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Be Part of the 1%

Read.

· Life

Books. Successful people commit to continual learning. Every day. Let’s be conservative and assume this is a drastic change. If you commit to an average of 30 minutes a day, for a full year, you have 182.5 hours of learning. That's over 900 hours of growing your mind for one year, and multiply times five years, you are well on your way to becoming an expert. Imagine what you could do for yourself, your family and your career if you commit to that kind and pace of growing into your best self.

An hour a day. A full hour a day gets you to 365 hours. Five years of 365 hours of reading is 1,825 hours. The wealth of knowledge you’ll have will put you in the top percentage of Americans. Imagine all of the possibilities! Imagine how many books, authors, stories and paths for success you will have in your brain. What would your list of books consist of? Mine includes self development, business, philosophy, religion, marketing, auto biographies and more. I'll be sharing my favorites/life changing books in a later blog post.

Do better. We are a society that scans articles, reads tweets and then binge watches the news, or Netflix. According to a 2007 survey by salary.com, 63% of workers waste an average of 2 hours per day on various activities such as idle chit-chat or surfing the internet. We’ve forgotten philosophy, we’ve forgotten reflection, mindfulness and what it means to be fully present. We’ve forgotten how to grow. According to Brian Tracy, “If you read only one book per month, that will put you into the top 1% of income earners in our society. But if you read one book per week, 50 books per year, that will make you one of the best educated, smartest, most capable and highest paid people in your field. Regular reading will transform your life completely.” I too believe this.

Make the time. Where do you find the time to read? Nobody has it, so you have to make it. You have to commit to getting up earlier and blocking that development time into your schedule, so it’s the first thing you do every day. Get up early, don’t hit snooze, make your coffee and read. Anyone can do 30 minutes for 30 days. You can even stay in your pajamas. Start there. Are you a commuter? Your local library likely has audio books available for free to you, or you can subscribe to a service like audible.com, which I happen to think is extraordinary. There is NO better time than now to commit to your individual growth.

My vision for my life is one that is extraordinary. How about yours?