Paul Smith - Internet Marketing

I quite often make the bed.

Sometimes by myself.

Sometimes with my wife.

I far prefer doing it myself. A bed is a bed is a bed as far as I’m concerned, and while I do like to do a good job, I don’t expect Her Majesty the Queen will ever be sleeping in it, so good-enough is good-enough.

Some of you will have picked a character flaw here. Yes, no matter how hard I’ve tried for perfection all my life, it doesn’t just elude me it fairly races off across the far horizon. I blame the stars. I was born a Cancer, and remain one to this day. Being nice to people (and the bed) is just who I am.

Aquarians treat their beds altogether differently. The bed is made so that it could pass the strictest inspection in a five star hotel. How do I know? Yes, you guessed, I’m married to one (an Aquarian, not a bed).

‘Making the Bed’ is a close cousin of that great topic of conversation, ‘Getting Out of Bed’. I’m an early riser. ‘Healthy’, ‘Wealthy’, ‘Wise’ should be my middle names if the “Early to Bed, Early to Rise” saying has any truth in it. I’m pretty healthy. However, not so Wealthy (well, not by the internet marketing ‘$21, 362.57 in one night” sort of advertisements). Wise? It would be a foolish man who claimed this one, and so, by definition, not wise.

It’s the ‘Wealthy’ one that causes me to feel anxious each of my early mornings. Never quite enough money, it seems. And what is ‘enough’? ‘Enough’ is when you don’t feel anxious about it any longer, I suspect. At any time of the day. And especially early morning, when I feel most anxious.

Like you, I have a name of course. Paul Smith. That’s mine, I assume probably not yours.

Like you (I suspect) I used to think it was a very ordinary, if perfectly serviceable, name (not too many people have trouble spelling it, for example). Then I was in Bali some years ago and found a whole shop full of ‘Paul Smith’ T-shirts. When my wife pointed out to the little Balinese shop girls that I was Paul Smith, they were most impressed (well, they went into fits of giggles, but I took it that they thought I was the ‘real’ Paul Smith, whoever he may be). I bought a load for probably about two dollars, and yes, they lasted no time at all.

Like you, perhaps, in these global village days, I’ve lived in quite a few places. In Sydney, where I was born and grew up, in Darwin, Rockhampton and Brisbane in Australia (where I was a school teacher). London, where I delivered vegetables, and Scotland, where I tried to sell insurance (in a little village called Jedburgh, where Mary Queen of Scots stayed at times); and in Essen in Germany, where I also taught, in a Kaufmannische Schule. Where the Dam Busters did their watery work in WWII.

Like you, the quest for wealth has usually been at the forefront of my anxieties in all those places and times. Which is why I am writing this. My first blog. I still don’t know how to use WordPress, but when you read this, I suspect I will know what to do (otherwise you won’t be here).

For the past three or four years since I retired from teaching I have been trying to increase my wealth, mainly by building an internet business and by trading Options.

The Options haven’t gone too badly overall, and I am now at the stage that I know how to trade without ever putting the house in danger.

But the Internet? Scarcely a bean. One exception was when I paid a fair sum (a few thousand dollars comes to mind, but I’m not exactly sure), and soon after received a cheque for $50. At last, I thought, I’ve cracked it. I photocopied the first of those cheques you see online where people make “$21, 362.57 in one night”. But the only further return I managed was the occasional phone call from America from some friendly gentlemen who promised fabulous increases in my income if I cared to invest reasonable sums ($20 000 or so). I managed to decline.

I have had some very kind and I believe genuine people try to help me in that time for far less money. At the beginning, Jim Edwards, and more recently, Chris McNeney, were both great. I still subscribe to Chris’ “Google Assassin”, and when I went to cancel yesterday decided I would keep it because it looks so good.

I studied Perry Marshall’s stuff (even on holidays). I exchanged frequent emails with Matt G (‘the lazy git’) and discussed how he’d have less of a celebratory hangover if he drank good Australian red wine instead of French (pure prejudice on my part here – no scientific evidence at all). And numerous others.

In fact the amazing thing with all these people that I found was that almost as soon as I sent an email I would receive a reply (not automated). Did they ever leave their computers, I thought.

All for the same ROI (Return On Investment) as we Options people say – a big fat zero.

And I suspect it is no fault at all of any these good people.

It all comes down to the way I make the bed. Not Versace standard. Good enough. Not great. Just OK.

But dear reader, you’ll be happy to know my ‘luck’ has at last changed. Now I have Michael Cheney coaching me. You’ve very likely heard of him. Michael is one of the Internet marketers whose stuff I looked at over those years without ever investing. But I know he does make “$21, 362.57 in one night” from time to time. I am up to Week Two of my course (a bit behind). And I am learning to blog.

And you know, this time I just can’t fail. Michael says:

You’ve got no excuse whatsoever not to succeed at this. Seriously, there’s absolutely no excuse. If you fail at this it’s because you’ve walked away from it, okay? It’s as simple as that. I can say that with my hand on my heart.

That’s it. My first blog.

Better go and make the bed.

Yours sincerely

Paul

Aka “The lazy bed maker”

http://thwack.startintro.hop.clickbank.net