only reason their body can handle the malnutrition is because they’re so young. Soon enough the body will cough, wheeze, and choke they’ll end up like everyone else on death row who thought prevention was for saps.

Right now I’m considering adding a few more things to my list because recently I read this:

The biggest breakthrough in anti-aging medicine in our lifetime involves telomere biology.

Each time your cells divide, they copy your DNA to make the new cell. But the telomeres – the sections of DNA at both ends of a chromosome – get shorter with every copy. And the shorter your telomeres are, the “older” the cell acts.

Once the telomeres get to their shortest length, your cells can no longer divide, and damaged or diseased cells aren’t replaced. This causes a chain reaction that weakens your tissues and organs. And that can only lead to disease… and, ultimately, death.

Fortunately, there are some ways to start to slow down the rate at which your telomeres are shortening right now…

1. Lower your homocysteine levels. According to a report in the journal Atherosclerosis, high levels of this amino acid can shorten your telomeres as much as 3 times faster.

I help my patients lower their homocysteine levels by having them supplement daily with the following:

Vitamin B12 – 500 mcg
Folic acid – 800 mcg
Vitamin B6 – 25 mg
Riboflavin (B2) – 25 mg
TMG (trimethylglycine) – 500 mg

You can find these supplements at your local health food store. If you don’t want to take them all separately, you can use the same formula I give my patients.

2. Take vitamin C. This inexpensive supplement is a powerful antioxidant. And recent studies – including one reported in the journal Life Sciences – show it can slow telomere shortening by over 50 percent. I recommend 2,000 mg per day to my patients.

3. Take SOD. Besides protecting your cells from the damage of toxins and stress, SOD (superoxide dismutase) has been shown to slow the rate of telomere shortening. I recommend 500 mg a day. You can find it at your local health food store. Or you can check out my formula, which contains SOD as well as other potent cell protectors.

All men should be taking 200 mcg of selenium and at least 200 IU of vitamin E daily.

Hmm, so I guess vitamin E isn’t so worthless after all.

#3. Workouts

The building I live in right now has a full-blown gym in the basement, so I like to sneak down there late at night when sane people are asleep to do cardio and pump iron.

What I’ve learned is if you’re going to do cardio, do HARD cardio for shorter periods of time instead of lighter cardio for longer periods of time. In other words, it’s MUCH better for your body to bust your butt for 15 minutes than it is to walk long distances. Walking or running long distances when its easy will actually do more wear and tear on your body over time with less health benefit.

So what I do is a quick mile to a mile and a half on an incline while carrying weights and swinging my arms back and forth naturally. This SUCKS when you first start out, but after about a week it gets a lot easier.

Then I do leg and arm curls, bench press, sit-ups, pullups, and several other kinds of weights to top everything off. Recently I also got the P90X workout DVDs to help me with a good stretching routine, some Yoga, and more hardcore ways of strengthening my body. The whole goal of that system is to vary the workout enough where the muscle development never plateaus, leaving you with a straight line of growth.

Overall, I’m sure there are a few tweaks I could make to my system. But after 4 years of testing… everything I’ve described here really does work wonders for me. It keeps me in shape, healthy, and of course… I never get sick.

If you have any sort of weight or health problem, maybe it would help you too. Give it a try and find out.

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1. Blatant Indicators of Positive Reputation Beat Subtle Luxury

Consider a face-off between the Toyota Prius and… a stylish Lexus.

Even Lucifer Himself couldn’t make me drive a dorky Prius.

But a recent split-test between these 2 cars revealed that when shopping in public, people are willing to spend more on a product they don’t really want as long as it makes them look like positive contributors to the greater good of society.

When the whole world’s looking (and can see the “green” eco-conscious logo) people buy the doe-eyed Prius. Then as you lock ‘em up in a room with no one to judge, they turn into me… a shameless consumer of pretentious luxury. The heated steering wheel. The baby seal skin leather seats. Plumes of toxic exhaust from a rumbling engine. Sickeningly delicious cheeseburgers in non-biodegradable containers.

Oh yes. We consumers are a dastardly lot.

And for the same reason, this is why clothes and other products with big, blatant logos sell better than those with more concealed identities:

Louis Vuitton’s classic “LV” on their bags. Abercrombie & Fitch’s garish tags. Polo Ralph Lauren’s pony. Apple’s glowing chrome apple.

People seek out the brands that best display their own particular set of personality traits. Regardless of what “flavor of the month” personality analysis books you may have read (not your fault, publishers barf up more of them than any sane person can handle), all human traits can be summed up as a measure of these 6 characteristics:

• General Intelligence - generally, how smart you are

• Openness - how receptive you are to new people and ideas

• Conscientiousness - your self-control, willpower, reliability, consistency, dependability

• Agreeableness - your level of warmth, kindness, sympathy, empathy, trust, compliance, modesty

• Stability – your ability to maintain control of emotions, deal with stress, ability to adapt

• Extraversion - how talkative, funny, expressive, assertive, socially confident you are

This model has been consistently proven to work over the past 40-some years. Like a delicate radio, all of us are tuned to different settings of the six. Different combinations make the difference between the neighborhood axe murderer and your Aunt Betsy. In all, there are 729 different personality types – which is one of the many reasons you won’t find a ton of experts on this topic.

I’ll write more on this advanced market segmentation in upcoming posts, but for now just understand the prime motivators for most purchases are rooted in a desire to express indicators of specific settings of the “Central Six” characteristics. That’s why there’s a market for so many different brands… we’ve got hundreds of personalities to display.

2. People Will Love & Respect You More If You’re Magical

Traditionally we as marketers are taught to “find out what a market wants and deliver it to them profitably”… but Apple Inc is one good example of a company who behaves differently.

Until Steve Jobs releases the new JesusPhone or whatever, no one has a clue what he’s up to. Mere mortals can only guess. And that’s precisely the allure of his mystique.

Nerds over at UCLA did a test where subjects read 2 equally positive performance reports. Employee A was praised for particular skills like “aptitude with numbers” while employee B just kinda “has a way of making things happen.” In another one, a CEO was praised for “long hours and loyalty” and the other for “insight and vision.”

In both tests, people preferred to work with the guy who’d achieved success via mysterious powers. Not only that, but people also wanted to hug him more and get “lucky” gifts from him.

What this means to you and me is it’s a good thing to not let lesser mortals peek behind your curtain. No one needs to know the wizard isn’t wearing any pants as long as you get the job done and perform with excellence.

Back in high school is when I first discovered the benefits of shrouded secrecy. My ninja skills with computers went purposely unexplained. Once I was called out of an important exam to rescue the principal from digital doom. When asked about the exam, my biology teacher shooed me away saying “Oh nevermind that Greg, you’ll get an A anyway.” Back then I had free reign of the halls and senior year no one even batted an eye if didn’t show up until afternoon.

These days, similar things happen to me because of Pay Per Click (PPC) marketing. It’s amazing what people will do for you if you can work some voodoo on their campaigns that cuts their cost per sale to 25-50% of what it was.

There’s a question traded among marketers with a wink of the eye that goes, “So how many years did it take for you to become an overnight success?”

I love that because it’s so true. You hammer away at a skill for years, seemingly without benefit, and then… one day… the planets align and BOOM you’re a hit.

Another way to say it is “Success is when preparation meets opportunity.” That’s the key thing that makes you look magical to others.

3. Fast Food & Big Tobacco’s Dirty Little Marketing Secret

It’s fairly common knowledge that the larger the plate, the bigger the bowl, or the bulkier the package… people will consume more.

But what you may not know is the mere presence of healthy options on a menu (or the warning sign on a pack of cigarettes) can make people snarf down more junk than ever.

They call it “menu mentality” – the pleasant industry discovery that adding healthier food options to a menu keeps the bureaucrats and medical-types at bay, while satisfying the customer’s guilty conscience, thus… giving them the mental green light to order whatever the hell they want.

One of the most important things in the universe to understand about people is just because they CAN do something doesn’t mean they WILL.

Add salads and grilled chicken to the menu and… like magic… you get more orders for burgers and fries. Label a bag as “low fat”, “low carb”, or “low-cal” and you get more sales. And this is important: You get more sales not because more people buy your stuff, BUT BECAUSE THE SAME PEOPLE BUY MORE OF IT MORE OFTEN!

This, once again, is my favorite subject at work: segmentation. People will do what they will do. Always and without exception.

Take a moment to re-read that again. People will do what they will do. Always and without exception. The implications of that are more profound than you can possibly imagine at first glance.

If we want to influence people positively, we must be draconian and remove all undesirable options from the table. Instead of a choice between “healthy” and “unhealthy” we change the game to “healthy” and… “healthy.”

This is also why school lunch programs will continue to breed fatties until pizza, chips, and soda are gone completely. But that won’t happen. Why? Because people will do what they will do.

Several schools I read about who tried this had parents (and kids) in a literal riot. Picket signs, yelling, screaming, fighting. Desperate parents snuck twinkies to kids through the chain-link metal fence at recess in an act of defiance.

No exaggeration.

You might dismiss this example as ridiculous, but wait:

Parents did this because they’re part of a segment – a segment of society that will find a way to eat crap no matter what you do to stop them.

You can’t change that with mere rules. They will find a way around the rules. You can’t offer alternative options. They will ignore those options. They will have their cream filling and jiggly tummy. And to hell with you and your hard body and steamed vegetables.

I used this food example because it’s something most of us can read with a smile. But the same goes for any segment of a population. There’s a segment of people who drink alcohol (prohibition didn’t work). A segment who smoke (warning labels and PSA’s don’t work). A segment who like marijuana (even though it’s illegal in most countries, anyone who wants it can still get some within a very short period of time).

People will do what they will do. More on that powerful concept another time.

4. Product Placements Only Work When The Plot Depends On The Product

Three things were huge in 1982: video games, the movie ET, and Reese’s Pieces candy.

The latter 2 were no accident. When Steven Spielberg approached the Mars Company (M&M’s) to have their product featured in the film, they turned him away. That’s when Hershey stepped in and offered Reese’s Pieces. Sales of the candy tripled within 7 days of ET’s debut and over 800 theaters all across the country started stocking Reese’s Pieces for the first time.

Or take Tom Cruise. In the early 80′s, sales of Ray-Ban sunglasses were flat and the company struggled to make ends meet. After Risky Business, sales rose 50% and another 40% when Top Gun came out. Sales of aviator jackets surged and Navy recruitment soared 500%!

Product placement is powerful, but like most things, people tend to screw it up when they don’t know what they’re doing.

A more recent example is the James Bond movie, Die Another Day. As far as James Bond movies go, this one is considered by many aficionados (me included) to be the worst of the lot. Part of it was because of the shallow reliance on technology and part of it was because they featured 23 brands inside 123 minutes. Some critics called it “Buy Another Day.”

Casino Royale did infinitely better, but many brands went unnoticed. Why?

Well, as any Bond fan knows, the British MI6 agent is mainly known by these products:

• Walther PPK gun

• Omega watch (formerly Rolex in the old originals)

• Smirnoff Vodka Martini

• Bentley, Aston Martin, and BMW cars

• Clothes designed by Tom Ford (more recently)

• Casino games, especially baccarat

The only reason these became synonymous with Bond is because of their integration into fascinating story plots over the course of many years. When James briefly drives a Ford car rental to get to a hotel or sends a package FedEx, no one gives a shit.

But we remember how tough it was for Bond to give up his Beretta for the new (and better) PPK. We remember the times it saved his life. We remember the vodka martini he orders from Dr. No as it slowly dawns in him the drink might be his last. And we remember the little saw blade and laser Q Branch outfitted in his watch to cut rope or melt metal.

These are meaningful product placements. Mindless cameos will be forgotten.

If you enjoyed our little romp through Marketing Land today, you won’t want to miss upcoming posts on my site… there’s lots more crowd manipulation magic where this came from.

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