Tag Archives: personal growth

What do you Expect?

The question of how to change your future is firmly rooted in the garden of our mind.  Specifically, it is a massive and ever-present plant called “expectation.”

The idea of expectation conjures up the age old question of which came first, the chicken or the egg?  In other words, do our circumstances and present reality determine what our expectations are, or do our long held expectations determine our present reality?

I suppose an argument could be made for either position.  As you might imagine, my purpose is not to engage in argument or contention, so let’s objectively agree that regardless of which came first, the reality is that if we want to change the reality in which we live we can make monumental strides towards the desired end by adjusting our expectations!

Let’s just for the sake of example say that “Bob” finds himself with poor self-esteem and low expectations or success in his life.  Bob has come to the place in his life where he has such expectations because his history shows a long established pattern of failure, bad choices and loss.  How would you encourage your friend Bob to change his fortunes going forward?  Hopefully, you could persuade Bob to get excited about the possibility of success.  Perhaps you could speak to him about the strengths he does possess and inspire him to dig deep into his soul and try again.  I believe you could excite him and help take his eyes out of the rear view mirror and focus on his future enough to help cultivate different expectations.  Reinforcing his newly adopted expectations, you cheer him on to a short term goal and bolster his confidence and reinforce positive expectation.

I could go on, playing this scenario out but I am sure you get the point.  When we make the conscious choice to change our focus and, therefore, change our expectations from failure to success our lives will bear out the better reality.  When we expect to succeed in an area or specific endeavor, our actions will fall in line with what it takes to be a success.  If I want to start a landscaping business, but I don’t really expect to be successful for whatever reason then my actions will be in line with failure.  I will likely not invest in the best equipment or in the best employees.  I will likely not bother to spend the money or time to advertise and market my business because, well, what’s the point?  I’ll just go through the motions and wait for reality to catch up to my expectations.  Conversely, if I fully expect to be successful, my energy level will be high and I will hustle and work my back side off in order to gain customers and earn their satisfied referrals.  I will invest in whatever it takes to get the job done and grow my new company and the end result will be that the new guy on the block is really making a splash in the market!

So, what do you expect?  If your answer is not exciting to you, adjust your expectations!

D.E.A.D. Principle (part 2)

Welcome back for the second part of the D.E.A.D. principle.

Diving right in, the “E” stands for enthusiasm.  The second component, enthusiasm, builds nicely upon the first which was, desire.  Let’s face it, if you aren’t excited about your products or services, why should your customers be?  In fact, if you are just joining me in this series, you might want to stop right here and go read part 1.  The reason is that if you have read and understood part 1 with regards to desire, then enthusiasm should be a natural progression.

For the sake of example, I will continue sharing the scenario of a car salesperson.  You can adapt the particulars to whatever industry you are involved in.  Remember, it is the principle you are looking to learn.  Once you learn the principle, application will fall into place naturally.  So, if you are following your desire to participate in the lucrative world of automotive sales  you will want to consciously have a very enthusiastic mindset.

How will this look in practice?  As a sales professional you will want to eat cars, drink cars, sleep cars, breathe cars, etc.  You will need to completely immerse yourself in your product in order to gain the knowledge it takes to intelligently communicate their every benefit, feature, and have a command of ever bell and whistle.  You will want to get so excited about the cars you sell that it literally is infectious!  Of course, your enthusiasm will show in terms of excitement and love of the vehicles, but you will also be armed to address every question, comment and concern that comes your way.  Also, you will be so intimately familiar with what you sell that you will instinctively know what is the right car for your customer.

There are so many different ins and outs with this idea that I could go on for pages and pages!  I believe you likely get the idea though.

True success comes to those who diligently pursue it.  It doesn’t just happen.  Making certain that you are following your desire will lead you to a place of proper levels of enthusiasm.  Be a good student of what you are selling, promoting, building, or teaching.  Learning everything you can will be one of your biggest assets in the pursuit of success.  Be sure to be real.  Enthusiasm is a wonderful and contagious thing, but, forced or fake enthusiasm shines like a beacon telling your audience you are not genuine and, therefore, not trustworthy.  Don’t make the mistake of equating enthusiasm with over-the-top craziness!  You don’t want to come across as a clown.

Enthusiasm is best served with a smile, and what I like to call controlled excitement.  You don’t want to explode on people.  You do want your excitement to be leading your customer somewhere.  Think of it this way—if your customer is at an excitement level of a 4 on a scale of 1 to 10 you probably don’t want to come across as a ten!  Stay a couple steps ahead.  Lead them, don’t drag them.

Genuine enthusiasm will ultimately create a follow me scenario where people will gravitate in your direction.  Just make sure your enthusiasm is following your desire and you will be well on your way to following the D.E.A.D. principle.

Failure is Not the Problem You Think it is!

I believe it was Thomas Edison who famously said that he had not failed, he had merely discovered ten thousand ways that don’t work. Is that not a beautiful take on perspective and determination?

There are many more famous examples of people who have literally failed their way to success! It doesn’t seem at first glance that the two are compatible, but indeed they are a close kin. Look at it this way, if all we do is dream about what it would be like to do something big, but never take a step towards the dream we are absolutely guaranteed to fail and never realize the dream. Truth be told, if we take a chance and step out in faith towards our dreams there is no promise of attaining the goal or even being any closer to the goal after we try. So why try at all if this is the way it is? There is something so amazing and surprisingly satisfying in our best attempts that makes the effort worth the while.

Speaking for myself, I know that there are enormous heaps of failure in between each success I have experienced along the way. You can say that when measuring the failures compared to the successes that overall I’m a failure right? If we are simply counting the numbers of failures versus successes, then I suppose, but who does that? The runner who competes and fails to place in race after race could be deemed a failure. However, the training and preparation that goes into each race strengthens the runner and puts them in a place where even though they may have lost this race, they are poised to improve the next them they try. Plus, lessons learned through the course of failure refine their approach next time. For some, simply being able to complete a race is reward enough regardless of winning or losing! But just imagine the exhilaration of the day that runner crosses the finish line first! Do you think at that moment they are looking back over their years of failure and accepting that because they failed more than they won that they are in fact a loser somehow? NO! Absolutely not! In that moment the first success is realized, all the failure is now nothing more than mere preparation that lead to this now sweet moment of supreme accomplishment.

I dare say that this scenario applies to me and you no matter what our ‘race’ of choice. It doesn’t matter how many times I got rejected trying to get a job in broadcasting. When I finally landed my first job, I wasn’t crying about all the missed opportunities, but instead, was celebrating the fact I had one now! When I found my beautiful wife and mother of my two amazing children I didn’t look back at all the failed relationships and label myself a social failure. No! I rejoiced in the fact that I now basked in the glorious success of finding the one for me! As an author, I don’t look at all the failed attempts to write a book and think of me as a failed author. No! I look at my book, “Power In Perseverance” and the lives that have been changed and the blessings that have come through the open door of radio & TV interviews because of it, and I see a resounding success!

We have to choose what we focus on. How do you like that? Another visual pun from a blind man! I can choose to focus on failure, but then my negative outlook will feed upon itself and become a self fulfilling prophecy of sorts and I will continue to live in failure. Or, I can choose to focus on my accomplishments and the joy they have added to my life and allow myself to be defined by them instead of the failed attempts.

If this blind, cancer survivor, heart patient can overcome the obstacles in my life, then why can’t you? What is your excuse? What is holding you back? If it is your attitude and perspective that’s easy to change, just make the decision. If it is a disability or other life challenge, that’s ok, you can still overcome it and get to where you want to go. You just need to find someone like you who has done it before. Solomon said there is nothing new under the sun. I believe that! If someone, anyone like you or me has done something before then so can we!

For more information, or if I can be of any further assistance to you, please do not hesitate to reach out. My email is throttleup@jeffgrillomedia.com

Below are some suggested links to help you grab hold of other ‘Throttle Up!’ outlets that will encourage, empower and inspire you to reach beyond your current circumstances and become all you were created to be!

Podcast: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/jeff-grillos-podcast/id984981881?mt=2&i=339792930
YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YamzUDTAj1w

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Habits

 

Volumes have been written on the topic of habits, both good and bad.  In this post I will share what I know to be the two most important things you need to know about habits.  I will not only point out the two most important things and show you why they are important, but I will explain why they are extra critical to those facing major life challenges.

My experience and research have revealed hard truths to me.  It all boils down to two things.  Habits are created from actions repeated over time.  Habits, regardless of how they became established in our lives, can be changed!  That is the bottom line!

We know that actions repeated over time become habits.  We must also recognize that actions always result in consequences, sometimes negative and sometimes positive.  If we find ourselves at a point in our life where we are re-evaluating the quality of our current state then we must examine the sum total of our actions which have become habits.  If we find that we are currently in a great position in life then the examining of our habits and actions of the past should reveal what we are doing right, and therefore ought to continue to do.  In fact, even in  such a situation we can fine tune the good habits to become great habits and thus ensure an even brighter future.  If, however, we find less than satisfactory results have been achieve then we are forced to examine the actions and habits that have developed which have put us in this undesirable state.

I have heard it many times throughout my life that studies show it takes 28 days of repeated action to develop a new habit.  That is not too long!  Most of us can make changes, even challenging ones and keep it going for 28 days!  Man, even the biggest of habits can be broken if we choose to look at it this way.  You can do it standing on your head for crying out loud!

Massive change isn’t always necessary either.  Sometimes even small or basic change made consistently can yield fantastic results.

Now that the light has shone upon this monster, what are you going to do about it?  Examine your habits that hold you back.  Start with the more obvious habits, or start with the easiest ones and correct them.  In only four weeks you can start to see real change.  Conquer even one bad habit at a time, just do something!  Get at it!  Get going!  You may find the results to be so gratifying that you become a monster of sorts yourself, hunting down and destroying these dirty little varmints that have held you back for far too long!

This leads me of course to the point that habits indeed can be changed.  They are conquered by a simple but focused choice of will.  The power is in your hands.  My two points about habits are summed up in one simple word…”choice.”  Make the choice to do things differently in order to reap the prize of a better tomorrow!