Joseph Idaye

Introduction 38.1%. That is how many people will even finish this book. Aside from having terrible odds in people finishing this book there is another problem. We struggle with finishing. Following through and consistency. Nothing you didn’t know. You need only look around your house, or desk, or body to find something that needs completion. But, what if making small specific changes allowed us to move things towards completion and ultimately more consistency and follow through? “Now! Now is when you think of that?” she said as we are in the line at the airport, headed to a wonderful tropical vacation. “Yeah, so! Who needs to pack underwear! Its warm there who needs clothes anyway!” I never know which one is worse. Is it the person who is so focused on tasks that they are constantly on a schedule? Even bowel movements are strategically planned. Or the people who wake up and the world has its way with them and they will just get to those responsibility things later? As with most things the answer is somewhere in the middle, but how do we get there? We have all been there. We have all been at a place where it is the 11th hour and we have yet to begin our dreaded task. Thinking, 2 “Why did I put this off for so long?” “How am I going to get this done in time?” Then those really philosophical thoughts come in, “Why am I doing this anyway?” “Does this even matter? We are all going to be stardust at some point anyway!” “All the coffee in the world may not get me through this one!” We get stuck. Overwhelmed. Frustrated. And in the back of our head none of these things are helping. I had a friend in college who claimed that the pressure of the deadline is what he needed to finish his task. Can you relate? Like clockwork he would wait till the last night before the project was due and stay up living off of coffee and chocolate for 24 hours, only to hand in what he claimed was his finished product. It almost plagues us. It is like a bad movie that just wont end. It starts to consume our thoughts and yet we still don’t do anything about it. Even the terms DEADline, DUE date can give us the heebie jeebies. Maybe it is our relationship with the ending of things. Maybe it’s the idea of something being final that we push it away so we don’t have to think about it. The further we get away from the task the more comfortable we feel. I mean we do this with death all of the time, why not with our projects and life goals? 3 In working with hundreds of people and speaking publically to thousands there are some patterns that I notice emerge when it comes to consistency and following through. First off, I don’t believe anyone was born with a tremendous ability to follow through or be consistent. This is certainly a learned behavior. We all have or had an area of life that plagued us when it came to getting things done. For me it was term papers. I would procrastinate, wait, make excuses, find a really good Netflix documentary, or just the usual college thought, “I have time.” As we know the college student almost specializes in, “Ill get to it!”. It wasn’t until I learned these 6 pillars did I begin to not only increase my efficiency, but I was able to tackle bigger goals and projects. 4 6 Pillar Overview Determining your Personal Priority “The key is not to prioritize what's on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” - Stephen Covey “ 5 Should. Should. Should. Should. I should get this done!” This is usually how the beginning of making priorities goes in our head. We make lists; we make “mental notes” and even check in with others regarding what we, “should be doing.” Priorities are important. They create our map. They ground us. They can be a reflection of what we value, our morals and how we determine what we need vs. what we want. By examining our current priorities we can not only set ourselves up for success, but you can also determine what you value most. Goal Setting “Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success.” - Pablo Picasso Maybe the most important pillar in the whole process. If you don’t know your destination, how can you be on the right track? If you cant envision your end game, what keeps you moving towards the finish? Most importantly, if what you are doing doesn’t reflect what you want, then why would you want to follow through in the first place? Learning to set strategic, defined, 6 specific goals is keys to helping develop consistency and ultimate success. Rituals “A thinker sees his own actions as experiments and questions--as attempts to find out something. Success and failure are for him answers above all.” -Friedrich Nietzsche “What you did yesterday reflects how you live your life.” Like it or not our lives reflect the rituals we enact on a day-to-day basis. The creation of routines, habits and rituals all impact our ultimate success and follow through. Learning to create and sustain daily rituals as a way of life can put you in the best position for long-term success. This pillar Identifies what you can do to create healthy, productive habits that lead to exponential follow through and success. Creating Your Team “A man's pride can be his downfall, and he needs to learn when to turn to others for support and guidance.” - Bear Grylls 7 Your team. Your enterprise. Your entourage. Your family. Who we surround ourselves with is vital to our follow through. The ideology that you are the average of the five people you surround yourself with most can be applied here. We all need support in a number of different ways. This pillar explores accountability, real support, and the creation of a support system to helping you achieve follow through and consistency. Limiting Beliefs “Your beliefs become your thoughts, Your thoughts become your words, Your words become your actions, Your actions become your habits, Your habits become your values, Your values become your destiny.” – Mahatma Gandhi Beliefs are where it all begins. How we see the world. What we believe to be true. Beliefs are recycled thoughts. Beliefs precede action and mood. They are the gateway towards fulfillment. Often times when you struggle with follow through or completing a task it is because your beliefs are not aligned with what you are doing. This pillar will help you evaluate limiting beliefs about yourself and the world around you so you can more effectively align with your goals and outcomes. 8 Celebration Somewhere after the age of four we lost this skill, the skill of celebrating. We used to celebrate if we put our toys away, now if we do a good job, it is what we were “supposed” to do. The truth is that we create new neuro pathways in our brain. New connections that help us associate pleasure and pain. When we begin to associate positive feeling states to accomplishments we tend to want to recreate that. In this pillar we will explore how to use celebration throughout our lives to help us be more drawn to repeat productive behaviors. 9 Life Areas There are different life areas that people fail to remain consistent and follow through. Some include academic or work life, physical health, financial, or interpersonal relationships. Throughout each chapter we will continuously reference different areas, with the main principles being universal to all of them. Career In work life we are filled with responsibilities, deadlines, projects, meetings and timelines that are to help us not only meet our goals but, to improve efficiency. However, most of the time it ends up like a child with an ice cream cone. Not pretty. This is one of the most common areas of life people tend to have difficulty with consistency and follow through. Interestingly enough we see patterns with this behavior and traditionally if you “procrastinated” in school then chances are you carried that behavior to the workplace. Is the workplace or school a place you struggle with consistency or follow through? 10 Physical We get on the scale we get off the scale. We declare change! We buy “healthy” food. We diet. We workout. We lose weight. Then something happens… Within weeks or months we return to our old patterns of poor sleep, poor diet, and missed gym days. Local gyms plan on this. It is estimated that almost 44% of people stop going to the gym less than one day a week after 6 months. Not before long we return to our original size and weight. Some people believe that our bodies reflect our standards. This may be true. What I can say however is that we as a nation are certainly persistent in our desires but not our follow through. As of 2014 the weight loss industry has become a $60 billion dollar market! Do those desires always translate to results and follow through? Financial Maybe the sorest subject for Americans. Even our government holds extreme financial debt. By extreme financial debt, I mean trillions. With a T. Financial hardship is one of the leading causes of depression in the country. The whole “saving thing” is what we struggle most with. According to research the average American 11 saves 4% of their salary per year. Taking almost 25 years to accrue a savings equal to their yearly wage. How consistent are you with savings? Relationships I hear a different number each time. According to the American psychological association, 40%-50% of marriages are ending in divorce today. There are many reasons for these numbers. As mentioned earlier we don’t necessarily do well with the concept of forever as humans. It is hard to grasp. Consistency and follow through may not save a relationship, however it can create a solid ground from which relationship can grow. Are you consistent in your relationships? Rating Scale To help you define a plan as you go throughout this book, lets identify your life area. Briefly think about the life areas we discussed and based upon a simple scale write down your answers on a scale from 1-10, with 1 being the least consistent and full of follow through and 10 being the equivalent to the modern day superman of consistency. 12 Life Areas: Rank 1-10 Academic/Work: __________ Physical: __________ Financial: __________ Relationships: __________ Keeping your score in mind can help you begin to focus on which life area you want to improve the most. Remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day, patience is one of the keys to consistency and follow through. Throughout the book you can apply the principles to these specific life areas after you determine your “personal priority”, which we will begin now. 13 Chapter 1 Determining your Personal Priority “Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.” ― Stephen R. Covey Because you have to. Because you should. Because they said so. Because what other option do you have? Does this line of thinking sound familiar? This is how we respond to tasks, not priorities. Tasks are the duties and chores that need to get done. They are the jobs that eat away at the time we could have been spending on what we really wanted to do. We all have certain obligations and responsibilities to fulfill, yet our level of consistency and follow through are greatly impacted by our inability to prioritize what we want to do before what we have to do. This is why people so often wind up with half completed tasks and to-do lists that don’t get done. Successful people don’t just find success. They put themselves in the best place to be successful. By giving priority to what I value, I’m able to realign my intentions with my actions. It is in these life areas that I consistently follow through. Success is often where we end up when we are looking for place where success lives. If your relationship is weak, it is not a priority. If you are overweight, your health is not a priority. If you don’t have enough money saved, then saving money was not a priority. If you think back to a time that you were really consistent and followed through, chances are your ambitions matched your priorities. This tool is imperative to setting yourself up for success. 15 Getting Your Priorities Straight Think of your priorities as a representation of who you are internally projected to the outside world. In other words, what we prioritize we actualize. What is highest on your list? What truly matters to you? What do you do before anything else? These are considered your priorities. They are what you decide takes more precedence over other tasks, jobs, or projects in your life. They represent an internal language that you have with yourself about what is truly important. Our priorities represent what we think about most, what we say to ourselves the most, and ultimately, what we believe about ourselves. For example, if you are an entrepreneur, building a startup company will consume all that you think about, read about, and surround your self with until your business becomes the priority and you begin to create it in your life. 16 Engaging the Pull You might find it difficult to involve yourself in tasks or projects that you can’t extract value from so you push yourself through it. However, your priorities and goals should interest you or motivate you often without needing any convincing. This is what I describe as “engaging the Pull.” When we think of activities we feel naturally drawn to, our passions, interests, and hobbies pull us to follow though. For instance, you may want to excel in your current job but you invest all your energy in your relationship. You may want to be secure in retirement but you never made saving and planning an important factor of your life. We become at odds with ourselves when our priorities don’t match our goals, when they don’t represent who we are. To engage the Pull, we must first, find out what our priorities are. Second, align them with our goals. Then the beautiful part about all of this is when we align our goals with our priorities, consistency and follow-through get TREMENDOUSLY easier! 17 This is apparent for me when it comes to cars. For some they find tremendous value, interest and passion in working on automobiles. For me this task seems difficult, tedious, and frustrating. I have to push myself to engage with the task at hand when it comes to auto care. Now, this is fine when I have to change my oil every three thousand miles and occasionally get a check engine light fixed. However, if I had to do this as a career or job I would find it way more difficult and ultimately set myself up for failure. There is a reason why some people are drawn to working on cars and others are drawn to working with numbers. At some point that person is able to engage themselves in the activity without a push and the activity no longer feels like a task but apart of them, this is called engaging the Pull. When “the pull” is engaged it would be the equivalent of me saying to you, “unfortunately, you are going to have to go out to a nice dinner and then a concert tonight.” I am in! We are drawn to the idea of effort at that point simply because we connect to the outcome. Dr. Norman Vincent Peale, an influential public speaker and self-help author said, “Problems provide the resistance we need 18 to sculpt our character and souls.” The key to staying motivated when we face a challenge is knowing when to engage the Pull in life. So many times I have worked with someone who is struggling to reach a goal, whether it be to lose weight, save money, find a job, or go back to school, and ultimately, they begin to lose momentum. It is normal to lose momentum at times and to go through strife and difficulty; if we didn’t, life would be very boring. But when the difficulties overpower the desire to follow through, not only are you not engaging the Pull, you’ve lost the ability to push. If we only push through life we inevitably set ourselves up to burn out and break down. They call this “white knuckling” it. You’re hanging on to your goal for dear life. We can continue on our journey and engage in the Pull of the activity when we find new reserves of momentum and strength. Creating Your Priority Map Priorities are your roadmap for following through. We all have certain life areas that just come easy to us; for some, it’s finance and for others, it’s career or relationships. This just is. The job now is to determine what area of life you want to be more consistent in. Which area of life do you want to have a higher level of follow-through? Once we determine which life area that is, before anything else…we make it a priority. In working with hundreds of people and helping them with following through and consistency, there are some continuous patterns that emerge especially when it comes to setting priorities. I was working with a gentleman who is intelligent, educated and doing well for himself. When it came to completing 20 tasks he struggled with choosing one road and going down it. He was constantly having “new ideas,” “goals,” and pathways for success. He never had a problem of coming up with a new idea or focus; his difficulty was with seeing that idea through. “Maybe ill go back to school?” “What if I try online dating instead? “What if I buy a house instead of investing in the stock market?” His priority map was not efficient. He was going north to go south. Trying new jobs, schools, relationships to find his way towards success. He would focus a little on his career, then on his relationships, and then on finance in no specific order. We set up a plan. We prioritized his desires. Focused on what he wanted most and used that to drive him towards following through and consistency. Desire drives follow-through and consistency. Being able to identify what you desire can help you create your map. Use your desires to fuel your drive towards consistency. If you keep thinking that what you desire is going to show up without making it a priority, you are mistaken. It’s when we decide to make it center stage in our life, that we put ourselves in the best position to follow through. 21 Hard Things First! There are aspects of every goal, task, or project that is hard, difficult or just less interesting. We struggle to wrap our heads around it and this is usually the area where most individuals fail to complete their goals. We have a preconceived notion that because we want it, it should be fun and easy. We think we should enjoy what it is we are doing or that it should be effortless because we love to do it. This is just not true. There are mundane, difficult, and frustrating aspects to all things worth pursuing. It is how we prioritize those areas within the bigger picture that makes the process more digestible. According to a recent study conducted by Hypersoft and its OmniContext users, the most productive time of day is 9 a.m. with an average work intensity level of 52.04 percent working six times per week. At 1 p.m. we work three times per week with an average work intensity of 52.92 percent. Lastly, at 8 a.m. we work two times per week with an intensity of 57.1 percent. The take-away from this study could be that working on your most important tasks in the morning and early afternoon is the most efficient method of productivity. 22 Doing the less interesting, more difficult or tedious things when you are more likely to be productive is a good place to start. In later chapters, I will discuss how to simplify tasks. However, being aware of what sparks your interest as opposed to what you dislike and would rather hire someone to do is essential to planning your roadmap to success. Points to Ponder: • What we Prioritize we Actualize. • When we align our goals and priorities it increases potential for follow through and consistency. • Decide which areas of life you want to make a priority. • Your desire is the fuel to drive you there 23 Chapter 2 Goal Setting “It's not an accident that musicians become musicians and engineers become engineers: it's what they're born to do. If you can tune into your purpose and really align with it, setting goals so that your vision is an expression of that purpose, then life flows much more easily.” — Jack Canfield As people, we need goals to help us achieve self-esteem and self-confidence. A goal is a useful benchmark for measuring your personal performance. They are the incremental accomplishments that keep you engaged with progress. Goals center us and keep us grounded. Goals remind us of our purpose. They foster innovation and give us a reason to create, produce, and add to the human experience. Desire drives follow through. If our goals don’t reflect our desires, we are setting ourselves up for failure. I believe poor goal setting is the number one reason why we don’t consistently follow through. If you have the wrong objective, what does it matter if you follow through or remain consistent? If you are not attracted to your outcome, then what would push you to make it happen? Goals can be big or small, long-term or short-term. What is most important is our relationship to our own personal goals. The more I achieve and accomplish my own goals, the better I feel. Our goals can feel unique. We feel like they are ours. “My goal is to own a house.” “I want to lose 20 pounds.” 25 It is as if these goals and successes were placed on earth just for you to accomplish, just for you to strive for. Yet more often than not people fail to follow through. We get tied up in life. Things happen. People move on. We lose momentum. That unique connection with our goals dims and we add it to the pile of things we gave up on. Is it laziness? Is it that people lose interest? Do we get overwhelmed? Maybe we set the wrong goals? It always amazes me how many people I see who are extremely talented in their professions yet are highly unfulfilled in what they are doing. They lack the emotional connection to their priorities and fulfillment takes a backseat. This often leads to a lack of progress and motivation. Goals must be compelling, realistic, strategic, and most importantly fulfilling. If you don’t have an emotional connection to what it is you intend to follow through on and be more consistent with, you could be setting yourself up for failure. 26 Know Your Outcome Consistency doesn’t happen from the neck up and in-between the ears. It is not just a thoughts process. It’s a feeling process. Granted, we need to know our direction and ideas surrounding the process, but ultimately, we follow through because of our hearts. Because we care to. Because it’s in our inner nature to achieve and accomplish and feel proud as a result. It fills us up. It gives us self-esteem and self-confidence that only breeds future follow- through. The more specific you can be with your outcome, the more you will be aware of the progress your making in getting there. One thing I can say for sure in working with hundreds of people is that there is what we say in our heads, the pictures we paint in our minds, and then what is actually playing out in our lives. Usually the pain we experience is determined by how different these two things are. When you think of a goal you want to accomplish, something that you really want to follow through on, can you identify what 27 following through on it would look like? What are some of the thoughts you have when you think about reaching your goal? Think of the last time you had a project, goal, task, or objective to complete that you did not want to be doing. Think back to what you were telling yourself about the task. Think back to how you were feeling and the pattern of what you were telling yourself. “I cant believe I have to do this!” “This makes no sense anyway.” “How much longer till I don't have to do this any more?” All of these thoughts are contributing to the mental picture of what it would mean to complete what it is you are doing. Think of your goal and answer the following: 1. Where are you when you complete this goal? 2. Who are you with when you complete this goal? 3. What do you look like when you complete this goal? 4. How are you feeling when you complete this goal? 5. What does this goal look like, feel like when its completed? 6. What is the first thing you will do after the goal is completed? 28 29 The stronger this mental image is, the more defined the outcome, then the greater the chance of accomplishment. If I say ice cream. Ice cream cone. If I say ice cream. Ice cream cone. Toppings. Id imagine you are starting to create a mental picture at this moment. You may have your favorite flavor, your favorite place to get ice cream and maybe even people with whom you would want to get ice cream with. Creating a mental image will help to promote new thoughts and emotions surrounding the topic or the idea. So why not create mental images of the outcome that are EXACTLY what it is we are looking to achieve? We can always find something about our outcome that will draw us closer to it even if it's the fact that this job or task will be over! This is where making it compelling comes in. Making it Compelling Progress happens when passion is at play. Think of making your goals so compelling that they act like an energy booster or jet pack for when you fall into the pit of procrastination. The benefit of having goals that are compelling or being able to create a 30 compelling connection to them is that you’re less likely to become unmotivated. When you are compelled to reach your goal, periods of inconsistent follow-through and procrastination will be short lived. Procrastination will become speed bumps and potholes instead of craters and canyons. When you are in the midst of attempting to complete a task, achieve a goal, finish a term paper, or project and the thought begins to enter of “ill get to it later”, or “after my show is over”, it is the compelling relationship, the feeling of connection you have to your outcome that will not allow you to stay there for long. I often speak to individuals who have had past difficulty with following through and it usually isn’t that they didn’t want their outcome. It usually isn’t that they didn’t want to achieve what they set out to do. Somewhere along the way they got distracted, disheartened, annoyed, frustrated and either gave up or under-produced. I ask this specific question: Would it be worse to look back years from now knowing you did not complete this or knowing that you never gave it your all? 31 More often than not most people admit they would experience more pain never having given their goal, project, or desire a shot. At that moment when they are answering and reflecting on the task with hindsight, they are creating an emotional connection to the outcome. They experience the pain of not finishing. That is the power of emotional connection! They are putting themselves in their own emotional shoes having not completed the task. We have all been there. Think back to a time where you were engaged in something and you left it unfinished. How do you feel presently thinking back to that event or goal? When you make your goal compelling from the beginning and really connect with it, you are using the same principal as a motivational tool. Instead of feeling the discomfort looking back on a goal that you didn’t complete, you engage in the excitement and connection of what that goal looks like completed. Renaissance man, Michelangelo, spoke of this phenomenon: “Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.” He had the ability to see the beauty and the end result in a single piece of stone and it was just a matter of uncovering it. 32 Following through and consistency is about seeing the beauty and emotion in what it is you’re doing to help you uncover it and completing what it is you set out to do. One of the main points that I always find myself making is related to the importance of “feeling” our way through a project or task. It enables self worth and self care. It creates the momentum of “the better we feel, the more we do.” The more you can engage in a task emotionally the more likely it is to stay with you because emotion is what we run on. The basketball player who is tired at the end of the fourth quarter finds the strength emotionally first. The runner who is entering the home stretch, digs deep down emotionally to finish the race. We are constantly looking to feel good and the more we can connect that feel good sensation to what it is we are looking to accomplish the more likely we will be able to get it done! We are pleasure-seeking beings in that way. We are wired to seek pleasure and avoid pain. Freud called this the pleasure principle. We will do anything we can to avoid pain and gain pleasure. The only problem is that most people don’t use this to their advantage. They fall victim to seeking pleasure at any cost, aimlessly and ineffectively leading to short lived fulfillment and a lack of consistency in their life. It is equivalent to have a guided missile that is programed for the wrong target. 33 Our brain wants to create a reality based on our beliefs. It wants us to produce results that reflect what we think. So, because we are wired to seek pleasure and avoid pain, we will do this at any cost. Identify a pleasure-producing goal as well as the best way to reach it. The equivalent to this would be putting a navigation system in your car. Your car is great at the driving part, it is your job to not only steer the wheel but to also steer it in the right direction. 34 Make It Strategic The knowing of where you are in relation to what it is you want to accomplish is imperative for following-through. These are the nuts and bolts, the checks and balances. The hard numbers and data that we can use to help motivate us and keep us engaged in our progress. As long as we continue to make progress and feel progress we will be less likely to give up. How do you know if you are making progress? What does progress look like? What if what you are doing isn’t working? Still to this day one of my favorite jokes of all time to play on people is toying with their idea of asking for help. Someone would ask me, “Steve, could you give me a hand with this?” Immediately, I start clapping. We would share a laugh and they would have that, “come on already face”, and after some busting of chops, I would help them out. There is some truth behind my dry sense of humor. To be specific, strategic, and defined can be important to achieving your outcome. After all they did get a hand! 35 Not Strategic: I want to save for retirement. I want to lose weight. I want to eat less carbohydrates. I want to complete this report ASAP! Strategic: I want to save at least 10,000 dollars a year for 25 years before I retire. I want to lose 10 pounds in six months by working out three to four times a week and dieting. I want to eat 10 more servings of vegetables a week and allow myself to eat three servings of carbohydrates Monday through Friday. I want to complete this report in one week, giving it five hours of my time a day. The more concrete we can be the better we will feel about our progress. Setting timelines, writing down your goal and breaking 36 it into digestible pieces are all great tools for being strategic. Similarly, so is the practice of checking in. During cross-country travel, the average airplane spends 80 percent to 90 percent of total travel time recalibrating to stay on course. Without that constant recalibration, flights would end up completely off course and miss their destinations. All successful businesses have three and five year plans. They have identified areas for growth and hold themselves accountable to those areas. Creating a strategic plan is important and checking in to see if you’re still on course is a major part of that. This step could save you hundreds of hours working in an inefficient way, producing poor results without knowing it.The more you can check in with your original goal and strategy, the more time you can save yourself in the end and the more efficient you will be along the way. Points to Ponder: • Know your outcome! Create a vision of what you completing your goal would look like • Make it compelling. Create an emotional attachment to what you are looking to accomplish. • Make it strategic. Create your checks and balances to track and monitor your progress. 37 Chapter 3 Rituals “Repetition is the mother of skill.” — Anthony Robbins What you did yesterday reflects how you live your life. In other words, we are what we do consistently. The basis of psychology is how it shows up in the things we do. We would have a hard time understanding what was going on inside people’s heads if we couldn't look at their behavior. The creation of routines, habits, and rituals all impact our success and follow-through. Learning to create and sustain daily rituals as a way of life can put you in the best position for long-term success. Rituals are the patterns of behavior that we enact consistently and give specific meaning to. We are creatures of habit and we all enact rituals whether we think about them or not. Overtime we forget about the power of daily habit and how strongly it contributes to achieving follow-through and consistency. This is because we get impatient, we want it now, so we give up practicing it and we try “life hacking” it. We can be a culture of the finished product. It’s what we usually see. The story before the product is finished can be boring, tedious and unentertaining. Think about the particular way you wake up in the morning. Do you wake up to your alarm or do you need the nudging of a loved one to really get moving? Do you head straight for the coffee pot 39 or straight for the shower? Is the news on, is there conversation, or do you prefer the quiet? If I were to ask you about a specific behavior and why you repeat it on a consistent basis, your reason might be that it’s convenient, comfortable, or simply the way you grew up. The reason for your actions, the mantra that supports your ritual, and your psychology of why it remains intact is a reflection of who you are and what you value. It's the meaning you give to your priorities. This is what helps you stay consistent. More important than what we do is why we do it. The meaning we give to life shapes our destiny. When you think of a time in your life that you struggled to understand an event, a relationship, or someone's actions, whatever meaning you gave it, produced your ultimate outcome. For instance, when we lose a loved one we are presented with the dilemma of not only how to feel about it but what meaning we give their passing. Some feel as though life will never be the same while others believe the deceased has moved on to a better place. Each sentiment gives way to different meanings and different outcomes. The expression, “Whatever gets you through the night,” applies here. Whatever meaning you want to go with 40 that helps, great. However, getting to a place to decide what that is, living it, and feeling it consistently will help us find the path of least resistance. Why do you do what you do? Why have your daily rituals become your daily rituals? The answer to these questions will give you insight into what you find meaningful, whether or not your actions are aligned with your desired outcomes, and your commitment to consistency and follow-through. Beethoven would be very selective in his cup of coffee. He would be strategic and make sure 60 coffee beans were in each cup of morning coffee. Mozart would spend one hour each morning just on dressing before he performed or composed. Immanuel Kant would have weak tea, a walk, and pipe every morning to prepare for study. Maya Angelou would only do her work in hotel or motel rooms. John Milton would have his aid read him the bible every morning and attempt to memorize as many lines as he could. Charles Darwin took three walks a day and played backgammon with his wife. 41 We all have these little idiosyncrasies that illustrate who we are, what we do, what we consume and why we consume it. These patterns, no matter how big or small, when altered or shifted can create major change over a period of time. An inch today is a mile tomorrow. When we take the time to make small changes and reenact those changes in terms of a daily ritual, success reflects these developments accordingly. When we see an athlete at the top of her game, when we see a successful business taking off, when we see someone who has the “perfect” body, we are also seeing all the time and dedication, the persistent effort, and the meaning they gave to those achievements. Anyone who has set out to accomplish major goals and achievements put in not only thousands of hours of time, but also practiced specific rituals to help refine what they already knew. From Michael Jordan to Mark Zuckerberg, from Mark Cuban to Serena Williams, all these men and women adjusted specific behaviors and created rituals in order to attain their greatness. 42 43 Defining Your Rituals What are your rituals? What do you do on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis in routine? Knowing what your rituals are is vital to your success. New patterns of behavior emphasize new meaning and put you in the best place to succeed. Readjust your priorities to produce new outcomes and target your goal. Self-care rituals differ from lifestyle/priority rituals in that all humans require sleep, good hygiene, and nutrition to live and to function in society. These are our basic needs that we tend to on a daily basis. Just above those self-care needs are what we engage in based upon selection. For instance, it might benefit one person to have leisurely mornings while another person finds it beneficial to be active. Some people like to get certain tasks completed early on like making a plan for the day and scheduling activities around school or work breaks, checking email and social media notifications, or paying bills. One person’s day might feel “off” if they don’t get Starbucks after their morning meditation session while another cannot focus at work without first a cup of tea and a long run. 44 These selection-based needs that we satisfy through routines are incredibly revealing. Defining your rituals is defining yourself. It is what makes us unique and different. Evaluating the lifestyle and habits of a friend or a coworker is how you distinguish them from others; and this is how they define you in return- based on your patterns of behavior. The small things we do on a daily basis not only comprise our personality but also determine the quality, direction, and pace of our life. In order to set yourself up to follow through consistently, it’s important to embed your desires and sense of self in your rituals. You can determine if a friend is following through to improve his health and physical fitness because getting to the gym at 5 a.m. each morning before work is his first priority. He doesn't think about whether or not he has to go to the gym. It’s not a constant debate. it’s what he does. It’s who he is. The importance of fulfilling this need has been reinforced since the ritual was first created. Environment We saw this earlier with Maya Angelou. She was a prolific writer who found her writing success in a bare hometown hotel room. It 45 wasn’t coincidence that brought her back over and over again: she returned because she flourished in that environment. There is a reason that working outside suits some and complete silence suits others. You might thrive in a cutthroat, competitive office environment and fail in a very nurturing office environment. Whichever environment brings about the most productivity, do what you can to create that environment to set yourself up for success. For example, hang pictures in your office if that motivates you or establish a meaningful relationship with a coworker if you like to bounce ideas off of others. Maybe your greatest achievements were realized in a cubicle listening to a podcast, a local café, or a specific room in your house. The fact is, as Deepak Chopra once said, “You can't make positive choices for the rest of your life without an environment that makes those choices easy, natural, and enjoyable.” Google is leading the way in this arena and it is paying off. The workspace, workplace shift of the past five years has changed the way business is being done. Creating your island of excellence or working in an environment that is conducive to your working habits is a surefire way to promote success and follow-through. 46 The key to success is putting yourself in the best position to be successful. If your current rituals are not aligned with your goals, test your productivity out in a new space or bring something new to an old space. Sound Birds. Music. No music. White noise. Background noise. I love to ask people about their bedtime routines, specifically, about the sounds they hear before they fall asleep. The answers range from the general (TV, music, a sound machine) to the specific (Friends reruns, CNN, stand-up comedy specials on Netflix). We either like or dislike certain audio environments according to the quality of sleep each produces. Similarly, we need to create an environment based on consistent ritualistic behavior that works for us and makes us work. I have found that I like soft instrumental music to help me get into a routine of writing. In doing research on the writing rituals of famous authors, I noted that the ideal environment for many is a private and silent space with limited chances for distraction. Ernest Hemmingway woke up early in the morning to work in peace while others slept. On the other hand, Kurt Vonnegut liked 47 jazz in the evening and Mark Twain preferred to write in his bed at home surrounded by his large family. What is your sound preference for productivity and follow through? Time Time is the ultimate currency. We all have 24 hours in a day, so how can some people do so much more? M. Scott Peck said it best: “Until you value yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.” It is the ultimate currency. Time is more than half of the reason we seek to improve our follow-through. We want more time to do what we love. Trade in your time for something that’s valuable, something that gives you meaning. Create a new relationship with time. Learn how to budget it wisely according to when you are most likely to engage the Pull verses push through it. This step was a great challenge because I forced myself to figure out when I was most productive in my routine and more likely to 48 complete a task. Although difficult, this step is vital to understand how you work best and what leads you towards consistency. Is it early morning? Night? Afternoon? Midday? Right before lunch? After breakfast? Finding the right “pocket of productivity” can be all the difference in you completing what it is you set out to follow through on. 49 Putting It All Together The trick now is to put all of your rituals together to create an environment, time, and atmosphere that are conducive to your rituals. Engage the Pull at the most productive time, in the most productive environment and create the most productive atmosphere and you will conquer 50 percent of the battle for consistency and follow-through. When time and time again you can create that environment at the right time, in the right atmosphere, your body and mind will begin to associate productivity, following through, and consistency with those variables which lead to more accomplished goals. This is the beginning of your ritual. Practice this ritual everyday in order to achieve incremental success. These little victories are the driving force to keep your desire aligned with your actions and outcome. Points to Ponder: • What rituals can you engage in immediately to increase productivity? • What sounds, environments, and times can you identify to help you create your island of excellence? • “It is never what we do, its why we do it 50 Chapter 4 Creating your Team “A true friend freely, advises justly, assists readily, adventures boldly, takes all patiently, defends courageously, and continues a friend unchangeably.” — William Penn One of the best sports teams in history was the 1992 USA Olympic men’s basketball team, also known as, the “Dream Team.” It donned the named of players like Larry Bird and Michael Jordan. These were arguably the best basketball players of all time joining forces for the first time to represent United States, and the whole world looked-on. Despite their individual history of sportsmanship and world-renown talent, they faced a series of unexpected challenges as a team. The biggest difficulty they faced was not about a lack of skill or leadership; it was about something much more basic. The Dream Team had to learn how to play basketball together- as a team. In order to prepare for the Olympic trials and kickoff the season, the Dream Team had to scrimmage a group of professional basketball players for warm up. Well, the group did just that. Not only did they warm the star athletes up, they beat them. And they beat them badly. Not because of lack of skill or talent but because they couldn't come together to play as a team. They practiced working collaboratively on and off the court and after much continued effort, they won the 1992 men’s basketball Olympic gold medal with an undefeated record and their closest point differential being 32 points! 52 Even the best in the game will fail if they don’t value the power of teamwork. Success of the individual rides on the successes of the group. Your team, your enterprise, is a select group of individuals that are in your corner and on your side. Each has specific roles unique to their skills, but all good teammates will hold one another accountable to be more efficient and to support achievements together. The individuals on your team will care about you as much as they care about what it is you are doing. Your people not only have resources to offer, but most importantly, are capable of offering up the emotional support needed to help you follow through. Creating Your Ultimate Team Understanding the difference between someone who can help you and provide you with feedback and support as opposed to someone who holds you back is the first step you take to create your own dream team. You already have people in your life that can be great team players and be there for you in a variety of different ways. 53 Building on those relationships and creating new strategic ones is vital to creating an effective support system. No matter what you are looking to accomplish, achieve, set out to do, chances are someone else has already done it. These people can become your teachers, mentors, and guides throughout your journey. Learning from those before you cannot only save you a lot of time, but can also give you a proven model to achieve follow-through. This is the essence of a team member. Create a team that can help you be a better you. Evaluate what you aim to accomplish and the type of support you need along the way before you recruit your team. Early on in business I remember people advising me to get a good accountant and a good lawyer. “Well, why?” I thought. “I don’t plan on getting sued anytime soon!” But the truth is that today I see the overwhelming value of having lawyers, doctors, and accountants on my team as priceless because they’ve helped me avoid walking straight into potential pitfalls, away from my goals. Having good, high quality feedback that is honest and real is so valuable when it comes to remaining consistent. 54 One of the major reasons why people struggle with consistency and follow through is due to setbacks. We can avoid setbacks, obstacles, and unnecessary roadblocks by seeking the guidance of qualified team members. This is a huge timesaver while also helping to maintain momentum. 55 Who Is On Your Team? What are their individual roles and how do you create your ultimate team? In working with hundreds of people, I have found any combination of the following categories of people can create a great supporting cast for the team of YOU! The Fan Through and through they support, and most importantly, love you. They care for you and they are your utility person. They give you support, affection, care and most importantly help you remember past success in order to prepare for future greatness. The Critic We all need a good critic. The skeptic. The one who is a little hard to impress, but know they come from a positive place. They can provide you with honest feedback in a way that you can hear it. They are real and true and can give you what you need when you need it most. 56 The Sidekick The sidekick is in the trenches with you. They know what it is you are trying to do and some of the best ways to go about doing it. They are your colleagues, roommates, classmates, and business partners. These are the members of your team that play with you and have a great working knowledge of what you’re trying to accomplish. The Mentor The significance of a quality mentor on your team cannot be overstated. This person has been where you are trying to go. They have accomplished what you are trying to do and can guide you in an efficient, reliable way through the forest. They can give you advice and encouragement. The mentor is living proof that what you are doing can be done. Can you think of your team? See if you can have one person for each role identified above. The Fan: __________________ The Critic: __________________ The Sidekick: ___________________ The Mentor: ____________________ 57 Spending Time with Your Team The biggest trick is to not only create a great support system and team around you, but to also utilize them. One of the key mistakes people make is not asking or checking in. We start to think that they don't want to hear about our problems or that we might a bother. We don't like to ask for help or admit that we need it so we end up struggling in silence instead. However, one of the biggest 58 fallacies that people still believe today is that we do things on our own. We do virtually nothing on our own; it is the limiting belief that you shouldn't ask for help that gets in the way. I have found in helping people create their team, that when they approach it as “checking in” and “touching base,” they initiate a natural conversation of shared interest and a pattern of supportive and productive behavior. For example, I touch base with some of my team members in the early morning before I start my day. I talk with others at the end of the day on my drive home or before bed. It is through some continued effort that “check ins” begin to form. There is a good chance you are already doing this. Before you go to work, is there a loved one that you reach out to? Or before bed, or on the way home do you connect with someone? This can be a time to expand your network and involve team members that can help you remain consistent and follow through. You want to be connecting with at least one team member per day. Even if for a five-minute update, a quick “check in” can go a long way to help you stay consistent. Ultimately, you will create a pattern with your team and they will come to support you and you will create growth together. 59 Learning to utilize your team on a regular consistent basis will give you different perspectives and support throughout each of your goals and not only help you follow through but also help support you overall. Aye Aye Captain At the end of the day, you are still the one steering the ship. The one who makes the final decision on direction, efforts, and follow-through. It is what you are “pulled” to or “drawn” to accomplish. If one of your team members thinks differently than you or is going down a different path, that is OKAY! It is up to you to trust your gut and determine which path is good for you. There is strength that is developed in continuing on in your direction, trusting in who you are. Points to Ponder: • Who is on your team? • What is one thing you can do to begin to create your team today? • Touch base with one of your “team members” in the next day. 60 Chapter 5 Limiting Beliefs “It isn’t the mountains ahead to climb that wear you down. It's the pebble in your shoe.” — Muhammad Ali You can’t be famous and want to be a private person. You can’t want to be in a deep, loving relationship but never commit. You can’t want to be in incredible shape but not eat well or workout. These are examples of your internal beliefs not aligning. Beliefs are where it all begins. Beliefs precede action and mood. Inconsistent follow-through is a good indicator that your beliefs are not aligned with your goals. I like to think of it as a garden. When we are young and vulnerable, we begin to form our beliefs about the world around us. Our parents, friends, family, community, and circumstances shape these beliefs, and ultimately, we create them by what we think. Think of these beliefs like vibrant flowers in your garden. The more you feed each flower, the more it grows and becomes a vital part of your garden. The more we think in line with our beliefs and the more the world justifies our beliefs, the more solidified our beliefs become. As we grow older and experience more of life, some of these beliefs no longer work for us. Our worlds change and what once was an effective belief becomes outdated or pathological. Those once vibrant flowers become weeds and start to infest the rest of our garden. The once functional belief that things will take care of themselves now 62 starts to work against us and cause us pain. Our garden begins to become infested with weeds and we create a limiting view of the world. This greatly impacts our ability to create consistency in our life. This pain is normal. It is our internal psychological response telling us that a certain belief no longer works. The only problem is that we don’t listen. For instance, if we have an internal belief that says, “All people should do the right thing,” we may experience pain when someone does something wrong. We get angry, frustrated, and upset because our beliefs don’t match up with our world around us. Pretty common story. Right? Most people will attempt to change the world around them before they change their beliefs. They try to change the situation, the environment, people, friends, jobs, relationships, and even their body. What this does is create a temporary fix. It is the equivalent of ripping the weeds out of your garden but not getting to the roots. THEY GROW BACK! We see this often. People with several marriages, different careers, constantly changing diets, new fads, all to provide relief to limiting beliefs. What they are doing is attempting to change the world around them to better suit their beliefs as opposed to changing their limiting beliefs to better suit the world. 63 What we want to do is identify and remove limiting beliefs so we can remove the weeds from our garden and allow it to flourish. We want to change our limiting beliefs to better suit our desires, and the world around us. Common Limiting Beliefs: I don’t deserve love I am a bad person I am terrible I am worthless (inadequate) I am shameful I am not loveable I am not good enough I deserve only bad things I am permanently damaged I am ugly (my body is hateful) I do not deserve... I am stupid (not clever enough) I am insignificant (unimportant) I am a disappointment I deserve to be miserable I am different (don’t belong) I should have done something I did something wrong 64 I should have known better I cannot be trusted I cannot trust myself I cannot trust my judgment I cannot trust anyone I cannot protect myself I am in danger It’s not OK to feel (show) my emotions I cannot stand up for myself I cannot let it out I am not in control I am powerless (helpless) I am weak I cannot get what I want I am a failure (will fail) I cannot succeed I have to be perfect (please everyone) I cannot stand it I am inadequate I cannot trust anyone “Relief is in identifying underlying beliefs.” 65 Identifying Limiting Beliefs There are certain patterns in behavior to look for when identifying a limiting belief. One of the first patterns to explore is repetitive behavior. Insanity is defined as doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. What usually promotes this cycle is an underlying limiting belief. 66 We are creatures of habit. We engage in behaviors on a habitual basis. When those behaviors become dysfunctional or create conflict, they negatively impact our ability to follow through. This is a red flag that a limiting belief is at play. Turning to drugs and alcohol for a good time only to find you feel worse the next morning, changing jobs routinely to find the best fit for your career, or changing geographic locations for the “best” place to live are all examples of continuous behavior not leading to the identified outcome. Chances are there is a limiting belief underneath. Another way to identify limiting beliefs is by exploring when your own thought patterns seem to be getting in your way. In business they often refer to this as “releasing the brakes.” Learning to not put your foot on the gas after you’ve taken it off the brakes. This forces you to slow down and think about the beliefs that break you down. Identifying your mood slumps. Usually when we find ourselves in a mood for a period of time where it begins to affect our level of efficiency, productivity, and follow-through, a limiting belief is at play. “I’ll get to it tomorrow” or “I just don’t feel like it today” are examples of how our past limiting beliefs can show up in our moods. 67 Meaning Makes a Difference You can think of meaning as a bridge to future actions. When we create new meaning it challenges our current perspective of life and helps us create different outcomes. As a counselor, I fundamentally believe that “the unexamined life is not worth living,” as Socrates once said. However, when we examine and examine and examine, we get so caught up in what we are thinking that we never get to the doing part. That is where the change in meaning can help us get better results and outcomes. If you have ever known someone to make long lasting change in his or her life it usually started with his or her belief system. This is where the meaning we give the world comes from. Beliefs are “recycled thoughts.” If you think something over and over again, eventually you will start to believe it. Do this enough with negative thoughts and you will start to be depressed. Do this enough with positive thoughts and you will experience a sense of contentment. These belief systems are created by our history of thought, experiences, circumstances, and memories that we have put together, that shape us. It is the community you live in, the 68 people you surround yourself with, the parents you had or didn’t have. All of these variables shape your belief system. Exploring each belief is a noble act, however, figuring out which ones are working and which ones aren’t is a fastest way to reach your highest potential. Because we are creatures of habit, when our actions are rewarded, we tend to do it again and again to get that same reward. When we CHOOSE a meaning that is beneficial AND get rewarded for it, momentum will happen because we create this self-fulfilling prophecy. Suppose there were only two reactions to have to your house going on fire. You could say: "My life is ruined!” or "I can finally rebuild it as I always wanted." The outcome of how we feel is directly related to the meaning we give it. Think of the last time you followed through and reached a goal. At some point you had a positive feeling, a bright side, or a rationale that allowed you to feel good about the process. It may be that you reminded yourself that a project you took on was for a great cause or that you believe in what you’re doing, for example. These beliefs help us repeat behaviors and good repetitive behaviors help us create skill and follow-through. 69 Meaning of Five Think of five major events in your life that you would say really shaped you as a person. No matter how big or small, make a list of five events that you would say made you who you are today. Now, next to each event, write in two statements or less the meaning or belief that you give that event and why it happened. So for instance, if one of your major events was graduating college, you could say that graduating college was the worst 70 financial decision you’ve ever made or that graduating college prepared you for the real world. Once you establish the meaning you associated with each event, write two to three experiences in which this meaning has shaped your life. For example, graduating college is the reason you are in debt or the reason you will never own a home. Do this will all five of the major events in your list. Notice how you feel as you are going through this exercise: when you feel positive and healthy and vibrant versus when you feel regretful or upset or guilty. This is the power of our belief system. When we begin to look at our life this way we can clearly see the funnel that the meaning we give the world creates. If we see college as a poor financial decision, that meaning will trickle down into our beliefs about our financial decisions, and ultimately, our self worth. We want to go with what works and what works is creating meaning that leads to more options as opposed to less options. So this is our goal: create meaning that gives us as many options as possible. As humans we don’t do well with little options. If you think back to a time you were scared, frustrated, upset, angered, or unmotivated, oftentimes it relates to feeling like you have no 71 options. There is a connection between limiting beliefs and limiting options. New beliefs are often the antidote. When a client is confronting an obstacle, I help them create new meaning by creating new options to think, act, behave, or feel about the obstacle. New Beliefs Start with New Meaning Where do we start? Once you have identified a limiting belief that is in your garden by either identifying repetitive behaviors, mood slumps, or thoughts that slow you down, take action by giving the circumstance a new meaning. Limiting beliefs can be one of the major pitfalls that can stall follow through and consistency. Points to Ponder: • Can you identify some of your limiting beliefs? Do any of the examples ring true for you? • What meaning do you give to the “negative” circumstances in your life? • For three months can you consistently give an area of your life new meaning? For example: “ I will allow myself to enjoy the gym without judgment of how I look.” 72 Chapter 6 Celebration “People of our time are losing the power of celebration. Instead of celebrating we seek to be amused or entertained. Celebration is an active state, an act of expressing reverence or appreciation. To be entertained is a passive state--it is to receive pleasure afforded by an amusing act or a spectacle. . . . Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one's actions.” — Abraham Joshua Heschel One of the things children seem to have mastered is the ability to experience joy in simplicity. They can become fascinated with the most inconsequential of things. You know this if you have every played peek-a-boo with a toddler. As we discussed earlier, making goals compelling is key to helping you follow through. Celebration works in the same way. Celebrating small accomplishments on the road to achieving your goals can strengthen your relationship to what it is you are doing and why you are doing it. It focuses on your relationship with your goals and how that relationship effects follow through and consistency. When we celebrate, our physiological and psychological responses tend to be aligned. When we cheer, yell, smile, dance, jump up and down, we are sending messages to our body that some really good things just happened or are about to happen. When those really good things happen, we want to try to recreate them again and again. This is where consistency and follow through come in. We like the good feelings and emotions. Our brains want to recreate those feelings and bodily state. The beautiful part of this is that our brains don't care where we get the emotions from or what brought them; it just wants more 74 of them. Whether it was landing a new job or acing your physics exam, if it feels good, your brain will want more of it. Freud called this the pleasure principle. We run towards pleasure and away from pain. By celebrating our small achievements, we recreate a compelling reason to work towards our goals. Take going to the gym for example. Most people who struggle with going to the gym have a different experience than those who workout consistently. They think about the pain and discomfort they feel while working out or the time and effort it would take to complete the workout. On the other hand, the person who goes daily focuses on the pleasure of feeling good after the workout or the way his or her body looks afterwards. The main difference between success and failure is in what each person chooses to focus on and celebrate. If you think about the gym and make negative associations, your follow through will be inconsistent in comparison to the person who focuses on the positive aspects of working out. The more we can create a reason to celebrate on the road to reaching our goals, the more likely we will want to keep traveling. 75 It keeps us in the game longer. It helps us not only stay focused but rewards us for our progress, because progress is what we are looking for not perfection. Progress Vs. Results One of the main reasons celebrating along the way to success can be the key to success is because progress is what we want anyway, even more so than results. In speaking with thousands of people, some of whom have achieved great success, a common factor relating to results and progress was uncovered. Progress is what we are after, not results. As we make progress on a project and see our growth over a period of time, the work that went into the progress is much more rewarding than us sitting with our result in our hands. We see this primarily with money. People who achieve tremendous financial success often find themselves more invigorated during the process of growth than when they have reached their financial benchmark. Quite often I find that my clients achieve one major life goal and then ask themselves, almost immediately, “what’s next?” I have come to coin the term for this as “Mountain Top Syndrome.” 76 77 77 Once you reach the pinnacle of what you were looking to accomplish, fulfillment is short-lived and we begin to think about our next mountain! It’s not the result of what we do, it’s the journey to get there that we feel invigorated by. This is also why people buy the Thighmaster at two in the morning and feel good immediately after. (But when it shows up at the house, it gets tossed into the pile with all the other workout gear.) This is because the progress made in buying the latest workout solution is what we are looking for on our journey. After all, making the purchase was a step in the right direction. If we shift our attention to the progress we make to achieve our goals, not only do we create momentum but we also create more fulfillment along the way. In the long run, it’s the progress of getting there that is more rewarding than the destination itself. How To Celebrate? Our bodies can help us a great deal on the road to follow-through. Our bodies send signals to our brains relating to pain and pleasure. When we celebrate an accomplishment, we are sending signals of pleasure to the brain. 78 Even a smile can do wonders. Dr. Tina Forster at the Cognitive Neuroscience Research Unit at City University London used a technique called EEG (electroencephalography) to record the brainwaves of 25 participants as they looked at photographs of faces that were either smiling or showing a neutral expression. Dr. Forster and her team found that when the participants smiled, their neural activity was enhanced just the same as when they looked at neutral or smiling faces. In other words, when the participant smiled, their brain processed, or partially processed, a neutral face as if it were smiling. When we take the smallest of movements that emulate a celebration, we begin to associate the accomplishment with the behavior as a positive. If you are writing a major term paper or working on a project for work, and along the way you set up benchmarks (see chapter 2 on goal setting) and celebrate when you reach them, you are creating a great opportunity to tell your body that you received pleasure. After all, do you not feel better that more of the project is done? The more you begin to accomplish small goals and celebrate them, the more you start to associate the process and pleasure. 79 A celebration can be high-fiving a friend, or listening your favorite song, or even a 15-minute power nap so long as you associate that physical celebration with accomplishing your goals. Our moods are conveyed in our body language. Harvard psychologist, Amy Cuddy, completed a study in which she determined that body posture directly influences mood, hormone level, testosterone, adrenaline, and even cortisol levels. She calls this posture the “superman pose.” If we hold the superman pose for a period of time, we can actually influence our mood. By celebrating steps along the journey to our goals we create a positive connection with consistency and follow through. We tell our bodies that this is positive and full of pleasure, that “we are making progress”. Points to Ponder: • What is one more recent accomplishment that you can celebrate? • Design a celebration that best suits who you are. Find the right music, dance, or even outfit for celebration. • Identify five areas of your life where you have made progress in the past year. 80 Chapter 7 Finishing Thank you for taking this journey with me. The principles and steps outlined in this book, at one time or another, helped me in my own life. I didn’t know perseverance or drive. But most importantly, I didn’t know myself. At the end of the day, follow through and consistency are about that relationship. The relationship you have with yourself. Like many people all over the world, I settled for the low-hanging fruit. I gave up too easily. If there was an easy way out, I took it. I constantly used my past as an excuse for why I was underperforming. Essentially, I became a victim of my circumstances and limited beliefs. They say in the first five years of our lives we learn more than we ever do for the entirety of our life. We create our habits, our psychological views, and our sense of self. I remind my clients all the time that the first person you learn to lie to is yourself. Denial is the first of Freud’s defenses we learn and we do so in a way that works and protects us. We thrive at protecting ourselves. We associate pain and discomfort with failure and then shut ourselves off from anything that might take us outside our comfort zones. This is what kept 82 me and thousands of people stuck in patterns of procrastination and lack of follow through. Now this is as old as psychology, but how has this changed our sense of self today? The level of learning we have in front of us today for children emerging into adolescents and ultimately into adult hood is quite different that thirty or even twenty years ago. We can no longer 83 take things at face value. We are flooded with so much information and starving for wisdom. We have to forcibly sift through senseless and at times useless content before we can arrive at what one might consider a viable option or conclusion. Twenty years ago someone said something or answered our question, to some extent believed them on the basis of trust of the human experience. Since the extreme change in technological advances I can fact check something within seconds. This can lead to a society that is struggling to speak out and find identity and most importantly trust. Human interaction is changing and so are the primary roots of relationship building. We can have “intimate” relationships and never meet someone face to face today. However, what is not changing is the first relation we form, and the first lie we tell and the first judgment that is created, and that is with our sense of self. Getting things done, moving on, completing what is in front of us to move on to bigger and better things is in our nature. It’s in our nature to keep moving. Once we give way to our true nature of forging ahead and finding a way to constantly reinvent ourselves through repetition and discovery, procrastination and setbacks will be speed bumps on the road of life. 84 Do One Thing Differently Here is my last invitation. I invite you to do one thing differently for 30 days. If you can’t apply all the principles in this book, apply one. If you can’t fully apply one principle, apply aspects of different principles. Do one thing differently than what you have been doing. Hold yourself to a new standard. Monitor how you feel and take a chance on yourself. Warm up to the idea of discomfort. Begin to create a relationship with discomfort. The best idea for change is usually the one we think of ourselves. 85 Copyright Copyright © 2017 by Steven Pinto. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. Steven Pinto www.stevenjpinto.com-17 East Carver St. Huntington NY, 11743 Content Creation: Steven Pinto Editor: Emily Goodrich 87