And that’s OK… But is it independence?

In an effort to be really Naked with you… I felt like a real freak most of my life… I really felt that I was a misfit. Like I didn’t fit in… Maybe you can relate to that. I was never one of the popular cool kids… I was the kid that got picked on, the kid picked last for sports, and I had a BITCH of a time dating!

Now looking back, I was different. I zigged while other kids zagged. I was always a Theater geek and found a place for myself behind the scenes. Who knew that that was gonna be a life choice. Now the kid that was beat up does special effects for bands like Taylor Swift, The Blue Man Group, Carlos Santana, Mariah Carey etc…

Now I also, based on a lot of my life experience, very successfully Coach many adults to success. Ya see, if I hadn’t been a misfit, I never would have found the lessons I needed to really reach a successful place in life! It’s finally being kinda happy being a misfit, that has made me successful

The reason I tell you this is I am starting a new Coaching program. It will be ONLY for young people, I think 15-21 years old. It will be a safe place for them to communicate their fears, to get feedback on their ideas, and to help them realize that “different” is GOOD! That just because they don’t feel like they fit in doesn’t mean they can’t be wildly happy and successful…

My first group will be in Shelton CT. Not sure where yet, we will do this as a group, a Mastermind if you will. So we’ll limit this to 12 young people. This will be a serious group, though it will also be a LOT of fun. I have proven that if you are passionate about something, you have a dramatically better chance of being successful. Stop trying to fit that square peg into the round hole!

I often fantasized about being a Rock Star and sometimes felt kinda empty because I was just a Roadie… Until one of my friends Charlie Hernandez (Tour Manager for Artist’s like Madonna, and founder of Just A Bunch Of Roadies ) said at one of our conferences “ Ya know if it weren’t for us… these guys would be just a bunch of old guys running around the stage in makeup!”. It was then I realized how important what I do is and how glad I am to be a misfit….

If you would like to be in our first group or if you have a child that you think would be a great addition to the group, just text your name and e-mail address to:

(203) 567-4214

In celebration of Our Nations Independence please enjoy this video that celebrates our individual independence!

Have a safe and happy Fourth of July!

My wife and I were ta our local Mall before Christmas and we found this cute Tea store called Teavana . First I’ll give ya why I love Teavana.

1. The store is really cool. Lots of ornate teapots, teacups, statues and tea. Really up my alley! I love looking at “Old World” type of stuff. They have a great range of teapots.. Did you know that some cast iron teapots can set ya back over $200.oo!  Definitely something I’m not ready for yet, but as I’m getting to like different teas, I’m starting to covet them!
2. The Teas are great. They must have 50 different teas to choose from, if anything it’s a little bit overwhelming, so many to choose from! I am really enjoying this process of becoming areal Tea drinker, Who knew!

Here’s where they are really chapping my hide… And please realize that this is my experience only, but I will add that my wife had the exact same experience when she initially bought me my teapot and tea there….

As a Customer… Especially a new Customer I expect to be treated fairly and with respect. That means you listen to how I respond top you, and you remember my responses. That didn’t happen!

The girl that was helping me was nice enough, in fact maybe even a little too “familiar”. When she approached me she asked if I was a tea drinker already.  I explained that I was a new tea drinker, told her that my wife had gotten me a pot there for Christmas and some tea and that I was just looking a round trying to figure out what to buy… She asked if I had a Cast Iron pot (those are the $200 pots) I said no, and she immediately tried to sell me one… This after I just told her that my wife had given me one not ten days ago from their store for Christmas… Was she indicating that my wife had made a bad decision and that they sold me a bad ceramic pot?  If she had offered me a trade up, perhaps I would have taken it, but there was no offers coming, just pitch about the pot!

Next I was trying to select teas, I explained that I liked the fruitier sweeter types as I had no sense of smell and that affects my tastes…

She asked if I was interested in the health benefits, I told her not really, if I liked the tea and it was good for me, well, that was an added bonus. So she proceeded to list all the teas with health benefits…

10 minutes later I told her again that I didn’t care about the health benefits so we moved on, I had read in their literature, (which is VERY well made and fascinating) about a bunch of the teas so I wanted her opinion of them.

She proceeded to take each tea off the shelf, show it to me and whaft the scent of the tea at me with the lid… Well to me they all look like something that I raked up in my back yard, and I have no sense of smell. So I explained and asked her nicely to stop waving the lid around, it was doing me no good… She didn’t listen, just kept on waving and kept saying it was force of habit….

Finally I had decided on a six teas. You have to buy them by the ounce with a  2 ounce minimum per tea. Some are as high as 10 to 20 dollars an ounce. I’m OK with  all that.

Here’s where I am really pissed. I asked for two ounces of the first tea, she poured 3 ounces in the bag and asked if that was close enough… I said no, I only wanted to pay for 2 ounces as I have no idea if I will like the tea, she begrudgingly took out some of the tea and proceeded on, we had this same ritual six times as I was trying six types of tea. Each time I told her I only wanted 2 ounces.

Ya know…If I was buying bologna at the deli at $4.00 a pound and they go an ounce over I’m not worried about, but at ten bucks an ounce, if I order 2 ounces I want 2 ounces. PERIOD.

Well, I get home and am discussing this with my wife, and they did EXACTLY the same thing with her. So I checked my receipt to see how much tea I had bought…

Each and every tea was rung up at over 2 ounces. One of them was 2.90 ounces! In my opinion that’s stealing from me. That’s unscrupulous, dishonest, deceitful business practice.

(I have to assume they are trained to do that as they did it to my wife, and she had a different clerk.)

She them proceeded to try to sell me tins to keep the tea in. I was lucky that she asked me, they just added the tins, one per tea to my wife’s order.(The tins are about 6 bucks each). She was shocked when I came home with tea in a bag as that was never an option of her, they just hustled another 24 bucks out of her!

SHAME ON YOU TEAVANA!

I appreciate that they are training their clerks to sell. I appreciate that artful upsell. What I don’t appreciative is deceptive and dishonest sales practices. And that’s what you are doing.

Will I buy there again… MAYBE. I have to look around online and see what my other options are now. As a new Tea drinker they had my loyalty until they stole from me… Now they need to earn it again, and it aint gonna be easy to do…

Folks, never, ever steal from your Customers. Never, ever treat them like anything BUT your best friends. Nothing good will EVER come of deceiving them!

Why is that?

I have my theories as you might imagine…  I think we make decisions early in life based on what other people want, what other people expect from us, regardless of whether it fits into our dreams.

How many people do you know that have a college degree that they worked hard for, and somebody likely spent a lot of money for, and now are either doing something else entirely? I’ll bet you only know a handful of people that are are doing what they were “schooled” for and of the ones that are,  I’ll bet many of them are miserable!

Some of our decisions are made for us… Like children. Many kids are “accidents”. But they are accidents that can change the course of your life! Some of us even go so far as to marry the person that we have an accident with… Kinda like compounding the accident. Before ya say it, I’m all for kids having two parents, I have just seen too many of these situations NOT work out because the parents are miserable with themselves and each other… and the kids feel that, and will pay for that for years to come!

Here’s a challenge for ya, and I have asked this before and gotten some replies, but I challenge you to go deeper this time. To spend some time with this answer. It’s important, so treat it like that!

I’ll do mine and my hope is that you will follow me!

What is your dream?

This will come as no surprise to many of you. I dream of living my life in Key West, Fl. (Now here is where I DON”T want you to stop… Go deeper)

I dream of living a life where I can be in service to other business owners and people. I already have a pretty successful Coaching and Consulting practice, but I want to focus my skills and talents in Key West.

Key West is a small Island, with a LOT of businesses. I want to make a real difference to the city, the community and the people of Key West. I want to help people achieve the dream that they came to key West looking for.

Many people move here looking for a place that they can enjoy a life filled with their friends and family and fun in the sun. Sadly most get lost a long the way, many people haven’t stepped foot  on a boat in years (Even though this was a big chunk of their dreams) I want  to help them find and achieve that dream by helping them grow their businesses, by helping them re-prioritize their lives, by helping them learn to dream again!

I know if I follow this dream fearlessly, if I ignore all the naysayers and jealous people, if I listen to my intuition, in the end, I’ll lay my head to rest for my final rest with a peaceful soul… and that in the end is my dream… To live life with a peaceful, loving soul and a life filled with laughter and love!

See as I wrote this I gained clarity! My dream is really “To live life with a peaceful, loving soul and a life filled with laughter and love!”!

Please take some time to really think about your reply. I would LOVE to help you follow your dream fearlessly as I am!And don’t get me wrong, I go through periods of wondering if I am doing the right thing, but I always, when I search in my heart, realize that I am on the right path to achieve my REAL dream!

I’ll leave you with these lyrics from “The Impossible Dream” from the Musical “The Man OF La Mancha”…

To dream the impossible dream
To fight the unbeatable foe
To bear with unbearable sorrow
To run where the brave dare not go

To right the unrightable wrong
To love pure and chaste from afar
To try when your arms are too weary
To reach the unreachable star

This is my quest
To follow that star
No matter how hopeless
No matter how far

To fight for the right
Without question or pause
To be willing to march into Hell
For a heavenly cause

And I know if I’ll only be true
To this glorious quest
That my heart will lie peaceful and calm
When I’m laid to my rest

And the world will be better for this
That one man, scorned and covered with scars
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star

Good luck and I look forward to your comments!

I was at my Chiropractors office and a report on the TV in the office said a plane had flown into the World Trade Center buildings. I figured it was a small Cessna that lost control… something like that. Horrible for the Cessna pilot and the folks and families of those on board, but not earth shattering. That was the beginning of a really weird and scary couple of months!

It turns out it was a large jet airplane, one of four that would, by the end of the day be crashed by Muslim, Taliban suicide bombers. The death toll was 2996, most of them civilians. Most of them dies when the World Trade Centers in NY, NY collapsed to rubble. It was plain old , down home scary. We had no idea if this was the beginning of something,or was this an isolated attack. Friends of mine that were previously pacifists bought guns, we all felt extremely violated, for the first time in our lives!

Fast forward 10 years. Their is a group of Muslims that want to build a Mosque 600 feet from where the WTC used to stand. And there is a group of folks that are pissed. They find it to be horribly disrespectful! And… there is a group of people that say let them build it…

I happen to be one of them. I say let them build it.

After all, our incredible country was founded on our freedoms; freedom of speech, freedom of religion etc. By stopping these folks from building their house of worship, we are essentially saying that Ossama bin Laden and his band of terrorists won. Heck the Patriot Act has kind of done that.  The Patriot Act strips us of our right to privacy… Please don’t get me wrong… I understand the reasons for all of this. I understand the fear that folks like me had when we were terrorized…

BUT.. I refuse to let them win.

For instance against a lot of pleading friends advice, I flew to Chicago within 30 days of the attack… To not go on and conduct business as usual let’s them win. To live in fear let’s them win. To change our life because we are afraid, lets them win. After all these guys promote terror… give into your fear and their promotions have worked!

Please commit to yourself today that you won’t let these guys win your hearts and minds. If you react in fear because you see someone that does not look like you, perhaps they look a little like and dress like the Taliban guys did, well… you have let them win.

I say build your Mosque. Build a Catholic Church, a Jewish Synagogue, and a  Buddhist Monastery right next to it.. After all, we, as Americans are the most unique race and group of people as many of us are Mutts. And in the end folks, even though we have different beliefs, we look different and have different religious practices.. we’re all flesh and blood. air breathing and blood pumping people. If we are afraid of each other, largely because we don’t understand each other, we have let them win. Don’t let the terrorists win! An educated American is our best weapon!

I bid you love, peace and happiness. My prayers go out to all the families that have lost someone thanks to terrorists.

John

So I gotta a say.. I’m kinda pissed.  For the last few weeks my hands and arms have been really, really stiff and hurting.  So much that it’s hard to get dressed in the morning and typing is a REAL chore! Many will say – “Well… that’s part and parcel with Rheumatoid Arthritis!” ( I’ve had RA since I was about 20 years old… I’m a few decades older now!)

But ya know what…It doesn’t seem like it’s my bones anymore, it seems like it’s my Muscles! I get massaged regularly. Deep almost masochistic massage… very painful but it really is exactly what I need. I get Reiki twice a week and am trying to exercise more… but the pain persists… My Reiki Master Berta Prevosti tells me I’m releasing old anger and sadness… Now I don’t really get the whole Reiki thing, but I know it’s really helpful. I have a lot of faith!

I’ve been on a journey of growth and self exploration for about 10 years… I would have thought I would have gotten where I need to get buy now… but I’m learning that the journey is it’s own end. And when push comes to shove… I LOVE this journey! I LOVE growing! I LOVE helping others grow!

And that’s what keeps me going through really tough times like this. I have a passion. I know what my passion is. It’s kinda funny, but when I’m in service with others, a LOT of my pain goes away…

Do you really know your purpose. Do you really understand what you are here for. Now I’m not perfect with this yet, but I’m getting a lot better! I think many of us walk around and through life in quiet desperation, some of us realize that “there must be more to life than this”… some of us feel that we have peaked, and just figure that their purpose is to maintain status quo… I challenge that there is more for all of us. The power to have more is in our hands. No one can give it to you, you need to take it!

So what is your purpose. Maybe you’re not sure. Let me know if you’d like me to write more on how I found my purpose….

When you find yours will you be as excited as Steve Martin in this Clip?

Talk to me… What is your special purpose… How did you find it?

I’m having a love affair, and it’s not a new one… This one has been going on for about 25 years and finally I’m coming clean.

My love affair is with:

Claude Hopkins!

Who Knew!

If you just said “Claude who?”.  ” He must be awful pretty or at least have the hottest new Internet marketing program or the hottest new whiz bang tool if John’s in love!”

Well.. this is your wake up call.

There really has been nothing new invented for sales and marketing technique in years. What you see today as new and improved is just warmed over versions of what guys like Claude Hopkins and John Caples were doing back in the day of the  “Steam Powered Automobile”.

The book I’m in love with is  a combination of two of Claude Hopkins works. They are “My Life In Advertising” and Scientific Advertising” Both originally published in the 1920’s.

That’s right! Almost 100 YEARS AGO!

Famed Marketer David Ogilvy says:

“Nobody should be allowed to have anything to do with advertising until he has read this book (Scientific Advertising) seven times. It changed the course of my life!”

Here is a link to the book. It’s only about 10 bucks and has millions of dollars in education in it. I re-read this book at least a couple of time a year. I ALWAYS glean something new!

Unsubscribe from all the pitches you get and sit down and read this book.

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