Do you say "it" enough?

You can learn a lot about people when they are enjoying success.  Do they share the spotlight?  Do they thank the people who help them succeed?  Saturday Night's NFL Pro Football Hall of Fame induction ceremony offered one of the best examples of how to do say thank you I have ever seen.
  
Emmitt Smith is the all time rushing leader, Pro Bowler, Super Bowl Champion,  and Saturday night he was enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, but his acceptance speech is a highlight that I will never forget.   Read Emmitt's speech.

Two items really stood out.

First, he shared the spotlight with his teammates.  The tears offered evidence of his sincerity.  His words were thought out, honest, and full of emotion.  There was another portion of this speech that offers a great example to all of us.  When Emmitt was six years old, he told his dad that he was going to play in The NFL.  His dad supported his dream.  Here are this week's points.

How often to you thank the people who have helped you succeed?  I don't believe in self made people.  There are always people who help you, serve as an example (good or bad), and support you.

Are you saying thank you to those people?  In addition to saying thank you, I believe that you honor those who helped you, when you help other people achieve.  Spend some time this week thinking about people who helped you and let them know what they mean to you.

Please, please, please never tease a child about what they can't do.  Joking and teasing around with youngsters can be fun.  But, never discourage them, even in a joking matter, about not being able to accomplish something they want.  Joking is a big part of my family, which I enjoy.  At the same time, do not joke about what they can't achieve.  How things could have been different if Emmitt Smith's dad had not supported his son's dream.

Are you living out your dream?  Why not get started?  Until your habits reflect the goal, your goal will never be a reality.  You have the ability, now change your routine, be thankful, and help others hit their goals.  You too will become a Hall of Famer of life.

Now, go make it happen.

The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo  and call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Is it time to "make it happen?"

Goals.  They are important.  They are the road map for your life.  Some people have their goals taped to their mirror.  Some people visualize themselves hitting their goals.  Goals are vital to success.

At the same time, a road map, like goals, is only useful when people are in motion.  People have to get in (or on) a vehicle and put it in action for a road map to be useful.  The same is true with goals.  We can cover every mirror in our house with goals, we can visualize every success we want to achieve -- but if we don't get off the couch and make it happen, it will never happen.  Here are some suggestions:

1.  Do not misunderstand this blog -- goals are important and you should have them.
2.  Keep a list of all the things that you do every day to achieve your goals -- work to accomplish four daily tasks that will help you.
3.  Understand that without action, nothing happens.
4.  Make a list of all the habits that are stopping you from hitting your goals - create a game plan to establish more productive habits.

Action is the key.  This week work to create a game plan for action.

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The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo.  Click Here   Then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Has it been that long?

Last month, my daughter turned 27. Today, my son is 20. I have two quick questions. Where did the time go? Is it true that the next 20 years will seem like 10?

Let me answer my own questions. The time went by one minute, one hour, one day, one week (etc - etc) at a time. In those moments, the questions went from daddy do you want to play ball with me to why can't I stay out until one am?

Yes the next twenty years will seem like ten and there is nothing we can do to stop father time. Accept it, enjoy it and make the most of it. Have you ever noticed that most of us keep time in years, quarters, and months. But the real champions track time in hundredths of seconds. Olympic Gold is usually determined in time that is quicker than a blink of an eye. Some things to consider:

1. Stop worrying about making this be your year. Make today be your day. If you put enough of "your" days together, the year will take of itself.

2. Have your goals and work hard to achieve them. But always remember, if you can't be happy striving to hit your goals, you won't be happy when you hit them. Enjoy the journey.

3. Don't ever forget that little kids will soon be big kids. Don't ever take for granted the question "Daddy, do you want to play with me?".

Happy Birthday to my son. I am very proud of you and your sister. Love you both.

The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo at www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Do you see yourself as successful?

I am not a golfer. I have never played the game. But I enjoy magical moments in sports. None were more magical than watching Phil Nicholson win The Masters earlier in April. As I heard Jim Nantz make the call, I remembered something that I read in Jack Canfield's book, "The Success Principles."

It seems that Jim Nantz and Golfer Fred Couples were suitemates at The University of Houston. Both had major goals. Nantz wanted to be the lead announcer on CBS and Fred Couples wanted to become a professional golfer and win The Masters. They actually playacted the event.

Fast forward 14 years to a magic moment. Couples won The Masters and he was interviewed by CBS's Jim Nantz. After the broadcast, both men shed a tear as they had reached a milestone goal. Here is what we can learn.

1. What is your goal? Nantz and Couples had clear goals of what they wanted to acheive.

2. Allow your sub concious to see yourself reach that goal. See yourself winning the award, making the speech. Think about what you will do and how you will celebrate.

3. Be willing to work for it. Couples did not win The Masters because he had a goal. He won it by having the goal and working hard to prepare for it. The same with Nantz.

4. Allow yourself the emotion once you win. Emotion is a God given thing, stop fighting and feel it.

Life is too short not to have goals; too long not to take chances; to hard not to enjoy your successes. Have a great week.

The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo at www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Where you are and where you are going!

Something a little different this week. Please be patient, I don't have plans of starting to copy other articles as an entry, but this will make a point.

You, like me, probably have people who forward you so many emails that you just delete them or block them. But hopefully, like me, you have at least a couple of people who forward you emails that you know, if they are forwarding it, it will be good. This week, I got such an email from a friend. This is an entry about the power of our brain -- as you can see this work is credited to Cambridge University.

More Brain Stuff . . from Cambridge University

Olny srmat poelpe can raed tihs. I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit a porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs psas it on

I believe that the same is true for our goals and our lives. If we know where we are and where we want to go, we can get there. Consider these points.

1. What are you goals? If you know your goals and you write them down, you have created the desired end result. (The last letter of the word)

2. If you will honestly describe where you are right now (the first letter) you can begin seeing what you need to change to get to your goals. For example:

A. To hit your end goal you need better time management. So you might set aside some weekend time to make sure you are ready for the week to reduce the stress of getting ready everyday. Perhaps, you start getting up earlier in the morning.

B. To hit your end goal you need to become an expert on a subject. So you might reduce the amount of TV or computer time and read more. You could buy an audio series on the subject and turn your drive into learning time.

C. To hit your end goal you need to get into better shape. You go to the grocery store and buy healthier food, you set aside exercise time, and you begin the walk to a healthier you.

Once you know where you are and where you want to go and start the walk there, your powerful brain will figure out what you need next. If you have no goals, then life just happens and life is too precious to just happen. So how about it? Why don't you spend some time this week figuring out the details? Take the first step and engage your brain and subconsious mind and you will be amazed on what happens.

The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo at www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

When will your Idol moment come?

Several thousand people traveled to Chicago to stand before the American Idol judges and get the pass to Hollywood. 13 made it. It is my perception (which in my head makes it reality) that a number of people just wanted to act like a fool on TV, some really think that they can sing and can't, and some are pretty good, but judged not good enough. My question this week; are you ready for you idol moment? When you get your shot at your goals, will you be ready to make it happen?

Here is what you need to be prepared:

1. A goal. Goals, dreams, and aspirations will drive you for success. Goals will help you get out of bed in the morning and keep you motivated.

2. Determination: A goal without action towards that goal is a pipe dream. Goals are achieved by making mistakes, correcting those mistakes, and constantly moving towards the desired outcome. That will not happen without determination.

3. Balance: A lot of people have hit their goals and are still very unhappy. How? They are out of balance -- hitting a goal with no one to share the joy with is not worth it to me. Keep a balance in your life.

4. The willingness to fail: Most successful people have "failed", learned from the failure (see determination) made corrections and gone onto success. That education does not happen if you are unwilling to fail in the first place. If you want to be great at something, you have to be willing to be bad at first.

So hats off to the people who are truly going after their dream at American Idol. The long lines, the nerves, the willingness to be judged. We can all learn from them.

This week, think about a forgotten dream and ask yourself, why you allowed it to die. That book, the Broadway play, the business, the *insert your dream here* is still in you -- just apply determination, balance, and the willingness to fail and your idol moment could be happening before you know it.

The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo at www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Happy New Year

Did 2009 go by fast for you? One more week and we will ring in 2010.


Even though time seems to go by faster and faster -- it's not true. There are still 24 hours in a day, 168 in a week and 52 weeks in a year. The illusion of time going by faster is simply the percentage of time in your reality. Let me explain.


When you are 8 years old -- A year is 1/8 of your reality -- so it seems to take a long time for a year to pass. When you are 48 years old, a year is 1/48 of your reality -- a much smaller portion, givin the perception that it goes by quicker. In 2010, I suggest you use the 5% rule.


5% of 168 hours (a week) is 8.4 hours -- 5% of 24 hours is 1.2 hours. What if you dedicated 5% of your week to your goal? In a little more than 1 hour per day, you could change your life. Lose weight, write a book, learn how to be more financially successful.


What can you give up that is currently taking 5% of your day? Two half hour sitcoms? Surfing the web? Sleeping in? Use the 5% rule in 2010 and see what a difference it will make in your life. You are worth it. Go make it happen.



Happy New Year!



The next time you need a speaker, make it easy on yourself and call me. I will inspire, motivate, and entertain your group. Check out my speaking demo at www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com then call (417) 339-6568 for availability. The only way I look good is making you look good for booking me.

Recalculating!

So, if there is a person on the planet who should have a GPS, it is me. However, I don't travel enough to invest in one. We spent the 4th of July weekend with our kids in Chicago. One of our son's shipmates offered us the use of her GPS for the weekend -- we accepted.


After getting it calculated to get us to O'Hare Airport, we changed our minds and decided to go to a restaurant near the Navy Base -- which lead us away from the GPS directions. What struck me as interesting were the commands of the GPS. She didn't freak out, she didn't tell us what kinds of terrible things were going to happen to us, she just merely said....recalculating....in 300 feet take a right and turn around, once we missed that turn, she calmly said.... recalculating in 500 feet take a right and turn around.


As I was listening to those comments, I thought about how life really does the same thing....it gives us feedback, and if we listen to the feedback we should be able to figure out if we should recalculate and try something different. Some quick examples....


1. If you are constantly out of money, you need to recalculate and either figure out a way to make more money or do a better job of handling the money you do make.


2. If you are constantly in conflict with your spouse, boss, or co-workers, recalculate and figure out which one of your actions you need to change.


3. If you need to lose weight, recalculate and understand that it's not a diet or a magic pill you need, just change your eating habits and start getting more exercise.


4. If your ego is constantly getting you into situations that are bad, recalculate and get your ego and actions under control.


Do GPS systems make mistakes? Sure they do. But the majority of the time, if you program it right, and follow the instructions and make the correct turns, you will arrive at your destination. Life is similar, if you program the incredible computer God gave you, your brain, to what you want to achieve and then make the steps and put in the efforts you will see the results.


When you miss a turn or make a mistake, recalculate, correct your path, and you will eventually arrive. Check out my speaking video at http://www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com/

Challenge Yourself!

Up for a challenge?

In the midst of the tough economic news, when the market is up and down like a roller coaster, I am going to challenge you to challenge yourself. Here's what I did.

I decided to turn off the TV for thirty days....this was big for me. TV used to be the first thing I turned on when I got home and it really dominated my evenings. Even though I had curbed my TV viewing a lot, I decided to keep the set off for 30 days. Here is what I learned from my experiment:

1. Not listening to all the bad news helped my outlook. I am not suggesting that I was not informed. I kept up with the news via radio and internet. But not listening to the naysayers night after night, was good for me.

2. I accomplished some major goals in my life. It is amazing what you can do when you re-invest as little as thirty minutes a day into your goals. In a seven day week, I probably put as many as eight hours of TV time into productive time. It paid off with three major goals achieved.

3. One of my goals was to create a new speech video demo. While doing that I invested 15 minutes per day in examining and listening to some of our greatest speakers. That time was major for my overall view of my goals and what I could accomplish.

4. When my time is near and the oatmeal is drying on my chin, I won't be wishing that I had those thirty days of tv back.

So the question is to you. Are you up for a challenge? What would happen if you invested thirty minutes a day into your major goals? Good Luck and Stay Tuned!

Go to http://www.bransonbusiness.blogspot.com/ to see my speech demo.

Hero or Zero?

It is the week of Christmas, whether we like it or not, we have either hit our goals for 2008 or we haven't. At this point, there is very little we can do. We are either a Hero or Zero.

Here are some simple recommendations for goal setting for the new year.

1. There is nothing more motivating than having to stretch for a realistic goal. Also, there is nothing more de-motivating than having a goal that feels like it is unobtainable. Do your homework, make sure that your goal didn't come out of your....left ear. What is your goal based on? Can you work that goal out on paper? If no, you are not going to hit it.

2. The time to start working on hitting your goal is now, not waiting until 3rd or 4th quarter. I once had a boss who wanted me to put a phone blitz together on Christmas Eve Morning to get us closer to our goal. Maybe if we would have had that type of push starting in January, we could have hit our goal that year.

3. Break the goal out. Remember, you eat an elephant a bite at a time. Break the goal down, would you rather have to sell 12 a month for 12 months or 144 for the year?

If sales person A has a goal of 144 sales, makes 12 in January -- that sales person can think, Wow all that work and I still have 132 sales to hit my annual goal, I can't do that.

If sales person B has a goal of 12 sales per month for 12 months and makes 12 in January -- they are pumped up and excited, because they hit their goal.

4. What steps do you need to work on to get better? Ask your boss, ask your best clients, ask somebody. What do I need to work on to be better at my job in 2009? Maybe it's better service. More cold calls. Better relationship with your co-workers. Remember you can't do the same job, with the same effort, and expect a different outcome.

Good luck in 2009 -- here's to all of us hitting our goals and being heroes. Stay Tuned.