You are hardworking, loyal and fully dedicated to your company for many years.

One day … a pink slip suddenly slipped into your hands and the next moment you know, you are shown to the door.

You are shocked, angry and lost!

“How could it be!”

“Why me?”

Your heart cried out in pain and agony!

Anyone who experienced laid-off will overwhelm by bunch of unpleasant feelings – sad, disappointed, depressed, betrayal, frustrated, helpless and etc. Some were hit so badly that their lives were completely destroyed after the laid-off. Layoff is very common today especially during this gloomy economic period, almost everyone experience once or more layoff during his/her working life. What is most important is you know how to pick yourself up quickly after the laid-off so you can continue to survive and thrive. It may be difficult at a start especially when you haven’t get over the emotional turmoil but the longer you delay taking action, the more harm it can cause you so try the below methods to restore your life now. 

1. Accept with Courage
   Let yourself grieve about your layoff. Give yourself a few days to feel bad, mad, and sad about being laid off. Many individuals react to bad news with anger or depression. In such situations, it is important to let your feeling out so it would not cause damage to your health. Being laid-off should not make your self-esteem down. Job doesn’t define the worth of a person, and this won’t degrade you at all. Although perhaps you may feel embarrassed, fear and lost of your identity, accepting the reality with courage will definitely give yourself a reality check and help you come up with practical action plans. You are then ready to play the next set of games in your life. 
 
2. Stay Positive at All Times
   It is easy to lose confidence after the laid-off but it is critical to remain positive as it brings strength, energy and initiative to your life. Letting yourself fill with negativity will destroy your life. Positive and negative are like directions, it affects your actions so think like a winner and be a winner. If you find it hard to do so, take deliberate actions like watching motivational movies or reading motivational books such as the following:
   1. Staying Positive in a Negative World
   2. Music for the Mind: Positive Outlook
   3. The Be (Happy) Attitudes: 8 Positive Attitudes That Can Transform Your Life
   4. Laid Off & Loving It! How People Like You Conquered a Career Crisis
   5. Surviving a Layoff: A Week-by-Week Guide to Getting Your Life Back Together
   6. Laid Off & Loving It for 2010: Rebuilding Your Career or Small Business with Social Media’s Help

   Remember when one door shut, another opens, by remaining positive, you can find new opportunity amid crisis which may end up better than your last job. 

 
3. Talk About It
   Believe it or not, the best way to restore yourself back to normal is talk about your laid-off openly. Many people felt a stigma attached with laid-off and most prefer not to talk about it. Unknowingly, many employers today view layoff is due to business decision and not to individual performance so there is no stigma attached. Make sure you are aware of this so that you can talk about your laid-off openly, it can not only help to gain support and understanding from your family and friends faster but also help to cure your wounded ego quicker.
 
4. Do Things You Enjoy
   The most effective way of picking up yourself fast is to do things that you enjoy most as they will always bring you happiness and satisfaction. However if you run of things you enjoy doing, try the list below, they are not difficult to achieve and are great ways to boost your spirit.
   1. Get a good massage, bath and have a peaceful sleep.
   2. Watch a comical movie or listen to your favorite music.
   3. Try a new image and make yourself feel like a brand new person; get a new hair style, hair color, makeup or clothes.
   4. If you enjoy cooking and eating then cook yourself and your family a hearty meal and eat merrily.
   5. Go walking with your pets in the park or beach, the nature breeze will calm your mind and soothe your spirit.
   6. Learning new things like going for seminar, workshop and training to stimulate your minds and get inspired.

   I believe there are many more things you can do to make yourself better. Remember, don’t overdo anything, be nice and give more compassion to yourself.

 
5. Make Your Overdue To-Do List
   Make a list of things that you want or interested to do but did not have the time for it. For example, catch up with old friends who you haven’t seen or talked in a while. Bond with your family – create special moments with them such as watching movies or going for holidays.It is also a good time to devote some of your attention to your hobby or community. The former gives you pleasure in life and some people found a breakthrough in their life when they turned their hobby into a professional business. If you haven’t had time to help out in your community, take the chance to volunteer your services now. You might find new hope when your network expanded.Some people find that their laid-offs came at the perfect time to address health concerns. So utilize this period to go and visit your doctor, work out, eat healthy foods, and go for retreat. It gives yourself a time to decompress and be ready for the next chapter of your life.
 
6. Exercise
   Go outdoor, get some fresh air, sunlight and exercise. Research showed that exercise is a good form of mental stress relief as it will help you to stay refreshed and keep you motivated. In addition, exercise will produce endorphins in your brain and help you feel more positive about your situation and life. This doesn’t necessarily involve intense work outs, a simple walk in the park could lift up your mood. If you prefer, engage in some sports such as golfing, tennis, cycling, swimming, walking and dancing. These sports are good ways to help you relax and energize especially dancing; it is not only an excellent way to stay mentally and physically fit but also an excellent way to socialize, mix and mingle with new friends. Dancing is more pleasurable and entertaining than other sports, most importantly; it has therapeutic effect which can help you to recuperate faster.
 
7. Make a List and Take Action
   Make a list of the things that you have to do so that your mind is free of “overloading” and you are not overwhelmed with lot of messy tasks. Break the tasks into smaller chunks so it is achievable and organize them according to priority. Cross out those tasks once you have accomplished them as it will give you a sense of accomplishment and control. This is another effective way to gain back your confidence and help you organize your life.
 
8. Explore Other Opportunities
   You might not have many chances to expose to other opportunities when you were employed as most companies’ policies required you to fully commit to your day job. However, here is your chance now! You can explore other income-generating opportunities besides looking for job again. Consider self-employ by starting an online home business. It required minimum startup costs and has great potential to grow into a profitable business and eventually become your lifetime career. Online home business has many business models to choose from, you can always choose the one which the safest and quickest to start.
 
9. Join Support Groups
   Find and join unemployment support groups as they can help you to stay positive and keep you on the right track. Interact with those who are in the same boat and learn from their experiences. Exchanging thoughts and ideas can help you get motivated and get back on your feet faster. They can continue to uplift you and might even have connections which may lead to new jobs or business collaboration.
 
10. Manage Your Finances
    Managing finances at this moment could be the most challenging and daunting task but the earlier you get it sorted out, the earlier you can set yourself free. Tell your family about your laid-off honestly and ask for their cooperation to tie over during the difficult period. Cut down on unnecessary expenses by adjusting your lifestyles and habits, you will soon find that it is not that hard to survive with bare minimum.

The list is not exhaustive but acts as a good start for one who wanted to get over laid-off quickly. Hopefully this post can help you to overcome the emotional turmoil and bring you back to normal as soon as possible. Only those who bounce back fast will continue to flourish and succeed in their lives. Treat it as an experience; consider it as a part and parcel of working life, once you have adjusted your perspective, you will find it is not that hard to accept and you can continue with your life with more confident.

If you have better ways of picking oneself up after laying off, please share it in the comments below.

Have you experienced your blog being crawled by search engines but not indexed? You can check this out by using Google Webmaster Tool or other Analytics software. I had always no problem with installing new blog and got it indexed but unfortunately not this blog …

Blog is favored by search engines and it can almost indexed immediately in most search engines if there is good content. I remembered I had helped one of my clients to install a new blog with only one post and surprisingly, it was indexed the next day. That was the fastest record I ever had, I had tried installing other blogs for my other clients using wordpress and similarly, never encountered any indexing problem. However, I’m just clueless why I have no luck with this blog – ehomepreneur.com, it is already 4 months old but still not being indexed in any search engines. This kind of worries me as I’ve never experienced this before so for the last few months I was trying desperately all kinds of methods to get it indexed.

… Check my robot.txt
The first thing I checked was my robot.txt as I afraid I might accidentally block the search engine spiders without realizing it. I went through it line by line and there was nothing wrong. The most important line is the content and it is not blocked, it is stated as “Allow: /wp-content” so robot.txt is not the problem.

Result: No Change        Next Action: Go Next

… Set up Sitemap.xml using Google Webmaster Tool
Even though Google stated that submitting a sitemap.xml will not guarantee indexing but it definitely help to inform Googlebot about the structure of the blog and its updated pages easily. Hence setting up a sitemap.xml in Google Webmaster Tool is a must, at least by doing so, I know those pages which could be ignored or not discovered will be crawled again. I was able to get my sitemap verified but unfortunately there was still no pages indexed after checking back 2 weeks later.

Result: Failed          Next Action: Good Try!

… Submit Blog to Search Engines
I tried submitting the blog to major search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing and waited patiently for them to crawl my blog. However, after 2 months, it was still the same … nothing happened.

Result: Failed          Next Action: Try harder!

… Back Link from High Ranking Sites
It was said that having back link from other high ranking blog will help to boost one’s indexing. One of the fastest ways to do this is to leave comments on some high-profile broggers’ blog. When I checked back using “link:” operator in Google few hours later, it was successfully listed. I was delighted and thought it worked this time but I was wrong, none of the pages was indexed even after a month.

Result: Failed          Next Action : Not hard enough

Then one day ….
 
I was trying to install a new plugin and suddenly the word “Privacy” at the WordPress Settings caught my eyes, I realized I’ve not been checking this since I installed this blog. And guess what? The blog visibility was set to “I would like to block search engines, but allow normal visitors”. I almost fainted when I saw this. Immediately I knew this was the culprit, it had caused me fear and sweat for the last few months wondering why my blog was not indexed and this was it! I always thought that the default setting for the blog is “I would like my blog to be visible to everyone, including search engines (like Google, Sphere, Technorati) and archivers” as I had set up numerous blogs for my clients without any problems. I wish someone can tell me why? At that moment, I wanted very badly to bang my head against the wall for such a silly oversight. Two weeks later, I checked again on Google, Yahoo and yes, all the pages were listed now. This double confirmed that it was my silly mistakes.
 
So if you ever wonder why your blog is crawled and not indexed? Please do check your wordpress setting first. I hope you can learn from my mistake so you won’t have to make it and waste unnecessary time.

Last year, Young Entrepreneur published a list of Top 27 Self-Made Billionaires in its Self-Made magazine and no … this is not another post to talk about their secrets to become billionaire. As a home entrepreneur, if you look at the list carefully below, you will notice something interesting among them besides their ability to make massive wealth. What could it be?

1. Bill Gates (Microsoft)           
2. Warren Buffet (Bershire Hathaway)
3. Carlos Slim (Telmex)
4. Lawrence Ellison (Oracle)
5. Ingvar Kamprad (IKEA)
6. Takemitsu Takizaki (Keyence Corp)
7. John Sall (SAS Institute)
8. Li Sze Lim (R&F Properties)
9. Zhang Li-Guangzhou (R&F Properties)
10. Paul Allen (Microsoft)
11. Michael Dell (Dell, Inc.)
12. Peter Thiel (Paypal)
13. Abigail Johnson (Fidelity Investments)
14. Ann Cox Chambers (Cox Enterprises)
15. Rosalia Mera (Inditex-Zara-Retail)
16. Yelena Baturina (Inteco)
17. Giuliana Benetton (Benetton)
18. Oprah Winfrey (Harpo Productions)
19. Chu Lam Yiu (Huabao International Holdings)
20. Margaret Whitman (eBAY)
21. Mary West (West Corp.)
22. Joann JK Rowling (Harry Potter Books)
23. Weili Dai (Marvel Semiconductor)
24. John Arnold (Centaurus Energy)
25. Xiaofeng Peng (LDK Solar)
26. Shivinder Singh (Ranbaxy Laboratories)
27. Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook)

Name: Warren Buffet
Company: Berkshire Hathaway
Net Worth: $37 billion

Nebraska, USA. At a very young age, Warren Edward Buffet displayed great ability with money and business. As a newspaper delivery boy he used his earnings to buy a pinball machine, placed it in a barber shop which eventually grew in a profitable business, owning two more at different locations.

In 1951, Buffet took his M.S. in Economics at Columbia University. His career started as an investment salesman for Ben Graham (Graham-Newman Corp). In 1956, Graham retired while Buffet founded Buffett Partnership Ltd., an investment partnership with his sister and Aunt in his five-bedroom stucco house in Omaha. He managed his partnerships originally from the bedroom, and later, a small office where he spent his days analyzing and searching investment opportunities. Together with his increasing business, his life was beginning to take shape with his growing family-a wife and three children.

Through successful investments and partnerships, Warren Buffet was a millionaire by January 1962. In 2008, he ranked #1 in Forbes’ Magazine Richest People in the world. Today, 79 year-old Buffet serves as Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, a conglomerate holding company that oversees and manages a number of subsidiary companies, as he continues to influence the world of Economics.

Name: Ingvar Kamprad
Company: IKEA
Net Worth: $22 billion
 
Smaland, Sweden. He was born March 30, 1926 and showed entrepreneurial spirit at a young age by selling matches to his neighbors from his bike. Using his reward money from his father for his good studies, he started his furniture-selling company IKEA (Ingvar Kamprad Elmtaryd Agunnaryd) at 17. The store’s name is a combination of his name, the farm and hometown he grew up with. He continued to expand his business to a variety of goods, including wallets, watches, jewelry and stockings but focused on furniture by 1950’s.

Kamprad admitted to have dyslexia and was involved in Nazi group activism during his adolescence which he bitterly regrets. Today, he has over 200 stores in 31 countries but is still known to be prudent as he drives his 15 year old Volvo and flies with economy class.                                     

Name: Michael Saul Dell
Company: Dell, Inc.
Net Worth: $12.3 Billion
Texas, USA. He was born on February 23, 1965 and was seen to have incredible business instincts at a young age. Multi-billionaire Michael Saul Dell made his first $1,000 at the age of 12 by selling stamps.  Having built his confidence as a salesman, he sold newspaper subscriptions to newlyweds and him $18,000 dollars for himself to buy a car.

At 15, his parents his first computer and disassembled it just to know if he can rebuild it. His ingenuity led him to a profitable business where he would order computer parts at a cheap price, assemble it and sell directly to his customers in his own dorm room at the University of Texas. He dropped out of school at 19 to focus on his company PC’s Limited (now Dell, Inc). At 27, he was the youngest CEO of a Fortune 500 company. Today, Dell is one of the most recognize brand in the computer industry.

Name: Rosalia Mera
Company: Inditex-Zara
Net Worth: $2.6 billion

A Coruña, Spain. She is a home-based entrepreneur turned millionaire. Founded in 1974, Inditex is now one of the world’s leading apparel manufacturers and also owns ZARA.

 
Name: Giuliana Benetton
Company: Benetton
Net Worth: $1.5 billion

Treviso, Italy. Born on 1937, Giuliana actually started the family fashion business. She used to knit sweaters and his brother Luciano would peddle in a bike to sell it under the label Tres Jolie. In 1965, together with her 3 brothers they started the Benetton fashion company which now manufactures clothing under the brand names United Colors of Benetton, Sisley, Play Life and Killer Loop. In 2006, the company reached $2.7 billion in sales.

Name: JOANNE “JK” ROWLING
Company: Harry Potter Books
Net Worth: $1 billion

Edinburgh, UK. Joanne Kathleen Rowling, the only billionaire author, had nothing but passion and sheer determination before to overturn her penniless living to multimillionaire status.

Although she graduated with BA in French and Classics, Joanne found herself in deep pit as a single mother struggling to raise her baby daughter living in a cold, mice-infested flat.

In 1990, the start of the sensational Harry Potter books was conceived while in train journey from Manchester to London. Six years later, along with several rejections, Joanne released her first book Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Her new found wealth was followed by numerous awards where in 2000, British book awards named her ‘Author of the year.’  She penned her last installment of the series in July 2007 that broke all time book sales records selling 9 million copies within 24 hours of release. In total, her novels were translated into 65 languages with more than 400 million copies worldwide.  Now at 43, she is happily married to Dr. Neil Murray with her son and two daughters.

 
Name: Mark Zuckerberg
Company: Facebook
Net Worth: $2 billion

White Plains, New York. Mark Elliot Zuckerberg is the youngest member of The Forbes 400 for founding an addictive social networking website: Facebook.

Zuckerberg started programming when he was in middle school. He also created a computer game (Risk), peer-to-peer communication software (Wirehog) and a music recommendation system that uses artificial intelligence (Synapse). As a Harvard student, he launched Facebook from his dorm room on February 4, 2004 which became an instant hit within the campus. He then decided to add other universities with the help of his roommate Dustin Moskovitz. He dropped out of college and moved to California where he met Peter Thiel, who invested in the company.

Facebook Inc. sold 1.6% stake to Microsoft Corp for $240 million. At the time of the sale, Facebook had a market value of $15 billion. In 2008, 25-year old Zuckerberg was named as one of The World’s Most Influential People under the Scientists and Thinkers category for his web phenomenon.

---

Out of 27 self-made billionaires, it is interesting to note that about 26% who have achieved massive wealth today were once a home entrepreneur. Their humble beginnings started either from home or in school dorm room – a place not only nurture for growth but also an incubator for successful business. They started small but had outgrown their home and part-time businesses into successful business empires today. If you ever doubt that starting a home business will lead to any success in the future, these billionaires are the real-life testimonials of what you could achieve. If you think that starting a business at home is less prestige then owning a proper office, think again, it is not where you start but rather where you end. A prestige office cannot guarantee you success but only your professionalism, attitudes and persistence will attract more business.

Successful entrepreneurs are not constrained by physical space but only the sky is the limit. From what these self-made billionaires have exhibited, if you have the creative ideas, passion and confidence, you will soon realize starting a business from home is not an issue. Outgrow your business one day from your home to massive wealth is possible if you know the right goal, strategies and tactics with the right product and services like those self-made billionaires had done. In addition, with the right doses of determination, persistence and patience, you are well on the way to the path of billionaire. My best wishes to all home entrepreneurs!

If you have watched James Cameron’s Avatar recently, most probably you were blown away by its spectacular 3D technology and visual effects. It was undeniable that James has demonstrated his ability as a talented director but what is important here is he has also demonstrated several essential entrepreneur traits to achieve phenomenal success.

1. Passion

This is probably the most fundamental trait that every home entrepreneur must have. Without passion there will be no success, at least your home business will not last long. James Cameron is passionate about his movies-making and because of his intense passion; he was able to overcome all hurdles and excel at what he is doing. As a home entrepreneur, you must develop burning passion with what you do so that you would love it, enjoy it and stick to it thick and thin until it succeed.

2. Patience

Nobody could be as patient as James Cameron when come to movie-making. James has waited unbelievably 15 long years just for the 3D technology to mature so that he could achieve his dreamed cinematic digital effects. Likewise, every home entrepreneur must be extraordinary patient when starting your own business especially during the startup phase. There are steep learning curves, uncertainties, criticism, lack of resources and support which could discourage you along the way. Many home entrepreneurs threw in their towels too early before they actually saw the results. It was said that a business must usually goes through 3-5 years before it can profit so having the extraordinary patience like James Cameron to see it through is the key to success.

3. Vision

James Cameron announced he would make Avatar after he had finished the blockbuster Titanic in 1996. However it was delayed due to the then under-developed visual effects technology. Since then, he already had the vision of what he wanted to achieve and he has made it today with amazing success. Every home entrepreneur must have a long-term vision of where you want to be in the future. You must be clear with what you want so that you will know what to pursue and where to go. A clear vision also help you to lay your foundation, framework and system in place, this allows you to work on your home business rather work in the business.

4. Creativity

Over the years, we had enjoyed fantastic movies like The Abyss, Alien, Terminator and Titanic – all thanks to James Cameron.  He is famous for his creativity and innovation as he has the ability to constantly generate new cinematic experience for his audiences. While not all of us can be as artistic creative as James Cameron but to every home entrepreneur you can be creative like him by doing old things in a new way or finding new solutions to old problems using limited resources. The more creative you are, the more ideas you can generate and the more success it can bring to your home business.

5. Perfectionist

He is often being labeled as a perfectionist and when responding to such label, his reply: “No, I’m a greatist. I only want to do it until it’s great.” Perfectionism can be a virtue when pursuing for excellence and mastery but at the same time it can also be a liability for growth and progression. Nevertheless, due to his perfectionism, James Cameron is able to set new standard in movie-making and raised the bar for his rivals. So for aspiring home entrepreneur, the only way to strive a balance is to evaluate the situation. In business, you need to manage multiple tasks and usually do not have the luxury of time and money so if you want perfectionism, leave it to the specialists.

6. Risk-Taker

James Cameron is well known as the biggest risk taker in the movie industry. Every film he made, he was trying to push the limit of movie-making technology. He was at high risk of losing the trust from his crews, producers and investors as each of his projects was too ambitious for them to achieve. Despite his high tendency of risk taking but James did not take risks blindly as he was very careful and done his research before embarking on every new projects. That explain even though his ambitious projects were risky but he seldom encountered any major accidents.

We learnt that even though risk taking is part of entrepreneurship but managing risk to minimum level is one of the good attributes that every home entrepreneurs must have.

Finally, I would like to share with you an interesting quote from James Cameron. It more or less summarized his philosophy towards working and what every home entrepreneur should possess.

“So my message is in whichever realm, be it going into space or going into the deep sea, you have to balance the yin and yang of caution and boldness, risk aversion and risk taking, fear and fearlessness. No great accomplishment takes place, whether it be a movie or a deep ocean expedition, or a space mission, without a kind of dynamic equipoise between the two. Luck is not a factor. Hope is not a strategy. Fear is not an option.” — James Cameron

As always, you are welcome to leave any comments and thoughts.