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Announcement 1: The Secret Life Of Michael Ross

Thanks for your interest.

Generally, I'm a private person inasmuch as very little of what is my Private/Home life is made available to other people. This was even remarked upon by one of my second grade teachers who told my parents "I know nothing about you because Michael doesn't talk about his home life."

And I could quite happily continue on doing what I am doing now, without mentioning what you are about to see. But I was thinking about what you're about to read and realized some of you - maybe even many - might be able to Benefit in some way. Because there is an important message in this. Several actually.

Back in January 2006 I was the owner/manager of multiple Offline businesses. And I Hired others to do the work while I ran the show, just as I mention in The Art of Leverage.

In July 2007, 18 months later, I no longer own those offline businesses, live in a different city and am Doing things that hadn't crossed mind 18 months earlier. In fact, if two years ago you'd told me, "In two years time you'll be doing X" I would have laughed at you.

So what am I doing now?

First, a little Why about the journey.

Back then (Jan 06) I decided to Ramp Up my real estate investing - interest rates were good and prices had flatlined for a while. And after a chat with my bank's Loan Manager we came up with a way that I could borrow more money for real estate investing Without Needing to show them 2 years worth of tax returns - SOP when lending to business owners in Australia. All I would have to show him was 3 payslips from a job! Even if I quit the job Immediately after getting the loan approval, he said, just 3 payslips would get me the money I wanted to invest with. He didn't care what I did for money After the loan was granted, only before.

So I started to look for a job. I had criteria. It had to pay high enough to Service what I wanted to borrow, and I had to be able to do it Without Needing Additional Education - such as a degree.

The search revealed to me that to get the Type of job I was after All employers asked for a Blue Card - a State Govt card which signifies you have sat through a Workplace Safety Course. Then, Employers wanted employees to have one so if something goes wrong and they Injure themselves the employer is Not Liable because the employee should have known better - as Proven by the Blue Card they have. (Such cards have now become Law in the industrial workplace.)

I didn't know where to get these cards so contacted someone I knew who I was certain had a card and knew where to get one. Turns out they were in another State helping build some Mine Infrastructure. They gave me the number of the person to call at the mine IF I wanted to work there, and also gave me the number to call for the Blue Card. And that was that, so I thought.

While waiting for the Blue Card Course date to come around I began Running The Numbers of working At the mine Building Infrastructure. The numbers Looked good. My wife and I chatted about it and agreed that IF I was accepted we'd move to another state. And so I applied - knowing it was highly unlikely due to the Govt rules and conditions of the permit to build which said the operation had to hire nearby Town Locals first, nearby city locals second, state locals third and out-of-staters last.

Apart from the numbers, I found it appealing because it was a chance to be involved in a Creation Process and the Epitome of the Capitalism system and the achievement of human beings. To you it may be just a building - but - to me it is proof positive of our wonderfulness and our creative abilities as man because no other creature we know of can do what we can do.

And even though it was unlikely I'd get the call, the decision we came to was an important one. Because it meant, Mentally we had Let Go of our Business and Social Interestsin living in that city.

The question now was, what to do with the businesses? Sell them? Shut them down and walk? Give them to the Workers? Hire someone to do what we were doing? Because if the Go Ahead was given we'd only have a Short time to act.

With hiring another person to run the office in our absence, the hiring, to me, would become counter-productive unless I could increase revenue. But increasing revenue was counter productive to staying.

And even though I wasn't DOing anything and was still making money, there are things to deal with. Did I want to add another person into the mix to keep things going while I was in another state and be an absentee business owner for a prolonged length of time? The answer was "no".

After a stint of Business For Sale we got fed up dealing with flakes and shut them down, just like that! I sent out a letter to all customers letting them know we could no longer help them and gave a date and was done with it.

I'd taken this step because the businesses were keeping us tied to the location - physically and mentally. And loss of Goodwill/Built Up Value was worth the Release.

So here I was - By Choice - No Offline Business Income and No Job Income. Some people who knew what I was doing told me They wish they had the Courage to do what I did. But I don't think it takes courage. It takes something else. Can you figure out what?

What were my downsides? I'd eventually eat through the money I'd saved and go on welfare. And in a worse-case scenario there are Charity Food Vouchers, Housing Assistance and so on. All the downsides are covered. But getting to them would be a Lo-o-o-ong way off. Plenty of time to find something.

So while I was contacting different employers and learning what it was like to be a job-seeker, I decided to Upgrade my skills. And since this started, while working and between work over the last 18 months, have acquired the following skills...

=> Dogman - attach the lifting slings to a load and guide the crane where to put the load, using hand and whistle signals and two-way radio.

=> Basic Rigger - erect steel structures.

=> Intermediate Rigger - erect concrete panel structures and latticework cranes and tower cranes.

=> Advanced Rigger - erect anything with wire cables involved (theater lights and backdrops, flying foxes, wire-braced cranes, communications towers, etc.), demolition rigging, suspended and hanging scaffolds.

=> Boomlift - workman's platform/bucket on the end of a telescopic arm.

=> Scissor Lift - workplatform which goes stright up and down.

=> Forklift (electric, diesel and all terrain) - need I say more.

=> Skid Steer Loader (bobcat / drott) - these are the small earth moving machines a lot of landscapers use. A Drott is much bigger, almost like a bulldozer.

=> Front End Loader - the machines with the big bucket on the front used for scooping dirt and other material.

=> Excavator - mainly used to dig holes and trenches. Has a bucket on the end of a long arm.

=> Truck License (open, "crash gear box") - this is currently a work in progress. The instructor told me on Thursday, if I keep this up I'd only need one more lesson.

And since my Journey started I've stripped out and demolished offices and buildings, replaced entire roofs on government buildings in a weekend, worked on high-end residential developments (million dollars plus per condo) and a range of smaller jobs between - built internal fire-escape stair cases, built an 11 meter high fire-retardant drywall 3 sheets thick, installed ceiling grids, dug plumbing trenches, jackhammered bathroom floors in a 40 storey office building, etc. With the latest one being to help build a new bridge in the city - a project which will go to 2011. Here's the project's website http://www.gatewayupgradeproject.com.au and here's a couple of photos I took the other day. Photo 1 is where I was working bolting together the steel formwork frame and Photo 2 is looking back from the edge of the car park which is as big as a football field. The second bridge is being built next to the existing bridge and will be identical to it. (Photos taken around 5.00pm after most everyone else had knocked off for the day.)

The thing with this Chosen Path is, work (and thus income from one source) is NOT guaranteed. Some companies do put on people FullTime. But most people are hired as Casual for the duration of the project or the duration of their work within the project (once the steel formwork is built riggers are no longer needed, once the piles for the pylons have been driven the pile drivers aren't needed, etc.). And it needs to be that way otherwise a company could go bust paying wages to staff who are sitting around idle waiting for the next project. So you could think I have No Security. But I think otherwise.

I am Free - not Married to a job. And can Walk from any project at any time - and have done so. Because in this Field, contacts are Gold. There is Always someone who knows someone who's hiring. And every project you go to you make new contacts. And there are companies who supply people to the Principal Contractor, so you can work on a project through them even if you can't get on the Principal Contractor's books for the project.

If you'd told me 2 years ago that 2 years down the track I will have been In Charge of dual crane lifts (two cranes lifting the same load at the same time), replaced entire roofs, been balanced 40+ feet in the air maintaining a roof truss, demolishing and stripping out buildings and helping build a bridge with a 300 year lifespan, I would not have believed you.

I have shared this because there are Important Lessons (at least 9) in what I've done over the course of the last 18 months and shared here. And while I could Spoon Feed them to you, I think it Better if YOU Think about the above and tell Me what the lessons are.

Michael Ross