I Thrive Here

By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.~Benjamin Franklin

by Leave a Comment

12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever – Part 9 – Risk Is Part Of The Game

I want to talk about something in this article that scares the hell out of most people and that is RISK. Taking a risk can be a sketchy prospect for most people. Before we start talking about what risk is:

Definition of; Risk (excerpt from Merriam Webster Dictionary)

1 :possibility of loss or injury :peril
2 :someone or something that creates or suggests a hazard
3 a :the chance of loss or the perils to the subject matter of an insurance contract; also :the degree of probability of such loss
b :a person or thing that is a specified hazard to an insurer
c :an insurance hazard from a specified cause or source war risk
4 :the chance that an investment (such as a stock or commodity) will lose value
— riskless play  \ˈris-kləs\ adjective
— at risk
:in a state or condition marked by a high level of risk or susceptibility patients at risk of infection.

Well as we can see, the word risk has many meanings depending on how it is applied to a situation. But let’s take a moment to look at how risk applies to our lives when we undertake the journey to improve our lives be it personally and professionally.

It’s easy to dream about the life you wish you were living. But, when we look at major change in our lives, most of us are taking a big step out of our comfort zone of what we are used to and of what we know. When the realization hits about what we are reaching for and what we may have to risk to grab the brass ring, it scares the crap out of us. Instead of looking towards the rewards that are to be gained, we look at what we could potentially lose. That is usually our material possessions even worse, it may change the way others look at us. Instead of seeing that perfectly constructed veneer that has been so carefully constructed to fool others into believe that we really have things together, it could reveal us to be actually vulnerable…even, heaven forbid…human.

This is not talking about strangers, friends,  people that are close to us, or even you. Being completely transparent, I am talking about myself as well. This is a real issue that I have struggled with in the past and continues to challenge me personally to this day. No matter how thick of skin we have, somewhere deep we all care about what others think of us. With the world being the way it is these days, it seems like everyone is ready to pounce on us if we make the slightest misstep. So risk? I’d have to say that there is some risk involved in the pursuit of what you want so badly. But, there always is risk in any endeavor in life worth pursuing. What about what you stand to lose? If what you have is so great then why do you want something different than what you already have, it’s great right? So do you really have so much to lose by going for it?

  •  Stuff? They make more of it everyday, there is no danger of running out of it.
  • Money? They make more of it constantly and there is billions, if not trillions of it in circulation all over the world. Again, no danger of running out of it.
  • Friends? You found the ones you have, right? There are over seven billion people on this planet, ‘nuff said?

Respect and love? Would anyone that respects and love you stop just because because you fail at something? Love is unconditional and respect? Well, have you ever lost respect for someone to works hard and is willing to try for what is important to them?

One more thing to remember is that anyone who has ever been successful did not do so without taking some serious risks. The only thing to remember that there is a big difference between taking a risk and gambling. Gambling leaves your chances up to the luck of the draw. Those who are successful have learned from their mistakes and failures. They know the odds because they have done their research and taken effort to ensure that any risk they take is minimal. In other words, they take calculated risks by making their own “luck”.

As we come to to the end of this article the one take away is that you need recognize is that anything that is worth having comes with a price. That price is that if your arms are full of what you can’t let go, there is little room to hold what is yet to come. Let it go! Because if you want to win, you have to realize that risk is part of the game!

Thank you for reading this week’s article. Please join me for the next article in this series, Surviving In The Ordinary Vs. Living In The Extraordinary.

by Leave a Comment

12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever – Part 8 – Manifesting Change Through Visualization And Action

I am now back from my late summer break. I have been working on some great projects, products and resources that I will be releasing periodically through the end of this year for you! Both, my wife, Ana and I also attended Podcast Movement 2017 (IT WAS AWESOME!) and will be bringing out our new podcasts, The Conformity Hazard and The Daily Thrive starting in Mid-October 2017! With that being said, I would like to move on to our next part in our series and talk about Visualization.

 

Vision is a powerful thing. Often it serves as the main motivation to achieve goals in our lives. The bigger the vision, the bigger the goals, and the more powerful the motivation to pursue our goals until we achieve success. It pushes us to move mountains and to reach for the stars to make our dreams a reality. Unfortunately on the flip side, there are those who have a lack of vision. They only put stock in what they can see and touch. They only believe in the “what already is”, and not the “what can be”. Nevermind that the “what already is” was once the “what can be, but what wasn’t yet”. They are not interested in the imagination and the visualization that it takes to create something new or make something that already exists better. Not only that, but they often revel in crushing the spirit, inspiration, and motivation of those that see impossible as I’mPossible.


That is why if you are one of those creative souls that want to do what you set out to do, you have to have a powerful support system in place to keep you on track when others who intentionally or not, try to derail you. One of the most powerful tools in doing this comes in the form of visualization. Visualization helps in making the intangible feel tangible and within your reach. While there are many ways to visualize your dreams and goals we will discuss three of them in this article.


The first is the easiest and does not take much skill to master and that is creating a vision board for yourself. A vision board is essentially a board that you can hang on your wall that contains visual stimuli such a pictures of items that you want to have or do when you reach your ideal level of success in life to afford those things that you now only dream about. It does not matter what those items are because each person has a different idea of what success looks like to them. For some it can be financial wealth, luxury homes and vehicles. For others it can be having the ability to travel and see the world with or without wealth. Some may choose to travel to help others or experience their way of life, you know, it doesn’t take lots of money to travel. For others it may be moving to another area to live or doing work that they love. Vision boards can be as simple as pictures stuck to your walls, cork boards, magnetic boards, or a piece of cardboard. They come in all shapes and sizes. They can be elaborate or the simplest of creations. The important thing is that whatever they are they need to do two things. They need to motivate and inspire you to turn whatever is on that board (or something even better) into your reality. Bear in mind also that the items on your vision board will change as you continue to pursue your goals and you need to be open to that change. As you grow and change in your pursuit of success, so will your ideas of what is important to you. What you started with in the beginning that was motivating you may not appeal to you in the same way as you grow nearer to having the life that you want to live. Remember that your faith in achieving what is on your board is relative to what you have invested in it. The more care and effort you take in crafting it the more you have invested in it, and that in itself will make it more real for you!

*** HERE’S A COUPLE OF BONUS TIPS!!***

It doesn’t hurt to place individual photos and or quotes at different points around your house where you will see them on a daily basis. A couple good places for these is on your bathroom mirror and your refrigerator door.

Also, if you want to keep your vision board handy to look at various times during the day, take a picture of it with your smartphone. That way you can pull it up at a instantly in your gallery and even zoom it to see whatever it is that inspires you at that moment.

The second tool that will help inspire you and lift you up when you are going through the trying times is your very own “Future Reality Catalog”. This will take more time than creating your vision board and will be an ongoing project. This is a much more extensive tool that you can refer to when you need that boost to keep you moving forward. Think of it as a scrapbook of the things that you are working to achieve in the place of memories past. Unlike your vision board, instead of being a collage of the things that you want in life, this tool is more organized as you can index it into sections. You can refer to in a specific manner to provide motivation on demand.  Just like looking through your favorite catalog and browsing through the things you like to have, think of this as your own customized catalog. It will contain every single thing that you want in every area of your life and nothing that you don’t. This catalog is all about you, and if you wish, your spouse or special someone. This catalog can contain anything that you want. You don’t have to feel guilty about it because it is for your eyes only unless, that is, you want to share it with someone.


Again, you can make this as fancy or simple as you want but like your vision board, it has to move you towards taking action to turn those pictures into your reality. For an example, I will tell you how I created my personal Future Reality Catalog. I made a trip to the local office supply store and purchased a 4 inch metal ring binder with internal pockets and transparent sleeves on the outer covers. I also purchased a pack of 200 8.5” x 11” transparent sleeves with holes for the binder rings, and index pages with colored tabs that came with insertable tabs that you can write on for indexing your catalog with the types of things it will contain. Lastly, I bought a box of 8.5” x 11” thick stock paper, a couple rolls of transparent tape and some paste to glue pictures to the thick stock paper. I brought it home and spent a couple of hours setting it up. I used Adobe Photoshop to create a cover page of me and my wife well dressed for a night on the town and a few pictures of some of the big ticket things that we wanted to have in our lives after we had achieved our ideal level of success. On the top of the page across our picture I wrote in fancy script “The Fairchild Catalog Of Our Future Reality”. I even created a nice little end insert for it so we could see it when tucked in on our bookshelf.


We then spent the next few days as we had time cutting out picture from magazines and printing pictures from the web of the things we wanted in our lives. These ranged from material possessions to travel, spirituality, health, pictures of homes with interior and exterior shots that we loved. They didn’t have to be all a part of the same house, we created the home we wanted from a hodgepodge of different photos. I put pictures of cars I have had in the past and some that I always wanted (including a red 1987 Lamborghini Countach). We still to this day add and remove pictures as we grow to have a clearer vision of the life we desire to live. I have referred back to this catalog time and again as I have encountered bumps in the road and major obstacles in working towards achieving what we want to have. It has been invaluable. Again, this catalog, like your vision board is only worth to you what you put into it. Make it something that sets you on fire everytime you pick it up!


The last thing that I would like to talk to you about in this article is the art of visualization itself. This can be, and is for me, the most influential and motivating technique that I  know of to help you engage in making your dreams a reality. This is also the hardest skill to master if you want to maximize it’s effectiveness in changing your way of thinking and it’s effect on your actions to move you farther than anything else in creating the life you desire to live. To prepare and initiate your visualization of your life as you would have it is imperative. For maximum effectiveness when you visualize, you need to clear your mind and your space of all distractions. You need to be in a state of quiet calmness akin to the state you want to be in when you meditate. A state where you can direct your sole focus on creating the pictures and “mind movies” if you will, of your life as you wish it to be, in the here and now. You can’t provide this kind of focus in an environment that is noisy, cluttered, or distracting. You need to create a personal sanctuary, be it big or small, where you can do this for a few minutes everyday, uninterrupted. Do not bring your electronics anywhere near this area when you are ready to visualize. Don’t turn them down or put them on vibrate, turn them off and leave them in another room. Remember that despite what you may think people survived on this planet for uncounted centuries without cell phones, TURN IT OFF! It will be there when you finish.

 

For this exercise in visualization you don’t have to bend yourself into a uncomfortable yoga position or sit indian-style in front of a candle. You need a quiet, comfortable place where you feel safe and at ease. Sit with your eyes closed and breathe deep while clearing your mind of all the things that will happen or have happened today, depending on what time you choose to visualize. Once you are in a state of calm, create a picture in your mind of you in the here and now, already living the life of your dreams. You, happy, healthy, smiling, well-dressed, looking and feeling great. You have all you need and want in abundance. You love others and they love you! Watch yourself as if you were immersed in a movie about your life being filmed in real time. If you desire money, you have lots of it – more than you’ll ever need. If you desire a beautiful home, imagine yourself walking through its halls and rooms. Imagine yourself walking barefoot in the grass and the grounds that surrounds it. Take a swim in the pool, fall back into your dreamy soft bed with big cushy pillows that you just sink into. Cook in your kitchen that is every chef’s dream. Sit in your favorite seat in your vast living room or shoot pool and play video games in your decked out game room. Slip into the seat behind the wheel of the vehicle that you always dreamed of but thought you could never have. Feel and smell the scent of the leather seats, hear the engine rev as you put your foot on the accelerator. Feel the sand and the sun on your face and body as you lay on your favorite beach as you hear the surf roll in and smell the fresh salty air that surrounds you. See the palm trees sway in the breeze overhead as you sip your delicious drink without a care in the world and with no sense of time because you have no other place to have to be at this moment.

 

The goal of your visualization is that you need to immerse yourself completely in the experience, feel it, smell it, see it as though you are there now, at this moment. You want to pick one thing to visualize at a time and only spend a few minutes to clear your mind and then only five to ten minutes visualizing. Any more that this and you will become distracted as you mind moves on to other thoughts. If you allow this to happen your visualization will not have the same impact on your subconscious mind. This is what you want to do by visualizing is impact your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind cannot differentiate what is real from what is imagined if you believe it. After doing this exercise over and over you will soon find that your subconscious mind will begin directing you towards taking certain actions. It will guide you into situations and experiences that are conducive to moving you in the direction of the life you want to be living.

 

Then, before you realize what is happening, you will actually be living the life that you only dreamed about before. Ask any successful person about visualization and most will tell you that they always visualize any goal that they want to achieve as having already achieved it before ever actually doing it. Of course you will always have to follow up visualization with action to get to where you want to be. Only thinking about something alone will never make it happen without action BUT visualization is a HUGE part of it! Make it happen.  


Thank you for joining us for this article on Manifesting Change Through Visualization And Action. Please join us for the next article in our series on 12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever when we will talk about Risk Is Part Of The Game.

by Leave a Comment

12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever – Part 7 – Channel Your Fear Into Power

Fear is an excellent motivator! But, saying this will likely provoke a variety of reactions from many people depending on their perspective. Some will disagree by saying that fear is not a motivator, stating instead that fear is a de-motivator. It demotivates people to do things by scaring them into not taking chances and helps keep them safe from harm. Some could say that fear of volatile financial markets keep people safe from losing their money by causing them to hold on tightly to their money, There are many arguments that are offered about how fear keeps people erring on the side of caution and they would be right, but would they?

There is also compelling arguments offered towards the contrary. How does one explain people that, despite the fear that they feel, choose to take part in extreme sports like bungee jumping, parachuting, white water rafting, competitive fighting, and auto racing. Also, what about those individuals that, despite the known risks, choose to spend large sums of their own money investing in stocks when it seems like the markets are crashing down around them? Would you call them crazy or crazy like a fox? Does the name Warren Buffet ring any bells?  There can be rewards to facing your fears, whether it be something as simple as an adrenaline rush or making vast amounts of money.

Everything, and I do mean everything, comes with a level of risk and people make choices to do them everyday,. The point in saying this is that you have to make choices in life to do things that sometimes involves major risks where others have very little. The problem lies in that fear also often makes no distinction in deterring us from doing things where there is no real danger, no risk, and no reason to be scared of what is simply a change to what we are used to and are comfortable with.

In fact fear, if channeled, can be a strong source of power and motivation to achieve great things in our lives.  When you take a moment and assess what is scaring you about what you are about to do, you can determine whether you are facing something that can harm you or not. If there is no danger of encountering real harm then you can will yourself to move past the feeling of being afraid and focus that energy towards the task at hand. Instead of allowing fear to control you, you will control it and master it. You will move forward and get through whatever it is that you need to do.

Focus your mind on the end result that you are wanting to achieve. Of course, you need to have a plan and you want to put it down in writing to refer to as you go along. But, do not try to take in everything you have to do to get to the end of what you are doing. Instead, break what you are doing into chunks in your mind. Start what you are doing and work from one chunk to the next, only applying the energy you are feeling to the one chunk you are working on in this moment. Work in a logical order from beginning to end. Do not allow yourself to become distracted and do things out of order. This will lead to you not knowing how to get back to where you started and that can cause anxiousness, which leads to fear.

By only allowing yourself to focus on only one chunk of your task at a time it allows you to complete one chunk and then move on to the next. With each chunk that you complete, you will feel a growing sense of accomplishment and confidence that will contribute positive energy to the energy that you channel from your fear. With each chunk you will gain momentum and as that positive energy infuses the energy from your fear you will gain even more power to complete your task as the energy from your fear changes from negative to positive.

When you confront and engage your fear as the energy you need to start something big, something that is outside of your comfort zone; it will create a powerful chain-reaction that will push your past any initial resistance and on to the point of critical mass when any remaining negative energy is converted to positive. Once you reach that point, there is nothing stopping you from achieving what you set out to do.

Thank you for reading this week’s article in our series on 12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever. But remember that there is more to changing your life than knowing what to do. The key ingredient is TAKING ACTION on what you learn! I will be traveling, attending Podcast Movement 2017 and working on a number of projects that I will be releasing later this year during August 2017.  Please join me again when I return in September when we’ll be exploring the next step in making this positive and permanent life change: Manifesting Change Through Visualization And Action.

by Leave a Comment

12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever – Part 6 – Live Life As An Adventure

Have you ever had a true adventure? A real adventure that kept you excited, your heart pumping, your body flooded with adrenaline, sweaty palms, jittery nerves, had you feeling fully alive and present in the moment? Did your adventure leave you craving more or disappointed that it was over? Living through an adventure often leaves one wanting more because of the feeling that they get while they are experiencing it. Then, when it is over, they often wonder when will they be able to feel that excitement again? When will their next adventure come? The thing is, for some, it never comes again when a person is used to living a life of “security” and when being “safe” comes before living a life that that may be perceived as being a little “risky”.

The truth that most people ignore, living in ignorant bliss, is that in the reality that we live in, risk is everywhere and there is no such thing as security. We live in a world where we drive cars, take part in sports, fly in planes, ride on bikes and in buses, we use knives, some people use, and some abuse firearms, we live near streets, use electricity, and subject ourselves to many, many, many different other things that can cause injury or death at any moment. We live also relying on money to pay for many of the things in life that we need and want in our lives. Most of us earn this money by either working for ourselves or by having a job. It has happened over and over in the past where financial markets crash, people lose their jobs, their savings, their investments, their homes, cars, you name it… Security? What security? In this world we have wildfires, hurricanes, tornados, blizzards, drought, monsoons, tsunamis, and dozens of other natural disasters that plague us no matter where we live. Along with robberies, muggings, murder, and some generally bad people living everywhere. To be sure, this world we live in is not by any means safe. Now before I scare you to death (no pun intended), I say all this to make a point. While we try to live our lives oblivious to the things that can happen at anytime to us, it is impossible to protect yourself from everything, in every way, every day.

Despite all this, there are many people who try to protect themselves by not doing anything that presents a perceived risk to their life, limb, possessions or money. Some will not fly in a plane, but they will get in a car everyday to drive to a variety of locations at an even greater risk because they do not look at it the same. Some people will not invest in stocks, bonds, or funds because they perceive it as too risky. Yet, they will go to the casino and lay down that same cash at a table, pump it into the slot machines or spend it on that newest, latest, greatest gadget that breaks after a month or two; leaving them with nothing. It can be interesting to take a step back and look at what people define as risky and why.

But, there are others, the trendsetters, the movers,the shakers, the rich, the powerful, the adrenalin junkies, the athletes, the heros, the fearless, the ones who get it done, THE ADVENTURERS. It is the people who live their lives as an adventure that other people look up to and admire (even if secretly). Who do you think is getting the most out of life? The person blazing a trail of their own or the person that is following the trail that is already cleared for them?

Helen Keller once said that “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all”. Truer words have never been spoken. Think about how life has evolved on earth. Animals in the wild never know what the next day will bring for them. They live their lives at risk everyday. They raise their young to be strong and survive the rigors and dangers of the environment they live in. They know nothing of security or safety. They live in the here and now. Their senses tuned in to what is around them, alert to adapt and respond to changes quickly, or else. It is the instinct of survival. We as humans also have an instinct for survival. The problem with our instinct is that we often confuse it with fear. Then we relate that fear to things that pose no real threat to our existence and pay little heed to it in the face of real and present threats. This is why some get a thrill from driving at high-speeds, racing or otherwise, (no matter the danger) while others fear standing in front of a crowd and to speak where there is no real threat at all.

When looking at life without the rose-colored glasses on, you soon realize that we are exposed to real and perceived threats everyday. Whether we choose to expose ourselves to living adventurously or not. We were not brought into this world to be sheep, we have actual sheep that do that job just fine without us adding to their population. Think about some of the great “adventurers” from our past that changed the world we live in and the way we live. What would our world be without things we take for granted? Electricity, modern transportation, housing, freedom, and all the millions of other things that makes life in the modern world easy in comparison to a hundred or so years ago. It is that spirit of adventure that creates innovation and invention. A sense of adventure in one’s life inspires and motivates a person to reach farther, do more, pursue a life of abundance and achievement.

What you need to take away from this article is not fear of what can happen to you, or sense of foreboding over the negative things that occur in the course of your life. Instead create a realization that things can happen whether you live a “safe and secure” life or a life filled with adventure and a desire to live your life to the full.

Yes, you should plan for your future by creating what financial and relational security you can as well as being a responsible, accountable, and ethical person. BUT, you can also live your life in such a way that you are able to to experience all that this life has to offer, while you are able to enjoy all the astonishing and terrifying things that make up the journey of life that you are on. You can do this all, knowing that the risk is the same whether you choose to really live your life, or just survive it.

Thank you for joining is for this article on Living Your Life As An Adventure, part 6 of our 12 part series on How To Leave Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever. Please join us again next week as we explore how to Channel Your Fear Into Power.

by Leave a Comment

12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever – Part 5 – Reinvent Yourself

So far, if you have been following our articles on “12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever”, you have:

  • Learned how to create your map that will help guide you to a new life.
  • Learned that you will need to get used to being in a state of being “uncomfortable”.
  • Learned that you have to think in “bigger” ways to have a “bigger” life.
  • Learned that you have to change your habits and rituals if you want a different result in life than what you have been experiencing thus far.

 

The question is that, while you may have learned some of what you will need to do to have the life you desire, have you been applying what you have learned? If not, you will continue to get more of what you have received in the past and while that may be enough to allow you to survive, it will not be enough to allow you to thrive in your life. You cannot continue to be the same person that you have been in the past with all of the same routines, work ethic, habits in your finances, lifestyle, health, and mindset and live the life that you want. You may have heard stories several times in your life about people who have literally went from rags to riches through playing sports, inheriting money, or winning the lottery only to find themselves back in the grips of poverty or even owing millions just a few years (or even a year) later. This is because they had no time to learn what they need to know about managing large sums of money when they had only dealt with meager amounts prior to receiving massive amounts of money. They never had the time to develop the discipline, habits, education, and experience necessary to successfully build, maintain, and grow their fortune. They never had to deal with failure and losses along the way to teach them what to do if things started going wrong. They never learned about living on only part of what you earn and diverting the rest to savings and investments. This is only some of the reasons why you cannot become who you want to be and live the kind of life you want and remain unchanged from the person you currently are.

 

What you must learn to do next to become who you want to be is Re-Invent Yourself! This is not to say that you have to become something that you are not. After all, who would want to sacrifice who they authentically are for success? I, for one, would not and neither should you. What I am talking about when I say “Re-Invent Yourself” is that you have to replace your mindset and how you presently do things with thoughts and actions that are useful in leading you from where you currently are in your life to where you wish to be. To be a true success and experience the happiness, that you hope, comes with it, you must be able to believe in yourself and you must feel good about yourself (and what you do). You must have the confidence & knowledge that comes from achieving your goals through working smart as well as being able to learn from your failures and keeping a proper perspective on both.

 

Imagine, if you will, how you would feel when things are going great for you. You have a nice home, the car you wish you had, a loving family, plenty of money, no debt, you are doing what you love to do for a living, you have & wear nice clothes, you are a picture of health, and live your life exactly as you wish to be living it. How would you feel if you were living this life? How well do you think your existing life, possessions, financial habits, your work, and your mindset would fit into that picture? Probably not so well. Maybe, wealth and material possessions are not your thing. Maybe you would like to travel the world, help others, and be free from your present work-a-day life; is that you? Either way, is how you picture your ideal life a far cry from what you have, what you do, and who you are today? If so, think about what you would have to do to be that person in your mind? You would have to re-invent who and what you are to become what you want to be. The thing is, what most people in that position do not realize is the best and fastest way to accomplish this goal is by becoming the person you desire to be one step at a time, in any way you can bring it into your life TODAY! You may not have the money or ability to just walk away from your life and re-invent it overnight. But what you can do is start with the little things that can make a big difference in your life immediately. If you want to feel better about yourself and build a solid, positive self-image:

  • Start by working on your health and physical condition. Eat better by making smart choices in what you consume, get more exercise (you don’t have to be a member of a gym to walk more, do some sit-ups, and get more physical activity). Do this consistently and you will begin to see results!
  • Dress yourself better! While you may feel more relaxed, you may notice how you never feel as good when you are dressed in old, poor fitting clothing as you do when you are dressed up and ready to go out for a night on the town. The old phrase “you clean up nicely” applies more than you know. While there are times that are appropriate to relax and dress down, most people feel much better about themselves when they are cleaned-up, well groomed, dressed up and looking their best. This is not to say that you need to be dressed up in a tuxedo or if you are a woman dressed up in a formal gown or dress to go out in the day or go to work. But if it’s appropriate, it doesn’t hurt to be dressed in a nice pair of slacks and a crisp-ironed shirt or a nice polo shirt. If you are a woman, you might want to consider a blouse and pants that flatter your figure (whatever it may be) or maybe a business-style dress. The point is, whether man or woman, when you look & smell nice, you feel great and that is exactly what you want to feel like, better about yourself.
  • Surround yourself with people that inspire and motivate you. Jim Rohn once said, “You‘re the average of the five people you spend mostof your time with”.  This is truer than most people like to believe but, you can see it time and time again if you just look around. How many underachievers do you see hanging around successful people? How many pessimistic people do you see in a crowd of positive, optimistic people? How many poverty-minded people do you see in a group of wealthy people trying to learn what they know, and vice-versa? Not many, if any. I say this not to judge, but as a fact. It does not typically happen in normal life UNLESS, a person is on fire about changing their paradigm (and their future). The point of this is that if you are serious about changing your life for the better and permanently; in the process of re-inventing yourself, you also need to change the people that you spend the most time with. Work to surround yourself with the kind of people that you admire and want to be the most like. It is only there that you will learn what you need to know and grow into the person you wish to become in the process.
  • Find a mentor! Make a real effort to find a person that you respect, admire, and who has been successful in life (and business if that is what you are looking to do). When you find them, introduce yourself and authentically become the friend that they would like to spend time with, provide them with value and make yourself useful in their lives. Do not become an annoyance by picking their brain for what you are wanting to learn. Instead be truthful with them and let them know of your desire for them to become your mentor then, if they accept, be open to learn from them in what they are willing to teach you and grow more from the experience.
  • Make a conscious effort to live in a state of happiness and gratefulness. This can prove to be one of the biggest challenges in re-inventing yourself, especially if you are not normally a person that always has an optimistic point of view. Until you develop these habits to the point where you don’t consciously have to pay attention to them, make the effort to maintain a smile most of the time, pay attention to keeping a positive point of view when dealing with situations in your life and work, and most importantly, you must learn to consistently live in a state of gratitude for what you have in the moment. While is fine to want to have more, you must learn not to focus on that. Having abundance in your life is a by-product of being grateful for what you have, what you are given, living in a state of happiness in the here & now, being open to receiving, and taking action towards your goals in your life and work.
  • Dream Build! Take some time every week or so to spend a few minutes or hours feeling what it would be like to have the life that you want. Remember that feeling something in reality is a powerful motivator. Go into the car dealership where your dream car awaits and take a test drive (don’t forget to dress the part when you go in if you want them to take you seriously). Visit some open houses on the weekend in the style of the home you want to live in, it makes no difference if you can afford it today, browse your way through the rooms and take it all in while keeping the thought in your mind of what it would be like to live here. Save some of your money so that once a month or so you can splurge on something that you could enjoy on a regular basis if you had the means to do so. Get away for a weekend, stay in a nice hotel (there are great travel discounts available if you just search a little), if you are at the beach, rent a jet ski and go riding or go out on a deep sea fishing expedition, have a nice dining experience, and maybe rent a luxury car if you are on a mini vacation (or for a weekend of driving enjoyment) so you can really get the feel of what it would be like to live this lifestyle every day.

 

Bear in mind that you will not only re-invent yourself once, but many times as you learn and grow as a person and in your knowledge that you attain along your journey. And what about once you achieve your goals? Then the journey will continue as your reach ever higher towards becoming all you can be in this life. Change is perpetual. Here’s to the Re-Invention of the new YOU!

 

Thank you for reading this article. Please not only read it, but apply it in your life to get real results that can change your life for the better. Please join us next week in our continuing series of articles on “12 Steps To Leaving Your Comfort Zone Behind Forever” as we explore the next topic on Living Life As An Adventure.

I Thrive Here On Twitter