I just finished my first 3 days at Landmark (I have “graduation” tomorrow), so I figured I’d post a wrap-up to how my experience was.

First thing’s first… it took me a long time to get to the Forum. I had a lot of friends that went there and recommended it, but for every positive recommendation, there was an atrocious review online. I twittered that I was considering going once and got all kinds of warning messages back.

Nobody I knew personally had anything bad to say about it – but for some reason I just kept trusting the reviews. When I asked my friends who went about the mind control I kept reading about, they admitted there definitely was some. They also said since I know influence tactics well, I should go and just be cautious, but that the overall content was phenomenal.

In retrospect, even Warrior Camp – which lord knows I recommend wholeheartedly – had mind control tactics… most things like that do… but for some reason, I was just really bothered by it this time. I think it’s because my “I freaking hate to be manipulated” meter was up… whereas with other things, the mind control comes unexpectedly so I can’t be cautious in advance.

…had I not seen a blog post that Lori Painter made. She mentioned that someone who studied a LOT about psychology told her that in order to conquer her self worth issues, she needed to go to Landmark.

That was the final push for me to go, and so I signed up.

I am always looking to push myself to the next level, and self worth is something I could work on.

But before I tell you about that, in order to understand this post, you need to know the forum runs for a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then a Tuesday night “graduation”.

With that out of the way –

When I first got to the Forum, I went in with a different mindset than I ever have before. I was skeptical from the getgo. I was so on the lookout for mind control stuff that it was incredible. The first thing I did was count the chairs in each row, multiply by how many rows there were, and calculated how much money the seminar was bringing in. I analyzed every word the leader said. I felt like a detective.

Initially when I signed up for Landmark I had planned on staying the entire seminar duration. During Friday afternoon when we were asked to write down if we were able to commit to the whole seminar, I wrote down that there was a possibility I couldn’t stay that night. I figured I’d be bored and that the good stuff didn’t come till later on, because that’s what one of the reviews said.

Because we had assignments during each one of the breaks and dinner breaks, I ended up being finagled into staying that night. Our first dinner assignment was to go to dinner with some people from the forum. Once I committed to going with them, I felt like I needed to follow them back into the building when we got back from dinner.

To be honest, the entire theme of the weekend for me seemed to be committing in small chunks. On Friday I thought I wouldn’t go into the Friday night session, on Saturday I thought I might just quit, on Sunday I thought I wouldn’t go Sunday night, and it was today (Monday) that I decided I’d go to the Tuesday night graduation.

At the end of the day on Friday I decided…

I mean, you can justify anything about anything… but my “mind control meter” didn’t ring at all during Day 1.

On Day 2, I didn’t outright see anything mind control-y either. I mean, there is some talk about “enrollment” which is getting people on board with the possibilities you create, but anyone’s going to tell you to have people in your life that support your goals. It’s common sense.

During Day 2, something cool happened.

He mentioned that he read the reviews and went full-on discussing how the possibility that Landmark uses crazy mind control techniques, manipulates people, etc.

The Forum leader engaged him and talked to him for probably about an hour in front of everyone.

I definitely had the feeling that the leaders were trained for these kind of things since ours (Jeff) seemed to have an answer for everything. Regardless of that though, the answers were good (enough), with the exception of one (in my opinion).

It may be a small detail – one I would have never even picked up if I wasn’t so on the lookout – but I’ll mention it anyway.

The dude at the mic, in an attempt to explain why Landmark would have a reason to use mind control techniques, mentioned that Landmark obviously makes a lot of money.

Jeff started talking about how he said the same thing when he was a student, and that he mentioned it to the people he went to dinner with on the Saturday night of his forum. Apparently some guy he was at dinner with was the VP of Training at a Fortune 500 company and told him that he had studied through hundreds of training programs, and that if Jeff knew “the truth”, he’d be shocked.

Jeff talked about how the VP was talking about how he had been through hundreds of the best training programs, and when he found out the price of Landmark, he thought it was per hour. When he found out it wasn’t per hour, he thought it was per day… then was shocked when he found out it was per weekend.

Then he started mentioning overhead, and almost making it sound like Landmark was not making anything or possibly even losing money.

The guy at the mic mentioned that you could go on Wikipedia and go through a tour of the San Francisco headquarters, and how magnificent it looked. He said he didn’t care that Landmark made money, but he just wanted to acknowledge that they did. Jeff said, “Have you ever been inside of that building?” The way he said it was like the headquarters were crappy inside or something (which I do not, at all, in any way, shape or form, buy).

Jeff was clearly trying to paint a picture of Landmark not making that much money. Most people just accepted what he said, and I think they really believe that Landmark is almost some kind of charity. That’s easy though – most because most people accept any reason why. It’s the classic Xerox example from Influence – “Can I cut in front of you to make a copy because I need to make copies?”.

I think Landmark makes a ton of money, and that’s fine – but I just don’t like to hear it being denied. I know that they don’t charge that much, but it doesn’t mean they’re not profitable. I have one word for that rubbish: Wal-Mart.

Anyway, towards the end of Day 2, I started learning some stuff. I definitely think I was blocking myself a little bit because I just kept being so suspicious of everything… but I did learn some stuff and I was very happy.

I would not have recommended Landmark to anyone at that point, but I did learn some cool stuff and figured it wouldn’t have been a total waste of time and money if that was the best it got.

On Day 3, the course changed for me – a lot.

The content on Day 3 was AWESOME.

Of course, that’s also the day when some ‘mind control’ stuff happened, although in all honesty, it was no worse than a pitch at the end of a seminar.

After we got back from dinner on Sunday night, Jeff tried to have us share with a partner the “creation of a possibility” about how our graduation on Tuesday night could go. Because you can invite people who haven’t yet been to Landmark on Tuesday (it’s when they recruit the new people), people were getting up and shared stuff like “I am creating the possibility of enrolling a million people and spreading the love”.

When I had to share – even after I had learned some AWESOME STUFF – I was still very cautious and on guard for mind control. I told my partner, “Sorry, but I’m not creating any possibility. I’m not bringing any friends, and I don’t think I got enough out of Landmark to recommend it.”

At that point I was also 99% sure I would NOT go to graduation. Despite the fact that I learned a lot and got an amazing new perspective change, I was still on guard and almost resentful of the forum. I figured mind control was looming around the corner, and since I hadn’t seen it yet, it was coming at any minute.

(I am normally not a conspiracist like this! … in fact, I’m usually the opposite.)

Today is Monday morning. When people asked me how I liked my experience, I told them I didn’t want to give them any judgments until a month or so down the line. I told them I wanted to see how much I implemented before giving my word on anything.

With Warrior Camp for example, I saw immediate and enormous life-transforming changes, and I was measuring Landmark against that. Like I told my friend earlier today – even on my millionth recommendation of Warrior Camp, I still get just as passionate as I did the first time I told someone about it, and it’s been years.

I felt strongly that I was not willing to give a recommendation of Landmark until I had some time to digest it.

In the hours afterwords, I had lots of time to think objectively.

I was still very on guard this morning. I was still thinking that mind control was looming, ready to taint my views of what I had learned. Because of that I was not ready to give Landmark credit yet. I was honestly not ready to allow myself to accept getting a lot out of Landmark because I kept thinking about those damn reviews.

In all honesty, I expect that graduation is going to prove that a lot of those reviews have merit.

That being said, I also realized that I need to take a more well rounded view of things.

I know that for a FACT because people have posted negative reviews about one of my companies – and I’ve investigated their claims! So many people feel it easy to make an anonymous post (I consider a handle on a forum “anonymous” still). It’s no problem to sit behind a computer when there are no repercussions against how much they slander a company. What do they care if they lie?

So that being said, I’m a bit disappointed in myself that I let those negative Landmark reviews affect me so much. I’m especially disappointed that I wouldn’t allow myself to be OK with Landmark considering:

1. I’ve seen firsthand that people lie when reviewing companies

2. All my friends that went – personal, real life friends – SAID THEY GOT A LOT OUT OF IT

It’s now Monday night. I have the graduation tomorrow and I am stone-cold positive there’s going to be a lot of strong-handed tactics to get people to recruit friends. There’ll probably be enough to frustrate me. I don’t doubt it at all – my friends told me there were mind control techniques and I didn’t see enough yet to warrant their comments.

That being said, I will wholeheartedly recommend Landmark anyway. That’s because I DID see immediate and (for me) beyond drastic changes in my behavior already.

First of all, I’m going to Mexico tomorrow. I was in such diet mode for the past few weeks, thinking I needed to look good for my bikini, and that I wouldn’t look good until I reached a certain weight. I tell you, I have NEVER… NEVER, EVER, EVER been 100% OK with what I looked like. There are definitely days when I have “I look cute!” days, but in the back of my mind, I still saw myself as 250 pound Rachel. Today when I looked in the mirror, not only did I feel beautiful and confident, but I ate whatever I wanted – even though it’s thisclose to Mexico and I would have told myself before that potential bloat could ruin a bikini.

Also, I decided to NOT take my computer to Mexico. Burn Your To Do List had been kicking my butt for a while and I was making myself feel very guilty about taking a week off – like I’d be letting down people on my team, that I didn’t deserve to take the time off yet, etc… but Landmark really helped me see that I create my reality in a way that no book has been able to.

Obviously I cannot tell you what’s going to happen a month down the line – and I will do my best to make a follow-up post (feel free to prod me along if I’m taking a while) – but I can tell you that as of this point, I would recommend Landmark, that I think I am forever changed (time will tell for sure), and not to believe everything you read online.

I would also say to take what you want from it and disregard the rest. Like I said, I still do expect heavy recruitment techniques during graduation – no doubt about it – and I hope it’s not so obnoxious that it takes away from the content of the forum. At the end of the day though, I decided that I am going to take what is useful for me from the forum, disregard what is not, and stand by my recommendation.

Look out for more posts down the line about some cool things I learned.

I went into my RAOK challenge super-excited, but unfortunately, I have to decommit from it now.

Because of a ton of changes with Burn Your To Do List and actively trying to make it as good as possible, there are days when I haven’t been able to think about anything but work – or even make it out of my front door.

I guess it’s in a larger picture doing something good for the providers and entrepreneurs we’re working with… but it’s not what I had in mind when I created the challenge.

I’m hoping that someday in the near future I can start this back up, as it really did make my soul sing.

I signed up for a new class that I was super-excited about learning today.

When the instructor learned about what I did, she asked if I’d be interested in bartering her lessons for my ability to get her more online exposure.

I agreed, and offered her a trade that is heavily in her favor dollar-wise. I think I’ll be able to get her a lot more clients… and I consider this not just a RAOK for her, but to all potential clients, because she is AMAZING and so are her services.

BTW: Some really awesome songs to download are:

Jason Mraz – Life Is Wonderful
Plain White Tees – What If
Michael Buble – Haven’t Met You Yet

These have been playing over and over on my iPod lately.

If you have any positive songs to share, please do!

I have been wanting to do a 30 day “Random Act Of Kindness” blog section for a while, but never wanted to commit to posting here 30 days in a row.

Joshua keeps pushing me on it though, so I’ve finally cracked.

So with that said…

What this is about: I love to do “random acts of kindness (RAOK)”. It’s partly purely selfish – it feels AMAZING to be able to give to other people. I’m also a big believer in the “ripple effect” – if I do something nice for someone, they’ll do something nice for someone, and so on and so forth, making the world a happier place.

I will be committing to doing a RAOK every day for the next 30 days. I’m still not sure about posting here every day for 30 days, but I WILL commit to posting here as frequently as possible (some days I might have a few days’ worth of updates).

In all actuality, I probably already do a RAOK once a day (or at least an average of 7 a week) – but I want to post here because:

a) It seems like whenever I mention a RAOK on Twitter or Facebook, people say, “Wow – I want to do that!” It seems like it’d be fun to share ideas.

b) Even if someone looks at this blog and doesn’t decide to go do something nice on their own, it should at the minimum, put them in a slighter better mood than when they got here.

What I consider a RAOK: A random act of kindness can be whatever you feel comfortable with. It could just be waiting for an extra minute to hold the door open for someone or giving someone a huge smile. It does NOT always have to deal with money, and it’s whatever you feel comfortable with (or NOT, which is even better, so you can push yourself out of your comfort zone!)

Just to get your imagination going, here are some things I’ve done in the past:

- Offered to babysit for a busy mom who couldn’t otherwise afford a babysitter
- Bought a gift card to randomly give someone in the parking lot
- Saw a guy trying on hats on the street in Vegas and went over to buy one for him
- Read to kids at the Salvation Army
- Paid for the person behind me’s toll on a bridge

What I would LOVE: If you started posting doing RAOK’s here, that would be AWESOME!!!

The stories that can come out of RAOK’s ROCK. Last week I went to go give someone a gift card and we ended up becoming friends and are going to hike together soon.

The week before that I ended up talking with a homeless man for a few hours. He ended up BLOWING MY MIND with how much he knew, and really challenged my thought structure. He actually wanted to be homeless, because he said he’d rather live in a box than with people that he considered had “toxic” lifestyles. It was so interesting to hear about how he stashed his stuff, things he went through, etc…

I don’t know about you, but I LOVE to hear about different people and their perspectives on life.

Okay, so with all that out of the way…

What I did for Day 1: Today the UPS man (who I’ve never met before) came to my door with a package for me. I saw the box said Oh Nuts (candy/nut store) on it, so I told him that my mom must have been sending me a Valentine’s present.

I told him that the stuff from there is very good, and he said he’d have to try it sometime. I asked him if he wanted me to open the box so he could try some. He acted surprised, but said yes. I ended up getting out the scissors, opening the box, and giving him a goodie bag of different treats.

He walked out with a HUGE smile on his face.

Disclaimer up front: Because I now have almost 100 providers depending on me for work with Burn Your To Do List, it crossed my mind for a few seconds that maybe I shouldn’t post such opinionated stuff on my blog.

Like I said, the thought only lasted a few seconds. I’m not going to silence myself on things I feel strongly about – that’s just foolish. If, at the end of this post, you are a client or potential client and strongly oppose my thoughts, then feel free to either cancel service or not sign up. To put it bluntly: don’t let the door hit ya where the good Lord split ya.

I definitely want to make sure my providers have work, and I actively work on that, but I also don’t want them to deal with bigots.

They tend to make for crap clients anyway.

(Definition of bigot: a person who is utterly intolerant of any differing creed, belief, or opinion.)

With that out of the way…

A big part of me is really excited to get married and have children. I really think I’d be a great mother, and it’s so easy to get lost in ideas on how I want to raise my children. I can’t wait to take them around the world so that they can actually SEE and EXPERIENCE in person what so many politically agenda’d textbooks teach them. I’m excited to help my future children stay heart-centered, empathetic, and understanding.

(Side note: I LOVE Mark Twain’s quote: “Travel is fatal to prejudice.”)

Up until recently it was easy to get lost in thoughts about marriage too. Jaime and I long fantasized about having a double-wedding, which would be so fun. I’ve also thought about doing fun things at my wedding – having cotton candy machines, maybe having a little carnival… just non-stuffy, fun stuff.

(I do realize this entire blog post is premature as I don’t even have a boyfriend right now – but based on a bunch of factors, I’m very confident I could get married pretty soon if I really wanted to. That’s not to sound arrogant – like I said, I base that on conversations, experiences, and other factors.)

So like I said, I had been excited about marriage… until recently. I’m not so sure I want to get married any more. I’m happy to accept a proposal, commit to someone, etc… but I don’t really think, in good conscience, that I can get married.

I recently saw an interview with Sarah Silverman on same-sex marriages that really challenged my thinking. In the interview, she said that a straight couple getting married in our current state of affairs is like being part of an exclusive country club where blacks and Jews aren’t allowed. I’ve got to say, I totally agree with her.

I think the fact that same sex marriages are STILL outlawed is truly vile. It’s just… archaic. How, in this day and age, can so many people (in fact the MAJORITY of people, if voting statistics are not politically manipulated) perpetuate themselves to be better than others? How can we, as a country, say that some people deserve to be married and others don’t? That one type of person is more “right” at existence than another? It’s absolutely disgusting.

Outlawing same sex marriage is judging other people and saying “We’re better than you.” It doesn’t matter what the rationale is – religious beliefs, upbringing, bad experiences, whatever… at the end of the day, being homophobic or not tolerant of other people is not having an empathetic and open-hearted view of your fellow human being.

There are many people that I really love in this world that are gay. I think I would feel crappy and guilty about perpetuating such shit rules if I were to get married. I can only imagine the hurt/sadness/shame/guilt that so many gay people probably feel when people get married. I bet for many, it stings every time they hear about marriage – even if it’s unconscious.

Thinking about this makes me think about a whole bunch of different things, too:

First off, why do I want to get married, anyway? Is it based on a scarcity mindset? Do I feel like I need someone to commit to me in order to feel truly loved? And if that’s the case, why would that be?

If I say I believe the world is abundant enough that I could attract several stellar people to marry if I wanted to, then it shouldn’t matter if one guy I love wants to commit to me or not. I could find someone else.

Then I think, is it because of tradition? Look how far tradition has gotten us – filling our gullets with crap food, Americans watching an average of 28 hours of TV per week, blindly following what the media says, etc…

Of course there are fantastic traditions too – ones I really adore, like the whole “Christmas spirit” where everyone in the world seems so happy… so it’s not to say all traditions are negative… but my point is, I want to evaluate things on an individual basis and not just welcome anything that comes into my life because it’s just what people “do”.

When I think about gay marriage, I also think about something my friend made a point about once.

(Note to friend: I’m pretty sure you didn’t want your name attached to this – if I’m wrong or you’ve changed your mind, I’m happy to give you credit.)

He mentioned that he doesn’t like to support those marathons for cancer because from a universal standpoint, focusing on cancer can only bring about more of it. (I personally think it’s a moot point since it has been proven time and time again that a healthful diet can fix a slew of health problems, including cancer).

I digress though. By focusing on the idiocy of outlawing gay marriage – even for a short while – I wonder what, if any, universal implications there are.

I really dislike what has become identified with the phrase “Law of Attraction”, but I absolutely believe that each individual, as well as everyone in a collective consciousness, shape our destinies. I know we bring into our lives what we focus on.

On the same note though, blindly accepting this injustice seems stupid too. If we followed that mindset, there would still be slavery.

I’m not sure on that point, but welcome any thoughts/comments.

The one thing I’m positive of is that at the end of the day, people just want to be loved. To tell some people they’re not as worthy of that is appalling, idiotic, stupid, intolerant, unfair, and ridiculous.

I need to get back into work, so I’ll end here… maybe edit and add more later… but those are my thoughts for the time being.

A few months ago, I decided to start BurnYourToDoList.com with Otto.

When I first started it, it seemed easy enough. A team of 33 trained assistants basically fell into our laps, so I thought things would go incredibly. We were going to charge entrepreneurs a marked up fee to work with our already trained assistants, and we’d basically get money for being the matchmakers.

I thought we would just sign up clients, assign them to already trained traffic assistants and virtual assistants, and everyone would go on with their merry lives.

I figured entrepreneurs would be happy because they got trained team members to work with them, team members would be happy because they’d get secure, stable income, and Otto and I would be happy because it looked like a lucrative, easy business model where we could help out our team members.

My initial intent was to work hard through January 1st, make BYTDL my 100% focus until we got 100 clients, and then start traveling again.

Easy enough, right?

WRONG.

I basically sold my soul for a few months. It was absolutely AWFUL.

In no particular order…

7. The way I had it positioned, I was basically responsible for everyone’s traffic and sales. People would ask me what they should do to get more traffic, and I’d give them advice. If it didn’t work, I was the one to blame. Awesome.

6. I was on the phone ALL DAMN DAY with clients. I freaking hate the phone (I’m getting frustrated again just as I’m typing this).

5. Because the service was high end, even if I didn’t position it as me being responsible for people’s traffic and sales, I still would have taken responsibility. I felt like everyone’s business was my personal business because they were paying us so much money.

4. While Otto and I are completely OK now, it definitely took a toll on us then. I was always super-stressed, sending a million emails a minute, and getting upset when I wasn’t getting responses back quickly enough. I’d get mad at Otto when the stuff he was responsible for wasn’t done right/according to what I wanted, and he was probably just as mad at me for being overbearing.

We eventually decided to stop being partners and I took on the company myself – which I think worked out very well for both of us. He had owed me some money, so we called it even and then went our separate ways business-wise.

3. Each of our team members was trained on different things. In my effort to make the clients happy, I told them I’d train the team members on anything. This worked out in some cases. In others, it didn’t, and then I felt like I was giving sub-par work to clients. I’d then go and spend money on correcting the problems through other service providers, and… blech.

2. Every time a client complained – even the smallest complaint – it would absolutely devastate me and ruin my day. I take client satisfaction REALLY seriously, and any complaint would just ring in my head for the entire day.

1. I had a big argument with one of the team members in the beginning. We ended up splitting up, and she tried to get all the team members to stop working with me, leaving me having to cover all the clients with NEW assistants.

She also ended up hijacking one of the clients.

In the end I was able to resolve mostly everything, but it was just a really miserable period. I haven’t been that stressed since my management positions in retail. I’m normally super-laid back, and in love with the PASSIVE income I usually make from my internet marketing efforts… but this was just awful.

It was time-intensive, miserable, and NOT hands-off.

So anyway, I REALLY wanted to get rid of this godforsaken site. I just felt like I couldn’t, though.

I felt really badly for the new team I was working with. Excited by all of the new clients I was bringing in, two of the project managers started to feel like it was their life’s mission to provide jobs for Filipinos.

I felt awful taking that from them.

One week the girls went and posted ads all over the place for Filipinos who were looking for reliable income. They rented out a venue – ON THEIR OWN, with their OWN MONEY – and held a training for all prospective employees. They figured we’d be set as we grew the business and brought on new clients.

They felt so strongly about being able to do this, and I had so much emotionally invested in being able to help them, that I couldn’t just let it go.

After considering all options…

When we first started BYTDL, we were all about having a high-end service. We thought we’d have a bigger profit margin this way, not deal with complainers (usually the cheaper people are, the more they complain), and be ready to leave the business after 100 clients.

It was also the model that other people used, so I figured it had to work.

After a few months of wanting to shoot myself more often than not, I decided to try a different strategy.

I started reading people’s emails, combined different pieces of advice I got, listened to my intuition…

And instead of sticking with high end, I started offering LOWER prices where people would pay for TASKS, not for HOURS.

I ended up changing the company around so people would purchase memberships for “X” amount of credits, and then they could use the credits towards jobs they wanted to have done.

1. It seems as if things get done slower than I want when my team does things versus when I do them. The clients felt the same way. I felt if my team was working on a TASK basis, it wouldn’t matter how long projects took them because the clients would be paying for the end result.

2. I figured if new clients asked for tasks, then they would go to a central “pool”. This way whoever was best for the job would take the task, and I would no longer need my team members to be jacks-of-all-trades.

3. NO MORE CONSULTING. Clients would ask for the tasks they wanted. If the tasks didn’t get them more traffic, they could request new tasks. This new model allowed me to stop consulting or be in charge of traffic results. All I accepted responsibility for was the fact that the tasks got done correctly.

4. I didn’t have to promise too much this way. People can only ask for jobs that I KNOW we can do well. If we can’t do them well, they’re not on the task list.

5. I thought this would help my girls provide jobs for Filipinos. This was actually the real and main reason I decided to go this route.

To be completely honest, when I started this new direction, it was more so I could leave BYTDL without feeling guilty about it. I was going to pay my girls on a task-based model where I would have broke-even at best every month.

I really didn’t care though – I just wanted to be done with the godforsaken site and not let my girls down.

First of all, I launched the offer on a Saturday. In less than 5 days, we had about 125 clients.

For months, I’d been staring at this wallpaper I put on my desktop:

…and then in less than 5 full days, it came true!

Then, I touched base with the team to see if they would rather get paid on a salary basis versus a task basis.

At first, they seemed hesitant.

When I pushed to find out why, they told me they were legitimately worried that if I paid them on a salary basis, I wouldn’t make enough profit.

(Do you see why I love my girls so much?)

When I explained the difference, they were more than happy to go a salary route. Not only can they get secure income now,I don’t have to worry about losing money (in fact, I’m getting a pretty nice TRULY PASSIVE profit margin now).

They’re going to make more money this way too. My original founders are getting a salary increase after every 50 clients sign up, and then I’m making sure they all get at least 2-3 weeks vacation a year (if not more).

We have also been able to give 9 more Filipinos a full time salary (not counting the ones who were already working with clients).

Talk about a win-win-win. We’ve helped Filipinos get more jobs, increased their salaries, gave 125 (and counting) entrepreneurs who couldn’t afford an assistant a leg up, and I’ve made great passive income.

I learned a LOT from this, and that’s why I wanted to blog about it.

Here are some of the things I discovered:

1. I wanted to go to a lower-end route from the beginning, but everybody had a “better idea”. People said it didn’t make sense to work with lower end clients… that my profit margin would be better if I kept it up the way I was going.

The same thing happened when I started internet marketing. I’ve mentioned this before, but when I first started, I was literally making between $500-$800/day my very first day (and then weeks thereafter). It wasn’t until I started getting on internet marketing lists and doing what everyone else told me to do, that I started losing a lot of my profit.

My learning lesson from this was – Screw everyone else’s opinions. Go with what YOU want to do. Test, tweak, and modify accordingly.

Even when I wrote my sales letter for this new offer, I got flak for it.

Thing is, I was completely honest in the offer. I had limited pricing to 100 people.

As a copywriter, I’d been trained to make “reasons why” all the time. “Make up a great reason why pricing needs to be limited! Use that sense of urgency! Make people move fast!”

On this sales letter, I explained to people that yes, I was limiting pricing to 100 people, but I had no reason to do so other than I thought it’d make them move faster. I was COMPLETELY honest.

People told me I was losing my touch, what happened to my “kick-ass” sales-letters, etc…

But I chose to go with MY WAY, and it worked out perfectly.

2. ALWAYS BE IN IT TO OFFER VALUE. I honestly didn’t think I was going to make any profit from this whatsoever. It was really about emotionally letting myself feel OK about not putting too much attention into BYTDL any more. I wanted to support my girls while not having to sell my soul.

AFTER I made that decision and took action, amazing things happened.

Like I said, I’ve been able to help my girls provide jobs to phenomenal people in a third world country, give 125+ entrepreneurs a leg up, AND make profit from it. Who gets to say that?

3. This is less important, but still a discovery. I say SCREW HIGH END. I know I used to say the opposite before, but I’ve changed my mind. The market’s changed, too.

Yes, it’s true – you’ll get more complaints from the cheapskates – but if you tell people exactly what you’re going to do and then deliver on it, it won’t matter. Just make sure expectations are completely clear. If a client gets moody or demanding, just quickly fire them and move on.

4. Even in your darkest, most miserable moments (hehe – I am NOT overexaggerating!), there’s a win-win solution that can come from it, if you’re open to it.

The more I grow, the more I really understand that there is no “right” or “wrong” (outside of obvious things like murder, stealing, etc).

Not only do I feel like there’s no right or wrong, but I feel it’s WEAK to use those labels. I think it’s more about your own personal journey versus anything else.

Take making money for example. Most of my friends are really great at ASKING for money. They have no problem telling people how much they think they’re worth, what they feel they deserve, etc… and it works out very well for them. I, on the other hand, have never been that great at it. Good things (including money) always seem to just float my way.

Many of my friends have mentioned to me that I should have more confidence, I should speak up more, assert my value… and I agreed with them for a long time, thinking something was wrong with me that I needed to “fix”.

Then, I realized that’s just stupid.

Insert adage here: “If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.”

Alcohol is another example. I have a friend that parties a lot. She loves it. Some of my other friends have made negative comments about it, as if she’s doing something “wrong”.

Maybe it’s “wrong” for THEM, but this particular friend happens to be in amazing flow when she drinks. She handles her alcohol extremely well (so if you were thinking this “friend” was actually me, that part disproves it ), is more intuitive than usual when drinking, and can get her work done better than ever.

The vegan lifestyle is another thing. Some people NEED MEAT. NEED it. I remember reading one story about a devout raw foodist who helped hundreds of people cure tons and tons of diseases by eating all raw. Throughout the process, his wife got very sick. He went to cure her with raw food, and it wasn’t working. For YEARS he tried, and she was getting worse and worse, with very little predicted time left to live. People kept telling him to give her meat but he didn’t want to. The thought disgusted him. However, he eventually gave in when it was literally “do or die” – AND IT WORKED. The wife ended up getting better.

I don’t think ALL people need meat, not at all. I think everybody’s body is different. But I think renouncing people who eat meat, judging them, etc… is a sign of weakness and laziness.

(And for the record, I’m not referring to super-huge amounts of it.)

Sure, it would be easier to make general labels – such as “Drinking excessively is wrong” – because label making helps tidy things up. It helps give us a nice, clean view of the world so that no extra thinking is necessary.

It helps so that we don’t need to go through the work of journeying ourselves and figuring out what’s right or wrong for us.

I think that’s why everyone thinks they’re better than everyone else, too. It makes things easier.

Internet Marketers think they’re luckier/smarter/more willing to “think out of the box” than 9-5 folk because they don’t work for the man. Many of us try to “help” people we know in jobs.

Vegetarians think they’re healthier/more compassionate than non-vegetarians.

Some religions go so far as to say all non-believers are “sinners”.

Schools have rivalries, each thinking they’re the better one. It goes on, and on, and on… when the end reality is that different people have different truths, and nobody is “right” or “wrong”.

Obviously this post encompasses things I’ve done/said in the past and things I will probably do again, but I’m going to continue to do my best to remember when I come up in situations where I try to judge “right” or “wrong”, “bad” or “good”.

I decided to quit the juice fast after 4.5 days. It just wasn’t working for me.

I made the first video a few hours ago, and then spoke to my friend Joshua, who inspired me to add more – hence the 2nd video.

(I’m sorry about the lighting the second time, I wasn’t thinking about any of it as it was totally impromptu. I’m wearing my PJ’s in it. )

This was an excellent learning experience for me and I thank you for letting me share it with you.

I posted this from my 5am – 9am experience:

This morning wasn’t super-awesome.

I woke up, sat at the edge of my bed for a while (because every time I got up yesterday I blacked out for a good 30 seconds), and got up. Luckily today I could see, so I thought today might be a better day. I know Steve Pavlina mentioned his Day 4 was much better than Day 3, so I hoped for the best.

When I went to go stand up to make juice, I had very little energy. I put the first bunch of celery in and found myself dwindling. I put a cucumber in and was REALLY dwindling. When I went to cut up the second cucumber, I knew I was about to pass out so I went to go sit down on my couch for 5 minutes. After I got up to try and finish, I had to sit down again. Finally I was able to finish the juice, but I had no energy to drink it so I put it back in the fridge and went back to bed.

Oddly enough, during the juicing this morning, I had almost no motor skills or brain function. It was very weird. I went to go throw some cucumber mash away and put it right in the hole part of my cutting board, so that when I lifted the cutting board, the cucumber fell right through again. I went to go pick up a plate in my sink and didn’t account for all the water on it, and ended up soaking myself. Those were just some weird things that obviously normally I would remember to do.

After I took my nap, I felt a lot more clear-headed but still didn’t have a lot of energy. I put one sock on, finished some emails, and then put the other sock on. I couldn’t do them both at the same time or it’d wipe me out.

On the good side though, I’m not feeling nauseous or light-headed today if I sit down… only when I exert any energy on anything.

All of this is making me strongly consider how long I should fast for. I started out intending 30 days, then thought 14 days at minimum, but now I’m thinking maybe I’ll do 7 days this time and then next time I’ll do another 7 days. While I know it’s very healthy for all this to be happening, I also don’t want to overwhelm my body.

I mean, I have no desire to eat or anything (even though I keep having food dreams. Last night I dreamt about these popcorn chicken things I used to eat all the time when I was 16-22)… it’s just that I read that these days are supposed to start getting better, and so far, no dice.

I know Jaime said after 7 days she started feeling worse and worse too…

Hmm, I guess I’ll play it by ear.

Oh, and I’ve lost 6 pounds in 3 days.

From 9am – 2pm:

I was randomly crying a few times throughout the day. I knew there’d be a lot of emotional detox from the getgo so I was prepared for it.

The thing is, any emotion one feels is really meant to last for a short while. Normal people are supposed to feel through an emotion and then let it be done. When you emotionally eat, you block those emotions and that energy stays stuffed in your body. Since I emotionally ate my weigh into being over 100 lbs overweight before, I clearly have a ton of stuff to detox. I knew that going into this.

I also forced myself to drink some more juice (36 oz so far) and also 40 oz of water. I’ll be drinking more of each later.

In the beginning of this time period I couldn’t even sit without feeling lightheaded, but now I can sit for a few hours… I just can’t stand for more than a minute or two without wanting to collapse.

I’m thinking more and more about ending this after 7 days. That’s because:

a) I don’t want to screw up my metabolism, and quite frankly, I’m afraid I’ll gain the weight I lost with a quickness if I do this too long. It’s well known that this fasting WILL slow down your metabolism. Advocates of fasting say that if you eat an all raw diet afterwards, it won’t matter.

I don’t want to eat an all raw diet after and don’t think that’s what’s best for my body.

I was also thinking it might be nice to do 7 days now, maintain my new weight, and then do 7 days later.

b) The idea of laying around in my bed for 30 days is a pretty crappy one. I know there are times when I’m supposed to feel euphoric, but I seem to be having the same reactions Jaime did… and she said she was bedridden from the middle of week 1 through day 12.

I have work to do.

c) Most people say they love green juice during the fast and want tons of it afterwards. Everything about that damn drink nauseates me right now (and I used to drink tons of celery, cucumber, or celery-cucumber juice pre-fast).

d) Even though I set up some conditions to make this easier than normal, they’re still not optimal. When Jaime did her fast, she was able to have a plethora of spa treatments to help make things easier – tons of massages, oxygen treatments, a sauna, elixirs to ease the pain of detoxing, and a full staff of support to help her with any concerns that came her way.

Maybe I should go to a retreat or set myself up with better conditions in the future.

e) Most people that do best on extended fasts do it when they’re eating raw or vegan for a while. This wasn’t the case for me.

I guess my hesitancy is that I don’t want to look like a quitter. I talked to Jaime about this though and she made me feel a LOT better. She too, ended her fast a few days earlier, and was worried about what people would think. She ultimately decided that it was HER body and she knew what she was feeling better than anyone else could.

I know I’ll probably be judged if I end the fast after 7 days, but to be honest, unless someone has gone through the fasting themselves, I really could care less what their opinions are. This is a very intense, grueling process that I underestimated.

Even if only do 7 days (the bare minimum), I’ll be really proud of myself.

Today has been the worst day by far.

I woke up feeling great. When I stood up, I was dizzy for a good 30 seconds before I could see anything again, but once that passed, I felt fine.

I had my green juice and then almost all of my liter of water with MSM and lemon (still drinking it now).

I also weighed myself because I knew I had a colonic today and I wanted to see what the weight difference would be between today and tomorrow. So far, I’ve released 3 pounds.

As far as the colonic – it was absolutely awful.

As I posted about earlier, colonics are very important because without a clean intestine, toxins can re-enter your bloodstream which is incredibly dangerous.

I felt very wary about going in and getting one done – anxious, a little disgusted, and nervous about how it would unfold.

It turns out the privacy part of it was nothing to fear at all.

I’ll go through the procedure – I know it can sound kind of gross, but I guess I don’t care. I’m in a weird, half-cranky half-muted to the world mood.

Anyway… when I went to the spa, they told me to undress from the waist down and put on a robe. After I did that, the procedure really wasn’t gross or weird at all. The practitioner inserted a tube in me and then I laid back on my back. The practitioner and I talked the whole time, so I didn’t have time to focus on anything “off”.

The reason that it was so awful, though, was that she had to pump me with water in order to soften my intestinal walls. Every time she did that, I felt intense pain. I pride myself on toughing things out, so I let her fill as long as possible… but it was really, really bad. I was closing my eyes, thinking of other things, trying to talk to her… but it just sucked.

I ended up pouring out a ton of toxins – a lot more than the average person does on their first try. The practitioner said this was likely because I was juicing for 3 days already.

The rubbish part about that, though, is that as the toxins come out, the body gets stirred up as toxins are moved around. I felt a massive wave of detox that left me feeling absolutely horrible.

I have my next appointment set up for Wednesday at 10am.

I haven’t been able to drink any juice since the colonic and even the thought of drinking water makes me nauseous – which means that I’ll probably only have the 16 oz of juice for today.

I took a nap once I got home but I still feel groggy. I’m planning on getting some more work done, watching a movie, and going to bed.

Blech.