PUBLISHER'S NOTE by Christopher J. Kuselias
One of the biggest myths in America is that we are entitled to a fantastic life. That is to say, the government or our employers carry the responsibility to ensure our happiness, fulfillment and prosperity. The truth is, each of us is responsible for every aspect of our lives including our level of fitness, career future, financial obligations, relationship quality and spiritual peace. It is disturbing to notice an increasing number of people that take comfort in assigning blame to others for their shortcomings or challenges or failures: parents, spouses, bosses, terrorists, economy, etc. News Flash! Stop looking outside yourself for the things you don't have and start looking internally. It is you and you alone who produces, or doesn't produce, your quality of life. Stop making excuses or rationalizing why you haven't achieved your goals and realize that it doesn't matter where you have been, but only where you are going. Not sure how to stop the blame and take a more active role in your own self-growth? Follow these 5 valuable tips:
1. Take 100% accountability for everything that happens to you.
2. If you keep doing what you're doing, and you keep getting what you are getting, and you don’t like it — make a change!
3. Blaming others is a complete waste of your time and no matter how often you do it, it won’t change you, or the outcome, at all.
4. If you seek a different result, simply change your response to, or how you approach, the situation.
5. It is your attitude, not your aptitude, which determines your altitude in life.
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LOOKING INSIDE FOR THE ANSWERS
by Jack Canfield, author of The Success Principles
There is a story about a man who is out walking one night and comes upon another man down on his knees looking for something under a streetlamp. The passerby inquires as to what the other man is looking for. He answers that he is looking for his lost key. The passerby offers to help and gets down on his knees and helps him search for the key. After an hour of fruitless searching, he says, "We've looked everywhere for it and we haven't found it. Are you sure that you lost it here?"

The other man replies, "No, I lost it in my house, but there is more light out here under the streetlamp"

It is time to stop looking outside yourself for the answers to why you haven't created the life and results you want, for it is you who creates the quality of the life you lead and the results you produce.

You-- no one else!
To achieve major success in life-- to achieve those things that are most important to you-- you must assume 100% responsibility for your life. Nothing less will do.

Sylvester Stallone knows how to say no to the good. After finishing the very first Rocky screenplay, Stallone encountered several producers who were interested in making it into a movie. But even though that alone would have made Stallone a lot of money, he insisted on playing the lead role, too. Even though other actors such as James Caan, Ryan O'Neal, and Burt Reynolds were considered to play Rocky Balboa, Stallone said no, and after finding backers willing to finance a shoestring budget of under $1 million, Stallone completed filming on location in just 28 days. Rocky went on to become the sleeper hit of 1976. It earned over $225 million dollars and garnered Oscars for best picture and best director. It also received acting and writing nominations for Stallone, who took full charge of his golden opportunities and turned Rocky Balboa, and later John Rambo, into industry franchises that have grossed over $2 billion in revenues world-wide.

What could show up in your life if you said no to the good?
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THE CHALLENGE - GETTING THE GUTS by Suzanne Mulvehill, MBA
I sure think a lot about starting a business. I wonder if this is something I'd really like to do. I think I would - but would I? Could I? There's something in me that craves more than a job.

How do you get the guts to go off on your own and leave what you know - be it the security of a job, a career or a paycheck? Most people get the guts when they become brave and courageous and are willing to step out in the unknown.

Bravery and courage are learned behaviors. We learn how to become brave by taking action. It is in becoming brave in small ways that we become brave in big ways.

Brave and courageous acts are available to us every moment. We need to look for ways to be brave. We must be committed to getting the guts - to becoming brave and courageous. This challenge focuses on choosing to be brave consciously - choosing to do things differently and experience our lives in new ways.

Welcome bravery and courage into your life, into your being. Take action and get the guts to become the entrepreneur you want to be. Be brave - you are experiencing the transition of a lifetime!

I am ready to make some changes - to experience some change in my personal and professional life.

Make a conscious choice to start this journey. Simply begin exactly where you are. It is like going to college in the sense that you may not know exactly what you want to do when you finish, but you know that you will find out along the way. Entrepreneurship is similar; you learn as you go. You don't need to have all the answers now, today or tomorrow. They will come to you as you need them. Make a conscious choice simply to begin. This is the first step to becoming brave and getting the guts to achieve what you desire. It lets you and your energy know that you are making a commitment to be brave and courageous, even if you don't know what it is that you want to do yet.
This does not mean you need to quit your job or change anything at the moment. All it means is that you are making a commitment to be brave and courageous as you begin your entrepreneurial journey.

Excerpts from Getting The Guts
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EXERCISE KEY TO RELIEF FOR SYMPTOMS OF MENOPAUSE by David Parise
Studies have proven that exercise is confirmed to be the relief for symptoms of menopause and post-menopause.

Why it Happens: Both men and women lose bone density, mass and strength with age. However, women are at a higher risk because of hormone changes after menopause. As estrogen and progesterone levels fall, a person begins to lose bone mass by 0.5-3 percent per year. By the time a woman is age 70, she could lose 35-40 percent of the bone mass in her body. More than 40 million women m the United States are post-menopausal. The average age for menopause, depending on dietary habits and smoking, is around 50.4 years. However, a smoker or an undernourished "meat skipper" could arrive at menopause at 47.4 years. In the transition, 85 percent of women suffer discomfort or debilitation. All the symptomology and relative risk that is associated with menopause and post-menopause have specific similarities... all increase the chances of a painful crippling, life-threatening condition called osteoporosis! This is the single most important risk factor for females… more common than heart disease, stroke, breast cancer and diabetes. Why do some people wait for a fracture or symptom to then take preventative measures? Because of its life-threatening nature, I must tell you that women must become vigilant and take measures to prevent osteoporosis from destroying their lives.

Here's the Information: The amount of bone in your skeleton as you approach menopause will depend on the peak level of bone-mass you achieved, the time at which your bone loss begins, and at the rate your bone loss proceeds. Simply stated... start strength training now to increase bone mass/density to have a higher bone mass to begin with. Without a doubt, exercise is the menopausal woman's best friend, in that it allows you to control your body and emotions by using your internal resources! Every time you exercise, there is a stimulation of the adrenal gland to help convert specific hormones into estrogen. I could spend a lot of time presenting the benefits of exercise... more specifically aerobic and weight-bearing. To summarize, women who exercise three times per week have much great calcium levels and bone density than non-exercisers and less complications and negative -symptoms during what I call "The Climacteric Stages." Its never too late to prevent the hundreds of risk factors associated with menopause. Bone can be strengthened to resist the effects of estrogen depletion during the post-menopausal years. If you are not physically active, call a Certified Personal Trainer --or consult a sports related Physician for the program best suited for your needs.

Dave Parise, of Results Plus Wellness Center in Hamden CT.
(You are encouraged to always consult with your physician before making life-style changes.)
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DON'T BRING YOUR JOB HOME WITH YOU by David Niven
We spend more waking hours on the job than doing anything else. We are taught from a young age to value hard work and that it will be rewarded. We hear far less about the efforts required in our relationships and the rewards that will come to us based on those efforts. Working at your job as hard as you possibly can, is not working as well as you possibly can. When the workday is over, the work must recede out of your thoughts and time.

James Keller designs home office-spaces in existing rooms or entire rooms dedicated to working from home. He thinks the home office concept is a metaphor for the home office worker.

"The space I design has to serve two functions. It has to be a home part of the day and an office part of the day. When you think about it, that's just what the person is too-- a family member part of the day and a worker part of the day. This is a limitation in a sense, since the design has to incorporate both functions. But it is also a strength because, done right, it serves the greater need."

Keller strives to make the space something that exceeds people's needs instead of something that just minimally functions. "I don't want to make a design that people can suffer through; I want to make something people can enjoy and someplace you want to be."

Keller's concept of a home office is not a space that beckons you to the office at all hours of the day. "You have to turn off the office lights and shut the door and then see your house as a home, come five o'clock. You might say, "I work in that room from nine to five. Come five o'clock, I'll clean up, and it becomes a family room again."

One of the easiest and most important things Keller advises is to use storage units. "Pack it up and put it away at the end of the day. That keeps your work safe from mishaps and misplacement." It also helps put the person in the right frame of mind. "Just as important, packing your work away moves you into the next phase of your day."

Excerpt from The 100 Simple Secrets of Great Relationships
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SPIRITUAL OR NOT? by John Cyr
What is spirituality? Some of us may appear to be "spiritual". Some get familiar with the spiritual lingo or fads. Some make sure they can talk spirituality with those that may approach them by being somewhat in "The Know" about Psychic phenomenon. Subjects like Inner Spiritual Growth, Life After Death, Psychic Readings, Spiritual Self Discovery, Eastern Enlightenment, Buddha, Jesus, Judaism, Christianity, Catholicism, or whatever the topics, they’ll need to be versed in to carry on a conversation. Let me assure you this is not spirituality.

Being affiliated with a religion does not make one spiritual either. I would agree that being a member of some good religion is a good step towards being spiritual. However, we have been speaking about superficial signs with no substance. Spirituality has to do with something that is inside of us all. In general, spirituality is wired in all of us. It is the divine within us that makes us strive to push towards excellence and becoming a greater person. There is one definition I have read that seems the best to me and it is likely to offend no one. It reads:

"Every noble impulse, every unselfish expression of love, every brave suffering for the right, every surrender of self to something higher than self, every loyalty to an idea, every unselfish devotion to principle, every helpfulness to humanity, every act of self control, every fine courage of the soul, undefeated by pretense or policy, but by being, doing, and living of good for every good’s sake – that is spirituality". –David O. McKay 1963

I recently met a friend who is not very religious at all. But in our conversations he always seems to muster up great sayings, quotes from famous people that have truly profound meanings for our lives. Someone remarked to me that he was not a religious man, and I barked back in defense, "Madam, this is one very spiritual person. Do you know how I know that?" I asked. "Because he has cared to read good books and research the very best sayings of mankind and has savored them up in his heart to teach others the wisest of things that help us become better people".

What do you think of my new friend; Spiritual or not?
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THE FLIP SIDE

Each month "The Flip Side" will feature a fun or anecdotal idea, a tasty recipe, a student success story or some other human-interest piece. This month: Humor in Sales

The salesman says, "I got three orders today: Get out! Stay out! and Don't come back!"

A good salesman is guy who can convince his wife that she looks fat in a fur coat.

A shoe salesman assigned to Africa filed this report "Impossible territory. Everyone here goes barefoot." He was replaced by an optimistic salesman whose first report was, "Piling up orders by the bushel. Nobody here has shoes"

If you are searching for an example of the perfect salesman, go no further then the family dog. Here is a creature that will get you to feed, house, and take it on adventures… trading you nothing more then unconditional love. That’s sales!

One woman defines retirement as "twice as much husband with half as much money."
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DID YOU KNOW?
BY THE NUMBERS-- 4min, 46sec, -The average per-mile pace of Paul Tergat when he broke the marathon world record in the 2003 Berlin Marathon with a time of 2:04:55. 7min, 12sec, - Average per-mile pace of the 1996 Olympic marathon winner.

TRAINING TRIVIA-- Pilates machines were developed during World War I, when boxer Joseph Pilates was placed under forced Internment in England with other German nationals. Pilates used bedsprings to create therapeutic exercises for the injured.

TRAINING TRIVIA-- The first archaeological evidence of yoga's existence is found in stone artifacts depicting figures performing yoga postures. These artifacts, excavated from a valley in India, appear to date from 3000 B.C.E.

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