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Where I Buy My Books And How
As you may or may not know, I like to read books frequently. I aim at a bare minimum to read one full book a month. From time to time I may add an additional eBook to go alongside. This keeps the mind ticking, it keeps me progressing to where I want to get to and finally is a high valued hobby of mine. I don’t just buy books from anywhere and I always look for the best deals. Time and time again I find that Amazon is the place to go to get my books (later in the article I will tell you how I buy from Amazon). 
Usually once a month I go to Amazon and purchase the book I will read for a future month. I purchased a few books a few months back, So I am basically set for the rest of the year. Starting next year I may just buy 12 books in advance and have the reading set out already. What I would then do is purchase books also throughout the year and read them as I please. Some of you may be thinking by now Amazon isn’t nothing special, give me something new. For those of you thinking this way, we will now look at how I buy my books from Amazon. And I will use a few real life examples I have come across.
I have spoken in recent articles about how important recommendation is in today’s world. Many books I read have been recommended from others or by the books I have read. When I want to purchase a book I go to Amazon and search for the book. After finding the book (maybe one time I haven’t found the book). I click on the book and observe the price. What I then do if I haven’t checked reviews prior is read through reviews (good and bad). I want to see what people think about it. Some bad reviews may not be valid for me and vice versa with good reviews. After I have fully decided to buy the book, I immediately click on “USED.” No typo, yes the used section. And scout the price difference. What you will find is, usually the prices are dramatically different (remember I will show you real life examples below). I then look for the book which has a “Like new” or “Very good” next to it and this is my book. What you will find is these two types of descriptive books are just as good as the new copy you would have bought for sometimes 5x the price. You will begin to save loads of money and ultimately this is money you will pay for all your future books. Find my live examples below.
I purchased “The Millionaire Next Door – Thomas J Stanley” earlier this year for £0.63. With postage it ended up less than £3.50. This was a hardcover book which was “Like new” and looked like it had never been touched when I opened the envelope. To purchase the book “New” would have cost me £15 upwards from Amazon. I could buy 5 copies basically for the price of this one new book. The four other books will be the next four months (think about it).
I bought “Today Matters – John C Maxwell” for £1.58. Including postage it came to less than £4.50. This again was hardcover format. What I saw on Amazon’s site when I checked for a new copy can’t be right. For a new copy of the book, it would cost over £30 to purchase it. These are just two examples and I have more like this. The point is, you could be saving loads of money.
Berean-like Believer
The past week has seen me going back to the beginning and relearning the creation. I found myself muddling up certain days and just guessing on occasions, what happened on day three, or what happened on day four. I wanted to be more sure of myself…I went back to the scriptures. When we want to develop, we have to put in the necessary effort, to receive the necessary results.
I started to go through the first verses of the Bible and it started to become refreshed. On top of this refreshing, I was opened up to new truths. New things God had opened my understanding to. The reason I can learn more from things studied previously, is because God rewards people who are diligent towards him. Those who desire to search for the Gold, find the gold. Jesus said in Matthew six, we should search for the kingdom and all the righteousness that it entails, this would conclude with all other things being added to us that we need. Hebrews six concurring, God rewards those who seek him diligently. When the believer decides to search for His presence and desires relations, God is moved…God is moved by our faith.
Paul noted the Bereans as a people who were more noble than those in Thessalonica because they received the word, studied the word and then made there conclusions. We should know that we owe a duty to God, not be deceived so easily, this scripture shows that we should owe an obligation to ourselves also. You owe it to yourself to be better and learned in the scripture. If you feel this is beyond you, ask for help and God will grant you. Jesus said ask! 
Last year I did some writing on the birth of Jesus and surrounding stories. It was a chance for me to share some of the insights I had from God. I once thought to myself, “let me take the story of Christmas, and biblicize it. I want to take the story and find where everything came from in the Bible.” The 25th, the presents, the tree (decked in jewellery), the three wise men and many other things we follow today. As I delved into my study, it started to become apparent that many of the stereotypical things Christmas brought about were not biblical. This may be a shock for you if you have never come across this, this may be another of the many times you’ve heard this, whatever the case, analyse the text.
Firstly, the scripture never tells us that there were three wise men, the scripture talks of Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh but never says three men came. Go to Matthew 2 and read down as I make these claims, and remember don’t take my word for it or believe what I say alone, pick up the Bible and see for yourself. If I came to your house with two friends, brought two gifts and you relayed the story to someone else, the hearers who went on to state two gifts were given from your visitors, would be a misjudgement for those to then say two friends came. The point I am making is simple, if we do not have facts we cant make assumption fact. However many wise men were present that is unknown, what we do know is that gifts were exchanged. The next thing I want to assess is the concept of giving gifts on the 25th December, these men did not see Jesus on the day of the Lord’s birth. Let me ask you a simple question, where was Jesus born? In a manger right? When you read Matthew 2 (verse 11), what is the first word that starts with h? This is not a manger. Adding to this point, by this verse Jesus had been described as a young child. As you keep on through the scripture, many references to young child occurs. Search what that phrase means in the Greek. Go to Luke 2, read the information given to us about the shepherds (verse 12), they were to find him in the manger. These men saw Jesus on his birth but the wise men did not.
To have a meeting with a king, then to travel to another city in the space of a few hours doesn’t make much sense. Reading Luke 2 and Matthew 2 simultaneously gives us good insight into what happened on Jesus’ birth. Finishing off this article, I want to close with the truth that no where mentions December 25th as the day the Lord was made flesh. This date when studied, highlights dates of false gods and other things like that but study for yourself.
Pick up your Bible and search out the scriptures daily!
Scriptures of interest: Matthew 2 – Wise men Luke 2 – Shepherds Jeremiah 10 – Tree decked in gold Acts 17 – The Berean.
Back To Greek Day #1
If you are following my bike riding series, you will know from that I stress the hard parts of stopping something for so long and then aiming to come back and start again. Greek was another thing I had put down for a few months and I guess it was a good idea for me not to go to Greece a few months back because in terms of the lingo, I was nowhere near I wanted to be.
Here’s a picture of me looking over my work of previous months, becoming re-acquainted with the language and remembering the different letters of the alphabet, different rules about specific letters (if you zoom in to this picture you can see a rule I wrote down about the letter “s” which is sigma in Greek).
To be honest I didn’t do as much as I thought I would but it was mainly based on review and re-establishing the work I had done previously. I only spent a little while looking over the notes (I normally aim to practice for 45 minutes with a countdown timer running – this increases intensity and forces me (well it should do) to work at my best due to the fact there is a clock counting down).
I really did get the understanding back when I looked over my previous notes and I guess it is a good platform to start from. The main purpose for learning the Greek language is to take my Bible study to the next level, therefore I am not using something like Rosetta Stone or something like that. I am currently using a video class based on learning Bible Greek. It comprises of short 4-5 minute videos which I aim to do daily.
More updates in the future. Please et me know if you have any tips which can help me learn more efficiently within the scope of what I have described.
Take care.
Getting Back On The Bike Day #1
Getting back on the bike day #1 was something I knew would be interesting to write once I had the content to go with it. As well as my desire to write, the experiences I knew I would have once getting back on the bike day #1 had occurred. Day #1 for me occurred yesterday and it was like I anticipated – hard work. The first day is always the hardest and then it gradually gets easier.
Here is me on day #1 riding hard feeling like quitting but powering through. I ride for 15 minutes per session and at my peak I ride two times a day. I normally aim to ride about 4/5 miles so in total about 8/10 miles a day. A few years ago when I was riding on my normal bike, I would ride around 10 miles three times a week (minimum – some weekends I rode thirty miles) and burnt massive weight in a few months (unintentional). Right now I’m riding again just for fitness and to remain healthy (lets see what happens). The thing is, it is only 15 minutes and this is what provides solace when I’m on the bike but I try to keep it intense. I aim to beat my score from yesterday, aiming to make further distance in less time and things like that. It is a good start for me although it was really hard today – but I expected this coming in because I couldn’t even remember the last time I rode my bike. I’m not getting too ahead of myself but my brother does insanity work out pretty much every day (Pro Athlete) and I may move into that in the future (big may).
Anyway – 15 minutes later and my thighs are burning in a way I haven’ felt in months.
Doing things like working out only usually ever takes like an hour max but so many days go by and we just feel like there is no time to do it. My bike sessions take up thirty minutes of my day. Thirty minutes of 24 hours. Such a small time but such a big impact long-term.
As it was my first day back as you can see so far, I expected a hard time – what I didn’t anticipate were things which actually happened during. Mistakes which happened from rusty-ness. #1 – I wore the wrong trainers (I normally wear my running shoes for comfortability) but I couldn’t find them when it was time to ride so I just put on standard trainers (Don’t do that), it makes everything harder. #2 – The timer which is actually in the picture above fell off while I was riding so I couldn’t see the distance I actually rode, or the time. Favourably I had my Blackberry in the pocket and could check my time this way. It was only when someone came in the room and picked it up for me I could start collecting data again but 1/2 data isn’t full data. As these things actually happened, I said to myself, these are things which can occur when you haven’t done something in a long time. The lesson to learn from today’s class “Be prepared for mishaps.”
This is me after the session writing down my notes for this blog post. I managed to get all my notes into the post succinctly without writing an essay so well done on my part.
Other Mistakes Or Observations?
YES. I will list them below and not type too much about them to save you some time.
- Worked out on an empty stomach (limited energy – makes it harder)
- Limited fluids prior
- Early on I felt to quit (persisted though)
- Didn’t want to do it when it came round to it due to the initial energy going away as I waited hours to start riding – when you leave hours, doubt grief & energy all have the time to attack
After X Amount Of Days I Got Back On The Bike!
I wrote an article yesterday about sorting out priorities, you can click here to read it if you haven’t already but please come back and finish off this 
article. You can kind of say the two are linked because when I got out of bed this morning (around 5:30 AM), I had just finished reading the Bible, which I aim to do every day before I start my day. I headed over to my laptop and was thinking about the blog post I was going to write today (This is another thing I am trying to sort out because for the second year running, I am failing to complete a post a day – How hard can it really be?).
Anyway I started thinking about new priorities (which are really old) that I wanted to reinstate. Now I started thinking about my first online callings. One was my blog and I am taking more time with it and giving it more of my attention, regardless of whatever other things I am trying to do. The point is, I definitely have the time, It just comes down to my priorities. As I sat down, another one immediately can into my mind…”Get back on the bike.” Like that it was back and it is something I am looking to start doing seriously again. As I write these very words, another thing shot to the front of my memory which is language practice. I did think of typing tomorrow I will start again but there is no time like the present, I will get back into the swing of things today and perhaps write a blog post about it in the future. This blog post today isn’t about business but I find it hard to walk over this point without using the words “passive income.” What I am actually doing here is taking actions and by me doing these things, more things are coming back to me without little or no work. All I am doing currently is writing today’s blog post but I already have two potential articles now for tomorrow and the day after (getting back on the bike again day#1 & back to Greek day #1). Guess what? This seems like a good stream of investment because I have now thought (while typing) of a daily review/oversight of my day of biking and my day of Greek. That is how easy action multiplies! If I did this every day, I would have a full year’s worth of content for my blog and would complete my task of posting every day.
Like I said, this post isn’t about business but you can see how the principle of business are transferable. Staying with this theme just slightly, I was lying in bed around 3/4 AM thinking about how great & timeless Jesus was. I’m a firm believer in the fact all plans including business, life, wealth etc are found in the Bible. I was thinking about Business and how important marketing/exposure is, it really is the most important (Yes more important than the good product). I started thinking about how Jesus had such a big impact. Firstly, you should know I do believe Jesus had the best product on the market but this isn’t enough. If people don’t even accept free products today, this alone shows you product is not enough. Jesus didn’t say – “I have the best product on the market, everyone will come to me.” He actually did the opposite! He travelled around Israel teaching freely about his product and showing people real life examples of the product. Tried and Tested. Just to relate it to business I used the word product. I know some people may find offence in that but even if it was a product, it’s free anyway. Moving on, he not only travelled himself, he sent people out before him and with him. Ladies and gentlemen – please tell me what one of the biggest marketing strategies out there today is? Affiliate marketing! I’m merely using this to prove my previous point that these strategies are nested in the Bible one way or another.
It’s funny how my article post about getting back on the bike has turned into various other things but there you have it. Nearly 1000 words in less than thirty minutes all original. Since I completely sabotaged this article (unintentionally in many ways), I can do nothing else but tell you to look out for my upcoming article about getting back on the bike day #1 (now written) which will talk more about my bike experience and the struggles that came along.
Riding my bike is not in the top two things on my list so I was not riding before writing.
Feel free to leave comments and let me know what you think and you can always share this post for free if you feel it was inspiring or helpful.
Thanks.
Israel.
Israel Ikhinmwin's Site 