You can have excuses or you can have results but you can’t have both. You get to choose where you place your focus. You can put your attention on defending the reasons things haven’t worked out for you in the past or make excuses for why you’re not taking action or you can become results focused and view each piece of feedback as a step in the direction of your goal. I believe people can be divided into two broad groups. People who are excuse focused and those who are results focused. I meet people all the time who go to great lengths to try and convince me why they are not producing the results they want. They can go into intricate detail about all the roadblocks they face and how their inability to progress is due to a set of unique circumstances beyond their control.
What I know to be true is if someone is investing a lot of energy into making excuses, that is energy that is not going toward producing a more positive result. I am not saying that challenges, obstacles and roadblocks don’t exist – they do. We all face them almost everyday. So despite the fact we are confronted by challenges we can still exert control over how we view them. Do you choose to see obstacles as temporary and possible to overcome or as overwhelming and impossible to move past? You are the one in control of how you view a situation. Where you place your mental attention is where you go. Just as a racing car driver who begins to loose control of his vehicle and starts heading toward the wall, he's focus is not on the wall but instead he keeps his focus on where he wants to go – the race track. You move in the direction of your dominant thoughts.
When you place your attention on excuses there is only one thing that will happen. The size of the problem grows. The more you think about a problem the bigger it becomes until you now see a barrier so big you truly believe it is not even worth trying to progress and as a result you give up. A group of psychologists in the US conducted an experiment with a group of ice hockey players. The psychologists gave a test group of 100 players a picture and asked them to describe in as much detail as possible what they saw. The picture was of an ice hockey goalie standing in front of a goal in a defensive pose. Ninty percent of the players described the picture literally list things like who the goalie was, the team he played for the stadium, his number, uniform colour etc. But ten percent of the player described the picture very differently; their focus was not on the goalie, what they saw was all the places where they could score, under the arms, between his legs above his shoulders. What the researchers found especially fascinating was the fact that these players where also the highest scores in the league.
To live Ready Fire Aim you must keep our attention on what you want not what you don’t. Every time you defend an excuse you make it stronger, bigger and the task of overcoming it even more challenging. We all face challenges; no one sails through life without having to overcome obstacles. When you are next confronted by a problem acknowledge it is there and then switch your focus to finding a solution. You cannot eliminate a problem by focusing on it you can only make it bigger. So move yourself to solution mode as soon as you can. Your time on this planet is short, so don’t waste another minute of it making excuses and defending your position. Get moving, get excited, get focused and start producing the results you know you are capable of creating.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Thursday, May 1, 2008
You Can Achieve Anything
Too often we allow ourselves to be controlled by people and circumstance outside of ourselves. It was Harold Sherman who said that the more you depend on forces outside of yourself, the more they will dominate you. When I’m in my seminars I often ask people to share with me the words they use to describe when they feel positive or negative. After people finish sharing the words they prefer I ask so who gets to choose how you feel. The audience responds in unison – you do.
I explain that it’s easy for me to stand up their on a stage and say you do, but in the heat of the moment when you’re under pressure is that what you do. I mean when you’re driving down the road and someone cuts you off it’s not always easy to remember that I get to choose how I feel right now. So we need to do more than simply acknowledge that we get to choose how we feel. We must live that message.
If you understand that you are in control of your emotional responses, you can break free from paying the role of the victim and take control over your emotions. This will allow you to maintain a positive attitude, have more energy, enthusiasm and self-belief in your own abilities, rather than be controlled by circumstances and other people.
The challenge of managing your emotional state is not limited to external pressures. You must also be aware of your internal dialogue. The messages we give ourselves have a profound affect on the results we produce. I have adopted a powerful formula to assist myself and my clients that comes from Tim Calloway. A tennis coach Tim observed that people’s performance could be measured by a simple formula. P-I = P. The letters stand for your Potential minus interference equals your performance.
Most people don’t live their potential. The average person’s performance is a long way from their potential best. The critical part of this equation is the aspect of interference. What interferes with your potential? Many of the barriers we face are the mental. They are our own limiting thoughts. It is the doubt we hold in our ability to be all we can be. On the wall of my office I have a poster that reads, “The highest fences we need to climb are those built within our minds”. While there is no doubt that there are times when outside factors can inhibit our progress the biggest obstacles for most people to overcome is their own thoughts. We need to recognise and eliminate the self limiting beliefs that are causing us interference. You have unlimited potential. You must know that without doubt.
When I train sales teams we explore the issue of trust. Without trust it is almost impossible to sell. But trust is not limited to a salesperson and a prospect, it extends out to the relationship you have with yourself. Do you trust you? Are you confident in your own ability or do you constantly doubt yourself? If you don’t completely believe in your own ability you will never fully commit yourself. You will tend to hold back from giving your all, allowing the doubt in your mind to distract you ultimately impacting the sort of results you produce. If you want others to trust you, you must first trust in your own ability.
I explain that it’s easy for me to stand up their on a stage and say you do, but in the heat of the moment when you’re under pressure is that what you do. I mean when you’re driving down the road and someone cuts you off it’s not always easy to remember that I get to choose how I feel right now. So we need to do more than simply acknowledge that we get to choose how we feel. We must live that message.
If you understand that you are in control of your emotional responses, you can break free from paying the role of the victim and take control over your emotions. This will allow you to maintain a positive attitude, have more energy, enthusiasm and self-belief in your own abilities, rather than be controlled by circumstances and other people.
The challenge of managing your emotional state is not limited to external pressures. You must also be aware of your internal dialogue. The messages we give ourselves have a profound affect on the results we produce. I have adopted a powerful formula to assist myself and my clients that comes from Tim Calloway. A tennis coach Tim observed that people’s performance could be measured by a simple formula. P-I = P. The letters stand for your Potential minus interference equals your performance.
Most people don’t live their potential. The average person’s performance is a long way from their potential best. The critical part of this equation is the aspect of interference. What interferes with your potential? Many of the barriers we face are the mental. They are our own limiting thoughts. It is the doubt we hold in our ability to be all we can be. On the wall of my office I have a poster that reads, “The highest fences we need to climb are those built within our minds”. While there is no doubt that there are times when outside factors can inhibit our progress the biggest obstacles for most people to overcome is their own thoughts. We need to recognise and eliminate the self limiting beliefs that are causing us interference. You have unlimited potential. You must know that without doubt.
When I train sales teams we explore the issue of trust. Without trust it is almost impossible to sell. But trust is not limited to a salesperson and a prospect, it extends out to the relationship you have with yourself. Do you trust you? Are you confident in your own ability or do you constantly doubt yourself? If you don’t completely believe in your own ability you will never fully commit yourself. You will tend to hold back from giving your all, allowing the doubt in your mind to distract you ultimately impacting the sort of results you produce. If you want others to trust you, you must first trust in your own ability.
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