Hey everybody! It is Neha with College Shortcuts. I hope you're having an incredible incredible new year. Again, I am live here on Facebook and on YouTube. So, I'm really excited to be talking to all of you guys today. Welcome to 2018. Now I know so many of us were waiting for this year to come. I know how stressful it was to end the year right. So, what I wanted to do here today was to talk to you a little bit about what needs to be done in 2018 that should be done differently than what was done in 2017. So, one of the first things I want to do is to go ahead and put a comment below here that specifically has our information if you ever want to reach out to us. Now, one of the things a lot of people don't realize is that I mean I know this sounds crazy but I've got to say this literally one in three students are actually getting help in the college admissions process. So, many times you hear "Okay well Little Johnny did it all on his own or little Sheila did it by herself in the summer." But the truth of the matter is if you have a group of 10 friends like three or four of them are definitely getting someone to edit their essays, to look through everything. I'm here to tell you that it's really important for you to understand how hard this competition is. Now, today I don't want to scare you or freak you out but I think there's something beautiful about knowing the truth and being honest about it. If you comment below "Yes" or anything. Go ahead and say "Yes" I will definitely reach out to you. Now, let's go ahead and get right into it. Now, I'm really excited about 2018. I have been waiting for this for about two months. So, I think it's really important for everyone to understand how important is youth momentum to your favor in the college admissions process. So, I want to give you a tip of the day here that I think is huge. It's something I've been using for over 15 years and I use it with all the students I work with. So, today I want to give you this free tip to help you really plan out your year. It all starts with dreaming big. You know I was reading an article recently and actually I was watching Shark Tank and Mark Cuban goes "It's the ones that dream so big, they're almost considered stupid are the ones I invest in." The reason I say that is because there's something really attractive and interesting and mysterious about those that dream really big. It's because they have such a huge dream that people almost laugh at them but if you don't dream big enough you only end up halfway or a fourth of the way. In my opinion the only reason why, people don't dream big is because they're scared to fail or scared that they'll never get there. But the issue is why are you even limiting your dreams to begin with. So, I want to give you three major tips here specifically around dreaming big and relevant to the college admissions process. So, I was talking to a student named Sonica the other day. She had said to me that she had been dreaming to go to a College, an Ivy League institution since she was in sixth grade. She felt really hesitant about it. She was like "I just don't know I get in." You know there was a lot of lack of confidence, insecurity, stress around this whole process. The thing that she done every single step that she needed to take to totally get into that college. In reality the colleges were lucky to even have her. I tell students this all the time "You are going to get in somewhere. It is about making sure that you find the right choice for you." But dreaming big is a massive part of this process. One of the biggest things I talk about is you know so many people don't dream big. They say "Oh well I just don't know if I'll get in there so I won't apply." But the thing about the college admissions process is once you finish one or two applications or three applications, you've pretty much done 80 percent of the work for all the other college applications you have to do. See, it's always the first application that's the hardest. So, I want to talk about why it is important to reach for the stars for your child. See, imagine a time and remember a time when your child was four and they said "I want to be an astronaut. I want to be the best ballet dancer or I want to be the biggest rock star. I want to be the next Elon Musk." Somewhere along the path your kid lost that dream and they started to feel unsure of who they are or not really feeling significant in this entire process. But I'm here to tell you that this is 2018. This is the time and this is the year to grab those dreams like this and be ready to take this year by the horns." I have put a little link below or you can comment below. Just type in "Yes" if you were interested in hearing more about our programs. We are only opening up a hundred spots this year. So, I just want to make sure everyone knows right below to comment say "Yes." Now, when I talk about reaching for the stars it is so important to number two, write it down. It is nothing more frustrating than listening to someone complain about things or say "Oh there's no way I can do it or I don't know how to change things or I just don't know if that's going to be possible for me." But the thing is why don't you write out. What it is you truly desire or you truly want. Students never do this actually. There's no class that taught in school about this. Some parents don't even do this with their own kids. But the families that we work with that we've done mentorship with on our family plan in other ways. We have seen them really succeed because they have a strategic goal in mind to go for. You know there's nothing harder than trying to achieve a goal and not have a direction, a strategy and a plan to execute. I'm here to tell you that this is 2018. This is January, this is the time to be creating these plans for your kid with them. The last thing I want to talk about here is you know really making sure that you understand to make it fun. You know 2017 was a hard year for a lot of us. People were exhausted, tired, frustrated. I think there's something beautiful to be said about really starting new year off right. I will tell you that when you write your goals down, they actually happen. I remember over three and a half year ago. I've written a list of things and I look back in December to look at this list. One of them was I want build a school overseas for children that are under-served. That was a 4-year-old gift, a goal that I had. I want to eventually go to Africa at some point. I definitely want to travel more. I want to hit certain numbers on my business. I will tell you I now looked at that little page of goals that I had written down. I put out there to the universe that this is what I truly want. I've actually hit every one of those goals. They say that if you write your goals down you are bringing in the vibration of what you truly want and desired. If you act uncertain or unsure you know if you say things like "I don't know if I can get in" or "Well, these other kids are better than me." These types of verbs and words and language that you're using if you're a teenager is not effective. It's not helpful and it's definitely not effective in the interview process where they want to see confidence and they want to see people that are sure of themselves. So, I want us to use 2018 and this month in this momentum that we have to really focus on what we truly desire and what we truly want. I want to tell you what I do and it's something I think will be incredible to do with your children. It only takes about five to 10 to 15 minutes max to do this. Yet it's such a game changer. I've seen it over and over. Now, just let you guys know my name Neha Gupta. I am founder of College Shortcuts. I'm so excited to be telling you about my tips for dreaming big for your kids here today. I put a link below on the Facebook Live. Definitely click on it and fill it out if you want to get in and learn more about our programs here. In YouTube please go ahead and just type in "Yes" in the comment box. Now, let me tell you one of the big things here about what we're doing here at College Shortcuts. Now, you may have wondered why we've been so quiet in December. Well, we had a lot of students reach out to us at the end of the school year right up to regular decision trying to get their essays edited. I'm not even kidding. We were working with the student up until New Year's Eve my team was pretty tired. So, I just want you to know that in 2018 we actually are not going to be doing that anymore. Let me tell you why. We've actually launched early bird programs with our entire team. It's absolutely incredible because anyone that signs up for early bird with us, will be getting roughly a 30 to 40 percent discount. Because you have shown that you want to be taking action and you want to execute. We want to reward you for that. Now, we're only taking on 100 students this year and we're capping at it. Of course, my life goal is to hit a million students in the college admissions process. But right now, I need to make sure that we get quality work done with a hundred of students that we take on. So, if you're looking for any assistance when it comes to your 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th or 12th grader this is the time to reach out to us because we are here to really make sure you're taken care of. Here's another big thing. Have you ever noticed that when you're traveling for the holidays, maybe you remember this during the holidays? As you try to get a reservation somewhere or you're trying to plan something and they didn't have availability because everyone else that was early and figured out what they wanted got your spot. You know sitting next to my niece over Christmas break and she was frustrated that her brother had grabbed something and got it before she did because you know she really wanted it. I said "Honey there's going to be a lot of people grabbing stuffs. You've got to get in there get what you want. So, if you already know your kid is going to college that is part of the process and her family then it makes no sense to wait until the last minute. Because I will tell you when people are rushed, stressed or unable to make their mind up about things. You never get good results. See, so many of the students we worked with early on. They got into colleges like you UPenn, Duke, Harvard, Dartmouth, Yale, UT, Rice, Michigan, Miami and all the California School Stanford. I mean these are hard schools to get into but we started actually a lot earlier than any college councilor ever will at any high school that you work with. So, this is why I think creating a vision dreaming big is very important. But let me tell you the last step. See there's nothing more amazing than creating a vision board and coming up with a list of incredible things you want to do. But see there's people that have an idea. That's great and there's lots of people that have lots of ideas. There's people that have they love to talk about their ideas. Okay then there's people that you know start to write their ideas down but the last part is not just writing it down but scheduling it in and executing. That last part there I will tell you that 10 percent of people actually do that. It's the action takers that get everything and it's the idea of people that get really pissed at the people that are executing on everything that they're doing. The reason I tell you this and I learned this attitude of Robins conference last year. He explained it in beautiful words about there's you know idea, dreamers, people that write it down. Then the last step is execution. I've noticed it's the parents that start early with us. That have a big dream for their child and they know their kids are absolutely incredible. Those are the parents and those are the students that get into top schools. So, this year in 2018 College Shortcuts is announcing our Early Bird program. This is for the dreamers that want to take their dream and make it a reality. This is for all of us turning 2018 into our best year ever. Because let me tell you something 2017 while it was the biggest year in my business ever. We had more clients. We have more team members. We had more work than we ever had before. We expect to triple that in 2018. But the thing is we're only doing early bird for a certain amount of time. So, if you really want to get in. You want to get your kid ready to go. If there are 8th, 9th, 10th or 11th grade. Please come and sign in now. I'll tell you why because dreaming big is one thing and creating a list of goals is another. But there's nothing more incredible than actually scheduling it in. I actually have a call later today. I'm talking to a parent who has an eighth grader and a ninth grader who has started in the December. He has a little bit more follow up about his kids plans. The summer activities they want to do. You know so many parents are just trying to do it right. They're trying to make sure they're doing everything right. They're trying to hope that their kid gets into a good school. They really want to know that they're doing everything that they can in their kids’ academic future. The thing about it, is what you don't know you don't know. In a lot of cases parents don't know the college admissions process and that's why getting a coach is so effective. So, I wanted to do today's video just as a welcome to 2018. We're really excited here at College shortcuts. We just decided to finally get above water with all the applications that were due January 1st. We are very excited about 2018 and working with you guys. Now, if you have any questions please go ahead and type them below. This is a live video here. I want to get into a kind of the nitty-gritty of how it works when you go from dream to execution. So, typically what happens is, everyone has dreams. I mean I don't know one person that doesn't have dreams. If you close your eyes and go to bed at some point you will have a dream. So, there is dreams in there that are always going through. There are times where you're sitting and you really have a passion towards something or you want to do something. So, usually what happens is you start off with what I call the brainstorming phase in a way. When you're thinking about your 2018 sometimes the easiest ways to come up with your list of dreams and goals is actually look into what you don't want to tolerate any more in 2018 that you tolerated in 2017. So, for some of the students I worked with. One of them was "I don't want to watch as much TV in 2018 so I get better grades." Now, this sounds like a small goal but it's actually a huge one because they're changing their entire schedule and their time management to allow them to study more. Another one said "I want to launch a club at school and I want to be the president or vice president of this organization." So, these were actually things I had done with this student. I'm talking about a student from last year that we did this with. Then also written down was "I want to improve my grades by at least a letter at minimum and I want go to X, Y and Z colleges." So, I want you to know these were just some goals that the student had. May of that year just a five-month period. This student had almost stopped watching TV, watch maybe one or two shows. All her grades went up by an entire letter grade and she had started a club on campus that had never been done before and it didn't exist on campus. So, she was very creative. She also agreed to doing an incredible summer internship full year later. Now, we're looking at a student who has raised their grades significantly. Who has made sure that they were involved in their community in some way. Who stopped watching the TV for you know hours and hours and now has more time to do things that she's interested in. Now, when working on her applications she's so much more to talk about. She also has dreams of going to certain colleges because she created that dream and that goal. She doesn't feel a lot of fear or anxiety or stress around it or worry because in her mind she's not created goals that she's hit over and over and over. No matter what she knows that she's done a great job. She's done the best that she can at her level and what she can do. That's when I realize this strategy of goal setting and having the conversations early on in the year when everyone is feeling momentum is the key time to actually be doing this. You don't see you all make resolutions in March. No, this is the month to really get going. So, I urge you to take a moment with your family and do this exercise for yourself. What are the things that you truly desire and want in your own life? What are things that you truly want specifically with your child? What do they want in their lives? You know I know many students they tend to be distracted. There's Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, selfies, YouTube and there’s all sorts of things that students can be distracted by. But in the end somewhere deep inside if they are asked the right questions. They can actually create incredible dream and vision for themselves. I'll tell you another example. I was working with a student almost seven years ago. I think he's now a pro baseball player and he was really at a bad place. He was one of the best baseball players in high school but because of his grades he was put on probation. So, what I did was I mapped out what his dream life would look like and what his not so dream life would look like. When I showed him, you know when you write out things you can visually look where visual creatures people. Where you can visually look at what's going on up in there. He said "Oh my god no! I will not do that. I don't want that life. I don't want to end up at a bad college. I don't want to stop playing baseball." Like I've been working for 15 years toward this goal. What can I do? So, I want you to look at last year's grades. So, I want you to look at 2017 and do an analysis with your child about where they were at and where they need to go. Because the big thing that most people don't think about is there's data in what you've done in the last year. Then you need to make the decisions and execute in the next year. So, one of the big things we always do is we write things down. We look at what happened last year and we make goals for the next year. It's a lot of fun because dreaming big is huge. I have some students who are dreaming of going to Ivy leagues. I have some that are dreaming to study a Computer Science. I have some that are really interested in doing some MIT programs. So, many schools have different views and different goals and none of them are good. None of them are bad. They are what is good for that person in that time in that moment for them. So, I want 2018 to be amazing for you. I know 2018 is already going to be epic. I've actually already scheduled in all the fun in my life and some of the most incredible things that we'll be doing in 2018 for my business. It's actually really exciting because it's what gets me out a bed every day. You know when you're going towards a goal and you don't know what you're doing. It's not as fun that's why a lot of students are going to school and they're like "Oh let's go to school again. I don't know I'm doing this. I hate waking up in the morning." Well that's because they don't have a vision. If you don't have a vision for why you're doing what you're doing. It can sometimes daily life boring. For example, most people don't like doing their taxes. They don't like doing accounting. It's not fun but when you think about all the benefits of doing these things. It makes you move to make sure you do it and get it done. So, I want you to take some time in the next two to three days. To create a vision with your child specifically around what it is they truly desire and want. Then the next step after that is to take that information. Work with them on it but then create an actual plan that you can execute. So excited to have you here in 2018. We have some incredibly huge dreams right now that we're going to be achieving in 2018. We want to make sure that you have our exact formula and strategy for dreaming big. Now please comment "Yes" below if you are definitely interested in learning more about how we can make your dreams come true. So, I want to tell you a little bit more about when you go the list of dreams and discussing it out. Sometimes it might be a little challenging. The first time you are asking your kid to do this exercise. They don't really know what to do. There's a lot of different areas of life they need to focus on whether it's social. Whether it's community service. Whether it's getting more involved in their extracurriculars. Whether it's academic, whether it's you know making sure their standardized tests are right. You know making sure that they're staying healthy. There's a lot of things that are being bounced whether you're a child or you're an adult. If you write out those goals, you're more likely to get them done. So, just you know everyone on Facebook live. There's a link where you just type right in. Click on that link, bit.ly link right there. Click on it and Gladys and everyone else, just fill in that information. That way you can find out more. Now, when you have this list. Okay so let's say the list is "I want to raise my math grade really high. I want to do more community service. I want to do 10 hours of community service in the next two months. I want to go to a top 25 university and I want to make sure that I am you know watching an hour or less of TV a week." Let's just say that's the goal. The next step as a parent is for you to dissect these goals. Now, this is where I actually personally do within our family plan of what we do with families but you want to sit down. I want to give you the strategies as well you know what we're doing. A lot of times it helps having a third party or a mentor because we all know how. Even starting at the age of four they stop listening to parents right. I mean let's be honest. So, let me explain to you what you would do next. Now let's say you have this list of things you're doing and the next thing you want to do is ask how do you plan on getting there. For example, let's say I have a goal of losing 40 pounds. Well that's an awesome goal but how do I plan to get from point A to Point B. Well, there's a lot of actions and steps that need to take place. One is I need to get a gym plan or gym routine or a workout plan. You know maybe I want to get a tracker for that so I can track my progress. Maybe I want to start making all my food for myself because I know that eating out. I'm not so regimented when I eat out versus when I eat at home. Maybe it's about giving myself a little treat in between to make sure that I feel better. I celebrate my wins when I feel really good about my goals. In the case of getting into a good college or raising. Let's say raising a letter grade. Let's say last semester they didn't do so well in the Math class, Spanish class, Language class, and Science class. You guys may not know this but that end of your exam is cumulative. So, that student now has to make up everything they learned from August to December. While starting in January and attempting to do better and this is where most people get really tripped up. Then half way to do or like "I want to do it right." Well, this is the thing you don't want to be doing that in the middle of the semester. When you don't know how to study effectively it can be super challenging. So, let's say it's algebra 2 and your kids are like "I want to do better in that class." Within the next question is how are you going to get there. I might say "I don't really know. I don't know." So, you've got to give some recommendations that could be "Hey let's go back through every chapter of your book and let's re-teach everything." Maybe it's let's go to the teacher and tell them your goal. What your goals, they're god that gets to tell you if you got a better grade. So, why not let your team know. Then the last is getting a coach you know for example I have coaches on my team that loves their subjects that they tutor. That's what gets them excited. It's teaching algebra 2 and the one-on-one approach can be really helpful because you can go through the material at the speed at which your kid learns and how they learn. Their style of learning one-on-one to get that grade up. So, I will tell you there are a lot of ways to set your goals. There's something beautiful and magical about when you write them down and you paste them to a wall where you can see them. So, just know this week I'm actually doing that. I have my planner and I'm actually scheduling in things already. I have things planned out up until September of this coming year. Already in my calendar. I already know I'm doing them. I've committed. I've paid for it and I'm doing it. I am going to also create a vision board for really what I want this year to be like for myself. I'm going to write out those lists of goals. Then I'm going to really start listing out all the steps of what it takes to do that because nothing more fun than having a challenge and achieving that goal. It's one of the biggest issues we see over and over with students. They are going to school. They don't really know the value. They don't know why. They don't know what they want to do with their lives. They don't know what they want to study and then we're expecting them to be stellar students. They have no mentor. That's really really one-on-one helping them at this kind of level of intelligence to get them in on what they truly desire. Then they lose momentum but I don't want that for you in 2018. I want 2018 to be your best year yet because I truly believe that this is the year to succeed. I mean my gosh it's like why not. I hope this video that explains what it takes to go from a dream. How to brainstorm around that. How to write out your goals? How to do this with your kid? Ask them certain questions and then to actually start getting some steps underneath each one of those goals. Really being patient with your kid about it. Now, like I told you earlier if there are things that you already know that your kid is going to need in the future. You should get it early. So, as I was telling you guys earlier my name is Neha Gupta. I am the founder of College Shortcuts and Elite Private Tutors. We have decided for 2018. We are giving an incredible discount and I'm not talking at a small discount. I'm talking about upwards of 30 to 40 percent off our services in our packages. I've included a link below if you don't see the link just type "Yes" in your comment and I will have a team member reach out to you. These are incredible early bird specials that we're only going to be taking 100 students. Once we fill the 100 spots it's close. I'm not taking on late students anymore. Like I said, I would say it one more time. I'm only taking on 100 students for this program. Once we're close, we're closed because I realize after 2017 I can't make my team stressed out during Christmas, during Christmas Eve and during New Year's Eve trying to get everything done by January 1st. Instead with our program, if you start early you can get everything done in less than 21 days. I truly believe that this is your year. This is our year to succeed and this is our year to let our children dream as big as they want. They should be able to do whatever they want in this lifetime. If there's anything that I truly believe is that I want to help you. Make sure your kids' dreams come true because there's nothing more frustrating. The one thing that keeps me up at night is when a teenager thinks they can't do it. No, I'm not tolerating this anymore for 2018. I'm just not. So, if this is your year if you want to commit to 2018 and you want this to be your solid year for you and your family. This is the year, let's do it. Let's do it together and let's make it fun. So, I hope this video has helped you to really understand the importance of why dreaming massively big is very important. It's the students that dream to get into an Ivy League that got in. It's the students that dream to go into a top school that got in. It's not the students that doubted a bunch or didn't do the work or said "I just don't know if I can do it." So why even try? You know there is a formula for being successful at anything. There is a science to achievement. I will tell you every single achievement has a strategy and has a plan of action. You know for example if you want to be more fit hang out with people. I literally just change my entire group to really fit people. I'm learning so much just being around them. You want to get your kid into a top school? You want them to be really really good at getting into a good college and all the things they need to know. Get them a mentor that knows exactly what to do. I mean why not. You know let's say you want your kids to do better in school or really be focused more. Get better friends! This is the year for you to grab this year by the horns. I'm so glad you could join on. Yes, to your life, yes to your kid's dreams. Please type in "Yes" below because this is the time. If you haven't subscribed to my YouTube channel at Elite Private Tutors. I'm looking for more subscribers this year. So, make sure to subscribe and share these videos with your friends whether it's through message or whether it's on your timelines. Please make sure to share it because I truly believe that every child inside has a dream. See as adults we're just overgrown kids. I mean if you think about it. You're just like an overgrown teenager if you're a parent watching this right now. Someone inside you, you had some big dreams when you were younger. When you had kids, you want to make sure that their dreams are absolutely fulfilled. I have yet to meet a parent that doesn't say "Neha I just want my kid to have an even more amazing life than I did. I want them to have an incredible education. I want them to find what they love to do and to do it. I want them to be in a beautiful relationship and to be happy. I want them to be healthy happy and strong and positive. I want them to have incredible friends and amazing life and they are my legacy." So, I want you to think from that perspective. Your kids are your legacy. This is what you are leaving behind. So, why not dream big for them. You don't know you may be hanging onto the next Elon Musk or the next YouTube star or maybe the next president. I don't know what you've got in your home there but let me tell you something. Every child has a dream. I have yet to meet one that doesn't have one. Once you ask the right questions. Once you figured out what they love to do and you start to help them get to it. So, again everyone this is Neha Gupta founder of College Shortcuts and Elite Private Tutors. I am so excited that we have now started 2018. This is our year. We are going to succeed. I am here to tell you that your kids' dreams matter and they matter to me and I know they matter to you. So, please make sure type "Yes" into the chat box. Please reach out to us. I've also put a link below. Don't forget to share this with your friends and family. This is the time if you know any parent that is struggling or is not sure about what to do or trying to figure out the next step. Please share this with them because this is the year to create more love. To spread more love and to make this year an incredibly successful and achieving year for everybody. So, I hope today that you take a moment to write down your list of goals. Write them down and really try to do this exercise with your child. I know it's weird one and it might be kind of awkward at first but you will see there's some beautiful magic that comes of it. So, make sure that you do this exercise with your kid and then take that next step. If you know you need to get college consulting. If you know you need tutoring. If you know you want to mentor for your kid. Yes! Say yes, say yes to you and say yes to your kid. So, have an incredible incredible day everyone. I love each and every one of you. I can't wait to see you on the other side. Please don't forget we are going to be calling you if you type in "Yes" below. We're going to reach out to see how we can make your life easier as a parent in 2018. Have an incredible incredible day!