I am sure many of us have been glued to the Olympics over the past few weeks.  What I have found so staggering, above all else, is the attitude of the medal winners.  When they have been interviewed post their win, they have all had a common link in their response.   When asked what the secret has been of their success, they have ALL replied, “I knew I could do it, I believed in myself, and I did it”.

So much of life is about apparently about attitude.  In the past year, I have become nothing short of a self-help encyclopedia.  I have a list of self-help books in my possession, I have a self-help CD I listen to in my car, and I walk around like a resident Deepak Chopra turning all “poverty thinking” into “prosperity thinking”.  All this being said, I am currently living at home (again), I am avidly re-networking and building up my business (again), I am very single and not accepting any date invitations (this is my line and I am sticking to it, the fact that are no invitations to turn down is of course irrelevant), and I spend my time working out how many days I have left to support my budget for the month.  So in essence, in the last year at least, I have gone shooting in one direction – reverse, instead of first, second, third, fourth or fifth gear FORWARD.

So how did this happen?  How did Ms. Positivity land up at the bottom of the proverbial barrel?  If it is “all about attitude” how did I land up back on my mum’s couch – not unlike evenings out at university when I used to come home and opt for the couch, as my bedroom, just twenty five meters away, was just too far to walk?

Let’s look at the positive side of things – from where I am now, the ONLY WAY IS UP!!

I have read, in one of my books, that most millionaires make money, then lose it, then make it again.  It is all because they think wealth, then they worry about losing everything, so they do, and then they think about making it all again, so they do that too.  This cycle has been known to repeat itself over and over again in just one individual.  I am not happy about this fact.

I am prepared to accept that I have made some astonishing mistakes; I am prepared to accept that I am taking steps to rectify these mistakes, and that it will take time to get back to my former glory (for want of a better saying, of course), but I am absolutely not prepared to accept that I may find myself back on the couch in eleven years from now (at age FIFTY, and hopefully fabulous).  If I make the same mistakes again, I am afraid I will have to accept that my intellect must be similar to that of a gold fish.

So now I have a challenge ahead of me.  How do I ensure I don’t go through this tough life lesson again?  It must be about attitude, naturally.  In the future, if I think I am going to temporarily shut down my business and all will be fine, it won’t be, this is a bad idea; in the future, if I attempt to rent out or sell the house I live in and think this is a good idea, it won’t be – another bad idea; and if in the future, I travel half way across this country, or any other country in fact in the vain pursuit of happiness, again, this is not a clever idea. 

Through all the hardships I have endured in the last year, and there are many, the one thing I have learnt from both the self-help network I have running through my head, as well as raw experience gained, is that the only person who can make me happy, is me; the only person who can make me rich, is me (I know this for a fact as I do not have any multi-billionaires running around waiting to throw me money once they have moved on to greener pastures), and the only person who needs to learn the lessons from these hard knocks, is ME.

And so I leave you with this thought:  In eleven years from now, when I am fifty (and fabulous?), will I be back on the couch reading about how to “think and grow rich”, or will I be choosing which couch I want to buy for my beach house in Martha’s Vineyard from the brand new Ralph Lauren catalogue?  Let’s hope the lesson has been learnt, and the latter is true…