She’d been having school problems and though she was above average (isn’t every kid above average? Seriously, I don’t think I have ever heard a parent say to me - “Well ya know my kids are a bit slower than the rest, but I still love them!”), they couldn’t get her to read books.

I asked her if she had an iPod and they replied that she had and she rarely took it off.

“Why don’t you get her books on audio then” I suggested.

You’d have thought I’d just cracked the Riddle of the Sphinx such was their gushing response.  At one point I thought they were going to hoist me on their shoulders and march through the dining room proclaiming me king of the universe.

I’m not sure if I have ever had a more obvious answer to a such a simple question and it was a brilliant example of people being stuck in traditional ways of thinking.

Traditional thinking keeps people stuck where they are. Traditional thinking tells people that Rich and Happy isn't possible for them, or that they aren't worthy or ready to be Rich and Happy.

If you think that, then it's time to step out of your own shoes and adopt a more empowering view point, right about NOW!

In all fairness, I suppose the answer to the parents problem was obvious to me because I love audio books and I only ever buy physical books if I can’t get the unabridged audio version. I can listen to a book a week on my iPhone (when it’s working) either walking the dogs, at the gym or in the car, whereas a book can take me a month or sometimes much more.

At the moment I have been sent new books by Chris Guillebeau and Deepak Chopra to review and I’m wondering if I can get them read this side of Thanksgiving, yet if they were on audio I’d knock them out in short order.

The reality is we all have different styles or combination's of styles for learning. I like audio books you may like traditional media, somebody else may prefer video, it is what it is and it’s no big deal as long as we know what’s best for us.

We are possibly about to invest a load of money (relatively speaking) from the How To Be Rich and Happy coffers into producing the audio version of the book and I really want need your feedback.

A book of the length of How To Be Rich and Happy will probably run at about 5 hours as Don’t Ask Stupid Questions is about 90 minutes or so to read and How To Be Rich and Happy is three times longer.

Paying somebody to do the book (even at mates rates) and all the editing involved is expensive and we want to be sure we’ll get the money back.

What we don’t want to do is go through the process and then nobody buys it as that would slow up the project to give the books away to good causes whilst we recoup the money.

I’ve set up a very simple 6 question survey and would be really grateful if you could spare a minute to let me have your thoughts. It’s only really relevant if you have already bought a copy or would be interested in an audio version.

If you have no intention of buying it, you’re much better going and reading ‘Why I’m Giving My Books Away For Free’ and maybe grabbing yourself all my 3 books for nothing.

Click Here To Take The Survey

]]> http://howtoberichandhappy.com/site/2010/09/do-you-believe-you-can-be-rich-and-happy/feed/ 1 http://howtoberichandhappy.com/site/2010/08/cute-polar-bear-huh/ http://howtoberichandhappy.com/site/2010/08/cute-polar-bear-huh/#comments Tue, 10 Aug 2010 12:31:30 +0000 Tim Brownson http://howtoberichandhappy.com/site/?p=600 If you have been following our progress with the Rich and Happy giveaway you’ll know that the path has been a less than smooth one. Even though it can at times be frustrating it is also to be expected as any huge project is an ongoing process of testing and adjusting, testing and adjusting.

One of the adjustments I have made is to forget e-mailing people with offers of help.

To my mind this seemed the most obvious plan of action. Send a charity an e-mail offering free books and then sit back and wait for the enthusiastic and grateful responses to come flooding in.

After all, who doesn’t want something for nothing, right? Well apparently lots of people, because at least 4 out of 5 e-mails I’ve sent out have gone unanswered.

It would seem the sheer intensity and volume of scam e-mails usually starting “Dearly Beloved” and emanating from Nigeria has made people somewhat skeptical of any correspondence that offers something for nothing.

To be fair to John, he has said from the word go that it will come down to personal relationships and so it is proving to be. Now I’m calling the charities and speaking to real people and it’s definitely making a positive difference although I think more face-to-face meetings are needed.

One of the personal relationships came about when John spoke to a lady by the name of Sandy Geroux. Like John, Sandy does a lot of public speaking and she is also involved in a lot of charity work.

When John told her about the Rich and Happy giveaway she jumped at the chance to help us put the books into the right peoples hand.

I got a call from John excitedly saying he had good news and that Sandy wanted 50 books as soon as possible. Ok, that is fairly good news I thought, but come on man I’m not sure it’s worth getting quite so pumped up about as it’s not even a full case.

It seems I misheard him because he’d actually said 750 books and that definitely was something worth getting pumped up about.

Last Friday I loaded the books into my car and set off to the Children's Advocacy Center for Osceola County in Kissimmee to meet Sandy.

If you’re as unaware as I was to the role of an advocacy center, here is how it is described on their website.

The purpose of a Children’s Advocacy Center (CAC) is to provide services to children and non-offending family members that are victims of child sexual and physical abuse. CAC’s use a multi-disciplinary approach coordinating law enforcement, child protective services, prosecution, mental health, medical personnel and victim advocacy to provide the most comprehensive services available so that children are not re-victimized by the very system in place to protect them.

A Children’s Advocacy Center provides a comfortable child friendly atmosphere where the child can feel safe and staff are specially trained to deal with the issues of child victimization.

Prior to the center kids would be taken to a hospital that was ill-equipped to deal with such specific problems and this would often exacerbate an already terrible situation.

Sandy gave me a tour of the facility that was both eye-opening and incredibly sad. If you have ever seen a medical examination table that looks like a polar bear like the one above, you’ll know what I mean. Knowing that the only reason this place exists is because adults are prepared to abuse children didn’t leave me feeling too great.

One of the statistics that Sandy gave me that I found most shocking was that 1 in 4 girls will be either physically or sexually abused before they reach 18 years of age, and 1 in 6 boys.

Most of the money to fund the center comes from fund raising and they like a great many such organizations have been hit hard by the recession as donations have dried up.

The double whammy is that as donations went south, abuse went in the opposite direction. When times are bad and stress is high it seems the victims are often not just the adults, but the kids that get in the way.

It was a bitter sweet day. It was great to help such a worthy cause (and by the way, the real help has come from the hundreds of people that have  bought the book, I just delivered them), but it was also sad that they are needed.

Copies will be going to the non-accused guardian to help with education, to the kids that are at the older end of the age range and also some other charities that Sandy is involved in. Hopefully they can help people realize that things can be different, if we believe they can.

We are down to the last 1,000 or so of the first print run and we expect these to be either donated or sold by the end of next month. If you want a first edition copy, go get one now! Or alternatively, if you know a charity that would benefit from receiving a case or more of books, please let us know.

If you read the post ‘Never, never, never give up’, you’ll know that we have been encountering some sticking points recently. A number of the charities we have approached are either not interested, or in most cases simply don’t return e-mails or phone calls. It’s frustrating, but it is what it is.

We have posted here many times that we cannot achieve our goal without the generous and kind support of people like you and we have had numerous offers that have been very much appreciated.

Now however, we want to do something a bit special and a bit different. After all, this project is a bit special and a bit different, so why not adopt special and different tactics, right?

We’ve already had a number of donations from people that have read the book, loved it, and believe strongly in what we’re trying to achieve. That’s brilliant of course, but we’d like to make giving a donation even more personal to the donor.

Buying a book is in effect making a donation because it helps us to get another 12 or so books into the hands of people that can really benefit and that’s very cool. But what if we could move that into the realms of uber-cool and help 60 people?

The Idea

When you make a donation to a charity you don’t very often know where the money is going or how it’s going to be spent. Some of the larger charities have huge running costs and many spend well over 50% of the money they raise paying the people that actually raise that money!

So what if you could be sure that your donation goes exactly where you want it to go and not into the pockets of some pencil pushing senior executive, would that be of interest, because that’s what we want to do.

We want to allow people to make sure their money goes to the charity closest to their heart (presuming it’s relevant that is. No matter how much you love them, rescued dogs will not benefit from reading How To Be Rich and Happy, they’ll probably just eat it)

The Donation

Buy a copy for yourself of How To Be Rich and Happy for $99 + shipping of $20 and tell us the charity of your choice you think could benefit from 60 copies (a case) of How To Be Rich and Happy.

We then ship 60 books anywhere in the United States as a donation from you.

We’ll also include a nice certificate explaining that the books were courtesy of you as part of the 1,000,000 book giveaway and you get that warn glow associated with helping others.

It may be that you don’t even want to give them in your name, but in the name of a friend or family member as a present. In that case we’ll also write to the person who the gift is for and tell them how amazing you are!

It sure beats trawling the stores for a gift that is often unwanted and unused, right?

If you don’t have a charity that you think can benefit from our book, but you have a business of your own or you are in an association such as a Book Club, Toastmasters, Rotarians, Weight Watchers, Meet Up Group etc then we may be able to do something for you too

This time you pay us $299 + shipping and we send you a case with a retail value of $1,500. Of course it would be under the strict understanding that all books are to be given as gifts and not to be resold under any circumstances.

Oh and just in case you’re wondering. Yes of course we will still be selling single copies of the book and yes the money donated would go back into the pot to buy more books just the same as with individual sales.

So that’s the idea, what do you think? It is doable or pie in the sky? Might it be something you’d consider if you have read the book? What sticking points can you foresee and are we risking devaluing the book. Any insights gratefully received.

Note: I Just want to recognize the help and support we have received from charitable workers, Virginia Moody, Susie Statham, Mark Romagosa and Cindi Kopelman. A huge thanks to all of you.

And for who knows what reason, someone stole half of the books we donated off the silent auction table.  Now in one sense we are flattered.  The thieves passed on expensive golf clubs, gift certificates, paintings, and a host of other very valuable items.

As a matter of fact, we were the only silent auction items stolen that night!

So in a way, it’s flattering.  A sort of bizarre, twisted way of course, because the purpose of donating the books was to help raise money so some teens could play a little softball.    A bit difficult to raise money on silent auction items, when the items are missing.

I guess let this be a warning.  Should you use How to be Rich and Happy in a fundraising capacity, please keep the copies in a sealed glass enclosure.  Or at least behind one of those fuzzy red ropes.  How bizarre.  Who steals from a charity?

Anyway, on to a more clearly happy topic.  We are thrilled to announce that to date the Rich and Happy Giveaway has donated more than $10,000 worth of books to four different charitable organizations in three states.

Which means that right this moment there is a good chance someone who really needs a hand is finding inspiration in one of the stories in How to be Rich and Happy, and/or having a laugh because of Tim’s slightly unconventional sense of humor.

And, we’ve got a number of other charities who have contacted us who also want to distribute the book to the people in need who they help.

There have been two really big insights that have come up as we’ve been announcing and then launching this program.  I’m going to share them here, so that you can take this information with you on your own Rich and Happy adventures.

The first is that people are often afraid to ask for what they really want.  Some of the organizations who have contacted us have asked for something like 15 books, which they promise to lend out, get back, lend out, get back... to the 600 PEOPLE they serve.

While we appreciate their concerns about not taking too many books, let me be very clear.  As I studied the Rich and Happy formula, it became very clear, very early on, that you get in life what you ask for.

And when two guys are crazy enough to announce they are willing to donate a million copies of a book that can help the 600 people you serve, ASK FOR MORE THAN FIFTEEN COPIES.

Trust me, the world will have no problem letting you know when it can’t deliver on as much as you ask for.  But more often than not, it will.  I’ve seen real estate developers take $20,000 off the price of a house simply because someone asked them to.  There was a woman a number of years ago who via the internet asked for help paying off her credit card debt, and she got more than $35,000 in donations.

If people are willing to help someone pay off the credit card debt that THEY ACCRUED!!! imagine what they’ll do when you’re asking for something that’s really important.

So ask for exactly what you want and need.

The second insight is also a reflection of what we talk about in the book.  It is how when you make the decision you are going to move in a particular direction with your life, and you commit to it, because you know it’s important to you, that resources will come your way faster than you can imagine.

So many people don’t use this part of the formula.  They would like to be Rich and Happy, but they never take the first step because they think they have to wait until they know they way the entire thing will play out before they start moving.

Action stimulates other action.  No one can predict all the events, sequences, and results of how the Rich and Happy formula will unfold in their life.  What can be predicted though, with 100% accuracy, is that if you don’t take that first step in the direction of your Rich and Happy life, you’ll never end up Rich and Happy.

The formula is very clear in that regard.

Which is why we are going to keep moving, and doing, and asking until we’ve achieved our goal of a million copies given away to people in need.

And why I encourage you to take steps toward whatever is your Rich and Happy life.

If you have an organization that can help us make a difference, contact us (and please ask for more than 15 copies).

John

The difference is, rich and happy people get that, poor and unhappy people often do not.

Poor and unhappy people stress themselves about what other people may think if they expose their human side and ask for help. They think it will make them look dumb, insecure and childlike when often the reality is just the opposite.

It takes a certain level of guts, self-awareness and security to in effect say,

“Look, I can’t really do this, or you’re better than me at that, can you help me please?”

Rich and happy people are brilliant at doing this though and they know that everybody has their strengths and weaknesses.

We have been putting the word out that we now have 3,250 books earmarked for charitable causes. I have to be honest in saying that primarily I wanted to give the books away to charities based in the Orlando area for logistical reasons as well as to minimize the cost of shipping.

However, when I got an e-mail this last week from a lady in San Antonio, Texas, gushing about how brilliant she thinks the book is and asking if she could have some to give away to unemployed people that attend a workshop she puts on, who was I to say no? Especially as she had already bought 10 copies for friends and family and offered to pay shipping too.

Sometimes getting help really is that easy, it’s just a matter of asking.

That’s why I have no issue asking you to buy a copy of How To Be Rich and Happy and help us build the momentum. One person recently accused me (albeit somewhat tongue-in-cheek) of ‘whoring myself’ and I honestly took that as a compliment.

The fact is, if neither myself nor John asked for help over and over and over again, then we’d almost certainly fail in our goal. I’m a life coach and I don’t like failing at goals, especially not ones this huge, so the occasional uncomfortable moment of admitting we can’t do it alone is worth it for the greater good.

Do You Want In On The Rich And Happy Project?

Although we are handing out the books to good causes, so could you if you really wanted to.

We realize that many people have charities that are very personal to them. For 30 years my mom worked with Marie Curie the UK based cancer charity. That wasn’t because she didn’t admire or believe in the good causes supported by other charities, just that Marie Curie was close to her heart.

With that in mind we are setting up a print on demand service for anybody that wants in on the project and has a bit of money to spare.

We’re happy to let people order as many copies as they want (minimum of 2,500)  at cost and in return we will insert a page saying that this particular copy of the book was donated by that person to the charity of their choice.

It doesn’t even have to be an individual, it can be a business that wants to help others and sees this is a really cool way of generating positive publicity and helping a lot of people. The only additional cost would be shipping.

So for way less than $5k people can put well over $50,000 (retail value) of books into the hands of worthy causes, be part of a unique project and get a warm fuzzy feeling into the bargain. Whats not to love about that?

Now would you mind please telling everybody on the planet you know about the Rich and Happy project because we can't achieve it without your help

IMPORTANT: The pre-sale for the signed first edition copies of the book runs out on Sunday 9th May. After that date the book will revert to the recommended retail of $25 and copies will not be signed. It's also doubtful that there will be more than a handful (if that) of first edition copies left so don't hang around!

I’m talking mainly about the kind of advice people can’t wait to offer when you’re telling them about your hopes and dreams. You know the type of person I mean,  the ones who are bursting with excitement to offer their feedback as you regale them with your life's aspirations.

Unfortunately, they’re bursting with excitement to tell you why your idea is unrealistic, plain dumb or to offer you 101 ways in which it will fail by next Thursday.

The irony is those types of people are seldom rich and happy, but they seem to be experts on telling other people why they can’t be either.

As a Life Coach I’m not really in favor of negative motivation and by that I mean the desire to succeed solely to stick it to somebody else and prove your worth.

It’s ok for a short-term burst such as a football coach pinning a derogatory newspaper report on the locker room wall to inspire his players, but as a long-term source of motivation it’s draining and largely counter-productive.

In the least month two people have told me the Rich and Happy 1,000,000 giveaway is unrealistic and I need to scale it in. Really?

I’m not talking about friends or family members here either, I’m talking about people connected, albeit extremely loosely, with the project itself. People who know what’s involved and know it’s never been done before and can’t see past that.

They are looking to the past to predict the future.

Fortunately, the people that invented/developed TV, the combustion engine, open heart surgery, space travel, the Internet and any other amazing break through you care to consider, ignored most people. If they hadn't we’d still by living in caves.

The FACT is, it’s not an unreasonable goal at all. It’s tough and it definitely fits into the BHAG (big hairy audacious goal) category, but so what?.

• It is possible to raise the $1m we need and it’s been done many times
• It is possible to print 1 million books
• It is possible to get the media support we need to pull it off
• It is possible to get charitable causes to approach us and ask for copies

None of those things are easy, but none of them are unrealistic either, so I’m choosing to ignore that advice and stay true to what I believe.

Believing in yourself doesn’t guarantee success, but not believing in yourself guarantees failure.

I bet you have some huge dreams. I bet if I told you that you could do or have whatever you wanted and there were no barriers to whatever it is, you’d aim really high.

So what’s holding you back?

Maybe you think they are just too big. Maybe you don’t share them with others for fear of ridicule. Maybe you think you’ll dare to dream big tomorrow once you have emptied your in-tray or that people like you don’t change the world.

Well guess what? They aren’t too big, it matters not a jot what others think, your in-tray will never be empty and people exactly like you change the world.

You change the world by going after what you want and what brings you alive. You set an example to others (especially kids by the way) that it’s ok to aim high, really high.

People think that by not having huge goals and dreams they will insulate themselves against the pain of failure. It doesn't work like that because, the pain of a failed life is exponentially worse than the pain of a failed goal.

If we only give away 3,000 copies of How To Be Rich and Happy I will still consider it a success. Of course I want way more than that, but I’m having a shit load of fun by aiming high and I really don’t care what anybody else thinks, and neither should you.

"You have to think anyway, so why not think big?" - Donald Trump

1,000,000 Book Giveaway Update

The books are less than a month away from arriving and here’s what we have planned and if you can help us get this thing rolling we’d love to have you on board

How Can You Help?

Buy the book - Ok it’s a no-brainer I know, but from 26th April you will be able to pre-order a signed copy (or hopefully copies!) off the original print run. In the meantime the e-book version is still available, so no need to wait.

There are only going to be 4,000 in total and we’ll only have about 750 of those to to pre-sell and when they are gone that’s it.

In any event we will only run the pre-sale for a limited time, when that expires if there are any books left they will revert to what will be the normal retail of $25 and not be signed.

If you’re a friend or family member waiting to get your freebie, you’ll be waiting a long time. Get one bought, it’s only going to be $19.99 and that helps us buy another 15 or so books. I will be on your case!

Donate - If you don’t want the book but like what we are doing and want to support us, we’re happy to take donations via PayPal and every $1.40 or so helps us put the book in somebody’s hands.

Request books - We need great causes (initially only in the Orlando area until we get transport arranged) to give the books to. Ideally not in dribs and drabs and no less than about 100 at a time.

So if you work for such an organization or know somebody that does please spread the word and ask them to leave a comment here or contact me here.

Help with shipping - Do you know anybody that can help us ship the books for free or at a reduced rate. This is one cost we have to minimize or get sponsorship on. I’ve tried and got nowhere with FedEx, DHL and UPS, maybe you know somebody that knows somebody that can help?

That’s all I can think of for now, but if you think you can see areas where we are lacking please leave me a comment.

Today I wanted to share something with you that a few people have commented on and asked about. On the back cover of the promotional copy we have been distributing to the media and people we think may be able to help us, is a very condensed version of How To Be Rich and Happy. In fact, if you can apply ALL of the things on the list to your life you probably don't need the book!

I’ve been asked where it came from and what’s it all about. The truth is it started life as an idle doodle when I had some spare time a couple of years ago. Every now and then I’d think of something else and add it to the list.

Then almost by accident I saw a pattern emerging that you can now see below, so I doodled some more until it became almost a perfect inverted pyramid. There’s no deep philosophical meaning to the shape, it just looks kind of cool.

We’re looking to change the rules when the books arrive in June. If you’d like to know how, check out “If You Live By The Rules, You Die By The Rules” a post inspired after reading Trust Agents by Chris Brogan and Julien Smith.

Last week Tim and I met to discuss the long-term strategy of the book. Things have gone well, feedback has blown us away (in a good way) and the book is having the positive impact on people we both intended and hoped for.

In other words, all is going fantastic.

So we decided to up the ante on ourselves.

We started asking crazy questions like what goal would it take to get us over the top excited for 2010?  What could we do with the book that would be so ridiculously cool that not only would we be digging it, but so would lots of other people too.  What would not only do all of that, it would, in the spirit of the book, make a HUGE difference in the lives of lots of people.

And we liked the energy behind that.

So in a moment of tremendous clarity, or insanity, or something in between, we decided.

Our great big goal for 2010 is to partner with the world to give away one million copies of How to be Rich and Happy.

We are undaunted by the logistics, unfazed by the obviously huge hurdles, and unsomething else by all the reasons why this looks impossible.

For us, we came up with a core group of people that we most want to get the book into the hands of.

• - Kids ages between 15 – 20
• - Single parents on income support
• - Unemployed people
• - Homeless people

Why those people?  Why not?  Also because we think those are the people who REALLY would get a life boost from some insights into the Rich and Happy formula.

We don’t expect every person who is offered the book to read it.  But think of the positive difference it could make in the lives of those who do!

Who would you give it to?  Keep that answer handy as you read some of the thoughts below.

To help you understand why we need your help in this goal, and in case you might be thinking about dismissing the ideas as not that big of a deal, let’s break it down a little.

First, we have to raise about $1,000,000 to pay for the books. So far we’ve raised $100. (Tim and I each put in fifty).

Then we have to get the books into the hands of the people we’ve picked.  No small logistical issue there.

Considering we have 40 physical copies so far (it was designed as an e-book after all) that means we’re 999,960 short and the clock is ticking.

Even if we had all the books paid for and in storage as I write this, that would still mean we have to distribute about 20,000 books per week until the end of 2010!

That’s an enormous number and quite frankly without the help of a nationwide distribution network it’s hard to picture that one happening.

As Tim and I bantered back and forth about ways to make our goal happen, we took a step back and realized we were getting caught up with ‘Mad How Disease’.

We were focusing too much on the how and not enough on the who. We were doing the exact opposite of what the Rich and Happy formula has proven to be true.  WHICH WE EXPLAIN IN THE BOOK!  How ridiculous is that?

So who is the who you may be wondering? Who is the person who can help us?

Well, it could very well be YOU!

We’ve decided to ask the people that already read our stuff if they can think of cool ways to help make this happen and if they want, to get involved.

I’m going to tell you the three options we’re thinking of.  I’d love to know which one you think is the approach most likely to succeed.  And of course, tell us any other one’s you think of.

Option One – Reverse Tithe

We keep selling the e-book version only we reverse tithe the proceeds.  90% of all money that comes in from the sale of the book goes toward achieving the goal of giving the million copies away.

10% may be a tight margin to maintain the website and other sundry costs and it may need to be closer to 15%, but that’s the general idea.

If we go this route, we thought about making the cost of the book variable but with a minimum amount. So if someone wanted to pay the $47 full price and be a major part of this effort, great.  If they can only afford $15, that’s great too.

Another variable of this is that for every person who buys the e-book at full price, we send THEM a case of 25 paperback books (or so, don’t hold me to the number) which they can give to people THEY feel would most benefit from it.

They win, the people they give it to win, and we get lots of help.

Pros

Please advise if we are slightly or COMPLETELY wrong.

We think people who want to buy the book but are on the fence, would get in the game knowing the money would go toward the giveaway goal.

The lower price option would make the book affordable for more people.

This option is probably the most likely to go viral, although that’s in the lap of the gods and not something we’d ever want to bank on.

Cons

We’re a little concerned about ticking off people that have already bought the book at full price.

Need to get an awful lot of people to buy the book at any price to get us where we want to go.

Shipping is costly.  It’s about $10 to ship a case of books.

Option Two – Ask For Donations

We continue to sell the book as we’re currently doing. Then as a separate entity running parallel, we work on getting a multitude of small donations that are filtered off to be used to get the book printed and shipped.

Pros

Easy to do.  We just set up another link on the website and do our best to create buzz about it.

Cons

Could be a long slow process to get to our goal.  Lots of people raising money for lots of good causes out there.

Option Three – Find A Wealthy Sponsor or Foundation

This option is the one that could move us from zero to a million in no time flat.

There are definitely people who have access to the kind of funds required to pull this off.    So what would make them get involved with this project in particular?

Pros

If we hit on the right person it’s a done deal. $1m is not a huge commitment in the great scheme of things and it would be fun having a huge name behind the project.

Tim has said he would literally sacrifice a small cute furry stuffed animal to have Sir Richard Branson on board*.  I said I’d sacrifice Tim, but I was mostly joking.

We are more than happy to have the book branded so that the sponsors name is on it.  Yes, we want this to be a win across the board for everyone involved.

Cons

We could spend all of 2010 working on bringing in the right person/organization only to be turned down flat for reasons out of our control (economic crisis part two).

In order to get someone on board, they probably need to read and get excited about the book.  So how the heck do you get it in front of them?  And how the heck do you help them find time to read it?

How Can You Help?

This is a truly monstrous goal. We realize the odds are against us, but that’s what makes it so compelling.  We do know this.  The odds of us pulling this off are infinitesimally small without your help. And yes, I do mean YOU!

What would it take for you to say YES, I’M IN?

If you have an idea no matter how off-the-wall or silly you think it may seem, please, please, let us know in the comments.

Think six degrees of separation.  Who do you know that might know somebody that might know someone who can help?  Please forward this blog post to them.

The person could work in the media or the charitable or distribution sectors. Who would ship for free???

They may work for any large organization that has the kind of pull we need to make this happen or whatever else you can think of.

If you know of reasons why one of the ideas will simply not work, please say so.  Even better, throw us an alternate suggestion too.

If you have a spare million dollars lying around let us know.

If you have a blog or a Twitter account and you can help us publicize this, that would be amazing, thanks!

Even a Digg, Stumble Upon, Reddit or Facebook mention would be appreciated.

I’m sure there are ways you can help that we haven’t even thought about, but you have, so we’re open to all options.

Tim and I are massively excited to hear your ideas and hope you’ll help us make this happen.  Not to mention have a lot of fun in the process.

And by the way, this is game on already.  It takes 12 weeks to get the books printed.  I’m committing that although I don’t know the way it will all come together, we will be distributing the first of the books come April 15th.

Nothing like a little insight into the Rich and Happy formula on the day income tax is due.

By way of a first post, we're simply letting you get a taste for the book that goes on pre-sale on 22nd September and full release on 5th October, by reproducing the introduction.

How To Be Rich and Happy - An Introduction

Congratulations on taking one of the most important steps you’ve ever taken in your life. You’ve decided to decide. You’ve chosen to choose versus live a life that others chose for you. That right there makes you one of a select group of people.

If you read the information in this book, and apply it in your life, you will be part of an even more exclusive group- those who are Rich and Happy.

As you embark on this adventure, you may be wondering how this book came to be. How and why do a best selling inspirational author who’s works are in nineteen languages (John) and a renegade life coach with one of the most left field and successful life coaching blogs on the Internet (Tim) pair up to write a book called “How to be Rich and Happy?”

The answer is actually pretty straight forward. Part of it you’ll find in the personal story described in the the opening chapter. That will explain our own motivation for discovering the formula for being Rich and Happy. The other part, which is why write the book now, is simply because we listened to what people are asking for.

We have been friends for a number of years. A friendship that began because although we operate in different arenas (Tim in life coaching and online blogging and John as an author and speaker) and we have very different styles (Tim relies heavily on a very English sense of humor to get his message across whereas John is more serious and inspirational) we have a similar life purpose, which is to help people.

And when we would get together for a round of golf, or grab lunch, and discuss how things were going and what people were telling us, it kept coming back to the same answer- people are really struggling. We knew from our interactions with them, and through our own life experiences, that even if they couldn’t actually name it, what they wanted was to be Rich and Happy.

Tim was seeing it through his work with individual clients, and via his blog, and John was seeing it at his events when he was speaking to large audiences.

So when people asked us what we were working on next, we started telling them that we were working on a book called “How to be Rich and Happy.” And literally every single person responded with something close to “That’s the book I need.”

If you are familiar with John’s previous books; The Why Cafe, Life Safari, and The Big Five for Life- Leadership’s Greatest Secret, this will be a very different type of read. Those works are fictional stories with inspirational messages.

This is a non-fiction, tell it like it is book. That said, the underlying focus is still the same - to help people live the life they want live.

Although the book is written by both of us, for ease of reading, you’ll see that it reads as if there is just one author. The word “I” is the collective I of both of us. Think of us as science experiment gone mad, where two people’s brains and life experiences have been merged into one. Or, just realize that it is a heck of a lot easier to explain the stories and material the way it’s written than for us to keep clarifying who is saying what.

And now, let’s move you toward what you want and deserve- to be Rich and Happy.

John and Tim