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Self-Appreciation
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Self-appreciation is also called self-love. Often times, when working with a client, this is something that I see missing. We all think “I love myself, I like myself, that’s all good, Doug.” But I can tell you right now, I have a lot of clients that pay me a lot of money to help them break through barriers to up-level their lives. The reason this works is that I am able to look past them and see the love or missing elements within themselves. Often times, the first things I have them do, is really assess their level of self-appreciation. Often times if you’re listening to this, you’re someone like me, someone that really likes personal development. Developing one’s self, and that’s great, but your personal development project needs to be smaller than your self-appreciation project.
I encourage you to have a self-appreciation project. What do I mean? What I mean is having an actual system of the project where you’re making sure you’re appreciating yourself. It’s not only yourself today, but also forgiving yourself from the past. That could be something as simple as “I didn’t go running this morning”, and allowing yourself grace and forgiveness. We tend to beat ourselves up over and over again. We beat ourselves up so much that there is no way we would do that to another person who is our friend. Isn’t that crazy? We’re the one person we spend the most time with, and yet we expect ourselves to grow, but we are not appreciating ourselves.
Now, if you’re married and you have a spouse, you know that if you’re not appreciating your spouse, they’re not going to stick around for very long. That’s true for yourself. You have to appreciate not only your current self, but also your former self, and give that forgiveness. Today, I’m going to encourage you to go into your journal, look back, and look at your self-improvement and self-appreciation. Have more depth and more time dedicated to each. Develop your own self-appreciation project. That could be as simple as giving yourself gratitude 5 times a day. Being grateful for things that you’ve done in the past: wins, accomplishment, and things you’re doing now.
You’re listening to this podcast. You’re making sure you up-level your life. Most people don’t do this. This makes you the top 1% of the world. Give yourself credit. Be here every day. Make your self-appreciation project bigger than your personal development project. I can guarantee you to wins in all areas of your life: business, relationships, body, mind, spirit.
Take care of yourself. Love each other, but also make sure to love yourself.
That’s it for today. Of course, always go to www.authorofyourownstory.com where we expand on these topics and get into deeper dives, as well as email a daily tip or trick right into your inbox to uplevel your five to thrive: mind, body, soul, relationships, and business.
See you tomorrow.
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How to make a Million Dollars
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This is your daily growth hack where each day we give you a tip, trick, or insight to help you up level in what we call the five to thrive. That’s mind, body, soul, relationships, and business.
Now, I’m often asked by people, especially young entrepreneurs, of how they can increase their revenue. Whether you’re an intrapreneur, meaning you’re working in a business already or an entrepreneur meaning you have your own business, having some extra revenue and cash flow is always key. I mean, don’t we all want just a little bit of extra spending money in our hands?
Now, when we think about being the Author of Your Own Story, part of that is just having freedom, and that freedom to me means freedom to do what you want when you want, within reason. And having extra cash certainly, helps. Now, we all have skills and assets that other people want to know. That could be something you know about fitness, something you know about cooking, there’s so many things that you know that others want to know! It is just a matter of taking that out and putting it into action.
I was talking to one of my clients the other day and he happens to own a catering business and one of his issues was increasing his revenue. He wanted to think about how can he make a recurring revenue stream that would get him at least a million dollars. So we sat down and mapped it out, and it turns out it’s not that hard!
Now you think about owning your own catering company. I asked him “how many people do you know or how often do you actually get asked on how to actually set up this business? How many people do you know that want to do this?”. So, we sat down and scratched our heads and seeing there are seven billion people in the world roughly, you know “do you think there are a thousand people that want to start their own catering business?”, and he said, “absolutely Doug there’s at least 10,000 or more, there’s just not a lot of information about there on how to really start a good catering business”.
So I said, “Alright that’s great. So you know that there are people out there now if knowing that you’re making over six figures a year in this catering business, who would buy a ‘how to start your own catering catering business course’ for 200-500 dollars?”, and he said “Doug, absolutely. People would actually spend thousands of dollars for a course like this, I mean there’s already courses that are just teaching you how to take care of knives that are more than $200, let alone a whole catering package”.
“Okay so let’s keep it at $200. Are you telling me there are thousands of people out there”? He said, “Yeah, Doug, at least a couple thousand I would say ten thousand or more that probably would want this information.”
“Well, did you know that if you could get five thousand people to pay you $200 for a course or seminar that’s a million dollars right there? If you had a continuity program – so let’s just say you had those five thousand people and you’re only charging them $17 a month over that course of 12 months you’d be a millionaire.”
There are multiple ways you can actually think about this and strategize and I’m going to put a chart below that actually will tell you different ways you can do it. Whether it be a continuity program, meaning you’re having someone pay a membership fee like they would at a gym or a yoga studio or if they’re actually paying for a product.
Let’s again go back to my client who is a caterer. Now, let’s say he decides to go all-in by filming a course on how to start your own catering business. It’s going to have all the nuts and bolts and he’s going to provide a ton of value. It’s going to tell them how to start their business, it’s going to tell them what products to buy, where to get clients from A to Z. He’s going to put that together and going to sell it for $4,000.
Now, to me as an entrepreneur, $4,000 is nothing to invest into a business, really. If you’re doing your business right that money should pay itself back in spades within the first week if not the first month. So they put down $4,000 and he only needs 250 people during the course of that year. 250 people that actually invest that $4,000 for him to become a millionaire.
You know, it’s really as simple as that. All of us have hidden talents and hidden goals and things that we can teach people that people want to know and all it is, is having to share it. We often forget the things that we know are things that we’ve had to learn and people just want to learn themselves, they just don’t know it yet.
So, I encourage you to look at your areas of your life.
Your five to thrive: mind, body, soul, relationships, and business.
Where is there a skill set that you have, that people often compliment you on or something you’re doing in your business currently that you know people would be interested in learning?
Where can you apply that to a course or a program, and how many people would want it? What’s your quickest path? Having financial freedom allows you to become the author of your own story that much quicker.
It’s not that money as the root of all evil or money is the savior for everybody. No, money is just a tool that allows you to do the things that you want to do. So, again I ask you what is it that you know that you can apply to a course or teach other people and add massive value that you can become a millionaire as well?
That’s it for me today. I’ll see you tomorrow. Take care!
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Embrace the Change
Awhile ago, I wrote about not trying to change too much at once. It can be a daunting task and people get too worked up trying to change too much and give up.
The flip side of that coin is not changing at all. that is even deadlier and often more common. Most people hate change. We get comfortable and complacent and like things the way they are. Even if there is something better on the other side of that change.
People stay in jobs, cities, relationships, and more where they are unhappy. But they don’t change because it is familiar, and that is less scary than the unknown of change.
People would rather fail than change. They would rather do the same old thing than doing things differently. That is literally the definition of insanity.
A mentor of mine once said one of the most dangerous phrases he’s ever heard. He said, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.”
I could not agree more. Don’t try to change too much at once, but, we as people, need to embrace change. You don’t have to embrace it, but change anyways!
– Victor Reyes
How are you going to grow?
I had a lab professor in college who said the 3 most important steps in completing a lab were:
- preparation
- preparation
- preparation
He mentioned it so much, it got annoying. I was 20 years old and considered him an asshole, so I did not pay attention or give his talks much merit.
Yeah, my bad, professor.
Now, I see how right he was, and how this applies to EVERYTHING. Not just in labs, but in life.
Preparing an exercise or workout plan is a big one for me. Planning a career change, a move, a vacation, how to save income, etc. works so much better when planned out and prepared for.
I’m not saying “Don’t be spontaneous at times.” It’s fun to do things on a whim, and see where life takes you. However, if you’re looking to grow and improve, you need to ask yourself, why? Like author Simon Sinek says in his book “Start With Why.”
Why are you trying to grow? To help yourself.
How are you going to grow? Take time to figure that out. Plan and prepare. It may take awhile but it’ll make your growth that much better.
-Victor Reyes
How are you achieving your goals?
We all have goals. We want to better ourselves and accomplish things. Short term, long term, big, small, overreaching, and more.
When thinking about your goals, make sure you’re doing something you want to do, and not what others want you to do.
There can be tremendous pressure to make sure we get the approval of family, peers, and others. Sometimes, we even pursue something they think is acceptable for us, but it is something we don’t want to do. 
Don’t get me wrong, go seek out good advice. If you have a great network of family and friends, listen to them, and know that they want you to succeed. They just don’t know what exactly is best for you.
Years ago, I was a test engineer. I realized that I didn’t want to do that anymore and decided to pursue other career options. I became a personal trainer and coach, and haven’t looked back. I love it. I had the opportunity to go into other fields or even the opportunity to go back into engineering, but I didn’t because I knew it would not make me happy. It definitely wasn’t something i wanted.
There was some pressure (especially from family) to go back into the nice stable office job. They meant well, although, I am glad I didn’t listen to those who wanted me to stay in the stable office job because it wasn’t the route that would ultimately make me happy.
Your goals are yours and yours alone. No one can decide them and attain them but you.
For more info, please read this article: https://www.10acreranch.org/2017/02/16/4-tips-setting-greatest-goals/
Consistency.
The simplest solutions are often cliche but it doesn’t make them any less true. This one is about being consistent.
Consistency is one of (if not the most important) factor in any growth hack and improvement. If you want to develop good habits do them consistently. Every. Day!
Whether it be for the mind, body, soul, or any other area in your life, performing positive habits over and over again is the best way to make sure they become a regular part of your life.
The power of habit and consistency is a common trait amongst most people’s success.
It takes 21 days first to develop a habit and 90 days to turn that habit into a lifestyle, some researchers say.
Focus on the 21 days first. Develop good habits until you consistently do them to the point that not doing them feels abnormal.
From on the 21 days first. Develop good habits until you consistently do them to the point that not doing them is abnormal.
From there, transform your habit into a lifestyle. Once you do, it’ll be hard to go back.
The best way to start transforming a habit is to prepare in advance for it. More on that next time. 
For more info, please check out this article:
Change is Hard
Change is hard. Don’t get me wrong, change is great and necessary to grow but its really touch.
Trying to change too much by changing multiple habits simultaneously is extremely hard. Unless you don’t have any bad habits which is absolutely no one.
Said no one ever!
If you’re ready to make a change that’s awesome but beware. Trying to change too much at once can do more harm than good. A strategy I’ve used is to write down some bad habits that you want to change. Pick one and just focus on changing that for a month. Once those bad habits have been replaced with a good one then focus on another bad habit.
I recently spoke with a friend who was trying to quit smoking, lose weight and gets in better shape. He was given a prescription to help quit smoking. I told him to just focus on quitting smoking for now. Don’t worry about anything else and just work on that. After a month or so if he feels like he’s in control of and not smoking is an automatic habit then start focusing on some other habits to change like nutrition or exercise.
Don’t try to change too much at once. Take things on one thing at a time.
For more information please read:
https://psychcentral.com/lib/7-steps-to-changing-a-bad-habit/
Setbacks Happen
Setbacks happen. They are a part of life. What’s worse than the actual setback is the guilt and quitting on a goal that can follow.
Instead of thinking: “I messed up, time to move on, and get back at it!” We think: “I screwed everything up and what’s the point of even trying anymore. I quit.”
A setback doesn’t mean that life is over and you should give up no matter what you’re trying to accomplish. Whether is be personal, business, or any other type of goal, do not give up because you hit a rough patch.
I’ve had a lot of setbacks, beat myself up over them, and then quit things that I shouldn’t have. The biggest lesson I learned is you cannot stop setbacks from happening. Life is unpredictable and they happen. You can control how it effects you with the actions you take once it happens.
For more info, please read this article:
http://bookboon.com/blog/2014/02/dont-let-mistkaes-setbacks-stop/
– Victor Reyes
Yourself
What would you say to your younger self if given the opportunity? If you could go back in time, what pieces of wisdom would your present self-instill to ease your younger self’s mind when it came to life’s many obstacles?
Challenge yourself now to sit in a calm space in front of your preferred computer and type the conversation on what you might have learned from a conversation that your present self-had with your younger self. What were the anxieties and doubts that your younger self-had in regards to love, family, career, and money? Were these fears just merely fears that your present self-learned or do these topics still haunt you daily? If you are still in fear, then what is this fear? Do your best to be as logical as possible with little emotion to understand your fear. You can be your greatest teacher!
