What are your goals? Do you want to make a lot of money? What for? The fact is that the more specific your goal is, the more likely you are to achieve it. For example, let’s say you want a new car this year. That’s fine if just any old car will do. The question is, do you want any old car or do you want an iridium silver 2008 Mercedes-Benz E550 with voice control and ipod integration kit? When you’re specific something magical happens. You’re mind unconsciously searches out ways for you to achieve your goal. Maybe you’ll notice an article about a local Mercedes dealership going out of business. That little gem would slip by you if you didn’t know exactly what you wanted. But how can you take a nebulous idea and turn it into something concrete that’ll really excite you? Good question. Here’s how:
First sit down and write out your goal list. At this point you’re just trying to list your goals; it doesn’t matter how specific. What is it that you want to achieve this year, next year, or in the next ten years? Write down everything! Higher salary, new car, inner peace, whatever it is; write it down now! I like to shoot for fifteen goals. For me it’s a good number that’s just outside of my comfort zone. Whatever number you choose, make sure it’s enough to both excite you and scare you a little bit. Remember that true personal growth happens when you’re outside your comfort zone.
After you finish your list, expand on it. If you said you wanted a higher salary, now’s the time to specify how much. Do you want to make $50,000 or $100,000? When you’re doing this, make sure that your goal is obtainable. If you’re making $32,000 now and your goal is to make $100,000 next year, you’d better have one heck of a plan or it’s not going to happen. Once you’ve made your goals specific, the fun part begins.
Create a goal scrapbook! If you wanted that iridium silver 2008 Benz, then find pictures of it in magazines and make a page exclusively dedicated to that goal. You could have the car in an open road setting or maybe you could create a picture of your Benz pulling up to red velvet ropes or driving through the wine country… whatever! It’s your goal, have fun with it! This exercise accomplishes two things. First, taking the time to put these pages together will solidify the goal in your mind. You wouldn’t take the time to do this if you weren’t truly serious about achieving your goals. This determination will put your subconscious to work and steer you towards success. Second, after you’re finished making your scrapbook you’ll have a constant and vivid reminder of what you want in life. Any time you feel like quitting, you can flip through your scrapbook and remind yourself how much you want to succeed.
Remember that anybody can say they want something. It takes someone who’s driven to articulate exactly what they want and make it real enough to go for it!
Of all the slogans I ever heard, I think the one that bothered me most was the old US Army slogan: An Army of One. How many times do you think the US Army sent just one person to the front lines? When the war on terror was announced did they say, “We realize that there is a clear threat from radical factions in the Middle East, but don’t worry ‘cause we’re sending in John Doe. He’ll take care of everything.” Which brings me to my point, how many truly successful people do you know that did it all themselves? Let’s face it; you need help to become obscenely successful. You need mentors, accountants, lawyers, support staff… the list goes on and on. So how do find all these people to help you? Ask Anthony Robbins.
In Unlimited Power, Robbins shows you how to identify disempowering beliefs that you hold such as, I have to do everything myself and teaches you to question them and break them down using neuro-linguistic programming. It’s truly amazing how many beliefs you develop that have little or no evidence to back them up! You see, the mind doesn’t like information gaps so when you lack enough information your mind will fill in these gaps to reach a conclusion. Some of these conclusions are preventing you from achieving your ultimate potential in life. Unlimited Power gives you step-by-step instructions to identify these disempowering beliefs, challenge them, and replace them with empowering beliefs so you can move forward in your life and achieve the success you deserve!
The book would be great even if it stopped there but Robbins takes in a step further and dedicates an entire section of the book to building a winning team. Most self help books focus solely on self improvement, but Robbins realizes that no one is an army of one. In order to put together a powerful team, Robbins teaches you a variety of techniques such as mirroring. When you mirror someone you mimic, to a degree, the mannerisms of the person you’re talking to. People like others that are like themselves. It’s true that birds of a feather flock together. If you are driven to be successful then you have to align yourself with other people who want the same thing. Unlimited Power is not only about bettering you; it’s about building a powerful alliance and growing together.
If you think you’re going to be an army of one, go ahead and try. But your chances of success are about as good as John Doe winning the war on terror by himself. When you have a group of like minded people working with you, there’s no limit to what you can achieve and Unlimited Power will teach you to do just that.
We’ve all said it. I’m willing to bet you’ve said it more than once. “All I need is a few more hours in a day.” Or maybe it’s, “If only there were 8 days in a week.” There just never seems to be enough time. But the truth is there’s plenty of time in each and every day to accomplish your most important tasks and it only takes about half an hour a day to set yourself up for success. How can this miracle occur? You just need to weaponize your day.
What do I mean by weaponizing your day exactly? Too many of us go into our days without a plan. We simply take whatever task presents itself, complete it, then move on to the next task. What you need to do is determine ahead of time what tasks are important? What tasks are going to be the most productive for you? Think about that for a minute. What tasks are hanging over your head right now? What tasks would advance you most financially, professionally, or personally if they were completed tomorrow? Now write those tasks down! Take a page from David Letterman’s playbook and make a top ten list. This list will be the backbone of your day. Come rain or shine, if nothing else gets accomplished, these 10 items will be done! Do this each and every day. I find that it works best if I make it part of my nightly routine. Before I brush my teeth for bed, I write my top 10 list down in my trusty notebook.
So what’s making a top ten list going to do for you? Well, first of all it will help you prioritize your day. You’ll no longer be a slave to those little projects that seem to pop up out of nowhere. When you prioritize your most important tasks it makes it infinitely easier to say no to the little things that crawl out of the woodworks to drain suck up your precious time. Every time someone asks you to do something you’ll immediately think, “Is this task really important enough to take time away from my top ten? Should I delegate this task or just say no all together?” By setting a goal for yourself ahead of time you’ve ensured that you don’t wander through your life just trying to keep up. You have a plan, a purpose, a direction; and nothing will derail you from that unless it’s of the utmost importance.
