Archive for the ‘LIFE Leadership’ Category

LIFE Leadership educates the world on the 8F’s of personal and professional change.

Murray Rothbard: The Banking Cartel

Posted by Orrin Woodward on September 8, 2014

Murray Rothbard is my favorite economist to read for several reasons. First, his extensive knowledge in economics, history, and business help him see connections where few others would. Second, his style of writing drives home his points in an enjoyable fashion and, even the few times where I believe he goes too far, I still marvel at his ability to muster the facts in a logical fashion to argue his point. to

As Chairman of the Board for LIFE Leadership, I am constantly reading, writing, and speaking. Identifying the top thinkers to read in each field is a high-priority for me and why Murray Rothbard is one of my favorites. For his thinking and writing clear the fog of ignorance on my different subjects. As an example, here is Rothbard’s description of how and why America cartelized its corporations in the late 19th century.

The Five Laws of Decline are alive and well in America and a return to the Six Duties of Society is going to take an active group of people who know leadership, history, and economics.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

Murray Rothbard

By the late 19th century, the Morgans took the lead in trying to pressure the US government to cartelize industries they were interested in — first railroads and then manufacturing: to protect these industries from the winds of free competition, and to use the power of government to enable these industries to restrict production and raise prices.

In particular, the investment bankers acted as a ginger group to work for the cartelization of commercial banks. To some extent, commercial bankers lend out their own capital and money acquired by CDs. But most commercial banking is “deposit banking” based on a gigantic scam: the idea, which most depositors believe, that their money is down at the bank, ready to be redeemed in cash at any time. If Jim has a checking account of $1,000 at a local bank, Jim knows that this is a “demand deposit,” that is, that the bank pledges to pay him $1,000 in cash, on demand, anytime he wishes to “get his money out.” Naturally, the Jims of this world are convinced that their money is safely there, in the bank, for them to take out at any time. Hence, they think of their checking account as equivalent to a warehouse receipt. If they put a chair in a warehouse before going on a trip, they expect to get the chair back whenever they present the receipt. Unfortunately, while banks depend on the warehouse analogy, the depositors are systematically deluded. Their money ain’t there.

An honest warehouse makes sure that the goods entrusted to its care are there, in its storeroom or vault. But banks operate very differently, at least since the days of such deposit banks as the Banks of Amsterdam and Hamburg in the 17th century, which indeed acted as warehouses and backed all of their receipts fully by the assets deposited, e.g., gold and silver. This honest deposit or “giro” banking is called “100 percent reserve” banking. Ever since, banks have habitually created warehouse receipts (originally bank notes and now deposits) out of thin air. Essentially, they are counterfeiters of fake warehouse receipts to cash or standard money, which circulate as if they were genuine, fully backed notes or checking accounts. Banks make money by literally creating money out of thin air, nowadays exclusively deposits rather than bank notes. This sort of swindling or counterfeiting is dignified by the term “fractional reserve banking,” which means that bank deposits are backed by only a small fraction of the cash they promise to have at hand and redeem. (Right now, in the United States, this minimum fraction is fixed by the Federal Reserve System at 10 percent.)

Fractional Reserve Banking

Let’s see how the fractional-reserve process works, in the absence of a central bank. I set up a Rothbard Bank, and invest $1,000 of cash (whether gold or government paper does not matter here). Then I “lend out” $10,000 to someone, either for consumer spending or to invest in his business. How can I “lend out” far more than I have? Ahh, that’s the magic of the “fraction” in the fractional reserve. I simply open up a checking account of $10,000 which I am happy to lend to Mr. Jones. Why does Jones borrow from me? Well, for one thing, I can charge a lower rate of interest than savers would. I don’t have to save up the money myself, but can simply counterfeit it out of thin air. (In the 19th century, I would have been able to issue bank notes, but the Federal Reserve now monopolizes note issues.) Since demand deposits at the Rothbard Bank function as equivalent to cash, the nation’s money supply has just, by magic, increased by $10,000. The inflationary, counterfeiting process is under way.

“Unfortunately, while banks depend on the warehouse analogy, the depositors are systematically deluded. Their money ain’t there.”

The 19th-century English economist Thomas Tooke correctly stated that “free trade in banking is tantamount to free trade in swindling.” But under freedom, and without government support, there are some severe hitches in this counterfeiting process, or in what has been termed “free banking.”

First, why should anyone trust me? Why should anyone accept the checking deposits of the Rothbard Bank?

But second, even if I were trusted, and I were able to con my way into the trust of the gullible, there is another severe problem, caused by the fact that the banking system is competitive, with free entry into the field. After all, the Rothbard Bank is limited in its clientele. After Jones borrows checking deposits from me, he is going to spend that money. Why else pay for a loan? Sooner or later, the money he spends, whether for a vacation, or for expanding his business, will be spent on the goods or services of clients of some other bank, say the Rockwell Bank. The Rockwell Bank is not particularly interested in holding checking accounts on my bank; it wants reserves so that it can pyramid its own counterfeiting on top of cash reserves. And so if, to make the case simple, the Rockwell Bank gets a $10,000 check on the Rothbard Bank, it is going to demand cash so that it can do some inflationary counterfeit pyramiding of its own.

But, I, of course, can’t pay the $10,000, so I’m finished. Bankrupt. Found out. By rights, I should be in jail as an embezzler, but at least my phoney checking deposits and I are out of the game, and out of the money supply.

Hence, under free competition, and without government support and enforcement, there will only be limited scope for fractional-reserve counterfeiting. Banks could form cartels to prop each other up, but generally cartels on the market don’t work well without government enforcement, without the government cracking down on competitors who insist on busting the cartel, in this case, forcing competing banks to pay up.

Posted in Freedom/Liberty, LIFE Leadership | 17 Comments »

Unspeakable by Os Guinness

Posted by Orrin Woodward on August 28, 2014

As the Chairman of LIFE Leadership, I have made reading a life-long habit. Nonetheless, this year’s summer season reading regimen was particularly productive. In fact, I read so many challenging books at my Michigan house that it is difficult to choose which one was the most impactful. However, if I was pressed to choose, it would have to be Unspeakable by Os Guinness. This book tackles the question of evil and how the Judeo/Christian, Hindu/Buddhist, and secular humanist world views respond to it. Through following Guinness’s line of reasoning I was left appreciating the strengths and weakness of each worldview while still bolstering my belief that Christianity has the most consistent answers to the problem of, and the response to, evil in the world.

Most people see themselves as fighters against evil, but what happens after they realize that the biggest battle they fight against evil is the war within their own hearts? Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn described the dilemma human beings face in his classic The Gulag Archipelago when he wrote, “But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being? And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” To destroy evil we must either destroy our heart or transform it through God’s grace.

The Lord’s Prayer

In his chapter on second chances, Guinness takes no prisoners. He explains how nearly everyone has said the Lord’s Prayer at some time in his/her life. However, few realize exactly what they are praying when they say, “and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Indeed, most of us mouth the words blissfully ignorant of the prayers meaning. For when a person prays this, he is stating that if he doesn’t forgive others, then he prays that God doesn’t forgive him! Yikes!

Guinness wrote, “No wonder Saint Agustine called the famous line in the Lord’s Prayer ‘the terrible petition’: ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.’ If we pray that prayer and fail to forgive our fellow human beings as we have been forgiven, we are actually asking God not to forgive us. . . nothing that anyone can ever do to us will equal what we have done to God, and he has offered us forgiveness completely and freely. Our duty, then, is to forgive as we have been forgiven and to show that we have been forgiven by being willing to forgive others in our turn. Do they deserve it? Did we?”

It’s important to understand that forgiveness is not the same as reconciliation. You can forgive someone even if they are unwilling to reconcile. It is this truth that allows Christians to have joy even when their enemies still hate them. Otherwise, they would carry enmity against their foes which poisons their own soul as much as it does their Haters. In the book Unbroken, for instance, POW Ernest Zamperini carried so much bitterness and hatred against a Japanese officer, who abused him in the war camp, that he nearly destroyed his own life through hating and alcohol. In sum, external evil (unjust oppression) had metastasized into internal evil (hatred in the heart). Fortunately, once he was forgiven by Christ, he was finally able to forgive the unrepentant guard.

Why am I telling you this? Because after twenty-one years of leadership, I have concluded that unrepentant sin holds more people back from their God-given destiny than anything else. Lack of forgiveness is sin, plain and simple. If you are a Christian, and harboring anger against someone, let it go. Place it in the same spot your own sins were layed – at the foot of the Cross. This is serious. Stop reading for a second and think about whom in your life you need to forgive. Go ahead. I’ll wait. Is there anyone from your past or present that is binding you in bitterness? Stop drinking poison while expecting others to die. Forgive them like Christ forgave you to release the evil bonds.

With so much evil and injustice to fight on the outside, why continue harbor these rebels on the inside? Guinness wrote, “. . . true forgiveness is not the same thing as condoning. . . It is not to deny wrong.It is not to tolerate the intolerable or lie down under the outrageous. It is to call a spade a spade, and evil evil, and to allow the full horror of its magnitude and outrage to sink in on every level – and then to be willing to dismiss the grounds of our own personal vengeance toward the evildoer. In other words, forgiveness confronts the evil as evil, and the wrongdoer as guilty, but refuses to retaliate and so refuses to play evil’s game and let evil have the final say.”

It’s time to wipe out our enemies by making them a friend. I let go of my remaining enmity back in 2011, shortly before the launch of LIFE Leadership. I realized that I could not carry around bitterness and resentment while still leaving enough room to love others as Christ commanded. What about you? Isn’t it time to let the hurts, the bitterness, and the pain go? Christ did that for us and now it’s time we pray rather than poison those who hurt us. Only then will you experience the peace that passeth understanding. Martin Luther King experienced more than his share of oppression, but he did not let the evil conquer his heart; instead, he observed, “We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of the enmity.” Amen to that, Mr. King.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

Posted in Faith, LIFE Leadership | 40 Comments »

How Limiting Beliefs Paralyze Your Growth

Posted by Orrin Woodward on August 20, 2014

Life is interesting. On one hand people say they want better results in life, but on the other, they seem paralyzed to perform the actions they know need to be done to improve. Why is this? Well, after 21 years of leading communities and studying human behavior, I have concluded that until a person changes his limiting belief, he will not change his inactivity.

I know. I know. You are probably thinking: but Orrin, how do you change beliefs? Great question. In fact, this is the topic of one of this months (August) LIFE Leadership LLR talks. In effect, one must learn to stand outside yourself and honestly look into why you are not doing what it takes to accomplish what you said you wanted. Psychologist call this cognitive dissonance. And, nearly every time, there is a belief system in conflict with the stated goal. If this isn’t addressed and replaced with a better belief system, nothing of significance will change.

For instance, one of the common limiting beliefs for many people is the thought that they have no control over life’s outcomes. So long as someone believe they have no control over the results in his/her life, why would they even try? While it is true that we do not control or influence everything that happens to us (to name just two – natural disasters or health challenges), most people view every area of life like it is random or a game of chance. In sum, whatever will be will be.

In contrast, a better view of life would be to see it as an exciting rapid-filled river that has never been traversed before. True, we have no knowledge or control over the river’s direction, drops, and dangers, but, thankfully, we are issued a kayak (vehicle), paddle (tool) and mind (thinking). The mind can learn to use the paddle to steer the kayak through life. In fact, this is the goal of LIFE Leadership – to teach people the proper strategies (wisdom) to navigate the rivers of life by utilizing the paddle in the current to propel us in the direction of our dreams.

If someone believes they have no control over the direction life’s river takes them, they, unfortunately, won’t even attempt to use their paddle. Thus, their limiting belief becomes their reality as the kayak bounces hopelessly off the canyon walls and eventually capsizes in the roughest rapids. Limiting beliefs paralyze a person into inaction. In this example, he/she focuses upon what is not within his/her control rather than upon what is.

The professional kayakers, however, respond differently. They have learned to navigate the rapids even when they have never been on a particular river before. How you ask? Because they have learned to apply river wisdom to recognize repeatable patterns present within rapids everywhere. In a similar way, wisdom supplies leaders with the ability to recognize repeatable patterns within life and apply the proper principle at the right time to navigate successfully.

Seek wisdom and everything else will be added unto you. What are you waiting for? Aren’t you tired of having life happen to you rather than making life happen? Laurie and I certainly were. We discovered Biblical principles applied to our lives and our business made all the difference. Perhaps its time replace your limiting beliefs with the truth so you can live the life you’ve always wanted.

Below is a short segment of this month’s talk.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

Posted in Leadership/Personal Development, LIFE Leadership | 23 Comments »

The Ethics of Money Production

Posted by Orrin Woodward on July 28, 2014

Jorg Guido Hulsmann

The Cobden Centre’s Andy Duncan did an excellent review of Jorg Guido Hulsmann’s fantastic book The Ethics of Money Production. In my opinion the number one battle for freedom begins with checking the Five Laws of Decline (FLD) destruction of the monetary system by the State elites. What is the point in checking government through representative government, separation of powers, term limits if the government can have access to practically unlimited funds? The State, simply by partnering with the Big Banks, runs a fraudulent Fractional Reserve Banking system anchored by the State’s favored central bank to bilk society’s monetary system.

Indeed, my new book And Justice For All spells out how the elites plunder the production of society. Since Adam Smith and Jean Baptiste Say, economists have recognized the 3 factors of all production – labor, land, and capital. The elites have plundered all three factors of production. Thankfully, Human Slavery (the plunder of society’s production through the monopolization of labor) is diminishing worldwide along with Land Serfdom (the plunder of society’s production through monopolization of land). However, Financial Subjection (the plunder of society’s production through the monopolization of capital) is exploding.

Why is it, you ask? Simply put, society cannot resist oppression until it discovers its source. The central planning of the financial system is inconceivable, illogical, and inconsistent since its underlying presuppositions run counter to our alleged free market system. Nonetheless, because the FLD rewards too tempting to ignore, the State and Big Bankers fill society with propaganda designed to confuse and disorient. As a result, the elites capitalize on society’s ignorance for massive FLD gains. Fortunately, anyone who invests the time to read and understands The Ethics of Money Production will not remain ignorant.

LIFE Leadership intends to play its part in educating society in the 8F’s of life to play its part in the restoration of liberty. Below is a portion of Andy Duncan’s review.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

The book is divided into three beautifully-written main parts:

The Natural Production of Money
Inflation
Monetary Order and Monetary Systems

These three parts cover everything you might think of, from the invention of metallic money all the way through to the end of Bretton-Woods and then the later creation of the Euro. However, the heart of the book is a sequence of four chapters — in the second part of the book on Inflation —with two of these chapter titles, alas, unfortunately insisting on the use of American spellings and the appalling employment of the letter ‘zed’; the chapter content, however, is still very good, even if has fallen under the unwelcome control of an American spell-checker:

Legalized Falsifications
Legal Monopolies
Legal-Tender Laws
Legalized Suspensions of Payments

When you are the elite organisation calling yourself ‘The State’, you have a monopoly on law in a particular territory; it is with this power that you can subvert and distort the natural order of private property, thus leading to the impoverishment and helotry of everyone else within that territory, under your rule, even leading to the ridiculous notion that any debt this elite runs up — to maintain their position of privilege — is somehow ‘owed’ by the subjugated population, despite no-one ever asking their opinion about whether this debt should have been taken on by the elite and despite all the benefits of the spending of that debt going directly into the grasping hands of that same privileged elite.

The whole problem with money is the state’s imposition of legal privileges for bankers, given to bankers in return for the promise that they will always soak up the debts of politicians, to enable politicians to enslave their populations over time in a Procrustean bed of warfare and welfare, to the ultimate benefit of the politicians and their friends, and to the detriment of everyone else.

These chapters make clear how that mechanism of monetary enslavement operates, and therefore how we can break that mechanism and become free again from the appalling bondage of government bonds. It is with the removal of these legal privileges and a restoration of the natural order of private property rights that we will be able to put the wheels back on the cart, get moving again, and put the politicians back in their place,

Posted in Freedom/Liberty, LIFE Leadership | 13 Comments »

Wisdom for Families: Part II

Posted by Orrin Woodward on July 21, 2014

Here is Part II of Mike Hartmann’s powerful story of faith, hope, and wisdom. LIFE Leadership isn’t just our business built on purpose; rather, it’s our purpose built on business. Wisdom and truth cannot eliminate pain in this fallen world, but it does provide the perspective and perseverance to overcome instead of succumb to the challenges life presents. Unfortunately, in modern culture’s pursuit of happiness, many have forgotten that true happiness is an inside job, not an outside one. LIFE Leadership intends to change this one life at a time. Here is part II of one family’s life-changing story.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

“But, a word of warning: if you don’t go to battle, if you actually listen to him, if you actually allow Goliath to stop you from going to where you know you not only should go but you need to go, he is going to grow in strength and he is only going to become more relentless for the rest of your high school career and the rest of your life. If you think he’s bad now, I promise you this: he will only get bigger. He won’t get more powerful because he never changes: he’s only a sheet of paper and you can overcome him at any point of time. But right now is your opportunity. This is your moment in time. This is your opportunity to stand up to him and knock him square on his back so that you can prove to him, and more importantly to yourself, the man you truly are.

“There’s no shame how you were feeling earlier. That’s normal and totally expected. And I promise you this: there are probably many of your peers feeling the same way tonight because he’s trying to stop them too. Trust me and go to battle and knock him down!”

Spiritual Truth & Spiritual Warfare (and What was Really Happening):

Jesus Christ is the one and only Son of God and He died for my sins. He completed all the requirements of God’s law when he hung on a cross at Calvary some 2000 years ago. After laying down his life after taking the punishment for my sins, He rose from the grave on that glorious Easter Sunday. And He provides me with everlasting salvation which has been given to all human sinners through His Grace.

The devil, who is very real and exists in our everyday lives, cannot take away Christ’s victory. Those who accept Jesus Christ as their Savior have everlasting salvation. And there is nothing the devil can do to change that fact or take that away from us. But this is what he can do: he can steal the joy of our victory and he does it every day with those same tactics with which he attacked my son, specifically: doubt, fear, & worry.

Why would we listen to such an evil, self-defeating thought process? We’ve read it and heard it thousands of times: the fact that we are human beings is a miracle all by itself. The fact that we live in North America in the time in which we do is an absolute blessing. The fact that we were born or maybe we had the opportunity to immigrate to United States of America and live here is nothing short of incredible. And in spite of these facts, so many trade-in the greatness of what we can truly achieve at any moment in time for the lies that the devil sows in our heads which hold us back each day.

As a father, I felt incredibly blessed to have been able to share the leadership lessons that I’ve learned through the association of Life Leadership and its personal development material (specifically, lessons were taught through the following sources: Self Talk by Orrin Woodward & Chris Brady, Goliath is Calling by Orrin Woodward, A New Label by Bill Lewis, The Magic of Thinking Big by Dr. David Schwartz, the All Grace Outreach subscriptions, and countless live speeches and testimonials). Without the books I’ve read, the CD’s I listened to, and the association of the great friends & mentors (Marc Militello) I’ve gained through this incredible journey, I would have only been able to respond in my original authoritative “because I said so” style. And I would’ve forced my son to go on a trip without equipping him mentally on how to fix his thought process. He would’ve gone reluctantly, but he would’ve been overwhelmed with the doubt, fear and worry that was there to begin with. Ultimately, those forces (and my original mishandling of the situation) would’ve had a radically negative effect on his experience and our relationship.

The Victory:

Well this is how it turned out: Kyle went to battle with Goliath and knocked him flat on his back! Kyle started talking to himself during our conversation over the phone, repeating what I was coaching him on; repeating and believing the positive uplifting and encouraging message that we all should be repeating to ourselves each and every day. He got up that Sunday morning at 4:30, ate breakfast and went to church. By 6AM, the kids, including Kyle, were in the vans and trucks heading down to Tennessee. He spent a week away from his family, for the first time in his life, and he had an amazing experience! Kyle loved it and made a ton of friends. He (along with the entire volunteer army from Keystone) helped make a huge difference in a family’s life and grew tremendously as a young man for the entire experience. Kyle learned skills of construction, he grew closer to Christ, and most importantly he learned the truth about Goliath: that he falls down quick and he falls down hard when you show the courage to stand up to him. As the old saying goes, the bigger they are the harder they fall.

Kyle_Griffin

Kyle (In Red) with his friend Griffin, just before departure.

In closing, I ask you the following:

What Goliaths are calling you and filling your life with self-depreciating thoughts?
What affirmations can you begin saying out loud to combat this merciless, yet truly powerless, foe?
What information can you tune into to prepare you for the battle?
Who can you count on to stand in your corner as an encourager in your life?
When will you begin?

Why not begin right now? Your brighter future is waiting. I’m cheering for you! Just like I did for Kyle. . .

Mike

Posted in Family, LIFE Leadership | 9 Comments »

LIFE Leadership: Wisdom For Families

Posted by Orrin Woodward on July 14, 2014

My good friend Michael Hartmann sent me the best message on how he applied some of the LIFE Leadership principles within his family. This is another example of why I believe the true successes in LIFE Leadership are not just the people who reach LIFE Coach levels. Rather, the true successes in LIFE and life, are those who seek wisdom everyday to improve themselves personally and professionally. For when a person improves themselves, he/she makes life better for everyone around them.

In the early days, Chris Brady, Terri Brady, Laurie Woodward, and I, once we realized what an impact the leadership training was having within our small community, made a commitment to never stop learning and growing. Regardless of the size compensated community, we believed becoming a person of character was job one. Imagine the national transformations if everyone sought to gain wisdom like Mike and Tonya Hartmann have to become better leaders in all areas of life.

Do you have a story to share how LIFE Leadership products helped you respond with more wisdom than the scripts you learned? If you do please share them with me. Who knows, you might be the next story featured on my blog. This is Part 1 and I will post Part 2 later this week. What an inspiring story!

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

The Mission

I have a hero in my life. His name is Kyle. He’s 14 years old stands 5’ 7” and weighs 115 pounds. Oh, by the way, he’s also my son.

Three weeks ago, Kyle was supposed to go on a mission’s trip to Copper Hills, Tennessee, through Keystone Community Church with the youth group and youth pastor. In a period of three months, Kyle raised over $300 in donations to cover his cost of his trip.

It was awesome to have Kyle find it in his heart to want to be part of a mission of higher purpose than I ever participated in when I was 14 years old. The opportunity to learn an incredible life lesson presented itself before the trip even began and is the inspiration for this blog. My profound respect for Kyle really comes from what happened the night before he left and how Kyle stood up to his greatest fear and how he learned a very valuable lesson that I’m sure he will carry rest of his life.

The Attack

I was out of town and leadership convention in Columbus, Ohio. My wife Tonya was with me but, due to an unforeseen circumstance, needed to leave early and was home Saturday night. I’m thankful that she was home because without her presence I don’t know how things might have turned out.

I called home at a break and talked with Kyle to see how he was doing. Tonya told me Kyle was really upset. He no longer felt excited about the trip. On the contrary, he was unsure of himself, trepid and anxious of the coming week.

I asked Kyle what was on his mind and out poured the unfiltered, emotion-filled dissonance:

“I’m quiet. I’m shy. No one talks to me. I have no friends. Please let me stay home. Please don’t make me go on this trip.”

Think back to time when you were 14 years old. That’s the onset of ninth-grade and, for all of us who survived those trying times of high school, you can probably empathize with how my son felt at this moment in time.

When feeling stressed, my natural reaction is one that was modeled to me from my father when I was an adolescent. Strict, straightforward, and blunt. There wasn’t much negotiation in the house in which I grew up. Maybe, some of the readers can relate to the“Because I said so” upbringing. This was my instant reaction:

“Kyle! You have been raising money for the last three months. We have been preparing for this very trip that entire time! The entire youth team and church leaders are expecting you to be there tomorrow morning. You need to suck it up, get a grip, and stop this doubt because you are going tomorrow. Make no mistake about it.”

Well, that went over as well as you can probably imagine. Kyle shouted back in the phone, “You don’t understand and you don’t care! I’m hanging up!”

And then he really did hang up.

The Turn Around

I immediately called back and Tonya answered the phone. My words were exactly this, “I think that went really well…”

To which Tonya replied, “What conversation are you a part of?”

I realized how insensitive and uncaring I was at that moment in time and asked to speak to Kyle again. While she was getting Kyle back on the phone, I meditated briefly and asked for wisdom & intercession, so that I would be able to share some of the leadership principles (that I have been studying for so many years) with my son to give him a different perspective and help him in his troubled time.

I started talking to Kyle and just offering perspective on what was truly happening here. I don’t know where you, the reader, may be spiritually, but here are some of our core family beliefs:

There is a God.
That very God created and calls each of us by name.
That we are meant for greatness.
That there are forces in this world that actively and constantly attack us and tear us down in order to stop us from achieving our true life mission and purpose.
Those very forces come out in full fury in the moments that we are about to accomplish some of our greatest achievements.

I shared the following conversation with Kyle to enlighten him on what was exactly was happening in his life:

“Kyle, you’re 14 years old and you are about to do something great. You are specifically going out to help a family in Copper Hills who, for whatever reasons, are living a life of poverty in this great nation. They need your help and it’s been on your heart for a long time to be part of this mission trip. What’s happening at this very instant is truly spiritual warfare. And you need to recognize it for exactly what it is: nothing more than a bunch of lies masquerading as doubt, fear, and worry.

“You see Kyle, you are about to accomplish something great. Something that you will look back on the rest of your life with pride and a sense of accomplishment, and the feeling and satisfaction of knowing that by your actions you made a difference in someone’s life.

“And what’s happening to you, right now, is you are under attack! These negative forces want to stop you dead in your tracks because they know that if you falter at this moment in time they will have secured a foothold from which to attack you and remind you of your ‘failure’ for the rest of your high school career and for the rest of your life. They want to prevent you from moving forward in a positive direction tomorrow and in the other opportunities you’re going to have in your future to make a difference.

David_Goliath

“At this very moment in time, you are facing your personal Goliath. And he looks big, and scary, and mean, and he is launching his insults and doubts at you. Your Goliath is shouting his lies at you and he wants to stop you right now. And here’s the real problem:You are listening. You are listening to the voices in your head that are calling you out, that are labeling you as someone less than you really are; that are creating a distorted reality which appears intimidating and it’s creating fear. You’re listening to the voice inside your head and that voice isn’t you. That voice is tripping you up before you get your foot out the door to do something great.

“And I promise you this: You can beat him. You can go to battle you can face your Goliath. And you will win. I know because I had to do this many times in my life. And every person who walks the earth needs to do this on a regular basis if they plan on accomplishing greatness with the time they’ve been given.”

I paused to let what I was saying sink in. I asked Kyle if he wanted to learn how to turn this around. Through a quiet voice, Kyle told me he did.

“This is how you go to battle: You need to stop listening to yourself and start talking to yourself. Action conquers fear. This Goliath is accusing you of being shy, of being quiet, of having no friends. He looks as if he is a giant and he’s intimidating. But I promise you this:Goliath is nothing more than a sheet of paper standing there with nothing behind his picture.

“You need to stop listening to yourself & start talking to yourself.”

“Kyle, you need to confront your Goliath. You need to be a man walk up to him and knock him over. And you do that by talking to yourself. You need to start using your mouth and your voice to silence his lies.

“Remind yourself right now that, ‘I am outgoing. I am funny. I make people laugh. People like to have me around.’

“Remind yourself how much your family loves you and that your mom and dad wouldn’t knowingly send you in an area that we knew would harm you. As a matter fact, I know only good will come out of this!”

“Kyle, start repeating those things out loud. That you are a winner. That you are a champion. That you have what it takes to go to battle and win! Kyle, you are 14 years old, a young man. You’re not a boy. And you’re not an adult yet. But God has placed you in our care so that we can help you along this battlefield and help you cross it successfully.

“I promise you this Kyle, from the bottom of my heart: If you choose to go to battle, you will defeat this Goliath and for the rest of your life you will remember tonight as the night where you learned one of the most valuable life lessons that you possibly can learn: You can battle Goliath and, when you do, you will beat him. Once you learn that lesson, your entire up-and-coming high school existence is going to be so much easier because this is so powerful.

“You can battle Goliath and, when you do, you will beat him.”

Posted in Family, LIFE Leadership | 31 Comments »

Western Civilization’s Debt Trap

Posted by Orrin Woodward on July 11, 2014

Western Civilization is in the midst of a life and death struggle with its monetary system. The financial elites have bound society with the most oppressive monetary system ever created, where over 90% of the money supply exists through debt. This is a recipe for disaster as people, companies, and governments at all levels are chronically insolvent.

Money Supply Explodes Without Gold Standard

While reform of the total monetary system is essential, individuals should not wait for global reform to begin household reform. Indeed, the best thing for each person to do is launch a financial revolution where he lives below his means and wipes out ALL of his debt. This includes student loans, car loans, and even mortgages. In the process of wiping out out personal debt, one also reduces the money supply created by that debt.

It’s really a simple, but not easy choice. Does society want products and services so badly that it will sell itself into debt-slavery in order to obtain them? Or, on the other hand, can society learn to apply the three keys to wealth to its finances by taking a longer term perspective, delaying its gratifications for trinkets, and start leveraging the effects of compounding to its benefit.

Sadly, our society does the opposite today by viewing everything in the short-term, desiring instant gratification, and having compound interest work against them. LIFE Leadership has committed to play its part in helping people, companies, and governments get out of debt by applying the proper principles of financial management. Indeed, it all starts with the individual. When a person decides to end his debt-enslavement, he becomes the model for others to follow. The Financial Fitness Pack has already helped thousands of people terminate their debt and it can help others do the same. Are you sick and tired of running out of money before running out of month?

The financial debt matrix is real and continues to grow. Ignorance only imperils one’s financial health. British monetary reformer Michael Rowbotham explained the effects of the debilitating debt system upon Western Civilization when he wrote:

The reason for all this monetary scarcity and insolvency is that the financial system used by all national economies worldwide is actually founded upon debt. To be direct and precise, modern money is created in parallel with debt. The reason for the failure of economists to question patently invalid monetary data becomes clear – there is a total acceptance by them of the most extraordinary method for supplying money to the modern economy.

The creation and supply of money is now left almost entirely to banks and other lending institutions. Most people imagine that if they borrow from a bank, they are borrowing other people’s money. In fact, when banks and building societies make any loan, they create new money. Money loaned by a bank is not a loan of pre-existent money; money loaned by a bank is additional money created. The stream of money generated by people, businesses and governments constantly borrowing from banks and other lending institutions is relied upon to supply the economy as a whole. Thus the supply of money depends upon people going into debt, and the level of debt within an economy is no more than a measure of the amount of money that has been created…

If a monetary system is invalid or flawed, then the entire economy is based on the mathematics of error, and must be riddled with the effects. If the financial system upon which our economies are built is defective, and yet monetary considerations dominate our economic decisions, should we be surprised if the results are less than satisfactory?

The major role played by bank credit, which forms over 95% of the money stock in most developed nations, suggests that it cannot but be implicated in these trends. This is further suggested by the way that banking has literally become the focal point of modern economic management, through manipulating interest rates. The stargazers of Whitehall and the Federal Reserve hold their councils, trying to tread the non-existent tightrope between growth and recession by debating quarter percentage-points of interest rates. Alan Greenspan, the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, engagingly describes his task in controlling the American economy through adjusting interest rates as a matter of ‘taking the champagne away once the party has started’. Businessmen around the world hold their breath, measuring his every word, wondering what he will decide. There could be no greater indictment of contemporary financial economics than this; that a fluctuating financial digit on a single computer system in a single street in a single country should have the ability to dominate the economies of an entire planet…

The past thirty years are almost unique by comparison with the previous three centuries in the lack of attention that has been directed at debt and the financial system. Throughout the eighteenth century, there were repeated calls for reform. During the nineteenth century, excessive banking was held by many to be directly responsible for the waves of appalling poverty that swept Europe and America during a period of increasing industrialisation and agricultural development. In this century, during the depression of the 1930s, the financial system effectively seized up and brought virtual collapse to the economies of the world in an age which was, perhaps for the first time, obviously wealthy, and in which technology offered people real freedom as well as material prosperity. One observer judged that over 2,000 schemes for monetary reform were put forward at that time – all with a common theme in their outright rejection of the debt-based financial system as it then operated. The same system continues to this day, modified in small details, but unchanged in principle; and the recent financial crisis in Asia shows the potential for collapse still exists.

However the issue of economic volatility through booms, slumps, crises, and collapses has never been the sole point of criticism. It is the long-term trends that a debt-based financial system fosters which are most destructive. The most obvious of these is declining personal solvency. Mortgages support over 60% (£420 billion) of the money stock in the UK and over 70% ($4.2 trillion) in the US. Housing-debt statistics for the UK and the US show that there has been a dramatic decline in true home ownership as mortgages become higher and ever more widespread. There can be little question that relying upon housing debt to supply money to an economy lacks economic and political justification. However, taken in conjunction with the marked rise in commercial debt, mortgages have a knock-on effect. In an economy where the price of goods is elevated by commercial debt and consumer incomes are deeply eroded by mortgage debt, there is a persistent and subtle advantage given to low-quality, mass-produced goods, and growth is fostered in this direction. The persistent decline in product durability and the growth-culture of a rapacious consumer society can be directly traced to the debt-based financial system…

The more one explores the broad impact of debt, the more apparent it becomes that bank-credit constitutes a dysfunctional form of money. An economy based almost entirely upon bank-credit and debt experiences an intense drive for growth, regardless of need or demand. Bank credit engenders financial dependence, injects instability and fosters growth-distortions, both within an economy and throughout the international arena.

Reform of the debt-based financial system is clearly not a minor issue. It is not a matter of fiddling around with taxes, incomes and allowances to make things apparently more equal, more efficient, or perhaps more straightforward. Changing the debt-based financial system involves gradually altering the very foundations upon which national and international economics is based. Monetary reform is concerned with attempting to determine a new principle for the supply of money to an economy – the purpose being to create a supportive financial environment in which more constructive economic trends are allowed to emerge, and in which more benign systems of overall economic management become possible.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

Posted in Finances, LIFE Leadership | 19 Comments »

No Dream; No Guts; No Story

Posted by Orrin Woodward on July 7, 2014

Here is a short segment from the LIFE Leadership Summer Convention. Cinderella Man is one of my favorite movies because it is based upon the true story of James J. Braddock. Don’t tell me the size of your obstacles, tell me the size of your dream! Chris Brady, Tim Marks, Claude Hamilton, Bill Lewis, Dan Hawkins, and George Guzzardo have dreams that power them past their obstacles. How about you?

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

Posted in LIFE Leadership, Life Training | 10 Comments »

William Bradford on Property and Prosperity

Posted by Orrin Woodward on June 30, 2014

Private Property and Prosperity

And Justice For All

The right to private property, as I discuss in my recently released Guinness World Record breaking book And Justice For All: The Quest for Concord, is an essential part of a working civilization. Without it, injustice and apathy quickly destroy the Six Duties of Society productivity. This isn’t just my opinion, it has been proven over and over again throughout history. For instance, the Pilgrims (a Godly group of Puritan separatist) attempted a communal approach to land when they first arrived in Plymouth, The catastrophic results nearly wiped out the colony.

Why? Because people quickly discover that regardless of how much work they do, they share in the rewards equally. This causes a Gresham’s Law decline in productivity as everyone seeks to do the minimum possible. However, because few work under this plan, famine and hunger result. For the past 20 years I have studied the effects of of compensation upon results. LIFE Leadership realizes that in a Compensated Community, the rewards must follow those who do the work. In other words, private property reigns.

William Bradford, the leader of the Plymouth Colony discovered this for himself. In fact, he captured the challenge and response in his history of the settlement. Private Property is the only way that a person can reap what he has sown. If he does not work, he will not eat as Paul stated. Hunger, it seems, has historically been a great motivator for people to act. A modern equivalent is the statement that a timid salesperson has skinny kids. 🙂 If a person can eat without working, rest assured many people will follow Gresham’s Law and choose the same path.

Indeed, remember that someone always owns property. The choices are 1) private individuals with no monopoly of force or 2) the State with a monopoly of force. If feel much safer knowing private people own property, not only for the productivity gains, but also for the protection of liberty inherent within ownership. Private property tells the State to keep it hands off this private sphere. However, if the State owns everything then the peopler are merely serfs or slaves.

Leon Trotsky, the Russian communist, said as much when he cynically changed the Biblical admonition to work into “He who will not obey will not eat.” Simply put, allowing the State to own the land means the people are at the mercy of those in power. Therefore, those who hate private property inadvertently support oppression of the people and depression of the economy. Perhaps its time to learn from our Bradford’s history of the Plymouth Plantation.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward

All this while no supplies were heard of, nor did they know when they might expect any. So they began to consider how to raise more corn, and obtain a better crop than they had done, so that they might not continue to endure the misery of want. At length after much debate, the Governor, with the advice of the chief among them, allowed each man to plant corn for his own household, and to trust to themselves for that; in all other things to go on in the general way as before. So every family was assigned a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number with that in view, — for present purposes only, and making no division for inheritance, — all boys and children being included under some family.

This was very successful. It made all hands very industrious, so that much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been by any means the Governor or any other could devise, and saved him a great deal of trouble, and gave far better satisfaction. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to plant corn, while before they would allege weakness and inability; and to have compelled them would have been thought great tyranny and oppression.

The failure of the experiment of communal service, which was tried for several years, and by good and honest men proves the emptiness of the theory of Plato and other ancients, applauded by some of later times, — that the taking away of private property, and the possession of it in community, by a commonwealth, would make a state happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser than God.

For in this instance, community of property (so far as it went) was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment which would have been to the general benefit and comfort. For the young men who were most able and fit for service objected to being forced to spend their time and strength in working for other men’s wives and children, without any recompense. The strong man or the resourceful man had no more share of food, clothes, etc., than the weak man who was not able to do a quarter the other could. This was thought injustice. The aged and graver men, who were ranked and equalized in labour, food, clothes, etc., with the humbler and younger ones, thought it some indignity and disrespect to them. As for men’s wives who were obliged to do service for other men, such as cooking, washing their clothes, etc., they considered it a kind of slavery, and many husbands would not brook it.

This feature of it would have been worse still, if they had been men of an inferior class. If (it was thought) all were to share alike, and all were to do alike, then all were on an equality throughout, and one was as good as another; and so, if it did not actually abolish those very relations which God himself has set among men, it did at least greatly diminish the mutual respect that is so important should be preserved amongst them. Let none argue that this is due to human failing, rather than to this communistic plan of life in itself. I answer, seeing that all men have this failing in them, that God in His wisdom saw that another plan of life was fitter for them.

These matters premised, I will now proceed with my account of affairs here. But before I come to other things I must say a word about their planting this year. They felt the benefit of their last year’s harvest; for by planting corn on their own account they managed, with a great deal of patience, to overcome famine. This reminds me of a saying of Seneca’s (Epis. 123): that an important part of liberty is a well-governed belly, and patience in want.

The settlers now began to consider corn more precious than silver; and those that had some to spare began to trade with the others for small things, by the quart, pottle, and peck, etc.; for they had not money, and if they had, corn was preferred to it. In order that they might raise their crops to better advantage, they made suit to the Governor to have some land apportioned for permanent holdings, and not by yearly lot, whereby the plots which the more industrious had brought under good culture one year, would change hands the next, and others would reap the advantage; with the result that manuring and culture of the land were neglected. It was well considered, and their request was granted.

Every person was given one acre of land, for them and theirs, and they were to have no more till the seven years had expired; it was all as near the town as possible, so that they might be kept close together, for greater safety and better attention to the general employments.

An excerpt from Bradford’s History of the Plymouth Settlement; 1608-1650, by William Bradford, rendered into modern English by Harold Paget and published in 1909, originally titled Of Plymouth Plantation, reprint by Mantle Ministries: San Antonio, TX, 1988, pp. 115-116, 141-142.

Posted in Freedom/Liberty, Leadership/Personal Development, LIFE Leadership | 13 Comments »

LIFE Leadership Breaks Guinness World Record!

Posted by Orrin Woodward on June 25, 2014

And Justice For All

When Ken Dunn (CEO of Next Century Publishing) informed me that Sammy Lee from Hong Kong had shattered the old Guinness World Records by signing 4,649 books during one book signing, I was impressed. For the previous mark was mid-2000’s and he nearly doubled that amount. Shortly afterwards, Chris Brady suggested that maybe we could break Lee’s world record with the release of my new book. I knew it would demand world-class levels in the process, people, and perseverance, but also knew LIFE Leadership was up for the task.

However, I didn’t just want to break the record, I wanted LIFE Leadership to smash it by topping 6,000 books signed. Of course, this wouldn’t be easy, especially when one considers that Mr. Lee took over 11 hours to sign 4,649 copies of his book. There is no way that I could sign 6,000 copies of my new book And Justice For All at that pace and still speak later in the day. Accordingly, if LIFE Leadership truly wanted to break the Guinness World Record, an interdependent leadership strategy was needed involving people, processes, and perseverance. In other words, not just working hard, but working smart was in order.

The people portion was the area I was least concerned about. With tens of thousands of active members and customers, I knew the people needed to break the record would be in attendance. However, it wasn’t just the number of people, but the quality of the people that made the difference. The LIFE Leadership Convention is filled with people trained on the best leadership information provided on a monthly basis. I believed the people would “buy into” the record-breaking strategy and discipline themselves to get their book signed quickly with few delays. Remember, time was of the essence because even at just 10 seconds per book, to sign 6,686 books would have required over 18 1/2 hours! No way could I have done that and still fulfilled my other responsibilities.

Guinness World Record Holder

This forced LIFE Leadership to develop a process to hit the 6,000 plus book signing target and do so in under 10 hours. This had never been done before. Undeterred, Chris Brady, Rob Hallstrand, and Michelle Turner planned a process to do what until that day had been impossible. These three studied the constraints in the people and process to improve the book ordering process. From the queue to order the book, to the line to get the book signed, to how the books were placed in front of me, everything was simply world-class. To say that the process achieved its goal would be an understatement. In fact, the old record was broken in under 4 1/2 hours without even taking a break.

Finally, the small part I played in the record was perseverance to serve the people and follow the process. I made a vow at the start of the signing to not remove myself from my chair until after the record was broken. Given the length of time required to break the record previously, I knew my bladder would probably be the weak link. 🙂 Nonetheless, by believing in the people and the process, I sat down and did not move until I had signed over 5,000 books. Even though I was legally allowed 5 minutes every hour that I could break to eat, drink, or use the bathroom, I wanted to beat the record without the luxury of a break.

After my first break, we pressed forward and blasted past 6,000 books on our way to our final count of 6,786 total books signed. This was a team effort and I would like to personally thank everyone involved. First of all, the people who disciplined themselves to follow the process flawlessly. Second, the office personnel for developing a world-class system to break the record. And third, a special thanks to Marc Militello, Neal Ruffner, and John Croyle for making the process fun and orchestrating the process and people through the line at record breaking speed. The Guinness World Record could not have been broken without your efforts.

Last, but not least, I would like to thank Michael Empric, the adjudicator from Guinness World Records, for investing his day in certifying the proceedings. Michael was a treat to work with and said this about LIFE Leadership’s process and people, ““What people often forget is the scope of organizing and coordinating a record attempt this large. The number of people in line was almost like being at a theme park, except instead of Space Mountain, all of these people were waiting in line to buy a book and have it signed by Orrin.” Michael went above and beyond by personally presenting the Guinness World Record plaque on the LIFE Leadership stage in front of a packed out Columbus arena. That was the perfect culmination for the record breaking day as it was a team victory.

LIFE Leadership Crowd – June Convention

In closing, leadership is the art of building belief. When people believe on the inside, a previously impossible task becomes possible. In this case, the impossible became possible once leaders believed and then developed the people, processes, and perseverance to finish. All of this, of course, inspired by the power of the dream. LIFE Leadership’s Guinness World Record performance proves that it is among the best of the best in the leadership field today. I am a blessed man to be associated with such a fine group of leaders on our way to changing the lives of millions of people.

Sincerely,

Orrin Woodward