Dr. Rick Wallace is the Founder, CEO & Chief Life Mastery Strategist at The Visionetics Institute. He created the Visionetics concept for optimal personal development based on nearly three decades of academic study, research and experience in the areas of behavioral psychology, neuroscience, personal development, metaphysics, quantum physics, neuro-linguistic programming, psycho-cybernetics and spirituality.
Dr. Wallace is one of the leading minds in the area of personal change --- achieving an exceptional rate of success with his clients.
Your Mind (the user) & Your Brain (computer & search engine)
Brain Power ~ The Secret to Success
Your brain is the most powerful search engine in the universe. Be very careful of the key words you enter into it because it will find, with great specificity the results associated with those key words. It will also work diligently to filter out any results and evidence to the contrary.
If you say or think your life sucks, your brain will find all of the evidence to back up your claim, while dismissing, ignoring or devaluing any evidence to the contrary.
If you ask why I can’t win for losing, it will find every reason that you are a loser, while ignoring and filtering all of the evidence that proves you could be a winner if you changed your approach.
If you say I can’t succeed at business, your brain will find every piece of evidence to prove you right.
Now imagine what your brain will do if you said, “there is absolutely nothing that can stop me from achieving my goals, guess what your brain will do. That is right, it will find all of the evidence that will prove your right.
Your mind is immaterial, but your brain is organismic. Your mind is the user and your brain is simply the computer. First of all, your brain can only search for and deliver what you download through your thought process and access gates (your ears and eyes — secondarily smell, touch and taste).
Through a neurological process, the brain records every experience you go through, as well as the interpretation you assign to that experience. This decision (interpretation) along with the memory will become a belief associated with the experience. If, as a child, you have a bad encounter with a cat and that experience leads you to believe that all cats are spooky or evil, the manner in which you deal with cats from that point on will reflect that belief and that will not change until you revisit the belief, assign a new interpretation to it and dismiss the old one.
In the brain, these memories that represent beliefs are stored in the physical brain and held by what is known as neurological synaptic connectors. Every time you encounter a situation that can be associated with a particular memory (belief), that belief will determine how you interpret the current experience. If you believe dogs are dangerous, you will ignore every physical gesture of the dog that suggests friendliness and affection and you will decipher the hyperactivity of the dog as aggression. Not until you revisit the original experience and either delete it or redefine it, you will always have the same experience with dogs. This will happen with anything in your life.
So, how does this apply to success and failure in your life? It is actually a highly convoluted process that I will not get into in detail, but your ability to succeed at any particular thing will depend greatly on your beliefs surrounding that particular thing.
In other words, limiting beliefs are what hold so many people back. In fact, a large percentage of my clients suffer from limiting beliefs that there aren’t even aware of. They will blame everything and everyone for their current situation when all along the problem rests with them.
Say for instance that decided you want to start your own business, but as a child you saw a parent or a relative really tank at their attempt to run a business, and then you hear your father say, “Not everybody is meant to be a businessman; you either have it or you don’t.” And then he follows up with, “nobody in this family has it.” So you have gone through your entire life believing that you don’t have what it takes to be an entrepreneur, but something deep down inside won’t let you rest.
You finally tell yourself that you are going to be an entrepreneur and you begin the process of launching your business, but you seem to be running into one barrier after another. What in the world is happening you ask. Then you entertain this thought: My dad was probably right, I am not cut out for this. What was really happening?
The moment that you set the goal to be an entrepreneur, you initiated an internal conflict — your new goal that is in diametric opposition to your belief about being an entrepreneur. Until you go back and deal with that belief (replace the belief held in that synaptic connector with an entirely new one) you will never make any real progress. Your actions will respond directly to your subconscious thoughts and perpetuate habits and behavior that will consistently work against what you are trying to do.
No matter how hard you try, it seems that you never get ahead, and eventually, this perception of reality (which is all it is) will serve to reinforce the initial belief and you will more than likely give up or settle for mediocre results.
One of the hardest truths to get people to accept is that life is not happening to them, it is responding to them. The truth is that you are living in a reality you created with your thoughts. The person you are now is a direct result of your thinking. You can get out of life what you are. If there is something that you have consistently failed to achieve, you must change who you are — raise your standards and expectations. And, you must learn to call those things that are not yet in existence as though they were. Scientists have proven that the mind cannot tell the difference between what is real and what is imagined.
Even if you don’t have it, you have to speak of it as though you do. If you constantly talk about your current situation and what you don’t have, you will actually perpetuate that reality. For the Christians that are reading this, remember what God told Moses about Israel when they refused to cross over the Jordon to seize Canon.
“28 So tell them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Lord, I will do to you the very thing I heard you say…” (Num. 14:28; NIV)
“28 Say to them, ‘As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will surely do to you…” (Num. 14:28; NASB)
Israelites kept saying they can’t and God said if you say you can’t, then I will make sure that you can’t.
Let me ask you a question, and you give me an honest answer. Have you ever observed a situation in which a person that constantly talked about how poor they are and how much they are struggling build wealth and financial freedom? The answer is absolutely not. You have, however, seen that person who had absolutely nothing but talked like they were rich (calling things that are not as though they were) completely blow up, even when you are sitting there thinking he/she is foolish and stupid.
The same principle applies to the poor person who does not believe that they can build wealth so they play the lottery in hopes of winning wealth. When they win wealth, the very idea that they can’t create their own works against them until what they have won.
You cannot escape your limiting beliefs, you have to change them. When you change your limiting beliefs, the words that you enter into the search engine of your brain will produce entirely new results that will completely change your life.
Your thoughts are the most powerful force in the universe. A clearly held thought can literally move mountains. There is absolutely nothing you can’t achieve, but you have to believe that or it means absolutely nothing. So, what are the limiting beliefs that are holding you back?
As a behavioral specialist and life mastery strategist, I am often asked why to be people find it so hard to achieve the type of lifestyle they desire, whether they are looking to improve their marriages, build wealth, become an entrepreneur or more. The truth is that there multitudinous reasons why people fail to reach the levels they aspire to.
One of the most common causes of failure is that the individual will have limiting beliefs that work in diametric opposition to the goals they are setting. Anytime that you set a goal that is not in alignment with your core belief system, you place yourself in a state of immediate and constant internal conflict. Although you have decided on a goal and written it down, the limiting beliefs that are the result of your past life experiences and the meaning you gave them are working against you.
Your beliefs set your expectations and God and/or the Universe will never meet you beyond the level of your expectations. Your expectations for yourself become the parameter of your capacity to achieve. Until you change the limiting beliefs and raise your expectations and standards, you will never achieve beyond what your beliefs allow.
Another major cause for failure is that people don’t understand and embrace the principle of process. Most people are becoming aware that there are certain principles associated with success, and behind every principle is a corresponding promise. The problem is that most people want the promise but they want to circumvent the process.
One thing that I teach my clients is that process always precedes the promise. There can be no obtainment of the promise without there first being an endurance of the process. The problem is that most people balk at the process. They don’t want to deal with delay, disappointment, frustration, setbacks and all of the other hardships that are a part of the process necessary to produce the promise.
To exacerbate this train of thought, we live in microwave culture where everyone expects what they want now! When things don’t happen right now, people give up and try something else. They never give consideration that the things that are worth having will take the greatest effort and highest level of commitment. It is simple, if you are not willing to go the distance, you will never achieve those things that bring with them the highest level of fulfillment.
There must be a certain level of implacability associated with your push. You can be easily satisfied with mediocre and average accomplishment. You have to be willing to push inexorably through the difficult moments to achieve those extraordinary results.
Can you be exceptional? Is it possible to do the phenomenal? The answer is an unequivocal yes, but you have to be willing to go the distance, and you have to be willing to endure the process.
What will you do in that moment in which absolutely everything goes wrong? When absolutely everything goes wrong in your world when the vicissitudes of life come rushing into your paradise, will you fold or will you rise to the challenge? I am here to tell you that you are built for this.
It was just 10 months ago that I was laying in a hospital bed in ICU having lost the use of both arms, having a broken humorous in my left arm in addition to nerve damage in the same arm. I had these businesses, but I could not run them. Even after being released, I could even get dressed on my own.
I looked at my situation and I admit that at that moment it was hard to see all of the visions and dreams I had before his catastrophic event took place, but I had been here before — not in the same situation but facing a challenge that seemed bigger than me, and in each situation in the past I had came through victoriously. So, I look at the man in the mirror and I told myself, “you are built for this.” Every morning I wake up and I tell myself that I am built for this.
Here I am 10 months later, back in the gym, about to release book #19, launching my first online course, less than a week away from my 50th birthday and I am making things happen because I refused to allow my circumstances to impact my beliefs or dictate my movements. You see, I decided a long time ago that I was going to go the distance.
It is not what you know, it is not the connections you make, it is not finding the best strategy and it is not ensuring that you have the resources that will ensure your successes throughout life. While all of those things are important, they mean absolutely nothing if you are not willing to go the distance. If there is any obstacle, challenge, or difficulty that can stop you, then you will be stopped. But for the person who is willing to go the distance, nothing will be withheld from you.
Another thing that I give great attention to is ensuring that I wake up each morning with a heart of gratitude. If you don’t have the capacity to be grateful for what you already possess, you will never develop the capacity to have more. I am not telling you to be grateful for your pain, struggles, and losses; that is actually sadistic — although I know a number of people who think like that. What I am talking about is being grateful for the ability and capacity to overcome the struggles. Being grateful for the wife who sticks by you when everyone else turns their back on you is what I am speaking of. Learn to be grateful for the visions and dreams that pervade your thoughts because they are the seeds that you must plant in the fertile soil of your soul in order to bring forth greatness.
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Or you can contact me at LifeChange@rickwallacephd.link to discuss working with me directly.
Here is one truth that you cannot avoid in search of success: Your thoughts are the seeds of your destiny. In my book, Your Mind is the Genesis of Your Destiny, I go to great lengths to elucidate the fact that your mind is the catalyst behind every result or outcome of your life. You are who you are and where you are based on the way that you have thought consistently. No matter how much you attempt to escape this reality, it will be there waiting on you when you look up.
Countless leaders and philosophers have confirmed this one truth, in fact, the one thing that every leader throughout history, every person who is considered remarkably successful and every person who has apprehended power and influence have in common is that they believe that you are what you think. Whatever you think about consistently, you will inevitably become.
There is no strategy on earth that is effective enough to overcome limiting beliefs. Your beliefs will set your boundaries and the only way that you will move beyond those boundaries is to change those beliefs.
“Nothing is impossible to those who decide upon possibility. The universe responds by becoming the thing you determine shall be. The framework of your preconceived notions is your only limitations. These are subject to change at a moment’s notice when you have arrived at a new decision.” ~ William Walker Atkinson
Your beliefs are actually decisions that were made during a past experience that defined how you interpreted that experience — the meaning that you gave it. Your beliefs are memories of your interpretations of past experiences. In order to change your limiting beliefs, you must be willing to redefine the past experience, giving it a new meaning; thereby, creating a new belief. ~ Rick Wallace, Ph.D., Psy.D.
Learn the step-by-step process of creating new beliefs and paradigms in this powerful course!
Read The Internal Book You’ve Written with Your Life
Read the internal book that you have written with your life. One person who I admire and have a great deal of respect for is David Goggins. Those of you who know me will know why I admire and respect him. He lives life on his terms. One thing that David stresses is the importance of reading that internal book that you have written over the course of your life.
We live in a world that has no shortage of experts and gurus, including your’s truly, and there is no shortage of books and material prepared and presented by these experts. What David Goggins suggest is that more emphasis is placed on reading the book that we have written, and there is so much that can be gained from an experience like this.
There are multitudinous challenges associated with reading books written by others, with of the most emphatic being the proclivity to write off their successes to extraordinary talent, a silver spoon or luck. The truth is that success is not about how much talent you have; it is about how committed you are to go the distance.
If you have followed me for any time you know that one of my favorite quotes is from the movie, “Lawless.” In the movie, one of the younger Bondurant brothers has been beaten within an inch of his life by a crooked cop. His older brother asks him what is he going to do about it and he responds by telling his brother that he is not tough and violent like him. His brother’s response is priceless. He simply replies, “It is not the violence that sets a man apart, it is the distance he is willing to go.”
Toughness is the willingness to go the distance. When you read that internal book, you will find points in your life in which should not have survived or overcome, but you did, it is a reminder that you are built for the battle that you face. Read your book to not only learn what you are doing that you should be doing differently but also read your book to be reminded of the stock you are made of at the core of your existence. Go back in that book and find those moments when you were written off, but somehow you survived.
If you are like me, when you read your book, you will discover that you are not where you would like to be, but you are far more than you are currently giving yourself credit for. This does not mean that you should rest on your laurels, but you should use this knowledge as fuel for you confidence — understanding that you are built for everything that you will face in life. I don’t care how bad it gets, how dark it becomes, how many people turn against you — you are built for it! ~ Rick Wallace, Ph.D., Psy.D.
To learn more about how you can work directly with Dr. Wallace, email LifeChange@rickwallacephd.link or visit our Elevation & Empowerment page!
There’s nothing like the thrill and excitement of discovering a new idea—a fresh concept, a cool product or a new line of business—that thing that’s going to take it to the next level. But wait…let’s not pop the champagne cork just yet.
Defining a brand is the first and most critical step to building a marketable business. Before we can effectively engage and retain customers, we must pause to evaluate who and what exactly our business stands for and what our customer experience should be. These essential components will help shape a solid brand that will be the muse of our marketing strategy.
The process isn’t always easy. There are five key steps to make before we can enjoy that crisp, sparkling glass of bubbly success.
Step 1: Establish the vision.
Ask yourself ‘What’s the end-game?’ What is the dream for your brand? What do you want the legacy of your business to be? You must take time to weigh out how your product or service fits into that legacy and whether the two are aligned. Once you’ve made a full assessment, then you can make clear and concise statement of the long-term goal. The shorter and more precise the statement of your vision, the more clearly defined your brand will be.
Often times, the road to our vision is paved with purpose. The process of tapering your vision to a clear statement should have presented questions that may lead to answers about why your business really matters. Think about why you’ve created your business, the need it fulfills, and the impact your product or service can make. Your answers outline your business purpose.
Understand that a brand is, very simply put–a promise. It is also, how and whether or not you deliver on that promise to your audience. Once you’ve outlined your brand purpose, you must identify the values that uphold that purpose. Between those values and your product, stands a commitment you make to consumers. Add that commitment to your outline and lay out a strategy for how you plan to deliver.
Step 3: Identify your market.
Most of the time we think we already know who our audience is. Our business may seem to serve a specific group or we may feel that our brand will appeal to everyone. However, once you have a clearer picture of your vision, purpose and promise, you may want to reevaluate who actually benefits from your concept.
So, let’s take the time to analyze your audience. Who are they? Where are they? What are their day-to-day behaviors? How much time do they spend online? What other brands do they like? These questions can go on and on, but the more you familiarize yourself with your market (and not just what you think you know) the better you can accurately tailor your brand to their needs.
Step 4: Connect through your story.
Consumers are people—heck, businesses are people too. The way to connect with people is throughpeople and relatable life experiences. This step presents yet another opportunity to examine the alignment of our vision, purpose, promise and now, our market.
Think about what led you to the realization of your business purpose. What are the personal experiences that led you to your business concept? Maybe it’s the similarities in the experience of others that prompted you to launch your brand.
Tell the story behind your brand and think of the voice of your business or product as you tell it. What does it sound like? Does it appeal to and connect with your market? Compose the brand story and fine-tune its voice until it rings true and is relatable to your target market.
Step 5: Set your brand apart from the pack.
It is key to the success of any business, that its brand is distinguishable amongst others. That goes for the idea behind the concept as well as the look, feel and voice of the brand. We must work to stay ahead of trends and find creative ways to blend innovative traits into our brand. That doesn’t mean that your brand has to be complicated—often, simplicity stands out amongst the crowd—but it does mean your brand should be a breath of fresh air to your market.
Imitation is best form of flattery, but it can be deadly if you are the imitator. If you want any hope of competing at a legitimate level, stay away from logos, business names and packaging that looks similar to potential competitors. Instead, establish a visual identity that sets your brand apart and speaks to the brand you’ve developed throughout this process.
Specifying your area of business supports your effort to separate from the pack. This comes in handy when incorporating and trademarking as well. However, if I could add an honorary step to this process, it would be to allow room for expansion and growth in your brand. When you are distinguishing your brand from the rest, it is important to be clear and specific, but not so specific that you box yourself into a tight and limiting corner. If you’ve evaluated your current market, always consider the possibilities of opening your market at a later time, especially if it fits into your vision.
Building a successful brand is a beautiful art. I would venture to say it is a balancing act for the likes of a trapeze artist, but when carefully considering these key steps, you are certainly on your way. I can already feel the champagne bubbles tickling my nose.
What do you think are the defining components of a successful brand? Share your comments below. If you find this article helpful, share with your business-minded friends or colleagues.
The one thing I can tell you with great certainty is that life will pay whatever price you demand of it. In the building of my core knowledge, I have studied all of those who have been able to have a massive impact on the lives of others, including the Dean of Success coaching, Earl Nightingale, as well as Zig Ziglar, Bob Proctor, Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins, Eric Thomas, David Bayer, Les Brown and more. I have anatomized and dissected literary work like “The Alchemist,” “The Science of Getting Rich,” “Think & Grow Rich,” “Awakening the Sleeping Giant,” “As a Man Thinketh,” and so much more. What I can tell you is that life is not happening to you; it is responding to you.
Unlike any other species on this planet, you have the power to completely change your environment, your reality and the results that you are getting in life. I teach my clients that your mind is the genesis of your destiny and your thoughts are the seeds of your future fortune.
Not everyone is in the same situation, some people don’t even have a clue of what is possible for them — believing that poverty and suffering are their lots in life. Others know that there is something better, but they confused as to how to obtain it. There is so much noise being made with advice and instructions on how to get it that they simply become frustrated.
No matter who you are and where you start, your destiny is in your hands, and you either have what you need or the capacity to go out there and get it. You are the results of your thoughts and the limiting beliefs that they produce; if you want to produce something greater, you must change your thought patterns so that they positively impact your beliefs and expectations.
If you really want better, you must raise the expectations that you have for yourself in this life. You must raise the level of what you demand of yourself. Simply put, you have to raise your standards. ~ Rick Wallace, Ph.D., Psy.D.
Rick Wallace, Ph.D., Psy.D. is the Founder and CEO of The
Visionetics Institute and he is one of the leading life strategist and
business strategist in the world. His extensive background in human behavior, conjoined with his vast and in-depth experience as a business owner, allows him to work with his clients, as a life coach, life strategist, business strategist and therapist on multitudinous levels.
The Warrior concept and the Warrior’s creed is a concept and
tool that Dr. Wallace uses to help strengthen the self-image of his clients while painting a portrait of what is possible when a person is able to create a paradigm shift in their lives.
Dr. Wallace has authored and published more than 18 books that
address everything from self-awareness, finance, relationships and more.
You can get some of his more popular books at Barnes &
Noble, including:
If you are reading this article, it is likely that you want to know how to make the law of attraction work for you. First things first. When it comes to creating the life that you want for yourself, there is a clear and precise blueprint that is tried and proven. When you use this blueprint, which I teach in all of my Visionetics courses, especially the Elevation & Empowerment and the 1-on-1 Coaching programs, you can be assured that if you stay the course, you will make progress, and progress is the greatest part of fulfillment.
The law of attraction does not exist in a vacuum. It is a part of a highly complex dynamic through which the seven universal laws are constantly in effect. The seven universal laws include the law of Mentalism, the law of correspondence, the law of vibration, the law of rhythm, the law of cause and effect and the law of gender. The first three laws are immutable, but the last four can be transcended by those who are able to achieve a supreme state of existence. In essence, what I do for my clients is help them to achieve this supreme state so that they can achieve their desired outcome or results consistently throughout their lives.
If you want to make the law of attraction work for you, you must first understand that it is a law, not a mystic force. What I love about the law of attraction, and the seven universal laws, is just that, they are laws — meaning that they produce the same results, under the same circumstances each and every time. So, I know when I am working with my clients that if I can get them to buy into the process, I will get the required results.
The Importance of Setting Intent
When I first speak with my clients I get them to tell me exactly what it is that they expect to gain from working with me. I want to know what is the result they are looking for. What is the outcome they desire. Without having a lucid portrait of the outcome, it is impossible to set the path to get there. One of the reasons that the law of attraction fails to work for many people is the fact that they don’t know, with any specificity, the outcome they are looking for. They are more focused on what they don’t want. The problem with focusing on what you don’t want is that you place so much emphasis on the undesired outcome, that it becomes the central focus of your entire servomechanism.
Your mind uses your brain as a tool to accomplish those things that are necessary and desired. The problem is that the mind has to be clear on what it wants, not what it doesn’t want. When you focus on what you want — achieving the outcome will automatically ensure that you don’t get what you do not desire. But, focusing on the undesired outcome works to place it front and center, and you end up getting exactly what you didn’t want.
When you set your intent, your mind, your brain, your reticular activating system and your neurological pathways begin to work in harmony to bring you those things that you place the most emphasis on. Have you ever seen a car, an outfit or some other object that you decided you just had to have, and then all of a sudden, every time you look up you see it? The truth is that the car or shirt has always been there, but not until you made it a central focus in your life, did it begin to register on your radar. This is actually the work of the reticular activating system — a biological function through a physiological mechanism located at the top of the brain stem. The RAS literally identifies those things that the conscious mind places emphasis on and translates it as a target to the subconscious mind. This servomechanism is what drives you toward certain things and away from others.
This is why setting your intent is so important. When you set your intent, it is like setting the thermostat of your brain, or the autopilot on a plane. Your brain begins to function as a servomechanism through a process known as psycho-cybernetics. When intent is set, you are on a course toward the setting. Here is where many people run into a problem. Remember, that the subconscious mind will focus on that which is most consistently entertained. It cannot differentiate between what is desired and what is not, only what is consistently entertained in a person’s thoughts. The process is also influenced by a person’s belief system. If a person does not believe that a desired result is within their grasp, it will impact the process through a number of factors, and they will, in some way, self-sabotage their efforts.
The Power of Homeostasis
It is important to understand that the law of attraction is not some magic wand that you simply wave around and get what you want. It is actually one component, in a highly complex dynamic, in which a person attracts that which they are in harmony with. A person who suffers in the areas of poor self-image, or a poor self-concept, will not be able to attract to themselves anything associated with greatness, because the servomechanism will continually point them towards behavior and habits that produce the results associated with their expectations, based on their own self-concept. In other words, you cannot become what you do not believe you have the capacity to be.
The law of attraction is about placing yourself in a position of homeostasis with those things you desire. This means that you must be vibrating on the same plane as those things you want. You can’t function at a low frequency, creating low vibrations, and expect to obtain anything that is at a higher frequency and vibration. No amount of positive affirmations and positive thinking can produce that. You get who you are.
As Tony Robbins says, “to get greater results, you must raise your standards.” When you raise your standards, you automatically raise your expectations, impacting your belief systems.
You can never attract what you, yourself, are not in direct harmony with. ~ Rick Wallace, Ph.D., Psy.D.
Co-author EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE 2.0 & President at TalentSmart
Why the 8-Hour Workday Doesn’t Work
The 8-hour workday is an outdated and ineffective approach to work. If you want to be as productive as possible, you need to let go of this relic and find a new approach.
The 8-hour workday was created during the industrial revolution as an effort to cut down on the number of hours of manual labor that workers were forced to endure on the factory floor. This breakthrough was a more humane approach to work two hundred years ago, yet it possesses little relevance for us today.
Like our ancestors, we’re expected to put in 8-hour days, working in long, continuous blocks of time, with few or no breaks. Heck, most people even work right through their lunch hour!
This antiquated approach to work isn’t helping us; it’s holding us back.
The Best Way to Structure Your Day
A study recently conducted by the Draugiem Group used a computer application to track employees’ work habits. Specifically, the application measured how much time people spent on various tasks and compared this to their productivity levels.
In the process of measuring people’s activity, they stumbled upon a fascinating finding: the length of the workday didn’t matter much; what mattered was how people structured their day. In particular, people who were religious about taking short breaks were far more productive than those who worked longer hours.
The ideal work-to-break ratio was 52 minutes of work, followed by 17 minutes of rest. People who maintained this schedule had a unique level of focus in their work. For roughly an hour at a time, they were 100% dedicated to the task they needed to accomplish. They didn’t check Facebook “real quick” or get distracted by e-mails. When they felt fatigue (again, after about an hour), they took short breaks, during which they completely separated themselves from their work. This helped them to dive back in refreshed for another productive hour of work.
Your Brain Wants an Hour On, 15 Minutes Off
People who have discovered this magic productivity ratio crush their competition because they tap into a fundamental need of the human mind: the brain naturally functions in spurts of high energy (roughly an hour) followed by spurts of low energy (15–20 minutes).
For most of us, this natural ebb and flow of energy leaves us wavering between focused periods of high energy followed by far less productive periods, when we tire and succumb to distractions.
The best way to beat exhaustion and frustrating distractions is to get intentional about your workday. Instead of working for an hour or more and then trying to battle through distractions and fatigue, when your productivity begins to dip, take this as a sign that it’s time for a break.
Real breaks are easier to take when you know they’re going to make your day more productive. We often let fatigue win because we continue working through it (long after we’ve lost energy and focus), and the breaks we take aren’t real breaks (checking your e-mail and watching YouTube doesn’t recharge you the same way as taking a walk does).
Take Charge of Your Workday
The 8-hour workday can work for you if you break your time into strategic intervals. Once you align your natural energy with your effort, things begin to run much more smoothly. Here are four tips that will get you into that perfect rhythm.
Break your day into hourly intervals. We naturally plan what we need to accomplish by the end of the day, the week, or the month, but we’re far more effective when we focus on what we can accomplish right now. Beyond getting you into the right rhythm, planning your day around hour-long intervals simplifies daunting tasks by breaking them into manageable pieces. If you want to be a literalist, you can plan your day around 52-minute intervals if you like, but an hour works just as well.
Respect your hour. The interval strategy only works because we use our peak energy levels to reach an extremely high level of focus for a relatively short amount of time. When you disrespect your hour by texting, checking e-mails, or doing a quick Facebook check, you defeat the entire purpose of the approach.
Take real rest. In the study at Draugiem, they found that employees who took more frequent rests than the hourly optimum were more productive than those who didn’t rest at all. Likewise, those who took deliberately relaxing breaks were better off than those who, when “resting,” had trouble separating themselves from their work. Getting away from your computer, your phone, and your to-do list is essential to boosting your productivity. Breaks such as walking, reading, and chatting are the most effective forms of recharging because they take you away from your work. On a busy day, it might be tempting to think of dealing with e-mails or making phone calls as breaks, but they aren’t, so don’t give in to this line of thought.
Don’t wait until your body tells you to take a break. If you wait until you feel tired to take a break, it’s too late—you’ve already missed the window of peak productivity. Keeping to your schedule ensures that you work when you’re the most productive and that you rest during times that would otherwise be unproductive. Remember, it’s far more productive to rest for short periods than it is to keep on working when you’re tired and distracted.
Bringing It All Together
Breaking your day down into chunks of work and rest that match your natural energy levels feels good, makes your workday go faster, and boosts your productivity.
Do you notice your energy and focus waxing and waning according to the cycle described above? Please share your thoughts in the comments section below, as I learn just as much from you as you do from me.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Dr. Travis Bradberry is the award-winning co-author of the #1 bestselling book, Emotional Intelligence 2.0, and the cofounder of TalentSmart, the world’s leading provider of emotional intelligence tests and training, serving more than 75% of Fortune 500 companies. His bestselling books have been translated into 25 languages and are available in more than 150 countries. Dr. Bradberry has written for, or been covered by, Newsweek, TIME, BusinessWeek, Fortune, Forbes, Fast Company, Inc., USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and The Harvard Business Review.
If you’d like to learn how to increase your emotional intelligence (EQ), consider taking the online Emotional Intelligence Appraisal test that’s included with the Emotional Intelligence 2.0 book. Your test results will pinpoint which of the book’s 66 emotional intelligence strategies will increase your EQ the most.
5 Remarkable Steps to Reach Your Financial Goals Faster
5 Remarkable Steps to Reach Your Financial Goals Faster
Introduction
While we are all human, we are not all the same in the way of desire and expectation. With that being said, we all have financial goals that are unique to us — serving our own unique desires. There are some of us who have immensely extreme financial goals that include a private jet, owning an island and multiple vacation homes in exotic places. Others have more modest goals that are the ones that matter most to them, such as never having to be concerned about having enough money to pay the basic bills and household expenses. There are even others who would simply love to have enough extra money to take the family on an annual European vacation.
At the end of the day, it is my belief that everyone should have financial goals that at least ensure that they are financially independent — having enough money to not only cover all of the day-to-day expenses for life, but enough to enjoy some of the pleasures of life that make it worth living. After all, we are not here simply to survive, we are here to live and thrive.
The point is to make the game of financial achievement and success a winnable one. It does not matter if you are just getting started on your financial goals, or whether you have been working on your financial dream for a while, there are some actionable steps that you can take that will fast track the process.
While most people are aware of one of the most important steps in the pursuit of financial freedom, far too many fail to activate it. In order to take control of your financial destiny, one of the first things that you must do is transition from the position of consumer to that of business owner and investor. You must be able to produce, own and sell a product or service that continually adds to your net worth. If you are completely new to the idea of building wealth, you may not have an understanding of what net worth means. In its simplest form, the term “net worth” is the representation of your total worth, including all liquid and hard assets, after your debt has been subtracted.
If you are going to build wealth and become financially independent, then you are going to have to become an owner and an investor. In fact, you should start investing immediately, no matter how small the amount, because this will allow you to tap into the power of compounding growth. If you are like most people that come to me on a limited income, you are probably saying that I don’t have any discretionary income to invest. This is because you are still in need of an adjustment in how you think toward and view money. The truth is that you do have the money to invest; you are just spending it on other things that you have currently placed a higher value on.
Allow me to give you an example of how changing your spending priorities can help you build your wealth with much less upfront capital than you think. If you eat out once a week, spending an average of $50 per week. Try ordering pizza on that night and splitting the cost among the group that you eat out with. This could result in a savings of $40 per week or approximately $2,000 per year. That $2,000 savings invested in products that produce an 8 percent compound return over forty years will produce $581,944. And, the exciting news is that there are actually index funds that produce as high as 9.2 percent consistently over the last 20 years.
How many other activities that are focused on sucking as much out of your bank account now as possible are you currently involved in? Building wealth requires that you are able to look beyond the moment and see into the distant future, where there will be financial needs at a time in which there may not be the physical or mental capacity to produce the required revenue.
Changing your approach to see into the future does not mean that you cannot create a great life for you now. In fact, the more you develop the proper mindset for wealth building, the more you will be prepared to create a lifestyle for yourself in which you can have many of those things you fantasize about, but you have convinced yourself you can never have. A person who has the right mindset does not see giving up nights out and certain forms of entertainment as a sacrifice, they see it as an investment in a better financial future. The quicker you make the change in your thinking, the quicker you will be able to experience the reality of your new thought patterns.
When I begin working with my new clients, whether it is through my Elevation & Empowerment program, my 1-on-1 Coaching program, or any of my other direct engagement programs and services I offer, I make sure that they understand that their current position in life is a direct result of their thinking. There is unyielding truth in the statement, “you are what you think.” If you have not read “As a Man Thinketh” by James Allen, you should do that immediately. It is a very interesting read, and it identifies exactly how your thoughts produce your reality through a series of circumstances. You see, contrary to popular belief, life is not happening to you, it is responding to you. The quicker you gain a lucid perspicacity of this reality, the quicker you will be able to take control of your life and your financial destiny.
Save More and Invest the Difference
Many people will quickly tell me that they do not have the money to save for the purpose of investing, or anything else. For the most part, I am always able to find far more that they initially believed was available. For those individuals that are serious, I challenge them to save at least 10 percent of their net income for the purpose of investing. I personally save 20 percent of all revenue I generate. When people ask me how, I explain that I treat the money like a luxury or investment tax. If the federal government were to increase your taxes by 20 percent today, you would complain, and maybe even scream bloody murder, but at the end of the day, you would pay it and make the necessary adjustments to your lifestyle. What totally blows my mind is that people will so easily acquiesce to giving up their money to another entity that will not return it with any type of interest or growth, but refuse to pay themselves in order to produce a better lifestyle for them and their family.
It is important to abandon the consumer mindset that drives you to spend your money on things that almost immediately depreciate in value, in lieu of investing in things that either increase in value, or at the very least, hold their value.
You must also develop a better understanding of your necessary expenditures, such as the purchase of a home. As of July 2015, the average cost of a home in the United States was $361,000, and that cost has continued to increase as a national inventory shortage is steadily driving prices upward. But even at the 2015 cost, at six percent interest, and 20 percent down, the house will end up costing you an additional $334,000, which is nearly double the value of the home. So, the first thing that you should learn from this is that a home, at least in the initial years of paying for it, is not an asset. It is a liability that counts against your net worth. How you manage your spending now will impact how this liability impacts your long-term financial health. If you manage your spending wisely, and invest wisely, you can end up paying off your home early — saving hundreds of thousands of dollars in compound interest.
Most people see interest as a small percentage of a larger amount, but they fail to take into consideration the impact of compounding. Allow me to show you how powerful having an understanding of how spending your money can immediately change your financial outlook. I am sure that you would love to put $400,000 to $1 million aside for your retirement. Let me show you how easy that can be. In addition to your usual mortgage payments, make small principal-only payments each month and watch your mortgage get cut in half. That is the power of compounding interest. Compounding interest is in direct correspondence to the principal amount, if you reduce the principal, you reduce the interest. This also works in the reverse in wealth building, as you increase your principal holdings, you increase the amount of interest you will be paid in annual compound growth.
There are multitudinous ways to cut back on your spending in order to save more for investing, from paying down the principal on your mortgage to cutting back on your coffee addiction.
Earn More and Invest the Difference
One of the biggest mistakes that people make is that they become conditioned to live at the level of their means, so any time there is an increase in income, they immediately increase their spending. Instead of increasing your cost of living, look for ways to decrease it, and invest the difference in revenue generating ventures.
Most people get stuck here, and that is where I come in. The truth is that your earning potential is virtually unlimited. Before moving forward allow me to explain how you can directly impact your earning potential.
There are three primary components that impact how much you have the capacity to earn, whether you are working for yourself, or working for someone else. It is worth noting that any time that you are working for someone else, you are always leaving money on the table.
Think about it for a moment. No company is going to pay you exactly what you are worth to them. To put it another way, if your employer is making $500,000 as a direct result of the services you provide, they are not going to pay you $500,000. Depending on the industry you are in, you could be paid as little as 20 percent of what you are generating for your employer. This means that you possess the capacity to generate that and more as a contractor or consultant, but we will shelve this for a future conversation.
For now, let’s just look at the three components that directly impact your earning potential.
Providing a service or product that meets a demand, need or solves an existing problem
Performing what you do at an exceptional level
Being so unique and exceptional at what you do that it makes it almost impossible to replace you
Meeting a Need
The first step in creating earning potential is to find what you are naturally good at, and find out how it can meet an existing need or solve an existing problem. While there are demands for things that are not needed or don’t solve a problem, these things are not necessary, and the demand can easily dissipate, but when you are meeting some type of need, you have the foundation for earning money, and you don’t need an employer to do it.
Exceptional Performance
Even if you are the first person to service a particular need in a specific type of way, you must understand that you will have others observing what you are doing and looking to capitalize on your revenue generating channel. That is okay, it is a part of the world of free enterprise. The way that you protect your brand and your position as the leader in the market is by providing the highest level of service and performance as possible. Performance and service are immensely important to creating the type of relationships with your clients that will lead to continuity and customer loyalty.
Become Irreplaceable
Find a way to deliver your product and services in a way that is so unique to you and your unique gifting that it makes you irreplaceable. When you become irreplaceable, you can literally set your price and people will pay it.
The key is to always provide more value than the price you charge — leaving your clients with the feeling that they received remarkable value for their spend. As long as your value exceeds your price, and continues to meet a need, you will thrive in your market. Keep your pulse on the needs and impulses of your target audience, in order to stay ahead of the game.
Work harder on yourself than you work on your job. The late, great Jim Rohn used to say that all the time. In fact, Jim Rohn was a personal mentor to Tony Robbins, who is by far the most effective and wealthiest person in the industry of personal development, and that is a direct result of working harder on himself than he did on his job. When he started, he was working as a janitor.
Basically, stop focusing on the things around you that you have no direct control over, and place your energy into controlling those things you do control. When you focus on self-improvement, with specific intent, you automatically increase your value and your earning capacity.
Be Aware of Your Fees and Taxes
This is an area in which so many people surrender a significant portion of their earnings. This is where the average person and the wealthy investor differ. In studying the ultra-wealthy — those with a net worth of $1 billion or more — there are four common denominators that exist.
The consideration of the potential risk of loss over the potential to earn money
Asymmetric risk/reward (investing a little to earn a lot)
An awareness of the fees and taxes associated with a particular investment
Diversification across assets
By this point in the game, you should have, at least, a limited understanding that it is not what you earn that matters, but what you keep. Do you know what takes the single largest chunk out of your retirement fund? Taxes. Generally speaking, Americans pay more than half of their earned income to some form of tax. Depending on what tax bracket you are in, and the state you reside in, you could easily be paying as high as 52 percent of your income to income, payroll, healthcare, social security and other taxes.
With taxes taking such a large chunk of your income, it is important to develop a mindset of tax efficiency, which is one of the most direct paths to financial health. This is not a suggestion to evade your responsibility to pay taxes, but to find legal and moral ways to reduce your tax liability. One place that you can go to have your current portfolio evaluated for excessive fees, taxes and other risks is Portfolio Checkup. Within minutes you can have your financial and investment portfolio evaluated, as well as receive recommendations on how to improve it.
It is also immensely important to be cognizant of what you are paying in fees to invest in certain assets and funds. Hidden fees are another silent killer of financial dreams, and the quicker you get your fees under control, the greater the long-term benefit.
Generate Better Returns
You may be wondering how in the world can you reduce your risks while generating greater returns. Well, the way that the ultra-wealthy do it is to practice an investment philosophy known as asymmetric risk/reward. Basically, asymmetric risk/reward is a technical way of saying invest a little where there is the potential to earn a lot. While most novice investors are being told that they have to be willing to risk a lot to make a lot, the wealthy practice finding situations in which they can invest a little and gain a lot. The reduced risk protects them from thedownsidee across assets. In other words if they are only investing $10 to make a hundred across 10 different assets, they can literally be wrong nine times out of the 10 and still win. This is much better than investing $100 to gain $15 to $20 dollars, but how many of you have heard that a 15 to 20 percent return is good?
Major players in the market, like Paul Tudor Jones, Ray Dalio, Carl Ichan and Warren Buffet, understand that no matter how much they know about the market, there will still be times that they are wrong, but asymmetric risk/reward allows them to be wrong along the way. While I used a 10:1 risk/reward ration earlier, Paul Tudor Jones says that he always looks for a 5:1 ratio or better. This means he is looking to gain $5 dollars for every $1 he invests. While these types of investment opportunities are more challenging to find, they are out there.
Another way that you can reduce your risk, subsequently increasing your returns is through diversification. While most people who familiar with diversification associate it with risk management, it also can serve to increase returns. So, asset allocation is key to long-term success in the worlds of wealth-building and investing. You see, your financial dreams are not as far away as you believe.
Make Changes to Your Current Lifestyle
While there are many people who never consider any type of radical change in life, even when it could produce a better quality of life, it is something worth considering. For instance, if you currently live in Manhattan, or a number of other areas in New York or in the Bay Area, you can move to any number of cities in Texas of Boulder, Colorado, for that matter and live an awesome life with just what you pay for rent or mortgages in the aforementioned cities. It is amazing how many people feel trapped in an environment that is not providing them with what they desire. Sometimes, a radical change in lifestyle and situations are needed.
Even if you don’t switch cities, switch environments, and find ways to reduce your spending. Also, find positive situations that will support your new-found desire for wealth building. Your financial dreams are within your grasp, but you must be willing to take the necessary actions to achieve them.
For those who are looking for a more direct approach to self-improvement and increased performance, I would love to work with you. Check out some of the resources listed below.
