My Essay Blog

The Seventh Biggest Mistake &ndash Having “Lone Ranger” Mentality.

If you think that the best way, or the only way for you to achieve your goals is to do it by yourself then you have Lone Ranger Mentality. Do you believe that reaching out to someone, and a professional someone for that matter, somehow indicates that you aren’t “something” enough? That it somehow means you’re incapable and not smart enough, strong enough or good enough?

Well let me assure you, the people who come to coaching are all of those things, extremely capable, smart, strong and a whole lot more. They choose coaching because they are ready to accelerate their personal or professional lives and work with a professional who will enable them to achieve their goals faster, easier and with better results than they could on their own.

A coach will facilitate your self discovery, the identification of your goals and the prioritization of those goals. Your coach will help you create your action plan as well as prepare for and overcome any challenges you encounter along the way.

Your coach will hold you accountable for taking consistent action toward the realization of your goals. Accountability is one of the greatest payoffs of coaching. It is so powerful because it can make all the difference in terms of you being a Goal Achiever instead of just a Goal Setter and someone who walks the walk instead of just talking the talk.

Think of your coach as your success partner, whose reason for being is to help you get what you want quicker, easier and with better results than you could on your own.

The Sixth Biggest Mistake &ndash Settling for Good Instead of Going for Great.

If you’re thinking your life is good and you’re relatively satisfied, congratulations! That did not happen on its own. You have obviously done some fabulous work.

You’ve already proven you’re the kind of person who proactively goes after what you want and you get it. So why would you settle for anything less than great? Why would you settle for living in black and white when you could be living in technicolour? Do you really want to play it safe and stay comfortable? Playing it safe and staying comfortable can take you no further than good.

Most of our clients are people who are already very successful. Now that they’ve personally experienced the power of coaching they tell us that they realize just how much less they were settling for, for themselves and their lives. They were settling for good when they could have been experiencing great.

These clients also tell us that coaching has dramatically increased the quality of their lives in all areas, from increased sales to enhanced relationships and from better health to increased productivity. They feel, many for the very first time, that they are fully and vibrantly alive.

So we challenge those of you who are settling. We challenge you to stop settling for good. We challenge you to go for GREAT and beyond with coaching.

The Fifth Biggest Mistake &ndash Believing that You Have to Work Harder in Order to Achieve Your Goals

Do you have dreams or desires that you’ve left unfulfilled because you can’t imagine bringing them to life without adding a lot more to your already jam packed schedule?

It may surprise you to know that coaching can enable you to be more, do more and have more by working smarter instead of harder.

Your coach will lead you through an efficient process. You’ll begin by getting crystal clear about what you do and do not want in your life. What’s great about that is that when you figure out the things in your life that you’re tolerating or doing just because you feel like you should you can create a lot of extra space in your schedule to tackle the things that are truly meaningful to you. Next, you will develop an action plan that details what it’s going to take, the what by when, for you to reach your goals. Finally, you will stay focused and on track by being accountable to your coach for taking consistent action and you will learn how to overcome any challenges that come up along the way.

If you want to learn how to work smarter instead of harder, coaching is a wise investment of your time and money.

The Fourth Biggest Mistake &ndash Blaming external factors for what’s not working in your life and waiting for them to change so you can have the life you dream of.

Do you find yourself wishing other people were different; easier to get along with, more positive, more successful, trustworthy or kind? Or, do you find yourself thinking about how your life would be better if your circumstances were different if only you had a better job, more money, more time or more opportunity?

Are you telling yourself that these external factors are responsible for what’s not working in your life or for preventing you from having what you want?

It can be very tempting to get caught up in this paradigm. But the reality is that if you are looking for or waiting for something outside of yourself to change and give you what you want, you will be waiting, and frustrated, for a very long time.

The reason for this is that you do not have control over anything outside of you. What you do have, though, is total control over yourself. You have total control over your thoughts, your actions and your results.

It is a fact that your circumstances will change when you make a committed decision to do the things that will move you in the direction of what you want to experience in your life, and then do them. Hiring a coach is one of the smartest things you can do to ensure you take control and create the reality you want to experience.

The Third Biggest Mistake - Wasting your time and money on stuff that doesn’t get you the results you want and is not ultimately fulfilling.

Let’s face it; there are an infinite number of things that you can spend your hard earned money and valuable time on these days. When you know you want things to be different or better it’s easy for you to waste your time and your money in one of two ways.

The first one is spending your time and money collecting information that comes in the form of books, software, seminars, reports or programs. You are collecting information that you believe can help you get what you want.

Now don’t get the wrong idea here, information is a great thing. We are big believers in books and programs being critical tools in helping you get where you want to go, but we want to make something very clear here.

Information alone will not get you results. You cannot expect that your sales will automatically increase just because you read the Guru of Sales’ latest book and you can’t assume that your monthly expenses will automatically organize themselves just because you purchased the newest expenses tracking software. You will get fulfilling results only by taking consistent action toward achieving your goals based on what you’ve learned from the information you’ve collected.

The second way you may be wasting your time and money is by acquiring and participating in things that have nothing to do with, and even go against, you having what you really want.

Have you ever allowed a month to go by where you indulged every food craving you had and did not exercise regularly, even though your deepest desire is to achieve and maintain a healthy body weight and lifestyle? Have you ever gone out and bought an expensive gadget you don’t really need or can’t really afford when what you truly desire is to feel successful and experience financial freedom?

If this sounds like you then you know what it’s like to be running on the hamster wheel of short term gain, in the form of immediate gratification, leading you to long term pain because your life experiences don’t match up with what you really want?

It’s very important to realize that spending your time or money on things that give you immediate gratification but have nothing to do with your goals and values will always leave you feeling empty. Completely and totally empty and looking for the next quick fix.

Instead of wasting your time and money, why not invest in yourself in a way that will accelerate your personal and professional development? Working with a coach on an ongoing basis is the most time and cost effective investment you can make in yourself and your quality of life.

Your coach can teach you how to make the most of what you’ve got and how to do more with less. Your coach will hold you accountable for taking consistent purposeful action towards achieving your goals.

By working with a coach, you will get crystal clear on what you really want, why you want it and how to get it. Having clarity takes the guess work out of things. That way, you will be able to evaluate all future investment opportunities, and by that we mean any and all opportunities for you to spend your time or money, according to their ability to enable you to fulfill your purpose, your vision, your values and your goals.

The Second Biggest Mistake - Waiting for a “good” time to make a change or go after the things you really want in life.

Guess what, there is no good time. Life will always be busy. There will always be family and business obligations to attend to, errands to run, chores to do, TV programs to watch and people and projects that want your time, energy and money. Your life will always be busy and it will always get in the way of what you really want, if you let it.

Wondering what you can do about it? You can stop kidding yourself. Today. Stop kidding yourself that the perfect time is just around the corner or sometime off in the future. Instead, decide to join forces with a professional who can teach you how to make the most of every moment starting right now.

Your coach will hold you accountable while keeping you focused and on track to achieving your goals no matter what life throws at you.

The Biggest Mistake &ndash Telling yourself you can’t afford a coach.

The truth is that you can’t afford not to have one. Coaches are highly in demand these days because coaching has proven itself to be an extremely effective method for facilitating personal and professional development and fulfillment.

The word is out everywhere, it’s in the media, it’s in corporations and it’s in the community. The word is out that coaching makes sense and it really works. In studies that have been done on the impact of coaching, the results have consistently shown a return on investment of more than 100%.

Coaching clients from all walks and areas of life consistently report that it is the best money they ever spent because their investment in an ongoing coaching partnership enables them to achieve their goals. What’s even better is coaching enables them to achieve their goals quicker, easier and with better results. Now think about that for a moment. Think about what that means for you. Anything you want is available to you quicker, easier and with better results through the vehicle of coaching.

If you are still unsure consider this, it’s not enough for you to say you want things to be different. Just wanting something doesn’t make it so. You must make a decision and then take purposeful action toward what you want. When you put your money where your mouth is and invest in a coaching program you demonstrate your commitment to achieving the thing that you want and at the same time you cut yourself off from any possibility other than total success.

“In nature every moment is new; the past is always swallowed and forgotten; the coming only is sacred. Nothing is secure but life, transition, the energizing spirit. No love can be bound by oath or covenant to secure it against a higher love. No truth so sublime but it may be trivial tomorrow in the light of new thoughts. People wish to be settled; only as far as they are unsettled it there any hope for them.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

Recently I was reading the 7 Secrets For Successful Living By Marianne Paraday when a thought struck me. In the book, Paraday gives her annotations on the works of transcendentalist, author and poet Ralph Waldo Emerson and my thoughts spawned from his words noted in her writing: “Every man in his lifetime needs to thank his faults. Our strength grows out of our weakness.”

Paraday writes at length about giving up our need for perfection and it got me thinking: How much our lives could be enriched if we could simply give up our quest to be perfect! After all, who defines the perfect house, income, body, relationship? If we let it, this quest could cause one to log endless amounts of time on what we’re not, don’t have and so on. What’s more, what if we could actually transform imperfections and literally “grow our strength” directly from them?

In many of my other articles on self-awareness, I encourage readers to focus on the positive parts of themselves and let them expand. Yet, what to do with the imperfections? Here’ three ideas.

Practice Total Self-Acceptance:

When undertaking the quest of full self realization, take responsibility for the total you. Yes, we all have parts of our lives that we don’t envision for ourselves, but we must continue to accept them. It is always important to take full responsibility for who we are in this moment. The word “forgiveness” comes to mind. What it means to truly seek forgiveness of ourselves requires, in my opinion, an awareness and acceptance of what is. Remember the statement: It is what it is? it certainly applies here. Yes, we can seek to change what we do not desire, but first we must embrace it - take off the proverbial Band Aid and let it heal from the inside out.

Be Aware of Emotional Hide and Seek:

With this in mind, it is very easy to hide, cover up, aim to sweep away what ails us. It’s not always as large as an eating disorder or pathology, for instance. It could be the day-to-day struggle of a strained relationship, addiction or financial instability. I’m convinced (through experience, sadly) what we continue to stuff and put away will not stop growing. In fact, when not acknowledged, trouble often manifests itself in a larger way later.

I like to remind myself that it’s easier to deal with problems when they are small. Even when they are huge, it is easier to first break them down into bite-sized pieces and take baby-steps toward solving them. For example, a friend of mine actively worked to quit smoking after his heart-attack. One day he just stopped and told himself, “I can always have a cigarette. I think I’ll wait ’till later.” He told himself this from minute to minute as the urges struck him. After a day he said, “Oh, no problem, I can have a cigarette tomorrow!” When tomorrow came, he continued this dialogue in his head until he’d strung 10 years together. He told me, “I tried not to look too far ahead, I tried to stay in the day.”

Use Your Active Imagination:

It is often a healthy practice to write a dialogue to a nagging imperfection and see what it wants. When I write a fictional story, for example, I literally get out pad and pen and create a dialogue with my character to talk to him/her. My aim is to decide what the story is that he wants to tell. I often use this same technique when dealing with a less than perfect part of myself. Give this a try. First identify the imperfection, then give it an identity by “talking” to it on paper. Find out what it wants, then find a way to fulfill its need and make peace with it. Finally, say goodbye and let go.

In Conclusion:

True, it’s uncomfortable to go into the places that scare us. Yet, the reality is, our lives are the productions of our choices, unconscious or conscious. Isn’t it worth our time to carefully consider each step? Moreover, instead of stuffing, why not continue to “grow your strength” from the obstacles that lie before you. We could all do worse than to let go of our need to be perfect and seek only our own highest truth. If nothing more, remember the words of Emerson himself: “Nothing is at last sared but the integrity of your own mind.”

You’ve heard about Saturn Return. What is it exactly? It’s a time to prepare for, that’s for sure. Saturn returns every 29.5 years, so this will happen to you between the ages of 28 and 30, again at 58-60, and again at 88-90.

It’s not often we get to see a third Saturn Return, but Picasso lived to have one. It is at this time that he invented neo-expressionism.

Got an idea now of what can happen?

Lt. Col. Thomas E. Lawrence, a British soldier, was sent to investigate the Arab nationalist movement at his first Saturn Return. You probably know him best as Lawrence of Arabia.

Saturn teaches us the big lessons &ndash what we can live with and what we cannot live with, what works for us and what doesn’t, in a sense what we are meant to do with and in our lives.

Many people make big changes at their Saturn Returns, so big their names and titles change. At their Saturn Returns, Eleanor of Aquitaine, the Queen of France became the Queen of England. Karol Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II. Lafitt Pincay stopped being a Panamanian jocket and became a U.S. jockey. Winston Churchill became a liberal. Phillipe Jaroussky stopped being a violinist and became a counter-tenor. At his first Saturn Return, Luciano Pavarotti became an international opera star. At his second, he stopped being Adua’s husband.

It’s about living out your Dharma, your higher self.

Saturn Return is the time the chickens come home to roost so to speak, in a good way or a bad way. Saturn Returns challenge us to get past old limitations, rules, responsibilities, unfulfilling behaviors, and particularly unconscious living through fear. It’s your chance at your free will. It doesn’t HAPPEN to you, it more like you work it, or it works you. As Jung said, when you aren’t conscious about things, it can seem like “fate.”

Saturn Return is a hard time for individuals who have lived out of fear and immaturity, been irresponsible or are not mindful. If that’s the case, it can be so sorrowful and hard, the person does not live through it.

Getting a Saturn Reading in advance can help you round this corner, just as readings all along the way can help you see better what’s going on. A Spiritual Path or Higher Calling Reading can help you clarify what your purpose is &ndash what you are here to do. The more you are in alignment on these two fronts &ndash knowing your purpose, and then living it purposefully, the better your life is going to feel to you.

Here are a couple more example of Saturn Returns.

At his second Saturn Return, Richard Nixon, a Quaker, had achieved the withdrawal of the U. S. troops from Vietnam.

At her first Saturn Return, Marie Antoinette’s fate was sealed with the French people. The Diamond Necklace Affair occurred at this time. Most historians agreed it set the stage for her eventual beheading and that she was barely implicated, if at all. Marie Antoinette never did learn how to manage her own PR, to project herself correctly to the public, and she never reached her second Saturn Return. (If you saw the recent movie, it was played as if she were in a dream …)

A man with a steady course in life, living his purpose, Karol Wojtyla became Pope John Paul II at the time of his second Saturn Return.

Peter the Great’s mission was to modernize Russia. To do this, he needed to get the church under his control. At his first Saturn Return he gained control of the church and its property and made the church a department of the state, subordinate to his will. Peter the Great did not live for his second Saturn Return.

Michael Vick is lurching toward an extremely difficult first Saturn Return. Who knows where he will be two years from now.

Got a Saturn Return coming up? Learn more about it, get a reading, prepare, find out what your chart says about your Spiritual Path. It’s another chance!

Ben danced to his own beat. He never listened to anyone, not his parents or his instructors. Ben’s motto was “I do it my own way.” As a consequence, Ben’s life was a series of bad decisions. He was unsuccessful in life. Nevertheless, Ben’s decision making never got any better. As the county guard shut the door to Ben’s cell, he ordered, “Lights out!” Ben screamed, “I’m the man! You can’t make me do anything.” The prison light goes out. Ben is left in the dark.

The Critical Decision

Have you ever wondered why some people continue to make bad decisions? You see million-dollar celebrities doing it. You can see this action in government officials and business leaders. There are no discriminators. From the very rich to the poorest of the poor, we see people caught in a vicious cycle of bad decision making. Sadly, we see it much closer than that. We witness relatives making those bad decisions. Despite all the wise counsel, the poor decisions continue.

Why is it important to teach people how to make better decisions? Anthony Robbins, author of Awakening the Giant Within, attributes good decision-making as a key attribute to a happy life. Bestselling author Brian Tracy argues, “The further you think into the future, the better decisions you will make in the present to assure that future becomes a reality.” Making better decisions improves the quality of one’s life.

Problem Identification

As a young advisor and college professor, I constantly hear students proclaim, “I’m grown.” This statement implies I don’t have to listen to anyone. I know best. Therefore, I can make my own decisions. Through series after series of bad decisions, the youth continues on merry ride of worsening consequences. Two things generally can stop this dead-end trap.

One lies in becoming more mature with age, and the other is experience. In going through a series of bad decisions, a wise person gains insight on the consequences of a bad decision. Every person, regardless of their background or social standing, can benefit from good decision-making techniques. Here are some key steps to use:

1. Define the problem or issues

2. Conduct research on the matter

3. Discuss with respected individuals with similar circumstances

4. Consider at least two alternatives

5. Select best decisions, based on your value system

6. Move on and accept any consequences

The Right Path

Making the right decision is a difficult process. No one will usually applaud your many good decisions; however, you will probably catch heat over the bad ones. Les Brown, author of How to Become the Person You Always Wanted to Be-No Matter What the Obstacle, explains, “Your values are not set by government or church leaders. Your values give you consistency in the way you approach life…By holding to your beliefs, you can always stay on track toward your dreams.”