What are you Chasing?

I listened to something the other day which said that people don't necessarily want one million dollars... they just want the FEELING they think one million dollars will bring them. They want the lifestyle they think one million dollars will bring them, They want the expensive car, the nice house, the exotic vacations, etc.

I see it all the time with so many people it seems like what they have their eyes on or their big goal in life or when they think their life will be "SET" is when they finally climb that mountain and get that ever elusive huge amount of money....whatever that is.

I use to think and be like this myself, the goal was to "get a million dollars" and then i felt my life will be a success, i will be a success and well i guess then you are officially "rich" whatever that means and can do whatever you want, i dunno?!

I don't think it is a bad thing to have financial goals whether it be 100,000 or 10,000,000 or even 50 bucks but I don't think that money should be a complete focus, I don't think that having a certain amount of money should be the determinant of whether you are Successful or not.
ask yourself WHY?

ask yourself, If somebody was to give you $100,000 today what would be different? Chances are you would be the EXACT same person you are today, you would just have more money in your bank account and so you would therefore probably have the means to be able to go buy some material goods or do some things that cost more money than you had before if you wanted to.

But YOU, does having that extra money whether its 100,000 or 1,000,000 change YOU?
if you could only type 30WPM is having that money going to increase your typing speed? if your social skills were subpar before will having all sorts of money increase them?

I have learned and I strongly believe that money is the by- product of chasing the things that you actually want in life. If you are doing what you like, what you love, what you are good at than money will naturally fall into your life, every amount that you possibly need. If it is the other way around it will be incredibly difficult to enjoy the "here and now" until you reach that money goal you set in your head, whatever that is.

mel

Decisions of Destiny

Lots going on this week, so i'm a little late on this weeks post have some great content so here we go!:

Have you ever thought about your attitude when it comes to whether you FAIL or SUCCEED in something?
what is a failure what is a success?
Nobody is perfect so at one point or another you are going to make mistakes, or you are going to mess up, or whatever, does that mean you fail?
Its all about how you define failure.

If you adopt the attitude of always learning – if you approach situations/life this way whatever happens you CANNOT fail, because you will ALWAYS be successful in the sense that you are learning, that you are always growing and getting better.

DECISIONS – life is really all about the DECISIONS you make, and how you approach your decisions. Ie do you study for your final exam or go out and party? Do you buy a condo in a suburb which is less expensive or one downtown?, its YOUR choice. Everybody decides what they do and therefore where their lifes go...

Sooooooooooooo.
What is one of the most important elements to success?

HAVING A GOOD DECISION MAKING PROCESS. And putting yourself in a position where you can make the BEST decision at any given time.

How?

What to focus on:

NOT ideas (EMOTIONS)
but FACTS (logic)
and what YOU HAVE CONTROL OVER

ie. Do you focus on what somebody says and how good they makes it sound (ideas?) or the facts that is what is ACTUALLY the case, what has actually happened,
Something that will really help the decision making process is taking ALL the info available+ all the things we have control over and making the BEST decision you can based on that criteria. Then having faith in YOURSELF and the decision YOU made, not necessarily somebody’s elses.
Control:

A recipe for making poor decisions is putting your decisions or anything else in the hands of somebody else.

Why?

ITS NOT that they aren’t great people and they wont get things done. Sometimes you have no choice but if you break it down think of what you are doing by putting yourself in this position,
You become DEPENDANT on them like a kid + has parents. And then to move forward or make a decision you REQUIRE THAT PERSON. Just like a kid asks his parents if he can have the car for the weekend before he can decide what to do with their friends, you have to ask whoever you are dependant on to see if your plans will get the green light and its okay…
Basically: YOU LOSE CONTROL, you are usually no longer in a position where YOU can make the decision.

SOLUTION:
Control is everything. Because whoever has control has the DECISION MAKING POWER. As we learned from above decisions are a key component to success.

Anything you do with other people should be a SUPPLEMENT with which you have NO EXPECTATIONS, because you can’t control them, so why would you expect anything?!?
Minimize exposure to losing control = Have YOUR OWN plan and stick to it, let other things fall into that place not the opposite way. Ie. Don’t follow somebody elses plan and make your plan try and fit into that.


hope this make some sense, that is all for this week!

MEL

Break it down, Bite size style.

Have you ever started something and not finished it?

Have you ever turned down taking on a huge project because it seemed like "too much" or too daunting at the time?

why is that?

You've probably heard before that Rome wasn't built in a day?

What's that mean?
How you can you apply this to your own life?

Think about every highly successful person you know... Does it seems like they have an amazing ability to complete multiple projects and make it seem easy?

Maybe they managed to get straight A's in school, while playing on a sports team, while still having time to hang out with friends, etc. Or maybe they are a successful business owner who has real estate investments on the side, who also volunteers in their community in addition to maintaining a family at home.

What's their secret?! How do they do accomplish all this??!! while making it seem easy!!!
DIBS!
This is how they do it: eat lots and lots of Dibs.

Small chuck it. Make things easy for yourself. Set yourself up for SUCCESS not failure or disappointment.

If you wanted to be a lawyer and before you went to university I told you, that in order for you to become a lawyer it was going to be crazy hard you would have to take 4 grueling years of undergrad and have a 4.0 GPA, then you had to do your LSATs and get all these reference letters from professors and other people and then get accepted into law school, then you had to do it all over again, Study hardcore for another few years, and finally get an articling position, and once you completed that and graduated with your law degree maybe you'd find a position as a lawyer....

Who is going to sign up for that? really? and even if you did after the first year if you looked at it that way you would probably just see miles and miles of work ahead, get discouraged easier and then be more likely to quit.

Break it down, whatever you want to do or be into small manageable tasks which you can achieve and then reward yourself for CONSTANTLY. Make it easy for yourself.
Break things down as much as you can and and approach it that way.

What we are trying to do by small chunking is Convincing our minds that whatever task is in front of us we CAN achieve it. Once our mind believes that it will go ahead and help us out, if not and your mind interprets whatever you are doing as some insurmountable feat that's when you will get discouraged and get those feelings like you would rather quit then continue on.

make it EZ

MEL

EGO

I dont watch the simpsons but like this pic!

here's some thoughts on the Ego,,, have a good weekend!

The human EGO (see Freud) has a huge influence on people's behavior, what does that mean? most people you will encounter go through life always trying to PROTECT, and NURISH their ego because it makes them feel OKAY and like they are important in society. Understanding this makes understanding different social dynamics much easier.

EX:
Person A and Person B are friends who work together and both smoke. They have been trying to quit for a year.
Person A is finally successful and quits smoking, Person A is very excited and tells Person B (who is still smoking) the great news.
"wow this is amazing, i never thought I could do this, it feels amazing to finally have kicked this habit, i feel healthier, I feel alive, i have started to go to the gym, my life is great!!!! wooooooo!"

How does Person B feel?

In most circumstances, In this situation Person B will think like the following:
We were equal we both had the same problem, and now my friend overcame smoking and I didn't this means they are better than me, I feel my ego getting attacked, they are stronger than me. Just imagine how person B would feel when they are at work and he has to go out for a smoke break which he always enjoyed with person A and person A isn't there anymore...

person B UNCONSCIOUSLY to protect his ego will usually deal with the above in one of two ways:

1) do whatever it takes to get on the same level as person A, meaning he will quit smoking himself, he will start going to the gym, he will do whatever.

2) (this is more common) Person B will try and get person A to come back down to person B's level so they can again be on the same level and then person B will no longer feel bad for continuing to smoke and most importantly his EGO will not be suffering. This will be attempted again mostly unconsciously, by person B saying things like, "oh come on, its just one smoke", "come on person A why dont you come out just like old times its not going to kill you"!!

fast forward a few weeks (assuming person B has not Quit smoking himself)
Person A will have either 1. continued to not smoke or 2. be persuaded to come back down to the level they were originally at and likely started smoking again.

"You will learn one thing from my class, remember this only: PEOPLE LIVE IN GROUPS"
-first day of class said by Dr. Michael Overington (former soiology professor at SMU)

If person A continues NOT to smoke, and Person B continues to smoke in most cases, person A will find a new social group with similar values and start spending more time with them, and person B will keep hanging out with current social group. Because both people are around others like themselves EGOS will feel okay.

This is why sometimes friends "drift" apart.... this is why some people quit smoking, or quit drinking only to start back up again, And this is why sometimes people will try and bring you down.
Its human nature. don't fight it, understand it, then expect it. and then RISE above it.

MEL