Perfection Kills Momentum!

True confession: I am a recovering perfectionist.
I say “recovering” because perfectionism is something you never fully overcome. Instead, you learn how to cope with your desire for perfection. At least that’s how it is for me.
Perfectionism is the #1 enemy of momentum.
If I had a dime for every time a new/old business owner fussed and fiddled over every minute detail, stalling their launch for weeks and even months, well…(let’s just say there are a lot more perfectionists out there than you’d think).
A few lessons about perfection…
Okay…if you are a fighter pilot or a neurosurgeon, ignore this Momentum Monday post: perfection is a must for you. Everyone else: ask yourself “what is the purpose, the benefit if you will, of working toward perfection?”
Just a wild guess, but perfectionism is an excellent disguise for self-sabotage. Think about it. You’re nervous about doing something new and the only way to control it is to fiddle and fret over the details. Even details that don’t matter.
“No, no, no,” you say. “I just like things to be perfect. It’s just the way I am.”
Really? That’s your standard? Anything less sucks? Because few things in life are perfect – our children, relationships, family – but we love and accept them just fine.
Coping with perfection and building momentum

#1: Recognize perfectionism – Acknowledge when perfectionism is holding you back, when you use it as a method of coping with fear, when your “higher standard” isn’t serving a purpose except to stall your forward momentum.
#2: Go with “Good is good enough” – That’s right –it’s time to settle for good, instead of perfect. From one recovering perfectionist to another, trust me – your good is everyone else’s perfection.
#3: Just get M-O-V-I-N-G – And THEN fiddle and fuss to your heart’s content. Take a lesson from facebook and just get it out there and change and adapt according to what the market wants, not what you think the market wants. It’s easier to correct course when in motion than to get moving!
#4: Get to the ESSENCE – Meaning focus on the core of what you are trying to accomplish. Start by getting the core functionality right and then add the bells and whistles.
#5: Focus on the BIG PICTURE – Your job is to get the big picture right and let others help you fill in the details. Often perfectionists struggle with letting go and waste enormous amounts of time and momentum trying to figure out every single detail.
Momentum Monday Challenge: Put something out there that isn’t perfect. Maybe it’s a contact/connection a plan something just do it.
Trust me – it’s not as bad as you think it will be and often an honest mistake is a *perfect* conversation starter.
Your Coach,
Bill

Five Ingredients Of Personal Growth

Five Ingredients of Personal Growth

As any farmer knows, the growth of a crop only happens when the right ingredients are present. To harvest plentiful fields, the farmer has to begin by planting the right seed in rich topsoil where sunlight and water can help the seed to sprout, mature, and bear fruit. If any of the ingredients (seeds, topsoil, sunlight, or water) are missing, the crop won't grow.
Growing as a leader also requires the proper ingredients. Unless the right attitudes and actions are cultivated an aspiring leader will sputter and fail rather than growing in influence. Let's look at five basic qualities essential for growth in leadership.

1) Teachability

Arrogance crowds out room for improvement. That's why humility is the starting point for personal growth. As Erwin G. Hall said, "An open mind is the beginning of self-discovery and growth. We can't learn anything new until we can admit that we don't already know everything."
Adopting a beginner's mindset helps you to be teachable. Beginners are aware that they don't know it all, and they proceed accordingly. As a general rule, they're open and humble, noticeably lacking in the rigidity that often accompanies experience and achievement. It's easy enough to have a beginner's mind when you're actually a beginner, but maintaining teachability gets trickier in the long term especially when you've already achieved some degree of success.

2) Sacrifice

Growth as a leader involves temporary loss. It may mean giving up familiar but limiting patterns, safe but unrewarding work, values no longer believed in, or relationships that have lost their meaning. Whatever the case, everything we gain in life comes as a result of sacrificing something else. We must give up to go up.

3) Security

To keep learning throughout life, you have to be willing, no matter what your position is, to say, "I don't know." It can be hard for executives to admit lacking knowledge because they feel as if everyone is looking to them for direction, and they don't want to let people down. However, followers aren't searching for perfection in their leaders. They're looking for an honest, authentic, and courageous leader who, regardless of the obstacles facing the organization, won't rest until the problem is solved.
It took me seven years to hit my stride as a communicator. During those seven years I gave some boring talkes, and I felt discouraged at times. However, I was secure enough to keep taking the stage and honing my communication skills until I could connect with an audience. Had I been insecure, then the negative evaluations of others would have sealed my fate and I never would have excelled in my business.

4) Listening

Listen, learn, and ask questions from somebody successful who has gone on before you. Borrow from their experiences so that you can avoid their mistakes and emulate their triumphs. Solicit feedback and take to heart what you're told. The criticism of friends(that have your best interest in mind) may seem bitter in the short-term but, when heeded, it can save you from falling victim to your blind spots.

5) Application
Knowledge has a limited shelf life. Unless used immediately or carefully preserved, it spoils and becomes worthless. Put the lessons you learn into practice so that your insights mature into understanding.
Your Coach,
Bill
Thanks John Maxwell for your wisdom.

Just Show Up-Momentum Mondays

Momentum Monday – When opportunity knocks…HALF the battle is just plain Showing UP!



It’s true what they say that HALF of the battle is just showing up. That means as soon as you do show up, you are halfway there! Woo-HOO!
That means your job is just that – showing up!
I could tell you numerous stories and events in my life where just showing up has created enormous relationships,connections,not to mention wealth.From seeing the business plan(I did not want to)the countless times i drove to an appointment not feeling at all like i wanted to be there.All activities have generated incredible fruit I WANTED to and felt like cancelling but instead, I showed up.

Winning the First HALF of the Battle
#1: Shift your thinking – Start thinking about what opportunities you can create this month, this week, today. Start talking to people, start connecting. START showing up.
#2 Energize the potential – Don’t be a wallflower. Step up – ask for help, shout “Pick me, pick me!”, make IT happen!
#3 Create space for opportunity – Label an appointment in your calendar “When opportunity knocks” as both a space to fill and a reminder that you are looking for opportunity.
Momentum Monday Challenge: Pick something, anything this week and just show up!
Your Coach,
Bill

Going Gets Tough
Momentum Thoughts: Got Sticking Power? How to Keep Thinking BIG When the Going Gets Tough


Oomph!
If there was a single word to describe the one quality every entrepreneur needs to survive the statistics, it’s Oomph! Oomph being that intangible sticking power that gets you through the tough times.
Because let’s face it – crap happens. Despite your best efforts, sometimes everything goes wrong. The economy changes, the unexpected happens, the supposedly ‘sure thing’ turns into a near miss.
That’s when you need Oomph – the mighty sticking power that gets you over the tough stuff and to the finish line.
Finding your Inner Oomph!
#1: Know that you are in good company – Behind every success story, there is the untold tale of the temporary setbacks, false starts, and yes, flat out failures. One of my favorite movies is Rudy. Watch it and you’ll understand why Oomph is so important.
#2: See the end goal clearly – Stay focused on what you are working toward. It’s easy to get caught up in the drama of minor setbacks and temporary failures so take a moment to reconnect with your purpose.
#3: Learn from it – Not every setback or failure is your fault, but there is still an opportunity to learn from it and prevent it from happening again. Ask yourself: How can I protect myself from this type of risk in the future?
#4: Strength your business model – See the setbacks as an opportunity to find gaps and strengthen your business structure. If you lose a revenue stream due to a downturn, perhaps it’s time to get creative and find new ones.
#5: Ask for help – It’s tempting to go inward and focus on the negative. It’s during these tough times that you need to ask for help – recruit friends and family, seek support and wisdom from peers, and find a mentor to help you find solutions.
#6: Channel your inner 2-year-old – Get stubborn – not just grumpy stubborn, but temper tantrum stubborn (minus the kicking and screaming). Now think about how a 2-year-old would go about getting her way in your situation. Do that!
#7: Keep digging – Remember the wise words from Napolean Hill: “Never give up, you could be 3 feet from gold” meaning that often we quit right before our efforts and energy result in success. Don’t give up too soon.
A final note: It’s important to distinguish between determination and stupidity. Determination is the ability to keep going despite setbacks. Stupidity is ignoring the obvious warning signs that your thought process and work ehic is inherently flawed. If it’s the latter, you need to address your foundation first because no amount of stick-to-it-ness can fix a flawed foundation.

Change The Way You See Fear.

Change the way you see Fear!

When was the last time you took a risk? Not something major and life-threatening, but something that represented a step outside your comfort zone. Can you recall a time recently when you did something that felt uncomfortable for you? If not, get ready to take a major step forward.


Frequently, in business and in life, we get too comfortable. We find solid ground – a place that feels safe – we get comfortable, and we settle in. We’re programmed to do it. It’s how we operate. Look for safety and stay there. But these days, it’s imperative that we act against our programming to truly succeed and find our own greatness.

What’s holding us back? Ultimately, it’s fear. It’s almost always fear. Fear is the number one reason why people stay in their safety zones. It’s why people don’t start new businesses. It’s why people stop looking for love. But what are we afraid of? After studying fear for several years and working with countless clients who were letting fear hold them back, I’ve become convinced that when it comes down to stepping outside one’s comfort zone, there are really two things at work for most people: fear of success and fear of failure.

Fear of Success
Many people say they have a fear of success. What does this mean? It means that when these folks envision their success, they see the ways in which they’ll disappoint people, the ways they won’t be able to handle the success, the ways they’ll mess up their success… ultimately, I actually believe that a fear of success is a fear of failure in disguise. In my experience, most people aren’t actually afraid of success, but rather of failing after the success. They’re afraid they can’t handle it and they’ll fall much farther than if they’d never tried at all. It’s much more painful to fall from, say, a 20-story building, than it is to fall from a sidewalk curb. It’s the fall from the height of success that we fear, not the success itself.

Fear of Failure
Let’s look at fear of failure, since that’s at the core of what’s holding people back. I’ve recently updated my thoughts about fear of failure. I’ve been reading Seth Godin’s book, Tribes, and Godin has some absolutely profound and brilliant thoughts on the fear that keeps us in our comfort zones. In Tribes, Godin says that there’s a common misconception about a fear of failure. He says that the fear of failure isn’t actually fear of failure at all – it’s a fear of criticism. We’re more afraid of being judged for our failures than anything else.

So now that we’ve isolated this fear of criticism, what does one do about it? How do you conquer the one thing that gets in the way more than anything else- more than lack of skills, more than lack of knowledge, more than bad luck or anything else you might think of – how do you conquer fear?

How Do You Conquer Fear?

It would be easy for me to say that you just shouldn’t care what others think about you. What they say doesn’t matter, doesn’t define you, has nothing to do with you. I could easily say that. But the problem is that we’re not just subject to the criticism of others when we fail. We still have to face our harshest critic: ourselves.

But here’s the secret most people don’t know. It’s a secret that most successful people know. You don’t actually have to “conquer” fear. You have to master it. Mark Twain once said, “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear – not absence of fear.” Successful people aren’t people who conquered fear, they’re people who faced fear. They’re people who were afraid and did it anyway.

For example, one of the most prevalent, persistent fears people have is public speaking. It’s something most of us don’t do very often and it’s something most of us don’t particularly care for. I’m one of the oddities – I actually love speaking to groups. But like many others I know who enjoy public speaking, I get nervous before I go on stage. My palms sweat, I think about how I wish I’d never agreed to do the gig, and I think of all the ways I can get out of doing it. And then I step on stage anyway, and within a few moments, I’m actually having so much fun connecting to the crowd that I forget all the fear and just live in that moment. That’s mastering fear, folks. That’s what it’s all about.

A part of it is doing something over and over and showing yourself that you can do that thing. That builds confidence and confidence is a formidable tool against fear. Usually we’re afraid of the stuff we’re not very good at. What are you afraid of? Think about that for a minute and then when you have the answer, ask yourself how often you do that thing. If you’re not very good at something, you tend to fear it. If you make a decision to face the fear and forge ahead with courage, you’ll eventually make courage a habit- and you’ll master that fear.

So what’s holding you back right now? What are you afraid of, and how can you face that fear with courage? Here’s an exercise I give to myself to help me face my fears:

Take out a piece of paper and a pen and turn the paper on its side so you’re writing across the long side. Make five columns on your paper. In the first column, make a list of the things that scare you the most. Then in the second column, for each of those fears, write down what is the absolute worst thing that could happen if your fears came true. In the third column, write down how likely the worst thing is to happen. Then in the fourth column, write down how that fear is holding you back. In the last column, for at least one of the fears you’ve listed, write down how you are going to face that fear. Make it tangible- give yourself an action to take and a date by which you will take that action. And follow through!

Look, everybody is afraid of something. The most successful people have mastered fear with courage and learned to forge ahead. Today, make a decision to forge ahead with something in your life or in your business. Make a decision to face at least one of your fears. Take a risk and get better at something you’re afraid of. Face a fear with courage and you’ll see payoffs emerging faster than you ever could have imagined.
Your Coach
Bill