The Power Of Indecision
I just got off the phone with another coaching client of mine, now this is a new coaching client I just started working with. And with each of my clients, I take them through what I call a 90-day game, where we gamify their life and their goals over the course of a 90 day period. Now for this particular individual, I was checking back on his game and how he was performing in the game. I noticed he had changed some of his goals, some of his goals became instead of being one direct key characteristic or thing that he wanted to achieve, it became I’m going to do this or I’m going to do that. I’m not really sure, I’m going to do this, or I’m going to do this over here.
Behind Anger Is Aways Hurt
Now right on the board right behind me in my office is the words behind anger is always hurt. Now the reason I wrote this up is that I was talking to one of my clients about this. They were talking about how a couple of their staff members seemed to always be angry. They seemed to always be really upset. And then when they’re in the boardroom having conversations, they seem to get more and more agitated. Now they also happened to say that this happens to them at home with their spouse.
Make Your Dreams A Reality
If you’re listening to me on audio only, you can probably hear a running water behind me and that’s only because I’m right by the river. This is a river my wife and I take our son down to almost daily. Each and every day, we’re able to walk down here, enjoy the sun, enjoy nature and we’re able to do it almost any time that we want to.
Who Are You Really Doing it For?
I just got off an intake call with an old buddy of mine. This guy I’ve known gosh, almost 20 years now, and during that time, he’s actually been in the same place. Now, what he said to me was, “Doug, I’m actually exactly in the same place I am today, where I was when I last saw you,” and that was almost 20 years ago. And what he was talking about was not only in his financial life, but also in the area of his marriage, in the area of his relationships with his friends, in the area of his business. He hadn’t changed, he hadn’t grown up is really what happened.
Revisit: The Art of Dabbling
The art of dabbling. Well, I’m here to tell you it’s not an art at all. When you dabble, you actually don’t go anywhere. You can’t focus.
You’ve heard that saying, jack of all trades, but master of none. Well, that happens in our lives too, our careers. We seem to always dabble at that shiny new object. And if you’re an entrepreneur like me, it’s easy to get caught up in that. But how often are we dabbling in our own lives? I realized this in school, and you see this often, while you’re taking a history class has no relation to the English class you’re taking the next hour, which has no relationship to the math class you’re taking the hour after that. There’s no linear progress, you’re just dabbling in these subjects, year after year, as you’re building them on.
Make Yourself A Priority
If you’re watching this on video, you can see I’m out in the middle of nowhere with my family snowshoeing, having an absolute blast on a Friday morning. Now, if you’re listening to this, just picture a picturesque mountain pine snow-filled hillside where we are actually trekking through and you can probably hear our little baby here with me. He’s happy to be here.
Have Passion For What You’re Doing
Today, I had a first coaching session with a new client of mine. Always one of my favorite sessions to have, because I get to deep dive into their lives, and into their dreams, and unpack what their dreams really and truly are. And sometimes, it’s easy and fun, and cheerful. And sometimes it’s like pulling stuff out of somebody, and it can be a little difficult. Have you ever had that experience before? I’m sure you have.
Stop Living In The Land Of Comparison
We’ve had this conversation before in these daily growth hacks but it keeps coming up in conversations that I have with business owners. Just this morning, I was talking to a client of mine who owns a business and hit his target goals, hit his target goals for the end of his 30 days. Now, with each of my clients, I set a 90-day game, 90-day goals around their businesses and their personal lives. Now, this particular individual hit his goals early. Now, by all stretches of the imagination or anybody’s standards, he should be elated. These goals aren’t easy to hit. We don’t set something that just anybody could do. These are big goals that are going to move the needle.
Start Now
Start now. What are you waiting for? Life is short. You have anything that we’ve seen around the world in terms of just natural disasters, let alone manmade catastrophes, and all the other things that come along with just this human condition. Life is short. We’ve had earthquakes, fires, floods, you name it, wars going on around the world. I actually know people who have been killed. I want you to start now. Whatever it is that your story’s about, your Author of Your Own Story Lifestyle, what does that mean to you? Start today.
The Fear Of Starting Out
I know many of you that listen to the daily growth hacks know that I coach business owners. But I also know that many of you aren’t business owners yourselves, but are aspiring to your own thing. Your business, your own side hustle, your own company. And I know a lot of you believe that this is the answer to being on the path to the author of your own story.
The Dirty Little Secret About Finding Your Passion
So recently, I’ve been getting a lot of direct messages on Instagram from young hustlers, and that’s how they’re self-describing themselves. And often times there’s a theme. In these particular string of messages, and there’s three to be exact, they’re asking me, “Doug, you know, how do I go about finding my passion. I want to make the world a better place, I want to go out and make changes, and I really want to go after it. What’s the first step? What do you recommend?”
The 2 A.M. Wake Up Call
This morning I popped out of bed, or at least wide-awake in bed around two in the morning. Now, this is typical because we have an eight month year old child, and he wakes up in the middle of the night and wants to be fed. That’s understandable, but this one was a little bit different. It was a little bit different because my child hadn’t actually woken me up. When I woke up, I was just wide awake. Now granted, my wife and I go to bed really early now to counter this interrupted sleep patterns that we have now. But, I sat there for a while and laid in bed and tried to go back to sleep, as I typically would, but this time I could just tell it was a little bit different.
Revisit: Start With A Fresh Slate
I actually heard this years ago from a friend Robert, and Robert actually was an entrepreneur along with myself. One of the things that he told me that really resonated with me and it still does today was that actually when you look at somebody who’s doing construction, they always put their tools away at the end of the day. No matter what they’re doing, they put their tools away in an organized fashion and close their day out.
Be True To Yourself
This morning I was talking to a young entrepreneur and the conversation was about the grind. About hustle and how there has to be some sort of hustle within a business. Now I had to stop him because what I wanted to ask him was are you getting everything you want out of life? And there was a long pause in there, as there often is when that question is asked. The answer was simply no, no they weren’t. They were trying to achieve their goals and dreams through the vehicle of their business, right? And it was a young business, a business just being started and they’re spending all of their time doing it.
It’s A Reflection Of You
Several months ago, in fact actually a year ago, I set out to keep a gratitude journal with the idea that after 90 consecutive days of writing down what I was grateful for in my wife, I would hand it to her. Now, the idea behind this journal is each and every morning I would wake up, grab my journal as well as this other journal, and I would write into the separate journal what I was grateful for. Not just the fact that I told my wife … I tell my wife every single day, but I would write it down. After 90 days, she’d have 90 pages, almost like a book that I could hand to her as a present, as a surprise.
Revisit: Your Businesses’ First Impression
Today I want to talk to business owners, and I wanna talk to you about what is your first impression, or what is the first impression your business gets. Now, today it’s all online. Now, we all know that, right? But as business owners, how often is that missed? You know, I was talking to one of my clients today, and we were talking about his business, and he was working on this very sophisticated marketing funnel, and it was really neat, except for the fact he missed his main first impression, or what I call your home base, which is your website.
Build It Before You Need It
Back in the early 2000s, I was a proud business owner. I had a business mentor that I was working with and he told me, “Doug, you need to build it before you need it.” Now, this is one of the most successful people I have ever met at the time and what he was really telling me was I need to start building the infrastructure in my business before I actually needed it. What I was doing is what most business owners, in fact, most of us do, right? We start building things or getting things in an order when we need them whether that be a relationship, whether it be a friendship when it comes to networking, or just whether a skill or even fitness. We try to get in shape for summer. We try to get in shape for the new year when that time is there.
Revisit: No Man’s Land
Today, I’m specifically going to talk about business. Now, if you’re not a business owner, just stay tuned, because this could apply to you, or at least you’ll learn a little bit more about the things that you should understand.
