I’ve been both a victim and a beneficiary of the self-help movement since the 1980′s. You couldn’t swing a dead cat without hittin’ a self-help guru in those days; I even had a band manager/mentor (Hi Jim!) who simultaneously inspired my band with forward thinking, and tortured us with pleas to become his est podlings. While there’s a lot of self-improvement tripe out there, there’s also a lot of great stuff. Laugh if you like, but I can shamelessly say that I’ve found something useful in books by all the big names, from old school stuff like Napoleon Hill, Dale Carnegie, and Norman Vincent Peale to the next generation biggies like Stephen Covey, John Gray, Eckhart Tolle, David Allen, and even Timothy Ferriss. But you know what I don’t derive any benefit from? Everyone with internet access who either read or skimmed these books and whose only resulting inspiration was to regurgitate everything they consumed in fragmented and ineffectual form on their blog as a list of “great tips” or “essential secrets”. The saddest part of what these self-improvement bloggers are doing is that they probably heard from some twit like Ann Sieg that you could make money that way. Ah well. It makes them no less annoying. I feel obligated to set the record straight though, with an authentic “10 Secrets” list. Enjoy.

10 Secrets To Being Happy, Healthy & Wealthy
	1.) Don’t Be Depressed One of the greatest obstacles to being happy is not being happy. So stop moping. Because if you keep walking around trippin’ on your lip like that, not only will people not enjoy your company, leading to loneliness and more depression, I just might smack ya.
	2.) Suicide Is Always An Option In many cultures, suicide is in fact highly respected. And it’s a well-established fact that depression can aggravate indecision, which leads to more depression. So if you can’t get over your weepy paralysis, kill two birds with one stone with this very decisive action. Or don’t.
	3.) Buy Something Nice For Yourself The old adage that “money can’t buy happiness” is disinformation spread by happy wealthy people to protect their slice of the pie. Money itself won’t make you happy, but it will buy everything that will. This step requires having some money, so be sure to check out our handy wealth tips below.
	4.) Don’t Be Sick Nothing is a greater impediment to excellent health than being sick, so don’t be. This requires little more in the way of explanation, but a key strategy here is avoiding doctors. You may have noticed their income is derived entirely from deciding you’re sick.
	5.) Don’t Die Of Malnutrition An estimated two-thirds of the world’s population is either under-fed or actually starving. Not eating is a surefire way to not get the nutrients necessary for good health, and not eating at all can kill you. So eat.
	6.) Don’t Sit On Your Ass All Day Eating Like A Pig This point really ties all the others together, and may in fact be the most important. First of all, if you’re sitting around all day, you’re probably not making money. And if you’re eating while you sit around, you’re going to end up fat, ugly, and unhappy, like a typical American. Which is a major obstacle to being accepted by the international jet set.
	7.) Be Born Into Affluence This is probably the easiest way to achieve wealth. When being born into wealth, an added plus is being born into royal families or American oligarchies like the Bush, Rockefeller, or Clinton families. This way you get all sorts of entitlements and pretty much don’t pay taxes.
	8.) Marry In, Or Build A Time Machine Okay, if you weren’t already born rich, maybe that last one is impossible because of the laws of time and physics. First of all, stop being so fatalistic. Inventing a time machine would solve all of these problems, so get to work! And if you’re too damn lazy to build a freakin’ time machine, just marry in. This works great for people like John Kerry and John McCain, so why not you?
	9.) Start A Successful Business You hear lots of stories about how people like Abe Lincoln and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales failed a lot before succeeding. This is obviously a waste of time. Start a successful business the first time. If AT&T can stay in business, anybody can.
	10.) Win The Lotto Wealthy and successful people who emphasize that hard work, persistence, and a positive attitude are essential to financial freedom have obviously never won the Lotto. Get scratchin’.

You don’t know me, but if you did, you’d pretty quickly realize that I’m one of the more laid back people you’ll ever meet. The other day though, I caught myself being the kind of person I sometimes laugh at: the person who almost runs over pedestrians to get to the next red light, that visibly snorts when a register clerk takes longer than they’d like, that avoids eye contact when they cut you off slightly to be the next in line. I don’t remember exactly how it happened that I got in that frame of mind, but I pretty quickly decided to do something about it. Coincidentally, a friend had just loaned me a copy of The Power of Nice. I decided to breeze through it; it’s a pretty light read. I’m glad I did. It was a great set of inspiring reminders of something I’m always working on anyway, something I call the “Kindness Economy™”. Kindness is a powerful currency. There’s an almost limitless supply of it, and you find that when you spend it, you end up with more of it than before you started. It’s like every purchase you make is a winning lotto ticket. So with a little nudge from my own grumpiness and the book, I decided it was time to re-invest. I want to share my profits with you, so let’s see if in the next several days we can’t create a little Kindness Stimulus Package out there. Here are some ideas, feel free to share if you have any of your own.

Hold a door for someone
Let someone go first
Pick up a piece of trash instead of just walking past it
Offer to pay for lunch or a coffee if you can afford it
Say hi to a stranger

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