Black Tuesday at GM & Delphi
My brother in law and Nora’s best friend husband both work for GM as engineers. They may not have a job by the end of today.
People have sometime told me that I am pretty cynical. I choose to think that I am a realist. I am pretty harsh on myself but above all I am realist. And here is the reality about this Black Tuesday which is unfolding right now today as I am writing this.
This is not the first time they have fired people who were supposed to have “secure” jobs and I can guarantee it that it isn’t the last time either. They will fire more people in the coming months / years – entry level, middle management, senior managers and blue collar – it is all the same now.
The thing that used to be about having a secure job for the next 30 years and retiring with a gold watch is not coming back anytime soon. Question is what should you do about it? Start your own business? Do real estate deals on the side? Sell stuff on EBay?
How about doing anything is better than doing nothing! Find 30 minutes every day – sleep late or get up early; TiVO the programs that you cannot bear to miss, beg your significant other to help you free up 30 minutes a day – I have done all the above when I was making the transition from employee to owner.
Once you have found the 30 minutes – learn something, research on the Internet, read a book, listen to an educational audio CD’s. I am pretty busy by any means of the world. If you followed me for a week the first question that will pop in your head is “how the heck is he doing ALL this?” and yet I am doing the above. I am researching 30 minutes a day a very cool new business (not related to real estate) that I just found on the Internet
I have given myself 4 weeks to complete my research and make my decision to move forward or drop the idea. The education and research is being done on the Internet. I bought 2 books from Amazon and a home study course from an expert in the field. Read 10-20 pages every night before going to sleep; listen to 20 minutes of CD every day. In 4 weeks I will know “more” than I do today. I buy and use shortcuts – books, audio CD’s, Internet discussion rooms, forums, Google Groups and Yahoo Answers, SBA, Fortune / Forbes / Entrepreneurs websites – whatever I can use to get the information.
Got your knowledge – awesome! Now lets act on it – want to sell stuff on EBay – lets list something and see what happens. Want to buy and sell real estate in Michigan? Lets make 5 offers and see what the banks call you back with.
The job you had today – white collar / blue collar / no collar – did not come to you in a dream. May be you attended a college or may be you went to a trade school or may be you learned on the job. The keyword is that you “learned” to do whatever you do 9-5 right now. You, Donald Trump and me were all born the same way – naked, crying and helpless. What we choose to do afterwards was entirely up to us.
You can learn to become an “owner” or a “real estate investor” where your income, fate and family’s welfare is not dependant on an email coming from the high floors GM headquarters where you are just a name on a pink spreadsheet. Rather you become like me where you paychecks are completely dependant on your own efforts. You make money – you get to keep 100% of it all. I have not meet too many wealthy people who work for somebody – have you?
Somebody asked me a while ago that if I am ever get scared of owning of my own business to which I said that all I had to do is turn my Dell X1 laptop on and look at my desktop. It is a picture of Hailey and Sage with Nora – that is enough motivation for me to overcome any fear that might come my way.
There are 3 kinds of people in this world – one’s who are playing the game; one’s who are watching the game and the one’s who have no idea that there is a game going on.
Decide on this Black Tuesday who do you want to be?
