Leonard Anthony Baker, my little brother first published January 2007

Gerald Ford

Saddam Hussein

James Brown

And my little brother Len

All of them died in December 2006.

Len was a regular working guy. A carpenter, a Master Craftsman.

He had a passion for putting things together, things like wood and hardware and making them function and appear elegant and beautiful.

And he roller skated. Moving, flowing, dancing.. Again elegant and beautiful.

And he was always walking around on his hands, cause he could

And he is one of my baby brothers.

I don’t even understand how this happened, might not ever get the full details, and we humans so want to know how.

I ask why and I sound even to my own ear like an inquisitive child, and I imagine God smiling patiently, lovingly while I move on to yet another question that I cannot understand the answer to.

I am a fifty year old woman, and have been for about thirty months , and I have spent all of my adult life focused on building community. And this has been pay-off time. The incredible outpouring of love and support from all the communities I have been part of is what has allowed me to walk through this unthinkable time.

There have been cards and flowers and gifts and phone calls and emails, every gesture just to remind me that I am cared about and even in the face of this, in the big picture, it really is all good.

My mentor, John Milton Fogg was/is often asked, “Do we lead with the opportunity or the product?”

His answer, my mantra, “Neither, lead with the relationship.”

Part of the best about Boomers and Network Marketing is the way we have blended personal and business relationships.

Henry Ford said "A business that makes nothing but money is a poor kind of business.”

My wish for you and your business in 2007 is that you prosper financially and in ways of the heart.

Gratitude Journal

When I’m ready I will listen

When I’m ready to know

Like a flower, I can blossom

When I’m ready to grow

Please don’t answer any questions

That I haven’t yet asked

When I’m ready, I will listen

And you can tell me at last…

© Francine Jarry

Going through the checkout at my favorite little grocery store, one of my favorite cashiers, Trish wasn’t her usual chipper self.

“What’s up?” I asked while loading my stuff onto her conveyor.

“Aw, it’s this Hurricane Wilma comin at us.”

“Why?” I asked, I mean this is South Florida.

We are winding up Hurricane Season 2005. Both 2004 and 2005 broke records. Sure, we’re all tired, but criminey this is just Wednesday, Wilma ain’t due til breakfast Saturday.

She said, “Awh, I’m gonna have to take care of two houses, do all the prep, get all the stuff and run around checking on my Mom and...” her voice trailed off, her head down as she slid my purchases over the scanner.

“Sweetie, you’re a Daughter, A Mom and a Grandma, get over it.”**

“You’re right. I have a lot of people to love!” And suddenly she was beaming.

Being a fifty year old woman, something I have been for the past eighteen months, has brought the knowing that it really is that easy to shift from seeing the glass as half empty to seeing it as half full.

This from a woman who used to see the glass as not only half empty, but all chipped up at the rim with possible glass shards floating in the drink.

It wasn’t easy coming to this awareness, not easy, but pretty simple (kinda catchy formula there.)

Teresa Romain was coaching me and she strongly suggested I start keeping a Gratitude Journal. It was not a new idea to me, I’d read Simple Abundance years before that and I thought that just saying Thank You a lot and occasionally thinking about how grateful I was and once in a while sending a card would be enough. And I know all of you know it, and still I’m going to say again, there is power in writing it down – whether it’s your Intentions or Goals or Gratitude.

So the Gratitude Journal became a part of my life.

Write ten things every day that I am grateful for.

Simple, not easy, especially not at first.

A Magical Life - first published December 2005

Many if not most religions have a Celebration of Lights near our calendar’s year end. Christmas, Chanukkah, Kwanzaa, Ramadan, Dijali and of course New Year mark a time of ritual, tradition and gatherings of family and dear ones with singing, gifting and feasting. With so many hearts opening to love there is magic afoot.

The Tall One gifted me with an armful of books this Christmas, he is a wise one, who knows me well. One of them was Marianne Williamson’s Everyday Grace. I opened to read “I have watched my daughter bury herself, like so many other children, heart and soul in the Harry Potter books.” “Emma has asked me several times, “Mommy, are the Harry Potter books true? Are there really magical places like that?” And I answer her as honestly as I can, which is to say that I answer “yes.”

Later the three of us, The Tall One, The Soccer Goddess and I went out to see a movie. We chose “The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.” SEE THIS MOVIE!

Sons of Adam, Daughters of Eve, Aslan, Turkish Delight. Magic.

Magic

Do you believe in magic?

My Teacher says the one thing that holds people back from having and owning and living all of their good is that they feel unworthy.

What is your good?

What would have you sitting on the throne and being King or Queen of Narnia?

We start out as tiny babies thinking we must be pretty cool and we know we are cute.

And then they start, our parents and caretakers and teachers – telling us “No.” and calling us bad.

“The world doesn’t revolve around you!”

“Share, even if you don’t want to.”

And even though they only mean the best for us, they only want us to be good members of society, by and large the message most of us get is:

Everyone else’s feelings are not only more important, they are more correct.

We are not only insignificant, we are wrong, stupid, bad.

Hey, wait that cannot be so.

The Creator did not make junk.

I am a Holy, Innocent Child of God – that must mean I am precious and special and beloved.

And that feels better.

And it not only feels better, it has Magic in it.

If I really believe that I am a Holy, Innocent and Beloved Child of God that makes me pretty special and absolutely worthy of all good things.

All those years and years of programming.

And the good news is, it’s only programming – the negative messages are not objective, absolute truth, it’s just software that can be overwritten and this issue is chock full of ways to overwrite.

Pick one. Doesn’t matter whether it’s Dr Jill or Shad Helmstetter or Peter Pearson – do the exercises for 30 days and celebrate the changes.

Magically you will be more loved, more loving and a bit more successful in your business.

My hope for you is that you experience at least some unconditional love in your life, that there is someone who loves you so much that there is nothing you could do to make them love you more and nothing you could do to make them love you less.

And my truth is that there is someone who loves you like that.

That which is Divine loves you that way.

And how much magic is wrapped up in that!

Who am I

I am Maran Banta.

I teach online marketing techniques to off-line bricks and mortar businesses.

Using web videos, emails and snail mail pieces, I show entrepreneurs easy, fun ways to find new prospects and build relationships with existing clients.

My clients can be as hands-on or hands-off as they want.

Everything has changed.

I was reading a piece by Jeffrey Gitomer, he says we're not going to recover,

we're going to revive and revise.

It's a different world. One of the important new rules turns a famous line from Godfather upside down,

"This is personal. This is business."

It's a New Game

Have you noticed?

There's a whole new way of doing business. The rules have all changed, though the changes appear subtle, because we are massively returning to core values that somehow have been ignored or down played for a long time.

Somehow it became ok in the business world to act differently than one would otherwise.

We came to not only accept dishonesty in business but we came to expect it.

We came to expect business people, salesmen, advertising people, politicians to lie and cover up.

And ya know what?

It's just not ok anymore.

Enron, Clinton's cigar, the mortgage industry, Bernie Madoff, the collapse of the economy.

We all got fed up.

We all said forget about it - I'm not taking this anymore.

And we started voting with our wallets.

The Market Place is crowded and no one has a monopoly on anything.

I love to buy things.

I hate to be sold.

I want expert advise on most of my purchases.

And they better be experts - cause I enter the market place educated about what I am looking for.

Lorikay Stone in Paris

Lorikay Stone in Paris

Lorikay Photography
659 Auburn Ave NE #205
Atlanta, Ga 30312

Betsy & Zach

Peas for Prosperity

A story about a smart girl with a great idea

about making a difference, with a couple

famous chefs thrown in.

Peas for Prosperity

Who deserves to hear from you?

Right this minute there is probably someone whose life would change dramatically for the better if you spent a few minutes writing out what they mean to you.

Someone who would be uplifted by reading words written by you, words from your heart expressing a simple ease that you feel around them, or expressing appreciation for something they said or did.

Someone could be having a bad hair day and at just the right time they receive a message from you saying they do make a difference.

It's amazing the power a simple gesture can have.

If someone came to mind for you I encourage you to act now - click this link and be sure your speakers are turned up - in just a few minutes you will send a real greeting card to someone without leaving your computer

AND WAIT - this is gonna be a real Greeting Card delivered by the PostOffice

cause we'll print the card & envelope, stuff it, stamp it and take it to the Post Office for you.

I'll even pay for the first one.

Why would I do that?

Just give you a free greeting card to send to someone?

Cause no one can out give the universe and for a buck I get to help you and someone else feel better.

Yeah I do like this stuff.

http://www.ItFeelsGoodToSendOutCards.com

Persuede redux

Persuading is about getting people to do what you want them to do.

OK, doesn't sound like a really bad thing, or does it?

How do you feel about anyone who would persuade you to do, or not do something?

I've had a lot of sales training, heck I've trained a lot of people in sales. I'm good at it.

Ask my daughter and my husband.

To convince is to persuade by the use of argument or evidence:

Who wins any argument?

What two people can agree on the significance of evidence?

I honestly cannot remember a time when I was persuaded to anything that I look back on fondly.

I also cannot remember a time I persuaded anyone to do anything that I feel good about.

Do you assume the person you are pitching is not as smart as you?

Persuasion, manipulation.

I just read another sales training email, this one talking about "The take-away close."

The problem with most sales training models is they assume I am trained the same way Pavlov's pooches were.

And they are partially right about that. I have been walking around the planet actively engaging and interacting for more than half a century.

I have been trained or conditioned to expect certain things, when someone says they're going to present in alphabetical order I do expect b to follow a. But creative thinker that I am, unless the presenter has said it will be an alphabetical presentation when they start with a I do not necessarily expect b to be next - just the rebel in me I guess.

A smart sales presentation assumes I am at least as smart as the presenter.

This one lost completely because it assumes I want what I cannot have and it assumes that I don't understand when I am being manipulated.

Persuede

Manipulation, persuasion, influence.

The first two sound more alike than different to my ear.

Persuasion feels bad to me.

I don't like being persuaded and I don't like doing the persuasion - oh ok in the moment I do like persuading people.

Persuasion starts with the assumption that I know whats right, and not only for myself but for at least some if not all others.

Maybe my resistance to the term persuade goes back to 8th grade.

I was the youngest in my class having skipped not one but two half grades. I was also the very shortest and still two years away from menarche I looked more like a ten year old boy than a twelve year old girl.

So I was the youngest, shortest, smartest, and I was really cute even without hormones.

And my Civics teacher was my father's brother's wife's brother's wife. Didn't exactly make her Aunt Ellie, but her husband's sister was my Aunt Helen, still it was family.

Margaret Bacera couldn't take it.

Margaret was at least six feet tall. Taller than just about everyone in the school, including Joe, my Aunt Helen's brother (they both taught at my elementary school)

Margaret was tall and gangly like a sixteen year old boy and as flat chested as one, so at least we had that in common.

She was an American Indian, I have no idea what nation. She was 15 and when she read aloud she stumbled through every sentence, probably more uncomfortable with the attention than I was aware then. I just thought she was all that slow.

We lived on the south side of Chicago. A very blue-collar neighborhood. We didn't have a lot of nice things, but neither did most every one else.

Hand-me-downs were the rule not the exception.

A bundle came into the house for me. I have no clue where it came from and most of the stuff was typical, not exciting at all. But the suede purse. Ohmygosh it was soo cool.

About the size & shape of a clutch bag, and it had a long leather shoulder strap.

Beautiful soft brown suede, trimmed out with brown leather.

It was easily the coolest thing I owned that year.

One day we had to write something that had me fully absorbed - deep in concentration on the assignment, my head down the entire class. Bell rang I stood up and gathered my things, including the gorgeous suede purse that had been hanging on the back of my seat.

Margaret had been sitting behind me and she hurried away when I stood up.

I pulled up the purse and froze.

On the back in blue ink, in large blocky letters it said

Mary Anne Baker - The Brain

The Age of Aquarius

Part of it is being this side of fifty.

Way this side of fifty.

I care much less today than I ever have in my life about what you think of me and I want to do and be authentic more than ever. It rubs me the wrong way, it puts me off balance to smile politely at what you say.

I have less tolerance for fools.

I am tired of other people being entitled to define who and what I am.

I just read a piece on misandry and antimisandry.

Misandry is the hatred of males. A term that must have been coined recently, because when I looked for the opposite of misogyny thirty years ago there wasn't a word. Misanthropy meaning hatred of mankind or all people.

So this guy went and found misandry and defining feminism as the radical notion that men are not people.

That's not what feminists believe.

I know.

I'm a feminist and its not what I believe.

Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.

I'm tired of people telling me what I do believe or what I should believe.

Getting in tune

Yesterday I was driving out of the parking lot, passing through the gate

when I thought - "I could offer to babysit for free, to single parents -

as an emergency back-up, for work not for play, cause I know it could make a

real difference to a parent. I prefer to hang out with older kids who can sit by

themselves & draw or whatever."

This morning Brook called and for the first time ever asked if I could

keep Casey for a couple of hours.

Kewel eh?

I take it as indication that I am in fact being more tapped in

and tuned in.

No Facebook today - weird!

Be like Home Depot

A friend, a woman I really like in real life teaches Network Marketers. And recently she teaching her students to be "like HomeDepot" - provide all the services your online customers are likely to be looking for.

I cannot even articulate what about that doesn't work for me.
The theory of multiple streams is great and in fact wise.
I just don't want to be a big box store.

I don't wanna have a list, I have an address book.
I don't wanna have an autoresponder - I swear I sign up with Aweber every other month - ok 3 times a year!
I don't wanna drive traffic
I don't wanna be an affiliate ho.
I don't wanna sell this guru or that one, cause those programs tend to compound the pain of most struggling network marketers.
Add another failure!

I do like making videos on my Mac.
Suddenly, this week I have reached a level of comfort about being on camera and I'm having fun.

I do like walking up to people I find interesting or attractive, and I like to do that if it's at a party, at a networking event, online.
I like introducing myself.
I like talking to people and listening to them in ways that make them feel validated.

Cause girl it's so much fun, walking up to someone like you at an event and saying (only because it's true) "Girl, I love those shoes! I'm Maran it's nice to meet you. Now back to what matters, where did you find those shoes?"

And then I love finding out who you are and what we have in common. Cause I'm a trained professional, I scout the room looking for people I'm gonna like and then I get in conversation and hunt for what is it about you that we have in common? What values do we share?

And when I look at you like that, you like me.
Which makes me like you even more.

Now maybe we have a foundation built.
So when you ask me what I do, we're already pals and I learned a long time ago not to throw up on my buds, cause puke makes people not like you so much.
Now cause we're friends I can tell you what I do without needing you to buy my products or join me in my biz opp.

And I learned to listen.
And I got enboldened by success.
Cause I know this pyramidy thingee works, cause that's real money the company deposits every week.
So when you ask, I can now invite you to look in a way that's just in service.

Everyone ought to at least be clear about what our industry is.

That kind of knowledge serves them.

And when they know what the industry is, they often want to get involved.

And by then they trust me.

And they can decide, without feeling hounded, or chased.