Okay kids. I hate to be a bummer and all that, but this has been such an issue recently that I think we could all use a little primer of copyright law…

What Is Copyright?

Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States title 17, U. S. Code to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works. Section 106 of the 1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner of copyright the exclusive
right to do and to authorize others to do the following:

• To reproduce the work in copies or phonorecords;
• To prepare derivative works based upon the work;
• To distribute copies or phonorecords of the work to the public by sale or
other transfer of ownership, or by rental, lease, or lending;
• To perform the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and motion pictures and other audiovisual
works;
• To display the work publicly, in the case of literary, musical, dramatic, and
choreographic works, pantomimes, and pictorial, graphic, or sculptural
works, including the individual images of a motion picture or other audiovisual
work; and
• In the case of sound recordings,* to perform the work publicly by means of
a digital audio transmission.

In addition, certain authors of works of visual art have the rights of attribution
and integrity as described in section 106A of the 1976 Copyright Act.

It is illegal for anyone to violate any of the rights provided by the copyright
law to the owner of copyright.

To put this in layman’s terms… you cannot teach, write, or coach any derivation of Financial Alchemy without my written permission; and I’m well known enough that word gets back to me. I hate to be a stickler on this, but the integrity of this material is everything to me, and the work demands my protection and respect.

Learn more at http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf.

Guest article by Nova Wightman.

Self EnRICHment’s Top 5 Ways to Get Out of Your Slump:

1. Give yourself a change of scenery.  Get out of the house, sit at a coffee shop, lay in the grass outside your home or office, go window shopping.  Sometimes physically moving yourself to a new locale can be the perfect remedy to shift your current perspective.  I even face a new direction when I’m working on something and all of the sudden feel stuck, and bam, just like that I have a new thought.
2. Get yourself moving!!!  It’s kind of like forcing yourself to go to the gym; you absolutely dread it but cannot deny how good you feel afterwards.  Movement of any kind (walking, running, swimming, dancing, etc.) brings you those much needed endorphins that give you a fantastic lift.
3. Get angry!  At some point during this slump process, you’re going to get there anyway, when you are so frustrated with yourself and current situation and you just blow up.  And it’s usually shortly after this that you shift and begin to move forward again.  Anger is a natural emotion, and when used and directed properly can be quite healthy and useful.  Write furiously on a piece of paper then tear it up and throw it away, vent to a trusted friend (might want to give them a head’s up on what you’re doing), scream into a pillow, or my favorite, have an angry dialogue in the shower. Yes, out loud.  Feels great.
4. Listen to uplifting music.  You may not even feel like doing this, and even think to yourself, “I am way too low for this to help.”  Fortunately music has this magical quality of inspiring you, calming you, lifting you up and sometimes taking you away.  Have you ever been really sad, mad or frustrated about something, and then the next song on the radio seemed to have directly addressed what you’re going through?  I’ve also created my own playlist on my ipod specifically designed to uplift me, full of Enya, The Beatles, and some Fergie and Beyonce, too (I can’t help but begin to start dancing to “All the Single Ladies”).  What would be on your playlist?
5. Give yourself a break and reconnect.  Take a deep breath and relax.  You’re out of tune with yourself and that sometimes happens.  We’re human.  We have a lot on our plates and can’t always be wonderwoman or superman.  So give yourself permission to feel the way you are feeling for a limited amount of time, say a few hours or a day.  Get as much into your slump as you can during this time, lay listlessly on the couch, indulge in your ‘why me’ thoughts.  Sometimes we need to surrender a bit in order to move forward.  Then, when your time is up, choose to reconnect with yourself and do whatever it takes to get there.  Journal, meditate, pray, set your intentions and follow through.    

Morgana Rae the Money Magnet

Now you can catch Joe Vitale, Chellie Campbell, Morgana Rae (and many others) ALL IN THE SAME PLACE!

I just wanted to let you know that this THURSDAY, MAY 14th I will be speaking on “Financial Alchemy: Creating a New Relationship with Money” in a new teleseminar series entitled: Hidden in Plain Sight: Secrets of Lasting Financial Health. There will be 18 speakers total, some that you will not want to miss! The series began on Monday April 6th and continues through Thursday, June 4th. So, register now to get in on this line up. All calls are FREE, but you will need to register to get the call-in information.

To register, go to: http://budurl.com/morgana

Some of the other speakers you will want to hear, include:

Joe Vitale – from the movie The Secret – speaking on Law of Attraction and Money

Spencer Sherman – author of “Cure Money Madness” speaking on “Your Mattress is Not Your Bank”

Wynne Whitman, Esq – author of “Smart Women Protect Their Assets” –speaking on the importance of Wills, Trusts & Estates and protecting your Assets.

Chellie Campbell – author of “Zero to Zillionaire: 8 Foolproof Steps to Financial Peace of Mind” – speaking on her book

Eric Lofholm – Master Sales Trainer – speaking on “How to Profit in Tough Times”

Roni Deutch – “The Tax Lady” – author of “The Tax Lady’s Guide to Beating the IRS and Saving Big Bucks on your Taxes” – speaking on saving on your TAXES.

Mari Smith – Relationship Marketing Specialist – speaking on “Social Marketing Success: How to Use The Top Two Social Networks – Facebook and Twitter – to Significantly Increase Your Profits!”

Karen Curry – 2007 Rich Chick Awards recipient – speaking on “Unleashing The Unlimited Flow Of Prosperity, Three Simple Keys To Unlocking Your Wealth Potential”

Marie Diamond – from the movie The Secret – speaking about Feng Shui & Money

Paul & Layne Cutright – Master Relationship Coaches, will be speaking on “How to Communicate with your Partner about Money WithOUT ruining your Relationship”

Brad Yates – speaking on EFT and Tapping your way into Abundance

Linda Holander – author of “Bags to Riches: 7 Success Secrets for Women in Business” speaking about The Secrets of a Wealthy Bag Lady.

And many more (18 speakers total)

Don’t wait. Register now. http://budurl.com/morgana.

And MARK your calendars for May 14!

This question came up on a coaches forum I like to contribute to, and I know this’ll apply to a lot of my readers…

“How do I cope with no-show clients? A new client hasn’t shown up for two of the four sessions we contracted. Each time she follows up with really apologetic emails, begging me not to give up on her…,” the life coach asked.

Here’s my response:

Fire her.

Or, to put it another way…

Fire her.

Keeping her as a client is not good life coaching.

The life coach writes: ‘My gremlin [inner saboteur] insists that she doesn’t value the coaching and it is judging her, and suggesting I either “lay down the law” or fire her.’

That ain’t your “gremlin” honey. That’s your professionalism and self respect. It’s your gremlin that’s telling you you’re not allowed to to have standards. And it’s your gremlin having cocktails with her gremlin when you buy into her excuses. (I roll my eyes.)

She doesn’t want to be coached. Period. End of story. If she wanted to be life coached she’d show up. It’s that’s simple.

If I’m wrong, and she really wants to coach, make her earn the right to continue coaching with you. I suggest an agreement that you’re authorized to charge her credit card $1,000 every time she’s a no show.

That’ll let you know real fast how serious she is about coaching.

Fire her. It’ll be great for your self esteem as a life coach, and that’ll be attractive to better clients.

And ALWAYS get paid in advance.

PS: My use of “gremlin” comes from Rick Carlson’s book “Taming Your Gremlin.” Learn more at his Gremlin Training Institute for coaches.

What does it mean when clients “can’t afford” you? This is such a powerful learning, when you finally get it…

“Can’t afford” to hire you means they don’t want you enough. That’s all. The bottom line is if someone doesn’t hire you, they don’t see the value you give as worthy of the sacrifice. That doesn’t mean you don’t provide great value. That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to be well paid. They just don’t see an urgent connection between what they need and what you offer. Either you aren’t giving them what they perceive they need, it’s not important enough to them, or you are offering what they need but you’ve dropped the ball in communication.

When someone tells me she “can’t afford” me, I always take the opportunity to point out that it’s more powerful–and honest–for them to say, “It’s not an economic priority for me at this time” instead of “I can’t afford” it. I’m totally cool with not being an economic priority! Nothing wrong with that!

As a coach, I feel it’s unethical to allow (even prospective) clients to relieve themselves of responsibility for their choices. I will not collude with their disempowerment. It is PROFOUNDLY disempowering to make money or time a scapegoat, an excuse for not doing something. This doesn’t serve them. And it can be quite LIBERATING to be given total permission to say “No. Other things are a higher priority.”

At the same time it takes enormous self-management to hear someone talk about having trouble coming up with money for food or rent. Everything in me wants to say, “Don’t hire me! You can’t afford it!” (And I’ve done that, much to my regret.)

It is ALWAYS their call to make. To give a discount, to give it away for free, or tell someone they can’t afford me is, essentially, saying “You don’t have what it takes.” Ewwww.

The people I take on as clients want me so badly that they’ll do whatever it takes to hire me, and they thank me. The moment I find myself trying to convince someone to hire me, I need to pause and acknowledge we probably aren’t a good match, and say so.

Ironically, this hands off approach (trying to “overcome objections” tends to bite me in the a**) is often enough to motivate people to come back and hire me. And if it doesn’t, we weren’t a good match.

I’ll add one last word: I find it helps to be CRYSTAL CLEAR about what results a client will get, how they’ll know, and when. I never promise “you will make money,” but I can tell them precisely what I can guarantee. And I stay absolutely in integrity about what I can promise and what I can’t.

Congratulations on writing your first book! And you want to sell it. Here’s what you need to do.

1) Write a book proposal. Seems counterintuitive, doesn’t it? You already have a book why write a proposal?

This is what agents and publishers want to see.

A book proposal gives a summary, an outline of each chapter, and A MARKETING PLAN. It’s up to you to sell books, not your publisher. Who’s your market, how big is it, how are you going to get in front of them, etc.

Few authors make money getting published conventionally. Pennies for the author. Pennies for the publisher. New media and the economy are taking an even bigger bit out of the profits. That’s why publishing companies are going out of business.

The money’s in self-publishing.

2) If you self publish, I recommend going the route of Print On Demand (books are printed when sales come in) over printing $20,000 books and store them indefinately. Use a company that accepts returns. If you’re going to sell to book stores or Amazon, you have to be able to accept and refund returns.

3) If you do print the $20,000 of books ahead of time (profit margin’s much bigger that way), hire (more…)