A friend of mine invited me to a network marketing session a couple of months ago, and while I'm not interested in these sort of initiatives, what I wanted to find out was how they managed to get my friend on board. As I find that things are not always what they seem, particularly with these sort of ventures.

I knew that word of mouth marketing/ advertising was strong, and could see that my friend simply joined without looking in the fine details of what she was getting into based on a recommendation by a friend.

So I went along and afterwards I tried to understand the reasons behind my friend's decision to head in this direction, and tried to help her to challenge her thoughts and understanding of it. After a while, I knew that her mind could not be changed, and one could understand why. If one had invested money in something that one would want to see a return from, then it would be the typical human reaction. As these ventures often require an investment (normally financial) to participate.

So, given this situation, the only thing I could encourage was for one to set boundaries, by setting stop limits. But one has to set this both ways though, a limit on the amount one be willing to invest and gain. This is when should one stop if such and such was spent, and when should stop if such and such was achievable. Greed and temptation is often pitfalls here, so though there were defensive reactions to my non-evasive suggestions and questions, I'd managed to at least encourage her to set those limits. I'd always advise that it's best to set limits early, as emotions will always play a factor down the track - even I get lost in my emotions at times, so it's best to be aware of this.

Enough about that though, as I know in time my friend will learn from their experience, and really I have done all that I could really. Now something that I really wanted to share with you was some great concepts that I learnt at this network marketing session. Of course, the session itself was more driven towards trying to persuade you by trying to show you how easy it can be to get rich, etc. which wasn't my thing.

What stood out for me were these comments that I've heard before from other sources, but it struck me well this time round:

• Surround yourself with great people - One should try surround oneself with a core of six people. The analogy of people carrying your coffin during your funeral was used. Essentially surrounding yourself with people who you can trust, who you can share and work with.
• Opportunities only come once - "When an opportunity comes by. The same one won't come again. You will not get the same opportunity. You may get an opportunity down the track but it won't be the same." This is true, as one philosopher once said that you never jump into the same river twice.

So what I got from the whole experience was that I should surround myself with great people and knowing that while I can't jump into the same river twice, I should understand why and why you didn't choose to jump this time round. As life is full of choices. Indeed I will only live once, but in this one life I may find that I can only jump in the river once and never know where I'll go. So I'd hope that make the right choice when I jump into the river...with my great friends and family...