In 2003, my list of greatest achievements was published in a personal growth and development book called Secrets of the Young and Successful.

Here it is, with a few updated “achievements” that have happened since 2003:

1.     In my second grade reading improvement class, everybody graduated but me.

2.     In grade school, I was always bullied and teased about my speech improvement, my height, and my big ears.

3.     Struggled studying, received a 1.8 GPA my freshman year of high school.

4.     Dysfunctional Household—Father and Mother divorced at age 8 without any communication within my family.

5.     I was humiliated and embarrassed at my high school graduation when, in front of 3,000 people, I froze at the podium, unable to speak as I was presenting an award to our school principal.

6.     I was denied acceptance into all but one university to which I applied; Arizona State University accepted me just under the wire.

7.     I was denied admittance into all fraternities during my freshman and sophomore years at Arizona State University.

8.     The woman I was going to marry left me, when to Colombia, met another man, and married him.

9.     Spend more than $1.5 million on a television infomercial, which failed to have a single week of profitability in the two years that it ran.

10.  Mortgage income dropped 92 percent in 12 months.

Let’s look at a couple of these personal growth and development “achievements” …

The woman I was going to marry left me, went to Colombia, met another man, and married him.

This was a personal growth and development achievement—and it was perfect—because today, I’m married to Lily, and I have three amazing kids. Thank God my college girlfriend left me. It was perfect,

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As I wrote in an article on Friday, even those who are back at work are not necessarily doing so well: only 7 percent of those who lost jobs after the financial crisis have recovered their income and standard of living. What’s more, the downturn and its aftermath have disproportionately hit people with less education. Even though the unemployment rates of high school dropouts and graduates have fallen from recent highs, they are still much higher than the rate for college graduates.

The Labor Departments jobs report for November, released Friday morning, also shows that the number of employed high school graduates actually fell by 187,000 over the last 12 months, while the number of employed college graduates has gone up 1.1 million during the same period.

Nevertheless, readers have pointed out that even among the college-educated, there is one cohort that is still feeling more pain: older workers. More than half of all unemployed workers 45 to 54 years old have been out of work for six months or more, and among unemployed 55-to-64-year-olds, close to 60 percent have been searching for work for more than six months.

People in the older of these two groups are worse off than they were a year ago. T

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HARGREAVES Lansdown,Britains biggest fund broker,has never been a fan of investment trusts.

The firm religiously excludes them from its influential list of fund recommendations, known as the Wealth 150. The only fundsthat make the gradeare all unit trusts or open-ended funds. Why? Sceptics might say the answer is that unit trusts pay commission toHL and the likes, whereasinvestment trusts (usually) dont.

Investment trusts dohave problems, such as the discount betweenthe traded priceand the underlying assets value; or the fact that they are sometimes not easy to trade.AndHLs investment analysts are quick to point these out as reasons whythe trusts are not promoted. The firms founder, Peter Hargreaves, has gone further,claiming investment trusts are fuddy-duddy vehicles, doomed to die like dinosaurs.

So last year when asset manager Fidelity took the unusual step of launching an investment trust, as opposed to the more usual unit trust,it was surprising to see how aggressivelyHL promoted it.

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It may be hard to believe just how one couple could have amassed over $90,000 in credit card bills. Yet, Sue and Jerry Bailey did just that. In just about thirteen years the Jackson, Michigan, pair ran up $92,000 using 17 different credit cards.
Anyway, the married couple paid for two daughters’ weddings for a total of $10,000 and put both major car and home repairs on plastic, writes Connie Prate on www.creditcards.com. Well, as many of us have experienced, one bill led to another and another and, bang, there you are, over your head in crushing debt.

Mr. Bailey, a pastor, was in charge of his family’s finances; he did not let his wife know how much debt they were in. Mrs. Bailey, a nurse, stated, “’I never thought it [massive debt] would happen to me. It happens to other people. You feel kind of ashamed that you got there because you believe in paying your debt and paying what you owe.’”

It got so bad that the Baileys were afraid to get their mail, fearing threatening letters from collection agencies. They even checked their caller ID before answering the phone; if it was a bill collector, they wouldn’t answer.

So what is this award of which we speak? Sue and J

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One thing is for certain, bankruptcy is a brutal beast when it comes to your credit file. But getting a car loan after bankruptcy is one of the best ways to begin the rebuilding process to regain your borrowing reputation and qualify for other loans. In fact, once your bankruptcy has been discharged, you can pretty much apply almost immediately for a car loan. Let us take a look at what you can do to get the best rates on your post bankruptcy car loan.

Checking Your Credit Report And Score

Before you run to the car dealership, you should always check your credit report to make certain that all of your accounts are noted as discharged in bankruptcy. Oftentimes, your credit report following bankruptcy will still show open accounts when they should be noted as closed and discharged, which does harm to your credit rating. And since different car dealerships use different credit bureaus when they inquire about your credit, be certain that you contact all three major credit reporting bureaus to determine the accuracy of your credit file (Experian, Trans Union, and Equifax).

If your bankruptcy and accounts are not noted accurately, contact the bureau in question immediately to request that they update your record. Read more…

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