Will That Be Credit?

“You want 21 percent risk free? Pay off your credit cards.” -Andrew Tobias

To all of the millions of people that use and live by credit cards, it is abundantly clear that we are prey to our own human nature. Credit card companies understand this and exploit the tendancies of human weakness to "want" things even when we do not really "need" things.

Once you are approved for a credit card, which is quite easy to accomplish, the credit card companies are pretty convinced that you will use that card. The credit card companies are even more sure that you will not pay off your credit card each month. This is where they hook you and it is where they make their money...interest charges.

It is those interest charges that begin to create the circle of debt that can make it nearly impossible to ever pay off a credit card. It is this constant debt we carry, you, me and everyone else which is the basis upon which credit companies create their revenue.

Now comes the rub, late fees. Most late fees average $34; instant profit to the credit card company and an addition to your balance that will collect interest charges if you don't include that amount in your next payment.

How do you to overcome the pitfalls of credit card usage? An article by Kristyn Kusek Lewis in Readers Digest offers these following tips.

* Remember that the due date on your card statement is just that. A postmark date is not the same thing. Because many card issuers impose ultra-specific cutoff times (American Express, for example, won't process some payments received after 12 noon in a customer's time zone until the following day), try to make your payment, by mail or online well in advance.

* One way to avoid going over your limit (and facing extra fees as a result): Go to the card company's website. Most will alert you via e-mail when you creep close to your cap.

* If you've historically been a good customer, it can't hurt to ask the customer service department to waive over-limit or other fees.

* Similarly, if your interest rate goes up, it's worth asking to have it lowered. A Study by the Massachusetts Public Interest Research Group found that when cardholders requested a reduction, almost six in ten got their rate reduced by at least a third with just one five-minute call.

What I caution everyone is to simply use credit cards with care. Do not overuse them and keep them to a minimum balance. Cash is always better but use of credit can be useful. One good way to limit the need for credit card purchases is to pay yourself at each paycheck (10%) and build up your savings. This will cut down on your need to use a credit card.

Lastly, read as much as you can about using credit and creating a savings account. Knowledge is power in many instances and the more you know, the better prepared you will be to handle your finances.

Don't Be Afraid, Just Knock on the Door

“If the sight of the blue skies fills you with joy, if a blade of grass springing up in the fields has power to move you, if the simple things in nature have a message you understand, Rejoice, for your soul is alive.” -Eleanora Duse

There is a great song that many of you are probably familiar with. It is called Mr. Blue Sky, written by Jeff Lynne and performed by the group Electric Light Orchestra (ELO). In a BBC Radio interview, Jeff Lynne talked about how he came up with this song. He had been staying in a Swiss chalet trying to write his band's next album after release of the album A New World Record. As he says, "It was dark and misty for 2 weeks, and I didn't come up with a thing. Suddenly the sun shone and it was, 'Wow, look at those beautiful Alps.' I wrote Mr. Blue Sky and 13 other songs in the next 2 weeks."

The ability of a blue sky to lift our spirits is like the smile upon someone's face when they greet you. It is the ability of kindness to make your day better. It can all start with a simple gesture or a sky of blue. And while I have this song in my head, another song by the same group comes to mind.

It is a song that talks about picking ourselves up and getting on with it. The blue sky may appear, but than we need to do something about it. We have to create movement in order to create a better life for ourselves. Here are the lyrics of the song titled The Diary of Horace Wimp that give you an idea of what I am saying.

The Diary Of Horace Wimp by Jeff Lynne

Monday
Late again, today,
He'd be in trouble though he'd say he was sorry,
He'd have to hurry out to the bus.

Tuesday
Horace was so sad,
He'd never had a girl that he could care for
And if he was late once more, he'd be out.

CHORUS

Don't be afraid, just knock on the door,
Well he just stood there mumblin' and fumblin'.
Then a voice from above said -
"Horace Wimp, this is your life,
Go out and find yourself a wife.
Make a stand and be a man,
And you will have a great life plan."

Wednesday
Horace met a girl,
She was small and she was very pretty,
He thought he was in love, he was afraid.

Thursday:
Asks her for a date,
The cafe down the street tomorrow evening,
His head was reeling, when she said "Yes O.K."

CHORUS

Friday
Horace, this is it,
He asks the girl if maybe they could marry,
When she says "gladly." Horace cries.

Sunday
Everybody's at the church,
When Horace rushes in and says
"Now here comes my wife, for the rest of my life." and she did.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Even when the dark and rainy clouds appear in your life, a blue sky sits just behind them. Get up and stay inspired my friends. Go out there and grab a great life.

Check out the video with the same song, "don't be afraid, just click on the play."

Artistic Data @EMCWorld

"Do you realize if it weren't for Edison we'd be watching TV by candlelight?" -Al Boliska

It is getting close once again to attend my company's annual technology conference called EMC World. Thousands of people will come together May 21st through the 24th at the Venetian Hotel and Convention Center in Las Vegas, Nevada. Yes, that very same place the Blue Man Group calls home.

In a weird way, the guys in the Blue Man Group look similar to the guy in our EMC World promo picture above. But they also look a little less freaky than the half wired man, half clouded bald guy. It probably isn't a good thing for me to be taking swipes at the advertising picture for EMC World 2012. But that picture makes me think about technology and where we are on the technology curve. While most everyone just flows with technology, I ride on top of it and believe we are on the upswing of even cooler stuff to come and it is this thing called "The Cloud."

I look back at what Bill Gates and Microsoft did for technology with their Windows Operating System. It gave the world greater access to technology in a more consistent and usable fashion. Yes, there were many...and I mean many...different companies and software options. With Microsoft, we were able to collectively do things together more easily and with greater productivity.

Some may argue that the dominance of Microsoft was bad, namely Steve Jobs and the folks at Apple. I contend that without Microsoft we would still be struggling to communicate between companies, between nations, and between people. There would have been fifty different word processing programs, eighty spreadsheet programs, a myriad of email programs and a lot of frustration. We had thousands of colors on an artist's pallette but no brush to make it all work together in one great painting.

A connected world by general adoption of a single operating system set up the path to where Apple would than lead us. With Steve Jobs at the helm of Apple, he worked all those many years to create a tightly controlled user experience that astounded millions of people. He created products that were elegant, in fact beautiful. Microsoft created the brush for us but we were still mechanical in nature, painting by numbers so to say. Apple products created an ability to bring human emotion and creativity into a blended mix with technology. They turned us into artists.

I was never a big Apple user early on because of my technology geekiness. I had a need to see what was inside and how it worked. That kind of geekiness has it's place in the technology craziness. Part of me could be pictured as the half wired guy in our EMC World picture. That is certainly part of who I am, always wanting to see the bits and bytes. Yet I do have a creative side, as all of us do. We could be engineers creatively designing a new product, a technical person creatively finding ways to diagnose and fix a product, or a business person coming up with new ways to sell or work with a new product. It really is not a whole lot different than painters, songwriters, singers or actors. We are all artists in one way or another.

What Microsoft and Apple did, including quite a few other companies, too many to mention, was to set the stage for an even greater collaboration of people, data and being connected. The technology advances we are going to see over the next couple of years will make video conferencing with friends in Curitiba, Brazil seem old school. Together we are going to see clarity in what the "cloud" can do for us.

I am excited because my company, EMC, is right smack-dab in the middle of it all. We play a very important role in this upswing on the technology curve. Along with all these other great companies, technology is becoming more about the connected nature of people as opposed to the technology itself. Billions of bytes of data out there in the world.

In a 2011 EMC-sponsored study, 1800 billion gigabytes (1.8 Zettabytes) were determined to be out there. If you look at just one zettabyte, it is the equivalent of the total storage capacity of 75 billion 16GB iPads, or all the information in all the academic libraries in the US (times half a million), or possibly the output of every inhabitant of the planet tweeting, non-stop, for a century. Lots and lots of data.

But never fear, it isn't some weird half android humanoid that we are going to become. It simply means that we will have the ability to be even more creative, more connected and more human in all of our connections to other people. We are going to see greater things happening in our lifetime. So stay tuned in, turned on and ride the wave of all that is happening.

See you @EMCWorld and I will blog each day I am there about the personal connections that are happening with people.

Stay inspired my friends.

Your Life, Not Theirs

“To wish you were someone else is to waste the person you are.”

There is a story about a small boy who was auditioning with his classmates for a school play. His mother knew that he had set his heart on being in the play - just like all the other children hoped too - and she feared how he would react if he was not chosen. On the day the parts were awarded, the little boy's mother went to the school in order pick up her son. The little lad rushed up to her, eyes shining with pride and excitement. "Guess what Mom," he shouted, "I've been chosen to clap and cheer."

Like many things, there can only be one Laurence Olivier to star in the stage production, only one Michael Jordan to sink the final winning basket, or the first John Glenn to circle the earth in space. All of us work and dream of being the "one" that garners all of the attention and success. We set our goals and ambition to be the best, the brightest, the most beautiful in the hearts and minds of everyone. We will try to define our success based solely on the highest pedestal others might place us upon.

There is possibility in becoming the greatest and most successful. There might be accolades from the mass public, cheering as you walk down the red carpet or ascend to the highest pedestal. But even the person cheering on the sidelines has greatness and success inside, inside where you are comfortable and happy first. That kind of success is determined by you and not by those around you.

And success can be as simple as being thanked for holding the door open for someone in need. Or by always being that person willing to help someone else, extending a hand to others. It could be greatness as large as the small boy being selected to clap and cheer, no matter what others may think. Success and greatness are wonderful things to strive for and accomplish in life. Just know it is you and the perfection that God made you to be which defines your great life.

Stay inspired my friends.