My Essay Blog

I am a student of Time Management and a big part of time management is beating procrastination. We all procrastinate, even those of us who pride ourselves in having good time management skills.

From my studies, I have come up with seven proven ways to beat procrastination.

1. Do the worst task first: I have used this technique for years. I have even created more than one “first thing.” There is first thing in the morning, there is first thing after lunch, and there is first thing in the evening. I take a look at the items on my To Do List and figure out which one I am dreading the most and spend a limited time on it at least moving it forward. This is known as swallowing the frog first thing; if you begin your day by swallowing a frog, then the rest of the day looks good.

2. Break it down: Often the reason that we procrastinate is because the task ahead of us is too big. Often there are small parts of the task that can be done. How do you climb a mountain? One step at a time.

3. Use a friend: I am not actually referring to delegation (but of course I don’t mind that either); what I mean is to tell a friend what you want to do and get them to help you start the task. Often it is the act of starting a task that is enough to get the task done.

4. Do the pleasant part of the task: Often many distasteful and large jobs have some parts to it that are not particular distasteful. Do them so at least you are moving forward on your most important items.

5. Fifteen (15) minutes: Just spend 15 minutes on a task. I have the attitude that I can spend 15 minutes doing virtually anything and I can certainly survive spending 15 minutes on something. Often by spending the 15 minutes on a task, I either complete it or I will get it moved forward enough that it has momentum to finish.

6. Track it: The simple act of tracking a goal is often enough to keep the goal moving forward. It seems odd, but knowing that you are going to write down whether or not you have done something is often enough to make you move forward.

7. Reward or punish: The reason we do something is because it is more painful than not getting it done, so if we can make the completion a task more rewarding or the consequences of not completing it more painful, then we tend to move forward on things. Tying successful completion of a task to a reward is often a successful technique.

Remember that even successful people occasionally procrastinate. Procrastination is not a permanent condition.

Are you looking for someone who will hold you accountable to achieving your goals? Career coaching and mentoring may be what you need to accomplish what you really want in your career. Your friends and family certainly love you and want the best for you, but they can’t always make the time to devote the necessary hours you may need to achieve your objectives and goals. Your friends and family have objectives and goals that they are looking to achieve as well.

Coaching is one of the best investments that I have made. Although there are many coaching packages that you can choose with becoming a coaching client, generally speaking, the coach and client usually have a weekly call, which lasts from about 45 to 55 minutes. Email communication is usually included between each coaching call.

I have worked with many terrific people who were extremely talented and were over qualified in the position in which they were working. I could only imagine how much happier and productive they would be if they had hired a career coach to work with them.

Why should you consider hiring a career coach?

1. You have someone who is focused on your objectives and goals.

Your coaching calls are all about you. Your coach will hold you accountable for your actions to achieve your goals. Many career coaches have graduated from CoachU (.coachu.com) and have been educated and trained on holding clients accountable to achieving their goals.

That’s why many coaches offer a free initial consultation. This initial consultation will better determine if you and your potential coach are compatible. There’s nothing wrong if a particular coach and you are not compatible. The same principle applies with other professional services. You may not be compatible with every accountant, lawyer, contractor, plumber, hairdresser, mechanic or web-designer.

2. You have someone who is objective toward you.

As mentioned before, you have family and friends that love you and they may think that any work you do is awesome, but you are generally getting a subjective opinion. A coach would be able to objectively prepare you for such events as a job interview, calls from clients, querying an editor, writing a resume and getting better organized.

3. Someday leads to a town of Nowhere

How many of us have always said that we wanted to do things such as write a book, start our own business and switch careers? When did you want to start doing those wonderful things? I have done all three by working with a coach! From what I know of myself, I would not have done these things had I not been working with a coach. I might have looked back and thought shoulda, coulda, woulda. I didn’t want to look back years from now and have those regrets.

4. Coaching Can Be A Great Investment

Coaching can cost a lot less than many seminars. What is the total amount of money that you have you spent on self-help items, such as books, audiocassettes, CD’s, Videos, DVD’s and seminars? Did you spend hundreds &ndash maybe thousands of dollars? What kind of rate of return did you get on your investment? Did you achieve your objectives after you read that book, listened to that CD, watched that DVD or went to that seminar? The aforementioned items most likely contained great information on how to achieve your goals. But did any of those items personally hold you accountable and ensured that you achieved your goals?

Like any other professional service, coaching costs money. Coaches are educated and trained professionals who provide valuable services. If your sink needed fixing and you had no idea how to fix it, would you hire a plumber to fix your sink? Hopefully! A plumber is paid to do something with specific measurable results: fix your sink. If your career needs fixing, what would you do? Coaching goes beyond specific measurable results. Can you put a price on having a career that you love?

I have always wanted to become a writer. My coach taught me how to write more effectively to express my point, get the attention of editors, and get my articles published. I cannot put a price on what I have learned by coaching!

I can’t help feeling that using the phrase ‘work/life balance’ reinforces the problem it seeks to address. To describe a need to balance work and life implies that work is not part of ‘life’. If that’s the case then approx 50% of the average persons hours on earth are devoted to non-life &ndash surely that’s dead.

People are not asking ‘how can I balance two opposing areas of existence?’, but ‘how can I live a holistic life; where all aspects of life co-exist and compliment each other and do not oppose each other?’ Balancing things puts them in opposing positions &ndash we reinforce a problem as oppose to deal with it. We need integration not balance.

If you are living a non-integrated life then perhaps you need to make some major changes. Some escape home by going to work and others escape work by going home. Some people feel like two different people. The person at work is not the person at home. If that’s the case, both your team and family are missing out. For some this is so extreme they keep the two parties at arms length. They feel that if the two meet there will be some kind of implosion of realities and life will end. Actually &ndash it’s at that point that life begins.

I believe it is my reasonability as a leader and employer to care for my team. Yes, we have goals, vision, dreams and commitments &ndash but they are meaningless if we destroy lives, demoralize people and deny children their parents input.

Leaders lead people not projects. If we do not care for our people they will not stay around.

Southwest Airlines (the most successful airline in the world!) has some ways they help people live integrated lives. How do they do this? Their office corridors are lined with photos of team members’ families, wedding photos &ndash they even have an area devoted to pets. Their people don’t leave. They are committed to the business because the business is committed to them

I suggest that we need to focus on integrating all aspects of life and not attempt to balance them out. People will happily work overtime to meet a deadline when they know there is a commitment to them as a person coming back.

For more infomation go to the Generous Leadership website - generousleadership.com

Change is the key to our success and to our financial future. Often in our own lives, however, change is something we fiercely resist. Even when achievement sits on our doorstep, we’re still too comfortable to make an adjustment. The very first place to look for transformation is within. When you take ownership of yourself, your life and your income, you are on your way to harnessing success.

I learned early in my life that if things needed to change, it was up to me to change them.

I have had the great pleasure of working with Jim Rohn, who inspired me to new levels of success and happiness. When I first met Mr. Rohn, I was sitting at a dinner table with ten other people. I grabbed a seat near him and just wanted to listen to his words of wisdom and conversation. When a lull in the conversation arose, I was caught off guard when Mr. Rohn asked me about my goals, dreams and aspirations. In response, I began to talk about many of the roadblocks I had experienced in my pursuit of success. I listed all the reasons why I wasn’t able to achieve my goals and dreams. I let him know who was to blame and insisted none of it was my fault. I thought I had made a pretty good case and then the hammer dropped. Jim looked at me and said, “Kurt, for things to change, you must change, and for things to get better, you must get better.” That brief moment in time changed my life forever. It was then that I realized that everything I wanted in life is on the other side of change, not the other side of excuse. I also realized that no matter the excuse (good or bad), it would not produce results.

If you want to make the same kind of transformation in your life, the first thing you have to do is take an honest look at yourself and where you are. You can’t make changes if you won’t acknowledge what needs to be changed. Where are you starting? What is your current situation? If you could change one thing in your life, what would it be? It is only from honestly assessing where point A is that you can develop a well-defined, well-planned route to point B. Then the next obvious thing to determine is where or at what point B is located. In other words, what exactly are you aiming for? What do you want?

Now is not the time to be timid.

Don’t shortchange yourself because you want to be “careful” or “reasonable” or you don’t want to “rock the boat.” Shoot for the stars! You’ll define the path to get there, but first you have to know what exactly you’re even trying to reach. In other words, you must begin with the end result and then work your way backward. You have to know exactly where you want to go and what you need to change to get there. Sometimes, people are actually afraid of being “too” successful. To be brilliant or amazing might actually be a scary proposition. As success comes into sight, you might feel a lot of responsibility weighing down on you. So, how successful should you be? How healthy should you be? How wealthy should you be? How strong should your relationships be? Consider the following powerful quote from Nelson Mandela:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our Light, not our Darkness, that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the World.

There is nothing enlightening about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.”

&ndash 1994 Inaugural Speech

We are unique creatures. In spite of the seeds of greatness that lie within us, we seem to program ourselves to do the least amount possible to get by. That is, we often do only what is necessary to survive. I see this tendency with my students at the local university all the time. Their mentality is: What is the least amount of work I can do to pass this class? They are paying top dollar to get their education yet rarely do you see a student take advantage of all the learning that is at her/his disposal. We see symptoms of the same mental laziness, lack of progress and resistance to change in the workplace, too:

What is the least amount of work I can do to get a paycheck and not get fired? When we are in this lazy mindset, we can’t find happiness, and as a result, our souls start to rust.

The challenge is that we often don’t see the consequences of our behavior fast enough.

Time ticks by, and by the time we’re even aware of how off course we’ve gotten, years have flown by. We live in a society where we want the quick fix, the easy way out.

Unfortunately, however, that is not how life works. If it takes someone five years to gain twenty pounds, why does someone else think he can completely lose it in a couple weeks? Another example is fast food. We know it’s not good for us, and yet hey, nothing bad happened today after I had that super-size order of fries. The consequences of the unhealthy food will take time to manifest, but in the meantime, the instant gratification of a fast and delicious meal now overpowers concerns about the future that, in the moment, seem immaterial. Imagine if every time you ate at a fast food restaurant the consequences were immediate. You took a bite and felt a bulge near your midsection. If that were the case, it wouldn’t take long before you changed your ways.

There are thousands of habits and patterns in our lives that fit the instant gratification scenario. Another example is debt. So what do we do when we’re constantly confronted with such difficult choices: immediate pleasure versus future gain? What do we do about it? You would be very wise to make a habit as soon as possible of analyzing your life on at least a weekly basis. Determine what you want to change now, not after years of reinforcing the wrong habits. The saying goes, “Old habits die hard” and it’s really true.

Stop destructive cycles now before the strands that bind you become impenetrable rope.

Without changing your action, your wishes and hopes will only be whims that never go anywhere. It’s time for you dreams to start to bear fruit!

So, are you ready to welcome change into your life? Good! Remember, as Albert Einstein said, “You can’t solve a problem with the same mind that created it.” Once you have recognized the need to change and have embraced the opportunity to change, then you will need to start organizing your plan of action. Think backward. What is the big picture? What are the major phases within that big picture? What are the steps within each phase that will move you from one point to the next? It is worth pointing out here that you must be careful not to let the opinions of others dissuade you. I’m sure you’ve experienced this before&ndashyou’ve gotten yourself all excited and pumped up, you tell someone you really care about all your great plans and they barely listen or care. Or worse, they start pointing out all the reasons why your plan isn’t going to work or why it’s a bad idea. Crash! You can’t remember the last time you felt so deflated.

I’ll admit that it is hard to stay focused and persistent when people spit on your dreams. Fear of failure, fear of what others will think&ndashthese are totally normal feelings. But you can’t let them debilitate you. Napoleon Hill said, “The fear of criticism robs man of his initiative, destroys his power of imagination, limits his individuality and takes away his self-reliance.” You are destined for greatness. Follow your heart not the useless criticism and discouragement of those who have forgotten how to live and dream.

So many people assume that if they don’t try, then they can’t fail. If they don’t try, no one will criticize them either. The tragedy of this mindset is that they will fail by virtue of never having even attempted to succeed. George Shinn once said, “Growth means change and change involves risks, stepping from the known to the unknown.” I have always loved the phrase “jump and the net will appear.” Consider the fact that most of the fears we face in life are not life-and-death matters. And yet, we are so gripped by our fears that it’s almost as though they were life-and-death matters.

The next time you feel yourself paralyzed by fear, stop and honestly assess your feelings.

What is the worst thing that could really happen? Are the possible setbacks really life-or death situations, or are they just opportunities to learn and grow, even if they are sometimes unpleasant or painful? Reflect on the fact that almost all successful people have their stories about where they came from and what they had to go through to achieve success. What’s more, it’s rarely a rosy picture. It might also be worth asking yourself what the worst thing is that could happen if you do nothing. Chances are the consequences might be more severe in the case of inaction versus action. Either way, there is a price to be paid. Do you want regrets or do you want results? We say no to some things because we are saying yes to other things. You just need to be sure you know what hangs in the balance either way. Sometimes it is the realization of the imminent, stark reality hitting us in the face that provides the momentum for change. Whatever the motivator is, just don’t let fear stop you from forging ahead.

What Is Personal Development?

Personal development used to be a course taught at business and vocational schools around the United States.

It was long since held that self-improvement was an essential aspect of succeeding in a more and more competitive marketplace that left little room for those who would not be able to pull their own weight &ndash usually because of self image problems.

Personal growth was considered to be the antidote to the possibility of failure very often experienced by job changers, vocation changers, and those who might embark on a new career at a more advanced age than most of their competitors in the marketplace.

Personal development was said to be effective in combining an individual’s innate wish for success with a change in the person’s mode of viewing her - or himself and also the way the person is portraying her - or himself to others.

NLP - neuro-linguistic programming &ndash is one of the favored tools of the personal development movement. Since it offers a wide variety of tools and techniques, this application itself promises success simply because of its superior adaptability to the needs of the person seeking personal development.

For example, for those will simply performance anxiety problems, a large number of exercises will make an accomplished introvert out of a phobic introvert who is sent into stammering or excessive sweating bits at the prospect of speaking in front of a crowd.

For the person suffering from extreme anxiety the idea of meditation &ndash well within the framework of NLP &ndash will quite often yield amazing results.

While traditionalists might scoff at the idea of personal development simply because it is such a subjective exercise, it is noteworthy that many people sear by it and attribute their business success to lessons learned and exercises attempted during a personal development seminar.

Perhaps the most important aspect to remember when discussing personal development is the fact that it seeks to capitalize on a person’s good intentions.

These intentions may be the wish to succeed in business the innate need to be useful, or maybe just the wish to further the role of leadership a person has taken within a corporation or business.

The goal is to draw out the good intentions and turn them into marketable objectives which the client will be able to realize and develop further, so as to ensure that her or his confidence will grow enough to pursue the next level of professional development.

For those who are gifted with a go-get-it attitude, this need may be hard to understand, but suffice it to say that in a world where corporate success is hard won, and abilities have to be proven time and again, those who may suffer from a lack of self esteem have often found themselves relegated to the sidelines.

If this is you, it is also important to understand that you do not have to be on the sidelines, but that you have everything it takes to make it up the ladder of success!

Author Charles Williams: For more information on Motivation and Self Improvement visit: .lsft.org

For the most part, we are all conformists. We will do what the crowd does. We might not like to admit that, but it is true. Only 5 to 10 percent of the population engages in behavior contrary to the social norm.

We see this law operating in groups, in organizations, in meetings, and in day-to-day public life. In all of these circumstances, there is a certain standard or norm. In churches, the moral code determines the standard behavior acceptable for the group. In organizations, the bylaws and years of tradition establish a standard operating procedure. Because we want to fit into these groups and maintain our membership with them, we conform our actions to the norm.

We seek to find out what others are doing as a way of validating our own actions. This method is how we decide what constitutes “correct” behavior. We see the behavior as more correct when we see others doing it. The more people do it, the more correct it becomes. Professor Kirk Hansen of the Stanford Business School demonstrated this when he boosted downloads for best-selling files on the Web by downloading those files over and over himself so the counter was artificially high. He and his team then observed that these boosted downloaded files were downloaded even more frequently. The high number on the counter indicated popularity, and people were most interested in downloading the files that were already ranked the highest. Whether the question is what to do with an empty can of soda at the park, how fast to drive in the city, or how to eat the soup at a restaurant, the validation of others give us our answers and therefore guides our actions.

We feel validation when we see others do what we want to do. We learned early in life that we make fewer mistakes when we follow the social norm. There are two types of norms: explicit and implicit. Explicit norms are openly spoken or written. For example, road signs, employee manuals, or game rules are all examples of explicit norms. Implicit norms are not usually stated openly. For example, you usually don’t have to be directed to say hello or to smile when you see someone, but you do it anyway. Or, somehow you know better than to put your feet up on the dinner table when you’re a guest in someone’s home, even though your host most likely will not request that you refrain from doing so.

If we don’t know the norm, we look around and find it. The Law of Social Validation becomes a way to save time and energy in figuring out what is correct. We use others’ behavior to guide our own actions, to validate what we should or should not do. We don’t always have to look at the positive and the negative in every situation. This automatic trigger saves us from thinking. We compare what we do against the standard of what everyone else is doing. If we find a discrepancy between what we observe and what we do, we tend to make changes in the direction of the social norm.

Social validation compels us to change our behaviors, our attitudes, and our actions, even when what we observe doesn’t really match our true feelings, style, and thoughts. We go against our better judgment because we want to be liked, accepted, and found in agreement with everyone else. When we are part of a crowd, we “no longer feel individually responsible for our emotions or actions. We can allow ourselves to shout, sing, cry, or strike without temperament imposed by personal accountability.”

We seek out social norms to help us know what we should be feeling or doing. For the most part, this is not a conscious process. We subconsciously accept many ways of behaving that are determined by our surroundings and the actions of others, such as raising our hands to speak in class, tipping in a restaurant, or how we behave at a concert. When we become part of a group, our once divergent emotions and feelings tend to converge.

When we find ourselves in a foreign situation where we feel awkward or unsure of how to act, we look for those social cues that will dictate our behavior. This could be at a party, during freshman orientation, or even while attending a family gathering. When the social information we are seeking is at all ambiguous, we don’t know how to respond and thus continue seeking out social clues. Imagine if you were sitting in the movie theater enjoying your show when somebody shouted, “FIRE!” Do you think you would jump up and run for it? Well, if everyone else did, you would, too. If everyone remained seated, you would remain seated also.

“There is the known, and there is the unknown, and in between is the doors.” &ndash Jim Morrison

“Break on through to the other side…Where the day destroys the night and night divides the day…Break on through to the other side.” These were the famous haunting words sung by the American poet, rock artist, Jim Morrison of The Doors. With these words, he electrified an entire generation. And with these words, he began his own destruction. Morrison was talking about the great hero quest that he longed to take: to break on through to the other side, the dark side, the spiritual side, the unknown, and beyond. To penetrate the deepest darkness of his soul, enter on to the other side of pure light, and return with a vision to heal himself and his people. But Jim Morrison never returned from the dark side.

Jim was not prepared to enter into the dark side. He did not understand the psychology of the hero soul, and did not have the capacity to deal with the horror of his inner demons. Instead of slaying the dragon, his ego, he fed his ego with more fire and hatred. He set out to kiss the serpent, to ride the snake to the end of time and beginning of eternity, but he was swallowed by it. He was consumed by his own darkness.

The same thing happened with Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin. They got stuck in the dark side. By using artificial means, massive quantities of drugs and alcohol, they were able to shut the spinning wheels of their mind and receive a small glimpse of the other side. In their drug-induced trances, they caught the occasional beams of light on ‘the other side’ that penetrated their darkness with visions of poetic expression.

But they did so at a great cost to themselves and people around them. These visions may have electrified their generation, but they did not heal. They simply entertained people, and at best, during their peak, may have satisfied a small yearning inside. But their music did not elevate people to a higher level of understanding like Mozart, Beethoven, or John Lennon.

Joseph Campbell, in his book, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, beautifully illustrates the path of the hero: “the birth, life, and death of the individual may be regarded as a descent into unconsciousness and return. The hero is the one who, while still alive, knows and represents the claims of the super consciousness which throughout creation is…unconscious. The adventure of the hero represents the moment when, while still alive, he found and opened the road to the light beyond the dark walls of our living death.”

The penultimate hero is able to enter into the unconscious realm and beyond, still awake, and bring back the boons that elevate entire civilizations and create the titan works that give birth to cultural enlightenment. He or she has the strength, will, courage, and inner capacity to defeat the dark demons of the other side. Heroes also survive the cruel impact of the world. They learn to effectively deal with the initial, furious scorn and ridicule from people that don’t understand them upon their return. They learn to shatter the ego, and return transformed, offering people the life elixir to renew and transform themselves as well. They cause the illumination of the collective soul and liberation of the mind. The highest purpose of the hero is to provide a vision that heals our tribe called humanity.

Can we all aspire to become like this in our lifetime? This is a question that I cannot answer, because I have no authority to decide what is possible and what is not. The important thing to remember is that this work is a composite of the universal hero in a state of perfection. We only need to access a small fraction of this power to experience a new life with new power and new blood.” [Excerpted from "Psychology of the Hero Soul," by Sharif Khan, Chapter 1.]

Psychology of the Hero Soul is an inspirational book on awakening the Hero within and rekindling people’s passion for greatness. It is based on author, Sharif Khan’s ten years research in the field of human development. The Hero Soul is availble to order in most major bookstores including Borders, Barnes and Noble, Chapters, Indigo, and Coles bookstores. To order online visit: .herosoul.com

Psychology of the Hero Soul, by Sharif Khan, ISBN 0973192208, Diamond Mind Books, 160 pages, $14.95 US, trade-paperback, Self-help/Inspirational, distributed by Ingram, Baker & Taylor, and University of Toronto Press.

For more information on special quantity discounts call (416) 417-1259 or email: inspireherosoul.com

Using the skills, strategies, and smarts of lawyers, you’ll be able to more effectively coach your employees to optimal performance. Here are 4 great tips to help you give constructive feedback in such a way that you motivate positive and productive performance…

1. Give evidence of performance to employee. In litigation, prosecutors are required to turn all of their evidence over to the defense. In order to be fair to employees, supervisors need to do the same thing. Tony frequently received disturbing memos from his district manager about his poor performance on sales calls. “You failed to cover the Five Points for Sales Excellence with a customer last month. This is unacceptable.” Tony never received a monitoring sheet spelling out the discrepancies, never heard a tape of a recorded call, and he didn’t even have the opportunity to defend himself because the cowardly manager simply shot her message off in a cold blunt memo.

Giving feedback the way Tony’s district manager does is dangerous. It certainly isn’t motivating Tony to improve.

Moreover, because the manager has provided no proof of the calls - no score sheet, no recording of the call, no date or time, and not even one specific statement about Tony’s alleged ineffectiveness - Tony can’t even defend his performance.

When monitoring and coaching employees, ALWAYS turn over the evidence of the call to them. This evidence may include a recorded call, Mystery Shopper score sheet, detailed notes from customer’s account, etc.

2. Prepare for employee performance meetings in advance. No attorney would conduct a direct examination or cross examination without thoroughly and carefully pre planning their questions. I always prepare a loose script prior to meeting with employees about problem performance, even though I don’t actually read from my script. Writing the discussion out reinforces it in my mind and allows me to be less concerned with covering all the basis and more concerned with my employee.

3. Ask open-ended questions. Asking a juror if they are for the death penalty yields a yes or no answer, but asking her how she feels about the death penalty gives the attorney the opportunity to learn more. Just the same, asking your employee if she thought the phone call in question was good will yield a yes or no answer, but asking her how she thought the call went gives her the opportunity to expound. My favorite open-ended coaching questions include: “If you could do this call over again, would you?” “Tell me about that caller.” “Is there anything else about this call/customer that I haven’t asked, but need to know?”

4. Don’t allow the “Twinkie Defense.” In court, defendants may stand behind a theory of the case called the “Twinkie Defense.” This theory tries to throw the jury off the trail by blaming the client’s bad actions on something else - he ate too many Twinkies, for instance, and was on a sugar high when he killed/robbed/raped/molested and therefore is not responsible for his actions. You may have encountered the Twinkie Defense with your employees: “I was late because traffic was unusually heavy and then when I got here the elevator was broken, therefore my tardiness is not my fault.” Decide that employees will be held accountable for their actions and don’t allow them to hide behind the Twinkie Defense. In response to the Twinkie Defense, you respond with, “This is about individual responsibility - not trying to hide behind excuses.”

Deploy these field-tested and proven strategies and you’ll be coaching employees like a pro!

As the species whose thinking ability supposedly separates us from the animals, we really don’t spend much of our life reasoning. Most of the time our minds get stuck on cruise control. Thinking takes up too much time and requires too much energy. Imagine having to think about every decision we make. It wouldn’t leave us much time to accomplish anything else, would it? Most of us have a systematic way of looking at the world. When this mode is operating, our minds are perfectly primed to automatically respond to persuasion triggers. I call these triggers the Laws of Persuasion.

The Laws of Persuasion operate below our conscious thoughts. When employed properly, your prospects don’t even realize you’re using them. On the other hand, if you blunder your way through a persuasion situation, your audience will be totally aware of what you’re doing. It’s like seeing a police car on the side of the road–it jars us back to reality. If the persuader is skilled, he or she will use the Laws of Persuasion so the message is delivered below the radar.

Understanding the Laws of Persuasion involves understanding the human psyche. Such knowledge empowers you to improve your persuasive abilities. It magnifies your effectiveness in relationships, improves your parenting skills, enhances your leadership ability, and helps you sell yourself and your ideas. In short, it maximizes your influence.

In his book Triggers, Joseph Sugarman estimates that 95 percent of the reasoning behind a consumer’s purchase is associated with a subconscious decision. In other words, most buying is done for reasons a person hasn’t even fully formulated. Dr. Gregory Neidert estimates that our brains actually run on idle 90 to 95 percent of the time. Let’s face it, thinking is hard work. It is human nature to conserve cognitive energy. Thinking burns three times as many calories as watching TV. Those who use their brains for a living have traditionally been among the highest paid professionals. Consider the incomes for doctors, lawyers, and engineers, just to name a few. Most of us feel we don’t have the time or even the desire to think on the level that these professionals do each day.

What are the main reasons we choose not to think? First, sometimes the amount of information available is so overwhelming we don’t even attempt to digest any of it. Sometimes our decisions simply aren’t weighty enough to warrant the effort of researching all the available information. Consciously and subconsciously, from the bombardment of information we receive, we selectively choose what we will acknowledge and what we will ignore.

Whether we realize it or not, we love shortcuts to thinking. When we buy an item, we don’t always take the time to research the product or read the latest consumer guide’s ratings on the product. Instead, we often rely on the salesperson’s advice. We might just buy the most popular brand, or we might bring a friend along for his opinion. Although we would never admit it, we sometimes even buy an item just because of its color or packaging. Certainly we know this is not the best way to make decisions, but we all do it anyway, even when we know we might make a mistake or feel regretful afterwards. If we thoroughly considered every single decision, we would constantly be overwhelmed and we’d never get anything done.

Recall a situation where you where persuaded or acted without thinking?

The Laws of Persuasion are so powerful because they capitalize on two very predictable things: one, what we expect from human nature, and two, how people will respond in certain situations. People react predictably under a given set of circumstances. If we learn to recognize how the Laws of Persuasion work, we will know how to use them in our interactions with others. We will also become more aware of how others will attempt to use them on us.

There are two paths to persuasion: the conscious and the subconscious. Both paths can persuade others to your way of thinking, but each path uses a very different means of processing information.

In the conscious path, both you and your audience make an active or conscious attempt to understand, define, and process an argument. A person who is interested in your persuasive attempts will be highly motivated to listen. As such, she will also be able to consciously evaluate your message by carefully weighing the pros and cons of the evidence you present.

On the subconscious path, the listener spends little or no time processing the information. This approach results in those automatic triggers we previously talked about. These knee-jerk reactions happen when you follow your intuition or use a mental shortcut. Your mind reaches a decision without doing any logical processing. These subconscious decisions are largely driven by instinct and emotion. Individuals who spend lots of time on the subconscious path do so because they lack the time, motivation, desire, or ability to really listen to your message. They’re not really involved in the subject. They use their instinct or emotions instead of their intellect. Passive processing and automatic decision triggers rule their decision making.

Our minds are programmed with automatic persuasion triggers. Most of us experience persuasive situations without realizing or thinking about it. Master Persuaders know what these triggers are and how to utilize them to their advantage. Understanding the Laws of Persuasion helps us become aware of how we are influenced without having conscious knowledge of it.

Learning to influence and persuade takes time, skill, and experience. What most people don’t realize is that we already instinctively use many of these laws in our daily communications. The same Laws of Persuasion that we unknowingly use every day are the very same ones Master Persuaders use deliberately, consciously, and consistently. Master Persuaders make persuasion a habit. Think about how conscientious you were when you first started driving. Now, after years of practice, driving a car doesn’t require as much thought or focus. Master Persuaders understand the rules of persuasion and practice them constantly. They can apply the techniques subconsciously, without even thinking about them. For them, the application of persuasion has become second nature.

Application Questions

1. Why do you think most decisions are made on a subconscious level?

2. Can you think of a time when you bought something and rationalized it later with conscious thought?

3. How can you use this information to benefit you in your ability to persuade?

Nothing disarms and invites an audience in more than humor. We are instantly drawn to people we think are funny. We enjoy listening to humorous individuals and hearing what they have to say. Humor grabs attention, creates rapport and makes a message more memorable. It can also relieve tension, enhance relationships and motivate people.

If you’ve got an important message to share, humor can give you a huge advantage. The actor John Cleese once said, “If I can get you to laugh with me, you like me better, which makes you more open to my ideas. And if I can persuade you to laugh at the particular point I make, by laughing at it you acknowledge its truth.” Don’t use humor just to get a laugh out of your prospects. In humor, there is so much potential for influence. Armed with humor, you can provide special insights or teach important principles.

Humor must be used cautiously, however. If used properly, it will help your audience to like you. If used ineffectively or inappropriately, however, it can be a big turn off. The instant you irritate or offend your audience members, it’s over. Nothing you say or do from that point forward will rectify the damage done. Worse, they’ll always remember you as a bad comic. Be sure that you have good material before attempting to incorporate humor into your presentations. Also, cater your comedy to your audience. What would they find funny? What are some inside experiences they share that you could draw humor from? Use humor that will evoke chuckles and lightheartedness but that is still built on truth. It is a very wise idea to test the comedic waters on friends or family to make sure your humor works!

Another technique that is sometime used in story selling is the instillation of fear. As manipulative as it may sound, fear definitely motivates others when it is used properly. I would strongly caution against creating a false sense of fear, however. Doing so truly is manipulative, and by instilling false fear you will lose your audience’s long-term trust. Use fear only if the threat is real and if it is in the best interest of the audience to be forewarned. For example, doctors sometimes have to be straightforward with their patients about the impending worst-case scenario if they don’t get in shape. It’s scary to hear, but the patient truly needs this information to be brought to her/his attention.

As much as we may wish it to not be the case, often it is only fear that will motivate and move someone off a path to destruction. There are less dramatic, but nevertheless fear-inspired, examples: Fear incites us to buy life insurance, to floss our teeth, to buy cars with airbags, to install home security systems and to purchase guns. Hopefully, fear will not be a persuasive tool you use with great frequency, but if you feel you can effectively use it to underscore a very important message, adhere to the following guidelines:

1. You must make your audience feel the anxiety and uneasiness that come from anticipating the possible, even greater, negative emotions (pain, grief, loss, etc.) that will become imminent if the problem is not dealt with.

2. Your prospects must feel not only that the fearful event is likely to happen, but also that they could be victimized by its occurrence. In other words, they must feel vulnerable.

3. You must provide a solution to the fear you instill. Give your prospects a recommended action to resolve the fear-inducing problem.

4. Your prospects must believe that they are capable of doing what is asked of them and that doing so will work for them.