I need to rant!

I work with home business owners, healers, coaches and network marketers.

I believe they ultimately want to help heal the world or help achieve their own wealth.

?The challenge is that there is so much advertising geared to what they are looking for that it becomes overwhelming.

?The hope of a new quick fix has more power in their decision making than the discipline to stick with one plan and see it through.

?Seeing it through can take a number of years before a business takes off yet everything they read, or watch, or challenge they attend, suggests that massive success is around the corner.?

For the outliers that may be so, but for the majority it is not.

?People that say a particular diet didn't work yet they did not accurately follow the diet for the prescribed duration in my honest opinion. Whether it is vegan, keto or all other diets in between, I believe they all work if someone would only stick with that plan on a consistent basis for at least three months or preferably more.?

?Yet we don't. We allow cheat days and ‘Just this once’ to be acceptable parts of our communications when really they should be banned if we are going to be serious.

?Focus-action-measure-adjust action, do this until we get the desired result.?

?Unfortunately, many people’s self-talk is so often the talk of making excuses or rationalising and then they believe their own rationalisations. There is no excuse or rationalising in “focus - action - measure - adjust action until desired result is met”

If people want to succeed they need clear and honest language in their self-talk to be able to recognize their own choice of words that is causing lack of productivity, and improve that self-talk and word choice by improving the thoughts in their head.?

I looked up the word excuse in the dictionary and it gives many reasons that an excuse forgives, grants pardon, serves as an apology, makes allowance for, overlooks, removes blame and on and on. I doubt many of us would be accepting of this from our doctor, lawyer, financial advisor, airline pilot or anyone else if we purchased their service. So when folks use an excuse for not completing a commitment, no matter how small they are not benefitting from using that behaviour as a part of their measure.

?Look, if I commit to lose 5 pounds in two weeks by cutting out burgers and fries and eating only salads for lunch, yet on 4 of the 14 days I had half a burger and an order of fries, then that is exactly what happened. I can look at that when I measure my weight and see I only lost 3lbs after two weeks. If I’m honest, I look at the result and take this into account while adjusting the action.?

It is important here to acknowledge what worked, losing 3 pounds, and then consider my performance when adjusting the action.

I ask myself was the outcome goal too big? ? My answer would be no

I ask myself if the plan is too difficult to execute and stick with. My answer would be yes, because I defaulted 4 times.

I ask myself what do I need to do now to achieve the loss of those extra two pounds?

Then I make that my focus, put it into action, measure the results, and if I hit the goal then great! If I miss the goal again the back to “focus - action - measure - adjust action until desired result is met”

?I believe that people try to achieve too much in too short a time frame and so their comfort zone pulls them right back to where they started. I also believe that some people repeat this failing pattern in many areas of their life. This results in feeling not enough, anxiety, sense of being overwhelmed, confusion about where to start or how to priroritise.

?I can’t blame them. I was them! Unless our thoughts are crystal clear, and what we need to do next is laser focused we will procrastinate in so many ways and just become excellent at rationalising our undesired behaviour. What makes it worse in my mind is that our family and friends often support our rationalisation much more than they supported our original dream or goal!

It’s not really their fault if they do not know better.

The ton of advertising we all receive every day is so powerfully worded, the hope built up so high and the input made to appear so easy and we all fall for it...every...single...time!?

?If only we learned to be selective. Choose one plan, stick with that plan for a long enough period of time to realistically achieve success by monitoring all the metrics along the way. By making adjustments when a metric is not scoring where it needs? to and then putting that adjustment into action.?

?Focus-action-measure-adjust action, do this until we get the desired result.?

?People need a clear blueprint to follow.

People need accountability in some form or other.

People need to move steadily forward and change no more than one degree at a time and only when that small change is habit should they move to the next degree on a consistent basis.

?Unfortunately, many people’s self-talk is so often the talk of making excuses or rationalising and then they believe their own rationalisations. There is no excuse or rationalising in “focus - action - measure - adjust action until desired result is met”

And finally, people need clear and honest language in their self-talk to be able to recognize their own choice of words that is causing lack of productivity and improve that self-talk and word choice by improving the thoughts in their head.?

?Consistency in daily commitment is the key without excuses.

?Rant over.

?Oh, thanks for reading and please let me know if you disagree or contest in the comments.