Listening is the Key
Listening builds self-esteem. It has been said that, "Rapt attention is the highest form of flattery." When you listen intently to another person and it is clear that you genuinely care about what that other person is saying, his or her self-esteem goes up. His or her feeling of personal value increases. He or she feels more worthwhile and important as a human being. You can actually make another person feel terrific about himself or herself by listening in a warm, genuine, caring way to everything he or she has to say.
Pay Close Attention
When a man and a woman go out for the first time, they spend an inordinate amount of time talking and listening to each other. They look into each other's eyes and hang on every word. They are each fascinated by the personality of the other. The more each listens to the other, the more positive and happy each of them feel and the stronger becomes the bonds of affection between them.
Focus 100% On the Other Person
The opposite of listening is ignoring. You always listen to that which you most value. You always ignore that which you devalue. The fastest way to turn a person off, to hurt their feelings and make them feel slighted and angry is to simply ignore what they are saying or interrupt them in the middle of a thought. Ignoring or interrupting is the equivalent of an emotional slap in the face. Men especially have to be careful about their natural desire to make a remark or an observation in the middle of a conversation. This can often cause the sales conversation to come to a grinding halt.
Action Exercises
First, take every opportunity to make the other person feel important by listening attentively to what he or she says.
Second, avoid interrupting the other person by slowing down and pausing for a few moments after he or she has stopped speaking.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
The Momentum Principle of Success
Fast tempo seems to go hand in hand with all great success. Developing this tempo requires that you start moving and keep moving at a steady rate.
The Key Action to Orientation
When you become an action-oriented person, you activate the "Momentum Principle" of success. This principle says that although it may take tremendous amounts of energy to overcome inertia and get going initially, it then takes far less energy to keep going.
Increase Your Energy
The good news is that the faster you move, the more energy you have. The faster you move, the more you get done and the more effective you feel. The faster you move, the more experience you get and the more you learn. The faster you move, the more competent and capable you become at your work.
Get Onto the Fast Track
A sense of urgency shifts you automatically onto the fast track in your career. The faster you work and the more you get done, the higher will be your levels of self-esteem, self-respect and personal pride.
Talk to Yourself Positively
One of the simplest and yet most powerful ways to get yourself started is to repeat the words, "Do it now! Do it now! Do it now!" over and over to yourself. If you feel yourself slowing or becoming distracted by conversations or low value activities, repeat to yourself the words, "Back to work! Back to work! Back to work!" over and over.
Get A Reputation for Speed
In the final analysis, nothing will help you more in your career than for you to get the reputation for being the kind of person who gets important work done quickly and well. This reputation will make you one of the most valuable and respected people in your field.
Action Exercise
Practice makes perfect! Pick up the tempo! Whatever you are doing, resolve to move faster than ever before. Do it NOW!
The Key Action to Orientation
When you become an action-oriented person, you activate the "Momentum Principle" of success. This principle says that although it may take tremendous amounts of energy to overcome inertia and get going initially, it then takes far less energy to keep going.
Increase Your Energy
The good news is that the faster you move, the more energy you have. The faster you move, the more you get done and the more effective you feel. The faster you move, the more experience you get and the more you learn. The faster you move, the more competent and capable you become at your work.
Get Onto the Fast Track
A sense of urgency shifts you automatically onto the fast track in your career. The faster you work and the more you get done, the higher will be your levels of self-esteem, self-respect and personal pride.
Talk to Yourself Positively
One of the simplest and yet most powerful ways to get yourself started is to repeat the words, "Do it now! Do it now! Do it now!" over and over to yourself. If you feel yourself slowing or becoming distracted by conversations or low value activities, repeat to yourself the words, "Back to work! Back to work! Back to work!" over and over.
Get A Reputation for Speed
In the final analysis, nothing will help you more in your career than for you to get the reputation for being the kind of person who gets important work done quickly and well. This reputation will make you one of the most valuable and respected people in your field.
Action Exercise
Practice makes perfect! Pick up the tempo! Whatever you are doing, resolve to move faster than ever before. Do it NOW!
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Four Steps to a Super Attitude
Decide How to React
It is not what happens to you that counts. It is how you react to what happens to you, especially when you have unexpected problems of any kind.
In this post, you learn powerful strategies you can use to keep yourself thinking and acting positively and creatively.
Here are four things you can do to assure that your attitude is the very best it can be, under all circumstances.
Focus On the Future
First, whatever challenges you face, focus on the future rather than on the past. Instead of worrying about who did what and who is to blame, focus on where you want to be and what you want to do. Get a clear mental image of your ideal successful future, and then take whatever action you can to begin moving in that direction. Get your mind, your thoughts, and your mental images on the future.
Think About the Solution
Second, whenever you're faced with a difficulty, focus on the solution rather than on the problem. Think and talk about the ideal solution to the obstacle or setback, rather than wasting time rehashing and reflecting on the problem.
Solutions are inherently positive, whereas problems are inherently negative. The instant that you begin thinking in terms of solutions, you become a positive and constructive human being.
Look For the Good
Third, assume that something good is hidden within each difficulty or challenge. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, a major proponent of positive thinking, once said, "Whenever God wants to give us a gift, he wraps it up in a problem." The bigger the gift you have coming, the bigger the problem you will receive. But the wonderful thing is that if you look for the gift, you will always find it.
Seek the Valuable Lesson
Fourth, assume that whatever situation you are facing at the moment is exactly the right situation you need to ultimately be successful. This situation has been sent to you to help you learn something, to help you become better, to help you expand and grow.
Decide to Be Positive
A Positive Mental Attitude is indispensable to your success. You can be as positive as you want to be if you will simply think about the future, focus on the solution and look for the good. If you do what other successful people do, if you use your mind to exert mental control over the situation, you will be positive and cheerful most of the time. And you will reap the benefits enjoyed by all successful people.
Action Exercises
First, become solution-oriented with every difficulty you face. Make a habit of looking for the answers to your questions, the solutions to your problems.
Second, seek for the valuable lesson in every adversity. Make a list of every idea or insight you can gain from every setback or difficulty.
Third, think on paper. Take some time to write out every detail of the problem, and then take the most logical next step to solve it.
It is not what happens to you that counts. It is how you react to what happens to you, especially when you have unexpected problems of any kind.
In this post, you learn powerful strategies you can use to keep yourself thinking and acting positively and creatively.
Here are four things you can do to assure that your attitude is the very best it can be, under all circumstances.
Focus On the Future
First, whatever challenges you face, focus on the future rather than on the past. Instead of worrying about who did what and who is to blame, focus on where you want to be and what you want to do. Get a clear mental image of your ideal successful future, and then take whatever action you can to begin moving in that direction. Get your mind, your thoughts, and your mental images on the future.
Think About the Solution
Second, whenever you're faced with a difficulty, focus on the solution rather than on the problem. Think and talk about the ideal solution to the obstacle or setback, rather than wasting time rehashing and reflecting on the problem.
Solutions are inherently positive, whereas problems are inherently negative. The instant that you begin thinking in terms of solutions, you become a positive and constructive human being.
Look For the Good
Third, assume that something good is hidden within each difficulty or challenge. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, a major proponent of positive thinking, once said, "Whenever God wants to give us a gift, he wraps it up in a problem." The bigger the gift you have coming, the bigger the problem you will receive. But the wonderful thing is that if you look for the gift, you will always find it.
Seek the Valuable Lesson
Fourth, assume that whatever situation you are facing at the moment is exactly the right situation you need to ultimately be successful. This situation has been sent to you to help you learn something, to help you become better, to help you expand and grow.
Decide to Be Positive
A Positive Mental Attitude is indispensable to your success. You can be as positive as you want to be if you will simply think about the future, focus on the solution and look for the good. If you do what other successful people do, if you use your mind to exert mental control over the situation, you will be positive and cheerful most of the time. And you will reap the benefits enjoyed by all successful people.
Action Exercises
First, become solution-oriented with every difficulty you face. Make a habit of looking for the answers to your questions, the solutions to your problems.
Second, seek for the valuable lesson in every adversity. Make a list of every idea or insight you can gain from every setback or difficulty.
Third, think on paper. Take some time to write out every detail of the problem, and then take the most logical next step to solve it.
Friday, October 10, 2008
The Golden Hour
You become what you think about most of the time. And the most important part of each day is what you think about at the beginning of that day.
Start Your Day Right
Take 30 minutes each morning to sit quietly and to reflect on your goals. You'll find when you read the biographies and autobiographies of successful men and women that almost everyone of them began their upward trajectory to success when they begin getting up early in the morning and spending time with themselves.
Feed Your Mind With Positive Ideas
This is called the Golden Hour. The first hour sets the tone for the day. The things that you do in the first hour prepare your mind and set you up for the entire day. During the first thirty to sixty minutes, take time to think and review your plans for the future.
Use Your Quiet Time Effectively
Here are four things that you can do during that quiet time in the morning. Number one is to review your plans for accomplishing your goals and change your plans if necessary.
Number two is think of better ways to accomplish your goals. As an exercise, assume that the way you're going about it is totally wrong and imagine going about it totally differently. What would you do different from what you're doing right now?
Number three, reflect on the valuable lessons that you have learned and are learning as you move toward your goals.
Practice Daily Visualization
Number four, calmly visualize your goal as a reality. Close your eyes, relax, smile, and see your goal as though it were already a reality. Rewrite your major goals everyday in the present tense. Rewrite them as though they already existed. Write "I earn X dollars." "I have a net worth of X." "I weigh a certain number of pounds." This exercise of writing and rewriting your goals everyday is one of the most powerful you will ever learn.
Fasten Your Seatbelt
Your life will start to take off at such a speed that you'll have to put on your seatbelt. Remember, the starting point for achieving financial success is the development of an attitude of unshakable confidence in yourself and in your ability to reach your goals. Everything we've talked about is a way of building up and developing your belief system until you finally reach the point where you are absolutely convinced that nothing can stop you from achieving what you set out to achieve.
Everything Counts
No one starts out with this kind of an attitude, but you can develop it using the law of accumulation. Everything counts. No efforts are ever lost. Every extraordinary accomplishment in the result of thousands of ordinary accomplishments that no one recognizes or appreciates. The greatest challenge of all is for you to concentrate your thinking single-mindedly on your goal and by the law of attraction, you will, you must inevitably draw into your life the people, circumstances and opportunities you need to achieve your goals.
Become A Living Magnet
Once you've mastered yourself and your thinking, you will become a living magnet for ideas and opportunities to become wealthy. It's worked for me and for every successful person I know. It will work for you if you'll begin today, now, this very minute, to think and talk about your dreams and goals as though they were already a reality. When you change your thinking, you will change your life. You will put yourself firmly on the road to financial independence.
Action Exercises
First, get up every morning a little bit earlier and plan your day in advance. Take some time to think about your goals and how you can best achieve them. This sets the tone for the whole day.
Second, reflect on the valuable lessons you are learning each day as you work toward your goals. Be prepared to correct your course and adjust your actions. Be absolutely convinced that you are moving rapidly toward your goals, no matter what happens temporarily on the outside.
Just hang in there!
Start Your Day Right
Take 30 minutes each morning to sit quietly and to reflect on your goals. You'll find when you read the biographies and autobiographies of successful men and women that almost everyone of them began their upward trajectory to success when they begin getting up early in the morning and spending time with themselves.
Feed Your Mind With Positive Ideas
This is called the Golden Hour. The first hour sets the tone for the day. The things that you do in the first hour prepare your mind and set you up for the entire day. During the first thirty to sixty minutes, take time to think and review your plans for the future.
Use Your Quiet Time Effectively
Here are four things that you can do during that quiet time in the morning. Number one is to review your plans for accomplishing your goals and change your plans if necessary.
Number two is think of better ways to accomplish your goals. As an exercise, assume that the way you're going about it is totally wrong and imagine going about it totally differently. What would you do different from what you're doing right now?
Number three, reflect on the valuable lessons that you have learned and are learning as you move toward your goals.
Practice Daily Visualization
Number four, calmly visualize your goal as a reality. Close your eyes, relax, smile, and see your goal as though it were already a reality. Rewrite your major goals everyday in the present tense. Rewrite them as though they already existed. Write "I earn X dollars." "I have a net worth of X." "I weigh a certain number of pounds." This exercise of writing and rewriting your goals everyday is one of the most powerful you will ever learn.
Fasten Your Seatbelt
Your life will start to take off at such a speed that you'll have to put on your seatbelt. Remember, the starting point for achieving financial success is the development of an attitude of unshakable confidence in yourself and in your ability to reach your goals. Everything we've talked about is a way of building up and developing your belief system until you finally reach the point where you are absolutely convinced that nothing can stop you from achieving what you set out to achieve.
Everything Counts
No one starts out with this kind of an attitude, but you can develop it using the law of accumulation. Everything counts. No efforts are ever lost. Every extraordinary accomplishment in the result of thousands of ordinary accomplishments that no one recognizes or appreciates. The greatest challenge of all is for you to concentrate your thinking single-mindedly on your goal and by the law of attraction, you will, you must inevitably draw into your life the people, circumstances and opportunities you need to achieve your goals.
Become A Living Magnet
Once you've mastered yourself and your thinking, you will become a living magnet for ideas and opportunities to become wealthy. It's worked for me and for every successful person I know. It will work for you if you'll begin today, now, this very minute, to think and talk about your dreams and goals as though they were already a reality. When you change your thinking, you will change your life. You will put yourself firmly on the road to financial independence.
Action Exercises
First, get up every morning a little bit earlier and plan your day in advance. Take some time to think about your goals and how you can best achieve them. This sets the tone for the whole day.
Second, reflect on the valuable lessons you are learning each day as you work toward your goals. Be prepared to correct your course and adjust your actions. Be absolutely convinced that you are moving rapidly toward your goals, no matter what happens temporarily on the outside.
Just hang in there!
Thursday, October 9, 2008
You Deserve to Be Happy
Achieving your own happiness is the best measure of how well you are living your life and enjoying your relationships. You can learn how to be happier and more fulfilled in everything you do.
Everyone is Different
Happiness in life is like a smorgasbord. If 100 people went to a smorgasbord and each put food on their plate in the quantity and mix that each felt would be most pleasing to him, every plate would be different. Even a husband and wife would go up to the smorgasbord and come back with plates that looked completely different. Happiness is the same way. Each person requires a particular combination of those ingredients to feel the very best about himself or herself.
Listen to Your Heart
Your mix is changing continually. If you went to the same smorgasbord every day for a year, you probably would come back with a different plateful of food each time. Each day-sometimes each hour-only you can tell what it takes to make you happy. Therefore, the only way to judge whether a job, a relationship, an investment, or any decision, is right for you is to get in touch with your feelings and listen to your heart.
Be True to Yourself
You're true to yourself only when you follow your inner light, when you listen to what Ralph Waldo Emerson called the "still, small voice within." You're being the very best person you can be only when you have the courage and the fortitude to allow your definition of happiness, whatever it may be, to be the guiding light of every part of your life.
There Are No Limits
A very important point on the subject of happiness is whether or not you feel that you "deserve" to be happy.
Accept the notion that you deserve all the happiness you can honestly attain through the application of your talents and abilities. The more you like and respect yourself, the more deserving you will feel of the good things in life. And the more deserving you feel, the more likely you will attain and hold on to the happiness you are working toward.
Make Happiness Your Key Measure
You should make happiness the organizing principle of your life. Compare every possible action and decision you make against your standard of happiness to see whether that action would make you happier or unhappier. Soon, you will discover that almost all of the problems in your life come from choices that you have made - or are currently making - that do not contribute to your happiness.
Pay the Price
Of course, there are countless times when you will have to do little things that don't make you happy along the way toward those larger things that make you very happy indeed. We call this paying the price of success in advance. You must pay your dues. Sometimes these interim steps don't make you happy directly, but the happiness you achieve from attaining your goal will be so great that it totally overwhelms the temporary inconveniences and dissatisfactions you have to endure in order to get there.
Action Exercises
First, accept that you deserve all the joy and happiness you can possibly achieve through your own efforts.
Second, make your own happiness the chief organizing principle of your life and judge everything against that standard.
Third, be willing to work hard and pay the price for the satisfaction and rewards you desire.
Always go the extra mile and your success will be assured.
Everyone is Different
Happiness in life is like a smorgasbord. If 100 people went to a smorgasbord and each put food on their plate in the quantity and mix that each felt would be most pleasing to him, every plate would be different. Even a husband and wife would go up to the smorgasbord and come back with plates that looked completely different. Happiness is the same way. Each person requires a particular combination of those ingredients to feel the very best about himself or herself.
Listen to Your Heart
Your mix is changing continually. If you went to the same smorgasbord every day for a year, you probably would come back with a different plateful of food each time. Each day-sometimes each hour-only you can tell what it takes to make you happy. Therefore, the only way to judge whether a job, a relationship, an investment, or any decision, is right for you is to get in touch with your feelings and listen to your heart.
Be True to Yourself
You're true to yourself only when you follow your inner light, when you listen to what Ralph Waldo Emerson called the "still, small voice within." You're being the very best person you can be only when you have the courage and the fortitude to allow your definition of happiness, whatever it may be, to be the guiding light of every part of your life.
There Are No Limits
A very important point on the subject of happiness is whether or not you feel that you "deserve" to be happy.
Accept the notion that you deserve all the happiness you can honestly attain through the application of your talents and abilities. The more you like and respect yourself, the more deserving you will feel of the good things in life. And the more deserving you feel, the more likely you will attain and hold on to the happiness you are working toward.
Make Happiness Your Key Measure
You should make happiness the organizing principle of your life. Compare every possible action and decision you make against your standard of happiness to see whether that action would make you happier or unhappier. Soon, you will discover that almost all of the problems in your life come from choices that you have made - or are currently making - that do not contribute to your happiness.
Pay the Price
Of course, there are countless times when you will have to do little things that don't make you happy along the way toward those larger things that make you very happy indeed. We call this paying the price of success in advance. You must pay your dues. Sometimes these interim steps don't make you happy directly, but the happiness you achieve from attaining your goal will be so great that it totally overwhelms the temporary inconveniences and dissatisfactions you have to endure in order to get there.
Action Exercises
First, accept that you deserve all the joy and happiness you can possibly achieve through your own efforts.
Second, make your own happiness the chief organizing principle of your life and judge everything against that standard.
Third, be willing to work hard and pay the price for the satisfaction and rewards you desire.
Always go the extra mile and your success will be assured.
Too Much to Do, Too Little Time
The most common form of stress that we experience is the feeling of being overwhelmed with far too much to do and having too little time to do it in. In fact, "time poverty" is the biggest single problem facing most managers in America today. We simply do not have enough time to fulfill all our responsibilities. Because of budget limitations, staff cutbacks, downsizing, and competitive pressures, individual managers are forced to take on more and more work, all of which appears to be indispensable to the smooth functioning of our company or department.
Become an Expert
The solution to this problem of work overload is for you to become an expert on time management. There is probably no other skill that you can learn that will give you a "bigger bang for the buck" than to become extremely knowledgeable and experienced in using time management practices.
Be Open to New Ideas
The most foolish manager of all is either the manager who feels that he has no time to learn about time management or, even worse, the manager who, while being overwhelmed with work, feels that he already knows all that he needs to know about the subject.
Never Stop Learning
The fact is that you can study time management and take time management courses for your entire business life and you will still never learn everything you need to know to get the most out of yourself while doing your job in the most efficient way.
The Keys to Time Management
The two indispensable keys to time management are:
1) the ability to set priorities; and
2) the ability to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing at a time.
Since there is never enough time to do everything that needs to be done, you must be continually setting priorities on your activities. Perhaps the very best question that you can memorize and repeat, over and over, is,
"what is the most valuable use of my time right now?"
The Best Question of All
This question, "what is the most valuable use of my time right now?" will do more to keep you on track, hour by hour, than any other single question in the list of time management strategies.
The natural tendency for all of us is to major in minors and to give in to the temptation to clear up small things first. After all, small things are easier and they are often more fun than the big, important things that represent the most valuable use of your time.
Start With Your Top Tasks
However, the self-discipline of organizing your work and focusing on your highest value tasks is the starting point of getting your time under control and lowering your stress levels.
Action Exercises
First, make a decision today to become an expert on time management. Read the books, listen to the audio programs, and take a time management course. Then, practice, practice, practice every day until you master time management skills.
Second, set clear priorities on your work each day, before you begin. Then, discipline yourself to start on your most important task and stay at that until it is complete. This will relieve much of your stress immediately.
Become an Expert
The solution to this problem of work overload is for you to become an expert on time management. There is probably no other skill that you can learn that will give you a "bigger bang for the buck" than to become extremely knowledgeable and experienced in using time management practices.
Be Open to New Ideas
The most foolish manager of all is either the manager who feels that he has no time to learn about time management or, even worse, the manager who, while being overwhelmed with work, feels that he already knows all that he needs to know about the subject.
Never Stop Learning
The fact is that you can study time management and take time management courses for your entire business life and you will still never learn everything you need to know to get the most out of yourself while doing your job in the most efficient way.
The Keys to Time Management
The two indispensable keys to time management are:
1) the ability to set priorities; and
2) the ability to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing at a time.
Since there is never enough time to do everything that needs to be done, you must be continually setting priorities on your activities. Perhaps the very best question that you can memorize and repeat, over and over, is,
"what is the most valuable use of my time right now?"
The Best Question of All
This question, "what is the most valuable use of my time right now?" will do more to keep you on track, hour by hour, than any other single question in the list of time management strategies.
The natural tendency for all of us is to major in minors and to give in to the temptation to clear up small things first. After all, small things are easier and they are often more fun than the big, important things that represent the most valuable use of your time.
Start With Your Top Tasks
However, the self-discipline of organizing your work and focusing on your highest value tasks is the starting point of getting your time under control and lowering your stress levels.
Action Exercises
First, make a decision today to become an expert on time management. Read the books, listen to the audio programs, and take a time management course. Then, practice, practice, practice every day until you master time management skills.
Second, set clear priorities on your work each day, before you begin. Then, discipline yourself to start on your most important task and stay at that until it is complete. This will relieve much of your stress immediately.
The Power of Personal Charisma
Become An Irresistible Person
Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines charisma as "a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure."
Develop Personal Magnetism
Charisma is also that special quality of magnetism that each person has and that each person uses to a certain degree. You have a special charisma to the people who look up to you, who respect and admire you, the members of your family and your friends and coworkers. Whenever and wherever a person feels a positive emotion toward another, he imbues that person with charisma, or attractiveness.
Project Yourself Positively
In trying to explain charisma, some people speak of an "aura." This aura is a light that is invisible to most people, but not to everyone, and that radiates out from a person and affects the people around that person in a positive or negative way. The halo around the heads of saints and mystics in many religious paintings was the artist's attempt to depict the light that people reported seeing around the heads of these men and women when they were speaking or praying, or in an intense emotional state.
Control the Impression You Make
You also have an aura around you that most people cannot see but that is there, nevertheless. This aura affects the way people react and respond to you, either positively or negatively. There is a lot that you can do, and a lot of good reasons for you to do it, to control this aura and make it work in your best interests.
Sell Your Way to the Top
If you're in sales, this aura, reflecting your level of charisma, can have a major impact on the way your prospects and customers treat you and deal with you. Top salespeople seem to be far more successful than the average salespeople in getting along with their customers. They're always more welcome, more positively received and more trusted than the others. They sell more, and they sell more easily. They make a better living, and they build better lives. Salespeople with charisma get far more pleasure out of their work and suffer far less from stress and rejection. The charismatic salesperson is almost invariably a top performer in his field and enjoys all the rewards that go with superior sales.
Influence People Around You
If you're in business, developing greater charisma can help you tremendously in working with your staff, your suppliers, your bankers, your customers and everyone else upon whom you depend for your success. People seem naturally drawn to those who possess charisma.They want to help them and support them. When you have charisma, people will open doors for you and bring you opportunities that otherwise would not have been available to you.
Enhance Your Personal Relationships
In your personal relationships, the quality of charisma can make your life more joyous, happier. People will naturally want to be around you. Members of your family and your friends will be far happier in your company, and you will have a greater influence on them, causing them to feel better about themselves and to do better at the important things in their lives.
Action Exercises
First, identify the people with whom you seem to have a lot of charisma - the people who know you, like you, respect you the most. How could you increase your charisma with these people?
Second, identify the people who have charisma to you, the people you most like and respect and admire. What is there about them that you could copy or emulate? If you think charisma, you'll have more of it.
Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines charisma as "a personal magic of leadership arousing special popular loyalty or enthusiasm for a public figure."
Develop Personal Magnetism
Charisma is also that special quality of magnetism that each person has and that each person uses to a certain degree. You have a special charisma to the people who look up to you, who respect and admire you, the members of your family and your friends and coworkers. Whenever and wherever a person feels a positive emotion toward another, he imbues that person with charisma, or attractiveness.
Project Yourself Positively
In trying to explain charisma, some people speak of an "aura." This aura is a light that is invisible to most people, but not to everyone, and that radiates out from a person and affects the people around that person in a positive or negative way. The halo around the heads of saints and mystics in many religious paintings was the artist's attempt to depict the light that people reported seeing around the heads of these men and women when they were speaking or praying, or in an intense emotional state.
Control the Impression You Make
You also have an aura around you that most people cannot see but that is there, nevertheless. This aura affects the way people react and respond to you, either positively or negatively. There is a lot that you can do, and a lot of good reasons for you to do it, to control this aura and make it work in your best interests.
Sell Your Way to the Top
If you're in sales, this aura, reflecting your level of charisma, can have a major impact on the way your prospects and customers treat you and deal with you. Top salespeople seem to be far more successful than the average salespeople in getting along with their customers. They're always more welcome, more positively received and more trusted than the others. They sell more, and they sell more easily. They make a better living, and they build better lives. Salespeople with charisma get far more pleasure out of their work and suffer far less from stress and rejection. The charismatic salesperson is almost invariably a top performer in his field and enjoys all the rewards that go with superior sales.
Influence People Around You
If you're in business, developing greater charisma can help you tremendously in working with your staff, your suppliers, your bankers, your customers and everyone else upon whom you depend for your success. People seem naturally drawn to those who possess charisma.They want to help them and support them. When you have charisma, people will open doors for you and bring you opportunities that otherwise would not have been available to you.
Enhance Your Personal Relationships
In your personal relationships, the quality of charisma can make your life more joyous, happier. People will naturally want to be around you. Members of your family and your friends will be far happier in your company, and you will have a greater influence on them, causing them to feel better about themselves and to do better at the important things in their lives.
Action Exercises
First, identify the people with whom you seem to have a lot of charisma - the people who know you, like you, respect you the most. How could you increase your charisma with these people?
Second, identify the people who have charisma to you, the people you most like and respect and admire. What is there about them that you could copy or emulate? If you think charisma, you'll have more of it.
Earn Ten Times As Much
Here's an exercise for you; imagine that it's possible for you to earn ten times your current annual wage. If you're earning $25,000, imagine for a moment that it's possible for you to earn $250,000, a 1000% increase.
Don't Sell Yourself Short
The first reaction of most people to that exercise is to smile briefly and then to begin thinking about why it isn't possible. One man said to me, "If you knew how many years it's taken for me to get to what I'm earning today you wouldn't be suggesting that I could earn ten times as much.
"Never A Good Excuse"
Mark Twain once wrote that there are a thousand excuses for every failure but never a good reason. The tragedy of the average American is that whereas his or her main preoccupation seems to be money, or the lack thereof, the average person has the inherent potential to earn far more than he or she is doing currently.
Is the manager earning $250,000 per year ten times as smart as the manager earning $25,000? 10 times as experienced? Does he or she work 10 times harder? Of course not. None of these are physically or mentally possible, but there are people in every business earning many times more than others with the same average age, experience and intelligence.
The Results Are In
In fact, a few years ago in New York, a thousand men and women were selected at random and tested for I.Q. Between the one having the highest I.Q. in this sample and the one with the lowest, there was a difference of only 2 1/2 times. But between the person earning the most, who by the way, was not the one with the highest I.Q. and the one earning the least, who was not the one with the lowest I.Q., there was a difference of 100X in income.
Action Exercises
First, identify the highest earning, most successful people in your field and find out what it is that they are doing differently from others who aren't doing as well. Copy them every day.
Second, set a goal to double your earnings over the next two or three years and then figure out how to accomplish that goal.
Don't Sell Yourself Short
The first reaction of most people to that exercise is to smile briefly and then to begin thinking about why it isn't possible. One man said to me, "If you knew how many years it's taken for me to get to what I'm earning today you wouldn't be suggesting that I could earn ten times as much.
"Never A Good Excuse"
Mark Twain once wrote that there are a thousand excuses for every failure but never a good reason. The tragedy of the average American is that whereas his or her main preoccupation seems to be money, or the lack thereof, the average person has the inherent potential to earn far more than he or she is doing currently.
Is the manager earning $250,000 per year ten times as smart as the manager earning $25,000? 10 times as experienced? Does he or she work 10 times harder? Of course not. None of these are physically or mentally possible, but there are people in every business earning many times more than others with the same average age, experience and intelligence.
The Results Are In
In fact, a few years ago in New York, a thousand men and women were selected at random and tested for I.Q. Between the one having the highest I.Q. in this sample and the one with the lowest, there was a difference of only 2 1/2 times. But between the person earning the most, who by the way, was not the one with the highest I.Q. and the one earning the least, who was not the one with the lowest I.Q., there was a difference of 100X in income.
Action Exercises
First, identify the highest earning, most successful people in your field and find out what it is that they are doing differently from others who aren't doing as well. Copy them every day.
Second, set a goal to double your earnings over the next two or three years and then figure out how to accomplish that goal.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Four Strategies to Find A New Business
There are four strategies you can use to find a new product or service to start or build your own business.
Search Your Own Field
The first strategy is to find a new product or service in your own field or skills. You may have a million dollar idea in your own mind. Many people have had the experience of having an idea for a product or service nag at them over and over again, and you keep pushing it away or ignoring it.
They say the average person has four ideas each year driving to and from work, any one of which would make them a millionaire if they would just follow it up. So look into your own field or skills. Look into your own mind. Look into your own ideas.
Keep Your Eyes Open
The second strategy is to find a new product or service while you travel. Keep your eyes open for opportunities.
A friend of a friend, who is now a millionaire, started his fortune when he traveled west and seeing a unique type of sport drink, he then got the exclusive rights to sell it in a large eastern city. From there, he expanded into restaurants, into real estate, and into apartments. He developed a high positive cash flow from his sport drink business that made him a millionaire.
Sometimes just finding a new product or service that is doing well somewhere else that hasn't come to your market area can make you wealthy.
Get the Rights to Sell It
Remember your objective, when you find a new product or service, is to acquire the rights to sell the product or service exclusively in your market area. Sometimes these rights are available for the asking.
A gentleman I know got the rights for Century 21 simply by going to the offices and asking for them when Century 21 was a young company. From that, he turned Century 21 into one of the most successful real estate franchises in his area. He is now worth millions of dollars, having taken the cash flow from Century 21 and channeled it into other real estate investments.
Be Sure it is Already Successful
Sometimes just asking for the right to sell it in your market area is all you have to do. Here's the key, though. Before you bring a new product or service back to your market area, be absolutely sure that it sells well somewhere else. Many people advertise products outside their market area because they are not selling inside their market area, so make very sure that the product is selling well already in other markets.
Look For Business Opportunities
Strategy number three is to keep your eyes and ears open and alert to new business opportunities occurring around you. Develop a money-making attitude. A friend of mine became very successful by building commercial property across the street from a new shopping center that was being developed. The traffic from the shopping center made his commercial space extremely valuable. He opened two businesses in it, and started his fortune. So be alert to what is going on around you.
Be Sure You Believe In Your Product
And strategy number four is this. Remember you will only be successful marketing and selling something that you believe in, use yourself and would recommend to your best friend.
Many times, people make a critical mistake of trying to sell a product or service that they themselves would neither use nor afford, nor would they recommend to someone else, but they think that other people will buy it even though they wouldn't.
You must really, really believe in the product. You must be excited about the product. You must believe that this product can enhance the life or work or play of someone else and then be eager to tell them about it.
You do not need to necessarily need to know everything about the product or even use the product that you are selling, because information is always available to do some research. But you do need to believe in the product and the service that you are providing.
Action Exercises
First, develop a new business mentality. Continually look around you for new products and services that people need, want and are willing to pay for.
Second, develop a money making attitude. Look around you for opportunities to sell products or services that are not currently being offered, at either higher prices or in greater quantities. The possibilities are everywhere.
Search Your Own Field
The first strategy is to find a new product or service in your own field or skills. You may have a million dollar idea in your own mind. Many people have had the experience of having an idea for a product or service nag at them over and over again, and you keep pushing it away or ignoring it.
They say the average person has four ideas each year driving to and from work, any one of which would make them a millionaire if they would just follow it up. So look into your own field or skills. Look into your own mind. Look into your own ideas.
Keep Your Eyes Open
The second strategy is to find a new product or service while you travel. Keep your eyes open for opportunities.
A friend of a friend, who is now a millionaire, started his fortune when he traveled west and seeing a unique type of sport drink, he then got the exclusive rights to sell it in a large eastern city. From there, he expanded into restaurants, into real estate, and into apartments. He developed a high positive cash flow from his sport drink business that made him a millionaire.
Sometimes just finding a new product or service that is doing well somewhere else that hasn't come to your market area can make you wealthy.
Get the Rights to Sell It
Remember your objective, when you find a new product or service, is to acquire the rights to sell the product or service exclusively in your market area. Sometimes these rights are available for the asking.
A gentleman I know got the rights for Century 21 simply by going to the offices and asking for them when Century 21 was a young company. From that, he turned Century 21 into one of the most successful real estate franchises in his area. He is now worth millions of dollars, having taken the cash flow from Century 21 and channeled it into other real estate investments.
Be Sure it is Already Successful
Sometimes just asking for the right to sell it in your market area is all you have to do. Here's the key, though. Before you bring a new product or service back to your market area, be absolutely sure that it sells well somewhere else. Many people advertise products outside their market area because they are not selling inside their market area, so make very sure that the product is selling well already in other markets.
Look For Business Opportunities
Strategy number three is to keep your eyes and ears open and alert to new business opportunities occurring around you. Develop a money-making attitude. A friend of mine became very successful by building commercial property across the street from a new shopping center that was being developed. The traffic from the shopping center made his commercial space extremely valuable. He opened two businesses in it, and started his fortune. So be alert to what is going on around you.
Be Sure You Believe In Your Product
And strategy number four is this. Remember you will only be successful marketing and selling something that you believe in, use yourself and would recommend to your best friend.
Many times, people make a critical mistake of trying to sell a product or service that they themselves would neither use nor afford, nor would they recommend to someone else, but they think that other people will buy it even though they wouldn't.
You must really, really believe in the product. You must be excited about the product. You must believe that this product can enhance the life or work or play of someone else and then be eager to tell them about it.
You do not need to necessarily need to know everything about the product or even use the product that you are selling, because information is always available to do some research. But you do need to believe in the product and the service that you are providing.
Action Exercises
First, develop a new business mentality. Continually look around you for new products and services that people need, want and are willing to pay for.
Second, develop a money making attitude. Look around you for opportunities to sell products or services that are not currently being offered, at either higher prices or in greater quantities. The possibilities are everywhere.
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