What is success? Not the dictionary definition, rather what does success mean to you? No one but you can define it, so what’s your idea of success? I believe that success is achieved by taking the actions, big and small, necessary to better yourself personally and professionally.

Is success a function of money? Not necessarily. While there are people that measure their success by the size of their home or investment portfolio, there are others who use very different benchmarks. It’s your success, it’s your definition.

When I’m coaching, mentoring or consulting with a client I want them to see the possible roadblocks or land mines, but I don’t want it to stop them from pursuing their dreams. It’s always better to walk into the minefield knowing where the mines are so you’re better prepared to handle them. It’s when you blindly rush ahead that you end up needlessly running into roadblocks.

The following are excerpts from my book, Your Attitude for Success! You can buy this directly from Amazon, though if you visit my website at www.shopalanberg.com and use the code 'promobile', you will get free shipping on this, and any of my other books.

Why do some people always find the worst in a situation when there’s so much good to be found if only they’d look? We all carry a 'victim card' in our pocket. Regardless of what’s going on I choose not to pull mine out. That’s my choice.

Isn’t it our choice how to see every situation? Of course it is. While I consider myself a glass-half-full kind of guy, this isn’t about being perpetually positive. I may be positive, but I’m also a realist. No Pollyanna here. You can’t just click your sequinned heels together and make everything alright. This is about understanding when you are and are not able to control your situation and then making the right choices and taking the right steps at that moment in time.

In my book, I share some stories from my own life and those of others, young and old, to help demonstrate this point. Please join me on a journey to a better perspective. I appreciate you coming along. After all, it’s your choice.

- It’s easy to take a woe-is-me attitude when facing a challenge.
- It’s so much easier to blame someone else, or something else for what’s happening to you.
- It’s the economy.
- It’s the weather.
- It’s a bad hair day (or bad hair decade - if you don’t know me it would help here to see my photo in my bio).

Not all that long ago, we were in the middle of the worst housing downturn in our lifetime. During the preceding housing bubble people were paying ridiculous prices for houses and now it had come back to haunt them. They were upside down on their mort-gages, owing a lot more than their houses are currently worth. But hold on, weren’t there winners in that same bubble? For everyone that paid too much for their house there was someone who made that sale, someone who probably made a handsome profit on that house. When did common sense go out of style?

My wife and I bought a two-bedroom townhouse, our first house, in 1986, at a time of very high interest rates. Out of necessity we took an adjustable rate mortgage. Interest rates were double digits back then so we needed an affordable option. What’s interesting now is that, in looking back, we had to qualify, not only for the initial mortgage payment at the teaser rate, but also for the highest payment the adjustable rate mortgage could reset to. That makes sense now and it made sense back then.

Of course we know that same logic