With shopping season in full gear, I began to wonder what the best presents are for your partner. Should you get something you know they want? Maybe something that they have not mentioned that you think they would like? Or would a present that touches their heart be the best? I did not have the answer – so I asked our community …

“What is the best Christmas present you’ve ever received?”

Our most recent poll shows that most men (42%) prefer a gift “that was a complete surprise” while women (56%) would enjoy a present “that touched my heart”.

So to all you women out there – put your thinking caps on and surprise him with a great find you know he’d like but hasn’t come across yet. While it’s no huge shock that surprises are great presents, keep in mind the meaning behind the gesture when planning. Surprises are great because they show your partner that you care. Surprises require an in-depth knowledge of their likes and dislikes as well as time and planning. So make this holiday special with a surprise for your man.

Now on to men. As I’ve stated in multiple articles, women want to feel cherished; and the holidays are a great time to remind her of your love. Throw a present under the tree that will let her know what she means to you (something inspired by your relationship and your feelings). Not only are you showing your love through the time it takes to plan this little surprise, but it also reaffirms your love and gives her something to look back on and cherish. It’ll mean so much more than all those nice-to-have presents combined!

The holidays are a wonderful time to show your partner you care. You get to spend more time together and think of new and exciting ways to surprise each other! Whether you’re new to romance or have been romantic for years, the holidays provide the perfect opportunities to show you care.

How valuable is this very moment to you? Do you realize that this moment represents all of the possibilities that exist right now in the present and all of the possibilities and potential of the future?

How valuable is your time? Do you spend it wisely? Do you focus your time on the most important tasks and value-added activities? Or do you fritter your time away, aimlessly going from task to task, or activity to activity, accomplishing very little?

Have you ever determined how much your time is worth on an hourly basis? Try it. You may be surprised at the amount of time you waste doing things that someone else could do better – leaving you to concentrate on the things that you do best.

A time/value analysis definitely gives you a better appreciation for what it costs you to spend your time on low value activities. Conducting a time/value analysis is easy – just take the total amount of money that you earn during an average eight hour day and divide the total by eight. For example, if your time is valued at $100 per hour, why would you waste your time doing things that you can pay someone $8 per hour to do for you?

Think about this – everything that you will ever accomplish is determined by what you do in this present moment.

The idea behind the power of the present moment is that everything that you aspire to be, have, or do is based upon your actions right now, in this present moment.

Do you want to be a millionaire? What are you doing to make it a reality? Are you studying millionaires? Are you starting and running business enterprises? Are you investing? Are you creating valuable products or providing needed services? These are just a few ways that people are becoming millionaires today.

Are you using this present moment to achieve the outcomes that you desire?

What do you have to do differently in the next five minutes that will bring you the results that you want in the future?

The present moment is powerful because if you think about time on its most basic level, you realize that every thing that is and everything that will be, is or will be created in the present moment.

Everything you see is a result of someone taking a specific action resulting in something growing, something expanding, and something evolving.

Every high achiever has mastered the present moment to organize their actions in such a way that great wealth and abundance manifested in their lives.

How can you use this present moment to improve your life; to live your dreams; to walk into your limitless potential?

The power of the present moment is the greatest asset you possess because it is the only asset that you can use to obtain any other type of asset including money, contacts, resources, etc.

How you use your time is a major factor in what you accomplish in this lifetime. You can be, have, or do anything as long as you use your time wisely.

So, what are you DOING with this PRESENT MOMENT?

The power of the present moment affects your entire life. For example:

Family Life

Love Life

Business Life

Spiritual Life

Health/Physical Life

Finally – what if you can learn from the lessons of your life and you don’t?

This article is not meant to condemn you or to make you feel bad about actions that you did not take in the past. The purpose of this article is to help you understand that in every moment you have an opportunity to do something different. In every moment you have an opportunity to start over.

You can start accomplishing your goals. You can start becoming a better person. You can start taking action on becoming the person you were meant to be. You can do this and much more… but, will you?

Action: Decide what you want out of life and use the present moment to start moving towards your desires.

Remember once you lose this moment you can never get it back – use each moment wisely.

Information and knowledge is power. In negotiations this information translates into bargaining power. The Internet is the ultimate source of information and is thus a great tool for employees to strengthen their bargaining power in salary negotiations. But there are disadvantages with the Internet as well.

A prime focus when preparing for a salary negotiation is of course to find out the market value of the job one is negotiating the salary for. There are loads of information about this on the Internet, categorized per country, state, kind of job etc. Just a few minutes of research could easily double the bargaining power of the employee.

Another prime focus when preparing for a salary negotiation is to find information about the employer. How is the employer doing financially? What is its history? What are its plans for the future? Information that is invaluable when the employee shall make himself as interesting as possible to the employer. Again – the Internet is a powerful source of information for the employee.

These and other pros of the Internet in a salary negotiation are obvious. There are, however, risks with the Internet that the employee needs to be aware of. This risk lies primarily in the quality of the information.

First of all, information that is not up-to-date will often do more harm than good for the employee.

Second, the information on the Internet is often scattered and brief. There are numerous websites providing information on how to negotiate a salary; information that, however, would fit on only one page in a Microsoft Word document. Although published with the best of intentions, the briefness of the information gives an appearance that a salary negotiation is a quite simple thing that one can succeed with armed with only a few tips.

This is very far from the truth. In fact, a salary negotiation can, from the perspective of the employee, be more complicated and tougher than a negotiation regarding a merger of two Fortune 500 companies. It is not something to be taken lightly and a few tips on a website will definitely not be enough if the employee has a serious ambition of getting a salary that is as high as possible.

Thus, there are powerful pros as well as powerful cons of the Internet for the employee about to negotiate his salary.