The Real Enemy in Your Career

How can you go into battle if you don’t know who or what your enemy is??

I first learned about this from an author called Steven Pressfield who described it in great detail in his fantastic book “The War of Art.”?

In the book, he describes how whenever we embark on a challenge that we perceive to move our life forward, whether that’s weight loss, improving our health, setting up a business, starting an artistic endeavour, writing a book, seeking a new partner, making more money… whenever we attempt to do anything to improve our lives, a force will come to try and stop us from achieving it.?

And he calls that force: Resistance.?

I have encountered it many times.?

In Pressfield’s books, he not only says this force is trying to prevent you from achieving your goals, it’s actually trying to kill you. And only when you understand the level of the force you’re up against, will you begin to match it with an equal or more powerful level of effort.?

Some things you need to know about Resistance are that…?

• It doesn’t care about you?
• It’s not personal?
• The greater the goal you’re trying to achieve, the greater the level of resistance you’ll to meet?
• The closer you get to your goal, the stronger the force will get?
• It will use the voice in your head, it will lie to you, it will trick you, it will call upon your most painful past events, it doesn’t care?
• It can even use people around you to put doubt in your mind. And as strange as that sounds, I have experienced it, even from people who love me very dearly?

If this interests you and you want to understand it at a deeper level, go and read “The War of Art.”?

For the purpose of what we’re trying to achieve here, all you need to know is that you are up against a malevolent force that you will awaken the moment you try to make your life better, and it’s called Resistance.?

A COMMON FORM OF RESISTANCE?

One of the first forms of Resistance you will encounter will be a lack of time.?

Resistance will convince you that you don’t have enough time to do the things you need to do.?

It will throw everything in your path to take your time away from you and in the past, you have thought this is just how it is, or this is because that member of staff isn’t skilled enough, or that client really needs to speak to me, or it’s your mate's birthday party, or your phone has just stopped working, or whatever.?

Now, the moment something like this happens, label it… this is Resistance showing up.?

Right now I have people wanting to book a 15-minute call with me to chat about something.?

It’s just 15 minutes, right? What harm can it do??

WRONG!!! That’s Resistance showing up.?

But the voice in your head kicks in… what if they’re pissed off at me, what if it’s an opportunity of a lifetime, it’s only 15 minutes, what harm can it do??

THAT is also Resistance showing up.?

The invite and the voice are both Resistance.?

I just reply with… I’m stacked for the next 2 months, when’s good after that??

If it is mega important, I might say, look, I can’t meet for an hour, but I can talk on the phone with you for 3 minutes right now, before I go into my next meeting if that helps??

Taking your time is one of the first tricks Resistance will use.?

But know this… ?

it’s never an issue of time… it’s always an issue of prioritising and focus.?

We all roughly spend the same number of hours at work.?

The only reason why someone achieves more with their time than you with yours, is their ability to prioritise and focus.?

And I know how good you are at prioritising and being focussed by asking you one simple question…?

When do you check your emails? Is it:?

1. As soon as you wake up?
2. As soon as you get to work?
3. At lunchtime?
4. Last thing in the day?
5. Last thing in the week?
6. I have someone else managing my emails for me?

If you answered A or B you’re screwed.?

If you do that, you are inviting so many unknowns into your world and because everyone else knows that’s what you do, your clients and your team will change their behaviours to suit.?

If you are CC’d into an email with other people on your team, are you the first to respond? If you answered yes, you are training your team to sit back and relax because they know you’ll step in and sort it out.?

The words “rod” and “for your own back” spring to mind.?

If you want to move something forward in your business, know what your goal is for that day and start on it early, without checking emails and with no interruptions.?

Tell your team that you will not be responding to anything in mornings from now on… not emails, phone calls or texts. You won’t even be available for a 10 second chat.?

Focus the first few hours of each day on you.?

Now that all might sound great, but again, Resistance has just made an appearance in your head saying, “But what if someone really needs you? What if there’s a problem? What if something’s hit the fan that only you can clean up?”?

So long as you’re the first person to solve the problem, you always will be. And unknowingly, you are accidentally diminishing your team, because you are depriving them of valuable lessons and learnings for them to grow and step up.??

It’s like you want them to remain children and for you to remain the parent and I get it, there is some fulfilment in that. We feel wanted and useful and valued.?

But you need to let go.?

Empower.?

Create a space for people to flourish and feel safe enough to fall.?

Get them to run experiments.?

Get out of their way.?

Get out of your way.?

Let’s say you were in a super important client meeting tomorrow morning for 4 hours, that they were paying you ￡1,000 to help them solve some huge problems in their business and to significantly move them forward.??

If you were in that meeting from 6am tomorrow, would you be checking your emails and taking phone calls, or would you give them your undivided attention and energy??

Would you try and distract yourself beforehand by just checking your emails first or would you want to show up fresh, ready to do your best work??

So why don’t you afford yourself the same privilege of your undivided focus and attention each and every day??

Could you imagine where you’d be if you did??

But you’ve managed to convince yourself that you always need to be contacted in case of an emergency.?

But when have you ever needed to be contacted in an emergency, that only you could solve, in that moment??

The answer is rarely, if ever.?

We give ourselves so much importance that we need to be contactable at all times.??

You are not the president of America. It will be ok.?

When I did the re-write of my previous book “Selling to Serve,” I wrote 4,000 words a day for two weeks straight.?

I ignored everyone and everything.?

My wife was not happy with me, and I was ok with that.?

I had to become focused and selfish, but for a good reason… I knew that accountants and bookkeepers desperately needed help with the way that they priced and sold their services.?

Timewise, the world was in lockdown because of the pandemic, there was so much uncertainty and these firms needed help.?

It became a No. 1 bestseller within its first week and is still the highest rated book in the world for practice management.?

But if I’d have been overly concerned with getting the cold shoulder from my wife for a couple of weeks, it may never have been written.?

When I recorded the audio version of the book, I did it in my garage on a very cold Sunday.?

I’d committed to the editor that he would have the recordings first thing on the Monday.?

I decided that I wasn’t going to stop if I got tired, I was going to stop when it was done.?

I was in there until 1am recording it.?

I couldn’t feel my feet they were so cold.?

But in that moment, nothing else mattered and I did what I needed to do UNTIL it got there.?

That is focus.?

I was cold. I was tired. My wife wasn’t talking to me. The voice in my head was trying to get me to stop?

When you get close to achieving something, that is when you need to be most on your guard for Resistance showing up; the MOST focused, the MOST diligent, the MOST resourceful, the MOST relentless.?

It’s at this point, when Resistance is throwing everything it has at you, that you must know WHY you’re doing it.?

Because only your WHY will drag you through, up or over.?