Success University 02 (Nov 08 - Jan 09)

[winston]

Positive Self-Talk for Good Health: It's Good Business! By Mary Jane (MJ) Paris

Positive Self-Talk for Good Health: It's Good Business!

Zig Ziegler’s terrific book, “Success for Dummies,” has had a tremendous impact on my life. I first encountered the book when I began teaching “Introduction to Business” at Housatonic Community College in Bridgeport, CT, a few years ago. It continues to be part of the curriculum and used in conjunction with the text book. At the beginning of each semester the students regularly question the reason for having to purchase and use such a book. By the end of each semester, after reading, writing a personal reflection, and discussing each chapter, the great majority of students remark how positive an experience it was and how much they learned about what it takes to be a success in life. They also saw the correlation between getting control of our personal lives and its affect on careers.

In Chapter10, Zig reinforces the fact that positive self-talk is good for your health! We know that there is scientific evidence that validates this premise! Saying positive, encouraging things to your self can have significant influence on how we behave. Of course, the flip side – saying negative, devaluing things can also have a great impact!

What are you saying to yourself? How is the “chatter” in your head affecting your attitude, your behavior, and those around you at home and in the workplace?

Since we spend most of our waking hours in the workplace, being aware of our “chatter” can make a difference (positively or negatively), not only for us personally, but on the workplace environment and, ultimately, on personal and business results.

In my workshops and programs, I usually ask three opening questions:
1. What business are you in?
2. Who’s really driving your business?
3. How can you create a more positive workplace?

How did you respond? Did you answer questions #1 with the product or service you provide? Did you answer question #2 with the word “money?” Did you answer question #3 with either your name or those of your upper management? If you did, you are not alone!

In today’s global workplace, many employees are being stretched to the max! (You may be one of them.) They are doing more with less, leaving them feeling stressed, overwhelmed and disengaged – burned out – leading to lower productivity, internal/external customer service issues, and turnover, all of which impacts career and bottom-line results. Did you know it costs about 250% of salary (recruiting, training, operational issues) each time an employee turns over?

I work with many “for-profit” and “not-for-profit” businesses/organizations who understand that we are all in the “people” business and how important it is to strengthen the (hard and soft) skills of those who are really running their business – the employees. This is the important “P2P” connection principle that I regularly talk about…

The partnership between managers and employees has a great impact on the workplace environment. When the manager/supervisor’s attitude sets a negative tone and creates an environment that is negative and toxic, employees tend to be negative, feel under-developed, disengaged, de-motivated, unproductive, and deliver poor customer service. Employee morale is low, turnover is high and business results suffer!

Starting today – shake things up by realizing how you are talking to yourself! What is the “chatter” in your ear? Is it positive or negative? According to Zig, self-talking takes only a couple of minutes at the start of your day and each evening before retiring.

Now let’s get started! Square those shoulders, look your self in the eye, and quietly but firmly say aloud:
• I (say your name), am a highly motivated, health-conscious individual who is committed to taking care of my health now so that I will enjoy a high-quality of life all my life.
• I am committed to a physical activity program that will increase my energy level and keep my weight under control.
• I will talk positively about my health and think positive health thoughts.
• I will eat sensibly.
• I will regularly get physical exams as a step to preventing serious problems, and I understand that my physical health has a direct bearing on my happiness, my attitude, my family, my job success, my peace of mind, my finances, and my corporate or business success.

Source: “Success for Dummies,” Zig Ziegler, Wiley Publishing, Inc., Hoboken, NJ, 1998.

Remember…The eyes are the windows to the soul. You can’t look yourself in the eye, make these statements with sincerity and conviction, and not have them make a Positive Impact on your personal life, career, the workplace environment and results!

A Positive Workplace Means Business! It Just Makes Cent$! TM


Author's Bio

Mary Jane (MJ) Paris, Founder and President of Positive Impact Consulting Services, LLC in Shelton, CT, brings a broad base of experience to her practice gained from more than 25 years in people management, sales, retail banking, training, recruiting, coaching, project management, event planning and community leadership.

With a focus on “The Positive Workplace,” MJ and Positive Impact specialize in leadership and professional development programs, speaking engagements, and small business coaching that bring “Positive Energy” to your workplace. Engage employees, maximize productivity, improve customer service and business results…

[winston]

10 Tips for Increasing Your Effectiveness (No Matter What You're Trying to Do) By Melissa McCreery, PH.D.

No matter how big our dreams, our time and resources are limited. Moving forward effectively is key. Once you've committed to accomplishing something and putting in the effort, you'll want to get the biggest return on your investment that you can, in the most efficient way. Here are ten of my best tips for increasing your effectiveness and achieving your goals–whatever they may be.

1.Be clear on your final outcome

This may sound obvious, but it's surprisingly easy to skip this step. Be as clear as you can about what it is that you are working to accomplish. Be sure you know exactly what success will look like and how you will know when you get there. Being "more" of something is not a clear goal–no matter what you're trying to be more of (more healthy, more patient, more relaxed, more productive . . .). Set a concrete measurable goal and you'll know when you've arrived.

2.Create a timeline and set milestones along the way

Set a date for achieving your outcome. Schedule "milestones" for yourself. In other words, identify the dates that you plan to achieve specific steps towards your goal. This will help you stay on track and recognize the need to make adjustments (if you are having difficulty achieving the milestones you have identified) as you go along.

3.Use deadlines to stay on track

Eliminate as much uncertainty and vagueness as you can. If you have a difficult step to take or are finding yourself procrastinating, set yourself a deadline. You might decide to write three pages of your novel before 3pm, get to the gym three times before the weekend, or get your holiday card list organized by a certain date. Deadlines can be particularly useful when you are struggling to make a decision and are feeling stuck. Set the deadline and commit to simply moving forward by making a decision before the deadline arrives.

4.Rein in your perfectionist

Nothing will get us off track faster or derail us entirely like our inner perfectionist. Perfection is something we can rarely achieve and it's often not necessary. The belief that we have to get something perfect before we can consider taking another step is a great way to never get anywhere. Work at developing an awareness of when your desire for excellence is working for you and when it has surpassed any definition of usefulness.

There is a concept called the Pareto Principle you might want to consider. The Pareto Principle states that 20% of our efforts produce 80% of our results. The additional 80% of our efforts will only yield an additional 20% of results. According to the Pareto Principle, the first thrust of our effort is the most productive use of our time. Spending time on the back end working to make something "perfect" is often time intensive and nonproductive.

5.Create an environment for success

Surround yourself with what you need to stay on track, believe in yourself, and stay focused on your goal. If you are trying to lose weight, don't fill your kitchen with junk food. If you are starting a new business, carve out the office space you need and surround yourself with people who encourage and believe in what you are doing. If you are cutting back on spending, don't spend your free time at the mall. Instead make sure you have frequent reminders of why your hard work is going to pay off for you.

6.Get support

Perhaps the most important part of your environment is the people in it. Create a support system. Find people who know about your goal and believe in you–a cheering section. Ideally you'll want to include people who are working toward the same or a similar goal. This isn't about creating competition but support. You want to have someone in your corner who will remember why your goal is important to you on those dark days when you can't. You want a support system who believes in your ability to succeed and will remind you of that when you need it the most.

7.Be accountable

I don't know why, but many of us do better when we are accountable to someone else. Telling someone else that you have committed to do and knowing that they will check in on you and ask you how it went is a POWERFUL motivator.

8.Be flexible

Life happens and things don't always go the way you planned. Sometimes what you learn from taking action is that you are going to have to try a different plan. If something doesn't go well, don't view it as a failure, view it as data. Use what you learned to readjust, realign, and remap your course if necessary.

9.Find a mentor

There is no need to reinvent the wheel. Chances are, whatever you are trying to do, someone has succeeded at something similar or knows something you don't. Even Olympic athletes–the best in the world at what they do –have coaches. Finding someone who has the expertise to help you soar can often help you achieve what you want to more quickly and with more ease.

10.Celebrate

High-achievers can be tempted to skip this step. It's easy to get so used to having your nose to the grindstone that you've planned your next project before you've completed your current one. DO NOT skip celebrating the milestones and goals you achieve. The pause you take to congratulate yourself and let the good stuff sink in is part of what will energize you, motivate you, and grow your confidence for your future endeavors. Plus, standing on the mountain top and really seeing how far you've climbed, is an incredible, soul-feeding experience.


Author's Bio
Melissa McCreery, PH.D.

[kennynah]

9.Find a mentor

i find this to be the biggest challenge.... "gui ren" is what i term these mentors to be...

[iam802]

I have find lots of mentors here in Huatopedia

Yes, finding the right mentor is tough. But, once you have find it... one can breeze through so many things easily.

[winston]

Your Questions Make You... Or Break You by Mike Brescia

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Today's Empowering Quote
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"The smart ones ask when they don't know. And sometimes when they do."
--Malcolm Forbes

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Today's Empowering Question
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"What would help me to ____?"

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Today's Fast Session
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Questioning is one of the two main functions of the mind. The other being affirming old and new beliefs. What do I mean?

Well, all day long as information is pumped at you, you're evaluating it so you can decide which of it you deem necessary to focus on. You need to have a feeling about what everything coming at you means so you can take the most appropriate action or none at all.

Much of this questioning is unconscious. For example, if you're driving and a man steps in front of your car, you don't have to take a lot of time and say, "What does this mean and what should I do?" No, that should be automatic. As soon as you realize what's happening, you slam on the brakes or swerve, avoiding a collision.

And it's our level of awareness of what's around us that determines what we do...Our habitual questions, conscious and unconscious (literally automatic).

If you thought I was incorrect about the last series of events being automatic, you're right.

You get a gold star!

See, many people would "freeze up" and slam into the person. Others would miss the brake and hit the gas. Ooooh! Others would brake and keep the wheel straight. Some might swerve away from the man only to hit the oncoming traffic, or the other way... into other people.

It just depends on your awareness. And your conditioning. Ever see people who just back right out of their driveways into oncoming traffic without looking? It's amazing to watch.

No awareness of what's going on around them! Their minds are somewhere else completely.

The human mind has pictures and words flying in and out all the time, and it keeps most of us from being aware of what's going on around us. Many people are in a literal daze most of the time.

Let's separate you from the multitudes, shall we?

How? I'm glad you asked.

Without getting lost in the minutiae (I don't want to home in on driving skills), let's stay general and you can focus in on it yourself.

What separates the winners in most situations from the losers?

Most people's moment-by-moment questions just "fly in" to their heads all throughout the day... while many truly happy and successful people have a trained, practiced habit of asking empowering, course correcting questions all the time.

The sad truth, though, is that of those people, most of them came about this good mental habit by accident. They don't know how they got that way; the same way the larger group, the "negative" thinkers got their habitual thought patterns. The danger of this ignorance is that you can be good at some skills and simply horrible at others. So it's important to know how you succeed in one area of life so you can duplicate it in others.

Are you starting to see the life altering power of controlling your automatic questioning mechanism?

Good, because positive thinking is good, but you have to be able to do it automatically without "thinking" to be a true positive thinker and to able to reap the benefits.

A lot of people in the personal development field like to put their twist on how positive thinking doesn't work.

It does work...

But like anything else, if you don't practice it, you stop doing it. And since any kind of thinking, positive or not, is something that is going on every second of the day (except in our deepest levels of sleep), you really need to practice it for you to develop mastery.

So positive thinking, while great, can't keep you from getting sidetracked and backing out of your driveway into oncoming traffic. That comes from awareness and getting the right mental questions anchored into your nervous system.

How?

By practice. So don't think that I'm going to tell you that you can be a master of this in one day. One day goes by, you're still getting rotten results with people and projects and then you'd be even more cynical than before.

I'll give you an example of how our questioning dictates what results we get. This weekend, my step-daughter dropped a glass in the sink and glass went everywhere. The probability was that it was on the floor, too, since it was quite an explosion.

She had bare feet and was in no hurry to get some shoes on before the cleaning began. So I ASKED her if she thought some glass might have gotten on the floor. She said what you'd expect from a thirteen-year-old...

"I don't know."

You see, at thirteen, references for many things in life are limited. So questions like the ones I asked her don't pop in as easily or even at all.

The trouble is, hundreds of millions of people who are much older still fail to even think of asking these most basic of questions most of the time (yours truly included). If you aren't habitually (and eventually, unconsciously) asking the most empowering questions of yourself, you're going to be picking a lot of glass out of your feet... or just making the same mistakes over and over again... ...Living a life with little joy, peace or accomplishment.

Take heart. You can learn to do this, habitually. And with practice, it will get wired into your mind and body. You'll avoid making stupid mistakes at the simplest of tasks.

It's not easy, but it's simple to do. And there is a difference.

There are thousands of empowering questions you can use in your daily moments. Empowering questions don't only take
the shape of the ones that you see at the top of my daily message.

They can be as simple as, "Could shards of glass have fallen onto the floor?" And, "How can I hold this so it won't fall?"

And please don't think this is too basic, in the scope of the challenges you face each day, to make a difference. Don't, Don't, Don't!

The awareness of this and then working at mastering it helped me become the highest paid person in the world in my field, and it can provide many other benefits for you.

At work, you can ask questions like, "What is he thinking right now?" If you don't, you can't anticipate the right thing to say NEXT! "Is it going to rain today?" is a question that many people don't ask and end up getting wet. Because if the answer is maybe, you can bring an umbrella. Not even being aware enough to ask the question, means higher cleaning bills, shoes that need to be replaced sooner, poor image to others...

...and a poor self image.

"I can't do anything right. Why am I so stupid?" become the questions that you come up with instead of ones that could turn your life around in a flash.

We've only covered the most elementary building blocks of question asking, but can't you feel a little of the power already? Hey, this helped take me from living on four wheels to standing on two feet.

Let's pick this up next time. There's more...

Lot's more.

[winston]

Good Things Come to Those Who Ask - By Jack Canfield ***

Asking for what you need is probably the most underutilized tool for people. And yet, amazing requests have been granted to people simply because they've asked for it! Whether it's money, information, support, assistance, or time, most people are afraid to ask for what they need in order to make their dreams come true.

They might be afraid of looking needy, ignorant, helpless, or even greedy. More than likely, though, it is the fear of rejection that is holding them back. Even though they are afraid to hear the word no, they're already saying it to themselves by not asking!

Do you ask for what you want? Are you afraid of rejection?

Consider this: Rejection is just a concept. There is really no such thing as rejection! You're not any worse off by hearing no than you were before you asked. You didn't have what you asked for before you asked and you still don't, so what did you lose? Being rejected doesn't hold you back from anything. Only YOU hold yourself back. If you are told no, ask for what you'd have to do to get it, or ask again at another time when the circumstances have changed. Ask if they know someone else who might say yes. When you realize that there's no merit to rejection, you'll feel more comfortable asking for things. But you may need a bit of help learning how to ask for what you want.

First, ask as though you expect to get it. Be confident in your request coming from a perspective that there's no reason why you wouldn't get it. If they say no, you can ask them why, or what you would need to do to get a yes. You might need to form a better business plan before you will get a loan. You might need to take a course in computers before you will get a promotion. You might need to spend more quality time with your family before you will get the loving support you need. By getting this feedback you are able to make adjustments and ask again with better chances of getting a yes.

Second, assume you can get what you want if you only ask for it. You want a window seat? Assume all you have to do is ask for it. You want an ocean view? Cheaper tickets? A scholarship? A better deal? Just ask for it as if that's all you have to do to get it.

And finally, be specific about what you want or need. Do you want to make $5,000 more a year? Then don't just ask for a raise. Ask for $5,000 more a year. Vague requests produce vague results. Don't just ask for more time with your spouse; ask for a date on Friday night. Don't ask for help on a project; ask for what you want that person to take care of.

Getting a good perspective on rejection and learning how to ask will make a world of difference for you as you work toward your goals. Practice asking and you'll get very good at it! You'll even speed your progress by getting what you need, or improving yourself in order to get it later.

Make a list of what you need to ask for in all areas of your life, then start asking!

[winston]

Turning Anxiety into Excitement: A Tip for Stage Fright, Fear of Public Speaking, or General Anxiety - By Sandra Zimmer ***

Human emotional energy either contracts or expands. When your energy is contracting, you feel negative emotions such as fear and anxiety, anger and sadness. But when your energy is expanding, you feel positive emotions like excitement, joy, love, and power.

In this article, I'll focus on anxiety vs. excitement. Anxiety is the contraction state where you think you don't have any power, possibilities are limited, and things will probably go badly. Excitement is the expansion state of being energized for action and creating new possibilities.

Whether you are anxious about public speaking, sharing your ideas in a meeting, meeting new people in a group, or interviewing for a job, anxiety can be a doorway to energy, expansion, and excitement. The secret to using anxiety is in how you focus your attention into the tension.

Try this. Sit or lie down comfortably. Take a few deep breaths and follow the air as it goes in and out your nose. This will allow you to place attention in your body. Then, instead of focusing on your tension and thinking it is bad, focus on the tension and feel it fully. That is, feel the tension and go deeply into it. Dive your mental focus into the area of your body where you sense the most anxiety. Follow it down to the bottom of the feelings, and suddenly a shift happens! The tension dissolves, and an internal space opens up that now feels free and energized.

You will most likely jump up from your chair or bed and race to accomplish something. I usually get great ideas as soon as the tension of anxiety shifts to excitement. Amazing!

The deal is not to feel the fear and do it anyway. The real magic is to feel the fear, feel the fear, and keep feeling it until it shifts into excitement, and then you will be energized to do the thing because you want to.

[millionairemind]

Turning Anxiety into Excitement: A Tip for Stage Fright, Fear of Public Speaking, or General Anxiety - By Sandra Zimmer ***

[b]

I found in my previous career that to do a good presentation, just focus on the subject.. and run in your head that all your audience are either naked or small children....this will keep you relaxed...

This helps me everytime to sail thro' a powerpoint presentation

[winston]

If it is a one on one, I will look for an imperfection on the guy and focus on that imperfection. Sometimes, it can be very intimidating to be talking to a billionaire

If it is a presentation, it has to be always "practise, practise and practise" for me.

[millionairemind]

W - You are connected..

I have never met a billionaire face 2 face.. millionaires yes... but not a billionaire..

The highest level presentation I have ever done was to the CEO of my former company. I know he is a multi millionaire (just base on the realized stock options )

Yes, the practice part is very important. Run it over in your head many times as well as in actual practice sessions with an audience whom you know prior to the actual presentation. Visualize in your head a successful presentation, if that presentation is very very impt.