So, Tell Me What You Want, What You Really, Really Want

In January 2020, I was having the best year ever. I had booked so many speaking engagements. It really was my breakout year as the speaker was so excited.?

And by March 2020 It all turned to dust. It all just dissipated and went away (I bet you can relate?)

I remember being in my room feeling so depressed. I remember the day the last cancellation came. It was 6am, I was still in bed, but checking emails when I got an email from the meeting planner for the BMW Conference in South Carolina. It had been booked for a year and I was going to be on the stage for BMW!!! I was going to get to drive a BMW around a race car track! It was remarkable that I had been chosen and it was a highlight of my life. You can imagine the kick in the gut I felt when it was canceled. Not only was I losing money and now had a complete goose-egg on the books for my annual revenue, I had just lost a major opportunity to have this brand on my resume.. which was a very big deal.

I felt sick. I wanted to close my eyes and go back to bed hoping that I would wake up from this terrible dream. I admit, it took me down for a couple of weeks.?

I thought to myself, what in the world am I going to do? I cannot control the pandemic, or the economy… I certainly didn't feel like increasing my sales efforts. I felt hopeless, like I had no choice, and everything was out of my control.

That’s when I started listening to my friend Jake’s podcast and he said he had decided he wasn’t going to participate in the recession. I thought he was nuts. How could he choose not to participate?

I thought about it for a while when I remembered two other times when I had not participated in what was going on around me. One was during 911 when my TV station stopped running ads to have 24/7 coverage of 911 events and the other was the recession in 2007-2008 when 100% of automotive advertisers canceled and the future was looking bleak.

In both situations, I found workarounds of the situations and we rebounded with more sales than we ever had before. Many of my salespeople made the most money in their lives during this time. I had proof that I could choose not to participate.

So here I am, right at the beginning of COVID and I thought… I’m not going to participate either and I launched a new program teaching people how to maximize LinkedIn and I have it away for free while making a few small offers that were affordable. The first month, April, I made $10k. I did it again and again and by the end of the year, I added 6 figures to my business and trained over 1,000 students.

I proved that no matter what's going on around you, you can always make a choice not to participate and find workarounds with what is in your control. The key is to change your focus from what you can’t do to what you can, make a plan and take action.

There are 5 parts to Saying Yes! Then Figuring It Out:

1. Say Yes! to what you really, really want. (When I say this, it makes me think of the song Tell Me What You Want by Spice Girls Spice Girls - Tell Me What you Want - YouTube…now you’ll be singing it all day too).

That means focusing on what you want and going for it. Often, I find business professionals sending mixed messages out about what they really want. One day they want this, the next day it’s that, and if you talk to them in a week from now, it will be something different. I’m guilty of this myself. Do I want to be on the road speaking to in-person audiences or do I want to be in my office doing more virtual presentations? When I can’t decide on what I really, really want, then I find myself spinning and getting nowhere.

The other thing that happened to me years ago was that all I could think about was what I didn’t want. I was having lunch with a dear friend, Lori, and complaining about all the things I didn’t want when she asked me one simple question: “I know what you don’t want, what is it that you DO want?” Bam, she hit me square in the face with this question. I realized all I was focusing on was the don’t wants and I was attracting more of that. I knew I had to change that way of thinking or I would never get want I wanted. I worked on this for many years, until I finally have a bigger list of what I want than what I don’t. It’s exhilarating!

Go now and get a piece of paper and write down one thing you really, really want. It’s important to figure out what that is, then you can set a clear plan of action to get it.

2. Let That Shit Go! If you’re still holding on to things you can’t control, you gotta let that shit go. Here’s a brief list of things that people get their undies bunched up about that they can’t do anything about (at least in the short term): the government, the pandemic, the news, the weather, supply chain issues, and my favorite, other people.

I recently witnessed someone spend 3 days ticked off over something they had no control over. That’s wasted energy. That time could have been used more productively to fulfill a business goal or have an adventure. You have to change your focus to get what you want.

3. Cultivate a Yes! Mindset. I love brain science. I’m no expert, but I’ve spent a fair amount of time studying it. Enough to know that our brains are hardwired to receive negative information over positive stimuli. That means that we must work at having a positive mindset.

For some of us (me, especially), it’s taken a lifetime to figure that out. The more I draw my attention to this human phenomenon, the quicker I am to pop out of the negative thinking and the more often I’m experiencing positive thoughts. I’m literally rewiring my brain every day. After several years of practice, I am noticing a huge difference in my thinking. This has had a tremendous effect on my life and business. In my book Say Yes! Then Figure It Out, I give the readers lists of things to do to cultivate a Yes! Mindset. Email me to learn how you can get an autographed copy ([email protected]).

4. Create a Success Environment. I like to do things on my own. I’ve always been very independent. This doesn’t work when you want to run a thriving business. I can no longer be the Chief of Everything Officer and let’s face it, our brains are wired for negativity which means that my inner critic likes to tell me what I’m doing wrong or when I’m not good enough. This is precisely why we need to create a success environment of people who are surrounding us with their Yes! Mindsets and we are rubbing ours off on them. Team members, coaches, mentors, mastermind groups, family members, and communities are all great people and places to find your success environment. If you’re like me and tend to go-it-alone, you are the person who needs to start building a new surrounding for yourself. If you already have a great success environment, keep adding to it. Receive positive vibes from your success environment and give back positive vibes too. You want a balance between receiving and giving. This is no “one way street.”

5. Take the Bull by the Horns. I’m a Fire-Aim-Ready kind of gal. That’s how I get so much shit done. Of course, this also means I need breaks more often for creativity and innovation. While I’m typing this, I’ve blocked the week from my calendar for getting caught up on my own marketing materials that have been lagging because I’m always sooooo busy. I notice when I do this it allows me to take even more action.

This week I’ll write content for my entire website rebuild, review my speaker video to package into a short promo, read my Say Yes! Book again to make any corrections to the final version, get my annual tax info ready for the CPA (my least favorite thing on the planet), write this blog, and start planning my next Lucrative Leads Retreat (which is everything from emails to registration page to agenda). That’s a lot in one week!

But, I know what I want… what I really, really want and that is to be a successful business owner helping other business owners to raise their visibility, rise in leadership and rock their sales results!

I don’t try to think this into reality, I act and keep the momentum going. What’s one step you can take today to help you move forward to get what you really want?

When you Say Yes to what you really want …you are very clear about it, you let go of things you can’t control, you consciously cultivate having a Yes! Mindset, you create a Yes! Environment, you take the Bull by the Horns, you will have a business beyond your wildest imagination …

Where you wake up every day excited to be challenged in your work, you feel creative, innovative, and ready to rule the world. You have the energy to be adventurous at work and outside of work.

You have everything you want.

If this sounds like you, I want you to stand up and proclaim it… say I want it all!!?Because you deserve to have it all!

Cheers!

Jennifer

p.s. I’m considering doing a masterclass on this topic. Email me [email protected], if this is something you might be interested in.