How To Overcome New Challenges In Sales

I have always believed that new challenges in life present new opportunities. We are given opportunities to grow, improve, and learn new skills and abilities, which we might not learn otherwise.

It is easy to get comfortable and complacent when the going is easy. We often just ride the wave of success, rather than learning how to paddle better. We miss the opportunities to learn, grow, and gain greater strength.

I have come to realize that there is always a greater challenge around the corner. The obstacles that you are facing right now are preparing you for the future. I did not always embrace this attitude of gratitude for challenges and obstacles. I used to say, “If I could only solve this problem, I would have everything else handled.” That’s not the way that life and business works. The most successful people are problem solvers. Rather than CEO, President, Sales Manager, or Salesperson on your business card, it should read Chief Problem Solver.

One technique to build your confidence and competence in facing new challenges is to record them. Record the challenge then think on paper to create the solution. Too often, we don’t concisely write out the new challenge. Then we fail to think solutions through on paper. Completing this process gives us two benefits:

1. Greater access to our mind to create solutions: By writing your challenge down, you activate your whole mind (the conscious and subconscious) to work on the challenge even when you are asleep. You will light a mental fire that will burn bright until you have extinguished the problem for good.
   
2. A record of success: By writing things down, you create a blueprint for greater success. You allow yourself to go from one victory to the next, applying your gained knowledge quickly and efficiently. Making the right decision is essential to success, but making it quickly is nearly as important. Sometimes, we might make the right decision, but we have waited too long. We have missed the opportunity that was before us. Many times, opportunity merely knocks once. You must be prepared to seize the opportunity when presented.

The speed at which a good decision is made is essential. Place yourself in the cockpit of an F16, one of the highest advanced aircraft in the world. You have been instructed to attack another military force. You have a series of missiles bearing down on you. Do you let the speed at which you make the decision have a bearing on your success…of course! If you don’t move quickly, you’re dead. We have to take the right perspective and attitude to achieve success. We have to acquire the focus and intensity of a great problem solver. We have to act decisively and quickly to achieve our desired result.

The Two Secret Components To Sales Success

There are two disciplines that will yield amazing results when applied daily. They will help you overcome any obstacles or challenges that are put in your path. If you can master these two disciplines, there is nothing you can’t accomplish.

The first is the development of faith in you, which can produce staggering results. I am talking about the faith and the determination never to quit. Have the faith to repeat the right disciplines and actions long enough, and with enough intensity, to win.

Your self-image is housed in your subconscious mind. Your subconscious doesn’t evaluate the information you put in it. It only tries to create reality out of what you put into it. If you are allowing the negative to enter your subconscious mind unfiltered, you will begin to focus your self-image on the negative that you allow into your subconscious mind.

To create a strong self-image or self-faith you must work diligently to feed your subconscious mind with positive thoughts, ideas, and goals to achieve. You can do this through books, audiocassettes, experiences, coaching, affirmations, and seminars. The world will gladly fill your mental make-up with negatives. Work to combat the negatives by placing positive thoughts and images in your mind every day.

As Zig Ziglar says, “Let’s do a ‘check up from the neck up.’” How often are you reading great books? Are you listening to compact discs in the car daily? Do you have affirmations that you are pounding into your subconscious mind daily? Do you have a career or personal success coach? If you aren’t doing these activities regularly, you are probably not reaching your peak performance.

To increase your belief in yourself, you need to fill your subconscious mind with the positive thoughts and experiences of success. You can’t neglect to do this even for one day, or you will fall behind. Don’t put yourself in the position to play catch-up with your self-confidence.

The second is development of focus. Focus is one of the most powerful tools a person can possess. Even if you have a positive faith in yourself you must have focus to achieve greatness and success.

Al Ries wrote a great book, simply called Focus. Al used a laser beam as one of his examples. The amount of energy a laser beam has is very small. Most laser beams only have a few watts of energy. It is the process of focusing those few watts onto a very small area, which generates the power. It is because the energy is condensed to the size of the head of a pin that amazing things can happen, such as eye surgery without making incisions, the removal of cancer cells, and cutting through metal.

You can be like that laser through focus. You can accomplish more in less time by staying in the moment and being completely focused on the task at hand. Here is a technique to improve your focus. Break your day into smaller increments of time. You may only be able to stay focused for 20 minutes now. So break your day into 20-minute increments, with five to ten minutes in between. Do the activities in the outline in 20-minute increments of time.

Don’t allow distractions to creep into those 20-minute increments. Only do the activities outlined in those increments of time. Think only of the moment and work to focus in on the moment and the specific activity you are to do in that moment. Don’t allow anyone to distract you during your 20 minutes of focused time.

As you get better, and more skilled, at focusing you will be able to increase the focus time and decrease the break time. When most people evaluate their time, there is very little of an eight-hour workday that is focused time. The lack of focus time is why sales professionals often work seven days a week. It is because there is little focus time invested daily.

By having a positive faith in yourself you will be able to climb the mountains of life. Being highly skilled at focusing will enable you to do it with efficiency. If you learn to focus on what is most important to you, you will create the abundant life you desire and deserve.

Conquering Life In Bits

Life is not really about what happens to you, but how you respond to it. If you were to poll any social setting you would quickly find that more people than expected have endured severe situations and came out on the other side with a smile. How you may ask? By adjusting their thinking to understand two vital facts.

First, all of life is cyclical. We are all rotating through this life in between struggles and good times. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you make peace with life. Next, you cannot eat an elephant in one setting. Big problems become manageable when you break them down into bite sized tasks.

The common thread through all the successful people I have had the opportunity to collaborate with is this, they know how to manage their emotions in tough times. Often our tact and resilience falls victim to whatever is going on. The easiest thing to do in times of adversity is buckle under the pressure and wimp out. Here’s the deal, greatness is not for those who try to whine their way to the top! I want to share with you how you can add ‘back’ bone to your ‘wish’ bone and win in life.

* How you end your day has a lot to do with how it starts: Most of us have fallen into the habit of going to bed with the television blaring into our subconscious. Instead try to spend a few moments before you drift off rehearsing your accomplishments of the day and your goals for tomorrow. Or you can on purpose put affirmations into your mindset by speaking positivity. Remember, our minds are computers that are running all the time.

* Increasing your skill-set is easy if you make the time: I hear this complaint from a lot of clients; “I do not have time to study or get better at things.” That’s just not true! If you commute to work, you have time. If your kids take naps, you have time. If you get a lunch break on your job, you have time. The truth is, most do not make time for what’s really important.

* Don’t just sit there, do something… anything: We use the excuse of not knowing or the task being too big. No it isn’t. The sooner you get busy taking a bite here and a bite there, the sooner you can look back and see your accomplishments. Have you ever had a day with so much to get done it depressed you? So you sat around complaining all day and in the evening you realized you got nothing done. That’s because you didn’t tackle anything. Get off your butt and do what you can for the moment and watch the magic happen.

* Enlist an accountability buddy: It is statistically proven that more goals happen when you know someone else is checking on you. You increase your percentage for success when you share your goals with someone who will support you and most important, will hold you accountable. This is not a new concept for business or life. For decades successful men and women have used a support system to ensure things in their life get done.

If you drop into any bookstore across the world one of the largest sections will be the ‘Self Help’ department. Why? Because most people would rather read about how to change instead of changing. You don’t need a degree, a trainer or a specialist. All you need is the guts to get up and start today to do something about your life. I say it all the time, “Dreaming is free. But if you want change you are going to have to get up, shut up and get busy!”

See you at the TOP!

Get Motivated!!! By Building Self Belief

When we witness someone else’s success, whether it’s in business, sport, relationships, career or whatever, there’s a tendency to see that great success has an end in itself.

When we see the mountaineer at the top of the high mountain, we don’t think so much about the fact that getting there involved taking a long series of steps one after the other. What impresses us most deeply is seeing the successful person at the pinnacle of their achievement, and seeing that success and only that success tends to make many people think that for them doing the same thing would be unattainable.

They see only the end result, the success itself, and not all of the training and effort that those successful people had to undertake in order to achieve that success.

They see only the glittering prize of ultimate success and feel themselves to be unable to do something similar. It’s this lack of self belief that drains motivational energy and prevents people from fulfilling their goals.

Success can look daunting to someone experiencing self doubt or lack of direction in life and make them feel that they’re not capable of doing it for themselves, and so then they lose the motivation to actually try.

However they’re simply overlooking the fact that every successful person had to start somewhere, that every journey to success begins with one small step, that for example every successful weight loss plan begins with losing the first pound, and not with losing twenty pounds overnight.

Here are some pointers to help you put this into perspective.

Prioritize Your Aims And Desires

Take some time out to think about what your most important goal or desire in life is, about what change or improvement in your life is most pressing and important for you.

Give yourself a few days or so to mull this over in your mind so that you’re ultimately able to clarify in your mind what it is that you really want, and not just what you may immediately “think” that you want. Take the time to delve down deep into yourself and arrive at an understanding of what’s really important to you.

Take The First Small Step And Keep The End In Mind

When you know what you want to do, understand that you can’t reasonably expect to achieve total success either immediately or without some effort.

Form a mental plan or map in your mind of the steps – or at least the first few steps – that you will need to take to ultimately get where you want to be. Then think about what you need to do in order to fulfill those first few steps, then begin to take the necessary action, while all the while keeping at the back of your mind a vision of yourself achieving your ultimate goal.

When you adopt this step-by-step, starting at the beginning attitude towards fulfilling your goal, you’re no longer comparing yourself to someone else who has been seen to achieve total success.

You begin to appreciate that they, just like you, had to start somewhere, and that with knowledge of what you really want combined with a willingness to apply dedication and persistence in a gradual pursuit of it, you begin to experience a growing and strengthening realization that as you fulfill one step after the other you are becoming as capable and successful as those who you once thought you could never emulate.

It’s through this gradually growing sense of self belief that you find the motivation that you need to carry you through to ultimate success.

How To Make Your Dreams A Reality

We all got dreams. Some of us have small dreams and others have big dreams. I personally advocate big dreams since they allow us to reach a level of greatness. Nonetheless, we all have some sort of dream, regardless of scope. Life in my perspective is all about capturing these dreams and living out the life we always wanted.

Some people get discouraged by the obstacles in their way and others never seem to muster up the courage to get started. They die with a dream, they don’t die having lived out their dream.

These types of people are the pessimist of the world, instead of coming up with reasons that will inspire one to chase their dreams all they are concerned with is how it’s not going to work. They rarely make their dreams become a reality, so I advise you to stop hanging out with people of this nature and if you’re a pessimist yourself, BREAK OUT OF IT.

Regardless of how high you aim, the path to making your dreams become a reality remains the same to some extent. This articles main focus is on giving you some insightful tips on how to make your dreams a reality. I will break the process down into three steps.

These steps are apparent in every dream that has been transformed from a vision to reality. It probably resembles your dream to some extent, you will probably find that you are stuck on one of these steps. The key to making your dream come true is to abide by these steps and keep progressing.

Step 1. Develop A Clear Sense of Vision

This is the foundation of making your dream become a reality.

The skyscrapers you see around your city don’t get made with a snap of the finger. No, my friend. It takes years to build the foundation. The foundation is what you don’t see. It’s the structure that is underground that gives rise to these buildings. If there was no foundation apparent the buildings would simply not stand upright yet alone leap out into the sky.

The foundation is therefore the most important part, although it is underground and cannot be observed. The same goes for your dreams. Your vision is the most important thing. It directs you in the direction of your dream and makes it possible to be king of the world. Your vision should be a mental creation which plays continuously in your mind like a movie.

Play your vision in your mind and picture how great life is going to be once you have accomplished your dream. What are you going to be doing? How are you going to look? How is your day going to be? Walk yourself through this. Create your vision because it is only with the end in mind that we can achieve our dreams. If you don’t know what you’re chasing, you’re running a race with no finish line. Hence develop that vision.

To better fuel your gauges you can familiarize yourself with this vision on a daily basis. Don’t think that you can skip this step. Don’t be that building that tips over and crumbles to a million pieces because it was lacking a foundation.

Step 2. Develop An Action Plan

This step requires you to take some action and begin translating your dream from a mental creation to reality. Another important step. Without this, all you got is a dream, but by committing to an action plan of how you are going to make your dream become a reality you ultimately double your chances of achieving that dream.

Most people in life will never make it to this step that is the reason why they die without having lived out their dream. They get sucked up in the first step and don’t have enough balls to proceed to step 2. They’re usually terrified. Being scared is fine, but as psychologists have proven countless times, what we are afraid of is usually nothing to be scared of.

They have a term in psychology that is called social construction which explains how our reality is our own mental creation. Hence, our fears and such don’t really serve any weight in all actuality. Therefore it is a must that you commit to this step. Make sure you keep progressing.

Step 3: Follow Through

This is the last and final step. This step requires the most amount of time and effort. This is the step in which we see who wants it the most. This is where winners are crowned and losers are defeated. This is where you have to work your ass off and make your dream become a reality. This is when you have to follow your action plan and make that dream come to life.

The foundation has been set and the call to action has been established, the only thing left now is for you to go out and prove how bad you want to make your dream become a reality. Work like you’ve never worked before. Live like a new you. Reach your dreams and leave a legacy so when you die you’ll be one of those ‘lucky ones’ who got the chance to live the dream.

How to Motivate Yourself and Stay Motivated

Often the biggest problem people have with achieving their goals–New YearResolution‘s included–is getting started.  It seems that Sir Isaac Newton got it right with his First Law of Motion: Bodies at rest tend to stay at rest.  Many people just can’t seem to get underway and as a result they simply don’t take action.

So, what does it take to get started? One easy way is to have someone light a fire under you—“if you don’t do X, by such and such a time, you’re fired”—or you light one under yourself.  (“I am not going to sleep tonight until I have taken a first step toward finding a new job.”)

The problem with lighting a fire under yourself (or having it lit for you) is that eventually your backside gets burned.  It’s not a great long-term strategy. Once the threat ends, you have no real motivation to continue. And if you are operating in an environment where you are constantly threatened, it gets demoralizing very quickly.

So, what is the best way to get started?

Identify:

• Something that you want and
• Something that you can do about it with your means at hand, i.e. taking an action that is within your level of acceptable loss. (The the cost is minimal, if the action doesn’t work out.)

Put that way, there are only four logical explanations for why you are not moving toward your goal:

1. Habit.
2. You don’t have the means at hand
3. The perceived cost is too high. Or
4. You are lying to yourself about what you want.

The fourth is rarely the case.  Most people who say they want to get a new job, or meet someone or lose weight really do want to find new employment, find that significant other or be thinner. As for habit, in this case, that’s “simply” a matter of getting used to taking action. (More on that in a second.)

So this means is if you aren’t taking action toward what you want, you either perceive taking action as either being too costly, or too risky.

What’s the solution?

It seems simple, doesn’t it? Reduce the cost and risk to acceptable levels, so that you could get underway.

Now, if it were as easy as all that, you would have done it.  So, you need some help.

Here’s one easy solution. Talk to a friend about the challenge you face. (“I really want to find a new job, but I just can’t seem to get going.”)

Together, come up with a list of possibilities, being as specific as you can. In the case of the new job, you would identify what you want to do; whether it makes sense to do it on your own—i.e. start a company—or work for someone else, etc.

Figuring all this out could take a couple of conversations, and that’s fine. But don’t wait until the end of all your talks to get moving. Remember, we want to make sure that habit, that is you are in the habit of not moving toward what you want, is NOT the problem.

So, at the end of the first conversation, the one where you decided your next job will be with another company, you immediately start compiling potential firms to contact and maybe even go so far as to talk to people who have the sort of job you want.

At the next meeting, you and your friend would try to come with a complete list of places that might hire you, as well as who to contact at those firms.

Then you’d set a deadline—say a week—when you will report back to your friend. At that meeting you say what you did to follow up, or explain why you didn’t do anything.

Isn’t setting this deadline the same as lighting a fire under yourself? Yes…but also no. Yes, in the sense that you have drawn a proverbial line in the proverbial sand.  But no, because you are acknowledging up front that you may not take action.

Let’s suppose you don’t. At the next meeting with your friend, you would explain why.  Maybe it was because you were sick and so you give yourself a pass. But it could be you didn’t take action because you found the idea of cold calling companies too intimidating.

In that case, you and your friend would try to break down the next step into even smaller parts. (Is there someone you know, who can get to someone they know at the company; is it possible to find out if they take online applications seriously. If that is the case, you wouldn’t have to cold call.)

And so the process would go until you reduced taking the next step to a point where it is doable.

10 Self Improvement Activities

These self improvement activities will help you become more productive, get into the positive state of mind and achieve better quality of life.

In this article you will also find out how to use your energy effectively, what is the quickest way to achieve personal growth and how to excel in every activity.

1st Self Improvement Activity: Use your energy on important things

If you want to succeed in life, you should not waste your energy on activities that do not bring any benefits.

Such useless activities include surfing the Internet without any purpose, watching TV, worrying and wasting money.

When you are involved in such activities, you have no or little energy left for activities that can create a better future. It is worth prioritising and accomplishing important tasks first, and then if you still have enough energy, you may decide to do the unimportant.

2nd Self Improvement Activity: Focus on one task at a time

If you want to get perfect results, you should only concentrate on one activity. This way all your energy will go into it and you will accomplish it perfectly.

If you waste your energy on several things at the same time, you will get average results because you will divide your energy between the activities.

3rd Self Improvement Activity: Control your thinking

To avoid chaos in your mind resulting in chaos in the outside world, you should try to observe your thoughts. Once you start doing that, you will notice how many negative thoughts you get daily.

By observing negative thinking you will be able to emotionally disengage from it. As a result, negative thinking will affect you less and you will notice that your days are getting more peaceful and positive.

4th Self Improvement Activity: Get organised

When you live in an organised manner, you do not suffer from stress and your life is peaceful and balanced.

To start living this way, you should start planning your day in advance. This will eliminate any stress caused by being late to a meeting or forgetting to complete some task.

You should also live in tidiness because by keeping your home clean you also keep your mental state clear and peaceful. Such mental state will benefit you in many ways, including improved memory and less negativity.

5th Self Improvement Activity: Live in the present

Although this self improvement activity may seem strange to you, it is a very important activity that many ignore. The majority of people do not live in the present. They either dwell on their past or daydream about the future. They seem to forget the most important time of all - the present.

You should enjoy every present moment because your current state of mind always manifests in the outside world, creating your future accordingly.

Therefore if your main mood is very positive, you will experience only happy days. However, if you dwell on negative thoughts, you are sure to encounter many obstacles and misfortunes in the present and days to come.

6th Self Improvement Activity: Complete each task in a perfect manner

Whenever you are working on some project, try to accomplish it in the best way possible. Always ask yourself 'Is this project turned out as perfect as it could possibly be?' If the answer is no, try to correct or add something to it until there is nothing that you can improve.

This way you will make sure that each single task you accomplish is done in an excellent manner. By doing this you will create successful future because you cannot possibly fail if you only get perfect results.

Also, when you entirely focus on one task excluding everything else, you will notice that you start enjoying the task. If you concentrate on the task but still do not enjoy it, that means that you probably see the task as a means to an end rather than the process.

You should start focusing on the process itself to find enjoyment in the task. Such enjoyment will fuel motivation and you will accomplish everything quicker and better.

If you enjoy your work, you will put only positive energy into it. As a result, your completed tasks will bring you success.

7th Self Improvement Activity: Challenge yourself

Nothing develops you more than challenges. Challenges force you to shift your comfort zone, experience new situations and make you grow. Without challenges life would be very boring and depressing.

Challenges are necessary for every human being who is seeking quality life. Only through trial and error you realise who you really are, which activities you like and what preferences you have.

You can easily measure the success of a person by the amount of challenges s/he had.

8th Self Improvement Activity: Read personal development books

There is nothing more important than searching information about self improvement. Without reading any self improvement books or articles you cannot improve yourself.

9th Self Improvement Activity: Socialize only with positive people

Positive people can inspire, empower and make you happy. It is so much worth to be at least once in a while with positive people rather than constantly spend time with negative friends or relatives.

If you spend your days with, for example, lazy people, you may notice that you are becoming lazy.

If all your friends' main qualities are negative, try to avoid all of them. This way you will not be affected in a negative way and after some time will start attracting positive people.

10th Self Improvement Activity: Exercise

Daily exercise develops determination, focus and patience. It improves your health and strengthens your body. It makes you more active, positive and invincible.

People who exercise every day are always perceived as strong-willed and disciplined.

Conclusion

These personal improvement activities are sure to put you on the track to success. I hope that you will apply the steps in this article and, as a result, will greatly improve the quality of your life.

10 Self Improvement Activities

These self improvement activities will help you become more productive, get into the positive state of mind and achieve better quality of life.

In this article you will also find out how to use your energy effectively, what is the quickest way to achieve personal growth and how to excel in every activity.

1st Self Improvement Activity: Use your energy on important things

If you want to succeed in life, you should not waste your energy on activities that do not bring any benefits.

Such useless activities include surfing the Internet without any purpose, watching TV, worrying and wasting money.

When you are involved in such activities, you have no or little energy left for activities that can create a better future. It is worth prioritising and accomplishing important tasks first, and then if you still have enough energy, you may decide to do the unimportant.

2nd Self Improvement Activity: Focus on one task at a time

If you want to get perfect results, you should only concentrate on one activity. This way all your energy will go into it and you will accomplish it perfectly.

If you waste your energy on several things at the same time, you will get average results because you will divide your energy between the activities.

3rd Self Improvement Activity: Control your thinking

To avoid chaos in your mind resulting in chaos in the outside world, you should try to observe your thoughts. Once you start doing that, you will notice how many negative thoughts you get daily.

By observing negative thinking you will be able to emotionally disengage from it. As a result, negative thinking will affect you less and you will notice that your days are getting more peaceful and positive.

4th Self Improvement Activity: Get organised

When you live in an organised manner, you do not suffer from stress and your life is peaceful and balanced.

To start living this way, you should start planning your day in advance. This will eliminate any stress caused by being late to a meeting or forgetting to complete some task.

You should also live in tidiness because by keeping your home clean you also keep your mental state clear and peaceful. Such mental state will benefit you in many ways, including improved memory and less negativity.

5th Self Improvement Activity: Live in the present

Although this self improvement activity may seem strange to you, it is a very important activity that many ignore. The majority of people do not live in the present. They either dwell on their past or daydream about the future. They seem to forget the most important time of all - the present.

You should enjoy every present moment because your current state of mind always manifests in the outside world, creating your future accordingly.

Therefore if your main mood is very positive, you will experience only happy days. However, if you dwell on negative thoughts, you are sure to encounter many obstacles and misfortunes in the present and days to come.

6th Self Improvement Activity: Complete each task in a perfect manner

Whenever you are working on some project, try to accomplish it in the best way possible. Always ask yourself 'Is this project turned out as perfect as it could possibly be?' If the answer is no, try to correct or add something to it until there is nothing that you can improve.

This way you will make sure that each single task you accomplish is done in an excellent manner. By doing this you will create successful future because you cannot possibly fail if you only get perfect results.

Also, when you entirely focus on one task excluding everything else, you will notice that you start enjoying the task. If you concentrate on the task but still do not enjoy it, that means that you probably see the task as a means to an end rather than the process.

You should start focusing on the process itself to find enjoyment in the task. Such enjoyment will fuel motivation and you will accomplish everything quicker and better.

If you enjoy your work, you will put only positive energy into it. As a result, your completed tasks will bring you success.

7th Self Improvement Activity: Challenge yourself

Nothing develops you more than challenges. Challenges force you to shift your comfort zone, experience new situations and make you grow. Without challenges life would be very boring and depressing.

Challenges are necessary for every human being who is seeking quality life. Only through trial and error you realise who you really are, which activities you like and what preferences you have.

You can easily measure the success of a person by the amount of challenges s/he had.

8th Self Improvement Activity: Read personal development books

There is nothing more important than searching information about self improvement. Without reading any self improvement books or articles you cannot improve yourself.

9th Self Improvement Activity: Socialize only with positive people

Positive people can inspire, empower and make you happy. It is so much worth to be at least once in a while with positive people rather than constantly spend time with negative friends or relatives.

If you spend your days with, for example, lazy people, you may notice that you are becoming lazy.

If all your friends' main qualities are negative, try to avoid all of them. This way you will not be affected in a negative way and after some time will start attracting positive people.

10th Self Improvement Activity: Exercise

Daily exercise develops determination, focus and patience. It improves your health and strengthens your body. It makes you more active, positive and invincible.

People who exercise every day are always perceived as strong-willed and disciplined.

Conclusion

These personal improvement activities are sure to put you on the track to success. I hope that you will apply the steps in this article and, as a result, will greatly improve the quality of your life.