I’m not certain, but I believe we all suffer from comparison despair.  I know I do and the more I’ve achieved, it has not gone away as I thought it would.

I’ve finally realized if it’s going to go away, I’ve got to take matters in my own hands and make some conscious decisions to not let comparison despair hold me back and instead to covert this phenomenon into something wonderful for my business and my life.

Before I talk about how to do that, let’s talk about what this comparison despair is exactly.

Comparison despair is that feeling you get when you look at where other people are in their lives relative to you and you feel frustrated, maybe even angry or possibly jealous.

It’s definitely not anything that feels good that’s for sure!

It may express in your life as disbelief in someone who appears to have achieved more than you.  You may have a strong desire to dismiss their success as false or disingenuous.

Or it may show up as a loss of energy or even apathy in your life.  You suddenly feel like all you want to do is watch TV or veg out because there’s no way you’ll be able to catch up anyway.

When these things happen, you have a huge opportunity to WAKE UP!

Recognize the comparison despair and don’t get sucked in by it.  WAKE UP and remember that you are perfect exactly as you are and where you are and that the comparison despair has a great gift for you, if you’ll let the gift come through.

As Reverend Michael would say, something is trying to emerge within you. Never let a good crisis go to waste.  And comparison despair is just that, a crisis.  But one that can be converted into the greatest gift of your life.

Ok, so how.  How do you convert comparison despair from darkness into light?

1. Recognize it.  I’ve given you an idea of what it might look like when it shows up in your life.  But, it might also look different.  The key is recognize when you are comparing yourself to someone else and that comparison is bringing up low energy feelings inside of you.

2. Allow It to Guide You to Your Desires:  Having a life full of joy, love and passion is possible for you.  It’s likely that you are feeling comparison despair because you are seeing things that other people are experiencing in their life that you want to experience in yours.  GREAT!  Once you know what you want, you can bring it into your life.  As I always say, the first step to getting what you want is admitting what you want!

3. Show Your Gratitude For It!: Now that you’ve recognized the comparison despair and noticed that you are feeling it because it’s made you aware of something you want in you life that you aren’t currently experiencing, show your gratitude for this new awareness by taking action on bringing more of what you want into your life.  Consider learning from this person who you have compared yourself to and learning his or her strategies for being, doing and having what you want in your life.

If you follow these three steps, comparison despair will never get you down again.  It’ll become a beautiful and welcome guidepost to what you want more of in your life and where you are playing smaller than you know you want to be.

We each have a money thermometer. A set point of wealth that we feel comfortable with and can easily manifest within.

When I was in college and law school, mine was $10,000.

Even though I paid my way through both with grants, loans and waiting tables, I almost never let me bank balance drop below $10,000.

This was my setpoint. What I needed to feel like the world was right and safe.

This carried through with me even after getting a job at the big law firm coming out of law school. My starting salary was $135,000/year plus a fat signing bonus and yet because my setpoint was still $10,000, I managed to only keep about that much in my account.

It wasn’t until after my divorce that I reset that setpoint through a tremendous amount of inner work.

Very quickly though, I raised the thermometer from $10,000 to $1,000,000!

Within a short time, my law firm was bringing in one million dollars per year. Then, I built a second business bringing in one million dollars per year.

Wow! But, I’ve noticed over the past couple of years that I now just have another setpoint.
And it’s time to raise the money thermometer. Doing that will take more inner work and, frankly, there’s a big part of me that just doesn’t want to do it.

This part of me is comfy cozy where it’s at. “A million bucks is enough” it says. “What will people say when you are making $10 million or even $100 million” it says.”Why do you have to be so greedy?” it says.

Blocks. Subconscious, old blocks to stepping into all that I know is possible.

My company is going multi-million dollar this year and if I don’t clear these blocks, my subconscious mind will find a way to sabotage it and me and return me right back to my setpoint.

What’s your setpoint? Are you ready to reset and increase your money thermometer?

If so, do it along with me in this unique program starting next week. You can do it all from home in just 30 minutes a day. I’ll “see” you there!

The Wealth Secret I’m sharing with you today is something a lot of people, including me in the past, have a hard time wrapping their minds around. It’s the idea of hiring people to do things you can do, but shouldn’t be doing because doing them actually costs you a whole lot more mo’ney than you realize.

Let me give you an example.

Today, I hired a car and driver to spend the day with me. Yes, the whole day. I live in Hermosa Beach and had two meetings to attend in Santa Clarita, about 45 miles away.

In the past, I would have driven myself and not given it another thought. I have a car. I know how to drive. What’s the issue?

Well, the issue is that all that driving would have cost me about 3 hours of my time. 3 hours during which I could be returning emails, writing articles like this one, and catching up on other computer work that needed to be done.

It cost me $375 plus tip to hire the car and driver for the day.

Is my time worth more than $125/hour? Heck yeah it is!

I charge a minimum of $12,500 per day to consult with business owners. If I had an hourly rate, it’d be at least $2,000/hour.

So, how crazy would it be for me to waste 3 hours of my day driving?

Shoot, even if my hourly rate was only $200/hour or $150/hour, it’d be worth it for me to get the car and driver.

And yet, most of us don’t think that way at all. If we can do something, we do. Even if doing it is not the best and highest use of our time.

As a result, we feel frazzled, rushed, overburdened and overwhelmed and then we begin to take that out on the people around us … our family and friends and clients and employees.

Take a look around your life right now and write down all the things you are doing that really aren’t the highest and best use of your time.

Then, think about what you want your hourly rate to be. Not necessarily what it is right now, but what you want it to be. What is your time really worth?

Last, outsource everything (and I do mean everything) that isn’t worth it for you to do anymore. The only things you’ll want to hold on to are things that meet these criteria:

1. You absolutely love them and doing them adds more value to your life;
2. You get paid handsomely to do them;
3. It is part of your highest calling to do them.

If something doesn’t meet at least two of the three of those criteria, drop it. Find someone else to do it and you’ll very quickly see your wealth increasing significantly.

Each week for the past month, I’ve been sitting in church and listening to Reverend Michael Beckwith help us understand the meaning behind the crises that so many of us find ourselves in and it’s been absolutely powerful and transformational.

How can a crisis create more wealth in your life?

It does so as long as you don’t let the crisis go to waste, as most people do.

Most people let a good crisis go to waste by resisting against it, by blaming themselves, burying their heads in the sand, and getting stuck in the why oh why.

It’s time to move beyond all that and recognize that the crisis is full of opportunity and promise, but you have to wake up and see it for what it is.

As Reverend Michael says, a crisis is merely evidence that the old way wasn’t working.  There’s a falling apart happening and that falling apart must happen for something new to emerge.

So next time you are in the middle of a crisis, don’t look around for someone to blame.  Stop asking why oh why.  Start asking what.

What is here for me?

What is trying to emerge from this situation?

What new opportunity is on the other side of this crisis?

What is my next right action?  Show me the way.

When you shift your energy in this way, a world of opportunity will open up for you.

Jobs will be found, money will flow in, houses will be saved.

Your life will be changed.  Don’t let a good crisis go to waste.

Recognize the good in it.  Find what is seeking to emerge and let it come through.

Your wealth will be multiplied by the hundreds and thousands.

I used to think most people were driven by one of two apparently competing values, freedom and security.  My highest value is freedom and I will give up security to have it.  Most people won’t.

I always thought my boyfriend Dave and I were lined up on this point, but when we were talking recently, he told me security was his highest value.  I was shocked and told him he must be wrong because #1) he’s a business owner and #2) he had told me in the past how much he valued freedom.

What he said shocked me even more and got my mind rolling.

Dave told me that he felt more secure being his own boss than he would working for someone else.  It occurred to me that most people feel the exact opposite and yet he’s right!

The security that people feel by working for someone else is really a false security.  You could lose your job at anytime, no matter how much seniority, prestige or pay you’ve got.  But, when you are working for yourself, you’re never going to get laid off.

Sure, in the beginning, working for yourself can be extremely scary.  It sure was for me.  But, after a while, you discover that you can always count on you.  And, if you can’t depend on you, you can fix it so that you do.  You could never get that kind of security from a job.

So, today’s wealth secret is to start your own business.  Even if it’s part time, after hours, do something.  That’s what I did.  While I didn’t start my own law firm until after leaving my job at the big law firm.  I did all the prep work ahead of time so that when I gave up the paycheck, I was ready.  You could be doing that now too.

If you want real security and the freedom that comes along with it, make today the day you commit to working for yourself.  There’s nothing real holding you back.