Kevin and the Giant Peach

Why Should You “Pay For” Taking Less of Someone Else’s Money?

August 5th, 2010

One of the arguments that democrats make for allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire at the end of the year is that these tax cuts aren’t “paid for”. The last time I checked a tax cut simply means the government takes less of people’s money. Who is the government supposed to be ”paying” to take less of someone’s money? And why are they having to pay?

Of course, what they are really saying is that to allow people to keep more of their money in the form of tax cuts, the government will have less income to pay for their stuff – entitlements, etc.. Now, Dr. Arthur Laffer and Ronald Reagan proved them wrong – when taxes are cut, revenues to the treasury always go up – but we can’t let the facts stand in the way of democrats doing what they have to do to gain power.

Even if the democrats were right and income to the treasury were to drop as a result of letting the Bush tax cuts continue on, government would just continue doing what they’re doing by printing more money to pay for their stuff. Heaven forbid they do what most households are forced to do which is to cut back on spending.

If you take a pay cut, you don’t whine to your employer that that pay cut is not “paid for”. You have no choice but to cut out the dinners out or other “luxuries.”

The best analogy that I can come up with as to what the democrats are saying when they argue that tax cuts aren’t paid for is this. Two thieves set a goal of robbing 3 banks of $1,000,000 per year. Each year, these two thieves hit the same banks for the same amount. After 10 years of doing this they have developed a nice lifestyle. In the 11th year, one of the thieves suggests to other that they only hit two of the banks since his brother just became president of the third bank. The other responds, “how are we going to pay for it?”

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Tags: arthur laffer, Bush tax cuts, democrats
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In Pursuing Your Dreams You May Need To Ignore Some Negative “Experts”

August 4th, 2010

In late 2001 / early 2002, I was just starting to train for the Elkhart Lake (Wisconsin) Traithlon – my first – on June 1, 2001. My last triathlon on the schedule for that same year was Ironman Wisconsin.

Yes, I was starting from no triathlon experience to a full Ironman (2.4 mile swim followed by a 112 mile bike and then a 26.2 mile run) in less than 4 months. But I wasn’t alone. There were quite a few other members our triathlon club, TriWisconsin, who were making the same attempt.

While most of our club members were supportive, some of the “old guard”, the experienced members, were, behind the scenes , scoffing and even placing bets on who of us would not finish. These were the elitists who were, on some level, contemptuous of the fact that their turf was being invaded by those deemed unfit – no pun intended – to dare to attempt to compete in the in pinnacle event of “their” sport, the Ironman.

In the end, most of us “newbies” did finish. This added another layer of irritation on the old guard. Many of them left the club.

This story is an illustration of people pursuing a dream. It is also a story of how that pursuit will sometimes threaten those who have already achieved the same dream.

You see this in academia, government and private industry. You see it at home and in the workplace. A new person comes into a group of people and declares their goal. Some of those, who have achieved the same goal, will actively help and encourage and support the new person. Others, out of jealously, will try to thwart and discourage them.

Whatever your dreams are, don’t let the “experts” talk you out of it. They are protecting their turf. Instead, seek out and enlist the support of those who you admire and are willing to assist you in achieving your goals. Do this and you WILL achieve your dreams.

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Tags: Dreams, Goals, Ironman
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Although We All Age, We Don’t Have to Get Old

July 31st, 2010

I was half mile from finishing the race when I passed him. We were running in one of thousands of Thanksgiving Day “Turkey Trot” 10K’s being held around the country. This one was in Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin.

At the time, I was in my late 30’s – about 10 years ago. He was but a kid of 17. We were both racing hard. Both of us were huffing and puffing, pushing past the pain to hold the pace and make it to the finish. As I passed him he asked me, “how old are you?” I told him. His reply? “Go ahead, you’re not in my division.” With his permission, then, I proceeded to move ahead as he dropped off.

I love this about running. Train hard enough and you are equal in ability to those half your age. Maybe even better.

The other day, my wife, who is Japanese, pointed out that the average life expectancy of Japanese women is 86 years old. That means that I am going to have to be very careful about my health in order to keep up with her. And much of being careful about my health involves minimizing negative stress. No problem there. The one thing we runners experience as a side benefit of our activity is the reduction of negative stress through the application of positive stress (training).

Tom Knoll

Tom Knoll, long time marathoner and one of the 12 original men who started and finished the original Ironman Triathlon in 1978, was the oldest of that elite group. A few years ago, Tom, his son, Warren, Frank Day, another one of the originals, and I sat in a pub drinking beers out of glass boots the day before Ironman Wisconson. He told us that, back when he was 30, he didn’t feel old. He thought that maybe he’d feel old when he turned 40. When he did turn 40, he didn’t feel old. So, he thought that maybe he’d start feeling old when he turned 50. When he turned 50, he didn’t feel old. So, he thought that maybe he’d start feeling old when he turned 60. When he turned 60, he didn’t feel old. So, he thought that maybe he’d start feeling old when he turned 70.

Tom was a few years past 70 when we were drinking out of the glass boots. He said he still didn’t feel old. He said, “Maybe when I turn 80.”

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Tags: Ironman, Mastaw Running Training, Running, Tom Knoll, training
Posted in Kevin Mastaw, Running | No Comments »

When the Bad News Gets Worse, Buy the Dollar

July 29th, 2010

When it comes to understanding the global economy and how it affects our pocket books, I visit this site daily: Learning Markets.

Whether or not you trade the markets, you can learn a lot by watching the daily briefings which are conducted by Jon Jagerson and Wade Hansen – the authors of “Profiting with Forex” and former product developers for Investools. Jon and Wade won’t give you specific trading advice but they do help you understand the fundamentals of trading. And understanding the fundamentals of trading will help you to make decisions on how to invest your money – including your 401K – to protect yourself from the ups-and-downs of the markets.

One such fundamental concept, which will seem somewhat contradictory, is that the U.S. Dollar will be getting stronger when the economic news becomes bad. Why? Because when people get skiddish about the stock market (i.e. risk), where do they put their money? They put it in “safety” which is traditionally treasuries. Treasuries, for all intents and purposes, means the U.S. Dollar.

In today’s daily briefing (under the Forex tab), Jon goes into a little more detail on this. I highly recommend you go there next:
http://www.learningmarkets.com/Forex-What-We-Learned-Today/euro-breaks-out-headed-to-13350.html

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Tags: Australian Dollar, u.s. dollar
Posted in Forex | No Comments »

If They Ain’t Listening, Quit Babbling

July 27th, 2010

Seven years ago, I agreed to “sit down with a couple of business partners” of a guy I knew from the gym to talk about a “new business venture” he wanted me to learn about. The meeting was to take place at a hotel in Brookfield. That should have been my first clue.

I had been expecting a meeting with 2 or 3 people at a restaurant over tea or coffee. Being open minded, willing to listen and genuinely interested in what people do to earn a buck, I didn’t hesitate at the invitation.

However, a few minutes after showing up in the lobby of the hotel, I was signing in and being ushered into a conference room with about 200 people. Even, now, I still think it was a sleazy way to get someone to listen to an opportunity presentation for a network marketing company.

I did end up signing into the opportunity after several weeks of studying their business model. And I still believe it’s the most stable and profitable compensation plan in the industry.

Would I have sat down and listened to the presentation had I not been duped into attending the meeting in the way I was? I don’t know.

It does amaze me that people still use these back door tactics to get people to listen to their pitch. I’m ashamed to say that I’ve done it. (I don’t any more.) It’s not what we’re taught by the company. But many people still do it.

Unfortunately, its these type of tactics which give the industry a bad name. People who are legitimately looking for a network marketing opportunity will find us. It’s a waste of time to try to convince those who will never have any interest in our opportunity to sit down and look at it. Even if they look at it and get in will probably drop out. You then enter the never ending game of signing up and replacing people . It’s a waste of time.

A much better way of finding those who will be interested in listening to you is to listen to them. The more time you spend listening, the less time you’ll spend pitching. And the less time you spend pitching, the less time you’ll spend on damage control.

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Tags: Network Marketing, opportunity
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What I’ve Been Doing In The Foreign Exchange (FX)

July 25th, 2010

Weekly Chart for AUD (Australian Dollar) vs. USD (U.S. Dollar)

I realize that I haven’t posted any updates on what I’ve been doing with Forex, lately. That’s because I haven’t been doing much.

The only position I have is a LONGGGGGG term position in the Australian Dollar. Why? My fundamental belief is that commodities (Gold, Silver, etc.) will continue to strengthen whereas the U.S. Dollar will not only continue to weaken but will, at some point, cease to be the “go to” currency.

Australia’s economy not only remains strong but will only get stronger. Australia’s economy is driven by commodities. Their overnight lending rate is 4.5% (versus the U.S. overnight rate of 0%) which means that, by holding a position in the Aussie, my account is credited interest every single day.

This strategy is an easy one to monitor. I only check the weekly chart on Sundays. If I see a breakout from resistence, I add another position. Otherwise, I hold.

Simple and boring. The best way to invest.

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Tags: AUD/USD, Australian Dollar
Posted in Forex, Kevin Mastaw | No Comments »

Learning Humility On The Path To Recapturing Glory!

July 24th, 2010

It’s difficult to start over, again. Especially when starting over in an activity in which you used to be near the top.

Such is my experience in resuming my running life.

Today, Saturday, July 24th, I finished my 12th week of running after a 4 year lay-off. I’m up to a whopping 20 miles. My long run is 6 miles. To a guy who used to routinely run 6-10 miles in the middle of the week and single 20 milers on the weekend, my progress hasn’t seemed fast enough.

It may be just the sign of a faulty memory, but I recall being able to ramp up much quicker. Forget that I was younger, then. That shouldn’t matter. Should it?

In fact it does. And that has been the greatest lesson of getting older – learning humility. With these lessons in humility has come a few revelations in actions that ensure that I will, ironically, be able to off-set the physical limitations of an aging body.

The first is that I’ve learned the importance of planning. I used to put training plans together with a lot of “wiggle room” to deviate from them at will. Therefore, I would often times find myself doing a longer training run than planned and/or running at a faster pace than planned. This would usually result in poor training which would then lead to lower than expected race performance.

The second lesson is the importance of building the solid base – which takes time. A solid base of mileage will take 6 months – at least. Maybe more for us older folk. My current plan has me “basing” through to the middle of December. That, of course, assumes that I take it easy and follow the plan.

There is a part of me that wants to expedite the process. I am an American, after all, and it’s the American way to want things quicker than we can have them. So, as part of my plan, I’m adopting a South American attitude towards my marathon training – which is fitting since the temperatures are going to be tropical for the foreseeable future.

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Tags: Running, training
Posted in Running | No Comments »

Geithner Gets A Job. Snipes Gets Jail.

July 23rd, 2010

I have a question. Why is Wesley Snipes going to jail? Yes, I know he evaded taxes for a few years. Let him pay the back taxes and a hefty fine and be done with it. Does he really need to be sent to prison? After all, it’s not like he did any harm to anyone. He stiffed the government. So what? That’s the American way. It’s every American’s patriotic duty to pay as little taxes as possible.

The current U.S. Treasury Secretary, Timothy Geithner, did the same thing. Not only is he not in jail, he was confirmed as Treasury Secretary after his tax evasion was discovered. He was given a slap on the wrist, paid the back taxes and the fine and then got a promotion.

Another interesting aspect to this is that Geithner is white. Snipes is black. Where is Jesse Jackson? Or Al Sharpton?

I’m just saying…

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Tags: Timothy Geithner, Wesley Snipes
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Why Do They Call These The “Dog Days of Summer”? (I feel more like a vegetable.)

July 21st, 2010

Here’s the answer I found in Wikipedia: “The Romans referred to the dog days as diēs caniculārēs and associated the hot weather with the star Sirius. They considered Sirius to be the “Dog Star” because it is the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major (Large Dog). Sirius is also the brightest star in the heavens besides the Sun. The term “Dog Days” was used earlier by the Greeks (see, e.g., Aristotle’s Physics, 199a2).

The Dog Days originally were the days when Sirius rose just before or at the same time as sunrise (heliacal rising), which is no longer true, owing to precession of the equinoxes. The Romans sacrificed a brown dog at the beginning of the Dog Days to appease the rage of Sirius, believing that the star was the cause of the hot, sultry weather.

Dog Days were popularly believed to be an evil time “when the seas boiled, wine turned sour, dogs grew mad, and all creatures became languid, causing to man burning fevers, hysterics, and phrensies” according to Brady’s Clavis Calendarium, 1813. [1]“

Impressed?

I would think we we’d be more productive in the summer. After all, there is more daylight. We don’t have to waste time “layering” and warming up the car. Higher temperatures mean that our muscles are loose right when we get up. You’d think that we would “feel” like doing more productive work.

However, other than my morning run, I feel like vegetating the rest of the day. Vegetables grow during the summer. Maybe, during the summer we have a tendency to want to get in touch with our inner vegetable?

On the other hand, we all like to play during the summer- sometimes at the expense of more “important” work. Our energy and resources, then, are diverted to our fun rather than our responsibilities during the summer. Could it be that we are less sensitive to the consequences of our actions during the summer months? I would think that getting fired, for instance, would be much more palatable when the temperature is above 70 degrees outside than if it were 20 degrees .

That’s enough thinking for one day. Time to go lay on the porch.

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Tags: Dog Days of Summer
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Introverts and Extroverts and How They Fit Into Your Business

July 20th, 2010

Several years ago, I read a book called the ” Introvert Advantage” by Dr. Marty Laney.

In this book, Dr. Laney makes several points that have stuck with me.

The first point is that there are physiological differences between introverts and extroverts. In each of our brains, one of two neurotransmitters dominate – Acetylcholine or Dopamine. Acetylcholine dominates in the introvert whereas dopamine dominates in the extrovert.

AC takes a longer path to the cerebral cortex which is why introverts are the way they are – they are seemingly slow to react to stimuli. Ask an introvert a question and you are often times met with a blank stare for a minute or two before you get an answer. Introverts are the type B,C or D personalities. They move at their own slow pace.

On the other hand, extroverts – in which dopamine dominates – will give you a quick answer to the same question. It may not be the correct answer but they need to react, immediately. Extroverts are the thrill seekers. They are the type AAA, AA and A personalities. There are no low gears in the extrovert.

The other point that Dr. Laney makes in her book is that introverts and extroverts gain their energy from different sources. Introverts derive their energy from the inside. They are most comfortable with their thoughts. Put an introvert in a room by him or herself with a good book and they’re happy.

Extroverts, on the other hand, derive their energy from outside themselves. Extroverts thrive on being with as many people as possible as often as possible.

This understanding of introverts and extroverts is very important to you in building your network marketing business. It’s important because to be the most successful you can be, you need to help the people in your organization be the most successful they can be.

Having an understanding of what would motivate a person to join a network marketing opportunity will help you work with them in the most efficient and effective manner.

The motivation for an introvert to want to develop a network marketing organization is to someday have an income that would allow them to minimize the time they have to spend with the “outside world” or, put a more positive way, to maximize the time they have to spend with their friends, family and themselves.

The motivation for an extrovert to want to develop a network marketing organization is to have a large group of people in which to interact with anytime they like. Extroverts also enjoy taking action and taking charge. They love to be at the front of the room, doing the business presentations.

You would think you would want to build a downline with no one but extroverts. This isn’t the case. You need a mix of the two for steady, solid growth.

Extroverts are energized by the building process and their energy can be addictive for awhile. However, they are in constant search for new stimulus. So if, after a few months, they don’t see big results, they may be likely to jump to another business.

Introverts may not make as many phone calls, go on as many appointments or attend as many meetings or seminars in the same amount of time as the extrovert – but they’ll be more patient and look for results over the long term. Introverts will have a deeper understanding of the company, their products and the compensation plan. The introvert will not be as likely to jump ship as the extrovert.

I count myself as an introvert – which is why I read “The Introvert Advantage” in the first place – and I appreciate the other introverts in my business. They make it solid and stable. I also appreciate the extroverts in my organization. They keep it fun and exciting.

If you or someone you know is interested in learning more about the product brokerage business that my team of introverts and extroverts are building, please don’t hesitate to email me at kevin@kjmastaw.com . We’ll be sure to contact you as soon as possible.

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Tags: acetylcholine, dopamine, extrovert, introvert, Introvert Advantage, Marty Laney
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Kevin and the Giant Peach

Why Should You “Pay For” Taking Less of Someone Else’s Money?

In Pursuing Your Dreams You May Need To Ignore Some Negative “Experts”

Although We All Age, We Don’t Have to Get Old

When the Bad News Gets Worse, Buy the Dollar

If They Ain’t Listening, Quit Babbling

What I’ve Been Doing In The Foreign Exchange (FX)

Learning Humility On The Path To Recapturing Glory!

Geithner Gets A Job. Snipes Gets Jail.

Why Do They Call These The “Dog Days of Summer”? (I feel more like a vegetable.)

Introverts and Extroverts and How They Fit Into Your Business

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