If you’re someone who’s tired of living from one paycheck to the next, want to build a solid safety net, curb impulse spending and increase your earning power, then Adam Baker at Man Vs. Debt is someone you should be listening to. He and his wife paid off about $18K in consumer debt, sold all their belongings, and were able to travel the world for over a year (with their 22-month-old daughter!). With a little hard work, they have been able to achieve some incredible things, and because he’s done it, Baker has become a huge authority in the online personal finance world who shares credible advice that will help you eliminate financial stress in your life.

I’ve known Baker since early on after he started his blog in 2009. Since then, he’s quickly amassed a loyal following, joined forces with some of the biggest forces on the social web (Leo Babauta at Zen Habits, J.D. Roth at Get Rich Slowly, and the team at WiseBread). He and I partnered together with a great team to start Untemplater, and finally got the chance to meet in person when he visited Thailand in January on his year-long location-independent world tour! I’ve been looking forward to doing a video interview with him for quite a while now, and this week we were finally able to sit down for a great conversation.

Baker just launched his first ebook guide, Unautomate Your Finances: A Simple, Passionate Approach to Money , which lays out his holistic approach to personal finance. I know from interacting with him on a weekly basis that he’s spent the last several months toiling away on this guide, he’s gotten a tremendous amount of positive feedback, and this is something that is sure to transform people’s relationship with money. Watch our video conversation below to see why you should un-automate your finances, how you can build a more conscious, simple, sustainable financial life, and get the scoop about his world travels since freeing himself from debt prison!

• 0:55 – Baker’s college experience, business background & financial history
• 2:15 – White picket fences & opting out of the template life path
  
• 4:54 – Unconventional approaches to eliminating debt
• 6:45 – Deliberate, effective budgeting
• 8:13 – How to plan for income fluctuations & irregular expenses when you’re a freelancer
• 10:20 – Couchsurfing & backpacking through Australia, New Zealand & Thailand
• 13:38 – Traveling the world with young children
• 16:07 – More about Baker’s new ebook Unautomate Your Finances
• 20:36 – Cultivating a conscious mindset about personal finance & money
• 22:12 – South by Southwest Web Awards & where to find Baker
  

UPDATE: For more from Baker: check out his Sell Your Crap guide to learn how his family got rid of all their belongings before they went traveling around the world, and how you can sell all your stuff on eBay, Craigslist, and Amazon to make some extra cash. Also, if you want to add a guaranteed $12,000 to your online business over the next 12 months, you might want to grab a seat in his course with Corbett Barr, The Hustle Project. Corbett and Baker are both Faculty members at Digital Nomad Academy, regular recurring mentors for our students inside the Academy, so I can speak personally to the high quality of their coaching.

I’ll be honest: I’m someone who hates to sit down with spreadsheets and budget out my finances. I don’t even like to look at my bank statements every month! With student loans, a lot of random business stuff going on, and the fact that I’m a lazy excuse for a human, my finances are a damn mess, but Baker has developed a product that has fundamentally changed the way I think about money, and he and his wife Courtney are proof that you really can get conscious about how you spend, escape the debt “game” that the rest of the world is stuck in, and start to build the lifestyle you want now! Forget dreaming about retirement, if he and his family can eliminate their debt and go globetrotting, you can get control of your finances and do whatever you dream of doing too.

Here is what you get if you purchase a copy of Baker’s Unautomate Your Finances:

• A comprehensive 83-page eBook. In “The Unautomation Theory” section, Baker relates his experience climbing out of the debt hole and the way that has transformed his family’s lives. He goes on to explain how to avoid financial burnout and unlock conscious financial awareness by un-automating. In “The Science of Unautomation” he’ll help you take a hard look at your priorities and figure out how to budget for what you really want in life. Lastly, in the “Applying Unautomation” section, he focuses on application, showing you how to actively manage your finances with a simple 2-page minimalist budgeting system and apply his “Debt Tsunami” tactic to rid yourself of debt.
• A 27-minute video interview with Leo Babauta of ZenHabits.net. Baker interviews Leo on how he applied the principles of simplicity and minimalism to dramatically turn around his financial life.  Powerful insights from a leader in simplicity, blogging, and productivity.
• A 29-minute audio interview with J.D. Roth of GetRichSlowly.org, one of the top personal finance blogs on the web. J.D. joins Baker on a call to discuss his own financial recovery story and what it’s like now that he’s in the “third phase of personal finance“.
• A 2-page, custom-designed PDF version (printable) of the minimalist budgeting system discussed in the main guide.
• A simple Excel template for those who want to take the minimalist budgeting system digital.
• Free Extended Updates! Get on the exclusive email list and over the next 6 months, Baker will be releasing sample case studies, FAQ’s, and exclusive interviews… for free!

At just $17, I honestly thought he was nuts for giving away so much hard work, but it just goes to show how dedicated he is to providing real value and helping those who need financial guidance. This is a truly impressive product that would typically go for at least $39 if you look around at other bloggers online, and it comes with Baker’s “as long as I have a pulse” money-back guarantee. So if you need to learn how to get the best of your personal finances, start an emergency fund, successfully get out of debt, and create a realistic budget that will let you achieve your financial and life goals, then Unautomate Your Finances is definitely something you need to check out.

And do make sure you follow Baker on Twitter, and join the Man Vs. Debt Militia over on his site MVD to learn more about how he turned his financial life around, took his family vagabonding around the globe, and get good solid money tips.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Get Out of Debt and In Control of Your Personal Finances with Adam Baker of Man Vs Debt

Four years ago, I was a nobody. I was working an office job I generally despised. Then I started toiling away, working at home, trying to earn a living as a freelancer, but mostly going broke in a city with one of the highest costs-of-living in the States and about the least exciting things to do.

When I decided to create my own footprint on the web, though, things started to change. I started sharing my ideas and my experiences with the world, and soon I had friends around the globe, influential colleagues running innovative businesses, and fantastic mentors who were doing the things I dreamed of.

I really leveraged the the power of web 2.0 to brand myself, build an extensive network, design a business that I can essentially run from anywhere in the world, and now I’m able to travel around the globe and live in Thailand where the cost-of-living is very low, and I’m dangerously close to the white sand beaches. I’m still basically a bum, but I’m a vagabonding bum with an international business, a global web presence, good friends around the world, and an awful lot of fun travel and volunteering experiences under my belt!

Plus, thankfully, it’s awful cheap to live in Thailand.

So Here’s How I Do It

Recently, I attempted to compile all the useful tools I’ve come across since I started this game four years ago, and separate it from all the crap. You can see my whole resource page for living a kickass life here, but today I’d like to share some of the applications, tools, and resources that I use daily and recommend to all my clients and friends. These are all of my best-kept secrets!

Web Presence

• Find a quality web host – Although I’ve hosted most of my websites with DreamHost for the last 3 years (use promo code THRILLING30 to get 30 bucks off), after surveying my blogger friends and clients, a vast majority of them prefer BlueHost. They offer truly superior 24/7 phone support, have much less down time and technical problems than my DreamHost server, and I love working with them!
• Easily manage your content – WordPress is by far the easiest, most powerful content management system out there. I use it for all of my sites—blogs, business sites, minisites, and it’s even great for photo galleries, portfolios, communities, job listing sites & more.
• Get a great web design – if you don’t have the cash to invest in a proper web designer (a good, original design will often cost $3–$5K) there are TONS of great, inexpensive HTML templates and WordPress themes available from companies like WooThemes and ThemeForest. I have used great designs from both.

Gadgets & Gear

• Pack a tough laptop – If you’re going to be backpacking the world for a few years, getting sand and water in your laptop, you might want to invest in a Toughbook. But I’m an Apple fanboy and all my favorite apps & development tools are on OSX. I’ve found the new 13-inch unibody aluminum Apple MacBook Pro can take a few hard drops and has been great to travel with.
• A global smartphone – Again, I go with my favorite Apple here, and as an online businessman, yes I am an iPhone 3G-carrying member of the tech elite! You’ll need to follow the unlocking instructions here for use on non-AT&T networks, international travel & data access.
• Portable WiFi – The awesome and compact Airport Express will turn almost any ethernet connection around the world into a wifi network.
• Backup your important files – Especially if you carry client work with you as you travel the world, you want to make sure you save secure copies frequently in case your laptop is stolen or damaged. I connect to an external drive and backup my whole system with TimeMachine often, and also use free Mozy online backup to automatically upload copies of my most important files to the cloud (runs in the background so I don’t even have to see it or think about it).

Communications

• Cheap calls around the world – call friends & clients around the globe for as little as 3 cents a minute with Skype, or set up your own virtual SkypeIn number that people can dial from their phone back home to reach you on the web (I even use mine to forward to my Thai mobile number).
• One number to rule them all – previously called GrandCentral, Google Voice will give you one phone number to route and forward to any phone; highly customizable. This is also how I maintain a Bay Area, California international line that I can forward to my Skype or my mobile abroad.
• One chat client to rule them all – Adium or Meebo can connect AIM, gTalk, MSN, Yahoo chat, Facebook chat and more.
• Online group video chat – Tinychat offers free chat rooms & audio video conferences online.
• Free teleconference calls – FreePhoneConference.com gives you a free dial-in teleconference number to hold a workshop for dozens of callers.

Online Collaboration

• Maintain a public or shared group calendar – Google Calendar gives you an easily-shareable calendar and schedule organizer.
• Easy document collaboration – Google Docs gives you collaborative word documents, spreadsheets, and forms that you can share with others and modify the same document remotely.
• Screen sharing – Adobe ConnectNow is a new, free service that lets you meet live over the web and share your screen with anyone.
• Team project management – There are tons of web-based project management apps like Basecamp, or the free alternative Collabtiv.
• File storage & sharing – Store archives of your large files online and easily send & share them with your colleagues with a free Dropbox account.

Web Development

• Access your server – Open-source Cyberduck FTP client for Mac.
• Edit your code – Powerful, user-friendly editor Smultron, also open-source for Mac.
• Build test websites offline – Run your own local Apache server with MAMP for Mac.
• Test and tweak live websites – Firebug is a Firefox plugin that makes testing your code much easier.
• Test cross-browser compatibility – Finally, Adobe BrowserLab offers a way to do this easily and free (keep this one on the down-low).

e-Commerce & Invoicing

• Easily send & receive money online – PayPal
• Simple online invoicing & bookkeeping – FreshBooks
• Deliver digital products – e-Junkie handles payment & fulfillment for your ebook, audio, or other information products.

Marketing & Promotion

• Start your mailing list – AWeber is the leading provider for customer list management, autoresponders & drip campaigns.
• Smart social bookmarking – Install the Su.pr bookmarklet in your browser toolbar, submit your links and they’ll be automatically sent to Twitter, Facebook & StumbleUpon!
• Build your expert credibility – LinkedIn is the best professional online network, and LinkedIn Answers is the best place to brand yourself, share your expertise with others, and even solicit feedback on your own questions from experienced CEOs and other professionals.
• Give a great presentation – Prezi is guaranteed to be a PowerPoint-killer. Forget slideshows, Prezi gives you a canvas without limits to deliver a dynamic presentation.

Personal Finance

• High-yield online savings accounts – get a little better return on your dollar by putting your savings in a Emigrant Direct or ING Direct account. I especially love ING because you can create as many sub-accounts as you want, easily managing different “buckets” for your many savings goals.
• Best multinational bank – HSBC Bank has the most locations around the globe of any bank I’ve seen.
• Avoid hefty fees – Charles Schwab could possibly have the best checking account for travelers. They reimburse all ATM transactions and have no international fees. If you want a referral, let me know.
• Frequent flyer perks card – Are you a frequent flyer? Get 1 mile per dollar spent, plus 12,000 bonus sign-up miles with the Discover Miles card.
• Manage your accounts & budget –  Mint.com is powerful, free personal financial management application.

Travel & Mobile Lifestyle

• Find the best travel deals – Kayak.com compares thousands of airfare and hotel aggregator sites like Orbitz and Travelocity to find the lowest fare.
• Get the cheapest local flights – Find the budget air carriers in your region with WhichBudget.
• Get last-minute airfare deals – You can bid low on last-minute flights from Priceline and check out their Pricebreaker deals.
• Meet locals and find free accomodation – Couchsurfing. Almost anywhere in the world. Awesome.
• Low-cost rentals & sublets – AirBnB lists vacation rentals and apartments for rent in 87 countries.
• Backpack around the world on $25 a day – How to See the World, the free Art of Travel guide, is a great resource to learn more.
• Learn how to become a digital nomad – Read Christine Gilbert’s great series 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World.
• Go green and get all your mail virtually – EarthClassMail will send all your snail mail to you via email. Great for business backpackers!
• Affordable world travel insurance – World Nomads insurance recommended by Lonely Planet.
• Master travel hacks – Grab the Frequent Flyer Master guide from Chris Guillebeau, who’s traveled to 119 countries in a few short years, to learn how to get the most out of your miles and get the advantage over the airlines. He even guarantees one free plane ticket!
• Learn to become a permanent traveler and live anywhere – If you want to move abroad permanently, and create income streams that support you as a perpetual traveler, then you absolutely must get Karol Gajda’s stunning ebook How to Live Anywhere. This is the guide I seriously wish I’d written! Check out my interview with Karol here.
• Get your work done wherever you go – Coworking is the hip new way to have an office without a job. If you like being surrounded by other human beings but not distracted from your work, search for coworking spots where your’e traveling.

Lifestyle Design Tools

• Set and budget for your goals – Tim Ferriss’ Ideal Lifestyle Costing method will help you figure out what your ideal lifestyle looks like, set goals for 6 months or a year down the road, and figure out what you have to do and how much it will cost to get there. Use this Dreamlining Worksheet.
• Build a support team – David Walsh is an automation genius who put together SourceControl to show you how to successfully outsource taks and give you a framework for your ambitious projects.
• Automate all your business processes – Take a few tips from Rob Granholm on how to Automate Your Systems. Rob has done a tremendous job breaking down processes, and for extra credit you can even apply this outside of your business.

What are your favorite tools, apps & resources for living a mobile lifestyle and getting work done from anywhere?

Check out my resources page for more useful tools, ebooks & resources for living an incredibly kickass life. BTW the featured photo at the top of the page is me with my buddies Migration Mark, Dwight Turner and Joel Bruner on a vagabonding trip to Laos.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: 49 Tools for Living the Mobile Lifestyle

Ramit Sethi was one of the earliest bloggers to inspire me when I first started writing Thrilling Heroics and building my online network. He was a graduate of Stanford University who’d studied technology and psychology, co-founded Silicon Valley startup PBworks, and was writing the hugely successful I Will Teach You To Be Rich blog to show college students and young professionals how to take control of their personal finances and get into entrepreneurship.

Although he’s based in the Bay Area, I reached out to him and learned that he’s originally from my hometown in Northern California. The first time I met Ramit in person was one chilly winter day in 2006 when he was in Sacramento to visit his family, and I had the chance to interview him about his education, entrepreneurship experience, and his perspectives on new media.

One of the first bold moves Ramit made in his career was to call up Seth Godin and negotiate a job opportunity with him! He later consulted with Omidyar Network, the philanthropic social innovation firm started by Ebay founder Pierre Omidyar. He got himself featured in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, NPR, ABC News, CNBC, and more, sharing personal finance tips and bolstering his readership at I Will Teach You To Be Rich to over 250,000 visitors per month!

In March, Ramit published his book by the same title, which instantly hit #1 on Amazon and made him a NYT bestselling author. His educational background in social psychology translated well into a book that helps you make real behavioral change:

At last, for a generation that’s materially ambitious yet financially clueless comes I Will Teach You To Be Rich, Ramit Sethi’s 6-week personal finance program for 20-to-35-year-olds. A completely practical approach delivered with a nonjudgmental style that makes readers want to do what Sethi says, it is based around the four pillars of personal finance—banking, saving, budgeting, and investing—and the wealth-building ideas of personal entrepreneurship.

These days Ramit hangs out with Tim Ferriss (check out his feature on the 4-Hour Workweek blog about the psychology of money and how to set up an automated personal finance system, with great excerpts from Ramit’s book).

How could you ask for a better twentysomething role model for personal finance and entrepreneurship success?

I met up with Ramit a time or two in San Francisco since first meeting him in 2006, but I’ve been wanting to catch up with him for a video interview for a while now to see what has changed in the last three years. Just my luck, this week he’s turning the six-week personal finance program in his best-selling book into a real online bootcamp where he’ll take you by the hand through a step-by-step online curriculum to automate and optimize your finances before the end of 2009, so I offered to help him promote the bootcamp if he’d sit down and answer some questions for you guys here.

Check out the video interview below for the following:

• Learn more about the I Will Teach You To Be Rich 6-Week Personal Finance Bootcamp
• Entrepreneurship, experimentation & failure
• How the things you spend your money on reflect your values
• How Ramit negotiated a book deal from his blog
• How he promoted his book to #1 on Amazon and the New York Times bestseller list
• Personal finance & entrepreneurship tips for travelers & expats
• Learn about the I Will Teach You To Be Rich Scholarship for Social Innovation

To learn more about Ramit Sethi, social psychology, technology in business, scrappy startups, and x-man abilities, make sure you also read my 2006 interview with him.

Feature photo from You 2.0

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Ramit Sethi Shows You How to Negotiate, Automate & Perspirate Your Way to Financial Success

What is social media? Some people think of geeks like me who spend all day on Twitter or Digg, some think of marketing or PR “gurus”, but really it’s just a conversation—empowered by new web technologies that connect people globally. It is reshaping how companies relate to and interact with their markets with people. It is giving more power to the consumer, nurturing communities of people with shared interests in innumerable topics. Social media is changing the rules of the game so that individuals can join, build and lead communities; rebel freelancers or micro-entrepreneurs can take on large corporations.

Viralogy.com is a community that strives to highlight thought leaders and influencers in this global conversation. They are quickly branding themselves as the place to go when you want to find the authoritative bloggers on any particular topic, by ranking individuals’ online influence through the blogosphere, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Stumble, and Digg statistics.

Almost everyone has read the influential works of social media thought leaders like Seth Godin, Tim Ferriss, Gary Vaynerchuk, and Leo Babauta, for example. But Viralogy co-founder Jun Loayza, as a member of Generation Y, wants to take a different approach to finding the authoritative voices on the web. “They have amazing content,” he says, “but at times it feels like I can’t relate with them. They’re in a position where they have reached success, and are now teaching us about how we can become successful, which may be the source of the disconnect. [But] I want to read about people who are in the trenches like me; I want to hear from people who haven’t made it yet, but are doing things the right way and can teach us how they’re doing it every step of the way.  I want to hear from the experts in my Generation.”

Jun and his team at Viralogy decided to create Viralogy Experts—a platform that will feature Gen-Y experts on a range of topics, including personal finance, business strategy, marketing & PR, and personal development. And Jun asked me to join their expert panel as a thought leader on location independence, so I’m excited and proud to announce my partnership with them for the launch of this new community! The five debut experts are:

• Adam Baker at Man Vs. Debt
• Steve Spalding at How To Split an Atom
• Stuart Foster at The Lost Jacket
• Derek Halpern at Prevential.com
• Cody McKibben (that’s me!) here at Thrilling Heroics

What we all share in common is that we are actually going through these challenges and transitions right now, so you can follow along with our journeys and know that our advice has been tested first hand. We hope to bring in a fifth expert on personal development and eventually expand to at least ten thought leaders, with the goal to help you separate the wheat from the chaff on the web and go straight to the blogs that give you actionable, step-by-step teaching from peers that you can trust.

Viralogy Experts launches today, so go check it out and please subscribe!

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Join Influential Gen-Y Thought Leaders on their Remarkable Business & Lifestyle Journeys

When I first started reading blogs, Ramit Sethi was one of the young writers who inspired me to get involved in the blogging community, as well as entrepreneurship. He’s a Stanford graduate who’s been helping readers save money for over three years, as well as a co-founder of a cool San Francisco startup, and he’s worked with Seth Godin and tons of other cool people! (Check out my 2006 interview with Ramit!)

Ramit has finally authored a hardcopy book to help folks optimize their finances, and it launched a few hours ago! There are several really awesome, useful preview chapters available, and Ramit’s even giving out prizes to a few lucky readers if you purchase your copy today. In his own words:

This book works. For about $10, you’ll get the step-by-step guide I wrote to walk you through optimizing your accounts, negotiating with banks and credit cards (use my call scripts), spending consciously (use my charts to see guidelines of how much people typically spend, and how to beat “typical” people), and how to invest. I’ll show you how most people think personal finance is all about willpower, like “If I just try harder, I’ll be able to save more…” That sounds suspiciously like a diet, which always fails. The book shows you how to automatically redirect your money to investing, saving, and guilt-free spending — even if it’s $200 jeans or $5 coffee every day.

Check out the cool gifts he’s giving out: if you buy a copy of the book and forward your receipt to iboughtthebook@iwillteachyoutoberich.com, you’ll be entered to win one of the following:

1. One Kindle per hour today: I’m giving away ONE BRAND-NEW KINDLE EVERY HOUR today (from 8am-4pm Pacific) to anyone who buys the book and forwards the receipt to iboughtthebook@iwillteachyoutoberich.com
2. $1,000 for 5 savings accounts—each. Mint (which I use and recommend in the book) is giving away $1,000 checks to kick-start savings accounts for FIVE book buyers (that’s $5k in total)
3. Software from Pearbudget: Three $30 accounts to help you manage your money
4. Entrepreneurs—free advice. Chris Yeh (Stanford/Harvard Business School grad) and I will get on a conference call with 3 aspiring entrepreneurs for 20 minutes each and answer any questions you can throw at us
5. I’m live on video throughout the day. I’ll be doing a live webcast for most of the day at iwillteachyoutoberich.com, so drop by and say hi

Ramit is an insightful writer who’s got hundreds of useful, actionable tips to help you save money, spend more wisely, and invest where it counts. His blog is great and he’s been a huge success, so I highly recommend picking up a copy of his brand new book I Will Teach You to Be Rich! Learn from the best! I highly recommend this guy’s work.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: ‘I Will Teach You To Be Rich’ Blogger Ramit Sethi’s New Book Release

Ever since I discovered Google Custom Search, I’ve been using it to pinpoint the exact kind of awesome articles, tips and tricks I’m looking for much quicker, and to increase my efficiency and decrease the time it takes me to find answers or write up blog posts.

Personally, I’m a big fan of productivity lists, how-to’s, and life hacks, so my custom search engine includes a lot of big name sites like Lifehacker, Zen Habits, Tim Ferriss’ 4HWW blog, and many more. Anytime I’m curious how to do something, like how to install a certain software application, how to improve my resume, or how to get the most out of a particular social networking site for instance, my custom-build search engine returns incredible results! And if you like to hyperlink to other resources and articles as additional support when you write new blog posts, this will serve as a fantastic tool for you just like it has for me.

I highly recommend Google’s Custom Search, and since I’ve already done the work and compiled a master list of over 50 of the web’s most credible and authoritative blogs, I’d also like to introduce my own Thrilling Blog Search engine as an open community tool for the Brazen Careerist network and the blogosphere at large. Try it out. Seriously! It provides some really cool results for all sorts of subjects from personal development to social media to finance. Link to the search engine page here and try a search for “resume,” “savings account,” or “LinkedIn” for example:

If you’d like to utilize this tool for your own blogging workflow, feel free to bookmark my directory/links page, or you can easily add it to your iGoogle homepage or your own website. Be aware that this search engine already crawls several of the most trusted blogs on the internet, but I will be adding to the sites in the future. If you’d like to contribute to the project or suggest a site for addition, you can get in touch with me but be aware there will be a strict review process. In other words, if you email me with a suggestion, you better be ready to pitch your site and why the community will benefit from it!

Here are the top-notch blogs/bloggers that are already a part of this fun customized blog community search tool:

Personal Growth/Productivity

• Lifehacker
• Zen Habits
• Steve Pavlina
• LifeDev
• Life Optimizer
• The Positivity Blog
• Scott H Young
• Duff McDuffee
• Today Is That Day

Career/Personal Branding

• Personal Branding Blog
• Brazen Careerist by Penelope Trunk
• Life Beyond Code
• Water Cooler Wisdom
• Personal PR
• Newly Corporate
• The Urban Muse
• PR Interactive
• Erik Folgate

Lifestyle Design/Travel

• The 4-Hour Workweek
• Anywired
• The Art of Nonconformity
• Real Social Dynamics
• Ronnie Nurss
• Brave New Traveler

Generation-Y Issues

• Employee Evolution
• Twenty Set
• WorkLoveLife

Personal Finance

• I Will Teach You To Be Rich
• Get Rich Slowly

Freelancing/Entrepreneurship

• FreelanceSwitch
• Escape from Cubicle Nation
• Erica Douglass
• How to Change the World by Guy Kawasaki
• The Anti 9-to-5 Guide
• Instigator Blog
• College-Startup
• Jamie Harrop

Social Media/Technology

• Chris Brogan
• Dosh Dosh
• Copyblogger
• Tobias Baeck
• Paul Stamatiou
• Greg Rollett
• Moving From Me to We
• Paul Woods

Blogging/WordPress

• ProBlogger
• Pearsonified
• Theme Playground
• Blog Perfume
• Lorelle on WordPress
• Thrilling Design

Remember, this is a community project, so please feel free to get involved!

» Add a search widget to your Google homepage.

» Add the custom Thrilling Blog Search to your own site.

» Get in touch if you’ve got a suggested site that will benefit other bloggers and readers.

» Blog about this or tell your friends about the Thrilling Blog Search engine!

These are just the first round of additions to the Thrilling Blog Search community search tool. As I come across more great sites, I’ll be updating the list and the search engine tool. You can view several of my favorite blogs and suggested resources, as well as my custom Thrilling Blog Search tool on my Links Page here.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Announcing an Awesome New Community Search Tool for the Blogosphere!

Ladies, do you hope to find a millionaire husband? Do you want to marry rich?

That’s what my friend Alicia Dunams set out to do in her mid-20′s, but she instead found herself on a journey of personal growth and self-actualization. Alicia is the author of Amazon best-selling book Goal Digger: Lessons Learned from the Rich Men I Dated, a successful entrepreneur, real estate investor, and success coach. In her book, Alicia asks: Rather than marrying rich, why not set about to earn a few cool million yourself? Or start your own dream business?

I love Alicia’s enthusiasm because much like me, her strongest passion is to encourage and empower others to seek their full potential! Alicia educates women and empowers them to seek their own financial success, and become wealthy in all aspects of their lives, through her book, her Rich Girl Guide series, and via the new Wealthy Girl Summit she has organized.

Wealthy Girl Summit 2008 is a nationwide, four-day virtual wealth-building conference that will be held next week from January 24th – 27th. Alicia has brought together some extreme female power players to speak about personal finance, retirement planning, real estate and stock market investing, entrepreneurship, and the importance of emotional wealth and attitude!

The event is inspired by the tyrannical words of one of the many rich men she dated and interviewed for her highly successful book. Upon seeking the advice of “Mr. Rich” on how women can create wealth and become millionaires, this rich man replied “Women must compete for men. That is the only way they will become a millionaire. Women are too emotional and scattered to become their own millionaire.” Enraged by this sexist remark, Ms. Dunams set out to prove Mr. Rich’s point of view to be wrong. Ms. Dunams had a vision for a nationwide event that would, “in one fell swoop”, get the attention of young women across the country to take action and empower themselves, in a radical fashion, to be the creators of their own millionaire success. “I want Wealthy Girl Summit to become a movement.” Says Dunams. “A movement that will instill the millionaire mindset in young women to create wealth in all areas of their life.”

Headlining the dozen power speakers are serial entrepreneur and venture capitalist Christine Comaford-Lynch, financial strategist Loral Langemeier, and leading motivational speaker Marci Shimoff. Christine Comaford-Lynch is the CEO of business accelerator Mighty Ventures, personal consultant to big shots like President Bill Clinton, and author of Rules for Renegades: How to Make More Money, Rock Your Career, and Revel in Your Individuality. Loral Langemeier is author of The Millionaire Maker’s Guide to Creating a Cash Machine for Life and Director of Live Out Loud, a financial coaching and mentoring company. And Marci Shimoff is the New York Times #1 bestselling author of Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul and a participating teacher in the transformative film The Secret.

If you’re an entrepreneurial or success-minded young woman in your twenties or thirties, I strongly encourage you to participate in this conference. I’ve read great material from Alicia Dunams and Christine Comaford-Lynch, and have interacted with both of these awesome women, and I highly recommend their insightful lessons! 2008 is a new year, and perhaps you’ve set some powerful resolutions for yourself — to increase your income, take control of your career, or start working for yourself maybe? No matter where you are located, this nationwide teleconference and webinar should prove to be an exceptionally valuable opportunity to invest in yourself in ’08 and learn from the tremendous achievements of other successful self-made women! To become the millionaire you seek to be, or even to achieve a more humble goal, it’s all about learning to transform your mindset and beliefs, and these special guest speakers will show you how to with their proven successes! Check it out at www.WealthyGirlSummit.com

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Women, Invest in Yourselves First with the Empowering Wealthy Girl Summit 2008

Happy Holidays everybody. I wish you all the best and hope that you get a chance to spend some quality time with family and loved ones. If you haven’t heard yet, I am traveling in Spain for the holidays with some good friends, but I wanted to be sure to share my 2007 year-end wrap-up with you here on the blog. If you’ve got the time to visit, I thank you for reading!

Thrilling Heroics in 2007

2007 was a fantastic year for the blog. The site became an early participant in the Washington Post Blogroll program. And many things are still in development for the road ahead, but TH has recently been accepted as one of the first handful of Gen-Y career blogs to join the upcoming Brazen Careerist blog network, which should be a great opportunity. Over the course of the year, I also had the chance to interview several interesting individuals to get their perspective on leadership and success, so that Gen-Y readers can learn from their experience!

Thrilling Heroics has seen a lot of change this year as my personal interests and pursuits have evolved. The discussion is geared more toward personal and career development now than it was at the birth of this blog in 2006, but the central mission is the same: TH is a career-oriented resource aimed at college students and young professionals, with a strong focus on leadership, personal development, productivity, personal finance, entrepreneurship, and “lifestyle design,” with the purpose of inspiring and empowering readers to pursue their wildest dreams! In 2008, you can plan to see some further changes around here in content and design, and you will probably see a few guest writers. Click here to learn more about plans for ’08.

I also have to thank the readers, of course! Thank you for returning week after week. Thank you for your kind words of encouragement, for your patience with me as my direction and obligations change, and for sharing your thoughts on the discussions that take place here. Your comments and your supportive emails keep me going, and they keep the dialogue here interesting! In the next year, I hope to build more community here for you young readers, so please help us to grow the community by sharing the URL with your family, friends, and colleagues. Also, if you are a regular visitor, consider subscribing to the RSS feed to make life easier on yourself. Get posts delivered to your email inbox only when there is fresh new content, so that you don’t waste time visiting the site when there’s nothing new!

Best Posts of 2007

There were 102 posts this year, with over 6,800 unique visitors to the site. We made it onto Tom Peters’ homepage, Yahoo! Finance, and Consumerist.com, among others! This could not have been possible without you, the reader. Thank you! Here are the blog posts that caused the most buzz around the blogosphere this year and inspired the best conversions. Please take a moment to look back at the best of 2007:

Top 10 Most Popular Posts in 2007

1. Learn To Build A Brand That Shouts Distinction, Commitment, and Passion
2. Interview with David Anderson, Founder and CEO of Green Options
3. How To Use Your Peers For Fun And Profit!
4. Karen Seeh, Corporate Sustainability Strategist, Talks About Social Enterprise and How to Break In
5. Global Marketing, Six Sigma, and The Donald: An Interview with 23-Year-Old Personal Branding Expert Daniel Schawbel
6. Six Simple Money Tips to Get You Back on the Financial Track
7. Warren Buffett on Doing What You Love
8. Interview with David Anderson of Palo Alto Investors
9. 17 Ways to Think Your Way to Wealth!
10. Bright Young Minds: An Interview with Duff McDuffee of Falling Fruit TV

2007 Women & Business Interview Series with IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com

• Interview with Michelle Goodman, Author of The Anti 9-to-5 Guide
• Interview with Julie Jansen, Career Coach and Motivational Speaker
• Interview with Alexandra Levit, Author of They Don’t Teach Corporate In College
• Interview with Anya Kamenetz, Author of Generation Debt
• Interview with Pam Slim of Escape From Cubicle Nation

A Few More Notable Posts

• It’s Time for Some Thrilling Heroics: Commit to Pursuing Your Wildest Dreams with Me in 2008!
• The #1 Skill You Need to Succeed at Anything: Learn to Build Relationships
• 10 Great Ways to Distinguish Yourself from One of Silicon Valley’s Top Entrepreneurs
• The Need for Corporate Partnerships
• Keep Your Brand Current
• I Have A Dream…

Happy Holidays!

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: ThrillingHeroics.com: The Best Posts of 2007

Over at CodyMcKibben.com in November, I wrote about my experiments with freelancing, and about my desire to shift my career so that my work is not just means to pay the bills, but more of a way to express my passions and continue to increase my personal growth. See the post here. In response to my thoughts on career development, my friend Gautam Valluri asked me about my plans to develop Thrilling Heroics in 2008, and to discuss my entrepreneurial plans further. He writes:

1. A while ago I remember you were very keen on going to study at Stanford. Are you still with that goal?

2. What new changes are you planning for Thrilling Heroics?

3. If you’re planning to detach your income from your time (as so brilliantly put by [Steve Pavlina in this podcast]) how do you plan to do it?

I ask these questions out of curiosity and as I too am facing them in my own version of things, I’d like to hear your approach to them. To be more specific, I’ve had a long-running goal of going to film school, I’m currently in the process of making some changes to my blog and I’m interested in the concept of detaching my income from my time.

I thought these great questions deserved a little more in-depth discussion, and they give me a perfect opportunity to recommit to my mission here at ThrillingHeroics.com and share some of the plans for its development in 2008, so I’m happy to answer them here on TH with this post!

Revamping Thrilling Heroics for 2008

New Developments & Directions
Some great news — ThrillingHeroics.com has recently been accepted as one of the first handful of blogs to join the new Brazen Careerist blog network! I’m deeply flattered to be chosen by Penelope Trunk and the guys at Employee Evolution, and I’ll be honored to work alongside some other fantastic Gen-Y career bloggers.

Thrilling Heroics has evolved and changed over time alongside my interests and pursuits, and it will continue to do so, but I remain committed to my central mission: to inspire and empower others to pursue their dreams and goals in the face of adversity. The discussion is concentrated more in the direction of personal and career development now than it was at the birth of this blog in 2006, but the central message is the same, with a new twist: namely, Thrilling Heroics is a career-oriented resource for college students and young professionals, with a strong focus on leadership, personal development, productivity, personal finance, entrepreneurship, and “lifestyle design.” Above all, I am passionate to encourage Generation-Y readers to pursue their dreams with reckless abandon!

TH started out with strong foundations in green business and social entrepreneurship. But whatever your interests, what remains central to the purpose of Thrilling Heroics is to empower the members of our generation to “think outside the box” of traditional work and traditional business, and really take advantage of all the things that are at our disposal to achieve our wildest dreams. Yes, that’s right — the ones you had when you were a kid. The world is your oyster! Whether your goals are to save the planet or to be the next CEO of GE! Join with other college students and young leaders who want to excel, make their dreams reality, and change the world. Watch as I experiment with entrepreneurship, living the mobile lifestyle, and practicing personal development and growth. Follow my adventures by subscribing to the blog, and share your own adventures as well!

New Format & Improved Features
For 2008, I will renew my commitment to sharing great content with you here at TH regularly, and the strong focus on career development and personal growth will hopefully manifest itself in several ways over the next few months: you should see a fresh, new, more personal design; articles will be organized into new categories and more useful chunk content; I’ve selected a new motto based on input from dozens of friends and colleagues; and I’ll continue to work hard to bring you great interviews within two new series: “Bright Young Minds” with young professionals who are making a difference, and “Proven Success,” a series where we’ll learn from the successes of established entrepreneurs and leaders. Check in later this week for an exclusive new interview with “Duff” McDuffy from Falling Fruit TV — Conscious Media for People Who Care!

Other features in the works include my definitive guide to networking, an introduction to lifestyle design, and further discussion of leadership, travel, personal finance, and personal growth. I’ll be serving up more consistent updates and sharing new, exciting content as I write from my experiences with personal entrepreneurship, and experiments with remote work, living the mobile lifestyle, and geoarbitrage. This is an adventure, so come along with me for the ride and learn from my successes and failures!

Help Me Create a Community for Young Professionals Who Want to Rock Their Careers!
I’ll be looking for guest writers that are interested to share their own stories. Other young bloggers who want to help encourage college students and Gen-Y workers to reach for their dreams, apply here! And to encourage user participation and build a true community, I’d like to potentially set up community forums to continue the discussion beyond the blog posts! That’s up to you guys too, though, so please help me spread the good word about Thrilling Heroics and tell your friends and colleagues. Get involved in the comments, submit your own ideas, and help me encourage our generation to kick ass and take life by the horns! Remember that my mission is to build your confidence to succeed, and to help you realize the freedom and flexibility to invest your time doing what you are truly passionate about.

Cody’s Entrepreneurial Roadmap

Freelancing & Entrepreneurship
To answer questions 1 and 3 above, let me start with the personal side. In the last three months, I left my traditional office job to pursue my true passion and I have been experimenting with freelancing and entrepreneurship. This is why I’ve been somewhat absent from Thrilling Heroics recently — I’ve been very busy with my freelance web development projects and laying the foundations of a business! I now work solely as a freelance web designer and consultant, building WordPress-powered blogs for professionals and small companies. I enjoy serving all kinds of clients, but work particularly well with other professional consultants who want to build up their personal brand, authors and columnists interested in transitioning to a web 2.0 platform, or speakers and coaches who seek to build an online community of raving fans! Some of my recent projects include Life Beyond Code, Moving From Me to We, HighlyObsessed.com, and TomAlexander.com.

I am in the very beginning stages, but my eventual goal is to incorporate and build my own web design company. In the next few months, you should see a full-fledged new business and website dedicated to my freelance design services, and at some point I may need to build a team from among my network of designers and creative-types — or outsource to other freelancers to help me increase my project capacity. This is not something I plan to do for my entire career, nor is it the only project I plan to have going at any one time, but over the next few years my end goal is to create a business that I own. The advantage of being owner, as opposed to president or CEO of a company, is that you profit from a company without necessarily having to run the business. (Not that there isn’t work to be done — but you hire smarter people to maintain things for you.)

How To Automate Your Income
Now to truly separate my income from my time, I plan to generate products that can bring in recurring income. You create it once, and see the profits from it repeatedly. Zen Habits has a great article on automating your income that discusses turning your service into a product:

Do you currently provide a service? If so, you have to devote many hours each week to provide that service. However, if you can turn that service into a product, such as a book or DVD or web site or CD, you can create it once and sell it over and over. Brainstorm the best way to create a product that gives customers the same information or skills that they would get from you in person.

Leo also goes on to speak about other forms of automated income:

Instead of creating an information product, you could create a real-world product, such as a gadget or nutrition product. Freelance designers can turn your idea into an actual design, and contract manufacturers can turn the design into a product. Other types of automated incomes include real estate, online retail businesses (including an eBay business), affiliate marketing, a blog, and a membership-type website. There are many possibilities. Find ways to turn your strengths into a revenue generator.

On my new web design blog, I hope to provide valuable free content, such as WordPress and business blogging how-to’s and instructional training videos that will attract both web design contracts and point users to products like website templates, podcasts, and eBooks that they can purchase from my site.

How To Get Into a Top University
Finally, I do still plan to apply to the Stanford Graduate School of Business, but not for a while. Once I prove myself with a few more years of career experience, either through the success or failure of my business and other professional pursuits, I feel I’ll be more qualified to work alongside other entrepreneurs and young leaders at one of the world’s best B-schools! I still maintain my strong interest in studying green business and social entrepreneurship at the University’s Center for Social Innovation and the Stanford Technology Ventures Program, but of course, coming from a not-quite-so-prestigious state school, it will be quite a challenge. For anyone who wants to apply to a big, competitive university, the keys are to show your dedication to achievement and personal growth, and to convince the program’s admissions officers that you’ll do great things with a degree from their school. Also, it doesn’t hurt to build relationships with faculty or with members of the alumni network from the school you hope to attend! Here are more valuable tips from Penelope Trunk.

I’ll be sure to post more about my personal goals and my 2008 resolutions very soon, so stay tuned for that before the New Year if you’d like to learn more.

###

I will be leaving to travel overseas at the end of the week (spending the holidays in Spain), but read my upcoming interview with Duff McDuffee — Co-Founder of Falling Fruit TV, philosopher, life coach, and yogin — in the next few days! Duff will share some great thoughts on things from conscious business to GTD to Buddhism!

Thanks again to Gautam for the great questions! Gautam Valluri is a friend from the blogosphere, a sharp young filmmaker, writer, and designer in Hyderābād, India. He does some fantastic exclusive interviews at BrokenProjector.com.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: It’s Time for Some Thrilling Heroics: Commit to Pursuing Your Wildest Dreams with Me in 2008!

It’s not easy being a student. Paying for tuition and books, rent, and the occasional entertainment, even if you are working, can be quite a challenge. But good news is here: you can build the skills to become wealthy while you are still a poor college student! You will need excellent financial IQ when you are the head of your household or your own business, so it’s best to develop those behaviors now. Admittedly, I was not always the most financially-intelligent student. But, since investing some time in learning a few simple “tricks” that make tracking, stretching, and keeping more of your money easier, I’d love to share some of those easy solutions with you. First, there are the “duh!” basics:

• Budget your finances! Don’t just throw away all your receipts. I know it doesn’t sound fun, but for one to three months, record each purchase you make and categorize it. Use Quicken, Microsoft Money, or paper-and-pencil. This will let you know where all your money is going, and then you can start to plan ahead and set a budget so you don’t go over. Cody’s super-easy hint: Although you have to be disciplined to do this, I use a credit card for virtually all my purchases (earn the rewards points in the meantime and pay it off at the end of each month), which makes tracking my spending a lot easier–no cash purchases to remember! You could also use a debit card. Once you have recorded what you spend, here is the easiest two-category budget plan EVER!
• Pay your bills on time! Use a calendar like Apple iCal, Outlook, or Google Calendar, to send yourself reminders a few days before your regular bills are due (rent, utilities, credit cards, etc.). Or use Quicken reminders, or check out a service like BillQ if it works for you. Paying on time is the best thing you can do to ensure you build good credit, which you will need later! Cody’s helpful hint: Most online banking services allow you to do online bill-pay and schedule payments for ANY available business day. So, take your bills as soon as you get them in the mail, go into your online banking, and set up a payment to be delivered by the due date, and then you can forget about it! This means the money is available and earns more for you as long as possible, but the bill still gets paid on time.
• If you have credit card balances, keep them on a 0% card. Mildly shady, but entirely legal. If you have debt, which many of us do, at least keep it on low-interest or zero-percent cards. Better yet, put your purchases on a rewards card! (I once got a card that gave me a free iPod Nano for transferring a $2000 balance.) There are a thousand credit cards out there with 0% introductory rates (usually for the first year), so take advantage of that and then simply transfer your balance to another one when the intro period is up. (This is not to encourage you to continue to maintain a balance though; pay off as much as you can each month until it is GONE!) Cody’s word of caution: Just be careful, read the fine print, know when the introductory rate is up, and AVOID balance transfer fees (many cards charge 3% of the transfer amount, but there are plenty you can find that have no transfer fee for new cardholders). Check out Jim Wang’s posts on 0% balance transfer offers and other credit card offers. Also see the next step for a tip on how to lower your credit card interest rate.

Now here are a few other, little-known hacks that you can use, and then laugh and taunt your friends for being stupider than you! Remember, the little things add up:

• Call your bank/credit card to get a better deal! This sounds so simple, but 99.9% of people DON’T do it! Here’s what I suggest, every time your bank charges you an overdraft fee, an international fee, or any other kind of fee, or if your credit card charges you a late fee for receiving your payment a day after the due date for instance…CALL THEM! And ask nicely. Give your defense if you have to. The worst that can happen is they’ll say no. And you’ll be no worse off than you were before placing the call. But I guarantee you, 95% of the time they will say exactly this, “Well, we normally don’t do this, but I’ll give you a one-time fee-waiver.” Remember, they want to keep you as a customer, so financial institutions are usually willing to part with 10 bucks here and there, and the majority of people won’t call them out on those fees, so they’re making plenty already. If the customer service rep denies you, just call back in a few minutes and speak to someone else! Also, here’s a fantastic guide to lowering your credit card rate with one phone call. Cody’s additional $0.02: in addition to the FreeCreditReport site they recommend, check out the Federally-mandated AnnualCreditReport.com for your free yearly report. If you pay your bills on time and you have a 700+, you have a LOT of leverage with credit card companies! (And you should look into getting some fantastic rewards cards!)
• Use coupon codes and discounts when shopping online. This one’s pretty simple, but when you shop online, especially around the holidays, try to take advantage of promotional codes and discounts. I don’t recommend going out of your way to buy the things you see coupons for (that’s why companies print coupons, don’t you know? So you will SPEND more!). But, if you already plan on getting a few items online, check a site like CurrentCodes.com to see if there are any special deals for the particular website you’re looking at purchasing from–discounts, free shipping offers, etc. This saved me about $30 on a Lost Season 2 DVD set once! That’s pretty good for a coupon.
• Open up a high-yield online savings account! This is one of the SMARTEST moves you can make! Most banks these days only offer annual percentage yields under 1% on their savings accounts, unfortunately (actually the national average right now is only 0.54%). But, there’s an easy solution that not everyone has caught onto yet. If you’re willing to do your transactions online and go without a paper statement, a high-yield online savings account is the perfect solution. There are a lot of banks doing this, but here are some of the top APY rates. All of these are FDIC insured and have zero fees, zero minimum balances:
  • I use the EmigrantDirect American Dream Savings Account, which returns 5.05%
  • HSBC Direct offers 5.05%. Try entering the promo code “start” and see if it gets you an opening bonus…
  • E*Trade Complete Savings 5.05%
  • CitiBank Direct at 5.00%. You need to open an EZ online checking account along with the e-Savings to get the bank fees waived on this one.
  • I also have an ING Direct Orange Savings Account, which is now up to 4.50%. If you would like, I can send you a referral and you can earn $25 for opening an account with a minimum opening balance of $250 (hey, it’s good if you want a quick 10% return!) Just email me if you’re interested (see sidebar for email).

  It only takes 10 minutes to set one of these up (literally!). All you need is your personal info and your regular bank checking account info. And you’ll immediately be making 6 to 9 times the national savings average! It’s easy. Do it.

Finally, I recommend you always continue learning about financial stuff and keep up your financial intelligence. For something you can read daily, check out the master of all personal finance and entrepreneurship bloggers, Ramit Sethi, at IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com. Read his 5 Steps To Getting Rich first, and then he’ll lead you through budgeting, saving, investing, and retirement. Read my one-on-one interview with Ramit Sethi. Also check out J.D. Roth’s Get Rich Slowly.

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: Six Simple Money Tips to Get You Back on the Financial Track

J.D. Roth at Get Rich Slowly has uncovered an interesting book that not many have come across. Read J.D.’s post about T. Harv Eker’s book Secrets of the Millionaire Mind: Mastering the Inner Game of Wealth. J.D. calls it more of a motivational tool than a personal finance guide (one thing I didn’t like about Robert Kiyosaki’s Rich Dad, Poor Dad–not enough concrete, actionable steps to take). I have not read it, but I found that at least Eker’s list of seventeen ways successful and wealthy people relate to money that unwealthy people don’t was very interesting. Remember, the way you think about things has a strong influence on how you behave and how successful you are at getting what you want in life. Here are Eker’s 17 things:

1. Rich people believe: “I create my life.” Poor people believe: “Life happens to me.”
2. Rich people play the money game to win. Poor people play the money game to not lose.
3. Rich people are committed to being rich. Poor people want to be rich.
4. Rich people think big. Poor people think small.
5. Rich people focus on opportunities. Poor people focus on obstacles.
6. Rich people admire other rich and successful people. Poor people resent rich and successful people.
7. Rich people associate with positive, successful people. Poor people associate with negative or unsuccessful people.
8. Rich people are willing to promote themselves and their value. Poor people think negatively about selling and promotion.
9. Rich people are bigger than their problems. Poor people are smaller than their problems.
10. Rich people are excellent receivers. Poor people are poor receivers.
11. Rich people choose to get paid based on results. Poor people choose to get paid based on time.
12. Rich people think “both.” Poor people think “either/or.”
13. Rich people focus on their net worth. Poor people focus on their working income.
14. Rich people manage their money well. Poor people mismanage their money well.
15. Rich people have their money work hard for them. Poor people work hard for their money.
16. Rich people act in spite of fear. Poor people let fear stop them.
17. Rich people constantly learn and grow. Poor people think they already know.

Think carefully about these things. Some of these ways of looking at the situation are only subtly different, some are more noticeable disparities. But, just read over the list until you can see how looking at it one way might make you more inclined to succeed. It’s all in how you look at the challenges, and the mindset you approach them with. Thinking rich will instill in you the behaviors to become rich…

-Secrets of the Millionaire Mind [Get Rich Slowly]

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: 17 Mind Hacks to Help You Think Your Way to Wealth!

The Heroines of Personal Finance and Entrepreneurship series continues at IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com with Anya Kamenetz, a young author and columnist for the New York Times, Washington Post, Salon, Slate, and Village Voice. Her first book is Generation Debt: How Our Future Was Sold Out for Student Loans, Bad Jobs, No Benefits, and Tax Cuts for Rich Geezers — And How to Fight Back. Here are a few excerpts from my Q & A with Anya:

You were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for the series “Generation Debt: The New Economics of Being Young” in 2004. What were your main findings?

Student loans and student credit cards have multiplied very fast and under the radar so that large amounts of debt are now a rite of passage for a majority of young people. Two thirds of college graduates borrow loans to get through college, up from less than half as recently as 1993, and they graduate with an average of $20,000 in loans and almost $3000 in credit card debt. Combine that with a changing job market that offers fewer benefits, and a higher cost of living, especially housing, in many metropolises and you have a lot of middle-class, educated young people falling behind, to say nothing of the fate of McJob Nation; the two out of three kids with no college degree have seriously fallen behind in income and stability.

Since graduating in 2002 you’ve freelanced as a writer and editor for several publications. What are some recommendations you can make for aspiring professional writers?

Think hard about it. I don’t know many “professional writers” as opposed to people who happen to be lucky enough to occasionally get paid to write. Boyce Rensberger, head of the Knight Science Journalism Fellowships at MIT, told the New York Times on June 10: ”I feel a little queasy encouraging young people into journalism. It’s such a precarious industry right now.”

I think if you want to write for a living you need to be pretty hardcore about your craft and your subject area or field. You can build up knowledge of your field by working a related job (in politics, the law, nonprofits, fashion, etc.) and you can build up your craft by writing, writing, writing, and being in a writers’ group, and taking classes or workshops, and working in media-related fields. I freelanced as a writer’s assistant, fact-checker, and copy editor before I started writing full time. If I were starting out now I would definitely blog too.

Continue reading at IWillTeachYouToBeRich.com: Heroines of Personal Finance and Entrepreneurship #2: Anya Kamenetz. Also be sure to read Anya’s new Yahoo! Finance expert column and grab her book Generation Debt if you’re interested!

Read the original article on Thrilling Heroics here: An Interview with Anya Kamenetz, Author of Generation Debt