Gary Vaynerchuk recently did a video talking about the importance of figuring out who you are. Check it out below.
He’s right, without a solid grasp of knowing what you’re about, life can feel somewhat pointless. I don’t mean in the sense of what’s the point in living, but rather, knowing what you should be doing, and where you should be heading.
Those we look up to
We look up to people that have found their niche, who seem to be living the dream. They love what they do, and can’t get enough of it. Productivity is at an all time high, because they are consumed by their passion 247.
No clue
I am aware there are a lot of people, particularly those leaving school, who haven’t got a clue where their destiny lies, and frankly, how could they? Without gaining some practical experience, how can you know what you like and don’t like. You may romanticise certain professions, but until you’re doing it as an occupation, there’s no way of knowing if it’s for you.
Hobbies don’t always make good occupations
All occupations have their downside, and it’s often very different doing something for a living, to earn an income, than it is when you’re doing something as an hobby. There is a certain level of pressure, a certain degree of “have to” and deadlines to consider. This is often enough to take the fun out of it for many. So don’t fall into the trap of thinking every hobby will translate into a good occupation.
The hard bit
So back to Gary, he says “Punt everything else and go all-in. The best blue print for your success, is to look yourself in the mirror and ask yourself “What’s the purest form of who I am?“, then build a thing around that.”
So that’s the easy part, recognising you have to start by figuring yourself out. The hard part is actually doing so.
Self awareness is a key step in the process of building a life you love to live. It’s not just knowing what you like and don’t like but figuring out what you’re good and not so good at. This part is difficult and requires some soul searching. None of us like to admit we’re not so good, or even bad at things, particularly if we like to do that thing. If we don’t care about it, there’s no problem, if we care about it, or have invested time and effort into it and are still not very good at it, then there’s a problem.
We’ve all seen the Xfactor contestants that can’t hold a note, but have fooled themselves into thinking they’re the next big thing.
How to improve Self Awareness
Take a long hard look at yourself, be completely honest, ask for a honest second opinion from someone who’ll tell you the truth. Family and friends are usually not good for this, they just don’t want to upset you.
Putting your work out into the market, and seeing if people are willing to buy your stuff is probably the best gauge of the standard and desirability of your talent or lack of. I use a few methods like PPC adverts or Facebook adverts, which are great for fast, inexpensive feedback, but you need to know what you’re doing before burning through your money, if you go down this route. Drop me an email if you want some help with this at info@getresults.org.uk.
Now be warned you have to ensure you have not invested too much of yourself in whatever you are shining a light on, otherwise a knock back can be hard on your self esteem. Don’t let it be, take it as a positive, it’s informing you, it’s being honest with you and allowing you to find a more fruitful path, and preventing you from wasting our most important resource TIME.
To uncover your own interests, tendencies…
Look at what you spend your time actually doing,
What you like to read about,
What websites you visit and are interested in,
What TV programs you spend your time watching,
What you find yourself doing when on holiday or during leisure periods
Ask others that are close to you, what they think you like and don’t like, this can be very enlightening sometimes
And then ask “why?”. What is it about these things/activities that you enjoy, is there a common thread that runs through them. Sometimes identifying what you don’t like or even hate, helps to focus you on what you do like, so build a list of these as well.
It’s a journey of self discovery. Don’t try to fool yourself, be honest. For those that have a negative perspective of themselves already, which are usually as disproportionate as those that have overly positive perspectives, also look for a reality check, as others will not judge you as harshly as you judge yourself. So allow more positivity through if merited.
That’s it, you’ve got to do the rest for yourself. Use those around as well, in the ways discussed above. Enjoy the process, and don’t be too frustrated if it takes a little time. I often find once you have made your mind up to make a start, your unconscious mind springs into action and will gently help inform you, but you can’t push it to do so.
If you refuse to put other people first, you’re failing
If you want to beat another, you’re failing
If you’re bitter, angry, or sad you’re failing
If you’re fearful, you’re failing
If you’re lost in the past, you’re failing
If you want the future more than the present, you’re failing.
If you hate, you’re failing
If you dislike, you’re failing
If you need more or better, you’re failing
If you don’t want a certain other near you, you’re failing
If you don’t give a s**t, you’re failing
If you wish harm on others, you’re failing
If you’re resisting “what is”, you’re failing
If you’re judging others, you’re failing
If you’re labelling others, you’re failing
All these failings exist in the mind, in thought. The more you think the more you fail. Thought initiates feeling. We feel bad because we think bad. If you shortcut thought and go straight to feeling, you cut out pain.
Feeling is “now”, being in “the moment”, feeling life, feeling wonder, feeling alive. Feeling without thought.
If you think this is boll**ks you’re thinking and failing, again.
There’s two types of knowledge you can have, the first is knowledge that’s wide and shallow, like general knowledge. The person with this type of knowledge, knows a reasonable amount about a lot of things. They might include diverse topics or be more closely related, something like the knowledge held by a GP doctor is an example of this type of knowledge set.
Then there’s knowledge that’s narrow and deep. This is specialist knowledge that is obtained by studying a specific topic for many years. These people might not know much else other than their area of expertise. And given enough knowledge about a particular subject, this is were expertise resides.
There are arguments for gaining both types of knowledge. Business owners, particularly small business owners are usually better with a reasonable knowledge about a lot of business related functions. They can, after all employ experts to do particular functions that require more specialised knowledge.
You could argue that running a business is a specific skill in itself and can be developed into expertise, but I guess it’s all relative. You have a finite amount of time to learn an infinite amount of possible things. The fun, I guess is deciding what best fits in with your long term plans.
If you want to be a business person, you need to learn what’s needed to be a successful business person, and focus on that until you’re as good as you can be. Maybe learning to be a good recruiter (of labour and freelancers) is more valuable than acquiring the knowledge to be able to do those particular functions yourself.
Should you spend your limited time, acquiring the knowledge for implementing an effective marketing strategy, understanding the principles that drive human psychology, so you know an effective advert and offer when you see one. Or should you spend your time gathering the knowledge and perfecting the skill to be able to create great visuals for your adverts, and write amazingly persuasive copy that entices your audience to your offer, for yourself, so you can be self sufficient.
These are the kind of choices you need to make in your pursuit of knowledge. It all depends on what you’re trying to achieve, I guess. It’s all about prioritising, which is dependant on what you’re trying to achieve as part of your end game (goal).
When it comes to losing weight, many people’s focus is directed primarily on their wobbly belly fat and trying to squeeze in to that old pair of jeans still hanging in the wardrobe. Belly fat or “subcutaneous fat” to give it its technical name, is the loose fat we grab from our midriff when we are testing to see if we can pinch an inch. We loathe it predominantly because of its aesthetic appearance, particularly when we are fed the flawless hard bodies shown on magazine covers and mainstream media.
The more worrying “Visceral fat” which can be found around the organs like the liver, pancreas and intestines is much more dangerous for our health, but because it can’t be seen, is not very well known about. You would need to undertake an MRI scan to see it. Visceral fat tends to be the fat that appears first when you gain weight and thankfully is the first to lose when you lose weight.
Some of my friends who are trying to lose weight have asked about how best to lose inches from their waist in a spot reducing type of remedial action, particularly if a holiday deadline is fast approaching and they want to look as trim as possible.
Now I’ve always said this is difficult, even impossible to achieve, although the muscles in a particular area can be toned by doing specific exercise to that area. For the stomach, you would need to do sit-ups to tone those mid-section muscles. This might help in tightening the muscles and as a result cutting some of the inches, but this would have to be part of a wider strategy of consuming less calories through diet and aerobic exercise to burn additional calories.
Belly fat reduction study
I then noticed a recent study conducted by the BBC “Trust me I’m a doctor” team who recruited 2 doctors who are experts in the field, Fredrik Karpe, a professor of metabolic medicine from the University of Oxford, and Prof Dylan Thompson, from the University of Bath, along with 35 volunteers. The volunteers would take part in a number of tests to see which was more successful in losing belly fat and provided other health benefits.
Before the six week study began, each person underwent health parameter checks and measurements, including undertaking a DEXA scan which gives detailed information about how much fat each participant had and where it was distributed in the body, along with resting heart rate, blood glucose, blood lipids, weight, blood pressure and of course waistline measurements.
Prof Thompson then took on two groups for two types of exercises, while Prof Karpe took two groups for two dietary interventions for a six week test.
Group #1 – volunteers were told to eat as normal but told to be more active in their normal routine, increasing their step count for instance.
Group #2 – volunteers were told to do sit-ups, including six exercises three times a day, every day for six weeks.
Group #3 – volunteers were told to drink milk 3 times a day (1 litre in total) as it has been suggested that milk prevents the body absorbing fat, instead excreting it as waste when you go to the loo.
Group #4 – volunteers were told to reduce portion sizes and stop snacking in between meals. They were given coping strategies for dealing with hunger pangs and supported by a dietitian throughout the study period.
Results
At the end of the six weeks study all participants had their parameters tested again. The results were as follows:
Group 1 – who were more active. didn’t lose any fat but had greatly improved health measurements such as blood pressure and even blood glucose levels.
Group 2 – who did the sit-ups, didn’t lose weight or get any healthier but did lose 2 cm from their waistlines, which backs up my hypotheses that toning the muscles would impact waist size.
Group 3 – who underwent the milk test, didn’t lose weight or improve their health. However they didn’t gain weight either even though they had consumed an extra 400 calories a day from drinking the milk
Group 4 – who consumed smaller portion sizes and stopped snacking lost 35kg between them which was an average of 3.7kg each, over the six weeks. Their waistline also reduced by an average of 2 inches. The DEXA scan readings showed 5% less body fat and an impressive 14% reduction of the dangerous visceral fat inside the abdomen. This group lost overall body fat as well as abdominal fat. They also saw improvements in other health parameters. On the downside they also lost some muscle mass, due to muscle cannibalisation, which is common with weight loss.
Conclusion
So the BBC study provided a clear winner in group #4, who cut calories by reducing portion size and stopped snacking in between meals. So the lesson to learn is that if you want to lose that stubborn belly fat, cut your calories. You don’t have to go mad, just reduce portion sizes and keep away from snacking in between meals.
However to prevent muscle loss, which is an inevitable side-effect of dieting, undertake some muscle building or toning exercise in addition to your diet reduction plan.
If you want to tone your stomach muscles, which will help reduce your waistline, than exercising that region is the way to go, particularly using stomach crunches. To do effective stomach crunches…
Lie on your back, knees bent and feet flat on the floor, hip-width apart.
Place your hands on your thighs, across your chest or behind your ears.
Slowly curl up towards your knees until your shoulders are about three inches off the floor.
Hold the position for a few seconds and lower down slowly.
When doing crunches avoid…
Tucking your neck into your chest as you rise
Contracting your abs throughout the exercise
Yanking your head off the floor
Hope you found this article informative, please share it with your friends and family if you did. Also check out my Weight loss ultimate guide for more health information.
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person, by putting yourself mentally and emotionally in their situation. You might not associate this trait with entrepreneurs, salespeople and marketers, but it is one of the most important skills these professionals should possess. Why? Because if they can mentally and emotionally understand how their prospective customer is feeling and what they are thinking, they can align their sales message in such a way as to connect with them.
Empathising shouldn’t be about manipulating, or taking advantage of your prospects, which are self serving descriptions of the process, it should be about putting yourself in the best position to help them solve their problem, answer their questions, squash their fears, and objections and add value to their lives in some way.
The empathises moves from what’s best for you, to what’s best for them. It’s about serving your customers, not taking advantage and disrespecting them. If your intent to serve and add value is pure, your results will inevitably reflect this positive approach.
Obviously you’re in business to make a profit, you’re not doing it for nothing, but that doesn’t mean you should be gaming the system, looking for short term gains at the expense of your long term, brand equity.
Don’t fake sincerity
People will see through fake, insincere people and will be less likely to want to do business with you now and in the future, they will be unlikely to recommend you to their friends or colleagues. It will make future business more challenging.
Being empathetic also helps you understand what’s driving behaviour, you will be more inclined to see future trends before none empathetic competitors.
Be Curious
An important part of empathy is curiosity, wanting to find out more about customers, their likes, dislikes, where they hang out, and why. The “why” is the most important part of the jigsaw. It allows you to better predict future behaviour if you know your customers “why”.
It’s a good idea to think about your own habits and behaviours, why you do what you do, and why you don’t do what you don’t do. I would recommend improving your own self awareness before trying to understand other people. It will provide insight and experience for you, developing your empathetic side is like exercising a muscle, the more you do it, the stronger it will become. When you do it enough, you will find it becomes habit and your default disposition, and you won’t have to force yourself to think that way.
Reasearch
When you’re being curious about prospects you’re going to have to do some research, find out where they hang out and try to engage with them in social spaces, join groups they are part of, get involved in online groups and discussion boards where they are likely to be found. You’re looking for any opportunity where you can engage in conversation with them.
Ask intelligent questions
When you get involved in discussions, make sure you ask intelligent questions that illicit responses that provide some insight that can used to help you better understand their point of view and perspective.
Listen, really listen
Another vital ingredient of being empathetic, is being a good listener. Be curious in the first instance by finding as much out about your customers, and asking questions, but then you have to listen, really listen to what they tell you or to what they’re saying to other people. If you’re busy talking about you and your product, you’re not learning anything about them. Great salespeople are great listeners.
Don’t overstep the mark
Now it’s important to go about this in a socially acceptable way, don’t just start interrogating prospects, like they’re under investigation. You wouldn’t want people creeped out by your line of enquiry, would you. So be smart and be patient. It takes time to do proper research. What you’re looking to do is immerse yourself in their world and understand over time, where they are coming from and their point of view and perspective. Engaging and interacting with them, also helps you build relationships. Remember you’re there to add value to their situation, not exploit and manipulate them. You want to equip yourself with the knowledge to make your solution the best it can be, for them.
Use Empathy in all aspects of life
Empathy is not just a trait you should develop for your business, it’s a really important life skill, that will improve all of your personal relationships. Understanding other people will help unlock the door to why people act the way they do, and offer you some insight into how to best deal with them for the benefit of all.
It’s a skill that needs developing over time, but an essential one if you’re to enjoy deeper personal relationships. Always try to think about what you say and how you act towards other people and how that impacts them. A careless word can really cause upset if said in an abrupt manner. Every interaction you have with other people has an effect on them, try to make it a good one.
One of the first things I learned about, when starting my own business was the principle of adding value. It’s especially important if you’re selling a product as an affiliate. Affiliates don’t actually own the product, someone else does, and it is these creators that are providing the initial value, because the product they’ve created, serves some good, or is of some use to the end user.
As an affiliate marketer you are a middle man, you add value to the creator, whose product you’re selling, by putting it in-front or your audience, an audience the creator might never have been able to reach. The creator than rewards you by paying you a commission.
You also add value to your audience, who you hope will buy from you. You add value for them by making them aware of the product, as they may never have heard of it had it not been for you. However you might be one of many affiliates selling the same product, and who are all offering the same value added aspect. These other affiliates are your competitors, along with the creator of the product. You’re prospective customers can buy the product from any number of sources and get the same result, if they are contacted by them.
So it’s necessary to add as much extra value to the transaction as you can. You should try to stand out from all the other affiliates and even the actual creator of the product in some way. How do you do this? Well it’s about giving something extra that no one else is giving.
Get Results: Add value
The image above illustrates some of the ways you can add value for your audience/ prospective customers. You can tie the value-added-bit into the transaction. So they only get the benefit of it, if they buy the product from you first. You can take a chance and offer something for free with no strings attached prior to the purchase and hope they feel a need to repay you and buy using your affiliate link after the fact. The choice is yours. Testing the two options is a worthwhile consideration.
Think of adding value in a bigger sense
Adding value can be something you do in all aspects of your life, not just business. It can come from simply smiling at someone who is walking past you on the street, or a thoughtful gesture towards a loved one. It can become a “state of being” that you live your life by. I recently tried to adopt this way of living, a value added life. It feels nice to be nice. I’m not saying I was a bad person before, far from it, I’ve always been pleasant and polite to other people, always. I’ve always been happy to go out of my way to help people. But I’ve never thought of such interactions as adding value, but they are.
Now I like to think adding value is also a way of making people feel better. To change their state in some positive way.
If they’re sad, making them feel a little better,
if they’ve lost something, helping them to find it,
if they’re fearful, helping them feel safe,
if they’re worrying, help them feel some peace of mind,
if they’re frustrated, help them feel relief or a sense of accomplishment,
if they’re feeling despair giving them a sense of hope.
Adding value in this way can be done one interaction at a time, on an individual basis, it’s small but it’s important, it’s important to someone..
Helping people over and over again
Adding value as affiliate marketers, with the tools at our disposal means we can help our visitors over and over again with one video tutorial, one insightful article, one honest review and recommendation. Once it’s done it’s there to help people over and over again. So next time you’re writing that review, scribing that case study, crafting that white paper, remember you’re doing it to add value to people’s lives.
Hopefully I’ve made you think a little bit more deeply about the concept of adding value. Let’s make the internet and the wider world a better place to be, by focusing on adding value to every part of it, one bit at a time.
“The marketing mix is a business tool used in marketing and by marketers. The marketing mix is often crucial when determining a product or brand’s offer”
The term “Marketing mix” was coined in an article written by Neil Borden called “The Concept of the Marketing Mix.” He started teaching the term after he learned about it from an associate, James Culliton, who in 1948 described the role of the marketing manager as a “mixer of ingredients”; one who sometimes follows recipes prepared by others, sometimes prepares his own recipe as he goes along, sometimes adapts a recipe from immediately available ingredients, and at other times invents new ingredients no one else has tried.
The Marketing Mix is made up of 7 P’s, they are
Product
When we talk about the product, we are focusing on things like technical specifications or features, design, quality and packaging. Also including are things like guarantees and after sales service along with product range considerations.
Place
When we consider Place and its part in the marketing mix we’re focusing on channels of distribution, promotional partnerships, stockists, location, stock levels and delivery arrangements and those types of things.
Price
Price includes things like retail pricing versus trade pricing, special offers, instalment terms, general price levels within the market, discounting policies, credit policy and overall pricing strategy.
Promotion
Promotion involves advertising, sales promotions, selling methodologies, advertising spend, advertising copy, media channels, and advertising schedules.
People
People involves any contact your employees may have with the customer from the CEO to the cleaner and everyone in between.
Process
The Process goes right across your business from the pre-purchase stage which includes things like contactability and purchase options, through the purchase stage and includes payment methods such as layaway and finance deals through to the post-purchase stage and includes delivery process and customer support and complaint procedures.
Physical Presence
Physical Presence includes things like premises, vehicles and staff uniforms and dress code.
So you can see how the marketing mix forces you to look at every aspect of your business and how it relates to the customer experience of your business.
Originally the Marketing Mix was made up of 4 P’s these being product, Place, Price, Promotion, but have since been increased to the seven we use today.
Use the Marketing Mix to gain advantage
Decide which P or combination of P’s is the most important and relevant to your business and heavily market this to keep the edge on your competition.
For example if you’re selling based on the quality of your service, this means emphasising People and Processes, if you’re selling based on “technology superiority” you would be emphasising the Products edge over competition.
Customer touch points
Identify the touch points between your business and the customer, everything your customer sees, hears, touches, tastes, uses or otherwise interacts with. Each customer interaction, contact or exposure is what is called a touchpoint. Use the 7 p’s to test these intersections and ensure your customers are getting the right impression about youyour businessand aim to build customer interest and loyalty, if you are not currently doing so.
Get Results: the seven P’s
Summary
The Marketing Mix and use of the seven p’s is a valuable tool and allows you to carefully analysis how you interact with your customers in a structured way. Aim to improve every customer touchpoint and market your business in a much more immersive way, not just through your advertising but through the way you do business and your business culture. The end goal is to make your business much more attractive to prospects and keep your existing customers coming back for more.
Are you frustrated that you’re not getting the results you want?
Are you working hard producing content but nobody’s paying attention? Are you wanting to get out of the nine to five rat race and liberate yourself with a location independent online business, but just can’t get any traction?
This article is based around “getting results” from an internet business perspective, but many of the points can apply to such diverse goals as losing weight and becoming wealthy.
You’re not getting the results you want because of one or more of the following:
You have no defined goal – you don’t know what you want, in this circumstance you need to decide on a clear goal.
You’re doing something wrong but you don’t know it’s wrong (assuming you wouldn’t knowingly be doing something wrong). If you’re not getting the results you strive for then you can be sure something is missing, something in your understanding. You need to find what this is to make any further progress.
You don’t know what to do or how to do something that is important, you may not even know you need to know or do it. This is a difficult one but ideally you want to look to role models – people who have trodden your path before you and got the results you are looking for.
You’re knowingly not doing something that’s important, Got to take action here, simple as.
or a combination of some these.
There are two components required to getting the results you want these are:
knowing what to do
Doing what needs to be done
Looking for relevant information to help you
If you don’t know what to do to get the results you’re looking for, it will be nothing more than a matter of luck if you achieve them. If you’re looking for online success you need to know the options open to you and the best practices in doing them in an effective manner. So for instance, if you’re at the start of your online journey, some of the options open to you are:
Affiliate Marketing
Running an eCommerce store selling physical products
Blogging free information (monetise with ads)
Running an Amazon store
So lets take affiliate marketing as an example. If you want to know how to go about getting results as an affiliate marketer you can search for a book on the subject, check out any reviews about it and buy. The problem with books on the subject of affiliate marketing is they quickly go out of date. The internet is evolving at such a pace, printed books can be old hat as soon as they hit the shelves, this is why self published kindle books or ebooks are very popular because they contain more timely information.
Alternatively you can start searching the major search engines for “becoming an affiliate marketer”, or similar searches. Then you have to start sifting through the vast amount of results which come in the form of blog posts, video tutorials, podcasts etc. In fact I have just done such a search and found nearly 300,000 results.
The explosion of the internet has resulted in us having access to unparalleled amounts of information about any topic we turn our attention to. The problem with this situation is not all the information has been created equal. Some of it contains gold nuggets while some of it can only be described as mis-information and trash.
If marketers are motivated to get you to buy their latest product, they will frame the information in such a way as to encourage you to buy that product rather than giving you balance or accurate information.
But let’s be fair, you ain’t ever going to go through all of these 300,000 results, probably just a few on the first page. So lets look at the criteria you need to use to find the golden nuggets of information that will help you get the results you are looking for.
First thing is to make sure you are only taking advice from people that know what they’re talking about. Look at the business models, systems, and habits and relationships they use and try them out yourself. It isn’t guaranteed you will get the same results they have, but until you try them out you will never know. Look at what they sell, how they sell it, who they sell it to, how they find their customers, how they drive traffic to their sales funnel etc. Then try to use their system as the basis for of your own. Don’t just duplicate them, but try to understand why they do what they do and use this as a guide. Check out a few models and see what they have in common. This will most certainly help you understand the process more clearly.
With affiliate marketing specifically you need to find a product to sell, ideally one you use yourself, that you like, find valuable and would be happy to recommend to someone else, then offer it to your audience. Find your own angle, don’t just blindly follow others, but think about what value you can bring to your audience and build a brand around this point of difference..
Get to know the right people
It’s not always about what you know, often who you know can help move mountains. So whatever area you want to get results in, look for people in the know, the influencer’s, and the thought leaders. Join relevant network groups, Facebook groups, and forums and get involved in the conversations and make contacts. If you aren’t getting results and are already in some groups and forums, leave and join others. Check out other blogs, listen to different podcasts, read more books. If you’re not already getting the results, then make a change, but don’t give up.
Make sure you have set yourself a Goal(s)
If you want to get results you need to start with a goal in mind, otherwise how do you know if you’re making progress. If you’re not heading somewhere specific then you’re like a rudderless boat, at the mercy of the tide.
Make your goals big and specific, check out my post all about goal setting for more information on the topic. In a nutshell. Have smaller goals which lead to your bigger overall goal, lined up like domino’s. Smaller goals can be daily, weekly, monthly. Keep your overall goal in mind at all times, and don’t be scared of thinking too big. Ask yourself, “If I couldn’t fail what would I want to do”. It’s okay to have big goals, but be realistic about how difficult they are going to be to achieve, don’t let the difficulty aspect de-motivate you. Use your success in the smaller goals to build momentum towards your overall goal.
Have a sound plan and take action
Your plan is “how” you get the results you want. It’s how you get to achieve your goal. When you’re formulating your plan you need to think about what gets done and when. Start with a basic framework and fill in the details. I find it easier to start with my goal and work backwards to the present time. A simple reverse framework might look like this:
Sell £x worth of X product
Email sequence – demonstrate the value I can bring and allow visitors to get to know me before I try to sell them something. To sell £x of product I need Y number of email subscribers
Lead Magnet in exchange for opt-in
Lead Generation – my customers spend most time on Facebook so use Facebook ads to get leads. It’s important to think about who your customers are, and how to best reach them.
Remember this is currently in reverse order because I find it easier to think things through in this way, but do what works best for you. I’m not going too much into the details about planning in this article, I just wanted to mention a few points and to stress the importance of actually making one, which I’ve now done.
If you find you’re not following your plan then find out why. If you’re:
procrastination
burying head in the sand/denial/ignoring/making excuses/keeping busy doing something else and justifying it
doubting your own ability
being indecisive
feeling overwhelmed
or anxious – perceived imbalance of “ability” and “necessary requirements/skills”
these are usually a manifestation of some fear you have
Avoiding fear of…
Failure
Ask “what’s the worst that could happen?” you’ll realise the consequences of failure are not as scary as you might have first thought. Each failure is a learning experience, and with each failure we take out another obstacle. Ask yourself “What would I do if I could not fail for next 24 hours.” This will help you focus on what needs doing immediately to achieve your goal(s) with the fear of failure removed.
You can not fail until you give up. “Winners never quit and a quitters never win”. Winning often follows losing, remember everyone wants to go to heaven, but no one wants to die. For winners, losing inspires them, for losers, losing defeats them, winning means being unafraid to lose.
Don’t let failure put you off, failure is a great teacher and helps you become more focused on what is needed. Your plan is the journey that you intend to take to reach your destination, and sometimes your way might be blocked, but reassess your options and take a detour. Just make sure you don’t forget that you need to get back on track at the earliest opportunity.
Don’t fear:
Rejection – if others say “no thanks” they are rejecting your proposal not you personally and are just protecting themselves. You need to convince them of your reliability and trustworthiness. “Profit from criticism”
Disappointment – each hurdle is a step closer to the finishing line, learn from each disappointment, change your mindset and learn from any disappointment.
Doing the important things productively
When you’re taking action, make sure you are doing the important high value tasks rather than keeping busy shuffling paper around your desk. It’s not about working hard or slaving away for long hours, its about working smart and effectively and making your work matter. You should make doing the important things a priority and doing them in a productive manner. In his book “The One Thing” Gary Keller advocates living with:
Purpose (determines who we are. It sets our priorities.)
Priority is our focus
Productivity are our actions
If you align your purpose (goal), your priority and productivity should easily fall into place, and motivation should be easy, because you’re doing something that really matters to you.
Get an accountability buddy
If you’re finding it difficult to maintain motivation, then look for help from someone else as an accountability buddy. Make your progress reportable to them and have them give you honest feedback and push you to hit your deadlines.
Avoid Distractions and Temptation
Many people love social platforms, but they can be a real “time drain”. Enticing headlines can easily encourage you away from the task-in-hand and off at tangents, usually on to pointless trivia sites, if you’re anything like me. Avoid such distractions, generally avoid anywhere where you will be distracted, they are killing your productivity.
Temptation is another goal killer, particularly with regards to weight loss and dieting. The same applies here, avoid being in situations and places were temptations exist, unless you have an incredible amount of will-power, and most of us just don’t.
It doesn’t have to be perfect
If you’re bringing a product to market then the best thing to do is get it out into the marketplace. It doesn’t have to be perfect, get the minimal viable product out there and use customer feedback to help you improve it. That way it evolves into what the customer wants and is likely to be more successful in the long term.
Taking Risks
We have come to something that is greatly variable from person to person and is heavily dependant on financial circumstances and pre-disposed tolerance to risk. The bottom line is every new action you take has some element of risk connected to it. You’re moving from the known to the unknown and usually outside your comfort zone, which feels scary.
However to get more in life you need to grow, and to grow, you need to do new things that you haven’t done or tried before. Self-belief is also a big component of risk taking. If you feel you have the skills necessary, you are more likely to take action. Fear will hold you back, re-read the section about fear, above.
Risk taking requires a mind-shift, and unless you make it, you will find yourself stuck in the same situation. However don’t be reckless. Don’t invest thousands of pounds in something that you know nothing about. Any idiot can lose money. Build up your knowledge first and only take calculated risks. (“Risk benefit analysis” is a useful tool for this).
Embrace Change
Taking risk feeds directly into the ability to accept change. Being open to new experiences or new ways of doing things is a crucial skill in a rapidly changing world. If you fail to adapt you will almost certainly get left behind. The days of learning a skill that would see you through to retirement has long gone, think of the steel industry, and mining industry to name just two. Whole towns lay derelict in the USA as testimony to the necessity to accept change as a part of life. Aim for skills that will always be needed, such as the skill of “selling”, businesses will always need to sell products and to employ people that are good at it.
Learn and never stop learning, be a master of what you know and an apprentice of what you don’t know. Don’t be satisfied with doing things the best you can do them, but the best that they can be done. We talked about it earlier, but use role models, and the systems, models, habits and relationships they have developed to get their results.
Additional Points
Just a few additional points to consider:
Have drive, be consistent and adopt good habits, if you think you lack the mental strength to lead others, then you will need to toughen up.
Don’t use failure as an excuse to fail bigger, be critical of yourself and strive for better results.
keep it simple, if you don’t understanding it you can’t control it,
Never give up, persevere and do whatever it takes.
Summary
You’re not getting the results you want because:
You have no defined goal – you don’t know what you want,
You’re doing something wrong but you don’t know it’s wrong,
You don’t know what to do or how to do something that is important, you may not even know you need to know or do it,
You’re knowingly not doing something that’s important,
or a combination of some these.
You must:
know what to do
Do what needs to be done
Sounds simple when it’s put like this but of course the devil is in the detail. However I am all for simplifying complex issues wherever possible. It allows me to go back to basics and helps me understand the underlying key issues with all the surrounding noise removed. This structure of analysis can be used for all goals, such as losing weight, getting fit, earning more money, finding success online, or in your career.
Hopefully you have found this article of use, if so, please share it with your friends, family and colleagues.
This is a piece I posted in 2015 on a different website, I thought I would include it here. I lost 3 stone within a few months, and continue to maintain the same weight today, so I consider that a success.
Originally posted 18th June 2015
Are you feeling frustrated that you’re not getting the results you crave? Disappointed with your poor results? Ongoing failure can lead to chronic anger, where you become difficult to be around in other areas of your life, snapping at others for the least thing. Often this state of being causes many to give up with a deep feeling of failure remaining in the background of their mind.
Wouldn’t life be so much better if you could take control of your destiny, without feelings and other things getting in your way. We all want to be high achievers, successful and consistently able to get results even if we fool ourselves into thinking otherwise.
Knowledge
I recently decided to lose weight and knew that a combination of exercise and diet would be critically important. knowing what I should be eating, and when, as well as knowing the best type of exercise to be most effective for my weight loss being key to success. I want to lose a lot of weight in fact. I’m currently 19 stone, which is the heaviest I’ve ever been in my life, and I’ve decided it has to go, I’m aiming to get down to 15 stone over the next 12 months or sooner if possible. Below is what I think I need to do to lose weight
Exercise
Build muscle – resistance exercise rather than cardio
High intensity exercise, with low impact on joints
Don’t sit so much at my computer and have regular breaks in between, walking around and standing more
Burn more calories than consume on a daily basis
Diet
Low calorie intake
Regular intake throughout the day rather than binge eating late at night
More calories early in day and less at night
Less snacking of fatty foods, instead fruit and veg snacks if at all
Drink less fizzy drinks and consume more water
This is only a brief overview of my plan of action based on the little bit of research I’ve done so far, I won’t bore you with the details, the important thing to know is it’s vitally important you find a good source of accurate up-to-date information to enable you to succeed in your endeavour. There is so much conflicting information out there about subjects such as weight loss, fitness, business, on-line business and the like, it can be really difficult to know for sure that you have the right information you need. Most of the time I go with the view, if it makes sense give it a go, but if I’m honest I’m forever reading and improving my knowledge bank and searching out more information. knowledge is power or the potential for power, but without action it’s useless.
Motivation
Well for me, this is a biggie particularly when considering the subject of losing weight. I don’t need to work on my motivation levels for business because it just comes easily to me, but cutting down calories and exercising are not my favourite things to do. I have an inner conflict which stops me doing what I should be doing and keeps me doing what I shouldn’t (cognitive dissonance)
What I mean by that is I eat too much fatty foods because I love the taste of it (doing what I shouldn’t be doing) and don’t do what I should be doing (eating healthier and restricting my calorie intake). This is double negative. When it comes to the exercise part of the equation, I’m just as bad, not exercising, instead sitting watching the TV or working on my laptop.
So what’s going on here. I want to do something I shouldn’t be and don’t really want to do something I should. The end result is I pile on more weight and move ever further from my goal of losing weight.
This is what’s going on in a lot of us I suspect. Lack of motivation and cognitive dissonance (inner conflict) is not just killing us but killing our chances of getting the results we crave.
There is no silver bullet I’m afraid. Gonna have to make a change mentally and physically if I wanna achieve my goal.
Get Results – Make the changes
I recently came across this quote or similar but I remember like this:
“What you do in this moment shapes all your tomorrows – make it count”
Get Results: what you do in this moment shapes all your tomorrows. make it count
It helps me to think from a “this moment perspective”. If I eat something fatty it’s not okay, cause I’m sewing the seeds of failure for all my tomorrows. It’s a zero tolerance approach. All we have is this moment, nothing else really exists, so aligning my now with what I want tomorrow is the only way to do it in my eyes and even though it’s early days…it seems to be working for me.
You might find taking a longer term view works best for you – the point is, you do what works for you and the way your mind works by default.
Alternatively you have to break bad habits and destructive thought patterns and replace with more empowering ones. This is harder to do than the previous option, requiring a great deal of “will power” but is greatly rewarding and can certainly be achieved with purpose, determination and perseverance.
The important thing is to get results, and that brings me back onto the purpose of this post, to help you get results, not just in weight loss but whatever you are trying to do.
So you’re here at the beginning – frustrated, disappointed, angry and ready to give up, right?
You want to be there (your goal) – achieving, successful, consistently getting results?
To get from here to there, you need to know:
What to do – this is the knowledge bit – What to do, How to do it, When to do it – this is all about doing your research and answering these questions. Find good sources of reliable information, study it and understand it thoroughly. Secondly
Do what needs to be done – this is mainly about motivation – doing what needs doing, and not doing what’s counter productive. This is often the hardest part of the equation. Most of us have inner conflicts where we find ourselves wanting to do something that is counter productive to our goal. Using the example I used early where I find myself enjoying eating tasty fatty foods while also wanting to lose weight. I find that changing the way I frame the situation in my mind helps, so focussing on eating well rather than the discomfort of not eating junk (re-framing the issue). Also I would suggest getting yourself an accountability buddy who will hold you to task if you don’t follow through on your plan. I am kind of doing this with you, my audience because if I haven’t lost weight within 12 months of writing this article, than you will know I have failed to practice what I preach, and with that, I’ll lose any credibility on the subject.
Fear is a big de-motivator that can trap you in your current situation and prevent you following your goals. Fear of failure, rejection, disappointment, change, embarrassment, of the unknown can all be dream killers. Often such fears manifest themselves in the excuses we give ourselves for not taking action, procrastination, buying your head in the sand, denial, avoidance, keeping busy doing other things, over-complicating situations, insisting on perfection before taking action, giving up without a fight. Facing fear head on and moving past it, although scary to think about, is often easier to overcome than our imagination would have us believe. Jim Carey said it best “Know the difference between a dog that is going to eat you in your mind, and an actual dog that is going to eat you”.
Use as much help as you can elicit from others especially people who have experience doing what you’re trying to achieve. From a knowledge perspective, consider hiring expertise where appropriate and look towards friends and family for motivation purposes to help keep you on track. Look for tools which will help you succeed with your goal, including things like phone Apps that you will have with you all the time..
Just going back to my plan of losing weight, I came up with the following list of additional things I could use/do to help me in my pursuit, should I need to:
Use fitness Apps – to keep me motivated
Listen to Audio books – to prevent boredom during repetitive workouts
Watch TV while working out doing cardio exercises (treadmill) – aimed to prevent boredom
Undertake what I consider to be enjoyable exercises such as bike riding, and 5 a side football with mates to make it more fun
Join a club and exercise with others possible down my local gym
Find an accountability buddy or exercise partner
Undertake Shorter exercise routines – high intensity in short bursts
Remember I don’t have to increase intensity if I’m just wanting to maintain fitness at a certain level
Have equipment set up all the time so there’s no time setting up and packing away, or use minimal equipment (ideas for exercises without equipment)
Investigate tasty, healthy recipe choices
Drink more water to fill stomach – avoid fizzy pop – drink flavoured water if I get fed up of plain water
Keep mind occupied to prevent snacking due to boredom in evenings
Eat health snacks – fruit or veg instead of crisps and sweets
Use recipe apps for healthy eating advice
Put X’s on calendar every time I follow plan. Don’t break the row of X’s
Read motivational quotes, watch motivational videos to help inspire me
Get Results:predator of chance rather than a victim of circumstance
The EU referendum has certainly divided the country, with strong opinions on either side of the argument. And it has been an argument, rather than a debate. From a psychological point of view it’s been a rough ride for both sides.
Politicians and the media have been guilty of constructing their campaigns in such a way as to play to the fears and insecurities of both sides, by using very emotive and divisive language rather than just presenting the facts. Why have they done this? Well because there are no facts, no one really knows if it would be best in or out of the EU. There are opinions about pros and cons on either side of the debate, but not many facts.
It is a gross understatement to say that the general public have been manipulated during this referendum. Politicians and the media recognised the fear of both sides and played heavily on these to influence voter’s decision-making.
Both sides have their own expectations and preferences about the future, which are in opposition. The leavers want to maintain democracy and see the EU as anti-democracy and a symbol of anti sovereign control. Remain campaigners want to remain part of a EU that promises being part of something bigger, making the UK something bigger than they see it as being outside the EU.
The current reality as perceived is also different for each side of the argument. Leavers feel they are having a bad deal, influenced by decision makers that are not directly accountable, see the UK with an elected government that lacks any real power to influence its own economic, immigration and law-making requirements. Remainers’ believe while the current situation isn’t ideal change is better influenced from within the EU rather than being isolated outside it.
The views are certainly in opposition, but you will never get a consensus. In fact it is good that we question each other’s beliefs. In fact both sides want the same thing, to have an improved quality of life, they just disagree on how best to achieve this.
What is not good, is the way politicians and the media have used emotive and divisive language to intensify the fears of both sides, and position the other side in such a way that they become perceived as the “enemy”
Let’s have look at how it works…..
If you look at how emotion is created, it becomes obvious how politicians and media have been playing us and why we have reacted so aggressively to the opposition, and it has been aggressive, and we do see the other side as “the opposition”, even “enemy”. In fact we are both victims of the same process of emotional and unscrupulous manipulation.
Lets look at the equation of emotion and how it shapes your emotional reactions. The equation of emotion is…
Expectation/Preference (EP) compared to Reality as Perceived (EP) = Emotional Reaction (ER)
When your Expectations and preferences don’t match your perception of reality you will experience a negative emotion. This is a fact.
If the source of this imbalance is not something we are attached to, we will become angry towards it. If we feel the threat to be greater, more real, and imminent, we feel even more angry towards the source. (Find out more about the Equation of Emotion by following this link.)
Let me explain…
Remain campaigners have a strong belief that:
We are better in EU than out because we are part of a bigger trading block rather than being alone, this comes from the belief we are too small to make our way in the world alone
We are an open society that welcomes diversity and is outward looking rather than being against immigration and having racist tendencies
We are more secure sharing security information within the EU, than being out on our own.
We can affect change better within the EU rather than being powerless outside it
The theme for these beliefs is that we are better together rather than alone. The fear of remain campaigners includes, fear of isolation, fear of not being part of the decision making process, but still being subject to the EU rules of trade, the underlying fear is a fear of being worse off, having less money, having less prospects, having less of an open society. It’s a fear of loss.
Remain politicians have played on these fears by using very emotive language and attacking opposing views as beings racist, xenophobic, anti-establishment fuelled, and of being an isolation mentality.
These are so against remain campaigners views that it positions opponents as the “ENEMY”. There is no greater “other” than an enemy.
So let’s go back to our equation from earlier.
Remain campaigners have an expectation/preference that the UK is open, inclusive, part of something bigger, part of the decision making process within the EU,
Their reality as perceived is, we are no longer that kind of country with over half of the nation having racist, xenophobic, anti-establishment tendencies. Seeing themselves as now being materially and prospectively worse off out of EU than they would have been within the EU.
The emotion they feel as a result of this, is anger. Anger directed at leave voters who have been painted implicitly and explicitly as the “enemy” because of their opposing views. The more remainers’ feel this to be true, the stronger their anger towards leavers. The more they believe they will be worse off, the more they believe leavers to be everything they are not, the more of an enemy they see leavers, the more the anger and hate they direct at them.
Leavers have a strong belief that:
We are better as a sovereign country rather than giving control to an un-elected EU
Want to control UK border rather than having no say in numbers and choice of migrants coming into country
Ability to make and enforce our own laws, rather than EU making blanket laws that don’t fit our particular national circumstances
Want elected politicians to be accountable and able to be sacked if not doing what the populations wants/needs
Don’t want to be pushed into ever closer union with a United States of Europe with un-elected officials making decisions for us, without accountability.
The theme for these beliefs are centred around control and democracy.
Leavers see remainers’ as not standing up for their democratic rights and laying down and letting the establishment take advantage. They feel the quality of life is being eroded by a lack of control and accountability of the politicians that have been elected.
Politicians and media have played on immigration fears, and lack of democracy to strengthen the resistance to these issues. Again they have strengthened their argument with emotive language designed to stir up and intensify these fears.
Leavers expectation and preference is to have accountable government who have control of the important aspects of society, like the economy, border control and law making and enforcement.
Their reality as perceived is that, this is now the case, having won the referendum, but let’s assume they had lost the vote, for illustration purposes. Had they lost they would feel that they had lost control of democracy. That the political elite had been given a mandate to take further power from the sovereign countries. They would be blaming the remain voters for allowing this to happen. They would likely see remainers’ as being gullible, spineless people who have foolishly given democracy away without a fight.
The emotional reaction would have likely also been anger. This anger would be directed at those seen as responsible for this unacceptable situation, the remain campaigners.
The truth is, that the exact same internal process is going on in the remain voters as is in the leave voters. Both sides have opposing views but both are doing it because they feel it is right for them and the wider community. They are both doing it from a position of “good will”. Both feel passionately about their views and see opposing views as misguided, ill informed, and the victim of propaganda. The emotion has been intensified by manipulative politicians and the media, who are trying to influence voters’ decision-making, by preying on voters fears and insecurities and over-blowing the consequences of either decision.
The truth is, staying or leaving isn’t as bad as either side believes it to be, and that the politicians and media have been stirring up emotion to serve their own agendas, and voters have been caught up in the intense emotion of it all. We would have survived had we stayed in, we will survive now that we are out.
Try to stop feeling angry and realise that love and caring is driving both sides of the debate. Now is the time to put our differences aside and focus on creating a new and improved Great Britain for the good of us all.
