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Passion: the Fast Lane to Success

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To-Do List - Win - Dry Erase BoardLast week we took a look at loving what you do for a living as a means to getting rich. Unless you’re passionate about what you do, it is very difficult for you to be successful or happy.

When you are not thrilled with your work, what are you doing unconsciously? Looking for a way out, yes or no? You’re always thinking “If there was something else …” You’re constantly searching.

Imagine driving on a highway. You’re looking for your exit. What lane would you drive in? The slow lane, because you don’t want to miss the exit. But if you weren’t looking for an exit you’d be flying down the fast lane. Unconsciously, you wouldn’t even know you’re doing it until you see a cop or traffic jam or something. But when you’re in that mode of looking for a way out, you never fully commit. You never get any momentum.

When you’re engaged in what you love to do, it’s like driving in the fast lane. Time flies by and more roads open up to you, alternate routes you may not have even known existed.

So why don’t we do what we love? You’d think it’d be natural, right? Natural talents are gifts from the universe, gifts from spirit, gifts from whatever you want to call your creator. You can refine your talent but it’s something that makes people say, “You’re a natural at that!”

The reason a lot of people don’t find or create work that they love is fear, of course. Fear of failure, fear of the unknown, fear of change, fear of rejection, fear of looking foolish, fear of disapproval. It’s a story you make up about what might happen or what could be in the future.

In conjunction with fear is obligation. Obligation to memories of the past, obligation to other people, obligation to the freaking mortgage! If your mortgage is hampering your life, which one do you want to release? You’d think the logical answer is the mortgage, but guess which one most people release? They release their lives. Isn’t that wicked?

Whatever obligation it is, it’s nothing more than a fear that ‘If I don’t do this, something bad will happen to me.’ Obligation is a ‘should’. It’s a ‘have to’. It’s an opinion, though, and every one of those obligations is made up. You made it up. It’s not true that you have to or that you should. It’s your opinion based on some other stuff, interpretations that you made about who you are, who others are to you, what’s important, what’s not.

Forget the obligations. If they are not supporting you, give up the ‘shoulds’. Don’t wait! Life is too short to work at something you really don’t love and have a passion for. When you do, you will promote it like crazy. That’s how you’ll know. Before you know it, you’re flying down the fast lane. Do what you love and the money will come. You have to trust yourself.

Now we want to hear from you! What are some ways that you’ve found to balance responsibility to others—like taking care of the family, for example—with responsibility to your creative side? What are some resources that we all have that people may not think about that could help them get over the hump of “shoulds” and “have to’s”?

The Secrets to Believe and Succeed

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iStock_000007655825XSmallSUCCESSSSometimes it’s easy to tell when someone isn’t certain of something or maybe harmlessly fibbing when you ask them a question and they give you an answer you don’t believe. Not that it’s always a big deal—like asking someone “Are you sure,” and they answer, “Yeah,” kind of like they’re asking a question, not stating a truth.

Try that in business or pitching yourself or your product or in fact whatever! For frick sake if you don’t believe in yourself, why should anybody else? This can become another one of those “Duh, Harv” moments. “Of course you have to believe in what you’re doing.” But is that what most people really live, do and sincerely … believe?

After all, believing means having confidence in the truth or absolute reliability of something without being able to absolutely prove that you’re right. There’s always that chance that you’re dead wrong. And that’s what holds so many people back, often without them realizing it. Fear of being wrong is insidious, undermining, and can become a success killer.

The most important thing about your business—your vehicle—is you have to freaking believe in it so much you would stand and shout it from the top of the roof to everybody, every minute of every day. If you can’t do that, you don’t believe in what you do enough.

When you find something that you really believe in and get it into your subconscious, there’s no problem in telling people what you do, or the value you’re offering. Preparation, education (which implies knowing that what you believe in can always be improved), execution—these are the sledgehammers that break through those inner obstacles, the roots that block us.

Sometimes, though, those roots can go very deep. This goes back to blueprint. Or a bad experience onhealthy.net/product/celebrex/ with belief, in one way or another, somehow internalized. If you can’t get past taking a shot in the dark without absolute certainty that you’re going to hit your target, what else do you think you can’t get past in life? Try everything! Anything! You stay in that comfort zone and even a little step outside becomes uncomfortable.

But guess what? Making a million dollars is not so comfortable! It’s like stretching muscles that you didn’t even know you had. It’s gonna feel tense at first, or maybe for a while, but the more you exercise your success muscles, the more successful you’ll be.

Belief and faith go hand-in-hand, and they are the foundation of success as much as energy is the basic unit of everything that ever existed. The idea of faith—as in “higher power”—is uncomfortable for some, but the same rules apply. Faith is simply doing and being from a place of not knowing what the outcome will be, but doing it anyway and accepting the result, whatever it may be.

But we won’t even get there without the basic unit of inner strength—belief in ourselves, in what we’re doing, in what we’re creating, in what we’re becoming. The science to get there is learnable. The spiritual aspect is something we have to continuously nurture.

We’ve been knee-deep in the nuts and bolts of business over these last few blogs. Now it’s time to open up the forum to your thoughts on belief, faith and success, and look for more spiritual lessons and thoughts next week.

But before we go there, it’s your turn to tell me what you think. What tips or strategies do you use to breakthrough your inner obstacles?  Others can learn from your methods, so share below!

Opportunities Might Be Your Enemies

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iStock_000010763230SmallEnemies#2

There are so many sayings we say—most of the time without thinking about it—that make absolutely no sense. Yet we say them out of habit and routine, not realizing just how silly we sound.

For example: “Harv, you can’t have your cake and eat it, too.” Well, what the hell’s the point in having the cake then?

Or how about this one: “Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.” Well, isn’t that exactly what the Trojans should’ve done?

The point here is that success building requires a lot of deprogramming from so many common beliefs and assumptions we’ve come to take for granted as true, even though a lot of the time it’s the exact opposite. We learned last week that a viable way to jumpstart an enterprise is to buy your product by selling it first.

Let’s take a look at another Rule of Opposites: Put all your eggs in one basket.

Most people will tell you otherwise. Why? Because if you put all of your eggs in one basket and something happens—like dropping it—you’ll lose everything. But I have a solution for that; take bloody good care of that basket!

We already know that no one’s reaching the next level without taking risks, yes? But the way we’ve come to think about our eggs and baskets is fear-based; fear of losing.

This truth is already established—if you want to be rich, you’ve got to be great at something. And to be great at something, you’ve got to focus on that something. For goodness sakes that’s where you put all of your eggs!

Rich people are focused. Poor people scatter their energies. Everything is one thing. It’s hard enough to make it in one business let alone divvying it up into dozens of different places!

‘But Harv—I’m constantly coming across great opportunities!’ This brings me to another Rule of Opposites:

Opportunities can be obstacles!

Opportunities can be obstacles if they take your focus away from what’s in front of you right now. That takes your time because you entertain them, maybe do some research and find out a bit more, and there you go again.

If you’ve got something semi-decent growing, put the blinders on and go for it. Not one person ever got wealthy to begin with in more than one business at a time. One business. One basket.

So you’ll have to choose, but then the next question is, ‘How do I choose?’ Look, pick one. It doesn’t matter because it’s the habit that’s the problem. Pick one to focus on. Worse comes to worse, even if you do mediocre with it, you can always let that one go when it’s finally done and get something going that does work—eventually without you. Then you can diversify and add more.

Choose one and get freaking good at it. Got it? I’m not saying you can’t buy real estate on the side. I’m just saying watch out. Every minute you do the other one you are losing time and energy that could have gone into your one basket.

There’re a lot of opportunities within your business. Make sure you’re doing well with one thing. First get rich and then you have the opportunity to go into other things. Get rich first!

Now it’s your turn! Can you identify one new opportunity within your business right now?  Will you take action and explore it ASAP?  Share your thoughts below and let me know if putting “all your eggs in one basket” just might be a lucrative opportunity for you.

Go Hard or Go Home

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iStock_000010769378XSmallgoHARD

I’ve seen that mantra in several different contexts, in particular to athletics or anything with a kind of “edge” to it. It comes off a little severe, like something those guys who pound each other in cages on Pay per View would say. Train hard, push hard, work hard, fight hard. Otherwise, what’s the point?

In general, people recognize the truth in the phrase ‘Go Hard or Go Home.’ If you’re going to do something, either be the absolute best you can be or don’t do it at all. Well, not everything. You can enjoy the heck out of playing golf, but you don’t have to be a PGA player to get something out of playing. You do it strictly because you want to, no reasons needed.

Consider, though, the difference between something you do for fun versus something you’re doing for your life, like working toward financial freedom, or living more healthy. Being an average golfer is fine, but there’s no such thing as an average millionaire. You’re either a millionaire or you’re not, and quite frankly there aren’t as many millionaires as there are wanna-be millionaires.

In other words, you can’t just “okay” yourself to riches. You’re either going to master wealth, or you’re not.

That’s where the warrior mentality is critical for the mind of the millionaire. The warrior always chooses to be a master. A warrior has to! There is no other option. For a real warrior, mastery can make the difference between life and death. Not that being anything less than rich equals being dead, but the same kind of must-mentality is … a must!

Mastery isn’t as much a skill as it is a matter of discipline, desire, and commitment to taking your life to another level. Most people are not living anywhere near their potential because they’re playing in the minor leagues. Major leaguers, no matter what job or industry, are making lots of money because they’re not afraid of themselves, the work, the responsibility, making the necessary changes, of playing big, and they believe they must play big in order to win big.

Does it take more work to play in the majors than in the minors? Not necessarily. It takes more practice for sure, but sometimes all it takes are minor adjustments to your thinking and how you apply your skills in order to make big changes.

If you want to master anything, you’ll have to do at least some things differently. Your standards must change, your thinking needs to change from “This is okay” to “I can do much better,” and you’ll need to find reasons why there’s room to get bigger rather than reasons why not.

Can you be a master at everything? No, nor does anybody need to be. You need, instead, to prioritize, choose and focus on those things you really want for yourself. Whatever you choose, know that you’re going to master it or not take it on. If you aren’t willing to see your potential and hold yourself to it, then you won’t master much.

You will always get what you’re willing to settle for. The hardest part isn’t actually becoming a master. It’s deciding that you’re going to be one in the first place, and not going backwards from that moment on.

Now it’s your turn!  Are you playing in the major leagues or still down at the minors?  If you are mastering your life, what was the turning point to get you to make the shift up?  If you are still in the minors, what will it take to get you to play bigger?  Share here—someone just might read what you write and be inspired to live a better life.

Don’t Feel Guilt For Getting What You Want

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iStock_000005893466XSmallSuccess

I wanted to follow up on a couple of points I made in my last blog about negotiating, in particular being honest while waiting for the other person to state their offer first.

It may seem a little counter intuitive to be honest, to not be the one to put the cards on the table first, yet still get what you want. Some people believe being successful in a negotiation means being ruthless, dishonest, or otherwise not very nice. It also seems more intuitive to state upfront what it is you want instead of letting that opportunity develop (or the opposite—some people are deathly afraid to say what they want); and we have all had times where we trusted someone with our honesty and were taken advantage of.

So a lot of people become cynical or untrusting of themselves and others, and not get what they really want—all while staying in a place of frustration.

In business, in love, and in life, there are rules that govern how people respond to us, hence the kind of connections, relationships, resources, happiness, success, and wealth you can attract and build upon.   Here are the rules:

(1)   Create Affinity. Affinity generates closeness and likeability. People will usually give much more leeway to someone they like, therefore creating room for possibilities of getting what you want from them. You create affinity by focusing on what you have in common. Directly or indirectly, saying “I’m like you” is another way of saying “I like you.”

(2)   Use affirming statements. When negotiating, use affirming statements like “I understand,” “I see your point,” or “I agree with that.” That doesn’t mean you have to agree with every single thing the person is saying. If you do disagree, though, saying “but” negates everything the other person just said, even if your point is 100% true. Saying, “I see your point of view, and I was thinking …” lets the other person know that they were heard and understood, and opens a door for you to say your piece at the same time (Sounds like it makes sense, yes? You’d be amazed, though, how easy it is to “but” another person to death!).

 

(3)   Respect Yourself. When you show need for approval or you want something too badly, you forfeit your strength and lose all power of negotiation. That’s why it’s crucial to know what you want and not have any fear about expressing it at the appropriate time. The less fear you have, the less anxious you’ll come off, the more confident you become, and the other person is almost forced to reckon with your interests out of respect that you show for yourself.

You’re not only creating more affinity by giving them the opportunity to express themselves first, but you’re also strategically setting yourself up in a position of power, more able to counter their counters until the two of you can reach an amicable solution.

That’s why it’s true that not respecting yourself means not fully respecting others either. The best way is to connect your truth with their truth courageously yet thoughtfully. You give yourself that much more of an opportunity to get what you want while being honest with yourself and others.

Using these basics, there’s little reason to feel bad about getting what you want in any situation. Awareness of what makes relationships tick just makes good, honest, nicer people that much more exposed to love, wealth, success and fulfillment.

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