- This is a perfect time to look at the plans. The overall plan and the individual plans. How is it all working? Do you have a plan? Are the individual plans still connecting with the overall plan? If you don't have a plan, now is a perfect time to write one. How do you want things to be? How will that be executed? Many times when business is good and things are happening all around, the plan is lost in the shuffle. An example in sales is that when business is good, there is no time for follow up, prospecting, let alone database work because you're so busy closing deals. Maybe you had a good plan of action when you started and then it just faded away. Now would be a great time to take a good look at your plans and make some decisions about them. This is one of the best things about slower times because you can get refocused and reenergized by putting a good plan together or renewing your original plans. That is powerful change.
- Get focused on what you want instead of what you don't want. Call it the Law of Attraction, or whatever you like, but a huge portion of the population is constantly thinking of things they don't want and they are likely to keep getting them as a result. Start turning that around by thinking about what you want and how you want things to be. Make a conscious choice. If you're a news junkie as I was at one time, let it go for a while and see what happens. The reports are almost all negative as you already know. You know how it makes you feel, then you end up carrying that with you all day. There's that old adage about when a tree falls in the forest and no one is there, does it make a sound? They fall all the time but you didn't know it, so did you miss it? The same is true of the news. To become positive and have a positive outlook in good times or lesser good times, you need positive input. The news will not help you here. Focus on what you want. Keep that in your mind.
- Believe in yourself and/or your company. If you need to learn something new, just know that you can if you want to. There is no substitute for believing in yourself. Give yourself encouragement. Stop putting yourself down. You are valuable and special and unique. You have the capacity to do whatever you set your mind to do. Ever had a dream and then the dream faded away? Go back and get it. Hold on tightly. Dreams have great power when you hold them tight. They can transform your life. Don't listen to others, listen to your own heart; your own inner voice. Read a classic: The Magic of Believing by Claude Bristol. Read Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. You can also get these as audiobooks for you long commuters and those who don't read much. They will help to have you believing in yourself in no time at all.
- Surround yourself with uplifting people. When you start talking positive, you will be amazed that the negative people that used to hang around you no longer want to be around you. Misery loves company. When you're positive, you will attract more positive people. At the very least, you will not listen to that negative talk anymore. Positive loves company too, but not with the miserable. Just watch what happens when you get it going! It is magical. Get a team. When you are feeling like you need a positive friend to hear their uplifting voice, give them a call and say, "I just needed to hear your uplifting voice!" It is amazing how powerful a team like this can be. Surround yourself with uplifting people.
- Study success. A better way to say that is to study personal development. My mentor, Jim Rohn says, "work harder on yourself than you do on your job." He says that it is what you become that is the best part of a worthy goal. Get some mentors. They are all around you. I've never met Jim Rohn in person, and I have had the distinct privilege of having him as my personal mentor for 25 years. I've read his books, listened to his tapes many times and each time I am uplifted and encouraged and more than I was before. Here's a really great inexpensive way to have a number of mentors in one location and be able to see them on video, not just audio or in books. Sign up for TSTN, The Success Training Network. I just recently found it myself and for $29.95 a month you can watch a lot of mentors and get huge benefits. I have received a great deal from Anthony Robbins. I went to a weekend event with him and did the Firewalk Experience the first night. What an awesome experience that was! It was over the edge spectacular! The whole weekend was a total gift to me. I've also read his books and I cannot recommend enough his book, Awaken the Giant Within. I have given away many copies of this powerful book. Find some mentors; people who uplift you and support you and encourage you. If you can be with them in person, all the better, if not, there are lots of them available in the media.
- ACT. The only way to change anything is through action. Take action. Make things happen. If you've never done it before, great. That just means that you are going to grow and become more! Wayne Gretzky is quoted as saying "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take." Remember Yoda saying "Do or do not. There is no try." Be bold and act even when you don't really know what you're doing. If you wait around to learn it all, you will never act. I love this quote: "A good plan vigorously executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week." - General George Patton. Get moving, the rest will come. Jack Canfield says that "you can drive from California to New York at night with your headlights only showing you the next 200 feet." Powerful thoughts. Another Wayne Gretzky quote: "Procrastination is one of the most common and deadliest of diseases and its toll on success and happiness is heavy." Give it your best shot. Your best shot right now. Your shot will undoubtedly improve as you move forward.
- Last and also first is to become grateful. Not just when things work out, but all the time. Most of us are not taught this. We must learn it. I began becoming grateful many years ago and it has increased continually. Now, I am thankful all the time for everything in my life regardless of how I might have interpreted it in years gone by or how others might interpret it right now. This one thing has changed my life more than anything. I am continually giving thanks. There is no requirement to be unhappy about certain circumstances and happy of others. You get to choose. You are choosing most likely based on your upbringing and from the responses and reactions of people around you. Still, you get to choose and you can choose to be thankful or not. I know this: when you choose to be thankful, more things will happen in your life for you to be thankful for until that is all that happens. There are no rules. You get to choose. I choose gratitude!
What can you do when business is slow? You can choose to grow. Look at this as an opportunity! There are many things to do to improve. Since I love great quotes for their inspirational value, I will leave you with this one from Michael Jordan: "I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."
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