Developing Discipline and Overcoming Obstacles

[Diane Kennedy]

I just stumbled on this thread. Bottomline on motivation - we all have different things that motivate us. I've had different strategies at different times in my life.

In the beginning of my career, it was like a game to me. I saw clients who weren't as smart as me making a lot more money than me. Talk about a kick in the ego....or kick somewhere. So, I watched them and learned from them. And just did what they did. My lesson from that: You don't need a brilliant idea to be successful, you just need to be able to bring it to market.

These days I still learn from my clients, but I don't have the same need for challenge. I've gone through some business turmoil this year and a few times I've wondered whether it was time to just go completely to passive income. We could have a very comfortable (even better than that, actually) life, but it still wouldn't be as much income as I get when I'm working actively in part of the business.

So, last month, I went down to Juarez (across the border from El Paso, TX) and visited an orphanage that I hadn't seen in 3 years. I think I posted about it somewhere else already, but it was sobering to see the conditions these young girls lived in. They have a new building under construction, but didn't have the resources to complete it once the building shell was done. I challenge anyone to spend a day with 34 girls crammed in a place so small that they have to take turns getting out of bed because they all can't be up at the same time. And, they're located in such a dangerous part of the city that they can't ever go outside. It's worse than jail.

It's through my business that I get the connections that can make a change quickly. In fact, I actually went a little over board. We ended up getting two project double funded. (Two charities agreed to pay for a sub-station, but one moved the funds over to employing a teacher for a year. And we got a grant plus a private donation, both agreeing to fully fund the completion of the interior of the building. Not sure where that extra money will go yet, but it will be put to good use. )

The other motivation for me is our son David. We adopted him just after he turned 14 and he's had plenty of role models on what doesn't work. My husband and I work very hard to set examples on how to live a life of full accountability (not being a victim),abundance (it's not "I can't afford it" "It's how can I afford it...") and outside the box thinking (it's not "Can I? " it's "How can I?") It's pushing us to be much more effective as well!

My biggest challenge is focus. The problem isn't lack of opportunities, it's drowning in opportunities. My husband is working very closely with me in my business again (thank god that the fix and flip market is done - he went into that because it was so easy to make quick money! But my business really suffered without his presence to stay single minded. ) and we go through opportunities every couple of days. He helps me focus back on what we need to do to create the most optimum return.

On overcoming obstacles - well, my family is a family of survivors. My husband was in a car crash that almost killed him and did kill his first wife. My son has been through 13 years of h*** in 6 orphanages in Mexico. My former husband committed suicide. I don't know that everyone else can do this, but when things are bad, we ask each other, "Is this the hardest thing you've been through?" And the answer is always "no." Dust yourself off and get back on that horse.

I can't remember who to attribute this to, but one of my favorite quote is "It'll all work out in the end, and if it hasn't worked out yet, it means it is not the end."

Cat & Kim, you both have found ways that motivate you. Hey, I don't care if it means you wear a Hermes scarf to get you through the day - whatever works, awesome. I am a bit of a hybrid between outside motivation and inner motivation. I don't use someone else for accountability, but I do use other people as the "reason" why I need to self-motivate.

Hats off to all of you who keep plugging away - focus on what's important, don't let anything stop you and be open to change your approach, but never your ultimate goal, or who you are at the core.

 

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[kimberland]

Simmer down Kim and Cat. :chatter:

Okay, okay, I apologize for the previous post.
I could have made my point a bit more delicately.
I was acting from emotion
which is never good for business.
Costs me money every time I do that.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Sorry I'm a little late to this thread ...

Every evening I create a "To Do" list organized into two parts ... daily and weekly. Daily describes stuff that needs to be done that day, while weekly that week. The weekly list eventually makes it into the daily list.

Goals written down do help you to focus on the priorities at hand - That has nothing to do with making yourself accountable to another person in order to give you the impetus needed to complete a task and reach a goal. Lets ask SteveO - MJ - Rus - Diane and some of the other Successes that post here and see how many of them had to use accountability in order to acheive. I'll bet not many!

My accountability came from being accountable to myself ... rent was due. The car didn't have a transmission. I couldn't afford normal meals outside of 1-dime Ramen Pride. This was my motive to achieve.

As for having other's make you accountable, I guess that strategy would depend on the individual. Everyone is motivated differently. Personally, outside accountability is a secondary factor in my personal motivation.

I've been asked many times how the progress on my book is going -- I have accountability there as people are expecting a completed book from me soon. Not sure if that outside accountability makes me get any closer to finishing.

When I owned my company I remember making feature announcements before they were completed -- this was done to make me accountable to getting it done ... so yes, I have done this before to add some fuel to "to-do-list" fire.

 

[AroundTheWorld]

I think that you can do it on your own - Why not try it? Cat

I was thinking about this.

We are all accountable to others whether we say it out loud or not. Your actions, choices, values do affect those around you. They affect your family, your employer, your employees, you friends, neighbors, coworkers, congregations. They effect the earth and environment and those that will come along behind us.

We all live interdependent lives and we are all accountable to others.

Why not say it out loud?

 

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[JesseO]

There is more than one way to skin a CAT...

Skinned cat has something to say about that....


View attachment 309

 

[Allthingznew]

I was thinking about this.

We are all accountable to others whether we say it out loud or not. Your actions, choices, values do affect those around you. They affect your family, your employer, your employees, you friends, neighbors, coworkers, congregations. They effect the earth and environment and those that will come along behind us.

We all live interdependent lives and we are all accountable to others.

Why not say it out loud?

Interesting.

I have to ponder this myself.

 

[Yankees338]

I was thinking about this.

We are all accountable to others whether we say it out loud or not. Your actions, choices, values do affect those around you. They affect your family, your employer, your employees, you friends, neighbors, coworkers, congregations. They effect the earth and environment and those that will come along behind us.

We all live interdependent lives and we are all accountable to others.

Why not say it out loud?

I agree with this, particularly being accountable to your family.

Once you have a family to support, many people change their mindset drastically to do what's best for them. Often, this results in a more conservative way of thinking as they feel they now have too much to lose.

And I can't say I blame them. If you had just quit your job which was the only steady source of income for your spouse and kids to focus on a business, wouldn't you be a little more motivated to do the best you can when working on your business?

 

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[fanocks2003]

I am more internally motivated than externally motivated. When I encounter an obstacle I always break the problem down into pieces. Then I take one piece at a time and complete it. Either by myself or by delegating it.

I can honestly say this: If I don't want to do something, then no external motivation will help me having it done. I decide what motivates me, always.

Though there is one unique thing about me that is totally externally motivating. That "thing" is if I give a promise to someone about doing something. Then I will be very motivated to keep that promise to the end. No matter what. In the beginning I promised a lot and hence I needed to keep a lot of promises (bad for your health). These days I try to promise as little as possible so as to evade to much work. Because promises is like financial debts, they will be collected someday and you better pay the collector/s.

 

[writing4freedom]

Discipline, to me is FOCUS, and DETERMINATION. I get hungry. We are all motivated by different aspects. Its important for us all to analyze and determine, our motivation. A pschycologist will tell you motivation, is meeting a need within you mind. Well...WHat are needs, and what are desires. Not so similar to each other. One may disire a Ferrarri, but only need a chevy, so he goes for the chevy. Maslows hiarchy onf needs describes this process.

1. Food and shelter, transportation, job Then freinds, then girlfriend....so on and so on

We need to develope the mindset that, being wealthy is possible, and and a NEED, not a dream

• do this by determining your desires, and motivations, nomatter how shallow they may be or righteouse they may be.
• one person may be driven by a vacation home in Belize, so to get motivatied he may keep a picture beside his desk or in his wallet, and daydream about living there
• another may dream abut pure success to prove his manhood, because his parents were poor, and he never wanted to be like them.
• another may want to party and live like a rockstar
• another may want to provide harvard educations for his children, and then grandchildren

You see to be honest with ourselfs, is key. One person quoted "I find the harder I work, the more luck I have!" What drives you, what pushes you to bite your teeth and keep trecken, what makes you pursue the wildest dreams, and say no to normalcy!? '


Lets be real but, what would you do if you thought you could never fail???
that perspective is motivation.

I feel dicsipline comes with motivation, they fuel each other, you cannot have one with out the other, they go hand in hand. Try it and see, I stare at vacation homes, and Ferrarris, and look at Biographys and success storys to drive me, and I dwell on the fact that there are people out there, living dreams, and that Im not one of them!
I Get PISSED and MAD, because Im not one of them, and then I stare this world in the face and say "YOUR MINE!!" thats my motivation, whats yours???

 

[Cat Man Du]

How do you keep & stay motivated? The underlines are my editing.

Your Belief Becomes Your Reality
by Brian Tracy

"Money never starts an idea; it's the idea that starts the money." -Mark Victor Hansen
One of the most powerful personal programming activities you can engage in is positive self-talk. Be your own cheerleader and talk to yourself positively all of the time.

The Determinant of Your Success
Perhaps the most powerful single factor in your financial success is your beliefs about yourself and money. We call this the Law of Belief. It says simply this: Whatever you believe, with feeling, becomes your reality. Whatever you intensely believe becomes your reality. That we have a tendency to block out any information coming in to us that is inconsistent with our reality.

What Successful People Believe
What we've discovered is that successful people absolutely believe that they have the ability to succeed. And they will not entertain, think about, or talk about the possibilities that they'll fail. They do not even consider the possibility of failure.
Positive Thinking Versus Positive Knowing
You always act in a matter consistent with your beliefs. The most important belief system you can build is a prosperity consciousness where you absolutely believe that you are going achieve your financial goals. We call this positive knowing versus positive thinking. Positive thinking can sometimes be wishing or hoping. But positive knowing is when you absolutely know that no matter what, you will be successful.

The Foundation of Willpower
Another principle related to your beliefs is willpower. We know that willpower is essential to any success. Willpower is based on confidence. It's based on conviction. It's based on faith. It's based on your belief in your ability to triumph over all obstacles. And you can develop willpower by persistence, by working on your goals, by reading the biographies of successful people, by listening to audio programs, by reading books about people who've achieved success. The more information you take into your mind consistent with success, the more likely it is that you will develop the willpower to push you through the obstacles and difficulties you will experience.

Beat the Odds on Success
Remember that success is rare. Only one person in one hundred becomes wealthy in the course of a lifetime. Only five percent achieve financial independence. That means that the odds against you are 19-to-1. The only way that you're going to achieve your financial goals is if you get really serious. To succeed, you must get serious. You must get busy. You must get active. You must get going. Remember, everything counts.
Resolve to Achieve Greatly

Self-mastery, self-control, and self-discipline are essential for anyone who wants to achieve greatly. And control over your thoughts is the hardest exercise in self-mastery that you will ever engage in. See if you can talk and think about only what you desire and not talk or think about anything that you don't want for 24 hours. Then you'll see what you're really made of. It's a hard thing to do but with practice, you can reach the point where you are thinking about your goals and desires most of the time. Then, your whole life will change for the better.

Action Exercises
Here are two things you can do to build a belief system consistent with the financial success you desire:
First, continually repeat to yourself the words, pictures and thoughts consistent with your dreams and goals. Whatever you repeat often enough, over and over, becomes a new belief.
Second, set a goal for yourself to think and talk only about the things that you want for the next 24 hours. This will be one of the hardest things you ever do. But if you can keep your mind on what you want and off of what you don't want for 24 hours, you can begin to change your entire future.

 

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[Moneymaka]

If you ever had that feeling of being obsessed with success and wealth, you'll realize there is no need for writing down your goals or planning your day.

Same thing if you love your work. You don't need to plan, you'll just do it because you have fun.

 

[PaulRobert]

What kinds of practical things have you done to become successfully productive?

Does it make a difference to plan your day or not? Have you struggled with planning your day and then when it came to follow through other things found a way to “become more or just as important” than what you planned?

How have you achieved the ability to remain focused and not go down rabbit trails looking at “good” ideas? How did you overcome fear, for example, the fear of calling prospects etc.?

How did you make the things you needed to do “bite sized”?



If you have had success in becoming more disciplined and/or overcoming obstacles, please share your experience.

Practical things that I have done to become successfully productive are-

1. Like many people on this thread- Create a weekly to-do list.
2. Living by this motto- "What you have to do tomorrow, do today, and what you have to eat today, eat tomorrow."

It makes a total difference to plan your day/week. When creating a to-do list you are working on your organization skills, which is very important in life.

Over this past year, I have followed many rabbit trails in search of ideas, many times these were just forced ideas that did not make any sense or where already on the market. I learned that you cannot force an idea to work for you. You must be patient and observant of your surroundings and find the problem that people reveal in conversations or actions. I also learned to Keep It Simple Stupid.

I overcame fear by remembering a few threads from here stating "What's the worst that can happen? Someone just says No."

I made things that I needed to do more bite sized by taking it one day at a time. I found myself many times worrying about future things that did not relate to the present yet.

I have overcome some obstacles in my life that maybe worth sharing. I learned that the less you think about fear, the better your work is.

I also learned that if you want something in life, you must do something or it will always stay a dream or thought. As I am taking action I see my dreams becoming realer everyday.

 

[Cat Man Du]

Try these on for size !!

Asking is the beginning of receiving. Make sure you don't go to the ocean with a teaspoon. At least take a bucket so the kids won't laugh at you." —Jim Rohn

"Resolve says, 'I will.' The man says, 'I will climb this mountain. They told me it is too high, too far, too steep, too rocky and too difficult. But it's my mountain. I will climb it. you will soon see me waving from the top or dead on the side from trying.'" —Jim Rohn

Disgust and resolve are two of the great emotions that lead to change." —Jim Rohn

 

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[wonderfulabi]

Hi, my name is Abi and this is my first post. I really like this thread about discipline. For me discipline is a key attribute to achieving your goals and often the strength of the discipline comes down to the strength of the reasons behind a goal - in other words, the more a goal is a "must", the more likely you are to stay disciplined. However, every now and again I believe we will all have our "down days" or "down moments"... it's like a plane that is off course 90% of the time but it keeps making little corrections to get back on course.

If ever I'm feeling like there is a big obstacle that I need to overcome, I'll often take a break from work and revisit my goals. Then I'll write down the issue on paper - I've found thinking on paper and getting stuff out of my bed removes the emotional attachment to the issue and I start thinking clearly. Often as I write, I'm able to come up with a solution and then get back on track to what I want to achieve. I hope that helps.

thanks, Abi

 

[emorgan]

There is a saying, what doesn't get measured doesn't get done. Sure resolve should in theory be enough. However, if accountability can help reach goals, perhaps even faster, why not utilize it?

I'm easily distracted, so I am all about being held accountable

 

[Cat Man Du]

There is a saying, what doesn't get measured doesn't get done. Sure resolve should in theory be enough. However, if accountability can help reach goals, perhaps even faster, why not utilize it?

I'm easily distracted, so I am all about being held accountable

Glad you're back....emorgan.

Well, of course, I’m going to disagree with the above. In reviewing this thread ( almost 2 years old ) I see that I was prolly too soft in my assessment of accountability.

First let’s state ..... WHAT we’re NOT talking about and that is accountability to your spouse, friends, pets ( yes, I’m accountable to my cat ) etc.
***************************************************************************************************

The accountability we’re discussing is: Making yourself accountable to a person/group/company in order to MAKE you do something!!! i.e. gurus...etc.

Once you do the above you are set for FAILURE......FAILURE....FAILURE !!!

WHY you ask ???

Because you are looking ....to the outside for something to affect .....YOUR inside.

Rather than looking for someone to be placed under .....please sur...please sur... ( accent mine ) can I be accountable to you?

Why not look into yourself to see WHAT would light your SECRET FIRE within.


WHAT THINK ??

 

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[emorgan]

Thanks! I've been distracted for two years...

There's also a principle that says that what gets measured and reported on increases exponentially. There's a chemical released in your brain the moment you commit to someone or something... becomes that inner fire

Yeah, I can discipline myself to get up and run every morning. However, if I have a trainer weighing me every week, and I have to face that scale... you better bet I'm gonna be up running everyday!

That's just me :smxG:

 

[Russ H]

Great to see you back here, Erin.

Post an update in the intros, if you want to catch us up-- you know we have no shame around here.

Any lessons learned?

How are the kiddos?

You buy stock in Starbucks yet? Are you still contributing to their annual sales reports?

-Russ H.

 

[Cat Man Du]

Thanks! I've been distracted for two years...


Yeah, I can discipline myself to get up and run every morning. However, if I have a trainer weighing me every week, and I have to face that scale... you better bet I'm gonna be up running everyday!

That's just me :smxG:

Well...........funny that you should mention a trainer and that kind of accountability.

Several years ago.....I was a trainer. I had 2 classes of 15 to 20 girls. The 15 lbs. and the 25 lbs. and did everything possible to NOT have the girls accountable to me!

The first thing I would do when they first started was to hand them a 15 lb. weight ....to hold while I showed them the facilities. and explain the class ...after some time passed they would look to put it down...as it was becoming heavy to carry.

This is when I would sit them down and explain that just as their arm was tiring out so does their body tire from caring the extra 15 lbs. NOW this was done to make them accountable to themselves for the extra weight.

I would have them bring in a dress, pants...some article of clothing that was too small to wear at their present size, but they could wear after the 15 or 25 lbs loss. We would tag it and keep it in the gym...until they were ready to wear it. This was another way to make them accountable ...TO THEMSELVES! We used several other “tricks†to engender accountability.

You see I couldn’t be with them every minute ...for weigh- in’s or to watch their eating, etc. It was up to them.

Now you will say , but being in the class and having a trainer engendered accountability to me...the class. YES, but I tried to downplay that and keep it to a minimum. Funny story: we had an ice cream store a block away from the gym and sometimes when I would pass the store (which had a large window) and look in ...if any of my girls were in there...they would hide behind a menu or their purse........ feeling accountable.

PS. The 15 lb. class always did better than the 25 lb. class and you would have thought it would have been the other way around, but they had a goal that was within reach...even though the 25 lb could have done the same ...they were more out of control. :thankyousign:

 

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