success is...

At age 4, success is...not peeing in your pants.
   At age 12, success is...having friends.
     At age 16, success is...having a driver's license.
       At age 20, success is...having sex.
        At age 35, success is...having money.
        At age 50, success is...having money.
       At age 60, success is...having sex.
     At age 70, success is...having a driver's license.
   At age 75, success is...having friends.
At age 90, success is...not peeing in your pants.

Squid... Who?

I've a confession to make - I've only just now made my first lens on Squidoo.

Till now I've kept away from social networking sites on principle, because I believed they were just that - social. It's not that I don't like being social, but there are more than enough distractions when you work online, and I'd heard all sorts of tales of how much time people can spend exploring them, so I thought I was being very virtuous in keeping well away.

Well, now I've found a perfect excuse. One of the very few people whose advice on Internet marketing I actually trust sent me an e-mail recently that gently told me off for having so far failed to recognize how good a social network site can be for getting your message out to the world.

(His name's Paul Myers, by the way, and if you have any interest whatsoever in marketing online his TalkBiz News e-zine is the place to be.)

So, I checked out networking... and found myself lens-building on Squidoo.

In case there's anyone else who hasn't tried this, it's great fun. A lens is just another name for a web page that's actually hosted on Squidoo itself. You start off with a template and add the modules that you want to use - and the words you want to say.

You can make as many lenses as there are subjects that you have an interest in, and you can link them all together so that in effect you have an extra website.

You can make a lens for pleasure or for profit, to raise awareness or to highlight a good cause. You can link it to your website. You can link it to your blog. You can link it up with Amazon, or show a video from YouTube. You can use it to get traffic - you can use it to make friends.

The folks at Squidoo even give you loads of advice on how to set it up to get the best results from it, and free tools to help you to promote it.

Well, my first lens is now up there with the others. It's about success, of course - what it really is, why it's so important to you, the process that you need to follow to achieve it, and the skills you need to make Supreme Success your own. If you'd like to take a look, it's at http://www.squidoo.com/supreme-success/ - hope you enjoy it.

Making Squidoo lenses is addictive. I'm looking forward very much to making more of them... and, of course, I can always tell myself I'm really working.

Welcome To The Celtic Cup

Further to yesterday's soccer post, I'm pleased to say a new competition has been announced. Seeing that Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales are all out of next year's Euro 2008 championship, they've taken some positive action and agreed to start a new tournament, the Celtic Cup, instead.

Now that England's in the same situation, they have to make a quick decision on whether they want to rebuild their shattered self-esteem by joining in.

I hope they do. If they don't, they're not scheduled to play another competitive international before next autumn. The commentators on Wednesday night repeatedly described them as playing like strangers. That's a situation that a year's absence from playing together as a team is hardly likely to improve.

Come on, boys - the fans are starving for success. The run-up to the World Cup starts right here, right now.

An Exercise In Logic?

Only 20% of women in the UK take enough exercise to benefit their health. So says the Women's Sport and Fitness Foundation, in a call for a public debate on how to persuade more women to take exercise.

Women, apparently, are put off taking exercise by their experience of sport in school (that, I can thoroughly understand!), and "need much better rôle models than the wives and girlfriends of football stars". Well, till shopping joins the ranks of the Olympic sports, they've probably got that right, too.

The perfect rôle models to encourage women to take part in sports and to take up the fitness training that demands, you might imagine, would be the female soccer stars who recently took part in the World Cup. It was held in China just a few weeks ago, and the English team deservedly reached the last 8.

What a pity, then, that it's also been announced this morning that for each day they were involved in the competition, each member of the team has been paid... £40.

That's less than $80 - and it means that the team's fitness level's dropping fast.

Instead of doing their usual amount of training, the women are spending extra time at work, trying to make up their lost earnings.

The governing body of women's soccer, the Football Association, says that investment in the women's game has never been higher. Maybe so - but high enough to attract women into a sport that demands healthy eating, a lot of dedication, a vast amount of time spent training, a lot of traveling and some serious hard work both on and off the pitch?

I don't think so. In fact, if it effectively involves them in financial penalties as well, any potential gains in raising the profile of the sport are probably already lost.

Maybe someone should be looking at some ways to attract far-sighted sponsors who can see the health and the commercial benefits of women's soccer, or maybe the Football Association could look at the amounts of money "earned" by Premiership clubs and players - some of whom occasionally claim to be "too tired" to play - and make sure that the funding they're responsible for is fairly allocated.

Maybe it's something that the Government's Minister for Sport might like to take a look at. After all, no-one's asking for a fortune to be spent on women's football - just to make sure the women who take part in it aren't actually penalized for their success.

Perhaps the first thing that needs exercising is some common sense.

Meeting The Terracotta Men

If you're in or anywhere near London in the next few weeks, I can thoroughly recommend a visit to the British Museum's exhibit of some of China's terracotta men.

In case you don't know the background to them (I must admit I didn't until recently), they're just a few of the estimated eight thousand lifesize figures buried with Ying Zheng, China's first emperor, in about 230 BC, apparently as servants to cater for his needs in the next world.

They weren't seen again until a chance discovery in 1974 unearthed a few of them, and so far about 1,000 have turned up.

A dozen of them are currently on show at the museum, and the best part of the whole thing is, you can get close to them... actually walk up to them and look them in the eye. It's a very strange experience, and really moving - and they're not at all the way I'd pictured them.

I'd imagined they'd be... well, just terracotta figures, with nothing much more special than their story to recommend them.

I can only say that I owe them, and the 1,000 people believed to have sculpted them, a massive apology.

They are incredible. They're absolutely lifelike, and have real personality. Apparently when they were originally sculpted they were painted, too, with proper flesh-tones for their hands and faces, and the appropriate colors for their clothes. That must have been some sight to behold!

It had simply not occurred to me that people were producing works of art of that standard over 2,000 years ago - the word "impressive" doesn't even begin to do them justice.

Apparently they were modelled on real people - the sculptors are believed to have used their fellow-workers as their inspiration - and that's what really made me think.

The terracotta men are all unique individuals, different in height and build and facial expression, and not to be mistaken for any of their colleagues. Some look happy - some look fierce. Some carry various implements apparently designed to show what they were skilled in - as well as warriors, there are acrobats, musicians, and even a few bureaucrats, too!

That's what really got me thinking. You see, every human being is just as individual - in looks, in personality, in temperament and in their talents - not just the amount of talent someone has, but in the precise combination of abilities, ambitions, skills and interests they possess. No-one else has now, has had or is going to have, the same.

That means, if you don't use the skills you have, there's no-one else to do it for you. No-one else can write the books or poems, songs or business plans that you might. No-one else can solve the problems you can, in the ways that you can solve them. No-one else can be the partner, parent, friend or colleague you can be... and no-one else can have exactly the same measure of success in what you want to do as you can.

The sculptors of the terracotta men created work that's lasted for 2,000 years, and still has power to delight and to inspire. What can you create... and why not start right now?

Beware The Gridlocked Video...

Yes, I know this story makes me look an idiot, but if you're looking for success in online marketing, the situation that gives rise to it is one you really need to be aware of... and if you're not, you can feel free to have a laugh at my expense.

I recently came across a site with lots of videos on something that I'm keenly interested in, and I couldn't wait to watch them. Each one was supposed to last about 4 minutes, so they couldn't take that long to load up... could they?

Well, not if you're in the same country as the site, perhaps. The trouble is, that site and myself were on different sides of the Atlantic.

I clicked on the first track, and it buffered for several minutes - then it flickered into life and its producer said, "Hi! My name is..."

The video then froze, and buffered for several more minutes before the guy in the picture jerkily moved his hands for a split second and gave me half his name... and then it froze again. Cue more buffering.

This was not what I'd call streaming video – it was more like gridlock.

Now, at this point I would usually have given up and left the site, but I really wanted to watch those videos, so I hung on.

I kid you not, it took an hour and a half before the buffering got near the end – of a video which, remember, was supposed to take a mere 4 minutes to play through.

It was at this point that I made my big mistake. Once the buffering had finished, I decided, I'd be able to watch the whole thing properly – and I might as well do it with a cup of coffee in my hand.

Wrong move. In the time it took to switch the kettle on, the buffering had finally completed... and gone back to zero. Hopefully, I clicked on Play, and the buffering began again. Right from the start.

Now, this ought to be a one-off horror story... but it isn't. There are lots of sites that offer video and other kinds of streaming media that only work the way they should if you're quite near to them, or else you're using broadband (I don't, because I reckon that the best way to ensure that all the content on Supreme-Success.com is easily accessible to all site visitors is to test it on a dial-up connection).

If you want to use some video without antagonizing all your visitors who can't get at it easily, it's a good idea to offer an alternative.

1. If possible, present it in a format that can be downloaded. A download manager that can collect it overnight, or resume an interrupted download when it's more convenient, can take the sting out of the waiting; or

2. It that's not feasible, offer them a transcript. Write down everything you're saying on the video, and let them just download it as an e-book.

If you're working from a script, that should take very little effort – if not, it's worth the extra work to play it through and just transcribe your words.

(Do get rid of those distracting "um"s and "er"s, though – they creep into most videos at some point, and your visitors will probably take clarity a lot more seriously than exact fidelity to the recorded version!)

Your visitors will love you for it – it's a quick and easy way to show you care about them.

If you don't, you're going to lose a lot of hard-earned traffic, because a gridlocked video has just the same effect as gridlocked vehicles – exasperated visitors avoid the place in future.

The Rôle That Killed The TV Star

A few days ago I watched a TV documentary about a British actor called Richard Beckinsale. The comedy shows he starred in are still shown often on TV (there was one on just this weekend), so I'm quite familiar with his work, though I was unaware that he was branching out into films and was regarded as a seriously up-and-coming talent... till one morning he was found dead in bed, after suffering a massive heart attack. He was 31.

The shows I've seen him in (Rising Damp and Porridge) give the impression of a pleasant, laid-back kind of guy – the very last person you'd expect would ever have a heart attack. Some of his friends were interviewed, and said that's very much the way he really was.

His wife, though, told another story altogether. She admitted that his confident, relaxed demeanor was an act – the hardest rôle he'd ever hard to play, and one that ultimately killed him.

The truth was that his nerves were strained so badly that he couldn't bear to stay in the house alone, and he suffered such serious panic attacks that he couldn't sleep without the light on, and often stayed up all night because he didn't feel safe enough to let himself fall asleep before full daylight.

In other words, he suffered from a stress level so intense and painful that it killed him.

Tragic though it is (his two young daughters had barely even got to know him), the story has two lessons that anyone who's stressed out needs to learn.

1. Many people will do, or suffer, absolutely anything to keep their friends and colleagues from knowing just how stressed they are.

Often, they're afraid that they'll be laughed at, or passed over for promotion – and both those things do sometimes happen; and

2. Stress that isn't dealt with can be lethal.

That's because stress causes the body to produce chemicals, like adrenalin, that are meant to deal with an immediate, short-term emergency. If you're stressed, then you're producing these chemicals all the time... and you aren't getting rid of them.

That means you're literally poisoning yourself.

Fortunately, much more's now known about stress and how to deal with it. Although if you have any kind of health anxieties it's always wise to talk things over with your doctor, you can check out an easy way to free your life from stress at the Supreme Success website – and if, like Richard Beckinsale, you suffer from panic attacks, there's a book available at the Resources area of the site.

Stress can make your life, and the lives of everyone you love, a misery. Isn't it worth a mouse-click to get rid of it... for ever?

Letting Your Light Shine

One of my favorite inspirational quotes is from Nelson Mandela. It's not in Your Daily Inspiration because of the sheer length of it, so I can't resist the chance to put it here.

I believe the quotation comes originally from Maryanne Williamson, and Nelson Mandela used it in the speech he made at his inauguration as the first black president of South Africa in 1994.

He said: "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

His words have the power to stir the heart – but for many people, they represent a serious, uncomfortable challenge. It's not that they don't want to let their light shine. The problem is, so many people don't believe they have one. They've got so used to criticism, self-doubt, negative experiences and poverty of expectation that the idea they might be supposed to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and famous, instead of being a delightful affirmation of everything they want to be, disturbs them deeply.

It doesn't bring them joy – they find it threatening.

Well, don't just take my word that you have the right, the power, the duty and responsibility to be those things.

Listen to the man who spent 27 years in prison because he wouldn't give up on the things that he believed in, and then came out to be not only his country's first black president but a man revered and loved throughout the world.

If Nelson Mandela believes in you so strongly, why don't you?

If you need some help to be persuaded that you can be gorgeous (naturally gorgeous!), check out Reveal Your Inner Beauty. If you don't believe you're brilliant, you can improve your self-esteem. If you don't believe you're talented, you can improve your self-belief. If you believe you lack assertiveness, try out Project Your Real, Dynamic Self.

If you believe the things you want most are beyond your grasp, check out Supreme-Success.com, or else Achieve Your Wildest Dreams - and for your free book of inspirational quotations for every day of the year, just visit Your Daily Inspiration (while it's downloading, you can get get a taste of what you will be reading at the Inspirational Quotations page).

Share Nelson Mandela's faith in you, and let your light shine!

The Secret Ingredient

I've just watched England beat France 14-9 to reach the Rugby World Cup Final.

I don't know that much about rugby (except, of course, that Ireland's already out of the competition), but it didn't take an expert to recognize the transformation in the English play and attitude from the demoralized bunch of guys who went down so spectacularly 36-0 to South Africa a few weeks back.

One of the TV pundits was asked what he thought had caused the vast improvement.

"Their coach, Brian Ashton," he replied. "He's filled them all with self-belief."

If that one simple difference, an increase in their self-belief, was all it took to turn a disorganized group of players who were being ripped to pieces in the press for their performance, into a proud, deserving team of World Cup finalists, in just four weeks, what can a real and lasting increase in your self-belief achieve for you?

You can find out at Supreme-Success.com/Self-Belief.

The Curse Of The Flightle Bee

Back in the days when presenters for the UK's national broadcaster, the BBC, had to be very, very careful about the language that they used on air, I'm told that the presenter of a music show was worried about his introduction to a particular piece – The Flight of the Bumble Bee, by Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov.

The title was easy enough, of course, but he couldn't get his tongue round the composer's name. Hard as he practiced, he was convinced that he was going to make a mess of it, and the night before the show he hardly slept.

At last the dreaded moment came, and the presenter took a deep breath and announced, “The next piece is by that popular composer, Rimsky-Korsakov...”

”YES!” he thought triumphantly. “I've done it – I've done it! Nothing can go wrong now.”

Then he gave the title as... “The Bum of the Flightle Bee.”

Now, the word “bum” doesn't mean in Britain what it means in the US. It means the equivalent of “a-s” - the part of your anatomy you sit upon.

It's actually considered a very mild word now, but apparently at that time it was high up on the list of things you couldn't say on air. The mistake the presenter was so scared of making, a simple mispronunciation of a name in a language he was unfamiliar with, would actually have got him into far less trouble with his bosses than the one he did make.

The point of the story is that what you focus on is what you get.

If you keep thinking hard enough, for long enough, that you're going to get something horribly wrong, the intensity of your feelings about it will convince your inner mind that that's the very thing you want to happen... and it will find a way it can achieve it for you.

No matter how hard you work, no matter how hard you try, how talented you are, what great ideas you have, or how much you would love to have Supreme Success... if what you're mainly feeling is a fear of failure, then that's exactly what you're going to get – your inner mind will show you how to sabotage your progress so that it can help you make those pictures in your head come true.

To be successful, see yourself as utterly successful. Feel all the excitement and anticipation of it. Hold that picture as strongly as you can, and thoroughly enjoy it. The more intense your feelings are, the faster it'll happen.

You have to do the work as well, of course – but that feeling will inspire you to do it better, and more easily.

What you focus on is what you get... so make sure you're always focused on success.

Welcome To Supreme Success!

Hi, and welcome to the Supreme Success blog.

Like the Supreme Success site, it's going to be about how you can achieve the things in life that mean the most to you - and, of course, the great thing about a blog is that it's perfect to add all sorts of little tips and tricks without making lots of changes on the site itself.

First of all, heartfelt apologies to anyone who's read any of my previously-published articles and followed the link to access-your-peak-performance-zone.com, then tried to buy one of the subliminal audio tracks, only to find the purchase links disabled.

The reason was that I was moving them to a new server and launching a new and much more comprehensive site (and with a much more user-friendly name!), and it's taken a whole lot longer than I thought it would.

However, the new site's up and running now, with several more personal empowerment audio tracks and a new book on offer... and a free book for everyone who visits.

No strings... no information to supply... no being forced to join a mailing list (though, of course, you're very welcome to sign up for the e-zine if you'd like to!)... nothing to do except download it - and make use of it.

It's easy to download a free book, put it on your hard drive, and forget about it.

Please, don't do that with this one.

You see, one very big the reason why so many people don't achieve the things they want to have or be is that the people around them and the situations that they're in are often so depressing and so disempowering.

This book's designed to be an antidote to that. It has an encouraging quotation for each day of the year (and, yes - including Leap Year), from some of the most famous people, past and present, in the world.

From John Fitzgerald Kennedy to Oprah Winfrey, from Thomas Edison to Bono, there's a dazzling array of famous names waiting to share their wit and wisdom with you - so, please...

Download it to your desktop, where you can see it every time that you sit down at your computer, and open it for just a few moments once a day.

Every day - and preferably before you start your work.

That gives you a burst of energy and enthusiasm that will get you off to a flying start, and make a real impact on everything you want to do.

To collect your copy right now, just head over to Your Daily Inspiration, and...

Enjoy!