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“An average person who develops the habit of setting clear priorities and getting important tasks completed quickly will run circles around a genius who talks a lot and makes wonderful plans, but gets very little done.”

Brian Tracy
Eat That Frog!

In his simple yet powerful book, Eat That Frog!, Brian Tracy shares the wisdom of unstoppable success with us. His formula is one you are familiar with:

1. Be a hundred percent clear about your goals—the things you care most deeply about accomplishing.
2. Write them down—only about three percent of adults have written goals and they accomplish five to ten times as much as their equally educated and talented peers who don’t bother to write their goals.
3. Set timelines—if you don’t they are still just ideas.
4. Make a plan with prioritized actions—this prevents indecision and wasting time later.
5. Take action—do something right now, today. Actions can be adjusted as you go along, but, if you don’t start, your plan is just a wish list.

We all know that the two biggest culprits contributing to procrastination are lack of clarity (the way forward is fuzzy and unclear) and lack of focus (we allow our attention and energy to jump from important things to low impact tension-reducing things we can check off our to-do list). Take ten minutes right now (right now!) and make your plan for the next month. If you did it, you are already feeling a greater sense of energy and confidence.

Now that you have your plan, the way to ensure that it happens is to identify the biggest, ugliest frog you have to eat today (calling your most important prospect, writing an article for your local business chronicle, analyzing your marketing efforts in terms of ROI), and doing it. If it can’t be done in one chunk of time, chunk it down and do the first “doable” chunk.

I have used this book/concept with many of my clients over the years and it has been life changing for some. The idea of eating the biggest, ugliest frog you have to eat today, first thing in the morning, continues to help master procrastinators everywhere. The rest of your day is now downhill and you have demonstrated to yourself that you are powerful and in charge.

Reflection Questions:

1. What is your habitual level of procrastination? (1-10)
2. What is the level of clarity of your goals? (1-10)
3. What is the resistance you have to writing your goals and how might you overcome it?
4. What is your biggest, ugliest frog? Will you eat it today?

The Book: Eat That Frog!

I had the pleasure of attending a lovely netweaving event at a cool place called Roam Atlanta (www.roamatlanta.com) last Tuesday night. In case you don’t know, netweaving is a concept developed by Bob Littell that means approaching any networking opportunity with the frame of mind that you will “be a ‘connector’ OF others, as well as a no-strings-attached ‘resource-provider’ FOR others, and doing both simply because you genuinely believe that, what goes around, does come back around.” It’s a ‘pay it forward’ approach. Check out Bob at www.netweaving.com.
We each had thirty seconds to introduce ourselves to the entire group of fifty people and promote our unique product or service. Then we broke into table groups of six to discuss a book summary for thirty minutes, took a break and had round two with a different table group. It was very evident that, while people were interested in the subject of the book, successful branding, they were more interested in learning about each other and how they might offer support, connections, and resources. Each person’s dream was shared and nurtured by ten people that they had never met before.
Between rounds I happened to go to the ladies room and see this message on the wall. In case you can’t read the

It'll cost nothing to dream...

words, it says, “It’ll cost nothing to dream & everything not to”. I was struck by how everyone I had just met had the courage, energy, drive, and tenacity to go to a meeting where they may not have known another soul and dare to share their dream out loud. And, of course, they had to dare to dream in the first place.
Here are my reflection questions for you:
1. What is your dream? (Have you dared to dream one?)
2. When is the last time you shared it out loud publicly?
3. What would it cost you to do that?
4. What will it cost you not too?

Did you know that a good belly laugh dumps enough endorphins into your system to enable you to have greater clarity of thought, raise your immune response, and increase your creativity tenfold?  Norman Cousins’ wonderful book, The Healing Force: How laughter, love and positive thinking can save your life, poignantly describes his successful battle against cancer and the major role that laughter played.  In the book he shares his strategy to deliberately bring laughter into his day—every day.  Laughter truly is the elixir of life and my guess is that none of us really get enough.  C’mon—how many belly laughs have you had today? This week? This month?

“Before” Questions:

1. What is your current mood?

2. To what degree is stress affecting you right now?

3. What is the level of clarity of your thinking? (1-10)

4. What is your level of creativity right now? (1-10)

Now, watch this hilarious video of new exercise workout (click on the little screen in the lower right hand corner for a full screen view).  I hope it makes you laugh yourself silly. If this is not your kind of humor, find something else that makes you belly laugh and then answer the following questions.

“After” Questions:

1. What is your mood now?

2. To what degree is stress affecting you right now?

3. What is the level of clarity of your thinking now? (1-10)

4. What is your level of creativity right now? (1-10)

Final Questions:

1. What could you do to have more belly laughs every day?

2. Why do people say, “I laughed my ass off”?

Definition of worry: living in fear about a future that doesn’t exist yet.
Worry is the most energy-zapping, mind-numbing, time-wasting downward spiral we humans engage in. I specifically referred to us (homo sapiens) because we are the only species known to participate in this non-productive and many times debilitating activity. Can you imagine a cow worrying that the grass in the pasture might not grow back, or the cat worrying about whether she’ll get Fancy Feast tonight?
It seems that worrying has become our national pastime. We worry about everything: losing our financial security, getting sick, our kids not turning out okay, gas prices skyrocketing again… the list goes on and on. When we worry, we not only lose our creativity and resourcefulness, but we also actually diminish our resilience by dumping harmful chemicals like adrenaline (the fight or flee hormone) and cortisol into our bodies. Worry actually lowers our immune response, making us more susceptible to the illnesses we fear.
So what’s the antidote? It’s simple, but it isn’t easy. We can’t live in fear if we are truly experiencing gratitude. So grab a pen and paper and start writing down three things you’re grateful for every morning and every night. If you make this a practice for forty consecutive days, an amazing thing happens. You actually start looking for things to write about during your day, experiencing the calming presence of gratitude in your life. You begin to feel your resilience and resourcefulness returning. And you make choices and decisions that empower you, working within your sphere of influence to do the things that will make a difference in your life… the things you actually have control over. The things you can’t control occupy less space. You begin to feel optimism.
Take the forty-day Gratitude Challenge and see what happens. What do you have to lose?

Every blog I read, every radio broadcast I hear, every news program I see, and almost every personal or business conversation I have is focused on what is happening in our world right now. Every day brings a new, lower stock market average or a high number of layoffs. And the numbers seem to be the most alarming part. They seem so impersonal, black-and-white, and terrifying. How are any of us to make sense of all this? How are we to remain positive? If we are positive, will those around us think we are naïve or stupid?

And yet I look around me, and people are still falling in love and planning their futures (my daughter), still looking hopefully for that first great job opportunity as a college graduate (my son), and still dying unexpectedly of heart attacks (a dear friend’s 55-year-old brother). Life is going on in all its richness and glory. The sunset tonight was spectacular, and the jonquils are persistently pushing their way out of the cold ground. Spring will come, no matter what.

So what do we do? How do we feel? How do we act? How do we move forward? The only way I know is to stop, look, and listen. Not to the external messages from the world, but to the rich internal resources we all possess. Ask yourself the following questions:

1. What really matters in my life?
2. What do I care deeply about creating?
3. What resources do I need?
4. What is my most powerful next step?

Then take three deep breaths, focus, and move toward your heart’s desires. After all, tough times go away, and when they do, we are left with the sure knowledge that we have what it takes to survive them.

“Courage is being scared as hell and saddling up anyway.”
John Wayne