Bank Your Bucks – Don't Waste Them

Albert Einstein’s was estimated at 160, Madonna’s is 140, and John F. Kennedy’s was only 119, but as it turns out, your IQ score pales in comparison with your EQ, MQ, and BQ scores when it comes to predicting your success and professional achievement.

IQ tests are used as an indicator of logical reasoning ability and technical intelligence. A high IQ is often a prerequisite for rising to the top ranks of business today. It is necessary, but it is not adequate to predict executive competence and corporate success. By itself, a high IQ does not guarantee that you will stand out and rise above everyone else.

Research carried out by the Carnegie Institute of Technology shows that 85 percent of your financial success is due to skills in “human engineering,” your personality and ability to communicate, negotiate, and lead. Shockingly, only 15 percent is due to technical knowledge. Additionally, Nobel Prize winning Israeli-American psychologist, Daniel Kahneman, found that people would rather do business with a person they like and trust rather than someone they don’t, even if the likeable person is offering a lower quality product or service at a higher price.

With this in mind, instead of exclusively focusing on your conventional intelligence quotient, you should make an investment in strengthening your EQ (Emotional Intelligence), MQ (Moral Intelligence), and BQ (Body Intelligence). These concepts may be elusive and difficult to measure, but their significance is far greater than IQ.

Emotional Intelligence

EQ is the most well known of the three, and in brief it is about: being aware of your own feelings and those of others, regulating these feelings in yourself and others, using emotions that are appropriate to the situation, self-motivation, and building relationships.

Top Tip for Improvement: First, become aware of your inner dialogue. It helps to keep a journal of what thoughts fill your mind during the day. Stress can be a huge killer of emotional intelligence, so you also need to develop healthy coping techniques that can effectively and quickly reduce stress in a volatile situation.

Moral Intelligence

MQ directly follows EQ as it deals with your integrity, responsibility, sympathy, and forgiveness. The way you treat yourself is the way other people will treat you. Keeping commitments, maintaining your integrity, and being honest are crucial to moral intelligence.

Top Tip for Improvement: Make fewer excuses and take responsibility for your actions. Avoid little white lies. Show sympathy and communicate respect to others. Practice acceptance and show tolerance of other people’s shortcomings. Forgiveness is not just about how we relate to others; it’s also how you relate to and feel about yourself.

Body Intelligence

Lastly, there is your BQ, or body intelligence, which reflects what you know about your body, how you feel about it, and take care of it. Your body is constantly telling you things; are you listening to the signals or ignoring them? Are you eating energy-giving or energy-draining foods on a daily basis? Are you getting enough rest? Do you exercise and take care of your body? It may seem like these matters are unrelated to business performance, but your body intelligence absolutely affects your work because it largely determines your feelings, thoughts, self-confidence, state of mind, and energy level.

Top Tip For Improvement: At least once a day, listen to the messages your body is sending you about your health. Actively monitor these signals instead of going on autopilot. Good nutrition, regular exercise, and adequate rest are all key aspects of having a high BQ. Monitoring your weight, practicing moderation with alcohol, and making sure you have down time can dramatically benefit the functioning of your brain and the way you perform at work.

What You Really Need To Succeed

It doesn’t matter if you did not receive the best academic training from a top university. A person with less education who has fully developed their EQ, MQ, and BQ can be far more successful than a person with an impressive education who falls short in these other categories.

Yes, it is certainly good to be an intelligent, rational thinker and have a high IQ; this is an important asset. But you must realize that it is not enough. Your IQ will help you personally, but EQ, MQ, and BQ will benefit everyone around you as well. If you can master the complexities of these unique and often under-rated forms of intelligence, research tells us you will achieve greater success and be regarded as more professionally competent and capable.

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I want to start out and profess myself to be an Apple fan. In my household we use 2 macs, 4 iPod Touchs, 2 Shuffles, 3 iPhones and my iPad. I use an Airport Extreme for my router and 2 Airport Expresses to extend speakers throughout the house. So you might call me a bit of a fan.

All this being said, I began to investigate downloading MP3 music and streaming movies from Amazon. Their cost is generally lower than iTunes and when it comes to movies, Amazon’s prices are considerally lower than Xfinity on-demand and Apple. My Roku box “adjusts” SD streaming to HD on my 60 HDTV, so I’m satisfied in saving a buck for each rental. The ONLY problem I have with Amazon is that they won’t release a viewing app for the iDevices like Netflix’s. I struggle with that every time and even go as far as tying the Roku box to my Slingbox in order to use the Slingmedia viewer on my iPad.

The bottom line is that although I love Apple systems and devices, as far as media distribution I prefer Amazon. I even recenlty priced a new Macbook Air and will order it for about $100 cheaper on Amazon than in the Apple store. (and with Free shipping same as Apple, only 2 day shipping from Amazon instead of 3-5 from Apple). I also like the instant gratification!

By the way, I am long on both Apple and Amazon stocks. They are myt sweetheart stocks.

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Isometric training (also known as static strength training) involves muscular contractions in which the length of the muscle does not change and there is no visible movement in the joint.

The word ‘contraction’ signifies a change in length (shortening) of a muscle but this does not occur in static strength training so the preferred term is static action not static contraction. Isometric exercises can be performed with ‘sub maximal’ muscle actions – which hold a weight steady on to a side for example. Here the force is not maximal as this would lift the weight further causing movement, change in the muscle length and joint angle. However, isometric exercises can also be maximal such as pushing against an immoveable object (like a wall or heavy weight). Both of these types of isometric action can increase strength and induce muscular hypertrophy although in practice maximal exercises are used for strength and conditioning whereas sub maximal exercises are used for rehabilitation.

Many sports require isometric actions such as climbing, mountain biking, judo, wrestling, skiing, gymnastics and horse riding. But one must be made aware that isometric exercises aren’t the most dynamic actions (which most sports are – running and jumping) so do not increase the limbs maximal velocity and may only strengthen the muscle at the angle at which it is trained.

Isometric resistance in isometric exercises typically involves contractions of the muscle using the body’s own muscles (such as pressing palms together),
structural items like a wall or door, free weights, weights machines and elastic equipment where the weight is in a fixed position
and ressure plate equipment that can give a digital read out of the force, like the iGrip.

Isometric exercises can achieve maximum muscular contraction as opposed to isotonic exercise (weight training).
The workout is much faster. You can do each body part in as little as a minute (with a few seconds rest).
It can gain strength to the isolated areas you specifically trained.

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Valentine’s Day is the time of year when women look expectantly at their boyfriends to see if they pass the romance quotient test, and the time that the boyfriends feel sorely under pressure. Not only that, sometimes boyfriends resent – having to just splurge all of a sudden for no real reason on chocolates, roses and jewelry. And there isn’t even any promise of any “return on the investment”. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that to men, Valentine’s Day feels a lot like tax day. Perhaps there is a way that a compromise can be worked out. A way that women can get the romantic gestures that they look for. And a way that men can save money – with cheap gifts that are still romantic. Here are a few ideas to get romantic. With cheap gifts you can think of as February 14 rolls around.

If you’ve been going out with a woman for no more than two or three weeks, Valentine’s Day can’t be too expensive. But that doesn’t mean that you can go the other way and give her a home-cooked meal. As romantic as that is, it’ll end up looking too intimate. What you can do is to make reservations at a new restaurant that’s kind of offbeat and yet nice and romantic. You can freshen up the proceedings with flowers like tulips or daisies. Don’t go for roses though, as that is likely to be too intimate. The whole outing shouldn’t cost more than $100.

Let’s say that you are going out with someone for many months. You are broke, but you want to make an impression. Here’s a romantic idea that should work out really well – be her butler for an evening or two. Spend $100 on lots of good ingredients to cook her a romantic meal or three with, and buy a few bottles of wine. Tell her that she is not to do anything for the time that you are her butler (personal assistant or anything you wish to call it, Role Play!). She snaps her fingers and there you are with a drink, with food, with a foot rub. Or whatever her imagination can conjure up. Play.

So let’s say that he have a girlfriend you have been going out for several months with now. If there’s one thing about her, it’s that she’s a bit clingy. Not that you mind – it makes you feel wanted. Cheap gifts on Valentine’s for the clingy girlfriend are easy. All you have to do with give her a lot of personal time. There is nothing she would appreciate more. Take her out ice-skating. You’ll be holding hands and there will be hot chocolate. For it to really romantic, go to a less crowded rink. The best part is, the whole outing won’t break the bank.

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To find a workable idea for an at-home business opportunity isn’t as hard as it sounds. A home-based business doesn’t require the kind of investment in time, money and know-how that a traditional startup requires. All you need is a good bit of acquired or seat-of-the-pants knowledge on how your industry works, and in no time, people with writing and marketing skills can be halfway there with building their own home business.

Freelance writers are often seen as people who will only work for established magazines and other regular publications. It doesn’t have to be that way. Freelance writers are routinely hired to write training manuals, marketing material, press releases and sales pitches. As easy to start and as profitable as an at-home business opportunity in writing can be, this isn’t something just anyone could do. To be successful, a freelance writer needs a good amount of training in the field he or she decides to write in. For instance, how could a freelance writer write a training manual or marketing plan without an MBA? Working at home isn’t for everyone – you have to be goal-driven and personally motivated to be able to push yourself to work hard even when there is no one supervising you or driving you.

If an at home business opportunity in writing sounds like just the thing for you, what you need is to build a great portfolio to help persuade potential clients with. Prepare your portfolio with samples of the kind of freelance writing you’ve done before. A portfolio can be built out of free work you offer to do for places like social work institutions.The PR campaigns and pitches you can design for social work institutions for free can help build your portfolio before you go ask for paid work. If the at-home business opportunity you’re interested in has anything to do with SEO writing, your best shot would be starting a great blog yourself and building up a series of posts over time. Nothing could advertise your abilities in writing as a successful blog can.

The best thing about starting a blog to showcase your abilities with is that you don’t just get to polish your writing skills, you get to earn an income through Google’s AdWords and through affiliate marketing programs. If things go well enough, if you have a profitable niche that you started out with, you might even end up making a great home business opportunity out of your blog.

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I just had, by mistake, a plug-in called Intelligent Explorer attach to my browser. What a nightmare! I have another article on this topic, but this brings home a point. Spyware or adware items are continually infecting computers. Most computers have no protection from them. Most frightening is the frequency of them.

What is Spyware?

The term “spyware” is broadly defined as any program that gets into your computer without permission and hides in the background while it makes unwanted changes to your user experience. Spyware is generally not designed to damage your computer. The damage it does is more a by-product of its main mission, which is to serve you targeted advertisements or make your browser display certain sites or search results. At present, most spyware targets only the Windows operating system (Internet Explorer).

To be fair, spyware can be harmless, for example tracking cookies don’t do much. While such things infringe on your privacy, they don’t really harm anything. Others, however, are extremely dangerous.

So what do you do about it?

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