In a recent seminar, someone came up to me and told me how inspired she was about the event, and that she was impressed at how she could stay awake compared with other seminars she had attended where other trainers were not as compelling.
You have to realize how awkward it must have been for me. On the one hand, this lady has learnt something, but she hasn’t really learnt much. The only measure for success in her life is that she doesn’t fall asleep in the classroom. While I honestly feel flattered, I think that the trainer has far less bearing on the success of a student.
If you analyze the situation properly, a trainer spends between 2-4 days in an average person’s life in a year. That leaves about 361 days for a person to be totally alone by oneself. That’s time spent at 98.9% away from the trainer. Sure, the trainer may have good qualities you would like to model, but the trainer is never in charge of your everyday living.
After running a training program, I find that the best thing people can do is to keep focusing on their goals and be more aware of their direction in life. This requires not just a seminar, but a range of other things such as:
- Life Builder Groups. To learn more about LBGs, you’ll need to attend our Patterns Of Excellence program, where we show you how the power of teams can make a difference in your everyday life. LBGs are great to build and maintain a culture as an organization. Without a structure, LBGs are likely to fail, relying only on dogma and personality to run the show. It’s important to build a culture of commitment and organize this properly so that it is a culture for life.
- Coaching. Contrary to what a lot of people think, coaching does not help you achieve a goal. You have got to achieve the goal yourself. Coaching is a way to open yourself up to resourcefulness in the achievement of your goals. It is also a way to remain accountable to your results. Probably the hardest question to ask is if you are honest with yourself while undergoing coaching. A lot of the time, ego forms a barrier and a good coach is able to break those down and confront the real issue.
This allows you to focus on what direction you want to take. No matter how inspired you feel after a seminar, you really need to use this to take action on the things you want to achieve.
ACTion Planning
You would agree with me when I say that our emotions drive a lot of our actions. The question is where do those emotions come from? See, if you are motivated, it probably means that you have a significant set of needs and desires. You want to look good? That will drive a set of actions. You got hungry? Same thing.
It’s not really rocket science, but I think action planning requires much more than just setting a goal. It means you need to align your needs and emotions toward the attainment of short-term and long-term goals.
Step #1: Create a vision of the future.
You need to be able to project and see into the future, dreaming up your ideal situation.
Step #2: Identify the reasons why you would like to be able to do this.
The “why” is very important. In most cases, you should ask several “whys” to reach depth of the reason. Let’s say you want to buy a new house. Of course the most simple reason for it is to have a roof over your head. But why do you want that? Maybe a deeper reason is that you want to provide a safe and secure environment for your children and family to grow closer. Now that might be a deep enough reason to drive you.
Step #3: Create Daily Rituals
Did you know that having lots of choices creates a lack of action? That’s the main reason why it is important to cut down everything to one choice if that is a must for you. Instead of taking two or three things at the same time, cut out all bridges that allow you to go elsewhere. Make sure you finish them and complete your cycle and turn it into a ritual every single day. If it’s exercise, do it every day like a ritual, just like breakfast, lunch and dinner (unfortunately some people don’t even do these as a ritual).
Step #4: Make it as natural as you can.
When you do something often and create a habitual cycle, it’s going to make you more focused on what you need to do because you took that for granted. Unfortunately, many people believe in waiting for the feeling to do something. You can’t afford the luxury of that time. You have got to do it as though it were a part and parcel of your everyday life, that if you don’t do it, you will feel extremely uneasy. Make it a “you” thing.
Step #5: Keep track of your successes while propelling yourself to the future.
All successes eventually become a thing of the past. However, you can use this to solidify the belief that you can get things done. Collect your trophies not for display, but for encouragement. If you’ve done it before, you know you can do it again. Then, focus on what you have to do next.
photo credit: HikingArtist.com
