One of the proudest days of my life… the day I give you Internet success through a unique gift you can only get from me!

 

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Howard Martell

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Ludwig van Beethoven (1820) by Joseph Karl Stieler
By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. Today is a red-letter day for me… one of the most important days of my life. For such a day nothing short of one of our weary world’s greatest masterpieces, Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” (1824), will do . Please play it before you read this article. You cannot but feel the thrill and exultation. If a human being can do this, human beings can do anything. Find it in any search engine and turn up the volume. Then you’ll know how I am feeling now as I prepare to give you a gift only I can give and which has taken me a lifetime to perfect.
Deaf… sublime.
When great Beethoven sat down to compose his 9th Symphony, of which the “Ode to Joy” is perhaps the most celebrated part, he was stone deaf. Yet in his capacious, extraordinary brain the music rang out to thrill the world. He could have said, “a deaf person cannot compose,” everyone would have understood such a conclusion and offered the usual words of sympathy… but that is not the way of people with a mission to improve the world. They recognize no obstacle! Do not give way to defeatism! And reach deep into themselves to find what they alone can give the world and its people who rely upon such genius for relief! Instruction! And improvement! For you see those who have such a gift must give such a gift… and today I give such a gift, the greatest I have ever given, to each of you.
The struggling world… and the profound promise of the Internet.
I have now been on the Internet over 18 years, about a third of my life. During these years I have witnessed humanity’s struggle to make sense of this monumental invention which has the undoubted power and demonstrated potential to connect people everywhere and enable them to say what they want to say without shackle or inhibition.
Now think a moment: for the first time, the very first time, in the long cycles of humanity each person can, with the simple expedient of an Internet connection, present himself, in all his wonderful uniqueness, to others who have the ardent desire to do the same, without the pernicious intrusion of any of the world’s Thought Police who have intervened with impunity and malice in all previous epochs.
The Internet brooks no interference… no one telling you what you can do…when you can do it. Yes, for the first time in human history each person has a voice that can be heard… that must be heard…. and so transform the world — for good and ill.
Is it any wonder then that I have selected “Ode to Joy” and recommended that you play it now… for on our troubled planet we need all the help we can get and the Internet is here to provide it.
Commerce…
From the very first minute far sighted folk saw that such a means of connection could prove to be a superb means of commerce. But how? Most didn’t know and so, without guidance, commenced a struggle which left them frustrated, confounded, angry and, too often, embittered. How, they wondered, could this astonishing invention produce a golden outcome for them? It was a question that millions asked — and continue to ask — but which only a comparative handful have ever answered successfully. With the almost daily assistance of my cherished partners George Kosch and Sandi Hunter, I have found such success… and been given the opportunity to give it to others. Today we celebrate that opportunity and its ability to uplift! Enrich! And empower people worldwide.
It all started with a blank sheet of paper.
I am not just a writer, but a published writer, which is a very different thing. To write to connect should be every writer’s objective… and it has certainly been my objective since my first article appeared in print 59 years ago, when I was 5 years old. You may well imagine what a heady thing it must be for that child, any child to experience such excitement. Once you’ve had it, you spend the rest of your life wanting more and doing what is necessary to get it. In this regard I have been most fortunate… having written thousands of articles and 18 books, mostly on business themes. My word has been carried — and frequently, too — on radio, television and on the lecture circuit. But my connection with the Internet has radically transformed the entire matter of content and given me the means to give you substantial advantage every single day.
How?
As I have often said and frequently written and emphasized, “the list is the business, the business is the list.” Thus each person desiring to succeed in business must spend a significant amount of time building a list, and this activity must be a part of each and every day that you desire to remain in business and increase your profit.
But maintaining your list, growing your list cannot, on the Internet, be your sole objective; that would be protecting your list and ensuring that you can use it daily to email ad copy to your subscribers. The problem is, if you only email ads day after day to these subscribers, they will quickly become disenchanted, even disgusted, with you… and manifest their displeasure by unsubscribing your list, thereby depriving them of all benefits you offer and yourself of their golden custom.
This is the exact situation in which most Web marketers find themselves… and why so many of these people are killing their lists, thereby killing their profits.
Here’s where I — and Bill Gates — enter the scene and why you need to pay attention to our message. Gates has famously and enigmatically said of the Internet, “Content is king.” What does he mean? Just that people will not put up with an unceasing avalanche of ad copy; they need more, much more. They need content… and if you create a blog and give them this content you can accompany it — every day — with the ad copy that generates the revenue. Problem is, most people cannot write engaging, meaningful copy and cannot afford the cost of hiring the people who could create such copy for them; it’s just too expensive.
That’s where I come in… I can and will produce such copy — for free. And today we recognize and celebrate the completion of the first 365 articles, one for every day of the year. These articles, all about 1500 words in length, are timely, intelligent, often provocative, always informative and, my signature and pride, beautifully written. Let me explain the importance of these articles and why you are fortunate to have them: they save your all-important lists from being destroyed by your subscribers, people who want more than a steady diet of ads and as such are invaluable.
Let us be very clear with each other: if you email nothing but ads, you will kill your list and thus obliterate your business. Thus, you have these options. Email the ads anyway and test my thesis (suicidal); try to write such copy every single day yourself (highly unlikely given your writing skills). Or you could hire the necessary talent to do the work, thereby breaking the bank. Or…
You could use the copy I have created for you… and which I give to you, thereby enabling your list and with it your business to grow and flourish while I provide the necessary (and always beautifully written) copy. And that is why we are celebrating today… not just for what I have written… or how well I have written — but because with these often lyric articles I am keeping your online business on the profit path.
“You millions I embrace you,” and give you the best of which I am capable for our mutual joy — freude! So now finish as we began… with Beethoven and his “Ode to Joy”. For we, now working together, have everything to be joyful about! Let the celestial sound soar… as we do — together! Freude!
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About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum -> http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy

Welcome to my house. What you must do — or say — and not do — or say — if you ever want to be invited back. (I’m serious.)

Posted on September 27, 2011 by Howard Martell

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By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. It took me the better part of nearly 5 years to suffer through the demolition of my Cambridge condominium and through all the never-ending (and always expensive ) stages to its glorious resurrection as a place fit for — me. Naively I thought I knew what would happen next, would happen that is when 25 years and more of serious art collecting would be positioned, each item in its appointed place, each contributing its special characteristics to the overall effect, the sum producing the critical “Wow!” factor.
Yes, I thought I knew just what people would do and say upon entering this earthly paradise, brilliantly lit, extravagantly appointed, a thing of beauty and a joy forever. But, as I still cannot quite grasp, I was wrong. And so, as a matter of your domestic comfort and serenity of mind, I am sharing my experiences with you… and you will thank me — vital if you should ever remodel and rehabilitate. God help you.
Let’s get the contractors out of the way.
This is not a story of how to select a contractor, attempt to bind them through contracts which are never to your advantage, much less how to keep them on schedule, within the budget. I am still not calm and judicious enough to write about that. My remarks on the subject of contractors deal with something I knew nothing about before undertaking this signature project; I did not know how many people have brothers-in-law and cousins, too, named Vinnie…. how much did you say you paid; Vinnie’s unlicensed but he could have saved you a lot of money… and look how your contractor is gypping you. The conversation always went something like this…
Delivery man brings package to my door… and sees I’m remodeling. “Can I take a look?” What you should say now is “Over my dead body”… and slam the door in his face. But it’s too late; the ever quick and curious delivery man is inside, and scrutinizing.
After a couple minutes of intense peeping, he renders his considered opinion: “Dr.,” he says, “what you’re doing here is amazing… incredible… You paying a lot of dough?” He doesn’t wait for an answer; he knows… and he knows I know he knows. I nod. Already I feel his hand in my pocket.
“Yeah, I’m sure. I wish I’d known. I gotta cousin Vinnie, over in Everett, Mass. Let me make a call, Doctor, youse Harvard guys, no offense, are over your head with things like this. And I want to help you, ’cause I think the world of you.” When they say that, you’re doomed. It goes without saying that it isn’t just delivery men, next-door-neighbors, people met casually in the grocery store check-out line who have cousins named Vinnie… no way. Every contractor seems to be amply stocked with the breed… and a cell-phone that instantly connects you, the money guy, with the next character certain to be feeding at the trough. Just writing this makes me break out in hives.
I can remember one dismal, and damned expensive, encounter with a never-ending conga line of unlicensed hooligans named Vinnie. Just telling you about one such encounter will, I trust, produce sufficient enlightenment for you without completely humiliating me. It concerned the recessed lights in my brand-new-in-every-way kitchen. I liked them.
But it is not the way of unlicensed cousins named Vinnie to like any work, any work at all, done by anyone other than themselves. They have made plausible disliking an art form… you’ve got to hand it to them, you never feel the complete effect of the shiv until they’ve left…
Electrician Vinnie didn’t like the new, expensive, kitchen lighting system. It was too this and not enough that. He might have understood his mumbo-jumbo analysis but I (while always sagely nodding my head) did not. Anyway, next thing I know my brand- spanking-new kitchen lighting is a mass of pulled out wires and smashed glass on the floor. I don’t mind telling you I threw myself down on the newly installed marble floor (soon to be re-laid by the flooring Vinnie) as if I were holding the mangled corpse of my beloved and wept bitter tears. Vinnie, of course, was already at work contacting the lighting fixtures Vinnie, who of course made me ashamed that I had ever had the temerity and bad judgement to do anything with anyone but him. Even with all the “special because I love you, man” discounts, the cost was 50% more than I had just paid for those now completely useless original light fixtures. I only knew, of course, after Vinnie gave me his “best offer, man.”
Soon, my wallet was being emptied not only by the original Vinnie but by his shiftless son Vinnie, Jr. whose skill at creating and delivering excuses for not showing up as scheduled was astonishing; then his wife Mrs. Vinnie (“she can wash your clothes and clean your house”) and of course those cute Vinnie by-blows of the next generation who took every opportunity to visit — and devour whatever was not nailed down. I knew them all… and suffered accordingly.
But all bad things must come to and end… and so it happened here.
In due course, even the ever resourceful Vinnies of every kind and description ran out of even implausible ways to “help” me. In short, they had battened, waxed, and grown fat off that once happy and self-contented man — me. One never to be forgotten morning, I woke to find they were gone, like so many gypsies in the night. Their tools were gone, even their half-eaten pizza (from Cousin Vinnie’s grease pit in Medford, Mass) was gone… anything with any value, no matter how remote, all gone.
I felt as happy as any prisoner on Death Row getting an irrevocable, eleventh-hour reprieve. It was, in fact, the happiest moment of my life… but, of course, it didn’t last. Happy moments in the midst of such projects are few and far between… but the tears are in my eyes now as I fondly recall the moment their removal was certain.
Problem goes, problem comes.
You know you are alive if you have problems. Only dead people don’t. By this measure, I must be the most alive cat on the block. Not only do I have problems; I positively seek them out. This was conclusively proved when I went from the frying pan of construction into the fire of arranging and proper presentation of the beloved items from my art and artifact collections. I started collecting as a boy, coins, books, autographs principally political. And if I collected it I know just when and, in theory, just where it is now. It is a herculean task, I can tell you… and the days when the art movers were here drove me close to becoming a Franciscan monk… because they are allowed very few personal possessions. It seemed a good idea….
… especially after the art movers had probed the limits of human endurance by stunts, while hanging, worthy of the flying Walendas. I can assure you you never take your eyes off their lithe movements when what they are hoisting an irreplaceable 17th Century Old Master. But no matter how anxious such moves made me feel, it was worse when the first visitors came to see the results.
The first thing I say is, “Don’t touch.” Of course that then becomes the first thing they do. They ignore the Biblical injunction from Jesus who told them “Noli me tangere,” don’t touch!
The second, “no liquids in the drawing room.” Moments later they are all but holding a car wash amidst the treasures of the Habsburgs.
And as if this were not enough, when they are poking and prodding, they say, “I have one just like this,” they announce about unique, valuable silver from the descendants of Joan of Arc. “Yeah, I got it at a garage sale for 56 cents. How much you pay?”
I want you to know something. If I end up murdering one of my guests, the jury is sure to acquit me. Lawyer Vinnie will see to it…
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About The Author

‘We need a little Christmas.’ Why I’m working hard right this minute to make Christmas 2011 the best ever.

Posted on September 26, 2011 by Howard Martell

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September 26, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. Every year, it seems, the opening date for Christmas marketing creeps forward, adding days, not just hours, to the already lengthy selling season. This year my cadre of Christmas watchers reported seasonal catalog and store sightings as early as Labor Day, September 8 . But you can count on this: as people worldwide read this article, they will surely report even earlier sightings. This happens every year… and as it does one of the interminable debates of our times reignites: when is this much too much Christmas?
Ask this query in a crowded room and, hey presto, there will be pandemonium, mayhem, and strident calls for the public lynching of the people who so tamper with and wantonly extend the most important and revered holiday of the year. Christmas creep is here… and you have an opinion on this matter; I’m sure of that. Everybody does.
Christmas is the promised land — for merchants everywhere. That’s the problem.
Christmas purists, and their number is legion, never tire of beating up the merchants who are, they aver, at the bottom of Christmas creep. From this moment of the year forward, a large percentage of Americans will get up on any soap box to hand and excoriate, insult, belittle and besmirch people who earlier in the year they knew and attested to be good, hard-working, service-providing, tax-paying citizens. But where Christmas creep is the issue, truth and justice are early casualties.
People will creep… it’s as American as apple pie.
Know any folks from California? Or Oklahoma? I do. They are some of the nicest people you’ll ever meet. They are also the descendants of creepers.
Take California for instance. There a grand gentleman named John Augustus Sutter was peacefully minding his own business when James W. Marshall on January 24, 1848 discovered gold on Sutter’s land, at Sutter’s Mill, near Sacramento. The nation didn’t say, “Good for you, Mr. Sutter.” No way. Instead they took to creeping on to old man Sutter’s land, a little bit here, a little bit there… until the creepers had everything and Mr. Sutter had nothing but lawsuits and a footnote in history. A little bit of gold in them thar hills and a whole lot of creeping got us the State of California, and that’s a fact.
Or consider the folks in Oklahoma. They’re not called Sooners for nothing. In 1889, the federal government organized the great land rush, whereby folks who wanted land could get it free by racing for it against other land-hungry folks. Problem is, a good many of the wanters couldn’t be bothered to wait… and so they crept out early and grabbed the good stuff. Yup, they were creepers and some of the best families of the state started that way, and that, too, is a fact. Creeping pays, and only a Grinch would disagree.
But Grinches proliferate the closer Christmas comes and its insistent, unrelenting messages.
Although there have been plenty of Grinches in our history, lives, and culture, the actual character debued in the 1957 children’s book by Dr. Seuss, who was by all accounts a Grinch himself. It was titled “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and was adopted into a popular television special in 1966. In an instant people with anti-holiday spirit and growly disposition were indelibly tagged as partisans of that scowling hermit with green fur, red eyes, and boots who lives in an isolated cave near Whoville.
Now exuberant Christmas lovers had just what they needed to characterize and lambast the nay sayers, “Don’t be a Grinch,” causing the justly labeled Grinches to writhe and squirm. Just as they deserve. We all know it’s fun — and de rigueur — to pick on each and every Grinch we know.
It’s a question of dates.
After the fall in 1815 of Napoleon and his gimcrack empire, a peace conference was convened in Vienna to divvy up the spoils. Participants included Russia, England, Prussia, Austria and — drum roll — the France now ruled again by its Bourbon dynasty and represented by the Prince de Talleyrand. One day Tsar Alexander I of Russia, who always made such a bad impression as he rattled on about God and morality, was being particularly insufferable on the matter of how to divide the Kingdom of Saxony, which had, in his imperial view, stayed loyal to Napoleon a little too long. Its king, he insisted, should be losing half his country, or more.
Talleyrand, polished, aristocratic to his manicured fingertips, the ultimate cynic and realist, scanned his colleagues, each of whom (but the English) had made deals with Bonaparte, and renigged on them, snapped out that toxic phrase, “That, sire, is a question of dates.”
And so it is with our Scrooges, our Grinches.
The person who wants no Christmas festivities at all, just strict, gloomy adherence to what they suppose has been ordained and sanctified…. are Scrooges to the people who want the Christmas season to exist for a day or two, but not more. These, in turn, get dubbed as Grinches by those who want more… and there are always those who do. And so it goes…
… merchants trying (especially nowadays) to make up for one punk month after another, delving deeper into the calendar….
… thereby fueling yelps of outrage and righteousness from folks who raise the cry of too much self-seeking commercialism too early…
… thereby forcing those who might even agree in theory, to push the adamant seasonal marketing forward and forward again, as an act of mercantile preservation and profit.
Each says, “Enough is enough”; each points fingers and mouths frantic imprecations; each postures, preens, pouts, and always acts and speaks as if truth lived in their house and only their house. So there!
Whoa! The baby at the center of Christmas has indeed been thrown out with the bath water, and this will never do. Thus some thoughts of reconciliation, offered humbly and with trepidation.
Christmas has had a significant commercial aspect since the three wise men of the Orient, who came so far and at such inconvenience, approached the manger and offered their expensive presents. Did they just happen to find such offerings — gold, frankincense, and myrrh — in their saddlebags? Doubtful. More likely, they had gone shopping at one of the great bazaars along the way; such bazaars, blazing with the riches of the rich lands of the East, were the malls of their times… even unto parking their camels, always malodorous and mean spirited. In such a place, even the most fastidious desires of the most demanding could be met, including those who shopped for the King of Kings, for whom they employed their most discriminating tastes and ample means, never rushed. Thus, commercialism and Christmas go hand in hand… as they always have.
These suggestions will help you cope with and better enjoy this best of all holidays:
1) Let every man set his own acceptable level for just the amount of Christmas he desires. A laissez faire attitude is not just useful, but mandatory. Stop worrying about whether the man next door is asking too much or too little from the holiday and instead concentrate on making yours the best ever.
2) Leave the merchants alone. They have had a bad year; even if we think they are going over board, let them get on with it without our jeremiads, lamentations and snide remarks. Where would we be at Christmas, after all, without them?
3) Remember Henry Ford II’s celebrated line, “Never complain, never explain”. Since the very inception of Christmas the Thought Police have attempted to coerce uniformity. Mr. Ford was right… you owe it to no one and nobody to adhere; simply believe in your own way and style. As the song says, “Have yourself a merry little Christmas…”
4) Select a few of your favorite Christmas carols and seasonal preferences and load them into your audio player. You’ll be a lot happier when you enter some establishment with music you detest, no matter how venerable, if you can hear the tunes you particularly like.
And one more thing, whether the Christmas you celebrate is long or short, the single day itself, or the 12 days with five gold rings and lords a-leaping, or something else altogether, remember this: the gift you should most give and be most fortunate to receive is love… it is the only true and essential element. All else pales beside it.
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About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum -> http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy

‘We need a little Christmas.’ Why I’m working hard right this minute to make Christmas 2011 the best ever.

Posted on September 25, 2011

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. I was young then, blessed with that overflowing feeling of high animal spirits and joy to the world. It was 1967, I was in New York City for the first time, about to sail to Europe on the SS Aurelia  … The future seemed boundless, was boundless, and I had only good wishes and to spare for everyone, everywhere.

The only snare was that I couldn’t get tickets for “Mame” (music and lyrics by Jerry Herman); the hit musical based on one of my mother’s favorite books, “Auntie Mame” by Patrick Dennis (1955). Bummer. But not down hearted I somehow managed to get a program and discovered when Angela Lansbury, the star, the toast of Broadway, was likely to leave the Winter Garden Theatre. .. and just where I could stand for the best chance of getting her autograph.
I well recall the moment she came out the stage door, she was smaller than she appeared on stage… and I remember how the collar of her coat brushed against my cheek… and her scent as she bent down to autograph the program, a little crushed in my hand. It was lush, seductive, delicious…  And I was happy…

I have that program still, in good condition, too, a reminder when the song I’ve chosen for today’s theme music — “We need a little Christmas” — was just a peppy, high-stepping, belt-it-out number, not an absolute need for all of us. Start, however, by going to any search engine… get the tune… then let ‘er rip… it’s going to get your blood going, your feet tapping, and maybe even bring a tear to your eye, you sentimental softie you…

“For I’ve grown a little leaner, Grown a  little colder, Grown a little sadder, Grown a little older!”
These words pretty much sum up events since that magic moment at the door of the Winter Garden Theatre — and I don’t merely mean for you and me, either. I mean for America and for our deeply troubled world. And that is why I am already at work to ensure this Christmas in this year of general dismay and gloom is the best ever. We need it — for the good of home, hearth, soul, and, yes, the economy.  I began this week.

It is September 25, 2011 as I write, and my dear and valued helpers, Aime Joseph and his soothing wife Mercedes, have commenced Operation Christmas. We started with a herculean task meant to occur twice each year but often “forgotten” — polishing the silver. It is arduous, it is wearying, it is dull… and it is a necessary deed in creating the “wow factor” that is such an essential part of Christmas for me and mine.
The question is, why have we started so early… just what are we doing it for?

Over the last few years I have noticed the inception and development of an invidious trend in me and many others: scaling back, pruning, diminishing the high festival of Christmas. This is a very bad thing… and this year I decided to take constructive action before I bear an even closer approximation to Ebenezer Scrooge. This called for drastic action… and my better self answered the call.
Unmarried, no (known) children.  Katie Segal made a fortune on “Married with Children”(1987) in which she played the ultimate suburban vulgarian wife, Peg. She thought the holiday was for maxing out her credit cards and causing pain to her hapless bills-paying husband. It was funny… because, of course, we weren’t like Peg, no way. But we are… and not, I hasten to add, because we enjoy the consumer aspect of the event.
I have always thought the sanctimonious folks who decry the blatant commercialism of Christmas and seek to revert to prior usages, pure and holy, misread the original text and allowed themselves to be hoodwinked by Puritans. Now, lest you think I am anti-Puritan, be aware I am of Puritan heritage myself. And it pains me to admit, the Puritans got Christmas all wrong and missed its message.
The culprit in the matter was Oliver Cromwell, a man who, saying enough is enough, helped King Charles I to eternity in 1649 through the simple expedient (as Charles told his horrified children) by separating His Majesty’s head from His Majesty’s body. The Lord Protector, more powerful than most kings, then lead an effort to root out all vestiges of the traditional high-living English Christmas. And so for 10 years (until his successor son Richard got kicked out in 1659) Cromwell and company worked to make everyone just as miserable and gloomy at Christmas as possible. That was the right and proper thing to do.

For instance, zealous Puritans, rigid, unbending, inflexible, muffed the matter of the Three Wise Men, princes of the Orient. Each, if you’ll recall,  brought the Christ child very expensive gifts. These included gold (imagine if they’d held it), frankincense and myhrr. Unless these royalties just happened to have some extra gifts in their treasure trove (possible, but unlikely) each had to make a trip to the bazaar (which is what people called malls in those days) to scrutinize what was available and mull over their options.
This is exactly what the non-kingly people do nowadays at Christmas, parking their cars (easier to handle than malodorous camels which spit), returning over and over to get just the right gift, the gift that will say loudly and clearly, “I care.” So, where’s the problem? Christmas, in short, has had a pronounced commercial aspect from the first moment. People  should get over it and get on with the real business of the event: love!
Whether you consider the matter from the vantage point of God to man — “For God so loved the world that he gave  his only begotten son” (John 3:16) —
… or from the vantage point of human relations, the fact is that Christmas is the prime event of every year based on, all about, and dedicated to love. And we humans after this storm-tossed year should embrace the event and enjoy it for what it is: a chance to love one another, be kind to each other, embrace our diversity, and give the embedded rancors of our deeply fissured planet a rest… even if we know, as we do, they’ll be back in the new year. Even a little solace helps. We need it, we must have it, and we deserve it.
And because I have been, shall we say, neglectful both about giving and taking love, I have a huge love deficit to make up for… and so Christmas 2011 must be done right in every nuance and detail…  and this takes time, care, and thoughtfulness.
Cleaning the silver is just the beginning.
And then like the score says, “Candles in the window/Carols at the spinet.”
And gifts for all… and not merely anything grabbed at the eleventh hour Christmas Eve either… for the gift must be as special as the beloved who gets it…
All this takes time… meticulous attention to detail… and, most of all, love…
And it is this love, in short supply in years past, suppressed, which is the most important thing of all… This year will be different, for this year that love  will flow without stint…  as a resolute declaration to everyone, everywhere that this is a place where humanity is made welcome and where we know the true meaning of Christmas… and mean to have it! Share it! And renew it…
Knowing this, can you wonder why I am starting so early here? The wonder is that you have not commenced early, for your need is pressing, too.
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy

Are you an entrepreneur? Check these crucial attributes and see if you really measure up. (You probably don’t.)

September 24, 2011 | Author: Jeffrey Lant | Posted in Dr. Jeffrey Lant’s Article Archive

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author’s program note. This is an article about bold, visionary, business risk- takers called “entrepreneurs”. Such people, by their intelligence, diligence, and shear bravado, overawe movie and sports stars in public awareness and regard and dwarf any renown which may come with mere public office, even the most high.
Entrepreneurs are the heroes of our age; never have they been more discussed, emulated, venerated and even worshipped as they are right now. On campuses around the nation and the world, the giants of entrepreneurial fame draw standing room only crowds while mere authors, statesmen, and musicians take second place, or worse.
Oh, yes, these are the heady days for entrepreneurs. It is no wonder you wish to enroll yourself amongst their ranks. But are you really cut out to be an entrepreneur? This article will make that clear, one way or the other.

To put you in the right frame of mind, I’ve selected the theme music for the hit television series “Star Trek”, which celebrates those who boldly go where no man has gone before. This music was composed by Alexander Courage for the series which debued in 1966. It is highly suitable for those who don’t merely move into the future… they create it. You can easily find it in any search engine. Get it now… turn up the volume… and closely follow the points in this article which will make it clear whether you will captain your own Starship Enterprise, or not…
What is an entrepreneur? Let’s start with the definition.
Entrepreneur was originally a French word taken over lock, stock and barrel by the English speaking world, much to the dismay of the Academie Francaise, official guardian of the French language. Its definition is “One who undertakes to start and conduct an enterprise or business, assuming full control and risk.” Now let’s see if you are this person.

1) Entrepreneurs see the world not just as it is… but as it should be. From this fundamental fact about entrepreneurs all other facts derive.
Scratch an entrepreneur and you’ll find a person who is not just tinkering with human reality today… but has been tinkering with it right from the get-go, even from the cradle. They never see just what is… in their mind’s eye they see each and every situation as it can be… must be; they have only to do their bit.

2) Entrepreneurs say with Harry S. Truman, who proved as president of these United States to have the soul and inclinations of an entrepreneur, that “You can’t have anything worth while without difficulties”. And, “Mistakes would be made. No one who accomplished things could expect to avoid mistakes. Only those who did nothing made no mistakes.”
Those without the blood and fiber of an entrepreneur live their lives in chagrined remembrance for all the mistakes, errors, miscalculations and bonehead decisions they have already made… and are sure, given the chance, they will make again. This paralyzes them… for they are sure that when they decide, that decision will be wrong. On this destructive basis no progress is ever possible.
Entrepreneurs are very different.
Each and every decision made opens the possibility for error. This is the real world in which entrepreneurs live and flourish… accepting whatever transpires as yet another valuable learning step, as they walk the road to improving the human condition.

3) Entrepreneurs are “people-people”. They understand their work, all their work, is for people, unlike those without the entrepreneurial wherewithal who, in this withering phrase, “love humanity but hate people.”
An entrepreneur looks at a given situation and sees people unable to fulfill their God- given potential because of a condition, an obstacle which can, given the idea, the desire, the resources, and their own time and energy, be changed, improved, or even eradicated, sent to the scrap heap of invidious, enfeebling circumstances that the collectivity of entrepreneurs and their active, can-do ways have  removed as obstacles to the perfectibility of mankind.
In short, while others immerse themselves in fallibilities and dismay, the entrepreneur activates Teddy Roosevelt’s celebrated recommendation to “do the best you can, with what you’ve got, where you are.”
They know to the depths of their being that there is nothing so wrong that cannot be righted by the sum and substance of their parts, their humanity, their problem-solving capabilities… and that je ne sais quoi that distinguishes them from the run of mankind which sees obstacles as finalities… not challenges which they can meet… with grace, joy, and gratitude that they had the chance to serve.

4) Entrepreneurs crash, burn, hurt… and get up to try it all over again.
In the international best-seller “Zorba the Greek” (published 1964), author Mikis Theodarakis writes of a young English entrepreneur who gets entangled with and wiped out by the bad advice and worse assistance of Zorba, who is at best a con man. He follows Zorba’s catastrophic advice… and in a memorable scene watches as the Rube Goldberg machine Zorba has created collapses, costing the entrepreneur every cent he has… and more. For an instant, stunned by the implosion of all his prospects, every dream and expectation, he is stupified, angry, lost. Then he shows the true grit of even the grieving entrepreneur, “Teach me to dance,” he asks  Zorba, not at all the line we expected… but should have. It is what a real entrepreneur would say… and dance the sirtaki.
This is how entrepreneurs face catastrophe… for as Thomas Alva Edison, revered of American entrepreneurs, said, â? I haven’t failed, I’ve found 10,000 ways that don’t work ât , commenting on what he learned from the exasperation of years of “failure.”  Sublime.

5) Entrepreneurs uplift, never cast down.
No one knows better than an entrepreneur how difficult the improvement of the human condition can be; certainly those without the entrepreneurial disposition and experience cannot.
Thus, on any opportunity, wherever they happen to be, entrepreneurs lift up, encourage, and ease the way. Thus they administer in friendship and human solidarity essential truths and elements which have benefited them and from which hopeful others may benefit, too.
Entrepreneurs carry with them at all times, truths and insights derived from their unique vantage points, practical advice and admonitions, steady advice, always utilitarian, on what to do… and what not to. They never think, as those without entrepreneurial proclivities do, that to give to others is to diminish yourself. Their point of view is radically different — and always helpful.
And one more thing…
Entrepreneurs, however much they have managed to achieve alone, know that their success is always predicated upon the dedicated assistance and endeavors of the crucial people who constitute their team. It is their honor, their pride and responsibility to recognize and thank these sinews of their success, and they are glad to do so.
When was the last time you did as much for the good people who have helped you? Isn’t it time you did, you who aspire to be an entrepreneur?

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About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy

When you meet a kindred spirit, reach out to them… especially when they are about saving our threatened language. Meet Huck Gutman.

Posted on September 23, 2011

Huck Gutman

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. I’m going to do something different today, something occasioned by my discovery (compliments of The Boston Globe, September 21, 2011) of Huck Gutman. The theme “music” for this article will be an instrument we all have — the human voice — this time wielded by a master of delivery, Robert Frost.
Many years ago, over a half century in fact, I used to ride my bike from the tiny hamlet of Belmont, Illinois into the nearest town, Downers Grove, so I could sit in the cool recesses of the public library. I had many objectives and purposes there, books, of course, always books. But there were the records made by authors and by those very special authors called poets, one of which was recorded, and most memorably, by Robert Lee Frost (1874-1963).
I can recall to this day Frost’s reading of “The Pasture,” a selection from his volume “North of Boston,” published in 1915. It begins so…
“I’m going out to clean the pasture spring; I’ll only stop to rake the leaves away (And wait to watch the water clear, I may); I sha’n’t be gone long. — You come too.”
I doubt I can convey to you now — though I shall try — just how evocative, how thrilling the simple words, powerfully rendered, “You come too”, were to me, for I was a boy who longed to see the world and meet its people, and here was an invitation to accompany this special man who had a simple mission he made seductive…
“I’m going out to fetch the little calf That’s standing by the mother. It’s so young, It tottered when she licks it with her tongue. I sha’n’t be gone long. — You come too.”
Oh, how I wanted to go… and I believe Huck Gutman wanted to go, too. Before you meet him, go to any search engine and listen to Robert Frost read, especially “The Pasture,” then return here for I want you to meet Huck.
Sensitivity and a love of words from an unlikely place — the Capitol.
Huck Gutman is what Anne Shirley (Anne of Green Gables to you) would call a “kindred spirit.” She, an author too, loved words and would have written Gutman a nice note complimenting his labor of love; she would have deemed it an act of lexicological solidarity to be lavishly complimented… I agree.
Huck Gutman, a civilized man.
Gutman is 67 years old, an age at which many seek the joys of retirement — travel, golf, socially sanctioned sloth subsidized by Social Security… but Gutman has other fish to fry. This long-time professor at the University of Vermont (where I myself gave many workshops in business success) now serves as chief of staff to the Senate’s most “out there” liberal, Vermont’s Bernie Sanders. Since the senator has his hands full resurrecting America’s anemic Left, Gutman is kept busier than most of his administrative peers. But he makes time for another occupation, one which keeps him grounded and of good cheer… he is an avatar of words and of words properly read… particularly the diamond-sharp words of poets.
And he has set himself the (perhaps Sisyphean) task of building civil bridges in the epicenter of internecine political warfare through the love of poetry, of words, and of language. Whew! This is truly a labor of love… but one bringing a special joy to the growing cadre of those who like the likable Huck… and appreciate what he is doing. His e-mail list includes 1,700 readers who include all the Senate chiefs of staff, several White House staffers, university presidents, academics, journalists, and former students.
His point is simple, profound, and absolutely necessary to the well-lived life: “It’s to remind them there are other things than the debt ceiling and Social Security.” Amen.
Here’s how he does it…
Every couple of months or so, Gutman, on leave from the university, makes time to find and circulate a poem. It may be from Ancient Greece, Shakespeare, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, or William Carlos Williams — there are no limits but one: it must be a poem by a master, a poem that can (if properly read) read well.
Gutman, educator to his fingertips, presents the work with one admonition. “LISTEN to the poem.” “The worst thing to do with a poem is to try to get at its meaning. We have done an absolutely horrendous job in teaching people how to read poems.” I go even farther than Gutman here… we have done the same horrendous job teaching people — and not just students either — to read prose, novels, letters, speeches, too.
Gutman’s solution is to encourage his audience to read for enjoyment, just as they would listen to music. Gutman is right, but reading his carefully considered selections, for all he gives his readers a few directional signals, is not enough. They need to read aloud, one of the great joys our speed-reading culture has left behind, to the detriment of human communication and meaning.
The marvelous human voice.
Most every day I write an article; the subject range is unlimited. Like all authors I like to have these articles (which can easily double as scripts) read and read widely. But I also insist on them being read aloud, each and every word
My experiment in reviving the joys of recitation started in our online Live Business Center where 24-hour-a-day monitors give out effective business advice… and also read my newest article or any of the hundreds of classics. I must confess: there was a universal, almost rebellious opposition to this innovation by the people who had to read the word aloud. What a mess!
They mispronounced words they’d used since grammar school.
Tripped over anything longer than a couple of syllables.
Disdained the helpful dictionary… making even more errors.
Moaned, groaned, complained that they were being “forced” to learn.
Killed every inflection, every intonation, every emphasis and so rendered brilliant prose banal.
Tossed necessary punctuation away… and thus forced the collision of words which to provide full meaning, needed careful enunciation and precise delivery.
It was brutal, excruciating, painful… . But I knew, despite the squawks and maledictions, I knew, I say, what I was about. I insisted on my point and moved forward word by liberated word. To great effect…
Now monitors take pride in reading these articles… and reading them well by mastering the text, individual words they have not previously encountered, including the mot juste which can make or break a composition. This article, starting today, will enter the repertoire… to touch people worldwide who are charmed, enchanted, comforted and enlightened by the human voice properly used.
Last words (for today) for this fellow New Englander and his romance with words.
Thank you… thank you for allowing all the poets you have carefully selected to speak again and anew, profoundly, passionately, resoundingly. For this you have been rightly praised. Let me add these words to your plaudits. They are from Joachim Du Bellay (1522-1560) “Heureux qui comme Ulysse qui fait une belle voyage.” You deserve such a voyage, and with the multitudes of poets who travel with you, will always be welcome wherever you go.
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About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy

What a great idea! Wish I’d thought of it! Cambridge, Massachusetts and MIT inaugurate Entrepreneur Walk of Fame.

Posted on September 22, 2011

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant
Author’s program note. I live and work in Cambridge, Massachusetts, just steps away from Harvard Sq. This compact area along the MBTA’s Red Line arguably contains the greatest concentration of brain power and technological innovation on earth. I’m here to tell you about a great new idea hereabouts which you’ll want to come and see.
To set the background for this article and get you in the mood, I’ve selected “You have to admit it’s getting better” by the Beatles, 1967, from “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band.” It’ll certainly get your blood flowing… a feeling every innovator young or old knows well and just cannot get enough of. Go to any search engine, find the tune, then crank up the sound and prepare to do your bit to ensure the future will keep getting better all the time….
Just the other day, September 16, 2011, something new, creative, innovative and long overdue was inaugurated the shortest walk from the Kendall Square MBTA stop in Cambridge. It’s the brand spanking new Entrepreneur Walk of Fame… and I say, “Hurrah!” and special thanks to the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and a handful of foundations and groups. The walk celebrates the essential importance of entrepreneurs, people who improve the nation and the world through invention and innovation, not least by being engines for the creation of new jobs; a task our nation’s capital and its bewildered office holders just cannot seem to do better.
For openers, the founders of the walk have honored 7 grand entrepreneurs, some of whom we know well, others we may not know at all, for all that we have enjoyed in one way or another the fruit of their experience and experiments. They include…
* Inventor Thomas A. Edison.
* Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates.
* Apple Inc. cofounder Steve Jobs.
* Lotus Development Corp. founder Mitch Kapor.
* Genentech cofounder Bill Swanson.
* Hewlett Packard Co. founders Bill Hewlett and David Packard.
How they were chosen.
Once the idea of the walk had been approved and financing was arranged, prospective honorees were canvassed… and, ultimately, inclusion criteria determined. These stated that those honored must be respected US entrepreneurs who developed an innovative, technology-based idea into a billion-dollar company, and who are known — and respected — as risk takers, thereby embodying the essence of the entrepreneur. They don’t need local ties, but must have had a big impact — creating jobs, or an entire industry. In short, these are the biggest of the big fry.
Why each entrepreneur was chosen.
The selection committee for the first seven honored released its reasons for each entrepreneur selected.
* Bill Gates… for creating the software industry.
* Steve Jobs… who embodies “bouncing back from adversity.”
* Bob Swanson… “showed that anything was possible. Created the biotech industry when he was in his 20s.”
* Bill Hewlett and David Packard. They “demonstrated the power of the team.”
* Mitch Kapor (always a local favorite). “Changed the entrepreneurial culture.”
* Thomas Edison, grandaddy of entrepreneurs, “created both inventions and a company.”
Inspirational quotes.
Each star in the walk is amplified by an inspirational quote. Here are a few of them…
Mitch Kapor’s “Building a workplace which engages a diversity of employees and brings out their best makes a far greater contribution than financial success alone.”
Bill Hewlett’s “Men and women want to do a good job, and if they are provided the proper environment, they will do so.”
Bill Gates’ offered this: “Never before in human history has innovation offered the promise of so much to so many in so short a time.” (I must say, Gates’ line is the best written, owing everything to Winston Churchill’s immortal remarks on the RAF pilots in the Battle of Britain. But then Gates had a Harvard education, though he did drop out long before he would have graduated.)
Interactive, innovative.
Innovatively, the walk also offers pedestrians such interactive stories as how Steve Jobs famously started Apple in his garage and how Gates left Harvard to become the richest man in the history of mankind, a tale from which restless undergrads have drawn all the wrong implications, to the chagrin of their worried parents who urge patience and the security of the degree Gates tossed away without a second thought. His parents worried, too….
Thoughts on entrepreneurs.
Let’s begin with the dictionary definition of the word, always a good place to start: “One who organizes, manages, and assumes the risk of a business or enterprise.” Entrepreneurs are bold, action-oriented, visionary, energetic, energizing. They can see the future and they want to do, will do, whatever it takes to deliver it. They are thrilled by challenges, not oppressed by them… and as a result they shape the lives of the rest of us… and reap unimaginable rewards… kudos, deference, money and — no matter how nerdy — the cute boy or girl of their dreams. It is no wonder, then, that the great age of the entrepreneur is here, now! It is a marvelous thing to be the cynosure of every eye with the deepest of pockets.
That’s why — right this minute — young men and (increasingly) young women throw off the comfortable and predictable to risk everything, knowing that failure is always a possibility, but proceeding anyway…
These folks, crucial to the economy, to the job market, and to the good of all, deserve just as much help as they can get. The Entrepreneur Wall of Fame and its many activities are an excellent start. Bill Aulet, managing director of the MIT Entrepreneurship Center, and his team should take a bow….
But it is not enough…
1) Every presidential candidate needs to visit the Walk of Fame and the MIT Entrepreneurship Center and see what it takes to make a better future.
2) The president of these United States should especially be invited. He knows nothing about the needs of entrepreneurs… and as a Harvard Law student never went near Kendall Sq. and MIT, and we are all suffering accordingly.
3) We need to establish and enthusiastically develop and promote a cabinet-level Department of Innovation and Entrepreneurship where we do everything possible for the crucial people reshaping the world to general advantage.
And one more thing, we ought to chastise roundly the candidates who lambast Cambridge, Harvard, MIT and, in general, the brainiacs here about. Such attacks are despicable, usually are made by those on the right in an attempt to frighten the uneducated, and get us no where. America needs entrepreneurs and their daring; let’s celebrate, not trash, them, for they are coming up with the ideas we need, not you.
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About The Author
Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Republished with author’s permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com . Check out Massive Traffic Ultimatum ->  http://www.HomeProfitCoach.com/?rd=sk9BRJWy