Anik Singal Success PDF
Anik Singal Success PDF
TABLE of CONTENTS
1 F OUNDAT ION! Wha t A re Co re Beliefs?!
C o re B e l i e f s : T he Fo u nd a t i on o f Yo u r S u c c e ss H i g h R i se ! C o re B e l i e f s = W ho Yo u A re! H o w To Un e a r t h Yo u r O w n Co re B el i e fs! C O R E B E L I E FS A S S I G N M E NT!
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A bou t t he A ut ho r!
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Legal Disclaimers
This ebook is presented to you for informational purposes only and is not a substitution for any professional advice. The contents herein are based on the views and opinions of the author and all associated contributors. While every effort has been made by the author and all associated contributors to present accurate and up to date information within this document, it is apparent technologies rapidly change. Therefore, the author and all associated contributors reserve the right to update the contents and information provided herein as these changes progress. The author and/or all associated contributors take no responsibility for any errors or omissions if such discrepancies exist within this document. The author and all other contributors accept no responsibility for any consequential actions taken, whether monetary, legal, or otherwise, by any and all readers of the materials provided. It is the readers sole responsibility to seek professional advice before taking any action on their part. Readers results will vary based on their skill level and individual perception of the contents herein, and thus no guarantees, monetarily or otherwise, can be made accurately. Therefore, no guarantees are made.
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1 FOUNDATION
YOUR CORE BELIEFS
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Im not just talking about knowing your likes and dislikes. Whether you prefer chocolate ice cream or strawberry, whether you prefer the mountains or the beach, or whether youd rather read a book than go to the movies - all those are supercial parts of your personality. Finding out what makes you tick has to go a lot deeper.
You have to know what you believe in. Deep in your heart.
Our inner beliefs are like the foundation of a building. If the foundation is strong and solid, building on top of it is just a matter of planning and execution. Ask yourself this: if you were building a high rise, what would happen if you didnt know anything about the foundation? How could you build anything on top of it? Youd have no idea how much it could handle. What you build might work - or it might not. But it would be impossible to have any condence in the outcome. This is why all my life Ive tried to dig below the surface of success. Sure, there are lots of supercial factors that APPEAR to affect a persons success: things like lucky breaks or favorable economic conditions. But I know from hard experience that appearances are just clues. And when I tried to model myself on successful people, I realized that I had to start with my thoughts before I could emulate their actions. In the end, results talk. It soon became obvious to me that my best mentors and teachers not only DID great things, but BELIEVED great things. The ones who operated from inner conviction really got results. They wouldnt try anything that wasnt aligned with their deepest beliefs and beliefs. My mentors all know what they believe in. They build on that. And ONLY that!
The only way to build your success high rise is to start from the foundation. CORE BELIEFS are that foundation.
Now what exactly do I mean by core beliefs?
CORE BELIEFS are the principles, ideas, or beliefs that you VALUE so strongly, theyre the driving force in your life. They are what make you tick.
Another word for core beliefs is core values. Like most people, I use the terms interchangeably. Your core beliefs inuence everything you do. They practically dene who you are. They have an impact on all your decisions and relationships. You know how some new age types talk about having an inner guide or inner teacher? Your core beliefs are your inner guide. Of course, core values are not some mysterious voice inside your head telling what you should or shouldnt do. But they are just as powerful. When youre in harmony with your core beliefs, your life is free of strain. All your decisions, actions, and relationships feel right. But when you go against your core values, everything feels off. Have you ever been okay with a plan or a person logically... it all looks good on paper... but theres still this nagging feeling that youre going against the grain? Youre not 100% comfortable, no matter how much you try to convince yourself its okay. When that happens, I can almost guarantee its because somehow, some way, that plan or person goes against your core beliefs. And thats why I want you to uncover your core beliefs. They!inuence your entire life even if you dont have a clue what they are! Doing the core values exercise Im going to show you changed my life. I learned so much about myself, so fast, that it almost made my head spin. The clarity it gave me transformed how I handle people, problems, and events. I will share a very simple technique so you can discover your core values, too. Yes, simple... but it requires a bit of courage. If youre shy to talk about yourself with friends or colleagues, youll need to step out of your comfort zone! But I guarantee its worth it. Finding your core beliefs will have an immediate, positive impact on everything you do. For example...
! Your self image will improve. ! Relationships will become more meaningful. ! It will be easy to decide whether or not a new person belongs in your life. ! And youll be able to make decisions, big and small, with ease and grace. To prove just how powerful this exercise can be, Ill share with you my own process of discovering my own core beliefs...
Our core values showed us why our company even exists. No mission statement could ever say as much about us.
We found out that were not just a bunch of people who all happen to work at the same place. Together we stand for something - our core values. I have a big printout of our core beliefs posted in my home ofce. Here are some of them: ! Create and appreciate laughter. ! Focus on solutions, not problems. ! Be crazy - but dont go crazy! ! Create raving fans. ! Be a family.
! Balance work and life. Now pay attention, because youre about to learn something that can get rid of 99% of all the confusion in your life. Once we had these company core values, I realized that I could use them whenever I made a decision. Lets say I had to decide whether or not to use a certain sales strategy. Id be thinking about it, all the pros and cons, what would happen if I did it, what would happen if I didnt, on and on. Complicated. Then Id go talk to members of my team, and each one would have a different opinion. More discussion. More thinking. Now it was even more complicated. What to do? I would go back to my ofce and shut the door. And right there, on the wall in front of me, were those core values. Id stare at them. And then suddenly it hit me: If I decide this way, does it t with all those values? If I was honest with myself and said, Hmmm, if I go this way, it goes against this core value, then I knew that option was OUT. When you know your core values, a lot of tough, confusing decisions suddenly become very easy.
Your core will tell you whether its a good or bad decision.
This didnt just apply to big, company-wide decisions. Every person in the company was expected to behave according to our core values. ALL decisions, no matter how small, were required to t with our core. One day while I was looking at our companys core beliefs, it suddenly hit me: What if I created a personal list of core beliefs? Would I learn the same things about myself that I learned about my company? Hey, I thought, that could be interesting. Believe me, I had no idea what Id discover...
Its a real eye opener when you dig up your TRUE core beliefs. Theyre like a treasure chest buried in your backyard.
Of course its nice knowing the treasure is out there, somewhere. But what if you get a bunch of your friends and set up an expedition to nd the treasure? What if you dig it up together, open it up, and nd wow - theres gold, diamonds, platinum in there! Now youve got all this beauty and wealth that you can use to make your life better. Thats what this core beliefs exercise is all about. Youre going to dig up the hidden beauty and wealth thats buried deep inside of you. And youre going to do it just like our company did. Youll take a poll to discover your core beliefs. A small group of people who know you best are going to assist you in uncovering your TRUE core beliefs. Your goal is to uncover 5 of them today. And just so you dont think this is some theoretical exercise... this is exactly what I did to unearth my own core values. I was the guinea pig in this experiment! So how did I do it? In a nutshell, I surveyed my friends! Okay, that oversimplies a bit. I actually did two surveys - one for personal core beliefs, one for professional core beliefs. I recommend you do the same, for reasons Ill explain below.
Hey ______, Im taking a little [self-development/professional development] poll, and would love your input.
Knowing me as well as you do, what do think I value the most in life? In other words, what would YOU say my beliefs are? It can be one, two or three beliefs - but no more than three. Thanks... really curious what you come up with!
Guess what... you'll be blown away at the response! I got amazing feedback, and nobody said it was weird. People were very quick to respond. They were incredibly insightful. But heres what's really amazing...
Step 3 - Compile and Compare the Responses. Watch for Trends and Surprises!
Now youre going to compile all the responses and look for these things: ! Any overlap or differences between personal and professional beliefs? ! What are the personal trends? ! What are the professional trends? ! Look for surprises! Let me show you how all this played out for me...
You want to pay close attention to the trends that are common from one friend to another, one colleague to another. Ill share some of mine so you can see what I mean.
This is the real reason you poll your friends and colleagues. Sometimes they will be able to state, in just one sentence, your buried treasure. That core value deep inside of you that defines you in a way nothing else does.
Did I know that I live life for the experiences? Well yeah, sure... somewhere deep down. But did I realize it was a core value like no other? No, I needed a friend to show me how encompassing it is for my whole life.
Step 4 - Develop Your Final List of Core Beliefs. Refine Through USE.
So now I have to nalize my core beliefs. From the responses of my friends and colleagues, Ill be selecting 5 core beliefs. I want you to do the same. But this isnt something you can rush. Youve got to ponder everything youve learned about yourself. Let it sink in a bit. You might even want to rene some of the core beliefs.
The best way to select your core values is to test them out.
When you have to make a personal decision in your life, pump it through all your core values and ask yourself: ! Does this decision mesh with my core beliefs? ! Or does it violate some of them? And out comes the solution. Decisions become so easy. Even if youve been totally confused about what to do, youll get instant clarity by running the decision through your core beliefs. It will also show you if theres some fuzziness in some of your core values. It will even help you rene or strengthen how you STATE your beliefs. For example, I always would have said, I like doing new things. But that sounds like a personal preference, nothing more. Yet when I say, I live life for the experiences, its a strong statement of WHO I AM. It doesnt just describe me - it denes me! For example, someone calls me on Saturday morning and says, "We're going hiking, wanna come? Ehhh, its Saturday. I'm tired from working out. I want to relax, I had a hard week at work. So I'd be inclined to say "Nah, I'm gonna skip it." But what if I put that decision through my core beliefs? Im all about living life for the experiences. Am I doing that if I say no? I've never been hiking. Why would I say no? Why would I go against who I am? Bam! Decision made. Yep, Ill join you. The very rst core value claried everything. And that's a huge reason why core beliefs are so important.
Your core beliefs dont just make decisions easier. They also guarantee youll feel good about the decisions you make. You wont be going against the grain of who you are and what you believe.
Theres also a great benet to going public about your core values. It allows you to avoid what I call core disconnect. This is when two people have absolutely NO core beliefs in common. Being up front about your core means you can draw lines. Youll nd it easier to minimize or eliminate those who dont connect with your core values, or who violate them. (Youll learn more about eliminating negativity later in this course.) You really have much more choice than you realize about WHO you will have in your life. Family? Okay, you can't really choose them. But you can choose how to deal with them and react to them. With almost all other people... ! Will you choose to be around people who support your core beliefs? ! Or will you choose to spend time with people who are against your core beliefs? If you've mapped out your 5 core beliefs, you now have a sound, well thought out basis for making those choices. You can look at someone and say, "Wait, does this person connect with at least two of my core beliefs?" If he or she shares only one of your core beliefs - or none - they're NOT someone you want in your life. In business, core beliefs make hiring much easier. When someone comes in for an interview I show them our core values. I read them out one by one. And I look at that person's face for a reaction. If they make a weird face at one of our core beliefs, it's over - core disconnect! In fact, right now 50% of our hiring process boils down to, Do you t what we believe in? Do you connect with our core beliefs? Its the same with every new person who comes into your personal life. It's really an interview, isnt it? Youre chatting with that person, observing them. But whats really happening, deep inside, is youre thinking, Are you someone who is
compatible with what I believe? On some subtle level youre matching your core beliefs against theirs.
If there's no overlap in core beliefs at all, why are you even talking to this person? On a superficial level you may have a lot on common. But deep down you won't connect and you won't have a real bond.
Supercial differences work the same way. You know the old saying, opposites attract? Often on the surface two people are total opposites. But what matters is on the inside. If deep within you share the same core beliefs, then you're on the same wavelength - in spite of the external differences. So outwardly maybe one person is detail oriented, the other is big picture and entrepreneurial. But those are just supercial things. That doesn't mean they won't share the same core beliefs of family, spirituality, loyalty, and honesty. In other words, core values can express themselves outwardly in different ways. That's what makes us individuals. But if there's no common CORE at all between people, then in the end you won't really connect. And you won't really learn anything from each other.
But the point Im making is you dont have to interview someone to get a sense of their core beliefs. All you have to do is pay attention. If youre observant - and if you know your own core beliefs inside out - a fundamental disconnect will often show up right away. Its almost like you send an unconscious message to the other person about your deepest beliefs. Thats not as far fetched as you think. Uncovering your core beliefs teaches you a lot about yourself. About who you REALLY are.
When you KNOW who you are, you constantly project that to others.
We all sense whether someone is our kind of person or not. But the stronger your sense of your core beliefs, the better your sixth sense about people becomes. Thats because your belief in yourself is so strong. When you dont doubt yourself, you can hear the inner guidance from your core beliefs. So dont hesitate. Begin this core values exercise today. I guarantee it will have a huge impact on your decisions, your relationships, your professional life, and everything in between! Before you start building the next part of your success high rise, you need to get the foundation right. So Id like you to do a very important exercise.
Compile the results. Write down all the unique core beliefs, overlaps and trends, and surprises. Personal Core Beliefs _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________
Professional Core Beliefs _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________ _______________________________________________________________
5. Now write down your 5 nal core values. 1 ____________________________________________________ 2 ____________________________________________________ 3 ____________________________________________________ 4 ____________________________________________________ 5 ____________________________________________________ Give this some time... and dont be afraid to revise and rene your core beliefs periodically. Now that you know some of your deepest beliefs, its time to build on the foundation. Youll get your imagination tuned up so you can see your high rise start to take shape in your mind, releasing the Law of Attraction to work for you. Youll do that in PART 2 -Vision: Imagine Your Ideal Life.
2 VISION
Imagine Your Ideal Life
Even if youre hitting every target and achieving every goal, those are just pieces of who you are. Your ENTIRE LIFE has to have meaning.
If you're stuck in a cycle where you're busy and overworked and overstressed, but don't feel like you're getting anywhere or making any progress, this lesson will help you reenergize your life. And even if you feel like you've got great goals and are moving toward them, this lesson will help you go to the next phase. It will help you evolve and reach for bigger and better things.
Yes, making a vision board will do all that for you. Why? Because it's a tangible, physical device for slapping yourself and saying... Stop! Think. Whats the purpose here? Whats am I doing all this FOR?
And they are looking at each other. I mean REALLY looking at each other with new insights and respect. I thought to myself Dude, you just did a sneaky little CEO thing. You wanted to know what REALLY motivates people... And now all you have to do is look at their vision boards! In one quick glance I could see... ! Who is motivated by vacations and travel? ! Who is motivated by material things, like money, cars, yachts? ! Who is motivated by peace and tranquility and Zen? ! Who is motivated by fame and admiration? ! Who is motivated by the outdoors and nature? ! Who is motivated by comfort and luxury? ! Who is motivated by relationships and family? ! Who is motivated by spiritual ideas? ! Who is motivated by philanthropy and helping others? I was oored. I discovered some amazing stuff about the people I work with - stuff I had NO clue about before the vision board exercise.
Every single thing on my vision board had a special meaning for me. It wasnt just about getting or doing. It was about what that MEANT to me.
Ill talk more about this shortly. Lets just get back to my process. So I made my list, and then I found pictures that represented each item. I just went to Google Images, searched, and printed out the pictures that resonated with me. Then I stuck them on my poster board. It took me less than two hours to do the whole thing. Here are some of the pictures that were on my vision board: ! Yacht ! Buddhist temple ! Porsche Panamera ! Private jet ! The number 100 ! Photo of a big audience with the number 4000 below it ! New York Times Best Seller image ! Picture of me on the Oprah show ! Boarding school ! A logo. Ill show it to you a minute! Now I want you to make YOUR vision board.
Porsche Panamera
This toy wasnt even for me. I wanted to buy a very special, luxurious and unique car for my parents. Kind of a thank you for being so supportive of me, even when they didnt agree with my decisions.
100
This represented having 100 people working for my company. Why was this so important to me? It felt like a milestone. It felt like the point at which my company would be poised to change people's lives.
4000 Audience
This is a personal goal. I want to one day speak before an audience of 4000 people!
Private Jet
I've always wanted to get my pilot's license. I've even taken a few lessons.
Me and Oprah
Id like to be interviewed by someone of Oprah's stature one day. What fun!
Okay, those are the whys for some of the more me oriented items. Theyre all cool, all fun things. But now lets get into what really excites me... the bigger picture things...
Boarding school
I want to build boarding schools for underprivileged kids in India - or any country really. I want to bring education to children who don't have access to it. And I want to give kids who otherwise would live on the streets a good, safe environment hence a boarding school.
Logo
This was a BIG dream. Its the logo of the nonprot we launched.
Buddhist temple
Ive always wanted to build my spiritual side up. So I want to take a few weeks and go to Nepal - or somewhere - and spend some time in Zen, learn to do yoga and meditate. It feels like a temple is the right environment to help me get to that sacred space inside.
WARNING: DONT SKIP THIS STEP! If you do, youll dilute the power of your vision board. Which means youll miss out on all the magic in the next step!
LOOKING at your vision board makes everything manifest for you a lot quicker!
I have a theory about how this works. With a vision board, youre taking things out of your head. Theyre not stuck inside your minds eye any more. When you print out the pictures, they are outside of you. Theyre in the real world so to speak. You can reach out and touch them. You can look at them any time. They have a more tangible feel to them. In other words, your dreams are out there all the time. Theyre in your face! And isn't that how an architect makes an ambitious skyscraper into a reality? By starting with a detailed drawing that shows the whole beautiful structure ALREADY COMPLETED. That's where all the blueprints and planning and funding starts with that VISION. I didnt want to put my vision board right in front of where I work. I am a very focusoriented guy, and I keep distractions (even good ones) to a minimum when I am in the ofce.
So I put my vision board in a spot where I walk by it every day, at least 20 times a day.
Heres an example: When I put up the picture of the Porsche Panamera, I stuck a photo of my parents next to it. I have this dream of retiring them so they never have to work again. To me, this car symbolized getting closer to that goal. And randomly, or apparently randomly... Id glance up at that picture of them as I walked by.
A month after I put up the vision board, some nancial things manifested for me. It wasnt exactly luck - I worked at it. But everything came together in just the right way. So I was able to buy them the car. I didn't know exactly what was happening the whole month I was walking by that picture. It was completely subconscious. But somehow that
This made me realize how much we UNDERestimate the power of the mind.
Your vision board reveals what your DEEPEST motivations really are. These motivations are what get you out of bed every morning. They are what give your life meaning! Heres another thing you will learn from your vision board...
So there I was, thinking about my vision board and all the dreams on it, and I asked myself, Anik, is this REALLY your dream? When I got back to the ofce I looked at the board. And I said, Ah ha, thats interesting. The letters CEO are not on there! Which made me realize something: where I was - at that point in my life - was NOT my WHOLE life. Life is a vehicle. Its a process. Im still attaining what I need in order to live my dream board. So are you.
What you're doing right now may not be your dream... but still you should remind yourself, every day, that you're living FOR the dream.
So even though my responsibilities at the time were far from my ideal life... my WHOLE LIFE was not reduced to all those CEO chores. It all goes back to the dog chasing his tail. If just doing what you do becomes an end in itself, guess what? You are chasing the tail. Dont get me wrong. I LOVED a lot of what I was doing. I love being a CEO. Its an incredible learning experience, I'm good at it, and I have done it well. But its not an end in itself. What I am doing as a CEO is like a ladder. I am going up the ladder so I can get to my dreams. Once I get to where I want to be, I can get rid of the ladder. Or I can create a different ladder.
That's how you build that great high rise called your life. You create a grand and beautiful vision. And then, while you're going through some of the more tedious processes of planning and building and funding... you use that vision to remind yourself of why you're working so hard.
At some point you, too will start to question what youre doing. That's normal and healthy. So remember: its liberating to know that what you are doing NOW is not the sum total of your life. Its a beginning. And it's a part of the process.
You also need to understand that things take time. No matter how good you are at manifesting, things in this world often need time to line up for you. Often circumstances need time to mature and ripen before you can act on them. For example, my non-prot was in the planning phase for more than two years. When it was all over, I was tempted to beat myself up and say, Why the hell did it take me TWO YEARS to start this? But if I stop and think about it, there was a lot that needed to happen before I could set up those non-prots. For one thing, I had to learn to make time. I needed to arrange my life so I had at least hour a day to devote solely to this project. I had to push myself and say... Wait, this is my dream. This is what I want. This is my legacy. When I leave the world I dont want to be remembered as the best CEO ever. No, I want to be the guy that built the most schools to help little kids get an education they deserve. So Im going to MAKE TIME for this! Then I needed to LEARN about non-prots and gure out how to channel my resources to help them. So I started working with a non-prot in India, helping them out. This not only gave me an appreciation for the challenges of running a nonprot, it also gave me a sense of who I needed to bring on board to help.
But your vision board is even MORE powerful. Why? Your vision board tells you who you really are. It shows you the REAL you.
Its funny, a lot of people ask themselves the question, Who am I really? Who is the REAL me? Guess what? Your answer is one piece of poster board away. Your vision board will give you the most liberating feeling youve ever had in your life. Even if you are nowhere near the dreams on that board! Make that board and... ! You will now know what your dreams really are. ! Everything youre doing will become a ladder that leads to the dream. ! Youll be motivated to organize your time, get control over your energy, and do some serious goal-setting. ! If you need to change something in your life, you will WANT to! ! Youll MAKE TIME for your dreams. Believe me, if I go more than 7 days doing things that dont contribute to my vision board goals, I feel like I just screwed up the whole week. I feel like I wasted it.
But then I look at my dream board, and it makes me focus harder on getting more done in less time. I need to have time for my dreams, so it becomes a priority. And nally, your vision board is a lot like your core values.
Run every decision against your vision board. Yes, do this even if youre far, far from the dreams on that board.
Stop for 60 seconds. Weigh any decision and all your actions based on what you really, truly want. Its easy enough - its all right in front of you, staring you in the face. Your vision board will ALWAYS get your mind back to the place where it needs to be. And you will KNOW what to do. Now for an assignment...
Now youre ready for lesson 3... where Ill teach you a simple technique for turning your vision board into actionable goals. Why wait years to make your goals happen? Once you learn this you can start making headway towards everything you want today!
3 BLUEPRINT
Goals Big and Small
The Law of Attraction does work but it only works if you step up to the plate by aligning your inner feelings with focused action.
Think of it this way: you're the architect and you're looking at a drawing of your skyscraper. No one can construct a complex building from just a drawing. You have to get to the point where you have a blueprint. Once you have that blueprint, you're ready for the money and the materials and the workers and the construction process. And that's where goal setting comes in.
Turning your vision into a list of concrete goals is the first serious step you'll take toward your dream.
It tells the Law of Attraction Hey, I'm serious! I want this, I'm ready for it, and I'm going to step up and build this thing!
Writing down specific goals then breaking your goals down into mini-goals is what makes it possible to get out of dreaming mode and into action mode.
The best part is this: your vision board gives you a great head start. Most people never even get to the stage of making a vision board. Because you have already gone through the process of choosing specic images that represent your dreams, making a list of goals will be easy. After that, all you need to do is list out what you need to do, get, or be to achieve each goal. Honestly, it does not matter how big and ambitious the dream is. There's no need to be intimidated or to say, Yikes, how will I ever get THERE from HERE? Think about the skyscraper. The architect doesn't think, This is too complicated and big, I can't get this built. Instead, the architect just gets to work, knowing all the components have to be broken down into processes. Once those are broken down, blueprints are drawn, down to the nest detail. Then all the team members come together and construct the building, one step at a time, one component at a time oor at a time, in a logical plan. What you need to realize is that you can approach your biggest dreams in exactly the same way. EVERY goal can be broken down into smaller goals and processes. Then you draw up a blueprint a series of things you need and steps you'll take and then go out and concentrate on just the next step. The bulk of this lesson will involve you doing things making goals and breaking them down. So there will be quite a few assignments. Let's get started on them right now...
3. Underneath the vision, write one sentence that turns it into a goal. It should be in the form of I will... This will be easy if you don't over-think it. For example:
GOAL: I will live in a 3000 square foot house in Malibu.
4. ON A SEPARATE SHEET, do both steps with the next item on your vision board. 5. Keep going, putting each vision and goal on a separate sheet of paper. Here's the basic template for each sheet in your notebook. VISION: ____________________________________ GOAL: I WILL ______________________________ Get through this part of the lesson as quickly as you can. Shoot for about 5-10 minutes, just whipping through it. You can always go back and rene it later.
Mini-goals are just smaller steps that you need to accomplish to get to the big goal.
You've heard that lame joke: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. That's what you want to do with your big goals: slice them up and devour them one bite at a time. So in this assignment, youll start to break down your big goals into little bites. Once again, try to go quickly, spending only a few minutes making each list. 1. On your rst goal page, write down ALL the steps, or prerequisites, or necessary things you need to get to that goal.
For example, let's say you have a picture of a gorgeous tness model on your vision board because you want to be trim and lean. Your goal may be: I WILL be trim, lean, and look great in a bathing suit. The problem is you're very overweight right now. So on that page, you're going to write down all the things you need to do or be to get to your goal. Here are some of the things you might list: ! Lose 50 pounds ! Eat a low carb diet ! Get to 15% body fat ! Cook healthy meals 5 days a week ! Work out with weights three days a week ! Do cardio workouts ve days a week
Don't worry about forgetting something or gaps. You can always go back. 2. Repeat on every goal page. Go ahead and FILL those pages if you want. Even if it seems trivial, don't waste time pondering it, just scribble it down.
3. When you're done, congratulate yourself. You now have a master list of goals. Make sure you do the two assignments above BEFORE you go on to the next part of this lesson.
I call this problem the MOTIVATION GAP. Without something to reward you, there is a hole in your motivation. If the hole stays open too long if you don't get a win to fill it your energy leaks out pretty fast. Youre like a car that has run out of gas.
Yet once I see some quick, major results... my motivation goes through the roof. I'll keep going no matter what, because I know that I'll have another win shortly. Bridging that motivation gap was what I needed to do. But how?
Once I had that... I had instant motivation. I KNEW I could lose 5 pounds in a few weeks. No more motivation gap!
No More Negativity
The other thing this did for me and it was huge was it blew away a lot of negative self-talk. No more little nagging voice in my head whispering Ugh, 20 pounds, its so HARD... it takes forever... I can't do this... I want a pizza...
Getting rid of negative mental chatter is CRITICAL for your big, important goals.
Because let's face it, when you look at that beach house in Malibu, there's bound to be a part of you that says, Dude, really? On your salary? With your expenses? You're crazy. This is normal. It's part of living in the world and dealing with your current reality. If you try and shut that down by force, it just nags at you even more. But let's look at what happens when your goal is more modest - when its just a bite out of the elephant. How about I will research the current prices of foreclosure beach properties in Malibu. Now that's not so unrealistic, is it? After all, you're just doing research. You're just nding out how much you'd need to plunk down for that house, IF there was a foreclosure, and IF you had the cash to do it. Your negative impulses can't harass you too much about that. Especially if you take your mind totally OFF the big goal of one day actually owning and living in that house.
By focusing on one little piece of your goal, it's pretty easy to set aside any major internal objections.
Or let's focus on a personal growth goal. Say your goal is develop more selfcondence. Lack of self-condence is a major problem. It tends to affect all aspects of life. It's often a persistent obstacle to manifesting what you want. It can lock down your ability to take any kind of action, no matter how small. But what if you break down the big goal of I will develop more self-condence into lots of mini-goals, even micro-goals. You'll focus on very small things, easy things, that you can do to improve your self-condence just a little bit. Some of those things might be: ! I will take a course in a subject that you enjoy ! I will take a public speaking class ! I will attend a networking event
! I will nd a mentor ! I will update my appearance ! I will expand my vocabulary ! I will develop my spiritual side You could even break some of them down further. For example, I will update my appearance could include: ! I will update my wardrobe ! I will update my hair style ! I will subscribe to a fashion magazine to stay on top of trends Or I will expand my vocabulary could be broken down into: ! I will learn one new vocabulary word a week ! I will use that word once a day ! I will write in a journal every day so I have a reason to use my new vocabulary The important part is to start shifting your attention from the big, intimidating goals to the mini-goals that underpin them.
You're going to think in terms of mini-successes, so you can prevent the motivation gap from getting too big.
Of course it's great to have lots of goals. The more you have, the more involved you are in life and the more you want to grow. But obviously you cant work on ALL the goals at once. Remember the military commander. Hes got to choose ONE target and hit it hard with all his forces. And he needs a strategy - something that helps him decide what to do rst, second, etc. So now Im going to ask you to do the same.
Priority Goals
Before you start working on any of your mini-goals, I want you to select the ones that are truly your highest priority. In a moment you'll do some exercises that will help you narrow them down to 2 or 3 you'll focus on. Prioritizing goals can be really hard at rst. Everything seems so important, and you can get all jumbled up in the details the mini-goals represent. As I'll show you in lesson 4, it was very hard for me. I needed a year and a half to nally choose one goal and focus on it. So rst I'll give you an example of selecting 3 priority goals. Then you can nish off this lesson with a couple of assignments that will leave you with a list of priority goals. Those will be your action plan for unleashing some success energy in your life. The example I'll use it taken straight from my personal life. I have a few personal goals on my vision board right now: ! I will get my pilots license. ! I will get my black belt. ! I will get t and healthy. On the pilots license... Ive already taken some lessons and have clocked some hours. It would be easy to just focus on it and get it done. And for the longest time, I've wanted to go back into martial arts. Black belt is a goal that goes back to when I was a little kid. In fact, I got all the way up to brown belt in Tae Kwondo. I wasnt able to achieve black belt because my health issues got in the way. So I have to start from scratch there's no way I'm at brown level now. Still, I REALLY want to get that black belt one day! Finally, I am determined to get in shape and be the healthiest Ive ever been. I'm following a hard workout routine right now, eating right, and being extra careful about health issues. I'm getting married, and besides looking great at the wedding, I want to stay healthy and strong for my spouse and family.
Heres something I notice right away: Dependencies between the goals. That means achieving one goal is dependent on another goal. For example, if I want to get back into martial arts, I need to be in good shape. I also want to make sure health issues dont sidetrack me like they did when I was young.
Dependencies are a big help in sorting which goal needs to come before other goals.
Analyzing the time a goal takes is next in importance. All of my personal goals require a considerable investment of time. It's totally unrealistic for me to try and do all three of my personal goals at once. If I try to juggle all of them, it will take me years to achieve each goal... and I'll have to struggle with the motivation gap a lot. Finally, I have to pay attention to the emotions associated with the goals. For example, Im drawn to the excitement of ying in a big way. I might also feel a bit down about getting t and healthy, since I've had so many health emergencies in the last few years. If I ignore my emotions, I could make the mistake of choosing fun and exciting even though it may not be the best choice. Hmmm... so how to process all this and make a decision? I will: ! Look for dependencies ! Look at the time required to achieve each goal. ! See how my emotions are aligned with each goal. In this case, getting t and healthy seems to be the pre-requisite for everything I want to do. Being in shape just improves my life in so many different ways. When Im t and healthy, I have more energy. And the more energy I have, the more I get done. I may have the same number of hours every day, but Im a lot more productive and efcient in each hour. So achieving optimum tness has a lot going for it. I really can't work on my black belt without achieving a certain level of tness.
I now see some clear dependencies: Both getting my pilots license and achieving black belt require me to be at my peak physically. In the case of ying, it comes back to energy - being alert and on. Now let's look at the time involved. Getting t is NOT the quickest and easiest thing in the world. It requires a daily time commitment. I have to plan ahead to stay in shape while traveling, which I do a lot. The quickest would be getting that pilot's license. Ive already started ight school. Ive logged some hours, and its different and fun and gets me excited. In many ways this would be the quickest thing to achieve. However, because being as healthy and t as possible supports so many aspects of my life, it's still edging everything else out for the #1 spot. So I'd probably make the pilot's license my second priority. That puts getting back into martial arts at the bottom of the list. When I'm in shape I should be able to make progress on it quickly. But for now, it doesn't get a priority spot. Now it's time for you to nd your priority goals. You'll do this in two stages. First, you'll pick 2 priority goals for EACH of your big goals. That means you'll have anywhere from 8-12 (or more) mini-goals in front of you. So the second stage is to look at all those mini goals, and pick just 2 to make your highest priority. Those 2 mini-goals may support just one vision. Or you could have 1 mini-goal for two visions. Doesn't matter. The point is to nd the two most important things to focus on so you can forget about the big intimidating stuff and take action.
Now its time for the next secret of your success high rise: taking ACTION, and the right kind of action. To execute effectively, you dont necessarily have to work harder than anyone else though hard work is important. What you really need to do is work with more intensity, concentrated, and FOCUS. Thats what youll learn in the next secret...
4 FIRST FLOOR
Focus and Execute
What's this magic factor? FOCUS. By focused I mean selective. And I mean strategic.
Think about a military commander. Is he going to send a handful of troops here, a handful there, spreading them around to wherever theres some noise? No. Hes going to focus. Hell decide on a STRATEGY - what he wants to achieve overall. Then hell SELECT THE TARGET. And nally, hell direct all his forces to that one target. Hes going to hit it hard. Hes going to WIN that battle before he moves on to the next.
You too have to strategically select which goals youll fight for now. And which ones youll attack later.
Oh sure, you can try to ght ten different battles at once. But how likely are you to win any of those battles? Not very. When you spread your energy that thin, it takes way too long to get anywhere. Eventually, after months or years, you achieve one or two little things... but getting there is so much harder.
FOCUS is the #1 success factor. Without it, none of the other selfdevelopment methods will work.
I learned about focus the hard way - by struggling against it. And most of you reading this report will struggle against focus just like I did. So let me share how FOCUS nally hit me right between the eyes... and changed my life...
That response pissed me off. I thought, What a bunch of BS. You, Mark Cuban, you run like 15 companies! And you're trying to tell me not to run ve? I was pretty upset. But you know what? This was just the beginning of a recurring theme. As I started talking to other successful people, asking for their advice, almost all of them would say:
Anik, youve got to focus!
I guess I just didnt really understand what they meant. Or maybe I just didnt want to believe them. But fast forward nine years, and what's the number one piece of advice I give people today? Focus! Heres how the full meaning of focus nally hit me.
But after a year and a half of this, I got fed up. I hadn't made any money. In fact, I had lost money. I was super frustrated. One night I said to myself:
You know what? Thats it. Im giving myself one last chance. I am going to clear EVERYTHING off my plate and just do this one thing.
Why did I do that? I assure you, its not because I remembered all the advice from the experts about FOCUS. I think I did it because I was fed up and just plain exhausted. I was sick and tired of working like a dog for no results. Okay Anik, this is your last chance. Make this ONE thing work! So I dropped everything else and just did ONE thing. A week after making that declaration, I went to bed and woke up the next morning with a little over $300 in my ClickBank account. That was the most money I had made in 18 months from all my multiple projects combined. But heres the next thing, and its important.
I decided to keep focusing on that one thing. I just kept banging away at it. No detours. No changes. No dabbling around in other things.
And lo and behold, two months later I had made close to $11,000 from that one project! After earning that much money while still a college student, you would think I would have tattooed the word FOCUS on my forehead. But in spite of that, being focused didnt really become part of me. Not until I saw a demonstration of the cold hard mathematics that makes focus an absolute necessity. The day it hit me, I was at a conference, sitting in the audience, listening to Mike Filsaime speak. Mike is a good friend and has been great mentor to me over the years.
Ahhhh... not again! And it was Mike's #1. God, how many times had I heard that? Before I realized it my brain was groaning. But then Mike showed an example which literally made me sit on the edge of my chair. It not only made perfect sense, it hit me between the eyes. I'm not sure if Mike invented this example. But I rst heard it from him so Id like to give him all the credit for it. Here it is: You are working on 10 projects. Each project requires 100 hours of your time to complete. So lets do some math:
10 Projects x 100 Hours per Project = 1000 Hours to get them all done
We'll assume you can work 10 hours per day. And youve decided to work 1 hour per day on each project. How long will it take you to get all 10 projects done? Again, its simple math:
1000 Hours / 10 Hours per Day = 100 Days to Complete All Projects!
Argh, 100 days before I nish anything? 100 days before I make any money (or whatever results I want)? Thats 10 weeks. If these are all money-making projects, youd have to wait more than 3 months to see any income! But what if you FOCUS all 10 hours of the day on ONE project? Lets do the math...
1 Project x 100 Hours per Project = 100 Hours to get it done 100 Hours / 10 Hours per Day = 10 Days and youve got results ($$$)!
Why wait 100 days to make some money? With FOCUS you'd be making money in 10 days! Do you see why Mikes example got my attention?
You have to look below the surface at how the most successful people prioritize their goals and win one battle at a time.
Now FOCUS is a way of life for me. Since I made the decision to focus, my income keeps growing and growing. I never make less money - its always more. Thats not a coincidence. Its because of my focus. Its ironic. Now I run multiple companies. And each company has multiple products. On the surface, you could say the same thing about me that I said about Mark Cuban.
Anik, I thought you said to focus. Yet youre running all these multiple projects at the same time!
But thats missing the point. Yes, YOU focus on one thing at a time. But that doesnt mean that you cant have others focusing on ongoing projects. Have each of them focus on just one thing. That's how you diversify your business. That's how you diversify YOU. But YOU, you need to learn to make focus a habit and a discipline. Because if you dont, none of the other techniques I teach will work for you.
You focus on just one goal at a time. You hit that goal hard until you start getting results. Then you focus some more to make sure the results are consistent. Then and only then do you shift your focus to the next thing.
This is even more true in your personal life than in business. In business, you can delegate. But you simply cant delegate your personal life (much as you might wish you could some days)! What happens if youre juggling too much in your personal life? Nothing! You have no balance. The people in your life feel neglected and confused. You get nowhere. You wear yourself out. And the result is nothing but unhappiness. You cant do justice to any of your relationships or personal goals.
Whether its professional or personal, FOCUS is the #1 factor that gets success sooner rather than later.
As far as Im concerned, success is at least 75% focus. As Mike's example showed you so dramatically, spreading yourself across multiple projects means all of them will take a lot longer to nish. So how do you become commander of your own life? Let's look a little more closely at how focus really WORKS, so you can use it. For that, Im going to turn to the Buddhist monks. You know, the ones who can meditate for several hours straight.
1. Practice 2. Discipline
In other words, FOCUS = practice + discipline. First lets take a look at the whole idea of practice...
! Speak to 3,000 people Ive already spoken before a crowd of 1,000. So am I ready to speak to 2,000? Well, based on my performance in front of 1,000, probably not. I did okay, but not as well as I would have liked. I need to PRACTICE speaking before groups of 1,000-1,500 people at least a few more times. Maybe a lot more times. And Im happy to take this in stages, for one simple reason:
But discipline is a success essential. Without it, you cant manifest anything unless youre insanely lucky. With it, you can make your own luck literally!
There are two kinds of discipline: mental and physical. And guess what? You must have BOTH if you really want to win at everything you do.
Physical Discipline
Ill deal with this one rst because believe it or not, its where most of us are lacking. Now dont misunderstand. Physical discipline isnt about being able to stand on your head, run 10 miles, or twist yourself into a pretzel.
Physical discipline means EXECUTING in the real world. Its about ACTING on your mental decisions. When you have physical discipline you are able to stop living in your head and take ACTION.
In other words, you get off your butt and make things happen in the physical world! Its manifestation, pure and simple. Physical discipline prevents analysis paralysis and aimless daydreaming. Yes, rening your goals and breaking them down is very necessary. But all that thinking and analysis is just the rst step. After that youve still got to ACT. Thats why practicing physical discipline is the best way I know to overcome procrastination. Dont want to do something? Dont feel like it? DO IT ANYWAY. Here are some common examples of physical discipline. (Which is not to say I practice every single one of them... though most of them I do - honest!) ! Getting up at the same time every day. ! Sticking with an exercise routine. ! Writing your to-do list every day. ! Prioritizing time/tasks with the 4-box method. ! Taking action on each task. ! COMPLETING tasks. (BIG one!) ! Eating quality food at regular times. ! Keeping strict work hours. ! Getting regular health/dental checkups. ! Delegating appropriately. ! Closing your door to keep interruptions out.
! Saying no when appropriate. ! Saving money. ! Paying invoices/bills on time. ! Making time for hobbies. ! Setting aside quality time for family/friends. ! Keeping your promises (karma)!
Mental Discipline
Now heres where we can really learn from those Buddhist monks. When these guys meditate, they are totally focused. Their concentration is so powerful, you can parade a marching band past them and they dont even hear it. Literally. How do they achieve this? By meditating. But its not just any old meditating, where you listen to some new age music and visualize pretty pictures. They empty their mind and do not let distracting thoughts enter! Not even ONE!
Mental discipline means CONTROLLING your thoughts. Its about ELIMINATING distracting thoughts and STAYING ON POINT in your head.
Yep, its time to stop multitasking - at least mentally! To control your thoughts, you need to stay on topic in your mind. If youre someone with a bit of ADD (Attention Decit Disorder), this can be a challenge. But you can make it lot easier on yourself if you consciously work at eliminating distractions. Heres a list of common distractions. I call them focus busters because thats what they do: they bust into your thoughts and destroy your concentration. And Ill bet you come across at least ve of them every day - I know I do!
IMPORTANT NOTE: Youll notice that this list includes positive distractions, like hobbies, travel, friends and family. Im NOT saying you have to eliminate them! But WHEN they come into your day is KEY. If you allow them to constantly interrupt your focus, they are distractions. But if you set aside time for them (physical discipline), they can ll your life with positive energy.
Focus Busters
! Phone calls with no purpose (Yo, just want to chat.) ! Emails from friends, family, etc. ! Unscheduled and emergency meetings ! Colleagues hanging out in your ofce ! Answering chats: GTalk, AIM, Skype, etc. ! Family emergencies ! Unexpected errands (example: car repairs) ! Shopping for last-minute gifts ! Entertainment: TV shows, movies, etc. ! Fixing computer/printer problems ! Following your favorite sports teams ! Hobbies and pastimes ! Fooling around with iPhone apps ! Getting sick (often unavoidable, but its still a distraction) ! Ofce politics/drama ! Personal dramas ! GUILT! (beating yourself up for failure instead of MOVING ON) ! Trying to do too many things at once
As you can see, focus busters are EVERYWHERE. If we dont practice physical discipline OVER them, theyll eat up your life! So lets do an assignment where youll identify all your focus busters... and gure out how to clamp down on them.
My Focus Busters 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2. 1. 2.
My Focus Strategies
3 - Bribe Yourself
Reward yourself for keeping your mind on-topic and on-focus. Heres an example:
"As soon as I nish this Powerpoint so I can give a kick-ass pitch to those potential investors, I am going to knock off early, work out, and then go have a couple beers with my best friend."
! If they are about important things, you can just move them to your to-do list... and forget about them until the time comes! This allows you to give your undivided attention to whats on your plate right now.
1 Almost Never
4 Very Frequently
5 Always
I manage my time and tasks and prioritize using the 4-box method. I am very comfortable delegating routine tasks to others. I can concentrate and nish a task even with a lot of distractions around me. I stay off chat and email except for specied times. I have no problem saying no when someone tempts me with a distraction. I apply the Peg Method to all projects and goals. Its easy for me to ask people to come back later if they interrupt me during an important task. I take regular breaks and vacations and do not think about work during those times. I use my core values to help me decide how to use my time. If I fail at something, I consider it a learning experience and dont beat myself up about it.
TOTAL IN EACH COLUMN NOW DO THE MATH! x1= ____ x2= ____ x3= ____ x4= ____ x5= ____
MY SCORE _____________
30-39 points
You might need to clean your lens a little bit! But overall it sounds like youre working at improving your focus. I recommend you concentrate on your focus busters and get control over them as soon as you can.
20-29 points
Your focus seems to be pretty blurry. Ive given you all the tools you need to improve your focus - but youre not applying them! Was most of your low score because of distractions? Use some of the techniques in Module 5-Step 2 to create the space you need to concentrate better. If your score was low because youre not managing your time and pegging your goals, its time to start using those techniques - they work!
A Personal Example
If you remember from the previous lesson, it was pretty obvious that tness/health was a standout priority goal. I had help available in my life, which I could use to overcome any obstacles. But what keeps me focused on my tness goal, more than anything else, is a core belief. If you recall, living life for the experiences in a big core belief for me. But Ive had health issues over the years - and therefore havent been able to experience being
truly t and healthy very much. Poor health has sometimes held me back from having even more experiences, too. So when I put this goal under my core beliefs zoom lens, I realized that being t can be a life-changing experience. This just reinforces my decision to focus intensely and ACT on this ONE goal.
A Business Example
Now lets apply this to a very simple business example: promoting products as an afliate marketer.
Affiliate marketing is a very simple online business model. Many companies that sell online will pay you a commission or a fee when someone buys one of their products through your website or email. Amazon is well known for this. Through their Associates Program and have paid out many millions in commissions. They keep track by issuing unique links that identify YOU as the person who referred the sale.
Let's say you want to make money this way. The rst thing you need is a website. That will probably be a priority minigoal. What will that website be about? What market will it appeal to? Obviously you can't link to every product in the Amazon store, that would be crazy. It's just too large and unmanageable. It makes more sense to select products that you're interested in and have a higher price tag, so you can make the maximum in commissions. You decide you are interested in large screen TVs, designer luggage, and digital SLR cameras. You'll need a website for each. Now, should you try building three different websites all at the same time? No. Focus on one only. As you focus, you will DEDICATE yourself to that ONE website. If it's the TV website: ! You will learn all you can about those TVs as you build that one site.
! You will gure out how to write TV product reviews and recommendations. ! You will learn how to use pictures of the TVs on the site. ! You will learn how to attract visitors to that site. ! You will devote yourself to that site until its making some money. Youll focus hard on that ONE TV website with all your time and energy until it makes its rst dollar.
Once you have made some money, will you start on the designer luggage website? No. You're not going to zoom out yet!
You'll continue to focus your zoom lens on that TV site. You will be as focused as a Buddhist monk, but instead of meditating and putting your entire concentration on your breath or the life force, you'll be focused on increasing the money you make from that TV afliate site.
While youre developing your powers of focus and concentration, youll discover something interesting: negative energy is the worst distraction of all! Thats why the next step is critical to success... removing negative energy from your life...
5 RISING UP
Energy: Positive Forces that Build Success
Yes, you may have solid beliefs, a powerful vision, and the ability to focus and take action. But you also need support from people in your life. Without at least some support, you might be able to START but you won't be able to keep going when things get tough.
In this lesson I'll teach you a process I use to maximize the inuence of positive forces in my life, while reducing the impact of negative forces. As you go through this lesson, remember:
Negative forces are people that can pull your vision DOWN. Positive forces are people that add to your momentum and bring you UP
Our goal here is to minimize negative forces and boost the positive ones your life. I'll teach you an extremely simple process for increasing positive forces through PEOPLE. I call this process PEP. PEP stands for the POSITIVE ENERGY PROCESS. Whats ironic is if you do PEP faithfully, it will absolutely increase the pep you feel on a daily basis. In other words, it will give you a massive increase in PHYSICAL energy and get up and go. However, just because PEP is simple - doesnt mean its easy. The process itself is almost a no brainer: just a few simple steps. But when it comes to negative people, actually doing the process might require some courage. It requires you to care enough about your vision to start to eliminate negativity, and might involve challenging some cherished relationships. But before you anticipate trouble and run away... theres a huge payoff waiting for you on the other side!
When you practice PEP in your life and eliminate the negative, you open up a massive vortex that will literally suck good energy positive people, new opportunities, more money, accelerated healing into your life!
Here's how we will do it: ! You'll learn why your core beliefs are the key to understanding which relationships are positive and which are negative. ! I'll show you how to be 100% open about your core beliefs.
! You'll use your core beliefs to understand your current relationships better and evaluate them. ! I'll teach you an exercise for increasing the impact that POSITIVE people have in your life. ! I'll share my simple four-step process for minimizing the impact that NEGATIVE people have on you. ! I'll give you some tips for dealing with negative forces from family members. ! And I'll even share examples from my own life that show you the process in action. Let's get started...
Now were going to use your core beliefs in another way: to sort the good forces from the bad in your life.
The biggest challenge is sorting out the PEOPLE who belong in your life... and the people who dont. We all know that people are major carriers of energy. Whens the last time you called someone a neutral person? Probably never! We tend to say that someone is either a positive person or a negative person. So you must NEVER underestimate the energy people bring into your life. Good or bad. Heres what I mean...
So be successful, youve got to take immediate steps to minimize the influence of negative people in your life.
This is where your core beliefs come in. Theyre like a ashlight. Shine them on a person in your life... and youll know right away if that person truly belongs.
When you hold people up to those core beliefs, you can see everyone with crystal clarity - even the people who drive you crazy. Being comfortable with your core beliefs is key. You have to start being open about them. This is simple to do, as youll see in the assignment that follows. NOTE: If you havent done the core beliefs exercise yet, you MUST do it now, BEFORE you start looking at the people in your life. It's just plain foolish to take action on relationships without that core of self-understanding under your belt.
You cant and shouldnt make decisions about people unless you know your core beliefs.
So now I want you to do an assignment that will make you more comfortable with evaluating people based on your core beliefs ...
A huge part of success is the ability to stand up for what you believe in. You cant really LIVE by your values if youre not comfortable stating them and saying, This is what I believe. Its amazingly empowering to know and express your values. But the only way to get that power is if you take your inner values public.
1. Choose three of the following ways to express your core beliefs publicly: ! Send your list of core beliefs to the friends you polled. Be sure to thank them for their help! ! Add your core beliefs to your Facebook, MySpace, and/or Twitter pages. ! Display your core beliefs in the sidebar of your blog. Write a post about them. ! Add your core beliefs to your signature le on your email account(s).
! Talk privately to each of your friends and tell them about your core beliefs . ! Print your core beliefs and hang them on your fridge. ! Make a big printout of your core beliefs , and hang it in your ofce. Of course, you can also add to this list. These are just some ideas to help you get comfortable with sharing your values and being completely open about them. On the next page tere's a worksheet you can use. Make sure you write down what you did, with the date you went public for each value. You can even post it on your fridge or on your mirror, to remind you to be OPEN about your core beliefs whenever you can.
When you minimize negative people in your life, you remove a huge current of negative energy. That means you can increase the time you spend building positive relationships.
You're making room for the millions of positive, uplifting, wonderful, people out there to come into your life. This is because when you spend a lot of time dealing with negative people, YOU become negative. All that effort puts you in a negative state. If the majority of your inner life is preoccupied with managing negative relationships, guess what happens? Positive people might be right within your reach - but theyre probably unconsciously pushing you away because... heck, they're positive. They don't want the negative you around! No matter what your life is like right now, there are new, POSITIVE ENERGY PEOPLE are out there just waiting to help you and make your life better. But when you're constantly focused on dealing with negative energy, you're not seeing them. So the point is...
ALL the people in your life must be in sync with your inner environment. If not, just like in a building, they can become toxic. They need to be cleaned up or cleaned OUT before they pollute the entire structure.
Before you do this exercise, Ill show you how this works with a very simple example - a little case study from my own life...
It didnt take much thought for me to realize that I really didnt need that trip as much as those kids needed a scholarship. So when my friend called to talk about the trip, I had to say, Im really, really sorry. I cant come with you. The money I was going to spend on the trip, Ive decided to give it to this school. They desperately need scholarships. Its really important to me to make that donation. It really hurts to give up on this trip, because I need a break and want to join you. But you guys will have to go on the trip without me. Now heres the critical point. Let's watch HOW that friend REACTS to my decision.
Now thats a highly NEGATIVE force. You'd be rattled by a response like that, wouldn't you? I should would. What does this negative reaction say to me? ! That person does not respect my core beliefs . ! Hes undercutting a value I hold dear. ! Which means hes undercutting WHO I AM. And thats where Ive got to draw a line. I have to make a decision about that person. You need to do this, too. Ask yourself...
How much influence do you want someone who does not respect your core beliefs to have on you? Is this a person you really want in your life?
When things like this happen to you, understand its not just a minor ght between two people. Youre being told that you need to decide whether you still want this negativity in your life. Its a signal that you need to draw lines. Im going to show you exactly how to draw those lines shortly. But the rst step is to map all the people in your life to your core beliefs . That also includes any new people who come into your life. Think of any initial meet-up as an interview. Be alert to signs that your core beliefs overlap with that person. I gave you a great example of how to do this in the core beliefs lesson, when I talked about observing a new person's behavior in a restaurant.
I'm not saying you have to constantly analyze every little thing the people in your life do. But you should become a thoughtful observer of your relationships.
Believe me, the attitudes and behaviors of the people around you leak into your subconscious. If someone is constantly boring negative holes into your energy, it eventually undermines your success. Every day your core beliefs will be challenged by someone. So the big question is, do you want to keep someone in your life who doesnt respect or share your core beliefs? In this next assignment, youre going to start answering this question.
Positive Persons Name _____________________________________________ My Core Value 1 Respects " Shares "
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Negative Persons Name _____________________________________________ My Core Value 1 Does Not Respect/ Share "
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You always want to look for ways to remove the obstacles inside of you that prevent the positive from flowing in. Make MORE room in your life for positive energy people. They will uplift your spirits and make your life better.
You dont necessarily need to go out there and TRY to attract more positive energy in your life. If you try too hard, theres the danger of appearing pushy. You can scare people away, leaning into them like that. Its much more productive to look for any barriers youve put up inside of yourself that PREVENT the positive energy from pouring in. And negative people are probably the biggest cause of those internal barriers. Its also very important to really work on your relationships with the most positive people in your life. This is so their good energy will ll up as much internal space inside of you as possible. And in turn, YOU will have more energy (its not called PEP for nothing!). That doesnt necessarily mean spending more time with positive people, though thats your ultimate goal. But it does mean getting the most out of the time you do spend with them. And thats what the next assignment is all about...
Now make a list of other positive people in your life - both personal and professional. Youll want to do the chart above for each of them later.
Positive People
Personal
Professional
Negative people bring your own energy down. They even suck energy out of you. Therefore youve got to find ways to minimize their impact.
And thats going to be easier with some people than others. Obviously you cant cut close family members out of your life (unless theyre so abusive or toxic that you simply have no choice). Ill show you how to deal with family negativity in the next step. For now, lets focus on non-family members. These are negative people who... ! Dont share your core beliefs . ! Dont respect your core beliefs . ! Dump a lot of negativity on you! So now comes the challenge. How do you minimize the impact of a negative person? Or even remove that person from your life completely? Its actually simple - though its not easy. If that sounds scary, it doesnt have to be. Ill prove it to you with examples in a bit. But rst lets look at the process. There are only four simple things you need to do: 1. Measure the person against your core beliefs. 2. Look for patterns of negativity before taking action. 3. Draw lines. 4. Back up your decision with consequences.
Now Ill go into each step in detail, and then Ill show you how it works with some real life examples.
3 - Draw lines
When youre ready, draw hard lines. These are boundaries - internal, external, or both - decided by YOU. That means from this day forward, you set the RULES for interaction. And no matter what, YOU must stick to these rules.
NO NO, you dont LITERALLY hit them! But you may need to be much more rm about it. That means you call this person out in a very strong way.
Strong consequences means that you push back mentally and emotionally.
And remember, YOU must stick to your rules.You cant be wishy washy about it. Otherwise youll just magnify the negativity. Now I know all of this sounds ne in theory. But relationships are not theoretical. Theyre real, theyre in your face, and they can get complex or even messy. So Ill show you some concrete examples - basically case studies - straight from my own life. These werent the easiest things for me to deal with. But I want to share them with you, because most likely you have similar situations to deal with. In each of these case studies, Ill show you how to apply the 4 stages
So the goal is to get less stuck with their downer energy. That means youll need to severely limit any impact they might have on you. How do you face this challenge? Heres an example I dealt with recently. See if it reminds you of anyone in YOUR life:
I have a large circle of old friends who go back to my days in grade school. Most of them are great people. They share my core beliefs and well probably be friends for life. But like all groups of people, some are evolving more quickly than others. Some are drifting toward a different path. Some just dont seem to be in sync with me any more. On top of this, over the last few years Ive become quite successful nancially. And within my larger circle of friends a clique emerged. These are people who react negatively to my success. Maybe theyre jealous or feel threatened. Maybe they feel entitled to a piece of my success - even though they havent earned it. But whatever their reasons, through the grapevine I discovered how they talk about me behind my back. For them, our relationship is more about the money I spend on them and the things I give them - and NOT about the person I am.
One day I got a rude awakening about this. I did a favor for one of these friends. I didnt really think too much about it, I just did it from the heart. I thought, Wow, this is a good friend, and he really needs something. I sincerely wanted to help, so I did. But then I found out that this friend said to a true friend, You see? I can get Anik to do whatever I want. I can get him to give me anything. In other words, this so-called friend just at out admitted to someone that they were manipulating me. Ugh... what a TON of negativity that dumped on me. Naturally, I was VERY upset. I felt completely undervalued as a person. Still, Im not someone who jumps to conclusions based solely on emotion. I thought, Okay, sometimes these things happen between people whove known each other a long time. And its easy to misunderstand or mishear what someone said to somebody else. Maybe the information I got needs to be taken with a grain of salt. But internally, I was on the alert. This corresponds to the rst lesson in this course, being true to your core beliefs .
One of my core beliefs is showing respect to everyone. If you just think of me in a materialistic way, you obviously dont respect me.
And I didnt want to shut someone out of my life based on one report. So I decided to watch for patterns, which is what you do in Step 2. Unfortunately, the incident repeated itself. I got more reports of what this person was saying. This was from a trusted source - someone with nothing to gain by telling me. So now I decided to draw a line inside my mind - Step 3. It was an internal rule, which stated: If this is REALLY how you think of me, I cant have you in my life.
I drew a line that made me careful about future interactions. The RULE I set was: If you continue to talk about me this way, I will MINIMIZE you in my life.
Now that I drew the line, of course I had to stick with it. But there was a problem: I could NOT confront this person. Typically Im very good at confronting someone. Thats because one of my core beliefs is to be very straightforward and blunt. But this situation was different. I couldnt confront this person without impacting many other relationships. Not only my relationships with people, but the relationships of the person who alerted me to the problem. In other words, it would be very obvious where I got the information. So a confrontation would create a huge mess of who said this, who said that. It would set in motion an avalanche of blame, recriminations, and heartache, making things very difcult the person who was kind enough to share with me.
I concluded that a confrontation would be good for nobody but ME. I might feel better, but it would be selfish. Id be hurting other people for the momentary satisfaction of getting in someones face.
So I made a decision - for the rst time in my life - that I would have to deal with this but without addressing it in a face-to-face way.
That didnt mean I didnt do Step 4 and set consequences. I just had to do it in a more stealthy way. I decided the consequences would be three strikes, youre out. If you continue to talk about me this way, Ill have to stop interacting with you. So the rst time I got a negative report, I let it go. I was on the alert, but I just decided to wait and see rather than put a lot of energy into it. But then it happened a second time. Once again, I let it ride - though now I started keeping communication with this friend to a minimum. The third time, it really bothered me. I kept thinking about it. Finally I woke up one morning and said, You know what? Im DONE. That person and I will never speak again. Heres what the PRACTICAL consequences boiled down to in this particular case: I would no longer initiate any communication with this negative person. I would minimize any unavoidable interaction with that person.
I promised myself that I would keep my mind free of negative thoughts about this person. The goal was to MINIMIZE his negativity on my energy.
I decided to keep quiet about it. I didnt feel I owed him - or anyone - an explanation for drawing a line. And talking about it would only create a mess. Was this a hard decision? Yes. I have known this person a long time. It wasnt easy to just cut the cord. Not communicating really bothered me for the rst week. But after that, an amazing thing happened. I felt totally peaceful about it. All that negative energy was of MY shoulders. My mind was free again. It was one less thing to cause worry.
And here is what is more amazing. My decision did not impact my friendships with my REAL friends at all. Yes, I am stuck with dealing with this so-called friend when were in a group. And I do feel some sadness that it turned out this way.
But since I ceased communication, its actually a thousand times EASIER to be around this person. His negative forces don't crush my spirit. I can feel at peace is because I followed the process.
What are the practical take aways for you from this case study? Lets review how I went through process steps 1-4:
1 - I realized that this friend was violating a basic core belief I hold dear.
This tells me that I have a very good reason for minimizing this person: they dont respect me for who I am.
Joes disapproval would come out in various ways. Remember, hes soft spoken. So he wouldnt just come out with it. Id mention something I was doing, and hed be condescending or sarcastic. Because we had been friends for so long, Joes negativity had a big impact on me. What he said would make me question what I was doing. It threatened to bring my entire success high rise DOWN. It was always a big cloud in the back of my mind. When I thought about it, Joe wasnt aligned with several of my core beliefs .
The situation with Joe went on for a while. And then in early 2009 things came to a head.
It began when I held a going away party. I took 60 of my friends to a club and said, Im going to be crazy busy for a year or two. Ill be overseas 75% of the time, so I may not be around for you. During this time, I hope youll still be there for me when I need you. But try to understand that I might not always be around. I also had a personal chat about this with my closest friends, including Joe. And on the surface, he seemed to be okay with it. But as I started to travel, he grew distant very quickly. And that was upsetting me. So during one of my brief times at home, I called him up. I asked him if he wanted to go out, since Id only be in town for a week. And his response was harsh! "I'm not living my life on YOUR schedule! It's not like you're around for us any more! Why do you expect us to be there for you? You're mister big shot!
The negative forces just started to slam me, one after another. After that, every single time we talked, wed end up arguing. I let this really bring me down. Every time I would even hear the name Joe Id start to feel bad. So I realized I had to make a decision. So let me go through the process I went through - and see if you can relate:
3 - I had to draw some hard lines if I wasnt going to be in a constant state of upset.
So I said to myself: "You know what, that's it. I'm done. It was clear that my friend was unable to understand me. He wasnt going to give me any slack.
I DO NOT recommend cutting people out of your life just because you have a fight.
Thats why Im emphasizing the PROCESS. Relationships are important. You shouldnt dump them just because someone put you in a bad mood. The PROCESS helps you evaluate. It helps you see someones impact on your life overall. You can uncover a recurring theme of negativity. You can see whether they always bringing you down... or if its an isolated incident here and there. Remember, regulating negative forces in your life is NOT only about cutting people off. It's about drawing lines with certain people to make room for the positive forces. For example, when you cut off a friend, theres an emotional bond that's been broken. It could take a few months - or whatever time you need - of no communication. You need some distance.
That distance allows for healing. Sometimes, eventually, no matter what damage was done, you can forgive that person. And I mean genuinely forgive you just see that person, smile, and you realize all the turmoil really hasnt made a long term impact on you.
Sometimes you can even let a negative person back into your life.
For example, Joe is now back in my life. Of course, we are no longer best friends. But we are people who like each other, who connect once every couple of months, and who appreciate the things we do have in common. Remember, eliminating negative forces means you increase the positive forces inside of you. And if you give the positive forces enough time, they tend to resolve things. You can go back to someone and rebuild a relationship - just on a different level. Also...
You need to resolve this as soon as possible. Draw lines. You MUST restructure this relationship so its no longer negative.
If all else fails, take the last resort: Cut this person out of your life. Ask yourself: If your issues are unresolvable, WHY ARE YOU TOGETHER?
Once again, the point here isnt cutting someone out of your life. That's very aggressive and its usually NOT necessary. Its much more helpful to strategically remove negative energy in a targeted away. Okay, now its time to apply this process in the next assignment. In it you will do some strategizing about ONE negative person in your life. Be sure to focus on just ONE person to start. That helps you get a feel for the process. And once youve handled one negative person, youll nd it easier to move forward with the others...
Step 3 - What lines will you draw? What are the rules of interaction?
You have to realize that family negativity is usually motivated by concern for you.
Unless youre in an abusive situation, please understand that your family does NOT want to hurt you. They do not WANT to crush your spirit, make you angry, or stress you out. But in the process of trying to protect you, they can drive you crazy. So you have the challenge of loving them, while minimizing their negative impact.
At the time, all this negativity upset me very much. Yet even then, I realized deep inside that they didnt mean anything bad by it. They were simply being cautious. And they were worried for me. So how do you deal with this kind of not in our family negativity? Obviously you just can't cut all those people out of your life. Theyre your family!
Let me share a perfect example of how you can manage negative forces without having to cut people out painfully. I came up with this solution because I couldnt cut out the negativity even if I wanted to. At this point in my life, there were just three people who weren't negative about my becoming an entrepreneur. Only three people who thought I could do it. I couldnt cut ALL but three people out of my life. So out of sheer necessity, I discovered something. Its almost like a law of the universe, and it helps a lot.
Simply accept how people feel. ACCEPTANCE can do an amazing job of neutralizing negativity within a family.
1 - ACCEPT that almost everyone around you just doesnt share this MAJOR core belief of yours.
Struggling AGAINST your familys opinions only escalates the negativity. You may feel like those opinions are an attack on YOU, but THEY feel like they are trying to help/protect/save you. Which means the odds of you changing their minds are pretty slim. I suspect that 90% of the time, the harder you try to change them, the more they will resist. So there YOU are, resisting your family - and there THEY, resisting YOU. Who do you think will change in this scenario? Nobody. All this resistance just churns up MORE resistance, which means more negativity, which means more of a drain on your energy. But theres an answer to this: acceptance.
Just accept the fact that they dont understand. Hard as it is, force yourself to be okay with the way they feel. Because the faster you can accept them, the better YOU will feel.
Ive found that the easiest way to accept your familys negativity is to remind yourself (a thousand times day if you have to) that your family LOVES you... but
they just dont understand. If you can focus on their LOVE for you - and the love you have for them - its a LOT easier to accept them.
2 - Accept the fact that the negativity from your family might be a recurring theme for quite some time maybe even your whole life.
This is a BIG one. Once I achieved some success, my family became very supportive. But remember what I said about lters? In some families, business just isnt done. So there are many successful entrepreneurs whose parents have never been okay with their choice of career. Their family disapproves even after theyve created multiple million dollar companies! And of course family negativity isnt just about your career choice. It could be about the person you decide to marry, the house you decide to buy, even your dietary preferences. Lets face it, theres always SOME big or small negativity thing going on in every family.
So you must be prepared for the negativity to last a while. Maybe a very long time.
Given my familys history, I knew that their negative reaction to my career choice was not going away in a few weeks. So I had to ACCEPT that fact, too. Once again, reminding myself that my family really loves me and only wants the best for me helped me a lot.
So to save my sanity, I had to draw lines inside of ME. And heres what I chose to do: I would NOT TALK about my business ambitions with others, especially my family.
Luckily there were three people who understood me. I could talk to them. They would listen. I was lucky to have them, because I didnt have anyone else to talk to about business. Those people never gave me one ounce of negative energy. I am grateful to them to this day. But for a while, my family, all of my closest friends, even my professors... they had no idea I was creating a business on the side! So I just drew a very simple line within myself: I would not talk about my business with anyone in my family.
Step 4 - Make the consequences clear cut and (if possible) simple to avoid.
As soon as I decided I had to draw some lines, I realized what the consequences would be if kept on bringing the topic up with my family. Id just get a lot of negativity dumped on me, with NO support or resolution. And this would be totally unnecessary negativity, because the fact was, I could avoid it.
So I immediately made another simple rule FOR MYSELF: Dont talk. And I made a simple consequence FOR MYSELF: If you talk, youll get grief.
During this time of my life I learned a lot about how to draw lines within myself. I learned it was very powerful to know what I could and cannot say, when, and to whom. If youre starting a business, never underestimate the power of drawing your own internal lines. Youll use this skill over and over again. Heres how I decided to make things as easy as possible on myself. I would keep all my business efforts a secret until I was ready to say, Look, I'm doing it.
If my family responded with, "Nooo... you can't do that," I could simply say, "Well, I already am. Here it is. It's up and running and I'm doing great. Thank you. How could anyone argue with me once I confronted them with the FACT of my business? After all, you cant argue about a fact - its just there. Now if someone still wanted to be negative at that point, then maybe it would be time to consider minimizing that persons inuence in my life. In the end, my family became my biggest supporters. They really believe in me. This whole situation taught me a very important lesson: you must be very careful who you listen to and who you don't listen to. This is a key element in drawing lines for yourself.
Its essential that you become very aware of WHO you should be talking to, listening to, and about WHAT. Minimizing negativity is often about controlling where your input is coming from.
This means you can control negativity in your life by choosing WHO you consult when you need advice. Heres a perfect example. When we have a problem or issue, we have a tendency to talk about it to our friends and family. Theyre closest to us, so they should know whats best for us - right? Hmm... not necessarily. Family and friends are usually NOT the best people to help us. Yes, we're comfortable with those who are close to us. Theyre easy to talk to, and thats why we go to them with our problems. And they come from a good place. They want to help you.
But just because they want to help you does not make them experts.
If you want to lose weight, are you going to go to an obese person and ask them how to do it? That makes no sense. Its obvious that they are NOT qualied to help you. You need to go to somebody who knows how, and obviously knows how.
If you want to learn how to get a job, are you going to ask the homeless guy on the side of the road? Obviously he doesn't have a job. That guy is not in a good place. You are not going to talk to him about how to get a job.
Yet every single day we talk to non-experts our friends and families about issues they obviously cant help with. We ask them to advise us on things for which they have NO qualifications.
When I was trying to start my business, I was asking for advice and support from family members who had NO CLUE. Take my own parents. My dad is extremely successful in his career, and my mom is the greatest mom in the world... but they've never run a company. They didn't start a company when they were my age. Theyve never had to worry about a product launch or making payroll. Which doesnt mean my parents dont mean well. They're the people who raised me and love me. They want only the best for me. But they just don't know anything about business! They are not qualied. Im sure youve read this somewhere: If you want to learn how to be a millionaire... go talk to a millionaire. Ask them how they did it. Take their advice. So you want to be an engineer? You want to nd out what it takes to be an engineer? Talk to an engineer. Because an engineer has DONE it. In fact, talk to several engineers. But please, don't talk to a scientist or a mathematician or a concert pianist, because they dont know. How could they? Theyre not engineers.
So when you're starting a business, you need to talk to the entrepreneurs who have succeeded, who have done it, who are exactly where you are. Dont talk to people who currently work in jobs and have been in jobs their whole life. They don't know what it's like. Lets look at some take aways from this case study. Well review each step in the process:
1 - My family was completely at odds with a core value at the time: Starting and running a successful business.
There was obviously no way I could get them on board with it. So I just had to accept the fact - and deal with the only person I could control, ME.
Thats what this next case study is all about - a little thing that can turn into a big negative.
Sound familiar? Still, our moms want nothing but the best for us. They just have a way of wanting the best thats sometimes not the best for our mood or schedule. For the longest time, my mom had this routine. She would call me rst thing in the morning. She wanted to make sure I got up and went to work. Its been years since shes needed to do this - my health is now in good shape - but she would still insist on talking every morning. Of course theres nothing wrong with this. So every morning shed call me and say, Did you do this? Did you do that? Did you take your medicine? Did you eat breakfast? Again, it should be no big deal. But if I ended up saying no to something, yikes. She'd say, Oh, you don't listen, you don't do this, you don't do that, blah, blah, blah! Yes, she was just being motherly. She was just giving me the typical mom lecture. But you know what? It would ruin my day!
I would blow up. Yes, I admit it - I would blow up at my mom. We would have this silly ght on the phone. Then Id hang up, and then I would feel really bad about how I spoke to her. Id get very down on myself. Id be at the ofce dwelling on it. Oh my God, why did I yell at her? I should have NOT spoken to her that way, shes my mom. She just wants the best for me. And there goes half my day! 80% of my energy is blown - and it could have been channeled into something positive.
Im sure you know from experience how negative energy can poison your entire day. And that can be disastrous if you need to be at your peak.
One day it nally came to a boil. My mom called when I was driving. I still remember where I was on the road. I picked up the phone, and the next thing I know, she said the tiniest little thing that just oored me. She really didn't mean anything bad by it. But it really got to me. I arrived at work and I literally sat at my desk for three hours, unable to get anything done. I was demotivated, deated, upset. So I decided it was time to get this negative force under control. So I called my mom. And I said:
Listen, please don't get upset by this. But I just have to tell you what happens when you call me in the morning. I know you come from a good place. And I am not mad at you for doing it. But after you call and you say this and that, heres what happens. Mom, it just ruins my day. Its not your fault - you mean nothing but good by it, and I totally understand that. But I am so deated. I just feel awful. And I cant concentrate on business at all. Everything gets derailed.
I continued.
Mom, you are retired. You can chill out the rest of the day. But me, I come to work, and I have all kinds of res to put out. I have to be attentive to what is going on. I have to be at my best and I cant be feeling bad about things. See, I wake up every morning and I naturally feel good. I am full of energy. I go exercise, so I feel great. I eat a healthy breakfast, and on my way to work I feel great, ready to conquer the world... until that phone call comes. Somehow, for whatever reason, I end up reacting the wrong way and getting upset.
So I drew a line. I made a very hard rule with her. Yes, with my MOM. Remember, when dealing with family, draw ONE simple line at a time. That is what I did with my mom. I wasn't rude, and I wasn't mean. I did this with no emotion except sincerity. I said:
Mom, lets make a rule: No phone calls until 5:30 pm. An amazing thing happened. Mom was FINE with it.
She started to see things from my perspective. She never got angry about it. I truly believe she understands WHY I needed to set this limit. And since that day, Id say 98% of the time, she has stuck to the one simple rule.
Here is the key: I kept the focus on the consequences for ME. I didnt lay the blame on anyone else.
So I didnt blame my mom. I explained I was getting upset even though that was not her intention. I told her that I knew she didnt want to make me upset - that was just my reaction, which I completely owned. I also stated everything in a calm way. No yelling, no anger, no you did this and you did that. I just said, Mom, this is what happens to ME when we have this type of conversation... Lets review exactly how the process worked for this issue with me and my mom.
4 - The consequences of crossing the line? I dont answer if my mom calls before 5:30 pm.
In fact, Ive had NO need to put my foot down on this. Except in the case of family emergencies, my mom has always respected my request. Now youre going to do an assignment to help you deal with some of the negativity that may be coming from your family...
Negative Family Members Name _____________________________________________ Family members who are affected by this relationship:
Step 1 - Reasons why this family member causes negativity. List Core Values this person does not share/respect:
Step 3 - What ONE line will you draw? What ONE rule will you make?
6 Penthouse
People To Accelerate Your Vision
You can't make it to the top of your vision the penthouse of your dream without the help of other people.
And I don't just mean your family and friends. I mean a network of people who will help you manifest your biggest dreams. No successful architect can afford to be a lone wolf. That architect could be a genius. But without a massive network to help with design details, engineering, construction, management, funding, legal, and dozens of other things, he or she will never get that skyscraper built. All it will be is a lofty idea, nothing more than a pretty picture, a dream.
We all need other people for one simple reason: what YOU dont know, others do.
Relationships are key. Relationships are what make us who we are. They are just plain everything. So in this part of your success high rise, I'll teach you how to leverage the experience, know-how and contacts of others... to achieve your dreams ten times faster than you could by yourself. This is the exact same process I have used in both my career and personal life to generate positive manifestation and synchronicity.
Luckily I found the answer. It's simple and it's free. It's called Google Contacts.
Google Contacts is the best way I've found to collect and maintain contact information. It allows me to sort my contacts into groups... and YOU are going to do the same.
You access Google Contacts through your GMail account http://gmail.com/. You'll create three groups to sort your contacts into. Youll label them A, B and C. It's not hard to use Google Contacts once you get the hang of it. Google has excellent help les, and even offers apps you can use on your phone and tablet. You'll nd everything you need to know to get set up with Google Contacts here. Of course, you can also set this system up in Outlook, Thunderbird, or any other email/contact management program. But I like Google Contacts because it's so easy to update from my phone or tablet, and sync everything up between all your devices.
Now you KNOW exactly WHO you know. The next step is sorting your contacts into groups that will help you manage these relationships.
Your A List contains all your closest contacts - close friends, family, key players in your business life and other VIPs (Very Important People).
A Listers are people I like to stay in contact with regularly. They get birthday cards and a gift. I remember them on special occasions and holidays with a gift and a phone call. The most obvious examples of A Listers are your closest friends and family. The reason to remember these people on birthdays and anniversaries should be obvious. I don't recommend you test to see what happens when you forget! A List people deserve thoughtful communication and careful management. They are true VIPs!
More important than those birthday cards and anniversary gifts, though, are the little things that show someone you remember them.
For example, I know someone whose sister-in-law is a nurse. So alongside the usual family greeting cards, holiday phone calls and get-togethers, he always makes a point of sending a bouquet of owers to her work during Nurses Week. Not only does she appreciate this thoughtful gesture... but all her colleagues know who her brother-in-law is! Now what about the rest of your A-listers - your most important business contacts? They need to be reminded of your continued existence as well. For example, think about your very rst business associate. Maybe a boss, a manager, a co-worker or mentor. Im talking from MANY years ago. Do you still make a point of getting together over lunch every quarter? Just to talk about all the new projects youre both doing?
No matter what you have going on, Ill bet youll nd something you can collaborate or brainstorm on together. A two-hour lunch every quarter is a total of 8 hours a year. Thats a very small time investment to keep a close professional friendship.
The B List
B Listers are all the people who are occasional key players in your life or business. But they arent the type of people with whom you need to keep in constant contact.
Because they have skills and knowledge that is useful to me, and because we have a good working relationship, I always want to make sure my B List people remember me. Heres an example: Lets say one of your B Listers is a friend from college. He just graduated from law school and is deep into building his career. He really doesnt have time to meet up with you every couple months. But hes decided to specialize in Internet Law, so he may one day be able to help with your business. If youd like him to work for you someday, youll be competing with others for his talent. So you want to periodically remind him that youre friends and you have a history. Even if its just a couple times a year!
B List people are important, but they are not regulars. They contribute to your life, but in limited ways.
Other B Listers include anyone who has made any regular or signicant contribution to my charity. Since Ill want to go back to them for donations in the future, I want to keep them informed about what we are doing and the children we are helping. So it just makes sense to send an update with a brief newsletter or post card. I want them to know whats been happening with their funds and what we have in the works - without necessarily seeing each of them for lunch four times a year.
The C List
The C List is where I keep contact information for my up-and-comers. They may not have something particular to offer me right now - but they show promise and possibility for the future.
C List people may have something interesting going on. They may be like you, growing and changing. Or they may be established in an area of business or life youre curious about. C List people may even have the potential to someday be B or even A List people. But they are not active in your life or business right now. Heres an example: We had a young intern in our ofce a few years back, working on various special projects. She was brilliant and showed great promise, but when I offered her a job, she told me that she had decided to work for a big corporation. Instead of being offended, I asked her to tell me more about it. It was obvious from her drive and attitude that she was going places... so I made sure to keep her contact information handy. Once a year or so I touch base with her to hear about what shes doing rsthand. Ill bet that someday soon our paths will cross professionally - and that she will have contacts who might be helpful to my business. On the next page youll nd a diagram to help you see the differences between A, B and C contacts:
C-List
Good to Know Expand Your Circle of Contacts May Someday Grow Into A or B
B-List
Helpful Inuential & Important Occasional Key Players
A-List
VIPs Close Friends Key Players
Now that youre clear on the types of people who go into each of the three groups, its time to roll up your sleeves and get to work!
Involve a VA or Friend
When I rst realized I needed to organize my contacts, I got my personal assistant involved. We sat down together and spent an entire afternoon just getting all my contacts into one place. Then we spent another afternoon sorting everyone into A, B and C lists. Of course I understand you may not have a VA or personal assistant - YET. But I bet there is someone in your life who could help you with this process. A sibling, a friend, a spouse, even one of your kids might be able to help. This is also a way to enlist someone close to you and possibly help them grow THEIR network. Get your helper to work with on on tracking the frequency of your contacts. Friends and family can be really helpful in this, since they often have creative ideas about how to keep in touch. Now that you know the ABCs of organizing your contacts... whats next? Youll learn how to work with each of these groups. But lets not get ahead of ourselves. For now the challenge is in getting organized. So its time for an assignment. Who falls into each slot... and who doesnt belong in your contacts at all?
Maintaining relationships means keeping in touch - and thats not easy if youve got dozens, or even hundreds of people on your combined lists.
You have to MANAGE all these relationships in an efcient and organized fashion. If you dont, your network will start to fall apart. Each list is a UNIQUE group of people. So each group deserves a different approach when it comes to keeping in touch. You have to think through these touch points and decide what makes sense for that group.
Then one day a good friend invited me to come visit her for coffee while she was in town. Now I often had difculty connecting with her - our schedules never seemed to mesh. And as usual, life got very busy for me. So when the day rolled around, I didnt really feel like being social. But then I remembered that being loyal and true to
friends and colleagues was one of my core beliefs... so I made a point of meeting her for coffee anyway. While we were catching up, I mentioned all the troubles I was having getting my new idea off the ground. I gave her the whole story. I even vented about my repeated frustration at making contact with the right people. She looked at me with a curious smile. Anik, do you know who the companys owner is? I nodded yes... but I could tell she had more to tell me. And wow... Anik, the person youve been trying to contact is Suketus uncle! Suketu is one of our close, mutual friends. It took just a couple of days to get in touch with Suketu. I conrmed that it was, in fact, his uncle who was responsible for planning the conference I needed to attend. Within 48 hours the paperwork was done!
Just by keeping in touch with one friend, all those months of writing letters and emails and making phone calls came together with almost no effort at all.
If I had gone with my initial reaction and blown off this get together, another year (or more) may have gone by before I saw my friend. She would never have been able to tell me about the contact who could fulll my desires - and this idea of mine would never have had the opportunity to manifest!
You should speak with or otherwise contact each A-Lister at least quarterly. Every 2 months is even better. These touch points should be MEANINGFUL and PERSONAL.
Take the trouble to update A List contact info with any tidbits that will help you communicate in a thoughtful and meaningful way. Note down...
! Birthdays (their own and their kids if applicable) ! Anniversaries (personal and professional) ! Likes and dislikes ! Favorite restaurants, bars, clubs ! Special interests, such as hobbies ! Favorite sports teams ! Info about spouses and kids ! Note home towns and favorite places With this information you can... ! Send them thoughtful cards on holidays ! Send them a meaningful gift on their birthday ! Drop them an email about something they are interested in ! Make lunch or coffee dates ! Do dinner if your schedules allow
IMPORTANT TIP: Be sure to SHARE with your A Listers! Go ahead, be talkative about your projects and future plans. You never know when these close acquaintances will be able to help you out!
Heres an example of doing something special for an A Lister... I have a good friend who is a cricket end. He eats, breathes and sleeps cricket just absolutely loves it! So for his birthday, I used my social network to get him a cricket bat signed by the number one cricket player in the world. Will this contact ever forget who I am? Never! Things like this build a solid, long term relationship.
Its not about the gift. Its about choosing a gift that means the world to someone.
Using personal touches like this, I can go for months without talking to that person. Yet he will think of me and remember me when I need him. If I ever need his help in the future, I am 100% certain hell be there for me. Heres another example where I realized that I was on someone elses A list... One of my friends and I joke about how we have a bromance. We probably communicate more than a lot of married couples! Well, he sent me a gag gift as a joke on Valentine's Day - pretty funny! It was a very creative and witty gift and the Valentines Day angle made it even funnier. You know what? I will remember that guy for the rest of my life - even if we grow apart - because he did something weird that really sppealed to my own goofy sense of humor.
world. And in the process the people they are close to will become your fans, too. When my mentors company won its biggest client contract ever, I sent a huge tower of fruits and sweets to the ofce - he never forgot it.
Touch base with your B list people at least once every six months.
Your goal is to make sure they remember who you are and why they want to continue to be helpful to you! What are some ways to stay in touch with B-Listers? ! Send an email to share interesting news about a mutual contact or acquaintance. This only takes a minute or two. If you keep your assistant informed about who knows whom, he or she can watch for these little news items and alert you to them. ! Touch base about a common interest. Maybe you both love tennis or cooking or working out or ying airplanes or collecting rare coins... whatever it is, you can always share information about a cool website or new book on the topic. ! Give them a call just to share. You dont want to call just when you want something from them, but when YOU might have something to offer. It could be as simple as sharing a contact who could be helpful. Or you can keep them in the loop by telling them whats going on in your company. Make them feel like they are a part of whats going on in your life. ! Ask how YOU can help THEM. This is just being a benevolent person. ! Take advantage of every meal! You have to eat anyway... so occasionally invite a B Lister to lunch or coffee. Set up a Google Calendar that lists each
of your available mealtimes. Share it with contacts when appropriate to save yourself a lot of scheduling back-and-forth. ! Plan an outing for a small group of B Listers. This gives you a chance to catch up with a lot of people at one time, and theyll probably enjoy the opportunity to network, too. Some ideas: wine tastings, a karaoke night, watching a game at a sports bar.
Remember, if you can help others make connections, you will become that much more valuable to your entire network. By facilitating new, mutually beneficial relationships, you become an important contact for others to keep.
One nal point about your B list: The key with B list people is to touch base in ways that add value for them without eating up a lot of your time - or theirs. Remember, its natural NOT to communicate with B Listers a lot. If I get a request from someone who is an A list person, naturally I'm quick to get it done. But when I get a request from someone I haven't heard from in six months, I'll probably still do it - but not with the same heart or expediency as I would for my friend. Remember that this is normal.
With C contacts, simply givethem a reason to remember who you are for the next year.
Make contact with C list people once a year... but in a way they wont forget! The easiest way to do this is to send out cards to everyone on your list once a year. Now most people do this sort of thing around the winter holidays with Christmas cards. But honestly, do you remember the names of everyone who sent you a Christmas card last year? I didnt think so! This is why being UNIQUE is so important. Of course its true for all the groups... but its essential for the C-List, who only hears from you once a year. So instead of a Christmas card...
! Send out cards on the anniversary of your business. Now they wont just remember your name, but your brand as well! ! Post an online video greeting. Let everyone know whats been going on in your life, and ask them to reply back with a video of what theyre looking forward to in the next year. ! Use a video to send a congratulations or get well greeting. Ill never forget a video get well made by the team at a company owned by one of my friends. It really made my day... and Ill never forget it! ! Send treats! Many people are foodies and will remember you fondly if you send them gourmet chocolate, cookies, fruit, or snacks. It doesnt have to be big, but it should be something really delicious! Flowers and balloons also work well. ! Ask all of your contacts to send you a recent photo of themselves, their family, or even their pet. Just tell them you were thinking about them and would like to add a photo to their contact information. Youd be surprised at how many will respond.
If you didnt make meeting new people one of your core beliefs, you should consider doing that. Relationships are everything especially when it comes to getting to that penthouse level!
Finding and maintaining connections to others drives the process of manifestation. It can even manifest solutions in an emergency. Even new C level relationships made by chance can benet you. Heres an example...
Relationships = Manifestation
I have some friends, Tom and Leslie, who went on an unusual honeymoon adventure: road-tripping through Mexico.
In a tiny town near Puerto Vallarta, while waiting out a tropical storm, they had some car trouble. Since funds were limited, Tom decided he would x the problem himself. So despite Leslies protests, he went to a local RV park looking for someone with tools. And guess what he found? A retired couple with an RV from their home country... who had the EXACT tools he needed.
Okay, you could say was just luck. But thats not the end of the story...
Tom xed the car, and he and Leslie continued bumming around Mexico. But they soon hit another snag. They planned to end their trip with a stay at a horse ranch. But it fell through at the last minute. Bummed out, with nowhere to stay on their tiny budget, they drove into an RV park to spend the night. And yep...you guessed it. The nice people with the tools and the RV were there, too. But they had more than just sympathy and beers to offer Tom and Leslie. The RVers were supposed to do a house-sitting job on the coast, in a beautiful villa on the beach. But they just found out they had to hurry home because of a family emergency. Would Tom and Leslie like to do the house-sitting job? Im sure you can imagine their answer.
Do you see what happened here? Because of one simple decision to reach out and ask for help, my friends were able to spend nearly a month getting PAID to live in paradise. The power of relationships turned what could have been a complete bummer into a miracle. Instead of manifesting disappointment, Tom and Leslie manifested a honeymoon adventure they will never forget.
Reaching out is extending your energy to others. Sometimes you give... and sometimes you take. But either way, youre reaching out to NEW people and experiencing them in NEW situations. You constantly GROW your network.
Obviously this involves both personal and professional growth. Its about stretching yourself to go BEYOND your immediate circle of contacts. Of course, you can meet new people just about anywhere, as long as you are open. But I recommend doing this strategically. It just makes sense to use your time wisely and limit exposure to negativity.
So you need to maximize your exposure to positive, uplifting people who are likely to benefit you at some point. This isnt selfish. Its about putting yourself in a situation which is MUTUALLY beneficial.
Think about the type of person who is in a position to help you. Most likely YOU will be able to help them at some point, too - right? So your goal is to move in circles
that expand the your possibilities for give and take. Thats really the classic denition of networking!
Why do you need at least 100 contacts? Because thats when your REACH really begins to expand like an octopus.
If every person on your list knows at least 100 people, the possibilities for creating mutually benecial relationships are endless.
How do you grow a network? Simple, by getting out there and mixing with people.
But you cant do this aimlessly. Just hanging out at a club every night is not necessarily going to put you in touch with the right contacts (unless youre in the nightclub business). Remember, you need to be selective. You must minimize exposure to negative people. And by negative I dont just mean people who bring you down. I mean people who dont really have a PURPOSE in your life. Those are the people who didnt t on the A, B, or C list in your rst assignment. Yes, I really was serious when I said you need to consider cutting ties with them. Because if someone isnt even POTENTIALLY supportive or helpful to you... why are they in your life? Chances are they are taking, not giving. That isnt friendship. Its just a waste of time and precious energy. That person needs to learn to be willing to give - if not to you, then to someone else. And heres the BEST way I have found to grow a network of truly meaningful relationships:
Build your network by moving in circles where youll meet people who are potential C Listers.
Why Cs? The more of them you add to your list, the more potential Bs and As youre meeting!
Most people who think they are shy actually arent deep inside. But in the past theyve had had their energy drained by negative people.
So to protect themselves, they withdraw and stay away from new relationships. If this happens to a little kid, they can end up being shy and unsociable their whole lives. But even if youre painfully shy, theres good news. You now have some tools to protect your energy while you make the stretch to meeting new people. ! Your core beliefs can support and guide you as you reach out and join with others. ! Use the techniques in the prior Energy (PEP) lesson to help you develop a stronger support base of positive people. That automatically makes it easier to become less introverted. ! Look at your vision board and ask yourself, How many of my dreams require the help of other people I havent met yet? Chances are it will be most - or even all - of your dreams! That will motivate you to start growing your list of contacts and building stronger relationships.
! Become an organizer! If you dont have a lot of activities like these in your area, START some. You can meet hundreds of people this way. ! Greet people! Just make eye contact and smile at people while running errands and shopping.
Business people join groups for a specific reason - to grow their business and to network.
So you have a built-in reason for participating in a business group, and everyone in the group shares that purpose. Youre not there just to meet people, youre there to help others and help yourself. Business and professional groups usually have a system for welcoming people who are new. When you show up at a business meet up or conference, trust me, total strangers will literally walk right up to you and shake your hand. Others WANT to meet you, which makes it easy for you. Of course once in a while youll have someone who gloms on and wont leave you alone. But that gives you a powerful incentive to walk up to other people, introduce yourself, and participate in new conversations. TIP: Even though its the age of web based communication, it never hurts to have business cards to pass around at events. I confess, I HATE business cards. But theyre still a necessity if you want to be able to share an email address efciently. Sure, you COULD enter each person into Google Contacts using your phone or tablet right then and there. If you do, then I recommend making a Pending group and adding all new contacts there rst.
And take my advice, dont share ALL your contact information on a business card. Your name, title, business name, and an email address youve set up for this purpose is enough. Finally, youre bound to come home with a bunch of business cards in your pocket. If possible, try to make notes about the person on their card as soon as possible. You want to do this while your memory - including your gut feelings about the person - are still fresh. Then when you get home, go through these cards ASAP. Either do it yourself or get help. Add the contact information and any notes on them into Google Contacts as Pending. If they contact you later, youll have at least some way of remembering them. And some will become C, B and even A players over time.
invigorating all at once! Events like this usually have networking parties, so be sure to go to these and meet as many people as you can. ! Join professional organizations. This isnt just for doctors and lawyers. These days EVERY profession and business niche has at least one organization. Just do some Google searches to nd them. ! Take some business classes. You dont have to go for your MBA. Many colleges and universities offer stand-alone courses in small business setup, business tax issues, entrepreneurship, investing, estates and trusts, and lots of other business-related topics. Youll not only nd contacts among your fellow students. The teachers are often successful business people, including CEOs, you can add to your network. ! Find and join relevant grass roots business groups. These types of groups often meet at the local library, community center, YMCA, or Starbucks. So stop by each of these places, check the bulletin boards, and nd out when they meet. ! Attend fund raising events sponsored by local businesses. Every community has these events - golf tournaments, walk-a-thons, car washes, softball games, weekend fairs, etc. ! Attend business fairs in your niche. Heck, even a job fair can be a good place to meet someone who might one day be your right-hand. ! Volunteer for a non-prot. This can be anything from the local animal shelter to participating in a televised pledge drive. One of my colleagues made seven new B List business contacts at a pledge night for her local public television station. Your fellow volunteers will often be business people just like you. At the very least, most of them will be well-connected and will share your core beliefs. ! Take a tour of a business you admire. When I had the opportunity to meet with Tony Hsieh at Zappos, I grabbed it - and Ill never forget it. It inspired me in so many ways. But you dont have to visit a Fortune 500 company. Ive met with many other online marketers at their ofces, and they have visited mine. Dont wait to be invited - just ask. Most business people will be attered, delighted, and eager to be helpful to you in the future. Okay, now you should have lots of ideas for expanding your network. Which is what your next assignment is all about...
EXISTING ACTIVITIES
Places I Already Go 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 How I Can Use This To Network More
NEW ACTIVITIES
Local Events 1 2 3 4 5 Business Groups 1 2 3 Non-Prot Activities 1 2 3 Professional Organizations 1 2 Conferences, Conventions, Live Events 1 2 3 Priority Date Priority Join Date Priority Date Priority Date Priority Date
Now that your success high rise is well on the way, there's one more powerful technique I want to share... Did you know theres a formidable Sixth Sense in all of us? Whether you believe in it or not, I guarantee youre already using this sixth sense to make decisions. In fact, it's operating in every aspect of your life whether you know it or not. Get ready learn how to tap into this sixth sense and use it to help you believe in yourself and do more than you ever thought you could...
7 Topping Out
Instinct
Most of the rapid growth of my success high rise is because I always listen to my gut feelings. Paying attention to my sixth sense gives me a massive edge.
Im not alone in this. Many of the worlds most successful entrepreneurs swear by their gut. They never make an important move if their gut feeling tells them not to - no matter how good the deal may look like on paper. So in this nal lesson Im going to teach you how to start listening to - and trusting your gut feelings.
What is feel? Its that sense of things around you and how they are working (or not working.
Next time you watch your favorite team in competition, youll see this sixth sense in action. Top athletes are constantly operating based on feel. They seem to know where the ball is going to go, where their teammates are, and what the other team is going to do. Yes, all this comes from practice. But much of the difference between the good athletes and the great ones comes from that inner feeling, that gut instinct, which takes them to the highest level. They dont have to spend time thinking or analyzing. They just KNOW where to go and what to do.
When you develop your own sixth sense, you can feel the pulse of your profession or market. You can instantly read and understand your environment, the people and the situations you encounter. You know what to do without even having to THINK about it.
Heres a commonplace example of feel. All of us have spent our whole lives dealing with people. Whether its our family and friends, or whether its people at work, or at school... people are people. We can usually tell how they are feeling, whether they are comfortable or not, how resistant or cooperative they are, if theyre skeptical or interested - all without them saying a word.
Sure, Anik. Whats so special about that? Well, if youve ever been around someone who is autisic, youll never, ever take it for granted again. its very moving and interesting to see how someone who is autistic has to cope with social situations that we dont even think twice about. Autism makes it difcult or impossible to read people. Theres no feel for someones body language, facial expressions, or the subtle changes in voice or manner. Which means its very hard for someone who is autistic to pick up on the little clues that are part of all our social interactions. They can't interpret the strain in the voice of someone who is sick or stressed out or ecstatic or scared. Autistic people have to LEARN how to notice these things. They need to consciously WORK on it all the time. It never just ows or comes naturally like it does for us. Our ordinary, everyday ability to read people can seem like a mysterious sixth sense to the autistic person. But to us its just business as usual. My point here is we completely underestimate our amazing ability to get a feel for something. We take it for granted. We just dont realize how well we pick up on very subtle signals.
Weve got a built in, highly well-developed sixth sense when it comes to people and for a lot of other things as well.
Some people call this sixth sense intuition. Others call is instinct or a hunch. Some people just call it awareness. I call it following your gut. Gut feelings are NOT limited to reading people. They apply to EVERYTHING in your life - especially your business life. Have you ever turned to the person next to you and said, "I dont know why, but something about this deal just doesn't work for me. I cant put my nger on it, but its not RIGHT." That's your gut talking to you. And you need to LISTEN to it. Now dont freak out, this isnt new age woo-woo. SCIENCE now supports the fact that our guts can literally think. Dr. Michael Gershon is considered the father of Neurogastroenterology. He says our enteric (gut) nervous system is incredibly complex. In fact, he says our gut is the second brain of the human body.
There are more than a hundred million nerve cells in your small intestine alone. Thats about the same number as in your spinal cord. So that funny feeling in the pit of your abdomen may actually be communicating with you. Not with words, but with sensations and feelings.
I believe that we all subconsciously know this. Thats probably where the expression, "listen to your gut" comes from. And the fact is, you are a much more complex and intelligent system than you realize. That intelligence isnt just housed in your brain - its all over your body so to speak. So why do so many people try to dismiss this innate, sophisticated ability? Why dont we trust it? Why dont we use it more?
We are not conditioned to listen to our gut, let alone act on it. In fact, were taught to be prejudiced against our gut!
First, most of us arent taught to recognize a gut feeling. Our society doesnt encourage it - at least not openly. So we dont really know how to watch our gut, monitor it and track it. If you dont know how to pay attention to your gut feelings, you cant act on them, can you? Second, we think that listening to our gut means it will express itself as words. For example, people say, Your gut is that little voice inside your head thats trying to tell you something. Or spiritual people might say, "That's the universe talking to you... or your angels talking to you... But I think this is wrong. In my experience, gut feelings are NOT a bunch of words in your head.
Self talk is NOT your gut. Your gut is a special type of feeling that you get. It might be a little uneasy, it might be energized, or it might just be a knowing. Its a sensation that is either comfortable and right, or unsettling and wrong.
In fact, if theres a voice in your head, saying, Do this, do that, dont do this, dont do that, why are you doing that, thats stupid, etc. etc., then thats denitely NOT a gut feeling. Most likely its a belief or an emotion thats ring off in your brain. And this self talk will taint your gut feeling. Ill get more into this in a moment. Third, in our culture we glorify thinking over feeling. We always look for a rational explanation to justify what were doing. This means we judge ourselves for
wanting to follow our gut feelings. A gut sensation doesnt come from logic, therefore we... ! Put ourselves down for wanting to act on it (I must be crazy) ! Get scared because it might steer us wrong ! Blow it off as unimportant ! Argue internally AGAINST the gut feeling Do you see whats happening here? All of these prejudices against your gut are sabotaging you. They make you suspicious of one of your most powerful abilities.
This why you MUST learn to listen to your gut. Its not just about getting an edge in everything you do. Its also about building up your trust in yourself.
Without self-trust, youre doomed to mediocre results - no matter how hard you work. There are lots of reasons we dont trust our gut feelings.
theres too much "mental noise" mixed in with your gut feeling
The noise prevents you from getting an accurate sense of what your gut is trying to tell you.
Why is this so common? In the past, when you didnt get "instant verication" that it was correct, you ASSUMED it steered you wrong.
1 Completely Disagree
2 Disagree Somewhat
3 Neutral
4 Agree Somewhat
5 Agree Completely
When I get a hunch about something, I try to act on it even if it might be wrong. I feel intuition is important for being successful. If a gut feeling doesnt work out, I look back at my inner process to gure out what went wrong. Even if I dont get instant verication of a gut feeling, Ill listen to it anyway. I keep notes on gut feelings and sixth sense experiences. When I argue against my gut feeling, I can usually tell whether its me who is talking, or if Im hearing the objections of family, friends, teacher, boss, etc. I believe my gut is my friend and would never intentionally steer me wrong. I believe my subconscious mind can process a situation faster than my conscious thinking. I respect the validity of other peoples gut feelings. Listening to my gut is an important part of every decision I make. TOTAL IN EACH COLUMN NOW DO THE MATH!
x1= ____
x2= ____
x3= ____
x4= ____
x5= ____
MY SCORE _____________
If youre going to learn to ACT on your gut feelings, you first have to learn to recognize them and take them seriously.
So lets look at some of the biggest things that get in the way of our gut feelings. In each case, Ill show you how to spot the gut feeling in all the noise.
At this point I didnt have any gut feelings one way or the other. I was simply very interested. So I decided to meet this person and get to know him. The more we discussed the project, the more I spoke to him, the more interacted with him... I started having that feeling. It was a sense in my gut that something was just not right.... that this was not going to lead to anything good. Could I explain it in any rational way? No. I would look at the FACTS and say to myself, "This is such a huge opportunity. I would hate to miss this. I mean look at this person. He knows this guy. He knows that guy. Hes bringing so much to the table. Theres no way this can go wrong. Its a thumbs up all the way. Yet the feeling in my gut was, "Get out of this!" Since my gut was nagging me so much, I stalled.
"Let's just take this slowly and do one thing at a time, I would say. I found creative ways to bring up my concerns. I was looking to see if this person would fumble and say something that would validate my gut. But this person was a very good talker slick. Every time I brought something up, he had the perfect answer. And yet, I'd get off the phone thinking, "Whoa, I just don't know about this." If someone came up to me and said, "Anik, WHAT doesn't feel right?" I would have to say, "I just don't know. I can't put my nger on it. I don't know WHAT or WHY. But something doesn't feel right. All I can say is, Im very glad I stalled. Because lo and behold, many months later, I got information about this person through the grapevine (yet another reason to build your network and nurture your contacts). As more and more information came my way, I realized, Wow, my gut was RIGHT all along.
And luckily, I am now pretty good at removing negative people from my life. It didnt take too much time or effort to eliminate their inuence. So not much was lost - and I grew as a person.
If the FACTS point one way... but your GUT points the other way... Go with your gut feeling.
A true gut feeling tends to be PERSISTENT until its acted upon. It will endure, even if all the facts are pointing in the opposite direction.
Youre dating someone, and its the third date. They make what (to them) is a completely innocent remark... but the second they say it you have a major REACTION. All of a sudden youre upset. And its not a little feeling - its a major disruption. You may not show it of course... but the rest of the evening is totally ruined for you. You cant see past that one remark. In fact, youve already decided youre never going out with this person again - theyre history.
Thats not a gut feeling. Its an EMOTIONAL RESPONSE. Now lets look at a different example.
Once again, youre dating someone. After the rst couple of dates you look at them and say to yourself... "Whats wrong with me. This person's gorgeous. They're sweet. They're nice. We have a good time together. But... something just isn't right. I don't get it. I SHOULD be crazy about them... but Im not." This lack of enthusiasm persists and persists... and then a month down the line, two months down the line, a year down the line you nd out that the person wasnt what you thought they were. If youre lucky, you got out of the relationship before that happened. But sadly, many people dont nd out until theyve made a commitment, bought the ring, gotten married, etc.
When the truth comes out, you nally realize, Wow, my beliefs and emotions weren't willing to accept it, but my gut was right. It could somehow see what I couldnt. That's why I wasn't getting on board. That's why I was having so many problems with this. So heres another way to identify a true gut feeling...
A gut feeling doesnt care about your beliefs or emotions. It is only interested in the TRUTH.
Heres one nal indicator... An emotion or knee-jerk reaction is triggered. Its a bolt out of the blue and it feels like one. Its always accompanied by pretty strong, even violent sensations. Its disruptive and often very painful. You feel slammed. But Ive never had a gut feeling do that to me. Sure, a gut feeling can happen fast. Often it will just be there. It can be a bad feeling, a good one, even an ecstatic one. But it also makes you think, Hmm, where did that come from?
A gut feeling can be very strong. But it never beats you up inside. Your gut isnt a dictator. It doesnt bash you or smack you around. Its an advisor and a calm advisor at that!
Like a good advisor, your gut is impartial. It isnt worried about offending you if it disagrees with your prejudices. It realizes that your emotions can cloud your judgment and interfere with your ability to get in touch with whats really going on.
So even if your gut nags at you, it only does that when youre trying to ignore it.
Once you actually acknowledge a gut feeling, its pretty peaceful. It just points something out to you... and it keeps on pointing it out until you nally listen! If its knee-jerk, if it slams you down, if it beats on you... its probably NOT your gut. You're just reacting emotionally.
Your gut doesnt always go against facts or emotions. Sometimes it will validate them.
As you become more accustomed to checking in with your gut feelings, youll notice when they reinforce what your brain and heart are already telling you. In other words...
Don't assume that the only time you'll get a gut feeling is to warn you about something.
A small dose of healthy skepticism is ne. Most of us get a little concerned if something feels perfect and wonderful and we have no doubts. So it never hurts to take a quick second look, check the facts, and make sure everything feels good about a deal. But in general, you want to avoid too much skepticism, feeding your doubts, and over-analyzing to nd every tiny thing that could go wrong. That lays negative energy on the situation, drains your enthusiasm and kills momentum. Doubt comes from brooding. This is too much thinking of the wrong kind. ! When you brood, you over-analyze a situation. ! Youre obsessed with only the negative aspects. ! It gets to the point where you cant see what the point is or where youre going. Skepticism is a bit different. Its habitual doubt. It doesnt even bother to brood, it just doubts automatically! Ever been around someone who always assumes that something isnt going to work - or who gets bogged down in one tiny issue? Thats usually a skeptic.
Im not putting down logic or thinking or analysis. I spend at least 50% of my time on totally logic-based, rational stuff like nancial projections and strategic planning. You cant be in business and not use your head.
But you have to balance the analysis with your gut instincts.
I'll use a business decision as an example. Let's say I have a gut feeling that the time is right in the marketplace and for our partners to launch an ambitious product. Even though my gut is absolutely certain this is a good move, I don't jump in without doing my homework: ! I'll do some nancial modeling with spreadsheets. ! I'll consult with all my team members about the feasibility of getting it done, given their workload. ! I'll look at MY obligations: do I have time to devote to the marketing side? ! I'll talk with a few key partners about whether they like the idea and would throw all their sales support behind it. ! I may even do some focus groups with current customers. I get INPUT and collect DATA. Input is other people's thoughts and ideas about the project. Data includes things like nancial projections how much will it cost to produce, projecting sales, and modeling the best and worst case prot potential. During the input and data phase, I check in with my gut.
Double checking doesn't undermine my gut feelings at all. In fact, it teaches me to read them more accurately.
Here's what I mean: Let's say a team member says, I love the idea, and I'm excited about it. There's only one obstacle I see: doing this now means we have to pull resources off this other project.
I take that very seriously, because right now we're a small company and we operate very lean. So I'll ponder it and say to myself:
I have this input, it's valid, and I need to resolve the shortage of resources with the brilliance of the idea. Have I missed something here about the TIMING? Is this a signal that I should do this but not until I have a few more resources lined up? Or maybe I need to challenge my team to nd lower cost ways of making it happen ways I may not be seeing right now?
Asking questions like this is NOT being skeptical or doubtful. All I'm doing is asking my gut feelings to tell me more. And about 90% of the time, it WILL. Notice I don't get all discouraged and bummed out by my team member's reaction. Instead, I use that input to ask my sixth sense to be a little more accurate and clear. ! I use this as an opportunity to TRAIN myself to listen more carefully to whatever signals I'm getting from within. ! It teaches me to pay strict and quiet attention to my inner sense of things. ! And it makes me attentive to external signs or signals that conrm or deny my feelings. None of this is woo-woo. It's about becoming even more sensitive to my already rened sense of which way trends in my business are going, what our customers like, and market conditions. And then checking all those things against that idea which my gut feels is such a good one. After I tune in a bit more, sometimes I get a feeling that I should WAIT. And sure enough, a few days later conditions show me that my great idea needs to happen about 3 months after I initially wanted it to happen. But at other times, I get a strong feeling of, Yeah, It may seem crazy, but do it anyway. Ask your team, because when challenged they're really creative. This happened recently with a new product. It looked almost impossible to accomplish within the last quarter of the year... until a couple of team members said, Wait, what if we just do it this way instead? It's faster, easier, cheaper and ts into the time frame perfectly.
If you really, really want to do something crazy, its probably your gut trying to tell you something IMPORTANT.
Even if its not crazy, it might seem illogical or irrational. Often it will feel like a big risk. But it will be a risk youre peaceful about and eager to face. Ive made lots of crazy decisions based on my gut. But please understand, that doesnt mean I ignore the analysis and the spreadsheets. Financial models are important. Projections are important. Respecting the load you and your team can handle at any given time are really important. But in the end sometimes Ill say, "This feels right. I'm just going to do it."
A gut feeling is something you don't have to think about. It gets you OUT of your brain. It puts you back in touch with the part of you that processes information on a more sophisticated, subtle level.
The trick, though, is to actually be able to listen to your gut when theres a lot of doubt or questions ying around you. That includes your own doubts. Remember, self talk - positive or negative - is not your gut talking. Inner chatter can mislead you VERY badly. So if youre brooding about a decision and buried in what-ifs, you have to nd a way to silence all that noise. Heres how you can quiet all that static... ! Get AWAY from people. Both the positive and negative people. You have to be alone. ! Take your mind off the issue completely. Order a pizza, have a cold beer, watch a movie - preferably one that you know and love (my favorite is Iron Man). Do anything that helps you clear your mind - go for a bike ride, play with your dog, hang with your kids, etc.
! Get a good nights sleep. This is important! You cant get rid of the negative thoughts if youre exhausted from lack of sleep. ! When you get up, just be quiet for a while. Dont THINK! Your mind should be rested and quiet. Just stare at the ceiling and expect your gut to answer. Youll soon know what you really want to do. Lets do an exercise that will help you distinguish your head chatter from your true gut feelings...
! Head ! Gut
! Head ! Gut
! Head ! Gut
Youll run into opposition from people who cant understand how you made that decision so quickly. And if they dont like the decision, theyll demand an explanation that satisfies THEM.
And frankly, thats not a bad thing. Because YOU also need facts to justify your gut decision. This is natural. We all seek evidence to validate our gut, and its okay. You have to reassure yourself. If you dont, you wont be able to go out on a limb and ACT on your gut feelings. It will be too scary. But the nice thing is, you already have all the tools to back up your gut decisions. You can... ! Map your gut feelings against your core beliefs. If a gut feeling is 100% in sync with your core, then you can trust it. ! Does your gut conrm all the things on your vision board? This will help clear your head.
Now lets talk about ACTION - doing what your gut tells you to do.
Very few people are born with the ability to listen to their gut. It takes practice.
Ive spent a lot of time paying attention to my gut feelings... monitoring them... and tracking their accuracy. I note them down. I look back and observe what the results were. You see, I dont always act on my gut feelings. I cant. Circumstances dont allow it, especially in the business world. Sometimes solo entrepreneurs can, IF they have the nancial resources. But once youre running a company, others are affected by your decisions. Often you need to let others have the last word, since theyre the ones who will have to implement the decision. Take hiring for example. Once a company grows beyond a certain point, the CEO can't be involved in every hiring decision. But the rst person I ofcially hired in the company was a total gut decision. In fact, it was so intuitive that I dont even remember it! I hired an Operations Manager when I was drunk out of my mind at a party. (Hey, I was only 22 at the time!) The following Monday morning, he shows up at the ofce. I said, Man, what are you doing here? He said, You gave me a job. Six years later, he was still with us.
Initially, no matter how strong your intuition is, you wont feel comfortable acting on it. The facts will be against it. People around you will be against it. You wont be ready to oppose them. But that doesnt matter. Even at those times you can still practice listening to your gut.
If you have a gut feeling and you go against it because of the facts and the evidence, that's okay. Just do me a favor. Make a note of it. I guarantee that if you track this over a period of 3-6 months, youll be impressed. Youll see that 80 to 90 percent of the time your initial gut feeling was right. And the other 10 to 20 percent of the time? Your gut was still trying to tell you something. You just weren't able to detect the complete message.
Remember, your gut is an advisor. If it looks like it made a mistake, dont judge it. Maybe it was trying to nudge you in a certain direction. Or maybe the jury isnt out yet time will tell!
The fact is, we don't know everything. When you consider how many variables there are in every decision, we actually know very little. Theres so much involved in even the simplest of situations. So if your gut makes a mistake, thats okay. Its not infallible. You can only measure it's accuracy based on whats in your world, right now. Also sometimes a situation is just so unique, so new, our gut isnt able to process everything involved. It has to learn, just like your brain has to learn.
Id say right now Im hitting about 85 percent. Which is a nice track record, so Im not complaining. But when I rst started acting on gut feelings, it was only about 50 percent. Now most people would give up with a 50/50 success rate. But I didnt, and heres why:
When my gut was right... It was REALLY right. In a BIG way. Its not just about how often your gut is right. Its what its right about.
In the really big, important things, my gut was soooo right it oored me. I soon began to see that I was crazy NOT to listen to my gut. The input it gave me was just so powerful - and frankly, lucrative. So right there I had a reason to keep listening to my gut. And the result was I learned. My gut learned, too. The more I tried listening to it, the better the results. If all I can do in this lesson is get you to believe that you do have a gut that you can listen to... and you can even become a tiny bit more conscious of it... And if I can get you to see that listening to your gut is a skill like any other, which you can improve with practice... You will be 10-20 times better off than where you were before you took this course! Youll have an edge that will make you a force to be reckoned with. Still, you might walk away thinking, What the heck, Anik...I don't know. I cant do that. Thats okay. Dont worry about it. And dont force it.
Just develop some awareness. Be attentive to those gut feelings you get... even if you don't act on them right now. Be aware of them. And document them.
Whether you track them in your head or you write them down, document those gut feelings. I strongly advise you to write them down. That way if youre resistant, your memory cant be selective and forget all the times your gut was right.
Documenting = Learning
Documenting your gut feelings does not have to be elaborate. In fact, it should NOT be a big deal. Youve got to make it quick and easy. Just keep a little pocket notebook or a le on your computer desktop. And write down... ! In this situation, I had this gut feeling... but I went with that decision instead... and look what happened. ! In this event, I had this gut feeling. I listened to the feeling. I didn't do this or I didn't do that... and here is what happened. ! With this person, I had that gut feeling... so I waited and watched. And heres what I found out. Dont make this an elaborate process. Just jot down 15 words, and give yourself a little check mark depending on whether your gut was saying yes or no. Or you can make notes on your calendar. "Did I have a good gut day or a bad gut day?" Just track it. Do this, and you WILL see it. You will see what happens and validate it for YOURSELF. Its amazing what you will nd out about yourself as you go through this process. You might discover you are the type of person who really needs to deny your gut feelings. Maybe you have this powerful need for everything to be facts, facts, facts. But your notebook will teach you that it doesnt have to be that way - that you can open your mind. It's like that ability to read people I talked about at the beginning. Or its like your sense of smell or taste. For example, as you develop your sense of taste, you become more discerning. You learn to taste the difference between junk food and a gourmet meal - or between cheap booze and top shelf whiskey. Some people can develop that taste in a very short time. For others it takes a lot longer. But no matter which type of person you are, you still need to LEARN. You've got to pay attention. Thats why youve got to track. If you don't, you wont pay attention. And you wont learn.
So to end this course, your assignment is to take everything you've learned and start tracking your gut feelings about your quest for success!
In the process of rescuing himself, Anik survived a life-threatening illness, pulled his companies out of $1.75 million in debt, revitalized his relationships and spiritual life all through the application of simple mental exercises and action steps. Now Anik wants to help others do the same in their own lives. Anik is the creative force and CEO of VSSMind.com, an e-learning company dedicated to helping individuals turn their visions for greater personal satisfaction, growth, and wealth into reality. His Future of Wealth e-learning course can help anyone with an Internet connection learn how to cleanse themselves of the mental poisons that threaten them and create abundance without sacricing their integrity. Through his Achieve Your Dreams workshops, Anik has taught hundreds of people in India a simple process for generating more wealth and abundance while honoring their core values and ethical principles. And as a coach and mentor to young entrepreneurs, Anik shows our future leaders how to avoid falling into the ego traps that threaten their businesses and all those who work with them. Visit his blog at AnikSingal.com.