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Where your focus should be for best results

Vision is important. Having the big picture in mind for your business or project is essential. But here’s the caveat: Once you have the big picture, you must break it down into small, manageable pieces.

 Do you have a step by step outline to achieve your big goals?

I ask this because one of the main causes of overwhelm and stress with any project lies in looking at the big picture for far too long. It seems that we like to dwell more on the expected outcome, the end result. We often want to get to that place as fast as we can. But working on a large project or big goal requires another skill set altogether. 

You must step away from the big picture, or adjust your focus so-to-speak. Blur the bigger picture and focus on the step you’re taking right now.

Breaking your project or goal into smaller pieces and working on one piece at a time is how you can actually accomplish big things. It’s in managing the little things, one step at a time, that a power is unleashed. Procrastination and stress are reduced and a whole lot of benefits await you if you can just focus on the one step you are taking right now:

Reduced stress and overwhelm
Imagine standing at the bottom of a mountain and looking at the summit. You’re going to climb the mountain. Do you keep looking at the summit as you climb all the way up? No, of course not. When you look at the summit it’s overwhelming. The scale of the journey is too big for your brain to manage. It will instinctually resist, get stressed and start telling you how hard it is, if not totally impossible. This is why small steps are so important. It makes it more manageable, more consumable for our brains. Consequently it reduces stress and overwhelm about the big climb that is your project or goal. 

Feeling more engaged with the project or goal
If you’re keeping your eye on the end result as you work on your big goal you’re going to be more attached to the end result. The end result is important, but it comes… at the end. While you’re in the middle, be in the middle. This is how engagement is increased. Staying with the step you’re working on increases your concentration and connection to what you’re working on. Feelings of engagement are generated when you stop treating the thing you’re working on as a means to an end, to get to the result. Try it, you will enjoy it. Trust me.

Feeling more in control of large goals and projects
Large goals and projects are exciting… until they’re not. Until you feel overwhelmed, out of control and spiral into an attitude of reluctance. It’s so big you feel like you have no control. That’s why breaking it all down into bite-sized pieces is essential. This is the only way to accomplish big goals. If you thought those people who are achieving big goals were just doing bigger things, then you’re wrong. Quite the opposite thing is happening. If anyone is achieving big goals it’s because they’ve mastered breaking it down into small pieces to keep them feeling in control. Bottomline: the more you feel in control, the more motivated you are to keep going.

Increased quality of work
When you focus on the step you’re taking right now, more care and attention will flow into what you’re working on. The result is a significant increase in the quality of your work. And increased quality also contributes to some of the enjoyment- see the next benefit…

More enjoyable process
An increase in the quality of your output is certainly satisfying. In addition to this and perhaps more significantly, is the enjoyment created in the focused doing. Allowing yourself to focus on one thing brings you into the present moment and helps you move into “flow”. Whether you call it flow, being in the zone or just presence- it’s all the same. When you are fully present with what you’re doing, the process automatically becomes joyful.

Prevents burnout
One of the major causes of burnout is in trying to things all at once. This is what can happen when working on a goal or project without breaking it down into the small steps. In fact, having no plan at all is what usually contributes to burnout because there’s a big effort put on many things all at once with no sequence or defined paramenters. It’s difficult to a) maintain this momentous effort and b) recognise any real progress. Focusing on one step at a time gives you one thing to put your energy into with a clear result or stepping stone being accomplished at the end. You will feel the progress.

It’s more trackable in smaller pieces
As I just mentioned, the small pieces become stepping stones. If the whole goal is broken down into 5 stepping stones, then you know after accomplishing 2 of those then you’re almost half way. This is great for tracking progress, resources and managing your time. When you can track it, you can anticipate all of these things much easier.

Eliminate resistance
A wonderful thing happens when you focus on one step at a time. Your brain relaxes a little. It can see that it can manage the task because it’s a small task and only one single task it has to deal with. The effect of this cannot be underestimated. The resistance you naturally experience when working on a big project or goal- all that procrastination- is overcome just by staying with the one smaller task at a time. When your brain has no resistance, you can easily start working. So it’s goodbye procrastination and hello efficiency. I say yes to that!

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How to prevent decision fatigue

Decision fatigue. It causes us to make unhelpful or irrational decisions. The consequences in your business can be procrastination and not creating the outcomes you want. In your life, the consequences are procrastination and not creating the outcomes you want. Yes, the same result. 

Decision fatigue will cause you to take the easy road or to procrastinate. And for those of us who have been on the personal development path for many years, you know how big a challenge it can be to overcome these two tendencies!

So, what is decision fatigue and how can we avoid it?

Decision fatigue is the deteriorating quality of decisions made by an individual after a long session of decision making. Given that we all make on average 35,000 decisions every day, you could say that towards the end of most days, we all have decision fatigue! It is at these moments that we decide not to go to the gym, to eat dessert, or simply to not do what we promised we would.

Sounds like it might create a few problems, right?

Yes. If you are creating new habits or banishing bad ones, then this is the crux of your challenge. Will power is a limited resource, so you need to rewire your decisions.

Here are 8 tips to prevent decision fatigue:

1. Cut out unnecessary decisions
You may already be familiar with the fact that Steve Jobs always wore the same thing to work each day. This was a conscious choice on his part to avoid making the decision of what to wear each morning. Sounds simple, but makes a big difference. You too can apply this approach to things in your life. Decide on things just once and then don’t make that decision again. Maybe having the same smoothie for breakfast or the same lunch. It eliminates one decision so you drop it from your mind knowing it’s already been decided.

2. Put the most important decisions and or tasks at beginning of the day
If our decisions are better at the beginning of the day, then you need to move the most important decisions and projects to your first priorities in the morning. Here is where the argument for avoiding email first thing is validated! All those decisions spent on correspondence and filing emails could be better spent on the decisions and tasks that will really generate your results.

3. Don’t delay decisions, schedule them if you have to
Never delaying a decision means what? It means you will free up so much space in your brain that is currently filled with the“might do that”,“will I or won’t I” and“must decide on that”. Having undecided things in our heads not only takes up a lot of space but adds to the decision fatigue. We have unnecessary“noise” in the background of our minds when we run back and forth over a decision. And each time we think of it, we’re increasing our decision fatigue. Don’t delay decisions. Make them once and drop them. If it’s really a big decision and you require time to think it through thoroughly, allocate specific time to weigh things up and make sure you set a deadline.

4. Schedule decision-making time
As I mentioned above, bigger decisions can require more time. Rather than let them loose while you go about your working week, schedule a specific time on your calendar to literally go through the decision-making process and make the final decision. This way you know you have time allocated to deal with it and will not have it floating around in your head.

5. Have a process for making decisions
So naturally what followsall this, is in scheduling decision time, you will want to run a big decision through a type of system. This is an efficient and effective way to manage the larger decisions we have to make from time to time. This will vary from person to person, but generally you should ensure you are aware of your core values(for a personal decision) and the company values(for a business decision. You can set a questionnaire, talk it through with your mentor/guru or take time out in nature- the process is up to you!

6. Drop some decisions altogether
Yes, you can drop a decision completely. You can do this by delegating or deleting. You may be able to delegate certain decisions that ultimately can be handled by your team/ partner. You can delete decisions that are no longer relevant or important to you. 

7. Reframe the right/wrong approach
Somehow we have all been led to believe that decisions are either right or wrong. It’s all a matter of perspective. Whatever the outcome of your decision, the actual outcome is neutral. It is only what we think about the outcome that ultimately classifies it as “good” or “bad”. This is not an avoidance of accountability. This is accepting that a choice will create an outcome and there is no right or wrong outcome. There is just an outcome. Don’t agonise over a decision. There is not just one path to your destination, there are many, and you can get there with different decisions.

8. Leave it alone
Once you have made a decision about something, leave it alone. Don’t go back over it again second-guessing yourself. This is surely how most of us are creating the decision fatigue. We um and ah and say to ourselves “oh, I don’t know.” But, if you did know, what would it be? Don’t let yourself float in that cloud of so-called confusion which is actually self-created. Make the decision and have your own back. What’s the worst that can happen? You make a detour. It doesn’t work, you try something else. But make the decision once and follow through without second-guessing yourself first.

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The Problem With Seeking Success

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As you are a consumer of personal development content, then you’re most likely also aware that much of the noise is all about how to become successful. In every article or blog you are offered tips, formulas and breakthrough techniques. And yes, in this post I too offer some ideas (guilty).

But, there are a few problems with this idea of the pursuit of success.

When we read articles about creating success, we’re thinking about success as a destination most of the time. As if someday, we will arrive there on our yacht, sipping champagne and smiling for the world to see. Sounds nice, but…

Success is not a destination. Because once we achieve a certain goal, we are quickly then on to the next thing. We are always growing, so the idea of reaching success at a singular point is illusory.

But more significant than this even, is the assumption most of us are making.

We are assuming that when we are “successful” then we will also be fulfilled. We assume that the hole within us of “not-enoughness” will be gone when we are successful.

Sorry, bad news: Success does not equal fulfillment.

Don’t get me wrong, you can be successful and fulfilled. But understand this distinction:
You cannot expect that your success will also bring fulfillment. They are two very different things.

You cannot pursue success as if it were the answer to your fulfillment.

You can pursue success at an endeavour for what the challenges will make of you. Being successful in that endeavour will be cause for celebration at achieving a goal. But fulfillment is up to you and is independent of your goal achievements and failures.

Have a think about it. Are you expecting success to make you feel better about yourself? Make you feel more confident? Will you feel worthy after you achieve that big goal?

Then, you are seeking fulfillment in a place you cannot find it. Success cannot fill that hole, you must learn to develop your own experience of fulfillment.

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What you need to know about resistance

If you’re chasing some big goals then you probably need no introduction to the experience of resistance! Yes, it seems to come up loud and clear the moment we commit to a big goal. Suddenly we’re looking up the cliff face above us thinking… oh man, this is huge!

But resistance is also a bit sneaky in that it pops up in much smaller things in everyday life.Have you ever woken up in the morning with a horrible feeling of the day that lays ahead of you?

You know you have a wonderful life and are generally a positive person. But still, there are days when you feel that“urgh” feeling. You might start to wonder… What am I doing wrong? Why do I feel so bad?

You’re not doing anything wrong. There is no problem. I know, from the way you feel, you assume there is a problem, but trust me, more often than not, there is no real problem. 

This is resistance at work! Let me explain…

Resistance is our mind creating a problem with either:

  1. the way things actually are(your current circumstances or a situation) OR
  2. your experience of an emotion(usually the ones we call negative)

As you know, our brains are wired for survival and can be hypervigilant. We need to manage our minds or they will manage us! With resistance it’s all about just understanding what is really going on!

Your brain is creating a problem about the way things are.For example:Situation: You have back to back meetings all dayThoughts:“It’s going to be exhausting”,“This is ridiculous, I can’t get my work done with so many meetings”These thoughts are creating a problem where there wasn’t one. Meetings all day- fact. Notice that the situation is not good or bad until the thoughts about the meetings kicks in. There is a judgement of good/bad. Our thinking creates the problem, the resistance to reality. Once that happens, we cannot accept how things are. They are perceived as “bad”or “wrong”. As a result, we spend most of the day resisting the situation because “it shouldn’t be this way”.

The other thing resistance does is push back against an emotion. Usually an emotion that doesn’t feel comfortable. Instead of allowing the emotion, we try to avoid it or cover it. As we were never really taught how to manage our emotions, it’s no wonder we we actually just try and avoid the ones we don’t like the feel of! But, I digress… 

The only trouble with resisting an emotion is that it actually strengthens it! So, you will start to feel even more uncomfortable. I think we resist our emotions because on some level we think that something is wrong when we are feeling bad. We equate feeling bad with something being wrong. 

But, if we allow it, it passes after a time.

Resistance is a natural part of the human experience, so you’re not alone. But to better manage your mind and move towards dissolving resistance, here’s something to try:When you feel that sense of resistance creeping in, ask yourself: What problem might I be creating here? What emotion might I be experiencing? 

Stopping to ask those questions is enough to loosen the grip of the resistance and move towards awareness. And being aware of what’s really going on is enough to create a significant shift for yourself, believe me!

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The skill you truly need to succeed

What is the one constant in life? Change.

We as individuals are constantly evolving, our work and industries are always shifting. Thinking back to 10 years ago, how much has your life changed? What is different now in your business and the way you market your business?

The answer is likely, a lot.

The nature of life is change and growth. If you’re reading this you most likely actively seek growth. Personal growth. You want to expand your understanding and skills to create a better life and business for yourself. There is plenty of content to consume and so much information at our fingertips, there really is no limit to how much we can grow our own skills. But what I want to present today is that regardless of what you have learnt and the skills you currently possess, there is actually 1 master skill that is essential for your success.

I call it a master skill because it sits above all the others that you have. All the other tips and advice you have implemented simply all lead back to this one master skill. Without this skill, trying to grow and develop yourself and your business will be a much more difficult road. Yet, we are not taught this fundamental skill at school or tertiary education. Most of us learn it the hard way, through life’s challenges. Additionally, most of us never consider building on this skill to accelerate our growth.

The master skill I am referring to is the skill of being able to embrace change. Not as simple as it sounds, actually. But more than worth the effort.
Embracing change is not about being one of the “early adaptors” of technology. Although early adaptors may also have this skill. Embracing change is about understanding, recognising and managing the change process. The change process within yourself and that of the events that are the ebb and flow of your life.

Most of us are not focused on change and it’s presence in our lives, until a big change comes along that was unexpected. Then we start the process of trying to figure out how to deal with it. But some of us do pursue change, at least at an intellectual level, through our pursuit of goals. And this is where we can meet the change process head-on, as we try to create new habits. 

Learning to create a new habit and sustain it requires much effort, I am sure you will agree. The skill you need is built slowly and over time. But like any muscle that is used, continues to get stronger. This is one way for us to learn about the change process, what is involved and the challenges it presents. It creates an opportunity to build a master skill that can be applied to all aspects of your life, namely, being able to change yourself and adapt to change around you.

If you would like to learn more about the change process, I am presenting a Day Course on How To Embrace Change at the St George & Sutherland Community College on Saturday 15th June. Click below for further details:

Learn To Embrace Change – Day Workshop