LIVE LIFE UP HIGH

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How are you living?

Many entrepreneurs are living their personal and professional lives in a cloudy haze. They don’t have clear written goals and plans to achieve them.  They really don’t know where they want to end up in life so they live their lives without a clear strategic plan, a winning personal culture and definite concrete actions to take them to this destiny.

You are destined for something great.

Some entrepreneurs are even waiting for their destiny to smack them in the face. They don’t know that they must discover the destiny that is already in them. There is a saying I heard recently,  ”destiny is not a matter of chance it is a choice”. This is very true. You have the right to choose your best personal and professional life. You have the right to move towards a destiny and to live a great life. Obviously there are some things you must do to reach this destiny but you can reach it.  

Let’s begin moving towards our destiny.

My fellow entrepreneurs, over the next few posts let’s take the time to explore some of the best information on effective goal setting, effective planning and goal achievement.  I will pull from some of the best thinkers and writers on the subject and synthesize this information for you in a way that you can take action on it right away. Step by step we will move towards your best life.

The power of choice.

If you want this life your first step is to make a choice. Decide today to be the best you can be and to live the best life you can live. Decide today to do whatever it takes to be your best, give your best, and have the best business and professional life you can have. Choose to have a great destiny and to leave a great legacy. I challenge you to choose greatness today.

Please join me over the next few posts as we move closer to our destiny and live our best lives.

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In this final post discussing Dr. Caroline Leaf’s book, Who Switched off My Brain?: Controlling Toxic Thoughts and Emotions, we will briefly describe the last three detox steps outlined in the book.

Detox Step 11 – Diet – Dr. Leaf suggests that you should never eat when you are angry or facing any other unpleasant emotions. Eating during those times can make your food toxic to you. Your toxic thoughts will interfere with the proper working of your digestive system. 

Another important point is that when you eat well you will properly feed your brain. Dr. Leaf explains that a major source of food for the brain is glucose. Of course, you need to eat this in the proper quantities.

Finally, it is important to think about what you eat. In the book Dr. Leaf mentions a few of the types of foods that help us think well and feel good.

Detox Step 12: The Spiritual aspect – In this section Dr. Leaf talks about the power of spiritual truth to deal with toxic emotions. The Christian faith is the guiding belief of her life and mine. I encourage you to live in your spiritual truth.

Detox Step 13: Relax – The “acceleration syndrome” is the cause of many mental, physical and emotional health problems. The key point here is to learn to spend your time wisely. You must focus on what is good for you and you must take time to relax.

We have reached the end of the steps to detox your thinking.  These last 3 detox steps are obvious and we hear them all the time, but sometimes as entrepreneurs we don’t do them. Make a decision today to begin using all the steps to detox your thinking and improve your life. 

As always I appreciate your comments.

Please click the image below to obtain this resource.

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In my last post we discussed Dr. Caroline Leaf’s book, Who Switched off My Brain?: Controlling Toxic Thoughts and Emotions . In that post we discussed some of the dangers of toxic thinking. In the next three posts we will briefly discuss the 13 steps that Dr. Leaf suggests for detoxing your thought life. If you follow these steps, you will definitely think better, feel better and perform better. Ultimately, you will dramatically increase your level of success and the success of those around you.

Detox Step 1 – Consciously Control Your Thoughts – The key idea here is to pay attention to what you are thinking. Are you putting unrealistic expectations on yourself and others? Are you thinking fearfully? Do you have specific positive written goals that you are focusing on or are you just drifting through your day. Dr. Leaf suggests that you engage and analyze thoughts that enter your mind and make a conscious decision as to whether you want to accept or reject this thought.  Step 1 is an important step with several important sub-steps that you will want to read in the book.

Detox Step 2 – Frame Your World With Your Words – Most of us have heard that words have power. This is shockingly very true. As, Dr. Leaf explains, 

The words you speak feed back into the magic trees of the mind, reinforcing the memory they came from. When you make negative statements, you release negative chemicals. These lead to negative memories that grow stronger and become negative strongholds that control your attitude and life.

An important point here is that it is not just positive talking that is important, it is positive talk that is congruent to your positive thoughts that is important.

Detox Step 3 – Express those Emotions – The key here is not to deny what you feel. You need to express your emotions at an appropriate time, in an appropriate environment, in an appropriate way. When you repress your emotions you make yourself sick. Eventually these emotions will manifest themselves anyway and usually not in at an appropriate time or way.

Detox Step 4 – Take Responsibility and Take Control – In this step Dr. Leaf discusses the importance of being aware of what’s in your mind in terms of past experiences and conditioning. What are your memories and emotions? Once you are aware of these thought patterns you can begin to deal with bad memories by growing good ones. Also, be responsible enough to seek extra help (prayer, meditation and counseling) if you have long standing emotional strongholds.

Detox Step 5 – Dream On! – According to Dr. Leaf when you dream, important psychological and physiological processes happen in the body-mind connection. Because dreams give you clues as to what is happening in your thought life she suggests that you make a conscious effort to remember and record your dreams. Some experts believe that when you dream, the body can discuss its condition with your mind. The key is to decide to remember the dream.

I know many of my readers may be wondering what all of this has to do with entrepreneurship. I understand the hesitation but please remember proper thinking helps you to excel and take advantage of opportunities. Without proper thinking you will probably never fully realize your entrepreneurial potential.

As always I welcome your comments.

Recommended Resource

Please Click Book Image Below to Order.

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I recently read a very interesting book on toxic thinking and its affect on all aspects of our lives. I found the book so interesting and so relevant for the serious entrepreneur that I decided to share it with you today. 

Did you know that the average person has over 30,000 thoughts a day? Further, did you know that an uncontrolled thought life can create the conditions for illness in your body? Toxic thinking can actually make you sick and if you are sick you can’t properly achieve your entrepreneurial goals.

In her book, “Who Switched Off My Brain?”, Dr. Caroline Leaf  helps you understand the anatomy of a thought, how a thought grows, what happens when thoughts go toxic and how to detox your thinking. It was really amazing to me to see how many systems of the body are affected by a thought. It has made me more determined to manage my thought life and to make sure I keep it positive.

In her book Dr. Leaf gives an example of three negative and incorrect beliefs that lead to toxic thoughts and emotions:

1. I must do well.
2. You must treat me well.
3. The world must be easy.

It would seem that these are harmless thoughts but the truth is they create unrealistic expectations and when they are not met they put your mind and body in stress mode and cause all types of health and performance problems.

Please check out the book and let me know what you think. As always I look for your comments.

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Entrepreneurs, in this post I share with you an eye-opening article that I read in graduate school. This article helped me to be more aware of the reward systems that I was using in every area of my business life. I changed the way I interacted with my employees, peers and clients.  I hope this classic article (updated version) is as helpful for you as it has been for me and many other business people. Read, learn and enjoy.

Kerr, S. (1975). “On the Folly of Rewarding A, While Hoping for B.” Academy of Management Journal, 18(4): 769-783.

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Well, we have made it to deadly mistake number 6 in our discussion on the 7 deadly mistakes new entrepreneurs make and how to avoid them. I hope by this point you have learned how to avoid some of these mistakes based on the information I have supplied. Why repeat mistakes others have made if you can avoid them?

Deadly Mistake No. 6 – Not Placing a High Value on your Customers

Many entrepreneurs have been taught how important the customer is but few have really embraced this concept so that it permeates every aspect of their business. Valuing your customer goes beyond customer appreciation days and rebates. In order to value your customer you must take the time to get to know them and then design your business around them.

Many entrepreneurs start out with the customer at the heart of the business but somewhere along the line the customer becomes secondary. This is especially true of growing companies. The entrepreneur’s focus moves from the customer to building the business and dealing with internal issues. This is a hugely costly mistake. The customer must remain the main focus of the business if the business is to thrive.

Here are three simple keys to help you keep your customer front and center in your business:

1. Focus on your customer – As the leader of your business the customer must be your personal focus. Spend time thinking about your customer’s lifestyle. What do your top customers do for work? What do they do for recreation? What are their biggest problems?  You also need to know how your customer interacts with your product or service. Why do your top customers buy from you and not from your competitors?  How are your top customers’ needs changing? What is the biggest problem your customer is having using your product or service. Start thinking along these lines about your customer and you will help keep them front and center in your mind.

2. Build your systems around your customer – This is really self-explanatory. Any system you build in your business should be built only if it helps you serve your customer better. If it doesn’t help you serve your customer better it is not a good system for your business. Simple.

3. Teach your employees how to treat your customers- Your customers are gold to you and they must be gold to your employees. Make sure every employee knows the link between their jobs and how they treat every customer. They must understand that without the customer there is no business and therefore no job for them. It is your responsibility as the entrepreneur to communicate this message to your employees both orally and by example. You may also want to reward your employees for going the extra mile for your customer.

In the final post in this series we will discuss the 7th deadly mistake. As always I welcome your comments.

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In part one of this post we discussed the fact that many entrepreneurs allow their past failures to hold them back. We discussed 3 bite-sized nuggets that entrepreneurs should consider to help them move past these failures on to success. 
In this post, we will introduce and discuss the four remaining nuggets.

Seek the advice of others who have gone before you – This is probably a step that many entrepreneurs skip. I think for many of us it is a pride thing.  However, it is imperative that we take this step my entrepreneurial friend. Seeking competent advice is very wise. You should seek advice on three levels:

1.Seek advice about whether you have properly defined the failure . Knowing how to properly describe and define the failure is key in determining the causes. It is also a key factor in ensuring you don’t have a repeat performance.

2. Seek advice about whether you have correctly identified the 1 or 2 key factors that led to the failure. It may be hard to be objective about what caused the failure. Discussing your list of possible key factors with a competent advisor can help you clearly identify the key contributing factors.

3. Seek advice about possible approaches to circumvent the failure in the future. This is very important if it turns out that your failure was due to an error in judgement. We all have blindspots in our lives that others see clearly. By seeking advice about solutions you will multiply the odds of succeeding this time around.

Create an action plan – After you have sought competent advice and combined it with the information you gleaned from your own analysis, it is time to create a plan for moving forward. Take your time and consider all the steps you need to take to move forward. A great action plan should include steps to take, deadlines for completion of each step, resources needed to complete each step, possible obstacles to completion and steps to circumvent any known obstacles.

Implement the action plan – There is no need to create an action plan if you are not going to put it into action. At this point, you need to commit to the action plan and get started. After each step, review your plan and see if you need to make any adjustments. Remember things change and we need to be flexible.

Review - After you have accomplished your goal it is important to review. You want to see what went right and what you can improve. The key is to understand the process so you can improve it and repeat it. 

When you face failure this way you will no longer fear it. You will eat failure for lunch. As always, I look forward to your comments.

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Recently I was looking in the blogosphere and found 4 very interesting posts for you my entrepreneurial friends. These bite-size posts help you as an entrepreneur to stay updated on important developments that can move you further towards success. As a fellow entrepreneur, I  want to share this information with you to help you be more successful and productive on your entrepreneurial journey. Please check out these informative posts and let me know what you think.

Small Business Success Index Highlights (Estimated time to read: 2 mins)
http://growsmartbusiness.com/small-business-success-index-highlights/

Small businesses are succeeding desipte the ecomonic downturn. According to the Small Business Success Index, small busineses are fairing quite well. For example, it shows that 69% of small businesses made a profit in 2008. This is good news.  Check out this article, get encouraged and get going.

Top 10 Business plan mistakes.(Esitmated time to read: 5 mins)
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/267696/Top-10-Business-Plan-Mistakes

The type is small on this post but this post addresses some important issues (right click and zoom in to enlarge the type). If you are planning to write a business plan for your business or if you are currently in the process of writing a business plan, read this first. It has some good points that many of us overlook when writing business plans.

Top 10 Social Networks for Entrepreneurs (Estimated Time to Read 3 mins)http://mashable.com/2009/03/12/entrepreneur-networks/

No one can deny the importance of social networks. Well in this post Dan provides a list of social networks designed with the entrepreneur in mind. No need to join all of these social networks. Find the one that best fits your needs and join. Spend some time there and then if you want to join another one go right ahead. You will get the best results if you take time to learn each network that you join.

The Best Entrepreneurs Fail Fast (Estimated tim to watch 4.5 min)
http://www.feld.com/wp/archives/2009/04/the-best-entrepreneurs-know-how-to-fail-fast.html

In this post, Brad Feld, does a repost of Mark Pincus’s interview about lessons Mark has learned from his Tribe entrepreneurial endeavor. Very interesting information. The idea of failing fast is so critical for entrepreneurs to learn. I have learned this lesson from my business ventures as well. Don’t miss this 4.57 minute video.

As always I welcome your comments.

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Here are 22 more things you can do if you want to fail as an entrepreneur. If you want to fail as an entrepreneur, go ahead and implement these items  and you will fail miserably.

1. Don’t give back to the community and to charities around you. This is your money anyway and you worked hard for it. You deserve all the spoils from your hard work.

2. Don’t bother hiring talented people. Hire your friends or hire people because you feel sorry for them. Hiring talented people is expensive. Yes, you may be better off in the long run with talented people but it costs too much right?

3. If you do hire talented people don’t pay them well. Try to get them for the cheapest rate you can and don’t give them any bonuses. If they go somewhere else then they just didn’t belong with you anyway.

4.Don’t provide incentives for your customers or your employees to bring you good ideas. You have all of the good ideas anyway.

5. Work yourself into the ground. Don’t live a balanced life. It is all about the business and the money anyway. What else matters?

6. Think short term in your decisions. Only care about the here and now. Don’t even think about how your short term decisions affect you in the long-term.

7.Don’t bother trying to understand economics and how it can affect your business. Your business is not even affected by what happens in the general economy right?

8. Don’t spend anytime learning the emerging trends in your business and in your industry. You will always have this business and it will always bring in income.

9. Don’t go to conferences in your industry so you can learn something new. You already determined that you know what you need to know. Besides, conferences cost money and they take time.

10. Neglect your family and friends. Who needs the hassle? They should understand that you are building a business. It is all about the business.

11. Don’t be flexible. Be as rigid as possible.

12. Don’t work on your communication skills. What’s that all about anyway. You talk and others listen. Problem solved.

13. Don’t create a business strategy. Just run your business by the seat of your pants.

14. Create a strategy and then take forever to implement it. Analyze the heck out of it but never really act on it.

15. Don’t create a unique selling proposition. Just be like everyone else. Don’t be original.

16. Let fear stop you right in your tracks. Fear is good. Even unhealthy fear that is not based in reality.

17. Constantly talk yourself out of good ideas. Keep doing the same thing.

18. Give up easily. As soon as an obstacle comes throw up your hands and quit. You knew it wouldn’t work anyway right? I mean that is what you constantly said.

19. Don’t learn from your mistakes. Keep repeating them over and over again. At least this is familiar.

20. Criticize your customers and your employees. They deserve it. Really give it to them. And do it often.

21. Neglect social media marketing. Who needs these new fangled strategies? Stick with the old way of doing things.

22. Procastinate when it comes to addressing issues. Put is off until it becomes an urgent matter that will take up a great portion of your time and resources. Who wants to deal with issues when they first present themselves?

Again, as I said in Monday’s post, I don’t want you to fail. Please focus on doing the opposite of what is presented here and you will be moving in the right direction. As always I look forward to your comments.

photo credit: markwgallagher

Do you want to fail miserable as an entrepreneur? Well in this post I will share with you 22 things you can do if you want to fail miserable as an entrepreneur. Follow these steps I can almost guarantee you will be a big failure.

1.Neglect cash flow and cashflow management. Don’t even create an Excel spreadsheet to show your daily, weekly and monthy expected cash inflows and outflows. Who cares about cash and the timing of those flows anyway as long you have profits right?

2. Forget about marketing and personal selling. Don’t even bother to create a marketing plan. Who needs to do all of this work. If you build it they will just come right?

3.Don’t bother to setup and document systems for your business. Run it by the seat of your pants. Who needs all of these structures?

4. Listen to no one. Don’t seek advice from those who have gone before you. Just go it on your own. You are smarter than everyone else anyway. Or even better, pretend you are listening to them and then do your own thing.

5. Don’t build your financal intelligence. Don’t learn about financial ratios that affect your business. All that matters is that you are making some money.

6. Spend no time talking to your customers. Or if you do talk to them don’t ask them questions about the business. Just shoot the breeze all of the time.

7. For goodness sake don’t spend time analyzing the metrics of your business. Who needs to know how many new customers are coming in and where they are coming from anyway? You don’t need to know why they chose you instead of your competitor. Stuff like that is useless.

8. Don’t write the vision plan for your business. Just work it everyday like a job. A business is just a glorified job right?

9. Don’t focus on a particular niche. Try to do it all even if you don’t have the budget for it. Be all things to all people.

10. Make sure you think of the glass as half-empty all the time. Don’t be tricked by those who think optimistically and implement realistic plans. You want to be as negative as possible so if something positive does happen in your business then great. At least if you don’t expect great things you won’t be disappointed.

11. Neglect your customers and focus only on the mechanics of your business.  Your customers are a nuisance anyway. They are always asking for something different. Can’t be just be satisfied with what you give them?

12. Work in the business but don’t spend time working on the business. It is the day to day that matters anyway, forget building the business for the long-term.

13. Do not waste your money on educating yourself and learning more about your industry and your business in general. Who needs the extra expenses? You already know everything you need to know about your business. What worked in the past will continue to work. All this talk about change is just that, talk.

14. Don’t bother to work on your leadership skill and your sales skills. Who needs the headache? You are good just like you are. Anyway, who wants to a bunch of people following you.

15. Don’t change with the times and please don’t anticipate change and try to get ahead of it. This takes too much time.

16.Don’t spend time growing your employees. If they want to grow they have to do it on their own. That is not your problem.

17.Don’t delegate. Try to do everything yourself. You are a one-person show anyway. Who needs other people?

18.Don’t take the 80/20 rule seriously in terms of your work. Don’t even spend time determining what the 20% activitives are in your business that brings you 80% of the results. What’s the use of that anyway?

19. Don’t take the 80/20 rule seriously in terms of your customers. Treat them all exactly the same even though about 20% of them provide about 80% of your profits. Don’t even identify these people.

20. Isolate yourself. Who needs to network with others who are in the same line of business or others who can provide critical services.

21. Don’t read. Spend all of your time working on your business and don’t bother learning new material. If you do read, only read about your industry, don’t bother expanding yourself to see if something in other industry can help you.

22. Forget being creative. That is for the artsy types. Don’t even learn anything about creative problem solving.

Ok. I know you know that I am being sarcastic. I don’t want you to think about failing as an entrepreneur but I do want you to take these things seriously. Obviously you want to do the opposite of what is suggested here. Take a good look at this list. If you are an entrepreneur, you may be doing some of these things. If you are, you may want to make a change. If you have not started on your entrepreneurial journey yet, please look at these items and avoid them like the plague. On Wednesday I will give you another batch of these items. Happy entrepreneuring.

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