How to Better yourself

Do Not Be Lazy When Bettering Yourself

Betting yourself is not easy work. The process of changing who you are is not a quick-fix; it is something that must be done over time. You cannot do this overnight, but you have to take time and follow a long personal journey. It takes time, it takes effort and it is not something you can do if you are not driven to do so. Changing yourself involves a lot of work, and you cannot be lazy. If you are lazy when you try to better who you are, you will not better who you are. You may think that you are bettering yourself, but you are not. You are just changing your perception of who you are, but not actually changing who you are. Being driven is an integral part of bettering yourself, and you cannot be lazy with it.

Here are some ways that you can do to ensure you stay driven with bettering yourself.

1. Don’t push yourself too hard. If you are trying to lose weight and you decide to go to the gym every day, you are going to push yourself to hard. This will result in you becoming lazy because you won’t want to do it anymore. A better solution is to go to the gym three days a week. That way you will be able to lose weight, while not pushing yourself too hard.

2. Make good goals for yourself. When you have goals, you have guideposts that you can achieve. The thrill you get from achieving a goal will ensure that you do not become too lazy with bettering yourself. The only thing here is you do not want to make goals that are unrealistic; otherwise you will get lazy and not achieve them.

3. Be accountable to others. If you are accountable to others, and if you have told people what your goals are, they will keep you from failing. They will ensure that you are going to achieve them and that in itself will keep you from becoming lazy. We all want to show others that we will be able to achieve something that we say we will achieve. When people think that you are going to fail, you want to prove them wrong. If they are watching you, you will make sure that you achieve what you said you will and that will keep you from becoming lazy.

Being lazy when you are trying to better yourself is the worst thing you can do for yourself. You will decide it is too hard to better yourself and you will not want to get up in the morning and meet your goals. The minute you become lazy with personal development, you have failed in your tasks. Laziness is one of the biggest killers in the world. Laziness keeps people on the couch, away from exercise, it keeps people from achieving things and it leads to many diseases. You do not want to have yourself fail because you were lazy, that is embarrassing.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the Simplepersonaldevelopment.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to Ahmed Dawn Dot Com. This article originally published on the above website on May 8, 2011

Amazon Canada Rewards MasterCard Fails to Attract Customers

Amazon Canada Rewards Credit Card Review

If you find this review or any other review on AhmedDawn.com or YouTube.com/ADawn different than 99% of other sites online, you got that right. The reason being, those other sites are working for the credit card companies, selling credit cards, and making money off you by providing affiliated links and dishonest, sugarcoated information.

My reviews are non-affiliated, unbiased and honest and I do not accept money or work for credit companies.

Amazon Canada recently launched a credit card issued by MBNA TD bank. There were lots of expectations, but this card failed to meet them. If you remember the old Amazon Chase Canada Visa Credit Card that was discontinued in early 2018, it was everyone’s favourite because of its zero foreign transaction fee feature.

The new Amazon Canada Rewards MasterCard offers 2 different rewards structures. If you are an Amazon Prime member, you get:

- 2.5% return on Amazon online and physical stores, such as Whole Food Markets, and 2.5% on foreign transactions.

- 1.5% return on everything else.

If you are a non-Prime member, you get:

- 1.5% return on Amazon online and physical stores and

- 1% return on everything else.

There are some other benefits, such as 90-day purchase assurance coverage, extended warranty, and trip interruption coverage.

It does not have any annual fee, points caps or expiration for points earned. Every 2,000 points earned will automatically give you a credit on your Amazon account for a $20 Amazon.ca gift card.

As you can see, the Amazon Canada Rewards Credit Card is a mediocre credit card that offers no value and there is no keep to make this card your daily card for any reason.

You can easily get a 4-5% return on Amazon purchases by purchasing gift cards (and using it on Amazon) from grocery stores with one of those cards that offer 4-5% return on groceries.

Although the Amazon Canada Rewards Credit gives 2.5% return on foreign transactions to offset foreign transaction fees for Prime Members, you will end up earning no additional returns on them. There are other credit cards that offer zero foreign transaction fee plus some returns. You can find these cards on my channel in the credit card section. 

Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this card to anyone, even if you are an Amazon Prime Member. Your best option to earn a higher rate on Amazon purchases would be to use a high-earning 4% to 5% card to buy Amazon gift cards from grocery stores and use them on Amazon.

You can watch my video on Amazon Canada Rewards Credit by visiting the link.

Inside The Waitomo Glowworm Caves | New Zealand Travel

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 9

Once I reached the waiting area before the entrance to the Glowworm caves in Waitomo, I lined up and waited with my group to enter the caves. There was a slight delay because the group before us had to finish before we entered.

The tour guides, all of them, looked like students but they all knew their stuff and were very well organised. After waiting about 20 minutes, it was our turn to enter the caves. What made me unhappy was that no sort of photo or video was allowed inside the caves. Not even without flash or with a video camera. They were selling their own high-priced photos inside, which I decided to not take advantage of.

The caves were cold and dark. There were lights to see the whole place and it was divided into sections. The ceilings were wet and the walls had water or moisture dripping. The limestone pillars and columns were wet too and their weird straight, bent, or twisted shapes felt like miracles of nature.

It felt unreal to see something that nature created in 30 million years, but could be broken by humans in seconds. And in many parts in the world, sites like these are not well preserved and humans are always destroying them.

To see the glowing of the caves, all lights had to be turned off and then another miracle unfolded. It felt like thousands of tiny lamps placed inside these rocks making them glow. The luminescent light these worms radiate is really fascinating.

We moved further underground where there was a jetty-like platform and there were cables and boats to ride and watch the glow from an even closer angle. While riding the boat on the underground Waitomo River, it felt like I was looking at a sky of living lights created by these tiny glowworms.

Tour guides used cables to hold and push the boat forward very slowly. The boat ride was not too long, but the experience was full of excitement and it felt like everyone forgot to breathe while trying to grasp the beauty of nature.

Once we made it to the meeting point outside, we went back to our tour bus. There was still about 15 minutes before the bus left for Auckland, so I took this opportunity to shoot some videos and pictures in front of the reception area.

This was the last item on the itinerary for that day. I will be heading back to Auckland from here, which will be approximately 2.5 to 3 hours on the tour coach.

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 1

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 2

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 3

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 4

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 5

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 6

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 7

New Zealand Travel Blog: Part 8

A Dawn Journal - A Top American Financial Blog

Reach Extends Beyond Canada And Gains Pan-American Recognition

First Published: August 24, 2009 ADawnJournal.com

Despite being based in Canada, A Dawn Journal has won the approval of one of America’s most widely recognised blogs. It is quite an achievement to be able to say that Efinancialblog.com, a widely respected and admired blog recognising the best financial writing in the US, has respectfully invited A Dawn Journal to take part in its “America’s Top Financial Bloggers” campaign of recognition, highlighting posts and blogs with accurate and well-written financial content. Efinancial Blog itself states that it is looking to spotlight the web’s best financial writers, so to gain their recognition feels like no small achievement.

Although Canadian finance is the specific remit of A Dawn Journal, it is true to say that good content is recognised as such wherever it comes from. The problems currently faced by families and businesses on the North side of the border differ very little from those which the United States currently faces. However, anyone will tell you that it is harder for a Canadian to gain recognition in the United States than vice versa, and for this reason it is very gratifying to be recognised in this way. Why has this happened? Well, it would be presumptuous to assume that one knows the minds of experts, but the simplicity and truth of the financial advice posted here means it can make an impact on anyone who shares our concerns about the financial climate of the day.

Although this is a Canadian blog (and very pleased to be able to say so) it has recently been noticeable that the number of global visitors has risen recently. There can only be one reason for this: readers understand and agree with the content written here. It is timeless and transcends national borders. Although there are always going to be differences from one country to the next, our differences are not what define us – our similarities are. An interest in finance is all the more relevant and essential at the present time, as we will all have financial questions to deal with the longer the financial turmoil continues. Being able to read simple yet intelligent financial advice and information helps us all deal with the important issues and questions we face.

So it seems quite reasonable and self-explanatory that this blog is becoming a regular read for an increasing number of people not only in Canada (which is still the essential focus of the site and a hugely valued readership) but also further afield. It is not only in America that this blog is read and followed, and it is hoped that this recognition from the US financial blogging community will not be the last. Financial information and news has now become a major priority even for a number of people who would not previously have paused on the financial pages for long before turning to seemingly more interesting information. For as long as people want to read important financial stories and get a no-nonsense, measured response to the issues, A Dawn Journal will be here to fulfil a need.

How To Be Confident

Where Can You Get Confidence?

In your tool chest of items that will allow you to develop yourself personally, confidence is one of the most important tools. With confidence, you will be able to tackle the challenges that come your way, but the thing is, you can’t just get confidence. You need to work for confidence and it is not always easy. Sometimes you may not think confidence is coming, but any doubt you feel is hurting your confidence. You need to get rid of doubt because it is what is going to hold you back. Confidence cannot exist if you have doubt, and these are the ways you not only get rid of doubt, but increase your confidence.

1. Make sure the people around you give you confidence. By having people who believe in you, you will begin to believe in yourself. They will tell you the things you are doing right, things you need to improve on, but most of all they will tell you exactly what you need to hear. That is why having a good group around you can give you confidence.

2. Confidence comes from pushing yourself to try new things. One of the ways you can do that is to get out of your typical comfort zone. If you don’t usually go out at night, start going out at night and pushing yourself to talk to people. If you are shy, be outgoing, if you are outgoing, be shy. Whatever you have to do to make things different, and to push yourself, will give you confidence when you need it.

3. Get inspiration from others. There are many people who have gone through bettering themselves, and they have a story to tell. Go to your local library and get biographies on individuals that you admire. Read about their challenges and how they overcame them. This will help give you confidence because you will see that others have gone through the exact same thing and achieved great success.

4. Talk to yourself whenever you begin to have doubts. Go to a mirror and talk to yourself, have conversations with yourself and compliment who you are. This may seem like an odd thing to do but you know yourself, you trust yourself and you will be able to push up your confidence just by talking to yourself. It is a very good technique that is used by actors, politicians, generals and more because you are speaking directly to yourself and making yourself confident. It works, trust us.

Being confident is very important in anything you do. When you are confident, you will not doubt your decisions and your confidence will help others believe in you. That then allows you to build up your confidence even more. Confidence is your best friend when you are bettering yourself, and it will keep you pushing yourself to become a better person. All you have to do to be confident is to use these tips and begin to change your life today.

To streamline and minimize blog maintenance, I will be discontinuing maintaining the Simplepersonaldevelopment.com website (however, I will still hold the domain). I will gradually move all articles from this site to Ahmed Dawn Dot Com. This article originally published on the above website on April 10, 2011