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Grow & Scale A Business That Will Set You Free
Are You Naughty Or Nice
Make your list; and check it twice.
Decide what’s naughty… and what’s nice.
I’m not talking about your Christmas list or your holiday card list or your To-Do list.
No, I’m talking about your most important list of all: your Stop Doing List.
We get caught up in the myriad tasks we have; we lose ourselves in the vortex. We forget that, as Mark Devine, author of The Way of the Seal, says, there are really only a few “high value” targets.
Think Pareto. Old Vilfredo was an economist. He was also a gardener. One day, Pareto looked out at his peas and made a stunning discovery: 20% of his peapods had 80% of the peas. Well Pareto, being the intellectual that he was, decided to explore whether this ratio could be found in areas other than his garden. And lo, the Pareto Principle, also know as the 80/20 rule, was born.
Here’s what’s true: 20% of your clients lead to 80% of your profits; 20% of your products are responsible for 80% of your revenues; 20% of your team is responsible for 80% of sales; 20% of your efforts yield 80% of your outcomes. (And, oh, by the way: 20% of your customers cause 80% of your headaches!)
So why not focus on that significant 20%… and chuck the rest?
Think back over the last year. There are certain efforts that didn’t yield any measurable results. Stop doing them. There were certain networking functions that didn’t yield any real viable leads. Stop going to them. There were certain customers that were way too high maintenance (or dangerous) to work with. Stop working with them.
Now think back through this holiday season: There were certain gatherings you went to that left you wondering why you ever went. Don’t go back next year. There were certain functions that left you feeling drained and down. Don’t do them again. There were certain toxic, soul-sucking people that were just unpleasant to be around. Stay away from them!
Just because you’ve done something before doesn’t mean that you should keep on doing it.
Stop running around giving everything the same level of import.
Focus on what matters most. Focus on what’s high value.
Apply Pareto. Ruthlessly.
Make your Stop Doing List. Today.
Turn Again
Because I know that time is always time
And place is always and only place
And what is actual is actual only for one time
And only for one place
I rejoice that things are as they are and
I renounce the blessed face
And renounce the voice
Because I cannot hope to turn again
Consequently I rejoice, having to construct something
Upon which to rejoice.
It’s dark. Really dark. And cold.
The sun, even when it comes up, skitters across the southern horizon. And then disappears.
Yet, next week, on December 21st, we celebrate the light.
It is the turning point.
From the very earliest of times, before tribe or tradition, we have confronted the darkness with trepidation – the darkness of the night, the darkness of our souls – and railed against it. Through liturgy and ritual and celebration, we connected with the ancient rhythms of the earth to welcome light – and hope – back into the world.
For a fraction of a moment next week, the earth will stop – and shift on its axis – and turn again toward the sun.
It is the turning point.
In the busyness of your frantic, constantly connected and over-stimulated lives, you can miss this moment. It is easy to forget why you run around and string lights and light candles and wrap presents and gather together – and in the process end up empty and depleted and sad.
It is easy to forget why we celebrate.
We celebrate the light. We celebrate in the deep knowing that the light always returns. We celebrate that the light always triumphs over the darkness.
Take a moment to stop this week. Reconnect with the ground – and with the Ground of All Being. Feel the earth turn back to the sun, back to the light.
It is the turning point.
Then decide.
What will you turn toward in the days and months ahead? What light will you discover in your life? What light will you shine in the lives of others?
Be that light.
And celebrate.
It is the turning point.
In The Vortex
It’s December, and you’re being pulled into the vortex of time. The maelstrom is all around you! Can you feel it?
After Halloween, the year just seems to accelerate. After Thanksgiving, the days move forward at warp speed. The commitments and the demands and the lists and the expectations and the projects that need to be done – have to get done – before the end of the year seem to mount logarithmically. And then there are the card lists and the gift lists and the shopping and the school concerts and the holiday parties… .
In many professions, there are the added pressures of pulling in the receivables and closing the deals by year’s end.
What to do?
Wrong question.
The question is what not to do.
The way out of the vortex – the only way – is the simplest and the hardest thing of all. The only way out is to say “no.”
Saying “no” is not news and it’s not rocket science. All of the leadership and success books will tell you that it is fundamental to your sanity and, paradoxically, a key to your productivity and goal achievement.
Success Magazine suggests that, “People could improve their mental and physical health as well as their relationships by carving out a portion of their day to do nothing.”
Jack Canfield in his book The Success Principals recommends creating a “stop-doing”or “don’t do” list. (My favorite list!)
I invited a colleague to a program I was hosting. Her response: “Thank you. But I ‘don’t do’ evening commitments.” (Those are pretty clear boundaries, I thought!)
But, why is saying “no” so hard?
Well, most of us are conditioned from very early on that “no” is not the “right” answer. As time goes on, you also begin to layer on your own assumptions – whether true or not – about what others expect of you.
Sometimes, I suspect, saying “yes” is just a habit. (I said yes to a commitment recently without even stopping to realize I would be out of the country during the time I’d committed!)
And yes, isn’t there is a healthy dose of narcissistic self-importance that loves to believe that somehow your presence is essential or that you are the only one who can do something?
So as the vortex swirls, I’m working on saying “no” more often.
I’ve started by asking myself whether a project or an invitation is one that I “should” do or accept rather than one I “want” to do or accept. I’m working at eliminating the “shoulds.”
(Note to self: Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.)
Saying no to the non-essential allows you to be more fully present to what is most important. By doing less, you can pay closer attention to what is essential. And as The Little Prince reminds us, “what is essential is invisible to the eye.” It takes time to see.
The Carmelite monk William McNamara writes, “We are not really practical, and we shall get nowhere, we shall never find life, life will escape us, unless we learn not to always be bustling about – unless we learn to be still, to let things happen around us, to wait, listen, receive, contemplate.”
“One final word on the subject of time,” McNamara says:
“I suggest that we stop doing half the work that presently consumes us. Then let us attend to the remaining half wholeheartedly, with contemplative vision and creative love. I stake the authenticity of our lives and the effectiveness of our work on this radical shift.”
I described the vortex to a colleague as a giant flushing toilet bowl.
Not a great place to end up.
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Go HERE for 7 simple practices that will make life a whole lot saner.
My Inheritance Of Waste
My life has been filled with terrible misfortune; most of which never happened.
Michel de Montaigne
I come from a long line of worriers.
My grandfather was a worrier. He would wring his hands for days before he’d travel about what the weather might be on the day he was set to start out. And when he’d arrive, he would become obsessed about what the weather might be for his return.
My father was a worrier. He worried about the weather too. And the stock market and his business and his health and his children and their children and whether he should retire or not retire and what may or may not happen in the next hour or on the next day or the next week or the next year. And did I mention that he worried about the weather?
I’m a worrier too. And I can be even more resourceful than my father.
“Worry saps energy, warps thinking and kills ambition,” said Dale Carnege in his classic How To Stop Worrying and Start Living.
Worry is a waste.
Worry is the bastard child of Fear.
FEAR: False Evidence Appearing Real.
Fear resides deep in the ancient part of our brain, the amygdala. It served us once. When we hunted on the plains and needed to avoid the predators: the mastodons and the woolly mammoths.
But as I drove to the coffee shop this morning, I noticed a curious thing: the landscape appeared devoid of wild beasts.
Today, fear is the predator.
Fear limits. Fear paralyzes. Fear diminishes. Fear robs you of opportunity.
With fear, you fail to live life fully.
There’s a really good book on fear: Feel The Fear …And Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers. Jeffers says, “We can’t escape fear. We can only transform it into a companion that accompanies us on all of our exciting adventures; it is not an anchor holding us transfixed in one spot.”
But how do you transform it? By holding it and moving through it. By feeling it – deeply – and doing what makes you afraid – anyway.
It sounds overly simplistic. But it really is supported by the “evidence.”
Mark Twain said, “I’ve seen many troubles in my time, only half of which ever came true.”
Jeffers says: “It is reported that more than 90% of what we worry about never happens. That means our negative worries have less than a 10% chance of being correct. If this is so, isn’t being positive more realistic than being negative? Think about your own life. I’ll wager that most of what you worry about never happens. So are you being realistic when you worry all the time? No!”
Fear never goes away. As long as you grow, fear goes with you. Those of you who journey out on the edge recognize fear as a pretty steady companion. But the paradox is, that in moving through your fear, you do grow.
And here was the big revelation for me: everyone is afraid. You’re not alone. No matter how successful someone is, no matter how confident someone appears, fear looms in the dark recesses, in the unknown, the untried, the unexplored.
Whenever you risk – whether in business, in relationship, or at play – you invite fear.
But as Jeffers says, “Pushing through the fear is less frightening than living with the underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness.” If we don’t confront our fear – and move through it – we stay stuck. And fear full.
“Courage,” Mark Twain said, “is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” He also said, “Do the thing you fear most and the death of fear is certain.”
Ultimately, the conquest of fear is about trust: trust in yourself. “All you have to do to diminish your fear is to develop more trust in your ability to handle whatever comes your way,” says Jeffers.
Trust. Trust that you can handle it.
Whatever comes your way. You can handle it.
(I wonder what tomorrow’s weather will bring?)
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Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday. Is time passing way too quickly? Are you ready to create that exciting next chapter? Let’s connect. Email me: walt@summit-succcess.com
And stop by for a visit at: https://summit-success.com/
How To Be Unhappy
If you want to be unhappy, it’s easy.
Focus on all the bad shit.
Gianni Infantino is unhappy. Really unhappy.
Infantino is the president of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association. He’s hosting the Qatar World Cup.
He’s unhappy about 3000 years of European oppression, the rapacity of capitalism, and the rapid enfranchisement of women in various cantons of Switzerland, just to name a few things on his list.
(And, yes, there are other people unhappy about the lack of beer.)
A lot of shit to be unhappy about for sure.
But jeeeeez. So many good things: extraordinary athletes from all around the world united by their passion for the game. Thirty-two nations together. Competition, celebration, dance. And for millions of spectators, joy.
This brings me to Thanksgiving.
A holiday in the U.S.
There are lots of people who are unhappy about it.
Some are unhappy about the holiday itself: the travel, the inconvenience, the social pressures.
(Oh, and the overeating and over-drinking. You see, there’s definitely no lack of beer.)
Others are unhappy about the holiday’s etiology: colonialism, oppression, genocide.
This camp sees Thanksgiving as a commemoration of conquest and subjugation, as Pamela Paul of the New York Times suggests.
But jeeeeez. There is so much goodness about Thanksgiving: a holiday unencumbered by gift-giving, the gathering together of families, and celebrations of joy around a festive table (many, for the first time in long pandemic years).
I do not diminish Infantino’s concerns or Paul’s truths.
But it’s easy to see bad.
Everywhere you look.
And good too.
A Ukraine refugee who gets to watch the World Cup from a shelter in a foreign land, and experiences a moment of hope.
A homeless family in Philadelphia that gets to enjoy a warm Thanksgiving, and sees the kindness of strangers.
This isn’t popular to say: But the world isn’t binary; it isn’t divided into good and bad.
Anne Frank, hiding from the Nazis, wrote, “In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.”
You can focus on the bad.
Or you can focus on the good.
What you focus on you’ll surely see.
Happy Thanksgiving.
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