The Passion Driven Life: The Secrets of Success, Balance & Fulfillment in The 9 Key Areas of Life

by Louis F. Vargas, Larry Jones (Foreword by)

Overview

Take your life from mundane to great in love, life, and business with this inspiring guide to finding your passion and living your faith!
Louis F. Vargas was a street-smart kid from an immigrant family who went on to graduate from an elite college, make a fortune on Wall Street, then lose it all—only to make an incredible comeback as chairman of an Inc. 500 company. In The Passion Driven Life, Vargas shares his own life story as well as the inspiring stories of other individuals who found success by following their passion with determination and Godly faith. And he shows you the secrets to doing it all yourself.
In The Passion Driven Life, you will find the tools you need to transform your life, find balance, and excel further. Some of the many things this book reveals are:

• How to empower thoughts and re-focus on purpose, passion, and success
• The 7 Secrets of Business Success
• How to harness the power of the mind and find out what holds you back
• Why life's really not all about you (sorry to disappoint you!)
• The source of unshakeable faith and hope in life
• How to overcome setbacks and obstacles
• How to unleash balance and enjoyment in your life and live at the pace of passion

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781614481973
Publisher:	Morgan James Publishing
Publication date:	09/10/2019
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	344
File size:	6 MB

About the Author

Louis F. Vargas is passionate personal and business success. He is the creator of the Business Maximization Series, award winning executive, a business consultant, and a speaker.He career has spanned import/export, Wall Street, entrepreneurship, real estate development, advertising, sales & marketing, and consulting. In all, he has created more than $1.5 billion in market value and sales for companies he has been involved with. He is the CEO of N.M.C.C., a business maximization company and runs a private equity investment fund.A co-founder an Inc. 500 award winning direct advertising agency and marketing company, he is a recognized business, marketing and sales authority. He is a member of Inc. Magazine's BizNet Advisory Panel on Marketing, and has received both Congressional and Presidential Commission recognition.Professionally, he is a member of the Global Entrepreneurs Alliance, CEOSpace, USC Marshall School of Business alumni, Junior Achievement, Latin Business Association, USC Alumni Association, and OC Stay Connected. An inspirational speaker, in his book, "The Passion- Driven Life", he applies his personal experience, knowledge of the laws of attraction, and extensive business experience to the spiritual and human potential realm. He shows how we can use our vast abundance of spiritual assets to identify, expand and manifest personal dreams, business goals, passions and dreams into existence in order to create a life of abundant service, giving, balance, fulfillment, empowerment, and prosperity.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

The Power of Living Life Without Excuses ... No Matter What

Everyone has the power for greatness, Not for fame, but greatness, Because greatness is determined by service..

~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I envision this to be a journey, a toolbox, and a guide along the road of your life. My desire is that it gives hope to those who have "hit the wall" and are losing, or have lost, their passion or purpose. For those who may feel an insignificance in what they are doing. As a continuous reminder to you that there are no excuses in life for you to pursue your dreams or aspirations! Pray, plan, persist, and just go for it --- no matter what.

Picture this: I'm sitting in heavy Los Angeles early morning commuter traffic, so far I'm not telling you anything that won't surprise you; anyway, I'm en route to my corporate headquarters (an hour and half away) of my Inc. 500 multi-million dollar company where I'm President, Chairman and cofounder, and a thought races through my head: "Is this going to be my life for the next 10 to 15 years; being stuck in grid-lock traffic and hurriedly going from one meeting to the next, and living life at a dizzying speed that is zapping me?" I pondered that thought in the back of my mind for a long time and for many months afterwards it lingered, quietly, and sometimes loudly, humming in my brain.

As I mentioned, I'm the President, Chairman, and co-founder of an Inc. 500 multi-million company. In 2007, my company was featured in Inc. magazine as one of the fastest growing private companies in America. My company was on the leading edge as an English and Spanish language advertising agency, marketing consulting and sales training company. I engineered a merger and acquisition in 2006, and as a result we were on target for $10 million in the first fiscal year.

The milestone was both bittersweet. It was sweet because it validated my abilities as an entrepreneur and executive. It was a good morale booster for the company staff as well. Bitter because it took a lot of time away from my family and home. Was I elated to get there? Was the sacrifice worth the pay-off? Yes and no. To me, if you consider what I had to give up: my personal life balance, harmony, health, major milestone memories with my children and wife. There was just too much, in my opinion, to continue to give up for the sake of business and the sake of making money.

A man should never neglect his family for Business.

~ Walt Disney

So back to being stuck in traffic, I'm getting nowhere as I drive to the office and I'm thinking to myself that there had to be a better way for me and my business where I could have an alternative that would be a win-win for everyone. I began to question why I was doing what I was doing and asking, "For what purpose?" I began to envision of a lot of other ways to make a great living and not die in the process, and leave behind a trail of tears, unfulfilled dreams, a heart-broken wife and children.

I have plenty of time to think as I drive, crawl along is more like it in my German luxury import: I think to myself, "Let's see I usually work 10-12 hour days and fight traffic for about easy 3 hours each day; that comes to a daily total of 12 to 15 hours engulfed by work. Subtract that from a 24 hour day, and I have roughly 9 good hours left to sleep, eat, relax (ha-ha), enjoy and actually see my twin daughters and wife. Take away at least six to seven for sleep, and you can see the major problem and issue I'm facing here: No time, except work time!" Sound familiar?

I hit the wall and said forget it! Today, I am no longer the Chairman, President, and co-founder of that company. Guess what? I couldn't be more relieved and happier. Why? As you can now imagine, I was sacrificing too much for it. It was draining me. I had no life beyond this company. The tradeoffs in my personal life versus business growth were too much beyond what I was willing to endure. To experience the life we dream and desire we face: Choices, Challenges, and Changes. The Secrets to Life lie in how we answer each accordingly.

I faced my challenges in my life, made the decisions, and changes to experience it fully. Because of the challenges I faced, the choices and changes I made, I was able to reassess, refocus, recharge, and unleash my passion and redefine my purpose in life. I reconnected with my family, and as a result, I was able get my life back!

It was in the process of searching for the secrets of going to the next level in life, after having experienced a financial meltdown in my life in the 1990s, serious legal difficulties, and conducting in-depth research and introspection that I realized that in our quest of living life in our modern world, almost all of us have created an amazing cottage industry of "busyness" --- defined as fully and always occupied, and unavailable to live life.

Everywhere in the industrialized nations we have crafted an art of somehow always being "busy." Some people carry it around as a badge of honor and proud of constantly stating to others, "Gee, I'm so busy. Can talk now, I've got to go!" While I believe in productivity, there is a major difference between being productive and just being busy for the sake of it. Activity or motion is not productivity.

In the meantime, rarely do we do anything to slow the pace about being so busy. It is no small irony that the levels of stress, heart attacks, depression, anxiety and dissatisfaction with life have dramatically increased over the past thirty ears.

"Busyness" rarely pays great dividends. It instead extols a heavy price on us: constantly being physically tired while it further taxes our mind, heart, spirit and soul. When you run so fast to get somewhere, we miss half the fun of getting there. So, I resolved to walk, not to run as much, and enjoy the scenery along the way of life. I decided to help my family and myself by placing "busy-all-the-time" on the shelf before it placed me in a pine box. Now I get to still be in the business arena, yet I can now take a lot of time to enjoy my family and my twin toddlers.

The highest level of charity, Is helping others help themselves.

~ Maimonides

At one time in my life I was where perhaps many of you are presently: hopeless, poor, in trouble, looking for answers, and just plain sick and tired of being sick and tired. In my search though for a better life, I came to the realization that I could live in, what Marshall Sylver refers to as an "and" world. Rather than having to choose between either one thing or another, you can have both!

You can have a world of success and a world of great family life and personal interests. I realized that I needed to stop worrying about aspects of running and owning a business. I realized I could own a business, and not be bogged down with daily administration issues, and still reap the benefits that come with being an entrepreneur.

There is no question that the company I co-founded was on the fast track, but I was on the slow track in my health, my relationships, and my overall quality of life. I had lost the passion for continuing onward for a multitude of reasons. After awhile it was no longer about a vision to merge the company with an even larger one, but to get my sanity, my life and my peace of mind back --- that is, believe me, priceless!

It was looking myself daily in the mirror and realizing that I could not continue with the same rhythm. That I had to choices to make. So I changed the business model and paradigm to fit my personal vision, life desires, dreams, purpose and passions for life.

We all have choices we must make without excuses. The difference is that some of us decide to take a leap of faith when we make them. We decide to follow our heart, to seek wisdom, and pray about the choices. We know that in doing so we can live life again.

Yet, so many others refuse to confront the reality or refuse to make the choices needed to regain a passion. They refuse to live out purpose. Instead they toil away with a burden in their heart, never looking to change the circumstances or to get past hurts or issues that have been holding them back.

A lot of you can relate. Perhaps you are a workaholic whose career or business seems to be more important than connecting with family, spouse, children, relatives, or friends. Perhaps you are someone who has lost, or is losing, passion and purpose in areas of personal relationships. Perhaps you are a mom who is constantly busy running from one place to the next and overloaded with "stuff" and you sometimes question the meaning of it all as you feel overwhelmed and sometimes unappreciated.

Or maybe you are someone who simply feels something is missing in your life. You could be a business person wondering: "What can I do to get me away from this situation that is causing me so much stress and heartache?"

99% of the failures come from people Who have the habit of making excuses.

~ George Washington Carver

There are no excuses for not having personal or financial success and a great spiritual relationship with God that uplifts you and builds others. There are no excuses for not having dynamic family, personal or social relationships. There are no excuses for not having a balanced life where you enjoy the "small things", rather than merely focus on the large picture. There are no excuses for living an abundant life.

I've had to face social, family, economic, and legal struggles to make it in life. Growing up, I experienced first-hand back breaking work. I had no choice when I was young, as I was forced by my father to work, unpaid mostly, long hot summer days and weekends alongside him in various manual intensive tasks such as a car mechanic, construction assistant, machinery mechanic, painter, delivery person, and a printer. It was at my Dad's print shop, when I was just twelve, in an accident that I almost severed my hand. I had to undergo multiple surgeries and years and years of physical and emotional pain afterwards. That ended my days of forced manual labor.

After that episode two things became pretty clear to me: 1) I appreciated hard work and doing a job well and; 2) I hated any kind of manual labor! It also sold me on the concept that I needed to get a college degree to create a better life for myself and seek to fulfill my American Dream. With no trust fund in sight I decided that I was better off heading for the books instead of back to the mean streets.

Refuse to be average. Let your heart soar as high as it can.

~ A.W. Tozer

Despite my upbringing and challenges, I fought on and was blessed to attend a college. I faced my challenges and unloaded my personal baggage from my rough upbringing, made choices and early on in my life changed my direction. I created breakthroughs and turning points to the next level. So for you there should no excuses in life.

I know what it is to struggle. But I also know what it is to experience success. In my thinking there are no excuses. I've had ups and downs just like an elevator. Despite everything, I persevered onward, blessed by God, and with an unbending spirit to succeed. I've faced my mountains of obstacles and got busy moving upward and onward to climb them.

This book came about as a result of personal lessons and inspiration from experiences I had from years of starting various successful businesses. In the process of my business career, at times I also did not place proper boundaries and priorities in my family, personal or social life. I suppose it was an unbending drive to have the type of lifestyle and financial freedom I never experienced as I was growing up.

It was only until confronted recently with the fact that I was repeating the same pattern once again, and that it was affecting my family life, did it strike me that I could not continue on like that anymore. There sometimes is a price that is paid. At the end of it all with the Inc. 500 company I realized that I was not living a harmonious life. The balance had been lost in my life while pursuing to build another business. I was not enjoying the process or my company's success.

For all the success, I was not having fun nor did I believe that I was really making a difference. As I mention later in the 21 Laws of Business, having fun and being passionate about what you do is one of the most important criteria. I had to contend with boring administrative matters and internal struggles, along with grueling daily commutes of 3.0 to 3.5 hours. These highly stressful work days extended into late evenings and quite often to weekends.

It placed emotional strains on myself and my wife, and affected the quality of time I could spend with her and my adorable newborn twins. It had created an imbalance. I was paying a heavy price. Something had to change. I had choices to make.

I wanted to explore new frontiers. I wanted to reconnect with my personal interests, my family life, and my dreams. I needed to recharge, reenergize, redirect, refocus and disengage from all that was toxic in my business life that was engulfing me personally. I too needed to refuel my heart and spirit. It was time for a change --- no more excuses.

The toxicity and stresses of my business life affected my passion in the other core areas of my life. It began to affect my passion for living life fully. I longed to recapture the passion of being a part of something that was more significant to me than just growing a company.

Just as I had toxic imbalance in my business life that affected my personal life, the same could be occurring in your life. Examine yours and the areas of toxicity that could be spilling from one area of life into others such as your personal life, spiritual life, family life, or love life.

During a recent period of challenge in my life vis-à-vis the company and future I came across the book Want Fries With That? which captured my attention as it detailed the author's escape from being an advertising executive into various blue-collar jobs. He did so as a way of searching for his meaning and reconnecting with himself without the stresses and strains of corporate life. The book caught my eye because the author, like me, had been engulfed by his business and had lost touch with the passion of his personal and family life.

My hope is that The Passion-Driven Life® touches your heart and soul and that it helps you unravel the secrets of how to get to the next level in areas you wish to excel in, for example, your personal life, love life, business or work life, spiritual life, social life, or health life. For you to find, redefine and redesign your life, and assist you in unleashing your purpose and passion in all areas of life. It's never too late to start and you're never too young to begin. As you shall see there are no excuses or past experiences, no matter how deep and painful, as to why you should not do so.

From my growing up years I realized there was a lot of baggage I was carrying that I had to unload to lighten the burden. Therefore, I decided to dump it on the side of the road before I could get on with my new journey in life. Do the same, if you are still carrying baggage from year's gone bye. There are no excuses!

There should be no excuses for you to capture and unleash the dreams you harbor in your heart and soul. That is the major purpose of this book. It's about how you have the inner power given by God to propel yourself to a new level of meaning, purpose and passion.

Life is too short and too precarious not too. As far back as I can remember, tragic or sudden death has surrounded my life from a very early age and shaped, to a major extent, how I value the gift of life. It is why I choose to appreciate life it in its totality.

When I was nine, my maternal grandmother died from an aneurism, when I was about 11, an aunt committed suicide. At twelve, a forty-one year old very close family friend died from a heart attack while cutting his lawn and an elementary school friend died from leukemia. When I was sixteen, my mother died from a brain tumor; at age eighteen a college friend died in a moped accident and shortly after another aunt died from stomach cancer. When I was twenty-one, my two year old cousin died from a fall. Toiling away at USC at twenty-two, I found out a cousin disappeared --- he was never found to this day. At twenty-four, another young cousin died from appendicitis. At twenty-five a friend committed suicide; and at twenty-eight, I witnessed and helped in a massive-rear accident in which a female passenger died in the flames. When I was thirty, my step-mother died at the young age of fifty-nine. And at thirty-six, I witnessed another serious car accident where the driver died in my arms. Within the last year four family members (my father, sister, mother-in-law and a cousin) and three close family friends passed away.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "The Passion-Driven Life ..."
by .
Copyright © 2010 Passion-Driven Enterprises/Louis F. Vargas..
Excerpted by permission of Morgan James Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

FOREWORD,
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS,
DEDICATION,
PART I: GETTING PREPARED FOR THE JOURNEY,
THE QUESTIONS: What's Life Really All About?,
THE CHALLENGE: Finding Passion & Purpose for the Soul,
PREFACE: The Power of Living an Empowered Life,
INTRODUCTION: The Power of Fully Embracing Life,
PART II: THE POWER IN SEEKING ANSWERS & MAKING DECISIONS IN LIFE,
CHAPTER 1: The Power of Living Life Without Excuses ... No Matter What!,
CHAPTER 2: The Power in Facing Tough Times Head-On,
CHAPTER 3: The Secret Alchemy: The Power of Faith, God & Moving On,
CHAPTER 4: The Power of Transformation: The Next Level Changes Needed,
CHAPTER 5: The Power of Choice: Getting Over Breakdowns, Creating Breakthroughs & Balance,
PART III: THE INITIAL STEPS TOWARDS THE SECRETS,
CHAPTER 6: The Power of the Universal Law of Love and Abundance,
CHAPTER 7: The Power of Change: Launching Your Visions & Life Dreams,
PART IV: THE KEY QUESTIONS THAT REVEAL THE SECRETS,
CHAPTER 8: 1st Question: The Power of Hope – What's Died in My Life?,
CHAPTER 9: 2nd Question: The Power of Focus - Am I Spinning My Wheels?,
CHAPTER 10: 3rd Question: The Power of Harmony - What Matters in The 9 Key Areas of Life?,
CHAPTER 11: 4th Question: The Power of Reflection - How Do I Define Purpose & Passion?,
CHAPTER 12: 5th Question: The Power of Possibility - Where's The Key to Unlock The Secrets?,
CHAPTER 13: 6th Question: The Power of Massive Action - How Do I Use the Key?,
CHAPTER 14: 7th Question: The Power of Commitments - Am I On Fire About My Life Purpose & Passion?,
PART V: THE SECRETS TO THE NEXT LEVEL IN LOVE, LIFE & BUSINESS,
CHAPTER 15: The 1st Secret: The Power of Creating Crystal Clear Clarity,
CHAPTER 16: The 2nd Secret: The Power of Self-Worth, Acceptance & Embracing Achievements,
CHAPTER 17: The 3rd Secret: The Power of Abundant Life Success,
CHAPTER 18: The 4th Secret: The Power of Imagine-neering Your Life Plan,
CHAPTER 19: The 5th Secret: The Power of Digging Deep in Your Heart, Soul & Mind,
CHAPTER 20: The 6th Secret: The Power of Vision-neering a Life of Fulfillment,
CHAPTER 21: The 7th Secret: The Power of Spiritual Abundance,
CHAPTER 22: The 8th Secret: The Power of Persistence,
CHAPTER 23: The 9th Secret: The Power of Passion-Driven® Planning & Goal Implementation,
CHAPTER 24: The 10th Secret: The Power of Creating Life Attitude Adjustments,
CHAPTER 25: The 11th Secret: The Power of Intention - Unleashing Purpose & Passion,
CHAPTER 26: The 12th Secret: The Power of Faith & Love - The 7 Laws of Life,
CHAPTER 27: The 13th Secret: The Power of Harmony in Life Success & Financial Success,
CHAPTER 28: The 14th Secret: The Power of Purpose & Passion in Business Success,
PART VI: THE POWER OF LIVING LIFE AT THE PACE & SPEED OF PASSION . . .,
CHAPTER 29: The 15th Secret: The Power in Asking, "What's Next In My Life?",
CHAPTER 30: The 16th Secret: The Power of Living Passionately Inspired ® A New Life,
CONCLUSION: The 17th Secret: The Power of Life Changes --- Creating Your Turning Points,
AFTERWORD: The Final Secret: The Power of Passionately Living in The Valleys of Life.,
A SPECIAL INVITATION: THE ComPASSION PROJECT - Transform the World & Make a Difference,
THE PASSION-DRIVEN® LIFE CHARITIES: Feed The Children® & Habitat for Humanity®,
BIBLIOGRAPHY,
MEET THE AUTHOR,
WHAT'S NEXT?,