Are You a Finisher?

In work and in life it is not always enough just to get started.  The first day of a diet, exercise plan, or resolve to change anything in one’s life is usually pretty easy.  You wake up, and “this is the first day of the rest of your life”, right!  Easy, you can do this, this time it will be different.  “I am in control.”  About mid way through the day, someone throws you a new dead line for a project, you lose a deal, something that you thought was a sure thing – isn’t.  But you are still okay, no need to turn to the old habit, you can handle this.  Life happens, no biggy, right?

After a few days and a few more disappointments, the vigor of the first day starts to wear a little thin.  Let’s face it, you lose, that is what you do, so why continue with the resolve to change.  Slowly you give in to your defeated feelings and by the end of the week it is all over, time to quit.

This same scenario can apply to something you are trying to achieve.  Maybe you are building a business, starting a charity, creating a new life for yourself.  You start strong, and the resolve lasts for a while and then you give up, “this can never work”, “what was I thinking?”  “I can’t achieve big things”.  And so the dream ends.

The difference between you and those that seem to “get lucky” and make it, is not that they are smarter, faster, have more money, or better connections.  The difference is that they just keep trying and ultimately they finish what they start.  Oh it may not look exactly as they thought it would in the beginning, but none-the-less they finish.  When they run into obstacles, they are just as disappointed as you, but instead of stopping, they just get up and go around, or over, or under the obstacle.

So how is such tenacity born?  Tenacity comes from inside of you.  It is learning to believe in what you are trying to accomplish and seeing yourself achieving it.  Tenacity comes from thinking positively and then speaking positively.  It comes from learning how to control your thinking, so that the urge to quit never enters your mind.

No mater what you are trying to accomplish, starting is not enough.  In order to live your dreams you must learn to become a finisher.  Start with the small stuff.  Finish that report, that book, or finish cleaning up the office.  Finish writing your resume, finish those phone calls.  Finishing is just as important as starting, and it feels even better.

New Year, New Passion

The new year has a way of making everyone feel like we have new resolve to accomplish anything.  It lays before us like freshly fallen snow.  Our first step in the year can be in any direction we want, it is still all uncharted, undisturbed and unknown.  It is full of possibilities and we all feel like this will be “our” year.  Our passion is high and our desire is to change our future.

We are happy to say goodbye to the last year.  By now it is bursting with the disappointments, distractions and perhaps even tragedies left over from last year’s passions and possibilities.  It is time to shake off the old year and look to the new year to bring about the changes we wanted the last.

At the beginning of each year is always a good time to not only plan all the things that we want to accomplish with the new year, but to examine how long those plans have been on the list.  We all know the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome, but we continue to put things on our “to do” list each year that just never get done.  Now is a great time to ask ourselves what we can do differently.

Losing weight and stop smoking were among the top ten new year’s resolutions made by Americans this year.  If one or both of those things have been on your list for the last five years and you continue to fall short, perhaps it is not time to rethink the goal as much as, it is the strategy for accomplishment.  “Cutting back” on food is not working, perhaps its time for a personal trainer or nutritionist to help you step up the game.  If you can’t stop smoking on your own, perhaps a visit to the doctor is in order.  Many people fall short of their goals because they fail to seek the help they need to do so.

The same is true in your work or business.  What kind of goals are you trying to achieve?  Have you exhausted all of the ways to achieve the break through you need?  Probably not, most of us just dig in and keep trying.  The last thing most people resort to is asking for help, but whatever you are trying to do in your work, there is likely someone who has done it, perhaps it is time to ask how?

Nothing refreshes our passion for life and work more than achieving our goals.  When we can see ourselves as winners, we can go on to tackle bigger and better things in life.  Rarely, however, do we let ourselves do so because we just keep doing today, exactly what we did yesterday.  It may not work, but at least we are trying and we look pretty busy.

The phrase “think outside the box” comes from the idea that great achievements and amazing new products come from trying something just a little different, outside of “normal”.  So take a look around your box and decide which walls need to be pushed out.  If you have trouble conceptualizing where to push, get some help.  Talk to a friend or co-worker, read some books, hire a coach, take a class, whatever it takes to look at your problem differently, do it!

Resolve to be looking at completely new goals next year at this time.  Determine to break through and look for new outcomes to old problems.  Don’t keep looking in the same places for answers to old problems, start expanding your thinking and you will be amazed at the outcome.

 

What Would You Do?

Have you ever thought about what you would do if you knew you could not fail? I know that is one of those questions motivative speakers ask you to get you all fired up. But for real, have you ever thought about it.

I ask this question because I just signed up for a boot camp to teach me how to do something that is out of my comfort zone. As I contemplate the next month that I will be working with this guy it makes me think of that question.

Rarely do most people do new things. Most folks are quite content creating a little routine that gets them all they need, but few ever step out to, say, jump out of plane or sign up for an art class.

And why is that? I think mostly because we think we might fail. Failure seems to have a remarkable way of seeming like the very worst thing that could happen to us. So we don’t do a lot of new and uncomfortable things just because we might fail or may not be that good at them.

Anyway, as I start my new adventure, think about something you have always wanted to do and do it. Even failing might be at least a change and may just catapult you to a new place that will make your life even better. Here’s to new adventures. I’ll let you known if I survive bootcamp.

The Balance Game

It seems that everywhere we turn these days we hear about “balance”.  Finding life/work balance, personal balancing, balancing work and family, balancing our chi, and so on.  Balance can be elusive.  Lately, I have been thinking a lot about balance, does that mean I’m unbalanced, not sure.  But as I have thought about the subject, I have noted that many people are looking for some type of method, or process that will make them and their life as a whole, more balanced.  It occurred to me that perhaps we can’t always find balance on our own.  Yes there are things we need others for, we are not the rugged individualists we all like to imagine ourselves a being.

Let me explain.  For many years of I have studied temperaments, seeking to understand people and how to best to communicate.  Temperament study is fascinating and enlightening.  One observation that I have made is that each of the four temperaments has an opposite.  So the Dominant temperament who is a natural leader, who hates details has an opposite in the Steady (using DISC methodology) who is a detail-oriented service prone individual.  The Intuitive, a fun-loving, look-at-me person is balanced by the serious, task-oriented Conscientious person.  In this we see perfect balance.

The next logical step in our discussion of finding balance is to seek out the people who will best compliment and balance our dominant personality style, instead of being everything for ourselves and enduring the stress this ultimately brings.  If we can learn to surround ourselves, particularly in our work, with the people who are our natural “other half”, the part we lack, we will eliminate 50% of the stress we feel each day trying to be everything.

So how does this look practically?  If you are a business owner who happens to be a Dominant, you get lots done in a day because you forge ahead, push people for production, take risks and take charge, meanwhile you forget to pay the power bill for three months (a detail) and you waste an entire day getting back on track.  Why not hire a virtual assistant who is a happy-to-be-in-the-background Steady. He/she will see to all the details and you will push your business to new heights.  Everyone wins.  Or let’s say that you are a to-the-point, fact-oriented, no-small-talk Conscientious, who finds herself, due to your hard, managing a sales department.  You neither want to sell or be around sales people, but times are tough and here you are!  Surround yourself with a bunch of intuitive, happy, friendly, love-to-talk, salespeople.  They start the deals and you handle the details, everyone wins again.

As with most things in life, balance is rarely a solo endeavor.  I find this intriguing and slightly comforting that we were never designed to go-it-on-our-own, but rather to find ways to interact with others in such a way as to ensure that everyone wins.  So if you are tearing your hair out right now looking for a way to feel balanced and less pressured and feeling it is all on you, you are wrong.  Start thinking about your strengths and what you know you don’t do well.  Find someone to lift your load on the side of the things you don’t do well and watch the scales of your life finally begin to balance.

What Do People Like About You?

While listening to one of my news shows this morning (yes, I am a news junky) I heard one commentator say that a politician has to do two things to be successful.  They have to first get people to like them, and then they have to get those same people to act on that emotion and go and vote for them.  As I thought about that, I realized that this is not unlike those of us who must network to get the message out about our product or service.  First we have to get people to like us and then we have to get them to act on that feeling and give us a referral.  Sort of makes one feel a little creepy to know that we are all like politicians, but that aside, let’s think about how we get people to like us.

Whether someone likes us or not depends on what they know about us, but more importantly, what we know about ourselves.  Do you know what it is that makes people like you?  I know, you are nice, pleasant, make eye contact, have a firm handshake, wear your name tag on the right side of your lapel and you smile a lot and give the occasional referral, but beyond that what is at the core of why people like you.  Can you articulate what it is about you that attracts people to you?  Are people attracted to you?  If you met you at a meeting, would you come over and talk to you?

Unlike politicians, we cannot “invent” our image.  It must be real, because, as we know, politicians make people like them every 2 or 3 years and the rest of the time they get to be themselves.  As business owners, we need people to like us, trust us and want to do business with us all the time.  It is important for each of us to look critically at ourselves and figure out those qualities that best define us and then allow those qualities to shine at networking events and with our clients.  If you are strong and assertive, use those traits to lead and direct, people like leaders.  If you are quiet and detail oriented use those traits to engage in support and serving on committees that keep things growing, people love people who can be depended upon.  If you are fun and love people, use those skills to connect new people to events and other people, everyone loves connectors.  Whatever your skills and gifts are, use them and highlight them so that you become known for those traits.

I have worked with lots and lots of people, helping them find their core strengths and I can tell you there I have never worked with a single person who does not have some fabulous strength that needs to be highlighted.  So what do people like about you?  If you don’t know, start asking your friends, employees, co-workers and acquaintances.  Once you get a good idea, start using your assets to build those relationships that make people act on what they like about you.

Networking Groups

I was at a wonderful networking group this morning and the exercise for the day was exchanging information about all the networking groups we all attended.  It was a good discussion that got me thinking a little about what I should be getting out of networking and what I should be contributing.

There was a lot of discussion around the number of members in a group, cost to join, networking effectiveness and the like.  Now I have done a bunch of networking in five years and I can tell you that there are lots of things to consider when networking, the least of which is cost and numbers.

As I thought about all the groups I have been involved in, I found myself thinking that what made a group “good” for me had nothing to do with its members and everything to do with me.  The return I get from any group is often dependent on my attitude toward that group.  People feel attitude and if mine is open and interested, I usually have a pretty good response from any group I am in.

Networking for me is all about making connections with people so that I might be able to connect them to someone else.  Along the way, I get referrals and business, but most of the time it is a result of connecting people to someone or something.  I truly enjoy networking, it actually makes me feel good.

A group is good or bad for me, not based on ROI necessarily, but rather on the groups openness to each other and to new people.  If a group is open and inviting, I always do well.  I know that it is important to measure in numbers the benefit one is getting from a group and some folks actually have hard formulas they use to determine if they will stay in a group or not.  However, I think it is equally important to look at softer issues as well.  Does the group seem to refer to each other?  Are they loyal to members?  Is there a general feeling of professionalism, respect and honesty?  Is there high energy in the room?  Do people enjoy being there and look forward to meetings?  Is the group centered around just one person or is it a team effort? All these are good indicators of the effectiveness of a group.

I also think it is important to evaluate one’s group involvement from time-to-time.  I do so about once/year.  I want to be effective in my groups so I want to be sure that I am not over taxed in my networking.  I do look at numbers, but when I find I am not getting business referrals from a group, I have to ask myself if it is my fault.  Are my commercials are clear and am I doing enough 1-1′s to be effective in the group.  It is not always a group’s problem if I am not getting referrals from the group.

So as we start a new year, think about the groups you are currently involved in.  Make sure that you are contributing and that people see you as someone who cares about the group.  Take time to get to know people well and help them know you as well.  Networking is an art, and art always takes time to perfect.

What are Your Barriers?

Coaches are always looking for clues that will unlock a problem or problems that the client has on the way to success.  Whether we are looking at business or personal success, the process is often the same when it comes to uncovering the barriers that stand in our way.

Barriers are attitudes, ideas, beliefs, habits, self-talk, long-held family beliefs, and fears that rumble around in our heads and keep us from reaching for the goals we are trying to achieve and can even keep us from healthy relationships with family and friends.  And like a barrier found on a road, until it is removed you are simply not driving through.

When we have a barrier in our mind about anything, it can be very difficult to overcome because like many things in life, we may not even realize it is there.  The kinds of barriers often include doubts about personal qualification stemming from prior bad experiences or words spoken to us, conflicted thinking about the kind of business we are involved in, concerns about our own ability to handle problems and so on.  The kinds of barriers are as many as the people who have them.

So how do we remove these barriers?  The first step is to determine what the barrier may be and how we arrived in front of it.  Folks can go an long time never running into a personal barrier, and then all of the sudden they embark on something new and all of their prior success becomes meaningless and they hit a wall.  It could be as simple as entering unfamiliar territory in a career (new type of business in new industry) or in a personal life (new relationship or loss of a relationship) to having an old memory trigger a personal response that sets one back for a while.  Take time to analyze the situation.  Write down everything that is new in your life.  See if you can uncover the clues.

Once you have uncovered the barrier, consider its validity.  Sometimes, like the monster in the closet for a child, once we turn a light on it, the barrier will simply disappear.  I have had clients simply smile and move on as they figure out what the barrier is and how silly it is to be trapped by the idea.  Others may take some time to work through, especially if it has been with you for some time.  But casting light on it is the first step.

Next analyze exalting how it is affecting your success.  Knowing this can help you cope and move forward until you are able to overcome the problems it causes.  The barriers that have been with us for a long time are the ones that will take the longest to overcome.

Don’t be afraid to get help from a friend or even a professional if the barrier you experience is constantly preventing your success.

So what are the goals that you never seem to achieve.  What are the achievements that constantly allude you, that seem to be just beyond your reach.  Ask yourself why?  Is the a barrier you need to overcome to get to that goal.  Look carefully at your whole life, not just business.  Many times when we are trying to achieve health goals or personal relaionship goals comments and untruths that we have embraced as truth could keep us from the success we seek in our lives.  What are your barriers?  We all have them, it is how we handle them that makes all the difference.

Do You Really Believe?

Recently I was reading a newsletter and the auther was discussing what causes people to miss the mark on their goals, especially when it comes to financial goals.  He stated that it is often easy to set a goal of financial freedom in two years, and just as easy to come up with the reasons one never achieves it.  He credits this phenomenon to the fact that when the goal was set, we don’t always believe it can actually happen.  Without the ability to believe, we really can’t achieve.  Sounds a little like ethereal, conjuring images of humming and chanting “I am financially free, I am financially free” doesn’t it?  But let’s think about that for a minute.

Believing and achieving are linked in that if we believe we can actually reach a goal, we will try to find a way to make things happen.  If we choose to believe that something; financial freedom, good relationships, successful business and so on, are within the scope of our capabilitities, and take responsibilty for being the catalyst for that success then we don’t accept excuses for why things can’t get done.  But the minute we start to doubt our capability we often look for a way out in the form of an excuse to justify failure.

So how does one start to begin “believing” in the success we can’t really see yet.  It is very important to get very clear about what you want to happen.  From there look critically at a all the obstacles that can jump in front of your success, slow you down or deflate your enthusiasm.  Having an idea of what could happen will make you proactive and help you to think about solutions before the problems come up.

Another way to “believe” more effectively is by no allowing yourself to engage in conversation, with others or yourself, that would include failure talk.  Like it or not, what we put into our mind does work its way into our actions and if we are practicing negative self-talk we may be inadvertently derailing our goals.

Don’t give yourself an out.  That’s right, hold yourself accountable to do the things you need to do to create success and then don’t say things like “the economy is against me” or “I got sick last week” as a way to let yourself off the hook.

Get clear.  Know exactly what you want to happen, understand the steps it will take and then know exactly how you will attack those tasks.  Put that plan into your daily activity schedule.  Create a clear plan to help you succeed and your success is put on auto pilot.

So what is the one elusive goal that every year you have to make an excuse for?  Have you lost the power to believe it could happen?  Has failure become a habit?  Maybe it is time to get some clarity as to how to make it happen.  Maybe it is time to really believe.

Do Your Goals Stretch You?

I was listening to Matt Morris of the Unemployed Millionaire Blog talk about goals.  He was talking about big goals and how our goals should scare us a little.  He says we should set what he calls BHAG (big, hairy audacious goals) that stretch our thinking and our ability to achieve them.

I do have agree, that some of our goals should really stretch us.  So what what does that actually mean “stretch us”.  Let’s examine that word for a minute, if you think of an elastic band stretching, think about how we can stretch and stretch and stretch it, and it won’t break.  It just gets longer and bigger.  Now sometimes we can stretch them so far that they will break, so we want to make sure those goals don’t break us.  Another principle to keep in mind, is that we should not had a lot of “stretch goals”, just one or maybe two at a time.  That elastic band breaks under too much pressure, and you don’t want to break under the pressure of too many stretch goals.

So my challenge to everyone today is to pick a goal for yourself that will stretch you.  Something that you can hardly dare to think about, let alone attempt doing.  Something you don’t even want to talk about because it is that big.  Set a reasonable time frame for achievement and watch what happens.

The next principle that is important with the BHAG is to keep that goal in front of you all the time.  Read it over every single day, several times a day.  Put it on the mirror, the dashboard of the car, on your computer, anywhere you are for any period of time.  Make it front and center.

And one final thing about your BHAG, what if you don’t quite make it?  Well think about this.  Before it was a goal, it was a doubt or a dream you only dreamed in silent moments.  When you turned it into a goal you got closer to achieving it than ever before, so if you don’t quite make it, try again.  Make it next month’s BHAG and get a little further with it.  You will get there, trust me.

Hard Work and Dedication

I have spent the last several days watching the Olympics.  Of course being a transplanted Canadian living in Texas, with an American citizenship, it is just a little difficult to figure out who to cheer for at times, but I have my favorites on both teams.  I was excited to see Bilodeau win the first gold medal on Canadian soil and equally excited to see Apollo Ono win silver.  I love the Olympics because it brings out the best and the brightest in all the world to compete for gold and make their dreams come true.

They all have one thing in common.  They worked extraordinarily hard to get to the games.  Whether they win a medal or not, they spent the last four years perfecting, planning, practicing, dreaming, doing, sacrificing and rehearsing until they are at the top of their sport.  They are the best they can be at this point.  They are ready to compete.  We all understand that.  We are astounded at the dedication these people have to their dream.  We hang on, and cry over, every personal story of the athletes as they tell us what it took to get to these Olympics.  And what it took was lots and lots of hard work and dedication.  The kind of hard work and dedication that many of us will never have to put forth in our lives.  The kind of hard work and dedication that it takes to be extraordinary.

So why is it that, while we fully acknowledge that hard work and dedication bring about great reward, most of us still think that there is a quick and easy way to get to the top and make lots of money.  Why do so many of us think that some internet scheme or affiliate program is going to make us millions.  Why, because most of us want to take a short cut to success.  We don’t want to believe that the people that make the money and have successful businesses, had to work hard at all.  We don’t want to believe that we have to sacrifice and work hard, we want it to be easy.

We all need to take a page out of the Olympian play book and realize that whatever we chose to do in this life will have its obstacles.  There will be days when we soar and other days when we are sore!  But through it all, if we keep our goals in front of us and keep working our plan, we will make it to whatever podium we are dreaming about.   The trick is to stay focused and not get distracted by all those people who want us to take an easier road.  Because in the end, all of life requires hard work and dedication to finish well.  Do you want to finish well?  Don’t be afraid of the work, it will make the podium seem even sweeter!