"Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great." Mark Twain

Anyone learning to do business online (it is a constant learning curve), will, I hope, find something of benefit here. At my business site, www.tucats-design.com, you'll find all the typical resources, but what of the more important and fundamental "tools" you need to get this show on the road?

Important, such as?

Oh, just little things like attitude, finding inspiration, nurturing your creativity, tenacity ... Simply, learning the secrets to realising your dreams and achieving the success you desire, without going completely nuts in the process.

You do have to find the inspiration, motivation and sheer discipline to work long hours, initially for very little return and without someone supervising you. But, if you can dream it (I am a real day-dreamer!), you CAN make it reality. I used to doubt that, but I have found it to be entirely true. I think you just have to want something enough then do something about it.

Wanting more is normal?

Why the question mark? Doesn't everyone want something better? Can they all have it? If we all got more, who would be left with less? (Normal, I can tell you, is just a setting on a washing- machine!)

Are there people who are as happy as pigs in the proverbial punching in at the factory 5 days a week, watching football at weekends, going to bed at 11 p.m. and not wanting more than that? Personally, I think not. There may be some who have not realised yet what their "more" is and there are lots who are afraid to try anything new, but I think deep down, we all want something we don't have.

It isn't always material things, but whatever it is, it is what keeps us striving. And because everyone's "more" will be as unique as the person themselves, then yes, I do believe that we can all have it: i.e. it is worth pursuing your ambitions, no matter how abnormal they may appear.

You'll face problems, overcoming them is the key

Yeah, that was obvious, wasn't it? You don't need problems, you need solutions and what you may forget is that most of them you already have -- right there in your own mind and attitudes. No, I'm not saying you have an "attitude problem", although I'll admit I've been told I have, many times!

Among the problems I have faced, and I imagine you have or will too, initially stem from needing to take what is virtually a "Leap of Faith" into unknown territory. I have done that to a foreign country and survived (not necessarily with my sanity intact, but alive enough to tell the tale).

If you announce your intentions work for yourself, especially on the net, I'll bet you last year's salary that someone in your immediate circle of family and friends will take a sharp intake of breath ... if they don't actually belly-laugh. Now if that isn't inspiration destroying, I don't know what is!

OK, they seem to think that us "normal folk" cant do this. You don't want to listen, but you hear them and some fears start creeping into your mind. What if they are right? Yeah, so what? Accept that YES, they could be, but don't let them project their fears onto you. That's them. They probably aren't prepared to put in the work, whereas, if you are reading this, we can presume you are -- and that's half the battle licked already.

Failure or learning? It's a question of attitude

Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover. - Mark Twain

Focus merely on doing what's right for you, now, (even if you suffer the consequences) for only you can regret not trying something if you choose and allow others to influence you to hesitate.

If at first you don't succeed ...

You will read statistics (and actually, they are not lies) that state only 5% of people will succeed. Almost none of them will do it on the first attempt. And this is where the 95% -- that the doubting Thomases above hold as being normal -- simply give up.

It's not because IT doesn't work, it's not because they couldn't have done it. They just didn't have that one elusive secret, quality or knowledge that the 5% do realise they have.

So what's the mystical secret that the 5% have?

Absolutely nothing more than the fact that they do not give up and they know they shouldn't. If their first ideas don't work, they learn why and go on to try something better. Again and again. They keep learning and they keep trying, for which they require inspiration, motivation and a large measure of tenacity. In my dictionary, failure is merely a sinister word that other people give to a natural learning-by-doing process. It ain't a big deal, it's no more than a knee-scrape in the scheme of things. Get back on that bike!

I've tried many things that didn't work for me, but I don't think I have failed, ever.

In fact, I have learned and I am still learning, but the two most important things so far are:

=> Finally, I am seeing results -- the ones that matter to me currently, ones that pay the bills => I am enjoying what I do at last instead of being an opressed wage-slave.

The motivation thus becomes self-fuelling. I am realising a dream.