Carmine

Looking to refinance your mortgage? Well stop, dont rush; there are a few things you should consider before refinancing. With mortgage rates at an all-time low, refinancing can save you thousands of dollars. However, if you rush into a new rate without negotiate for the best deal or you dont understanding all the details of your new mortgage you could end up losing money.

Is Refinancing Right For You?

A general rule is that refinancing becomes while if the current interest rate on your mortgage is at least two percent higher than the prevailing market rate. However, depending on your loan amount, you might choose to refinance a loan that is only one-point-five percentage points higher then the current rate.

When choosing to refinance, consider is how long you plan to stay in your house? Given the costs of the refinancing, it usually takes at least three years to fully realize the savings from a lower interest rate. Refinancing is only good idea if you intend to stay in your house long enough to make the additional fees worthwhile.

Remember To Shop Around

The most common mistake homeowners make when refinancing their mortgage is they fail to shop around. Would you buy a new car without first checking out the competitions prices?

Call two or three lenders to compare their interest rates and closing cost, then compare then to the terms offered by your current lender. Comparing offers allows you to get a better idea of what rate you may be able to qualify for. It also puts you in a better negotiating position with the lenders.

Once you receive offers, pay close attention to the interest rate, points, and closing costs. Talk with the loan officers and see if you can negotiate a better interest rate. Most often, the initial rate offered is not the best a particular lender can offer.

Consider All The Cost

There is no such thing as getting your cake and eating it too. It is important to understand that refinancing your mortgage is not free. Consumers need to ask their mortgage originator to provide all costs that will be incurred in order to complete the refinancing process in writing. There are no cost rates available where all of the closing costs are built into the rate, but they usually involve higher rates. This is one of the reasons shopping around is so important.

Many lenders require that you have at least ten percent equity in your home, but there is usually at least one lender willing to underwrite loans in which the borrower has only five percent equity. Nonetheless, beware low equity loans can involve relatively high mortgage insurance costs. In most cases, a homeowner should plan on paying an average of three to six percent of the outstanding principal in refinancing costs. One way of saving on some of these costs is to first check with your current mortgage lender, they may we willing to wave some of these fees; including the fees for the title search, surveys, and inspections.

Check Your Credit Twice

If your credit history is less than sparkling, it might be worth while to invest sometime into cleaning up your credit before you applying for a home loan. Before you apply for your new mortgage, first check your credit report for any mistakes or outdated information. Its estimated that 60 percent of credit reports contain some type of incorrect information. Federal law allows consumers to receive a free copy of their credit bureau report each year. Review your report and make any change requests directly with the credit reporting agency.

Depending on your credit score, the process of cleaning up your credit can be as easy as reporting errors on your credit report or as complex as hiring a professional credit counselor to get your finances in order. If your credit problems cannot be fixed quickly you will almost certainly have to pay more than borrowers who have a good credit history. Yet, don't assume that the only way to get credit is to pay a high price. Ask how your past credit history affects the price of your loan and what you would need to do to get a better price.

Don't assume that minor credit problems or difficulties stemming from unique circumstances will limit your loan choices to only high-cost lenders. No matter what your credit score, remember the key to finding the best deal or rate is to shop, compare, and negotiate.

Rebecca is a respected copywriter has created several helpful mortgage refinance articles directed at loan applicants. You can read more mortgage related loan articles at home equity loans and learn more about refinancing first and second mortgages.

To get more free mortgage refinance tips, please visit Refinance.

As the cloning debate of humankind continues we find ourselves in an interesting predicament. We see the need of self to extend past ones own lifetime as an innate characteristic; self-preservation has always been one of mankinds greatest drivers of motivation. World Religions in their haste to rally group support and social order amongst the masses have in fact been able to capitalize on this to a large degree, purposing the idea of eternal salvation for a promise of the individual in this life time to do as they are told and live their life in a certain way. That certain way includes among other things; not upsetting the current hierarchy of power. Human Beings obviously have questions which need to be answered such as; How did I get here, How did all this begin, what happens to me when I die and what will happen to the entirety of all I see in the end, when will it all end. World Religions can use these needs of the individual to know such things as a lever to control their psyche, by carefully answering all those questions in some sort of believable and yet un-provable way. Of course over time as more scientific light is shed on various subjects these religions must adapt their story line a bit to keep all the believers buying the storyline. Most of the most successful religions have done a good job of using vague comments on the answers so that they are able to adapt over time.

As the language changes they can revert back to the old definitions, adopt the new ones, take a broader interpretation in a non-literal sense or stick with a fundamentalist exact reading. Often different groups in different regions or cultures may adopt all of these methods. Similar to our laws, where you as an individual can do anything you wish provided you have the right lawyer to re-interpret the law, use the letter of the law, use case law on either side to shed light on the grayness of the law. In the end all truth is relative from the perspective of the individual, judge or jury you see? Why is this important? What does this have to do with Cloning? Well simple, those against cloning are generally fundamentalist in thinking or they simply cannot comprehend the benefits or short falls which cloning might cause and therefore have sided with the fundamentalists views as a fall back position.

Cloning has some serious advantages in that genetically speaking those who at first can afford to clone will come from men of means or of wealth. Having more than one of you might be an incredible leg up on the world no doubt. Many people with similar vision and skills will be able to do more with less and further ones efforts in society, business, leadership positions, etc. If entire family units are made up of those who are cloned, who pool resources they will in fact do better than families who are not working together so closely and are not cloned, lack the discipline of a purposeful and united vision or are diffused as each sets out into the world to make their way. Which is generally the case in America. Where we train our young to go out into the world get a college degree and go work for large companies or other families who own businesses and corporations. Those other families and their accumulated teams, corporations, networked groups and families thus use those who wish to make a name for themselves the opportunity to advance within a new family, the corporation. For this the rising young star can be highly compensated or economically enslaved if they fail to meet expectations of the whole of the family, corporation or its shareholders.

This of course we already know. As we watch the classic fight between union and company and the fights of corporations and families from many different countries work together at times and then duke it out in the market place at others, often enlisting government to tilt the field in their favor long enough to level another blow to their competitor. Meanwhile the young new entrant into the economic minded family is barraged with a number of decisions as to what they want out of their personal life for fulfillment as they sift through the mixed messages of advertising, peer pressure, religious doctrines, governmental rallied nationalism or attraction of a mate.

The capitalist or founding families of the companies or those heavily leveraged in its outcome and success reap from these efforts along with the individual rising star or up and coming if they are to treat their efforts and dedication the same way with the same convictions. This is done by incentives, stock options, golden handcuffs, great titles, social status and money, perceived wealth and/or the ability to further leverage future earnings through borrowing from credit unions and banks to live at a higher standard of living or in a belief system of quality of life and arrival to a new plateau in ones career? Is this good or bad? Well it just is and this need of the individual is balanced around the needs of the corporation. Again why is this important to cloning? Well in cloning those who are cloned can serve the needs of the individual advancement within the group in a way never before possible outside the close run wealthy class families.

At first cloning will only be available to those who have the capacity to pay for it and only those who have out of country hideaways to do it, since the entire socio-economic models of capitalism currently in place in most countries might be in jeopardy as those with the capital could lose their power to those with the greatest number of inter-related family clones. In many countries we have extremely powerful groups of families and in some cases one family in control of the entire country, the people of these countries are allowed enough latitude of freedom as long as they perform for helping in the system. Those who do not go along with these pre-agreed upon methods are killed, exiled, leave, made slaves or are sent to prison. Those in charge continue to make sure they also rule over the form of government in such a way, which keeps them in power, wouldnt you? If your answer is no and you are benevolent by nature, it would not take you very long to convert.

We need to be thinking if we are ready for a paradigm shift which might change the balance of power of Corporations by creating Super Families of Clones. Think about it.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/. Lance is a guest writer for Our Spokane Magazine in Spokane, Washington

Cast iron generally means grey cast iron, but is identifies a group of ferrous alloys which solidify with a eutectic.

Overview:
Iron accounts for more than 95% the alloy material, while the main alloying elements are carbon and silicon. The amount of carbon in cast iron is 2.1-4% while ferrous alloys with less carbon are called carbon steel by definition. Cast iron has appreciable amount of silicon normally 1.3%. Therefore, these alloys should be considered ternary Fe-C-Si alloys.

In spite of this, the principles of cast iron solidification are understood from the binary iron carbon phase diagram, where the eutectic point lies at 1154 C and 4.3 wt% carbon. Because cast iron has this composition, its melting temperature of 1150 to 1200 C is about 300 degrees less than the melting point of pure iron. Cast iron tends to be brittle, though the name of particular alloy may suggest opposite. The color of a fracture surface may be utilized to identify an alloy; carbide impurities allow cracks to pass straight through resulting in a smooth white surface, while graphic flakes deflect a passing crack and initiate countless new cracks as the material breaks, leading to a rough surface that looks grey with its low melting point, good fluidity, castability, excellent machinability and wear rising resistance, cast irons have become an engineering material with a wide range of uses like pipes, machine and auto parts.

Products:
Cast iron is produced by remelting pig iron, normally with large quantities of scrap iron and steel and initiating steps to remove unwanted contaminants like phosphorus and sulfur. Depending on use carbon and silicon content are lessened to the required levels which may be anywhere from 2% to 3.5% and 1% 3% respectively. Other elements are then added to the melt prior to the final form being made by casting.

Iron is generally melted in a small blast furnace called cupola. After melting is over the melted iron is ladled from the forehearth of blast furnace. This system was developed by the Chinese whose innovative ideas brought revolution in field of metallurgy. Before that iron was melted in an air furnace, which is a type of reverberatory furnace.

Some advantages of cast iron in engineering uses:

a)A family of metals having capacity of being used for engineering and production needs.
b)You can have it in a wide range of mechanical and physical properties.
c)Good strength to weight ratio.
d)Generally cheaper than other competing metals and lower financial cost per unit of strength compared to other metals.
e)Lesser density and higher thermal conductivity then steels at comparable tensile strength levels.
f)Easily mechniable, allows high speeds and feeds and less energy due to free graphite being presence.
g)Many iron castings may be utilized without heat treatment (as cast) but when required may be heat treated to increase overall properties or local property like surface hardness.
h)Very good damping capability especially in grey irons.
i)Chemical analysis may be changed to give improved special properties like corrosion resistance, oxidation and wear resistance.
j)Quickly changes from design to finished goods.
k)Capable of having highly complex sizes from ounces to 100 tons.
l)Of flexible pattern and capacity to improve appearance for sales appeal.
m)You can make intricate shapes as well as very thin to very thick sections.
n)Capable of redesigning and combining two or more parts from metals into a single casting thereby lessening assembly cost and time.
o)Capable of being cast with inserts of other metals.
p)Many casting systems for low, medium or high production.
q)Less tendency toward residual stress and warpage than other competing metals.

More articles are available at http://www.article-ghost-writer.com & http://www.bhunit.co.in

Free cell phone reverse lookup is an excellent way, which helps you to make sure your home, and family is safe from strange calls.

You ask how a service like cell phone reverse lookup can help protect your spouse and children. Did this ever happened to you, you answer a phone only to have someone hang up on you, or maybe a stranger, without introducing himself asked for your kids or wife? Now consider for a second how good you would feel if you had a way to trace all these strange calls.

Lets take for example your teenager and hers or his friends. Most of the kids that age have cell phones, they receive calls in all hours, and you have to be real James Bond only to get the numbers of those callers.

Nevertheless, just having the numbers will not help you, you need to find out who is it really that calls your kids! Therefore, the next thing you need to do is to use the caller ID and write down the number, that is if you are in any way concerned about the way your teenager has been behaving recently.

Free cell phone reverse lookup can be really useful in case that friends of your teenager do not want to give you their names or leave a message. Reverse cell phone lookup now for the first time gives you the just the right tool you need to see if your kid is maybe associating with the wrong people.

Very often keeping a watchful eye on your teenager and hers or his friends can have a primary role in safeguarding the future of your whole family.

One more wonderful feature of free cell phone reverse lookup is that you can find out who is behind the so called wrong numbers calls.

Just in case that you are one of the people that is the target of lots of hang ups or constant calls from one number, you now have the tool to check it up even in case that those calls come from the prepaid cell phones (this is a little more complicated and you will probably have to pay for this service, but it can be done).

If are receiving intimidating calls, it can also now be easily stopped.

Free cell phone reverse lookup has one more great advantage, and that advantage is that you can now trace the call you actually want to receive but because of some mistake, you were cut off.

For example lets say to your mom or dad calls you, and a gets interrupted because of bad connection before you found out who is on the other side. In some cases hitting a redial button is not going to help you but a reverse cell phone look up just might.

All of us have a family member or a friend who might call us and need our help.

Because of that, while you may have some reservations about free reverse cell phone lookup and its use, try to look at it from another angle and see how you might use it to improve your life.

Here at Cell-Phones-Reviews.net we endeavor to offer you all the cell phone info you need to stay informed. Visit us and discover more about free cell phone number reverse lookup.

Many people want to make sure they are providing for their children as much or more than their parents provided for them. While you dont want to give to your children blindly, you would like to make sure you are raising your children to be conscious about money and financial matters.

Paying a regular allowance is a hotly contested topic. Should you pay a regular weekly amount or just pay your children for chores around the house? There is no reason you cant do both. Providing a regular allowance can offer your child a sense of independence and understanding of money. However, you dont have to give them too much and you can also pay them extra for certain chores, like mowing the lawn or extra cleaning around the house.

You dont have to share every detail about your own personal finances (for example: I cant believe my credit card bill is $3,000 this month!) but you also dont want them to grow up completely ignorant about money. If you have a new job and want to watch expenses, this is something they ought to know. You can also share with them how much the grocery bill costs or how much the movie ticket costs but they dont need to know how much the mortgage payment is every month.

A common used technique in parenting is giving children choices. This can be applied to money matters as well. A great example is a childs birthday. You can offer them a big birthday party or a special gift (like a new bike) but not both. They dont need to know the actual costs, but by becoming more involved in the process, they learn how to prioritize their financial decisions.

Teaching your children about the concept about saving is especially important. Once they start getting a regular allowance, you should encourage them to save a portion of it for special occasions. They may not do it, but where else are they going to learn about it? Once they get old enough (at least 8 years old), they can also learn the basics of investing with some fun games or children focused mutual funds. Junior Achievement offers some wonderful programs in elementary schools. At the same time, you can also introduce contributing to a charity. They can either give through their own money or you can give them a certain dollar amount and let them choose their own charity.

When they reach high school age, there are basics concepts of personal finances that should be taught. These include putting a budget together, balancing a checkbook, and the concept of time value of money (for example, interest growing in a savings account). These are all invaluable lessons they will apply for the rest of their lives!

Galia Gichon, Founder of Down-to-Earth Finance, demystifies personal finance particularly to women through unbiased financial education. With over 14 years experience in financial services and an MBA in Finance, she does not manage money or sell investment products. You can subscribe to her weekly e-mail newsletter at DownToEarthFinance-On@zines.webvalence.com for smart tips to save more money and independent advice about mutual funds and retirement. She can be reached at 212.734.0433 and http://www.downtoearthfinance.com

Written by Galia Gichon
DOWN-TO-EARTH FINANCE

(Copyright Down-to-Earth Finance LLC 2006)

This article provides a brief overview of the 4 sources of income we can take advantage of as a participant in the e-currency exchange trading system.

Specifically, I am refering to the e-currency exchange program through DXinOne. DXinOne is by far the leader in facilitating e-currency conversions. The fees charged to account for these transactions is how DXinOne makes money. They are in essence a clearing house.

So how do I make money in this? The first and most important income source is the Portfolio. The first thing you will want to do is open an account and start building a portfolio. It does not cost anything to open an account. Fund the account with as little as $25 and start building your portfolio. As you progress you will be able to use leverage to increase the overall value of the portfolio. It is not uncommon to see portfolio growth of 20 to 40% per month. This is accomplished by combining the daily profits and the leverage to add to your portfolio. The average daily profits on your portfolio will range from about .15% to .35% depending on the supply and demand in the system.

The second source of income in the e-currency exchange program is to become qualified as a Merchant. Don't get excited, you aren't selling anything. Merchant is just a term given to signify those that have qualified to participate in the actual e-currency exchange process. Thousands of times each day there exists the need to convert from one e-currency to another or e-currency to hard cash etc. This is where the Merchants come in. The Merchants receive a fee of 4 to 14% for making funds available to make these conversion transactions possible. To qualify as a Merchant you must have a portfolio value of at least $5,000 and you have had a DXinOne account for at least 90 days.

The third source of income is the P4 Program (Pre-Paid Profits Program). This program provides non merchants the ability to earn a per transaction fee for exchanging with active merchants. Merchants need liquidity to perform their functions and are willing to pay a fee for this liquidity. The fee paid to the non merchant ranges from 5 to 7% of the transaction. Caution: I have seen a lot of advertising boasting the P4 Program as "Huge instant profits" and "You get paid first" etc. Unfortunately, you do not have the whole picture. The rest of the picture is 2 part. The first is, when you have completed a transaction you will have to exchange those funds in order to do anything with them. This exchange will cost you upwards of 3%, so the real returns are cut in half or so. The second part of the picture is the reality of the time required to perform the e-currency exchange process. As of the writing of this article the process is extraordinarily long. Expect the process to take 2 weeks or longer depending on how the system is flowing and how much you are trying to exchange. So maybe the truth is 2 to 4% return every 3 weeks. Still not too bad for passive income.

The fourth source of income is for webmasters. This is called the AdsExposed Program where advertising is placed on your website. You will receive pay per click revenue from those ads.

So now you have the 4 sources of income currently being offered by DXinOne. The great thing is DXinOne is a progressive organization. They have many other programs and services in the works that will be launched as time goes by.

Merv Thompson Author and operator of http://www.futures- brokers-review.com a website providing tools, resources and reviews for todays trader.

Get detailed information on e-currency trading at e-Currency Exchange

Having spent many years as head of our call centre's IT department it has frequently been necessary for me to purchase telephone headsets in bulk. The telephone headset is a call centre worker's best friend. If configured properly it sits, neatly and comfortably on the head and allows one the freedom to type, eat and doodle whilst aiding customers with their requests.

There are many types and features which may or make a headset suitable for a person. Generally we expect the staff to be at their desks whilst on the phone so we have corded headsets which plug right into the system phone.

The most popular is an over the head monaural headset such as the Plantronics H51 Supra Monaural Headset this is the world best selling headset, it being a low cost, lightweight, reliable and comfortable headset, manufactured by Plantronics, the market leader.

The other matter which is extremely important to take into account when ordering headsets is the issue of connectivity. There are many different ways in which a headset may be attached to a telephone, a terminal, a PC or a server using RJ11, USB or even RJ45; dependent upon what it is connected to and what type of line it is working on. Unless a company has a fully featured SIPP exchange it is likely that any VOiP headsets will use a USB connection. It has made the job easy for me by including a connectivity matrix to the checkout so that I am able to select the phone type and their online catalogue automatically tells me what sort of connection lead the headset will want. I am also (thankfully) able to select by myself as I know, in general what goes with what these days.

Best4headsets also solves another headset headache, that of maintenance, they supply amplifiers, ear cushions, handset lifters, voice tubes, and cables; with a service that allows one to return faulty or damaged headsets for immediate replacement.

There is a wonderful online resource for Plantronics Headsets at Best4headsets which has mad my life much easier, offering a one stop solution for headset information, purchase and maintenance.

Alexis Svenn is interested in many things he finds online and in his pockets. Alexis Svenn

One diagnostic technique being studied to detect early stage breast cancer is Ductal Lavage. Ductal lavage was first thought of by George Pappanicolou - since he felt that all breast cancers start in the ductal system, then why not test cells from the ducts for cancer. He tried to extract fluid and cells from the duct but it was difficult and not many other researchers had an interest in what he was trying to do in the 1950s.

20 years later, some other doctors picked up where Pappanicolou had started and began studies of ductal lavage on the west coast. Dr. Pappanicolou was actually the developer of the pap smear test for cervical cancer, so the ductal lavage technique is often referred to as a "pap smear" for the breast.

Now we know that over 95% of breast cancers start in the cells lining the breast ducts and that it can take 8 to 10 years for cells to grow into a 1 cm tumor that can be felt or seen on a mammogram. A ductal lavage (lavage is French for wash or rinse) consists of flushing cells out of the breast duct using suction and a saline wash.

The procedure involves little to no discomfort. A doctor will apply an anesthetic cream that will numb the nipple area. A breast pump is used to determine which 1-2 ducts will be flushed later in the procedure. When the ducts to be flushed have been located, more anesthetic is put in the duct and a catheter is placed. Salt water is flushed through the catheter into the duct and the cells collected to be looked at by a pathologist.

When a pathologist looks at the cells, he or she is looking for abnormalities which could suggest that cancer might develop at a later date. Women may want to consider preventive measures if abnormalities are found to be present in the breast. Those can include careful monitoring with mammography, clinical breast exams and breast self-exams; prophylactic mastectomy (preventive breast removal) for women at very high risk of breast cancer and the use of the drug tamoxifen, an anti-estrogen.

The presence of abnormal or atypical cells in a woman's breast does not mean she will develop breast cancer. Studies show that most atypical cell do not become cancer. Because of those findings, ductal lavage is recommended to be performed only on women who are at high risk for developing breast cancer. That would include women with a strong family or personal history of breast cancer, those who carry the BRCA gene mutations and those who have had non-cancerous conditions from prior biopsies. (Lobular carcinoma in situ or atypical hyperplasia)

The procedure is currently available in a few locations across the US., but as more doctors complete the training for the procedure it will become more widely available. In most cases a woman must meet some eligibility requirements in order to have a ductal lavage performed on their breasts.

Dr. Susan Love is one of the biggest advocates for the procedure in the United States. She feels that ductal lavage can help physicians better understand the development of breast cancer along certain groups of women and in addition, help identify women most likely to develop breast cancer based on hereditary and environmental factors.

Michael Russell

Your Independent guide to Breast Cancer

If you are curious about the natural healing practices of acupuncture and chiropractic, you will be surprised by the availability of training in those fields. Today's consumer is looking into alternate healing methods that do not involve surgery or drugs, and that is why acupuncture and chiropractic medicine have gained such notoriety of late. There are quite a few places you can go to study natural healing, but there are three natural healing colleges stand head and shoulders above the rest.

For a thorough and comprehensive education in acupuncture, take a look at the Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College in Berkeley, CA. The mission of AIMC is to promote and fulfill the highest standards in acupuncture & Oriental medical education leading to a Master of Science in Oriental Medicine Degree. AIMC, Berkely proudly employs a diverse faculty of experienced practitioners, and they have a low, low student-to-teacher ratio in both clinics and classrooms. The long and the short of it is that AIMC, Berkely offers instruction that encompasses every aspect of the professions full scope of practice, and gives students every advantage towards a successful career in acupuncture medicine.

For a solid chiropractic education, there are two chiropractic colleges that are considered leaders in the field, Palmer College of Chiropractic and Cleveland Chiropractic College. Let's take a look at Palmer College of Chiropractic first. Founded by the original discoverer of chiropractic, D.D. Palmer, Palmer has been teaching the art of chiropractic for more than a hundred years. Palmer College has three convenient campuses where students gain the knowledge, skills and confidence required to achieve the Doctor of Chiropractic (D.C.) degree. In fact, one third of the practicing chiropractic doctors in the world today are Palmer graduates!

Another excellent school of chiropractic is Cleveland Chiropractic College, with campuses in Los Angeles and Kansas City. Cleveland Chiropractic has nearly a century of educational experience, and they provide a balanced approach to chiropractic studies that includes an early introduction to multiple spinal adjustment techniques, as well as the science, philosophy and art of chiropractic. Students may study for the Bachelor of Science in Human Biology, or go on to complete a Doctor of Chiropractic degree, making Cleveland Chiropractic a good choice for the serious student of chiropractic.

If you would like to know more about natural healing schools such as Acupuncture and Integrative Medicine College, Berkeley, please visit SchoolsGalore.com where you will find an excellent selection of accredited schools that are ready to take you to the next level of success.

DISCLAIMER: Above is a GENERAL OVERVIEW and may or may not reflect specific practices, courses and/or services associated with ANY ONE particular school(s) that is or is not advertised on SchoolsGalore.com.

Copyright 2007 - All rights reserved by Media Positive Communications, Inc.

Notice: Publishers are free to use this article on an ezine or website, provided the article is reprinted in its entirety, including copyright and disclaimer, and ALL links remain intact and active.

Michael Bustamante is a staff writer for Media Positive Communications, Inc. in association with SchoolsGalore.com. Find Cleveland Chiropractic College or Palmer College of Chiropractic, and thousands of other schools, colleges and universities at SchoolsGalore.com, your resource for higher education.

It was a beautiful December day in magnificent Hawaii. The Christmas holiday season was approaching and everyone was getting excited to spend time with their families. Out of nowhere came an angry swarm of Japanese fighter jets as if someone shook their hive. They unleashed a fury of firepower onto the U.S. Pacific fleet of Naval warships destroying many and killing many of our brave men and women.

The attack at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941 was a day that changed our nations position in the world forever. Until that moment we were neutral for the most part in the World War that was engaged all throughout Europe. Following the attack America joined the war and ended it with the dropping of the atomic bomb onto Japan.

Why did the government decide to go to war with Japan? Why did we go to war with Iraq? Why do we fight with each other? These are all questions that are going to be covered within this chapter. Before we get into these details, I want to discuss the different types of fighting that we can become engaged.

The first type of fighting that may pop into your mind is war. That is one nation versus another or many other nations. It can be a civil war within the same nation. This is the extreme to physical violence. That is where the goal is to hurt the other until they no longer have the will or ability to fight. If you achieve this goal you win the war or fight. Leaders in time of war and professional fighters before a fight spend a great deal of time formulating a strategy to reach his or her goal.

Another type of fighting that many dont plan a strategy for is a verbal dispute. This can be a lovers quarrel about something important or about something tiny like how to get to a restaurant. A verbal fight may be the bickering between friends over a basketball shot. It could be a hardy debate over the best candidate for an upcoming election. A harsh e-mail can even be the fulcrum of a dispute.

The truth is there are thousands of examples for the different types of fighting that we may encounter. However, physical and verbal disputes are the two main types of quarrels at the end of the day. Every single one of us has been involved in one or both of these types on more than one occasion. What drove you to fight?

What would motivate someone to fight? There are many reasons. You might disrespect me or my beliefs. You could threaten my property or my body. Maybe you challenge me to a fight. The underlying reason is that I have something that you want. The next few paragraphs are going to get into each of the above in a little more detail.

I am going to start with the most obvious of the three and that is if you threaten or attack my body or property. This is what drove us into World War II. Our property was attacked and our military blood was shed. We were enraged on one hand and on the other we had to fight back for self-preservation.

What if we had ignored the attacks? Every nation on this planet would feel as if they could get away with the same thing. Eventually, we could be conquered by another nation. The first emotion that we feel is rage towards the attacker. We want them to feel the same pain or even greater pain than what we experienced. This is the reaction that we have to a situation.

Every situation requires a reaction or a response. To react is an instinctual action that occurs. This is like a flinch when someone swats at you. Often the reaction is not the best decision, but we feel that we do not know any better. If someone yells at you, you are probably tempted to yell something back to them. You are likely to say the wrong things if you do not think before you speak.

We are designed and have the instinctual desire to react. One of Sir Isaac Newtons laws of physics states that every action will have an opposite but equal reaction. This is the counter-attack and often it is not equal. Usually the person counter-attacking wants revenge and reacts in a more aggressive manner. That in turn sparks the need for a reaction from the other person and so forth.

Have you ever played a prank on someone or been the butt of a joke? What happened next? Most likely you had to get them back. In fact, you had to get them even better to save face with others and to let them know you are not a punk. Then this person probably reacted with something even bigger and the cycle continues until it is out of control. That is true in every type of fighting.

Do not feel hopeless or upset about this, if you are a reactor there is hope. The antidote to the reaction poison is to respond. A response is the planned counter-attack. You are not flinching you are strategically answering the attack based on past experience and knowledge or training.

When I would train someone in free-sparring in Tae Kwon Do I would lay down the ground rules of safety and then cover the different ways to score points. A head shot was worth two points and the body was worth one point. Naturally, everyone did nothing but kicks to the head the entire fight. That is the way to get the most points, but rarely did a single one of them kick me in the head. This was not because I am a great fighter it was because I was much more experienced and new how to see that kick coming.

People often telegraph their true intents if you watch their body language. I was able to determine from the position of their hips whether they were on the attack or retreat. I was able to tell by the distribution of weight on their feet which foot they would kick with. Then often they would look to the location they desired to kick. All this was seen before they even picked the foot up and attempted to raise it six feet to my head. Because of my training I did not have to react, I had time to formulate a response.

Knowledge and training allowed me to think about the best way to counter-attack to reach my victory as opposed to just throwing a gut reactive attack that most likely would be very ineffective and a depletion of my energy. There is a story that I recall that keeps me level-headed in these situations. It goes back to a technical school class at Dover AFB, DE.

I was working on C-5A/B Cargo Aircraft at the time and needed to learn how to operate the jet engines. There are many safety precautions that are taken to prevent disasters and minimize damage in the event of a fire. We had many steps on a checklist to follow to accomplish this engineered response and had to know the first three by heart. The instructor would throw emergencies at us while in the simulator to give us the experience. Even though it was a computer program our adrenaline would get pumping and we had the tendency to react and do the wrong thing. The instructor advised me to sit on my hands until I had the proper response.

By sitting on your hands and thinking things through you are more likely to choose the response that is best for the situation. In the case of the airplane; choosing the wrong switch could result in disaster. Sitting on your hands for a second allows for the emotion to calm and a level head to prevail. In other words, sitting on your hands allows you to combat the feeling of rage which drives us to react to an attack.

The number one reason that people resort to violence is that they feel disrespected. If you step on my beliefs or hurt my ego I am not being respected by you. I want revenge. I start by bickering and trying to solve the problem with words. If you choose the wrong words I am hurt even more and I will react. This will continue until I have no more perceivable words that will get through to you. Then I see physical action as my last resort.

A good friend Damien Thomas loved to get under peoples skin. He would make jokes and knew exactly what buttons to push to get a rise out of you. He told me once to watch as he played a joke on someone or made a comment to see how they reacted. If they hit him or threatened to hit him as a reaction it meant they had nothing to say. They saw violence as the last resort to regain their image and respect.

We do not often just invade another nation. When something happens that we do not agree with, we start with diplomacy. There are statesman and representatives of the government that try to talk through the issues. Once talk stops showing results or glimpses of hope we declare war and the armies begin to march. The Iraq War began this way. We tried to sanction the Iraqi government to inspect for weapons of mass destruction and Sadam Hussein kept toying with the United Nations inspectors. President Bush answered with a declaration of war.

I use wars as an example because they are the extreme to fighting. If you look back into history at conflicts and wars you will see they all were over the reasons listed above. We are the same in our quarrels and disputes. We feel as if our property is threatened as it was in the attack of Pearl Harbor. We get to the point to where words are not enough and we begin to see no other feasible action which leads to a dispute or even a war. This is evident in the Iraq War where we felt as if we were disrespected.

The last of the three reasons is if we are challenged. This could be a boxing match or martial arts tournament. Maybe it is a debate or sports game. It could even be a board or computer game against a friend. Whatever the challenge, it still has the same guidelines and principles as a fight.

We challenge others for fun, honor, or some type of reward. Many people have much fun playing board games like chess or checkers against one another. It is a great feeling to be competitive against others. When we play a game on our own we do not push ourselves to our limits and therefore never get better.

Playing against someone with comparable or better skills drives us to use our full potential. No one wants to lose at anything because it feels so good to win and therefore we pull all the tricks out of our bag. Playing against another also allows us to sharpen our skills and even learn new tricks. If I see my competitor doing something that I think is more effective I am going to adopt that. I will then practice what I learned on my own and then try it against my next challenger.

Lets go back to the world of Tae Kwon Do for a short story about competition. Three of my best friends and I had our own little group that would work out together and even hang out together when not in class. We all had different talents and skill sets in a variety of areas. What was great about us is that we constantly were pushing each other to get better. If I was running sprints faster during our workout, the others would go home and practice and train until they could beat me. Meanwhile, I would be working on kicking harder than one of them because they were kicking harder in practice.

I am sure all of us have seen something that another has or can do and had the desire to share that ability. We see someone at the beach with a muscular or trim body and that may push us to get in the gym. Another business is getting the product to market faster or better and we need to step up our game. I will be honest sometimes it is fun to compete simply to deflate the big-headed balloon of that loud-mouth coworker.

Competing against others is very healthy in that it pushes us to get better. Some fighters get paid millions of dollars to fight for capacity crowds. Without challenges and competition we would all be happy with the status quo and mediocrity. The conditioning of our bodies and minds would diminish. Businesses would be able to charge anything and do whatever if there were no competitors.

Human nature is to react to a challenge, disrespect or personal property attacks. Fighting is not necessarily the best action and in most cases should and could be avoided. Reactions will result in a more extensive reaction and so on as the cycle continues. There is a Chinese proverb that states, War does not determine who is right, war determines who is left.

We need to learn from past personal experiences and from world history to respond and not flinch. Sit on your hands for a moment and utilize your knowledge to determine the outcome you desire. Then what response is best suited to get you to that conclusion. Never forget that violence is the last resort of someone that cant perceive any other solution.

Joe Lawrence is the creator and president of InspireTomorrow.com. He is a true student of life and is a firm believer in the whole person concept. If you spend five minutes on his site you will come out inspired! http://www.inspiretomorrow.com

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