Faith Commerce

pBy U.S. SBA Entrepreneur of the Year, Business Coach amp; Cofounder of Fears amp; Clark a href=http://www.fearsclark.com target=_blankTulsanbsp;Real Estate/anbsp;Group – Clay Clark/p
pnbsp;nbsp; If our economies were hot air balloons then faith would be the hot air that makes them soar through the sky. If marriages were plays then faith would be the actors and actresses that makes the scripts comes alive. If banks were swimming pools then faith would the water that fills them up. If our currency was comprised of worthless thin green pieces of paper with elaborate print on them then faith would be the opinion that we would all have to have to give that currency its value (wait a minute…our fiat currency is comprised of worthless green sheets of paper with elaborate print on them). If someone were to write us a check, faith would be our belief that they genuinely had money deposited with the bank from which their checks are written from. What then happens if the person writing the checks does not incisively inspire faith? What if you knew that person and you knew that they routinely bounced checks? Would you accept the check? What if you knew world history and knew that the Germans inflated their currency through the printing of currency faster than their people could actually earn it? What if you knew that the Germans printed money so fast that the people began to lose faith in its value? What if you knew that once the people lost faith in the currency, they began to lose faith in their government? What if you knew that once the people lost faith in their currency it began to take wheel barrells full of paper currency just to buy a loaf of bread? What if you knew that once the people began to be unable to afford food they began to turn their allegiance to the first charismatic leader they could find? What if you knew that this leader used the peoples desperation as a tool to manipulate them intonbsp; nearly exterminating an entire race? Wow! Its a good thing that you didnt know that./p
pnbsp;nbsp; My friend, optimistically speaking faith has a huge role in American business, leadership and nearly every aspect of your life. The brutal truth and reality is unsophisticated. If you do not inspire confidence, you inspired pessism. If you sound like a bumbling idiot who does not know your stuff, then people believe that you do not know your stuff. If you dress like you are the newest member of the Wu-Tang Clan, then you immediately get written off as having no value in our economy. Is this fair? Do I mean that people actually judge other people based on their faith in them? Yes. People do judge you every day./p
pnbsp;nbsp; Check this out. Think about the last time that you went to the mall. Did you see an attractive woman or handsome man there? Did you see somebody arrive at the mall in a brand new Hummer? Did you see someone wearing expensive clothing? Did you see someone that was extremely fit? Did you see someone that was morbidly obese? Did you see someone role up in a late 90s Buick with huge chrome rims that in all probability cost more than the vehicle before the rims were added? Did you see a guy with a great haircut? Did you see a guy with a mohawk? Did you see someone who looked happy? Did you see someone who looked angry? What judgements did you make about these people? Did they inspired you to have faith in them? If they offered you a job would you be skeptical? Would you believe them if they told you a stunning fact? My friend, faith is a huge element in our economy and in our life. If you cannot inspire faith, you simply cannot become successful in our world and in our economy. Lets look into this a bit further./p
pnbsp;nbsp; Faith is nearly the complete basis of our society. Although I believe in God, I am not talking about spiritual faith here. I am talking about faith from the aspect of faith being a living, moving, and powerful mind-changing and life altering, almost tangible thing. Faith is at the core of nearly all business. Did you know that over 90% of the trade and commerce that is done in the world today is done on credit. I already knew this, but a few months ago I spoke to a bunch of top level credit managers in Ft. Lauderdale Florida and I was truly shocked to see how much credit was being utilized in the world today. These credit managers entire job was based upon lending money to chemical companies so that they could sell their products to plastics manufacturers who would in turn pay them using credit who would then sell this plastics product to retail stores who would pay them using credit who would then in turn sell this finished product to consumers like you and I would now have an average consumer credit card debt of over $12,000 according to a recent research. How leveraged are these chemical companies? Oh, they only borrow about 90% of all the money the use to make payroll and by chemicals? 90%? What? Are you serious? You mean if the U.S. people suddenly lost a little faith in our economy and began to pull their money out of the mutual funds and pillory that funded these companies they would go belly up if only 11% of their investors disappeared? Yes. Look at our current economical situation for proof./p
pnbsp;nbsp; My friends, if the public were to ever lose faith in our paper currency then our paper currency wouldnt be worth the paper it was printed on (because you couldnt really use it to take notes very well). If the public began to lose faith in the overall sustainability and soundness of our money markets then stock market crash would immediately occur (hence 2008 economic crisis). If terrorists truly wanted to kill our economy they could just create a computer virus that made all of our online banking accounts show a zero remainder. People would begin to wonder, is my cash really at the bank? Soon, one by one they would discover that their cash was in fact not deposited in their account. Soon average people would learn about the banking practice called fractionary reserve lending and they would simply freak out. People would go nuts as soon as they realized that most banks only have 3% – 10% of the cash we have deposited at the bank at any given time. Soon it would be sprint to see which 3 out of every 100 customers could get their money out of the bank the fastest. Once the 4 customer showed up and discovered that his money was not at the bank he would ask where is my money. The bank teller would then explain to them, Sorry sir. The money you deposited with us has been lent to somebody else for a profit./p
pnbsp;nbsp; My friend I am not a dooms day theorist. I am not a historian. I am an award-winning entrepreneur and I am a man of faith. I am a man who is well aware that faith is truly the basis and fundamental of every functional and non-third world society. Without a solid faith that my wife is being faithful to me, I could not trust her. If I could not trust her, our family would fall apart. If my employees could not trust me to pay them, they would not work with me. Without the faith of your people and without a faith in yourself it is simply impossible to accomplish anything of merit in our world./p
pnbsp;nbsp; The biggest value and virtue that you must develop to become successful is becoming a person of faith. Become a person of faith. Become a person who inspires faith. Become a person who believes in others and the potential of others. Life-time academics, professors and college nerds have debated about faith forever and they will continue to have these meaningless debates. I personally do not care about your opinion of faith or my opinion of faith. What I care about is that faith is essential to success. Faith without works is dead, because no one will believe that you have faith in anything unless you take action on it. You want me to invest in something? You invest in it first. You want me to invest in that a href=http://www.fearsclark.com target=_blankreal estate/a deal? You invest in it with me. You want me to invest in that business? You have a skin in the game as well. You want me to believe that you love your family? Let me see you act on that love for your family. You want your spouse to know that you love her? Act on it. Show her that you love her. I dare you to take action based on your faith. You have a political belief? Act on it. I dare you. You have a religious belief? Act on it. Act on all of your beliefs in a spirit of faith, or you are bogus and people will not believe you./p
pnbsp;nbsp; Here is the problem. Most people do not ever consciously work at developing their faith. Thus we just have a bunch of talking heads walking around talking about business plans, diets plans and plans for their future. We have nearly an entire society of people walking around saying that, Someday when I retire, I am going to spend more time with my family. This is bogus. We have Monday through Sunday, but someday will never come. If you want to do anything of merit, size and note then you are going to have to inspire others to follow you and no one will follow a person whom they do not have faith in./p
pnbsp;nbsp; If you were to see yourself at the mall, would you want to work for yourself? If you saw yourself in your home, would you believe that you were a good family member and good spouse? Are you bogus or are you real? Faith without actions is dead. Show that you are alive and act on your convictions./p
pClosing thought:Dont waste your time asking a person about what he values, just look at how he spends his time. – Coworker Cody Aldrich/p
pstrongClay Clarkbr //strongstrongU.S. SBA Entrepreneur of the Yearbr //strongstrongU.S. Chamber Blue Ribbon National Quality Award Winnerbr //strongstrongMetro Chamber of Commerce Entrepreneur of the Yearbr //strongstrongFounder (cofounder) of 9 Businessesbr //strongstrongCofounder of Fears amp; Clark a href=http://www.fearsclark.com/about-us target=_blankTulsa Real Estate/abr //strongstrongHusband of 1br //strongstrongFather of 3br //strong/p