GoHuman Blog

Whichever path you choose in life, there will always be someone to throw cold water on your plans. If you want to keep playing  the game “to win,” ignore the naysayers and do it anyway. Don’t let them stop you from pursuing your passion and transitioning it from a project into reality!

Naysayers aren’t necessarily mean-spirited people; they come with the territory. When we dare to attempt something different, there’s always a group of people standing by to tell us how ridiculous the idea is. However, these people actually add great value to our lives. They test our level of commitment. The more tentative you feel, the more negative they sound. If they’re successful in discouraging you, be grateful. This allows you to reevaluate your intention or let completely go of what’s holding you back. If you’re determined and committed enough to succeed in spite of all the cynicism, then you will.

Criticism and rejection are unavoidable when playing “to win.” All the more reason to never take the harsh words spoken by others, personally. Don’t personalize the criticism. Don’t allow the remarks made by other people to become personal, giving you an excuse to find fault within yourself. Repel the negative comments by calling upon the guidance of those who WILL support you; a counselor, a coach or a friend; someone who will help you discover a new and fresh perspective. Adlai Stevenson quoted, “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.” Any business is tough and the higher you climb, the higher and bigger the stakes get. It becomes increasingly difficult to continue putting yourself out there, but do it anyway.

A great solution for many has been to focus on a higher purpose rather than immediate gratification. Remind yourself why your passion is so strong. Passion and purpose are great motivators. Experiencing such a mind-shift can make all the difference. The game is only a game, And games are fun if we allow them to be. And when they’re not, the work becomes demoralizing and often destructive, in which case, it may be time to walk away.

Saying “thank-you” to a family member, a friend, a co-worker, or someone you’ve only met once, can make a world of difference for them and you.

Letting someone know you’re grateful for something they’ve done or for just having been a part of your life through a simple thank-you, will bring new, positive light to their day. Gratitude projects a feeling of pure and positive energy. When we’re grateful, we feel thankful and appreciative. The more gratitude we feel, the more positive energy we experience in our lives.

It’s important to communicate to others that we’re grateful for their friendship, their love and their support. It allows them the opportunity to share in our positive energy and therefore, they experience feeling good, themselves. According to the law of attraction, the more gratitude we express to others the more appreciation we receive in return.

A few simple tips to use and ideas to consider when letting someone know you’re grateful for something are:

• Write a short note thanking the person for their friendship, a gesture, a gift or for being a sounding board, when you needed someone to just listen.
• Make a list of specific people you intend to write a thank-you note to who have, in one way or another, positively impacted your life.
• Commit to a set number of thank-you notes each day, week or month.
• Replace thank-you e-mails with handwritten notes. People appreciate your personal touch.
• Choose noteworthy situations. A thank-you note for a routine situation can weaken the message.
• Always direct a thank-you note to an individual, vs. an organization/group. If the situation involves multiple people, address the note to the senior person, asking them to pass along sincere appreciation to the others.
• Thank-you notes are a statement of appreciation from one person to another. Carefully double check grammar and the spelling of all names. There’s no quicker way to reduce your credibility and sincerity than to misspell names.

Clarity accounts for nearly 80% of success and happiness. Lack of clarity leads to frustration and underachievement. Those with clear, written goals, accomplish far more in a shorter period of time than those without them. Everywhere and under all circumstances!

In fact, the three keys to high achievement are, “Clarity, Clarity, Clarity.”  Success in life is largely dependent upon how clear you are about what you really want.

The more you write and rewrite your goals and think about them, the clearer you will become about them.  And the more likely you are to do more things that are consistent with accomplishing them.

Experiencing an “A-ha” or a “light bulb” moment, is like discovering an important piece to a difficult puzzle.  It’s rejuvenating, motivating while adding new challenges and opportunities for learning and growth.

In order for a fresh idea to become fully developed, it requires more flashes of light and self reflection. The idea must be evaluated to determine if it’s worth pursuit and further cultivation. Things will have been overlooked, and you’ll find ways to make the idea better, or why a certain idea isn’t ready to fully pursue.

The quickest way to gain clarity is to simply take action! When we take action, we get immediate and direct feedback. We gain insight and great knowledge as we continue to work through a situation. Things happen rapidly these days and therefore, there’s not much time to contemplate starting a project.  It’s always better to take action and learn along the way, than to spend time over-engineering without ever seeing any results.  Taking action, provides many answers to questions we were previously uncertain about. This doesn’t mean jumping totally into the project, but it does mean knowing that no plan is totally set in stone.  A road map is essential, but don’t let the absence of having one prevent you from moving forward.

When working towards meeting personal needs, or maintaining relationships, it’s important to consider how big decisions impact other people in our life. Most often, a change in one area of life, will ultimately affect other areas and therefore, we need to consider any potential negative consequences. When it comes to getting clear about relationships, ask yourself, “How much does the relationship mean to me?” “How much does my personal goal mean to me?” Remembering that relationships are a major key to happiness, so be certain to gain clarity in how this area of your life will be impacted.

Is there truth to the idea that many people choose a career path but need their own services?  A successful Psychologist studies others, helps them acknowledge, deal with and overcome the chains of the past, masking her own, similar struggles.  A drug addict injects and snorts his way to alienating everyone close to him, but recovers to become a poster child on the deadly consequences of drug addiction.  A huge financial investment guru creates great wealth for many, before going broke.

My twenties and thirties were spent in the corporate world of distribution.  In the late 90’s a group of us branched off to rapidly grow our own company from seven to over 300 employees.  I loved the culture this dynamic group of individuals created, collaborating with diverse minds, and leading others to achieve personal and professional goals.  We supported one another, bouncing ideas back and forth, listening and providing input and perspective.

The distribution industry was all I knew, and I thrived on working with large groups, experiencing success and failure with others.  When our company went out of business, I was lost and vulnerable, without a sense of purpose or direction as to “what was next.”  It wasn’t clear at the time, but it was the best thing that could have happened.  I had learned that our biggest strengths and skill-sets can, paradoxically, be our greatest personal points of weakness.

I started a business coaching practice to create opportunities for myself to help growing and or struggling companies avoid making some obvious (and not so obvious) mistakes we had made.  More importantly, I had a new found purpose in life, serving others, which would be worth any challenges that lie ahead.

Has it been easy?  Absolutely, unequivocally NOT!  We’re often drawn to things we fear most.  I could never have imagined working in an environment without the daily support and interaction of others, much less starting my own business.

Has it all been worth the risk?  Absolutely, unequivocally YES!  The greater my fears become, the more certain I am that I’m on the right path. What’s more, the persevering desire I have to serve others by providing them with the support, guidance and clarity without judgment, is what many individuals and businesses want and need, in order to help them breakthrough their own fears to get the desired results they want.

It doesn’t seem like it would be true, in that by slowing down we’d get more done. But it is true and it does work. Every day you do it, you will get more done. Every day as you experiment with slowing down and focusing on doing what’s most important, the better understanding you’ll have about the truth behind the legendary story of the tortoise and the hare.

Think of it this way, if you’re on the wrong road, it doesn’t matter how good you get at traveling faster down that road because it still is and always will be the WRONG ROAD.

On the flip side, when you take whatever time is needed to think some major (or not) personal or business decision through with a clear, uncluttered mind, and act accordingly with your complete and only focus being on “doing it right the first time,” the sooner you’re able to cross it off the list as complete and move on to the next priority.

Those who recognize the value of slowing themselves down, soon realize how quickly it speeds up their success. When they slow down and focus on that next small step ahead of them and TAKE THAT STEP, they’re surprised at how their whole world changes by doing that.

Every little achievement raises the self confidence. As your confidence increases, your achievements become greater and greater. The real success in reaching any goal is achieved by breaking down a plan into small steps to take along the way, and then start taking them. With each of these steps your self-esteem rises. In the end, the goal itself isn’t even as important as the huge strides you’ve made in self-confidence and self-respect along the way. Because of the increased self-confidence and self-respect, the next challenge that comes your way, will be that much easier to handle. It’s those small steps that build the self-confidence.

The thought of achieving any big goal can often be overwhelming and seem so far out of reach that we decide it’s not worth pursuing. So how do you get past that daunting, dreading feeling and transform a dream into a project? By taking action. Any action. You accomplish it one step, one task, one measure at a time.

Ask your superior or yourself, “what’s the one thing I do that is more valuable than anything else?” Whatever the answer, look for continuous ways to perform more and more of that task and learn to do it a little better each day. It’s amazing how much and what you can accomplish by breaking your tasks down into bite-sized pieces, setting deadlines, and then taking action, every single day.

Get into a routine where you’re regularly improving your skills through personal & professional development. Designate a specific amount of time each day to reading about your field. Listen to audio programs on your way to and from work. Take additional courses whenever you can. These activities alone will jump-start your entire career and get you on the fast track in no time. When you invest an extra hour or two per day in personal/professional-improvement, the cumulative effect on your ability to get the results you want is extraordinary.

If you can measure it, you can manage it. In every area of your life, carefully analyze your activities and choose a specific number that will determine your level of success in that area. Focus all your attention on that number because just as a plant depends upon water to prosper, the same is true for people, what you focus on is what grows. The very act of being and remaining focused will allow you to perform better in that area, consciously and unconsciously.

The human fear of failure is the greatest obstacle we allow to get in our way of achieving success. Taken to its extreme, we become totally pre-occupied with not making a mistake, with seeking the approval of others for security. We allow it to debilitate us, entrap us, immobilize us from taking action.

Another major fear that gets in our way and interferes with performance, is the fear of rejection. We learn this when our parents make their love for us conditional upon our behavior. If we do what pleases them, we gain their love and approval. If we do something they don’t like, they withdraw their love and approval, which we interpret as rejection.

When dismantled, fear is nothing more than a thought. A thought that is all based in the future. As humans, we tend to fill in the blanks (our thoughts) with the worst case scenario. Fear is irrational. It’s a habit that we can change. Everyone has courage within them and the distinction is that those who don’t allow fear to control their thoughts and actions, call on that courage. They don’t allow their story to stop them from being who they want to be or from doing the things they want to do.  Our personality or story that we use to identify ourselves as, is never what truly defines who we are. Drop the story, get into action and the fear will gradually dissipate.

The opposite of fear is love. Love is always creative and fear is always reactive and ultimately tragic. Destructive! Fear produces “need,” but need it and you won’t get it.  Want it and you will. Want it with all your heart, aka, “commitment.”

The Webster’s Dictionary definition of failure is: omission of occurrence or performance; specifically: a failing to perform a duty or expected action.

One of my favorite quotes is by a gentleman who, in my opinion, is the epitome of what “failure” cannot be defined as. Words recited by an individual who, with absolute certainty, knew his own potential and recognized an opportunity not worth giving up on.

“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas A. Edison

It took Thomas Edison 10,000 attempts before successfully creating the light bulb. When asked how it felt to fail 10,000 times, he responded by saying he didn’t fail at anything, but rather learned 10,000 ways of what didn’t work before discovering what did work.

Whether with personal life struggles or professional challenges encountered at the office, there are times when we allow ourselves to see no other way out of a bad situation other than to “give up” and walk away because we’ve failed. We have failed at doing something with a specific outcome intended and in turn, produced all other results other than what was expected, anticipated or desired.

What most people don’t understand is they haven’t failed because something didn’t turn out the way they anticipated or due to certain decisions made in a situation they believed to be right, didn’t produce the results they wanted. People only fail when they decide not to do anything about the situation. They throw their hands in the air and give up. They turn their backs and chalk it up as a loss. Better yet, they’ll play the victim role and walk around with their heads down telling everyone how “circumstances beyond their control,” were to blame. It was the poor economy. It was his fault. It was her fault. It was their fault. It was always someone else’s fault, other than theirs.

Paradoxically, when we take full ownership of who we are being, the choices we make and how we react in a difficult situation, we can do anything, because when we own the problem, we own the solution.

“A common cause of business failure: seeing that a strategy isn’t producing the anticipated results- and responding by going unconscious. A common cause of failure in your personal life; the same policy.” –Nathaniel Branden

How important do you suppose it is to personally invest in ourselves through continued self development? Whether it be for business or personal reasons, many people just don’t take the time or rather, feel worthy enough to spend the time on themselves, to further develop their skills. I say this with certainty because I used to be one of those people who never took the time to further educate myself, for many reasons.

Before starting my business coaching practice, I spent most of my adult career (20 years) in the RV-MH distribution industry. During that period, I was fortunate enough to continuously advance in my positions from administration to head of operations, which I attribute to a lot of hard work, motivation and a strong passion for the work I did and the people I served.  As shameful as this may sound, it never occurred to me how much additional value I could add to my employees, co-workers, customers, and myself by reading leadership books to learn more about effectively leading others or listen to audios about goal setting & achieving, team building exercises or how to deal with work place conflict. With having said all that, nothing could have prepared me for the complete transformation I’ve made over the past year and half.

Once I made the decision that it was time for a change and realized in doing so, not only would I be stepping way out of my comfort zone, but rather setting myself up for the biggest challenge of my life. By the time I reached that awareness, I was far too invested (financially and emotionally) to ever think about turning back and returning to the “land of safety.”

One of the first lessons I learned about starting a business was any/all results that were to occur, would be completely dependent upon me and the commitment I was willing to make to myself, in order to achieve the results I wanted. Part of that commitment meant learning a lot more about a trade that was, although very unfamiliar to me, a great deal similar to much of the work I had done, over the past twenty years.

For starters, I sought out a good training/certification program that would help me lay the foundation for my practice. Next, I hired my own business coach, someone who I knew had a great reputation in the industry and more importantly, one that was effective at getting the results her clients wanted, which in turn, produced the results she wanted. I spent months reading motivational, coaching, sales and success books. I listened to problem solving, financially fearless, owner/victim distinction audios while in my car, every opportunity I had. Then, it was practice, practice, practice the art of coaching, to learn everything that didn’t work for me or others, in order to find what would work.

I’ve encountered more roadblocks than downtown Chicago and at times, often wondered if I made the right decision. However, as soon as I feel myself falling into the victim mode trap of “poor me,” it’s at that same time when I recall how I’ve overcome every one of those obstacles and turned them into opportunities for growth. As a result, I’m a much more independent, wiser and stronger individual & coach, today.

The whole problem with not achieving goals is preoccupation.  And the greatest obstacle to happiness, to high performance, to personal wealth is preoccupation.  People don’t understand that.

When I work with people one-on-one, they don’t quite understand how distractible they are, and how preoccupied they get.  And how they wake up and decide, “Well, today, I’m going to do this project and I’m going to pursue my goals,” but five minutes into the day, they’re thinking about a thousand other things.  And the mind that thinks of a thousand things in one day is not going to get anywhere. No matter how fast it’s thinking!    But if the mind is on the right path, it doesn’t matter how slow or fast you go.  If you’re on the right path, you’ll get there.

The key is to slow down and focus all your energies on doing “that one most important thing” you’ve told yourself you were going to do today. Since the mind can only  focus on one complete thought at a time, why not put all your focus, all your concentration and efforts into doing that one thing to the very best of your ability? The beauty of it all is once it’s done, it’s done, and you can move on to the next most important thing, project or task on your list.