Rightly timed pause

No word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause.- Mark Twain’s Speeches (1923 ed.)

While Mark Twain was referring to a pause in a play or story, a rightly timed pause is powerfully effective in many aspects of life.  

In conversation, most of us spend the time the other person is speaking planning what we are going to say next. Instead, listen to what the other is saying, pause and then respond authentically. 

When a boss just drops a bombshell on your desk, don’t go straight fight or flight. Instead pause, think about why this is happening and how this situation might be turned into a positive and then respond. 

Take the time. A deep breath’s worth. Take your rightly timed pause.  Your life will be richer for it. 

Rightly timed pause

No word was ever as effective as a rightly timed pause.- Mark Twain’s Speeches (1923 ed.)

While Mark Twain was referring to a pause in a play or story, a rightly timed pause is powerfully effective in many aspects of life.  

In conversation, most of us spend the time the other person is speaking planning what we are going to say next. Instead, listen to what the other is saying, pause and then respond authentically. 

When a boss just drops a bombshell on your desk, don’t go straight fight or flight. Instead pause, think about why this is happening and how this situation might be turned into a positive and then respond. 

Take the time. A deep breath’s worth. Take your rightly timed pause.  Your life will be richer for it. 

The Secret Psychology Of Restaurant Menus

Source: The Secret Psychology Of Restaurant Menus

Fifteen minutes on Friday for a fabulous Monday

You’ve made it through the week.  Friday is finally here!!!  A couple more hours powering through the day and you get to enjoy the weekend.  I’m not going to go into how wrong it is if you are wishing away the week to live for the weekend.  At least, I won’t go into it in this post but there is a lot you can do today to make next Monday fabulous.

Take 10 minutes this afternoon.  Review what you have learned and accomplished this week.  Write it down.  What worked?  What didn’t work?  What would you do differently?  What are you going to do the same?  It make take a little longer at first, but with practice  this self review can be quick and effective.

Take another 5 minutes and leave your Monday self a note.  What does your Monday self need to accomplish next week?  Of course, your Monday self should spend a little time planning out the week.  A little note from your Friday self will help keep your focus and goals going strong next week.

An easy dream board hack to conquer procrastination

Vision and goal?  Check

Action plan?  Check

Tools and resources?  Check

Taking action?  . . . . . . . . well, maybe after I check Facebook……again.

Sound familiar?  Procrastination rears its ugly head in most of our lives at one point or other.  We allow procrastination to arrest our progress for many reasons.  Some of us procrastinate because we don’t really value our goal or we are unclear of what our vision really looks like.  Others of us are afraid of trying and failing or perhaps trying and looking like a fool.  Without a clear vision, it is easier to procrastinate because it is harder to prioritize more important tasks.  Still others are distracted because we are getting too much short term pleasure by whatever it is that is distracting us.

A lot of people can be helped by having a powerful dream board.  A dream board is when you spend time going through images, words and quotes that are meaningful to you, clip them out and stick them to a board.  The overall impact is to capture visually your dream and to force you to go through a process of thinking it through in detail.  By having this dream on one board in a place you see frequently, it helps many people prioritize their long term vision over their short term distractions.  The idea is this vision will be compelling enough to keep you moving forward.

Unfortunately, a compelling vision still isn’t enough.  I’ve known of hundreds of starting network marketers who know that picking up the phone is how to really jump start their business but are unwilling to actually pick up that phone.  They have a compelling vision.  They have a beautiful dream board.  They are also not picking up that phone.  The act of picking up the phone for a business person is simply too challenging or scary for them.  The phone is just one example.

There is a hack to help people who have a few tasks that are preventing them from realizing their ideal life.  Have them right down on sticky notes the things they are doing (or not doing) that are preventing them succeeding.  Ideally have them write down these things in first person, action oriented words.  For example, don’t just write “phone.”  Instead write, “I won’t make networking phone calls.”  Then have them put these sticky notes over the top of their dream board, partially blocking their dream.  Now when they look at their dream board, it shows them that their own decisions are blocking their progress.

Happy Hump Day!

Monday is a great day for planning, organizing, strategizing, initiating.

Friday is a great day for learning and genuflecting.

That means Wednesday is a great day for getting it done.  Don’t worry about your goal.  Don’t worry about next week.  You have an action plan…….so act!!!

Five ways a coach can help you reach new heights

1.) Define/Clarify your goals – Lost or confused?  Feel like you were meant for more but aren’t quite sure what that more looks like?  Is fear or procrastination preventing you from realizing the best YOU you can be?  A coach works with you to help you understand your “why,” your reason for being.  This “why” is inside you right now.  A coach simply helps you uncover it.

2.) Create your action plan – Goals are useless without a plan to realize them.  Without an action plan, no amount of effort will realize your goals.  Coaches work with you to create a series of milestones and the tasks it takes to reach them.

3.) Hold you accountable – Four crows sat on a fence.  One of them decided to fly away.  How many crows are still on the fence? . . . . . . Four.  Deciding to fly away is not flying away.  Goals and plans without action are merely dreams.  A weekly meeting with the coach keeps you on track.  A coach will help you recalibrate your goals and actions and help you overcome your obstacles.  A coach will hold you accountable.

4.) Focus your efforts – Success depends on effort consistently put in (hours) times the effectiveness of those hours.  Are you waisting time doing low value added tasks?  Are you allowing facebook, clutter, fear, over planning, etc. to eat up your hours without much progress?  Coaches help you separate effective tasks from time eaters.  You can then cut away those time eaters and work hard just on those tasks that will create results.

5.) Crank up your motivation – When you know what you want, why you want it and have a plan to obtain it, you can’t help but be motivated.  Once you start reaching milestones, your motivation will go through the roof.  Even so, it is normal and natural for short term motivation to take a break.  A coach can keep you productive and moving forward even during a motivation break.  Then a coach will help you stoke your motivation.

Researcher reveals 4 happiness rituals – Business Insider

Find happiness with these methods.

Source: Researcher reveals 4 happiness rituals – Business Insider

Five things to do when you aren’t motivated

Every one of us has moments where there are things to do but we aren’t motivated to do them.  Sometimes these moments are hours, days or even weeks long.  The longer you allow lack of motivation to stop your progress, the harder it is to get your motivation back.  Therefore, it is extremely important to not let lack of motivation hold back your progress for long.

Here are five things to do when your short term motivation isn’t living up to your long term passion and goals:

1.) Take a breath and realize that it is ok.  Everyone feels this way sometimes.  Even the most successful person you know has moments where she can’t get her motivation going.  It is normal to feel this way.  Take that deep breath and relax.  If your lack of motivation happens only rarely and doesn’t last very long, it is ok to just enjoy the break.  Take a little vacation from your goal.  Do something relaxing or enriching.  Recharge yourself.  BUT…….if your little vacations start to interfere with your progress, time to end your vacation.

2.) Eat the frog – Mark Twain said, “If it’s your job to eat a frog, it’s best to do it first thing in the morning.  And if it’s your job to eat two frogs, it’s best to eat the biggest one first.”  His logic is that if you do the worst, hardest, least pleasant job first, everything else you have to do will be easier to accomplish.  When your motivation is failing you, do just one task.  Do your most difficult task.  Eat that frog.  It will be a little easier for you act if are only committing to one task.

3.) Do the minimum – When you create your action plan, make a list of easy to accomplish things.  Don’t do these tasks when you are motivated.  Save them for a low motivation day and pound out a few of them.  Because they are easy to do, you will be able to accomplish them, even on a low motivation day, and the day won’t be waisted.

4.) Work off of an action plan – Every week, plan out what needs to be done each day.  Create realistic minimum goals and have a few stretch items.  On high motivation days, go for the stretch goal.  On low motivation days, do the minimum goal and celebrate your accomplishment.  Getting things done when you aren’t motivated is worth a celebration.  Be proud of anything you get done.

5.) Use your body, language, action virtuous circle – A virtuous circle is the opposite of a vicious circle.  In a virtuous circle, there is a chain of events and actions that build on each other to create a more and more positive outcome.  What you do with your body – how you carry yourself, what you eat, the amount of activity, etc – affects your language.  The language you use – whether it is positive or negative, encouraging or defeatist, etc – affects your actions.  Your actions – driving towards your goals or binge watching Game of Thrones – affect what you are doing with your body and language.  Keeping this virtuous circle in mind, do something positive with your body, your language or your actions.  Go for a walk.  Say some affirmations.  Tackle just one task.  Anything positive you do will help make the next step more positive.

Three reasons not to hate Mondays

Monday has such a bad reputation.  People grumble out, “It’s Monday” to justify bad moods and a grumpy disposition.  I’ve never heard anyone complain that way about Friday.  I’ve never seen a Garfield poster saying, “I hate Thursdays.”  This bad reputation unjustified.  While Monday may never beat out Saturday as your favorite day of the week, there are lots of reasons to look forward to Monday.

1.) Monday is a start of a new week.  So much can be accomplished in a week.  What ever happened last week, good or bad, Monday starts another opportunity to grow and accomplish.

2.) Monday is plan day.  Take twenty minutes and plan out what you are going to accomplish the rest of the week.  That twenty minutes is your most important twenty minutes of the week.  By starting out your week with a plan, you will be more efficient and effective the rest of the week.

3.) The stories.  People’s weekend stories are more entertaining than their weekday stories.  More crazy things happen on a Saturday than a Tuesday night.  Take a few minutes and share some of your stories and listen to your co-workers’ stories.  Bond.  Laugh.  Enjoy.  Become closer.