Life Clerks

Are you a dreamer? What are your dreams? Are they small, or are they much larger and more complex? Do you feel they have value?

“All men of action are dreamers.” – James Huneker

The dreams that you have are there for a reason: to be realized as a part of fulfilling your life purpose. If you are still trying to find your passions and purpose, you might want to start with Leo Babauta’s article on how to find your passion.

Many people have trouble seeing the potential of their dreams; they give up on them because they don’t see how they will ever come true. They just can’t see how taking the time to discover and to plan will have any impact on the dreams coming true. Have patience! Although your dream may not have come to pass yet, it can still be realized. 

While you can’t force dreams to happen, you can take steps toward actualizing them. Maybe you want to travel to a specific place. Do you know anything about the culture and language there? Are you saving money each week or month toward your trip? You won’t magically arrive there. You must plan and work toward what you want. Start with a trip to the library to find some books on the culture.  Next look into a class to learn the language, make sure you have a savings account with an automatic deposit.

The same is true if you want to have a family, write a successful book, help others, move to another state, or anything else that interests you. Even if you try and fail, keep trying, take small simple steps forward. Your dreams have value; keep moving toward them, even if you face setbacks and challenges.  Moving forward with your dreams means starting with the first step, here is an article that explains how to take the first step.

Visualizing and Planning for Your Dreams

In addition to physically working toward your dreams, mental preparation is important. That means you need to keep visualizing and dreaming. I highly recommend spending time using guided meditation and Zen meditation to allow you to focus more precisely on your plan.

Hold on to what you believe in and what you want to see happen in your life. Use the power of positive thinking in order to see your dream coming to fruition.

Try these techniques:

• Make a vision board where you can pin or glue symbols of what you want to see realized. (so much fun!) I still have my vision board from 2008, it still holds true today.
• Write down your dreams to keep them fresh in your mind. I have a dream journal that I have specifically created for each of my major dreams.
• Keep a journal of what you’ve done toward realizing your dreams each day or each week.
• Remember to enjoy and respect the present moment. Then you’ll be well practiced when your dreams do come to pass!
• Talk with others who share your goals and dreams to stay encouraged and excited. Every time I share my dreams, people get excited and want to join in, keep that level of passion for your dreams.

Many successful people focus on positive affirmations and meditation to help them see and realize their dreams. By meditating on what you really want and how you’re going to get it, you may come up with solutions that you would otherwise not have thought about. Meditation gives your mind some quiet, peaceful time to work behind the scenes. You can create a recording for yourself that walks you through your vision of your completed dream so that you can really focus on the positive outcome.

Positive affirmations also help keep your spirits up and keep you moving toward your goal, even when you don’t really see a way. Just because the way to your dream doesn’t seem obvious to you just now, that doesn’t mean there isn’t a way. Something could change in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, you’ll be able to see how and when your dream will be realized. Create your affirmations around the positive amazing feelings that surround your dreams, so that you can keep your vibes high and you can let the “how’s” go and allow the universe to take care of that for you.

If you hold tight to your goals, you’ll find it easier to stay on the right track. Training yourself to observe progress can be important, too. This will help keep you motivated. Regardless of what your dreams are – however big or small they may be — you can usher them in to your life!

Simple small steps every day, moving toward your dreams will get there. Enjoy the journey!

(Photo credit: Lying Couple Dreaming of Island via Shutterstock)

Lori Lynn Smith is a passionate and an authentic teacher who shares her real life experiences about creating a more nurturing and fulfilling lifestyle. Get her free ebook and MP3, The 5 Myths of Self Care.

Original post by Lori Lynn Smith

There’s a way for you to fly first class for free over and over again.

The best part? It doesn’t require incredible negotiation skills or dumb luck. Anyone can do it.

Let me tell you everything you need to know so you can decide if this powerful travel strategy is right for you.

How to Fly for Free

A few years back, I started searching for the best ways to travel for cheap. I wanted to get out and see the world … or at least the United States.

What I ended up finding were a small group of people that were booking free flights over and over again with a strategy that was the complete opposite of what most people do.

You see, most people know that you can book a free flight by using frequent flyer miles. And if you have enough frequent flyer miles, then you can even fly first class for free. Of course, the only problem is that it’s really hard to accumulate a lot of miles by flying.

Luckily, there is a way to get hundreds of thousands of frequent flyer miles without flying at all.

This travel strategy is a special process called “credit card churning” and here’s how it works…

The credit card industry is extremely competitive. As a result, many credit card companies are willing to offer you huge frequent flyer mile bonuses if you sign up for their card.

This strategy works so well for getting frequent flyer miles that a group of people called credit card “churners” have used it to earn more than 1 million frequent flyer miles in a year. They apply for card after card and churn through as many applications as possible. Then, they spend the minimum amount needed to get the bonus (for example, $1,000 in 3 months) and move on to the next card. Some people routinely have over 15 credit cards on rotation!

The good news is that credit card bonuses work just as well for normal people like you and me. By simply getting 1 or 2 new cards, you can get enough frequent flyer miles for multiple round–trip flights.

There is no need to go crazy and get 15+ new cards. Of course, if you did, then you could literally earn enough miles to fly around the world multiple times.

Regardless of how many cards you’re comfortable with getting, these frequent flyer mile bonuses are the best way to fly for free because you can use frequent flyer miles to book flights anywhere and at anytime. For example, I used frequent flyer miles to book a free flight to Costa Rica last December, which is during the “high season” down there.

Where to Get Started

Many credit card churners get their information from a variety of blogs, forums, and websites. Thankfully, there are services that can do all of that research for you.

A great one to start with is The Credit Card Fly. It’s a free email newsletter that sends you a short weekly update of the best credit card deals for earning frequent flyer miles, free hotel stays, and rewards points.

Once you know the deals to apply for, the 3–step process looks like this:

1. Apply for a new credit card that has a big frequent flyer mile bonus.
2. If necessary, spend the minimum amount to get the bonus. Many cards have no spending requirement.
3. Redeem your miles and fly anywhere.

Does this Hurt Your Credit Score?

Applying for new credit cards actually helps your score in one way and hurts it in another. Let me explain…

When you apply for a new credit card there is an inquiry on your account. New credit inquiries usually drop your score by a few points, but new inquiries only make up 10% of your overall credit score so the drop is small.

On the flip side, when you get a new credit card this also increases your overall credit limit and this will probably help your credit utilization ratio.

For example, let’s say that before your new card you were spending $2,000 and your total credit limit was $10,000. In this case, your credit utilization ratio was 20% ($2,000/$10,000). Then you get a new card and let’s say your credit limit raises to $15,000. Remember, your spending habits should be about the same because you’re only spending the minimum needed to get your frequent flyer miles. So now your credit utilization ratio is only 13% ($2,000/$15,000).

This is a good thing. A lower credit utilization ratio helps your credit score. For this reason, many credit card churners actually see their score increase over time. Many churners have 10 or more credit cards and still hold excellent credit scores in the 780 to 800 range.

How to Know if This Will Work for You

As a rule of thumb, your credit score should be 700 or above if you’re thinking about following this credit card travel rewards strategy.

And if you’re planning on applying for a bunch of cards to get tons of frequent flyer miles, then you should probably have a credit score above 720.

No matter what your score is, this strategy will only work if you pay your balance in full each month and carry no debt on your new cards. It doesn’t matter how good your history is, if you get a new credit card and start piling on debt, then your credit score will suffer and this travel strategy is useless.

If you have the discipline to pay your balance in full each month, then you’re ready to hit the skies.

(Photo credit: Passenger Windows on Plane via Shutterstock)

Original post by James Clear

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