It is very easy to work in your business. In fact, taking care of the day to day operations is vitally important to staying in business.
However, it is just as important to work on your business.
The good news is that it can take less time to work on your business than in it. I recommend my clients to take one afternoon a month and answer five basic questions that could make a huge difference in the success of their endeavors. They are: Why are you doing what you are doing? What are your core values? What is your mission? What is your strategic vision? And, what is your strategy? Knowing the answers to these questions is so important that I have created a series of free webinar/workshops (I call them Webishops) to help entrepreneurs at www.webishops.com. These Success Planning Webishops help you to answer each of those five questions, and each on only takes 20 minutes to watch. It is only by working on your business that you will find the new opportunities that are waiting for you.
Counseling, or therapy, has been around a long time. It has gotten a bad reputation at times, but is very beneficial for people wanting to heal from past trauma.
However, with so many “coaches” coming out of the woodwork these days, how do you decide whether to hire a therapist or a coach? And how to you know if you are hiring a professional?
There is one main difference between therapy and coaching. Therapy helps to heal a person from the past and coaching helps people toward a better tomorrow. In either case, the person you hire needs to be more committed to your mental health than they are toward their profit margins. There are therapists and coaches out there that count on you coming back, with debit card in hand, consistently. A professional counselor/coach will help you develop techniques so you can start to help yourself. If you are working with a professional who is not helping you to develop your own coping skills, it might be time to ditch them and look for someone new.
Determining if a therapist is a professional is not too difficult; counseling certificates are controlled by the government. A person cannot call themselves a professional counselor without holding valid certificates. That is not the case with coaches, however, so do your homework. Make sure any coach you hire is certified or, even better, has degrees in coaching. The best scenario will be a coach who has both.
Finding a good coach is a bit less expensive than finding a good therapist. Most professional coaches offer a free first session. This is a benefit to both of you. You don’t have to shell out a lot of money before determining if they can help you, and it gives both of you a chance to see if your personalities mesh.
The word “goals” almost makes your chest tighten and stress levels rise.
The knowledge of so many past goals that have failed may even lower your self-confidence.
So stop making goals.
Create a vision for your future instead. What do you want to be able to say/do/feel about yourself that you cannot say/do/feel now? Get as specific as you can. Don’t just say “I want to lose weight,” nobody likes to lose anyway. Turn it to a positive, like “I want to be able to fit into size ** jeans,” or “I want to eat 2 healthy meals a day and work out 3 days a week.” Don’t make your vision out of reach. After you have your vision down, create action steps. What is one small thing you can change now to get one step closer to your vision? Is it changing one junk food snack into something healthier? Is it planning a 10 minute workout once a week? Start small. All the past failures may have eroded your confidence. Small successes will help to build it back up. And if it doesn’t work, don’t consider it a failure. Figure out what went wrong, what you can do to overcome that, and try again. As long as you keep trying, you are not failing.
I would say that whether local or virtual business coaching is better is completely dependent on the person. I offer both, and most of my clients take advantage of virtual coaching because they are in different parts of the country or in different countries.
There are many fantastic online business coaches. My recommendation would be to take advantage of the free first session (for those coaches that offer it) to make sure the two of you can work together.
Certifications are important. The International Coach Federation is the gold standard of coaching today, but many colleges are now offering degrees in coaching as well. I would recommend taking the college path because you learn a lot more than just coaching, and many colleges offer certification as part of the degree.
The number 1 thing to look for in a business coach is compatibility. Hopefully the coach you are considering has a free initial session so you can make sure that person is good fit with your personality. An amazing coach may not be the right one for you if your personalities clash.
It is a fact that people who live near nature are happier, except those that are not. It comes down to whether you are an introvert or extrovert. Introverts are more comfortable in quiet surroundings and prefer to be closer to nature. If you are an introvert and live in an apartment in the city, it is a good idea to plan getaways to quieter surroundings on a regular basis. It doesn’t have to be a week-long vacation. A day trip to a park might be the ticket.
And, on the opposite side, if you are an extrovert that lives in the wilderness, a different kind of getaway is prescribed. Find out where the party is, and find a way to get to it. Any social gathering will do, as long as there are a lot of people and the conversation is flowing.
We are all tempted to say things in the heat of the moment that we know we should not say.
Our feelings are hurt, and we want the other person to know how hurt we are. But lashing out at the other person will only make the situation worse. It will quickly change a heated discussion into an argument, and nobody wins an argument.
There is one trick that can diffuse an argument before it even starts. It’s the “I hear…” defense. When someone gets angry and lashes out, respond with something like “I hear that you are upset.” They may agree and lash out again. A great response could be “you seem very upset by that.” What you are doing is acknowledging their anger without feeding it. In fact, this defense usually calms the other person down because they have no more fuel for their fire. Then, once they are calm, you can start to present your side of the case. This defense will take time to master, but will make you a great negotiator whether it is in your marriage, a business deal, or with relatives over the holiday table.
I had the privilege of being interviewed on the Seattle Shrimp Tank recently. This video gives an overview of the show. Click here to listen to the entire podcast. -Dr. Ty
What’s stopping you from making 2017 the most successful year you have ever had?
What is stopping you from making this year the most successful year you have ever had? I’m not just talking about money, I’m talking about the way you feel, the way that you look at yourself.
So what’s stopping you? Do you need to create a new vision? Perhaps you need to figure out a new mission statement. Maybe you would like solidify your core values, or even define exactly why you are doing what you are doing. Why is the core of everything you do. If you don’t know why, keeping passion and commitment becomes much more difficult during the day-to-day grind.
But what if it’s something else? Have you heard about visions and missions and strategies many times before, but you still have never actually done one? Is there something inside that is stopping you from being more successful than you are? Is there a fear? Possibly a fear of failure, or even a fear of success? Both of those are very real concerns. If that is the case, please contact me. I would be happy to talk to you more about it.
What is planning for success? What does your bright future look like? Why does it look like that? What needs to happen to make it a reality? And When will it happen? That is exactly what these Success Planning Webishops are about; they are about planning for your success, whether your success is determined by having more money, being happier, having more free time; whether your success is business, personal, family, team, organization, that doesn’t matter. This series of Success Planning Webishops can work with any of that.
Here are the five Success Planning Webishops:
What is your Sizzle? Why do you do what you do? What are you passionate about? What gets your brain going? What gets you up in the morning? If you don’t know exactly what that is, it’s very important to figure it out.
What do you believe? What are your core values? Are they written down? Do you use them when making tough decisions?
What does your amazing tomorrow look like? What is your vision for the future? Is it strategic and compelling?
What do you do? What is your mission? Is the old style of mission statement right for you, or do you want to try a Twenty-First century variation?
How are you going to get there? What is your strategy? Is it mapped out? Are you looking for obstacles before you hit them?
Each Webishop will not be available on YouTube for up to 90 days after they are available on Webishops.com. Be among the first to implement the new ideas you will get from them.
But if what I said in the beginning caught your attention, if you really are wondering if there is something internal stopping you, and you are not sure what it is, and you need to break through it, you need to get unstuck, contact me. I am doing these Webishops because I am a professional, certified business and life coach. I am giving you the tools you need to accomplish each subject, but I am here if you need more help. Together, we will schedule a free, no cost and no obligation, strategy session so we can see if we are a good fit.
Do you like gifts? Do you feel the same as you did when you were a kid? Do you look at the wrapper with anticipation, knowing that, whatever might be underneath it, even the mystery produces anticipation?
Or has time dulled the excitement? Is a gift just another item that you probably don’t want or need? Are you already trying to figure out how long you have to display it before you can get rid of it, even before you have unwrapped it?
I know you are probably imagining the upcoming Christmas season (October is only days away, and some stores already have Christmas items up), but not all gifts come only during holidays.
The future is a gift. It is covered, there is no way to know what it holds, and it is waiting to be unwrapped. How do you look at the future? Is it like a kid, with excitement and anticipation? Or does a sense of dread surround it?
However you currently look at the future, it is wrapped up. There is a ribbon around it, and a bow on top. But how does your future look? Is it dull, like looking at it in twilight? Or is it bright and shiny, like looking at it on a summer’s day? How does it feel? Is it wrinkled like it was carelessly wrapped? Or is it smooth to the touch? Is the ribbon a bright color? What is written on the wrapping? Are there words of promise and wonder, giving you a sense of excitement at what it holds?
The future is a picture in your mind of what might happen. The past is set in stone, it cannot change. The future whatever you want to make of it. The present is the time to start making those changes so your future can be unwrapped in new, bright, amazing ways.
In the past, it was thought that life coaching was only for business executives. But today you can find parenting coaching, relationship coaching, and many other subsets of life coaching all over the place.
But what are the benefits of life coaching?
A Life Coach offers guidance toward better fulfillment in life. They can be a catalyst for change. Change that can bring about higher self esteem, greater confidence, empowerment and fresh ways of thinking. A life coach can help you to focus on what you want out of life and what you want to achieve.
Time wіth a lіfе соасh is a safe place to talk about реrѕоnаl and private hopes and fears, and hоw often do wе gеt a сhаnсе fоr that іn this day аnd аgе?
A life coach is a person who will dеvоtе their tіmе to lіѕtеn tо уоur соnсеrnѕ аnd troubles, and ask probing questions to help you overcome them.
Finding the right life coach may not be easy. Look for a life coach that has certificates with a well known organization (a degree in life coaching may be even better, but people with life coaching degrees are rare)…