Your life is a business, and you are the entrepreneur. It has to generate profit, grow continuously and be successful.
Invest in yourself
You should treat your life as you treat a business.
It does not matter what your goals are.
Your life is a business, and you are the entrepreneur. It has to generate profit, grow continuously and be successful.
Management is an essentially human activity. Thus, failures are the result of weaknesses.
The techniques used in large companies are no different from those used in our personal lives.
A student once asked Andrew Carnegie, the “King of Steel”, what he had done to become so successful.
He smiled and answered.
“I simply planned it.”
Naturally, if you do not plan, you will obviously:
- Make more mistakes.
- Waste time.
- Lose track of what generates value, what makes a difference.
- Invest in the wrong people and risk falling into demotivation.
Plan what you want…
Every success begins with organised knowledge to achieve a well-defined goal.
There is a difference between what you can do and what you want to do.
To define what you can do, you must consider your ability to endure the pain caused by the task at hand, without having to put it off, dodge it or make excuses.
Challenges with manageable difficulty, as explained by the Yerkes-Dodson law, should be a maximum of four per cent above your current capacity. It must be something realistic. It must match the indicators you use to deal with your obstacles, the strategy to tackle them and the limits you set for each action.
Ask yourself: what is the smallest step I can take without going backwards?
The things you seek lead to beliefs. If you believe, you achieve.
To plan what you seek means: doing more with less effort, being happier, maintaining the energy to overcome failures.
And also what you do not want
Dr Lair Ribeiro states in his book “Viajando no tempo”: “A part of you dies every time you say yes when you wanted to say no.”
Sometimes, it is simply difficult to say no. This is mostly due to the impact of saying no on the reputation we wish to keep. It is not so much due to the actual effects of saying no.
If there are situations that could leave yourself trapped in a corner, think in advance about what to do. Think of a friendly response and have it ready to use in your mind.
The peanut salesman
While passing by an important bank, a friend meets another friend he has not seen for a long time.
The warm hug was followed by the usual questions: family, life, walks down memory lane…
The friend who was passing by lamented his bad luck. The other friend spoke of his achievements. His expression reflected his success.
This well-to-do sold peanuts by the doorstep of that bank, making enough money to pay his bills and even save a little.
Just as soon as he had the word once again, the unfortunate friend asked the well-to-do friend for a small loan.
The well-to-do friend, with great regret in his eyes, answered: “What you ask is not much next to the friendship we have, but unfortunately I cannot help you. Under the contract I have with the bank, I cannot lend money and they cannot sell peanuts”.
Planning means having an answer to what is going to happen.
It means:
- Anticipating the future.
- Being able to fix today something that may not work tomorrow.
- Ceasing the waste of resources on unimportant things.
- Setting priorities and targets.
- Programming yourself for success.
Plan ahead, so that your motivation does not drop and you are not forced to back down.
Plan the action
If it is true that our lives are not measured in years, but in joys, then you must make plans so that your motivation does not drop.
In this sense, it is more important to consider your individual characteristics than the quality of the plan.
Reflect on each of the actions to be carried out:
What positive emotions will you feel when you perform a task?
What tasks, situations or goals make you happy?
Which tasks will cause you discomfort? And why?
What emotion is associated with each task?
Understanding and working with the continuous use of creative imagination, in order to make opportunities out of threats that cause you discomfort, to turn what is difficult and painful into a challenge, is a habit that facilitates action and paves the way with positive emotions. These, in turn, induce happiness. They keep your spirits up. They allow you to stay optimistic and motivated.
This does not imply we should be doing whatever we please. It implies we should do what we really need to do and can do.
Make it easy
If you wish to make any given plan easier and more feasible, you need a special ability: to develop a habit out of anything that is particularly difficult or painful, and to know how to work on your ability to endure pain, so that you feel pleasure in the effort itself, learning to value the courage to get it done.
The first step is to know what needs to be done very clearly. If your car needs repairs, you need to drive to the garage knowing what is wrong with it. If you do not know it, you should ask the mechanic to diagnose the issue.
The second step is to make an association with habits that are part of a routine you already have, in order to facilitate the creation of a new routine. For example: if you want to start exercising, you can exercise a little bit as you take a shower, before you go to the gym.
Creative use of imagination will make difficult things feasible, shifting the focus from threats and pains to opportunities. With imagination at our disposal, we can focus on meeting our real needs, overcoming inertia and obstacles.
The third step is to make a commitment to what you want to do, and to create a trigger that can be set off by determination. For example: let us suppose that you wish to take reading as a habit, and you have chosen to do this after lunch. Once you have brushed your teeth, you must put your book on the table and read as many pages or lines as your brain can handle, without losing focus. Then you can play a game or engage in some other pleasurable activity as a reward.
We prove our faith in the future by the plans we make in the present.
(Paul Holdcraft)
Prospecting in life
If you wish to know what makes something better or of higher quality, ask the relevant person. Sounds easy, right?
Well, it is not easy.
Most people do not know what exactly they want.
We need to be skilful to get good information.
To know what others value the most, trying to get to know them better than they know themselves, is a permanent task.
Research everything you can. Find out how they live, what their hopes and fears are:
- What are their pains, needs and expectations, and which of these are most important to them?
- Can you meet some of these needs?
- How do you exceed their expectations, so as to truly make an impression?
Planning the action
Planning is easy.
Few people know how to plan well.
Planning the action is an art.
A valuable plan stimulates the desire to get into action and experience something different.
A valuable plan is based on people’s virtues, not their faults.
It has clear, achievable, measurable goals, and there is a reward for each one.
It has goals with focus.
It has goals that contribute to the final objective.
It has goals worth celebrating.
It also has intermediate goals, that allow you to “recharge your batteries” with each achievement.
They are flexible. They adapt to the circumstances.
They require you to advance only as quickly as your pace allows you to. They do not induce overstepping.
They adapt to personal and professional life.
They respect everyone’s values and learning styles.
A valuable plan aims to turn expectations into pleasant surprises.
It´s from the pleasure during the journey itself, that becomes the energy necessary not to give up comes .
Reaching the goals gives you a sense of victory. You hear the triumphant music that the gods play to a hero’s welcome. You feel strong enough to take on the next battle.
When planning goes wrong
Planning leads to expectations. The better the planning, the greater the motivation. If you do not succeed for some reason, frustration can lead to suffering. This can open the door to limiting beliefs.
The best way to avoid this is a so-called “contingency plan”, in which expectations of failure and alternative solutions ensure that frustration will not reach harmful levels.
Think about what might happen if everything goes wrong. What if the outcome is not the desired one? Will you get a second chance? Do you accept the worst-case scenario? Or do you have an alternative? You can prepare your contingency plan based on the answers to these questions.
On the trading floor of life
Have you ever bought shares on the stock market? Did you sell them? Did they go up or down?
Just like shares on the stock market, our plans, our mood and our lives have their own ups and downs.
Planning does not mean that we can predict the future or foresee every possible event. Previous success and experience do not ensure a smooth future.
Get ready for the bass
Avoid being caught off-guard, falling into depression, feeling like a failure or feeling like you hit a dead end. Prepare yourself for times of crisis. Have a contingency plan that allows you to anticipate the worst-case scenario.
If persistence is fundamental and depends on motivation, do everything you can not to allow this motivation to slip away.
It is time to think.
Firstly, make sure you understand what is going on.
Do not attempt to justify yourself or blame others. Take conscious responsibility.
Start by admitting that the worst is a possibility. Anything better than that is a profit. Things are never as bad as they seem.
Do not make decisions if you are tired or nervous.
The source of all success is the ability to turn every mistake—even a temporary defeat—into a learning experience. Never into failure.
You cannot change the facts, but you can change the interpretations. You cannot avoid pain, but you can avoid suffering.
Risks can be lowered by having a contingency plan.
What makes the difference
The secret to success is to do the common things uncommonly well.
(John Rockefeller)
I used to work for a company whose call centre had thirty telephone operators. One of them charmed all the customers, according to several of these very customers.
This operator had standard performance. Nothing seemed to set her aside from her peers. Even the tone of her voice was similar.
Finally, the team monitoring the call centre found out that she was the only one to smile when she answered the phone.
Remember: smile when you answer the phone. Your caller will sense it.
Smile whenever you can, provided it is convenient, but be careful. I am not talking about an insincere smile, or a subservient one, or the smile of an artificial persona that some artists stubbornly turn into a brand.
I am talking about a sincere smile, like the smile of someone who was just given a gift they longed for.
If you are genuinely interested in the person in front of you, your greeting will convey this. Your handshake will be firm, the look in your eyes and your voice will change accordingly.
It does not matter what you know or what you do. What matters is how you do it.
To do it right, you have to be motivated. And you will only be motivated when you can have fun while you are doing it.
That will get you better results.
That will allow you to make history.
That will afford you the enthusiasm. The driving force that will brighten your life and infect everyone around you.
The secret to success is to do the common things uncommonly well. (John Rockefeller)
After all, if you want to get to a place where most people never get to, you need to do something that most people do not do.
Write down what you have planned
There is no magic that gives us what we desire merely because we wish for it.
Now that you have made your plan, you should write it down.
Writing it down helps to consolidate ideas, to identify what builds value. It allows you to see both the big picture and the little details.
The treasure map
Charles Fox was a foresighted man, the kind of man who would keep the screws when discarding a fridge. One day, as he was tidying up the attic, he discovered a jigsaw puzzle that he had kept since childhood.
Then, he hurried over to our house. He cheerfully held the set under his arm.
It was a “puzzle”, with several thousand pieces. It was no longer in its original box.
It was a real puzzle.
I took it to the garage, where we had a big table, and began putting the pieces together.
This was such a difficult puzzle that it inspired my family to help me. They were helpful people.
It took months to put the last piece in its proper place. We celebrated as if it was our great brainchild.
My father quickly took a photo.
Years later, my son found the disassembled puzzle. He put everything together in a mere two days. I was amazed at how quickly he had managed to do it.
When I got closer, I noticed the photograph my father had taken next to it. This explained my son’s swiftness.
A plan draws a roadmap that facilitates execution, speeds up the process and allows for diligent revision.
A plan should have: firstly, the objectives, then the past history, then the strategy that indicates how the objectives are to be achieved, what resources (human and material) are to be used, the milestones, the intermediate goals, the deadlines for completion and the cost.
As it has been mentioned before, the whole process must be outlined taking into account your ability to endure the pain caused by the tasks to be performed, leaving no room to put it off, dodge it or make excuses.
The plan applies to both your business and your career.
A plan should be ideally written for five years, or three years at the very least.
It has to be drawn so as to allow it to be summarised. This allows it to be read frequently.
It should always be accompanied by a list of the values you wish to embrace as your life philosophy.
It must be accompanied by a list of standards by which the planned actions will be measured.
People who best their better selves achieve better results.