An Unlikely Proposition...

I’ve had quite an amazing day.


I’m in Dallas, Texas, attending a Super Conference given by Bill Glazer and Dan Kennedy. In my book, The Lavish Cheapskate, I mention Dan Kennedy on page 44 and recommend the book, “The Ultimate Marketing Plan” as a great starter for anyone considering a business to create their own stream of residual income.

 If you’re not interested in starting a business, there is still a universal message I want to share here, so hang out for a moment…


Now Dan is a “tell it like it is” writer, mentor, and genius marketer who doesn’t mess around with trying to “win you over.” He’s quite the opposite.

Dan can be so downright direct that some may find him quite offensive. Yet, this man is one of the most generous people I know. He shares his incredible gifts and simultaneously cuts out all the “B.S.” (as he commonly refers to as his style of communicating). He has not only helped me with running a successful business, he has helped me on a personal level.

I was a student of Dan’s when I lived as a “Poor-Rich Person” back in the nineties. In my book I tell the story of how my “ old lifestyle” put me in a place of losing it all (including a once very successful business) to having to find my first “full-time job” as a single mother at the age of thirty-five.

What I’m about to share with you is very personal…

Back in the late nineties, when I lived as a Poor-Rich Person, I had a big bottleneck in my life, and that was drinking. I wasn’t a “light drinker,” I was drinking myself to death. I didn’t mention this in my book, but I did mention a stress-induced seizure that woke me up.

A short time after that incident, I sobered up and have been sober ever since. In June I will be entering my tenth year of sobriety and as a part of my own gift to myself, I decided to come to Dallas and see Dan Kennedy, once again. It’s been more than ten year since I’ve seen him.

So why am I sharing such a personal story with you? I’m sharing it for two important reasons:


1. No matter where you are in life, there is always a path to a new freedom. It doesn’t matter where you have been, it’s a matter of where you courageously go… and you ALWAYS have a choice.


2. When you share something others may judge as “humiliating,” you also open a door for many others by demonstrating a new possibility. I have found as I become honest and direct, I have not only helped myself, I have had the gift of sharing something of value with others. The most inspirational stories I have received are from those that write to me about their own struggles as they compare them to mine.

Dan reminded me of the power of this as he talked about criticism this evening. His suggestion... “Unqualified Opinions Are Best Ignored.”

When I reflected on these words tonight, I asked myself, “If I were free from any fear of criticism, what would I write?” And I thought of how I have lived a new freedom since I gave up drinking and how this has had such a profound impact in all aspects of living. I also realized that the fear of criticism could have stopped me from sharing this and it’s quite possible it will inspire others to venture down a path of their own personal recovery (whatever that may be).

When you become courageous enough to share a part of yourself with the world and attempt to add value to others through your own experience, you WILL have critics. It’s not a matter of if it will happen, it’s a matter of when.

You will be criticized when you take courageous leaps in life. I make only one small request of you… Leap Anyway!

I will close this with something else Dan Kennedy taught me years ago (in my words, not Dan’s, but close)… If you haven’t received criticism by high noon, perhaps you’re not doing enough.

My hope is this will give you the freedom to look forward to criticism knowing that “taking leaps of faith” are never done for the critics; they’re done for YOU. And when you do it for you, you share a new possibility with the world.

May you have many courageous leaps!

Until next time, may you live in lavish cheapskate liberation!

-Ardy Skinner