Raphael Collazo's Blog

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard people say, “Raphael, I’d love to create more income streams, but I don’t have a good business idea.” The frequency with which I heard this phrase inspired me to dedicate a portion of this book to the subject. Although I won’t be sharing specific profitable business ideas, I’ll provide a framework you can use to vet these ideas and maximize the value you provide your customers. This technique is discussed in detail in MJ Demarco’s best-selling book T...

As you may already know, most businesses fail. In fact, according to the Small Business Administration (SBA) Office of Advocacy’s 2018, the failure rate for businesses within the first 5 years is more than 50% . Although your venture may not be a home run, you need to continue searching for opportunities to add value to others. Continuing to push through adversity and seeking to add value to others is the only way you’ll ever reach the level of financial success you’re after. Many of the most...

There are tons of personal finance books out there that will preach the idea of the “latte factor”. The premise of the idea is that the average cost of a Starbucks latte is around $4. Therefore, if you stop going to Starbucks each morning and make coffee at home instead, you will save around $120 per month and $1440 per year. Although I do agree that making this change will improve your saving rate, it’s not the most significant factor in how much you save each month. If you want to drastical...

We all feel pain at some point in our life. Pain can be either physical, mental, or spiritual and can have a substantial impact on our overall happiness and sense of wellbeing. One of the most difficult and painful events in a person’s life is experiencing the death of a loved one. The loss of someone close to you can leave you feeling empty, sad, and unsure about the future. I experienced these exact feelings when my grandfather passed away in 2013. I spent most of my formative years in Euro...

Raphael’s 2019 S.M.A.R.T Goals Organize a conference and/or event that brings in $30,000+ in revenue by June 15th, 2019. I will do this by attending at least 1 networking event per week and engaging with between 3-5 new people at each event. During this event, I will give my pitch and follow up with interested parties. I will speak at a TEDx event by August 15th, 2019. To do this, I will research local TEDx conferences happening within a 2-hour radius of Louisville and establish relationship...

Have you ever worked out or eaten a healthy meal and used it as justification to eat a few donuts or skip a few workouts later in the week? If you answered “yes” to this question, you’ve borne witness to the power of “moral licensing.” Moral licensing is a subconscious phenomenon whereby “someone’s increased confidence and security in their self-image or self-concept makes them worry less about the consequences of subsequent immoral behavior and, therefore, more likely to make immoral choices...

Have you ever really wanted something (money, love, happiness, etc.) but no matter how hard you tried to achieve it, it never seemed to come to fruition? If you answered “yes” to this question, you may be interested in learning how your subconscious beliefs impact your day to day life. Sigmund Freud, the famous German psychoanalyst and researcher, highlighted the principles of the conscious and subconscious minds in his paper titled, “The Ego and the Id.” In the paper, Freud discusses three d...

I decided to write this article after a conversation I had with my girlfriend. Sensationalist media outlets have been damaging young people’s perception of themselves by displaying unrealistic expectations of what true beauty is. They parade around tall/lean models and celebrities who have been made up and digitally modified to eliminate all signs of imperfections. These individuals are then held up as the TRUE standard of beauty and plastered all over in magazines, commercials, and other for...

We all know someone who loves to talk about themselves. I’ve found that conversations with these people aren’t really conversations at all. They’re just 30-minute commercials about their life and problems. I try to avoid interacting with these individuals whenever possible because they add little value to my day and my life. Although you may not be as bad as the above-mentioned persons, most of us think we’re better listeners than we actually are. In fact, in a recent survey administered by W...

The funny thing about time is that it stops for no one. The hourglass is always running and if you let the sands slip away, there’s no getting them back. We often get too caught up with frivolous things in life. As a result, we live a life full of worry, stress, and eventually regret. Some of the best lessons we can learn about how to live our lives to the fullest are passed down from people in their golden years of life. For almost a decade Bronnie Ware, an Australian nurse and counselor, wo...