Mind your thoughts: You’ll get what you think

I’m often struck by how much energy one person will put into their thoughts of doom and gloom and then watch how doom and gloom are repeatedly manifested in their lives. At the same time, and under the same life conditions, another person will see only the best that life has to offer and those expressions are realized and without any other rationale as to why these things should come to pass except they believe they should; no evidence to support their thoughts, just the belief that good things will happen to them.

Why, then, if the key to getting what you want is rooted only in your belief you should have what you want, more people don’t believe?

One reason is likely that many of us live with falsehoods told to us by others; falsehoods told not out of maliciousness but of beliefs ingrained by others. When the bad invariably happens because we have always believed they will, we then have the evidence to support that the belief was, in fact, true and, since it happened to us, we can now confidently pass this “truth” onto others. However, the counter is also true.

Many years ago, I took a commission-only sales job with a company that just felt right despite there not being a set salary. I asked a new colleague what I could reasonably expect to earn in my first year. She said I would earn $80,000/year without breaking a sweat as she had done in her first year. In less than 6 months, I was earning more than $9,000/month and having a fabulous time. At my former employer, I was earning $36,000/year and everyday was a struggle.

Did I learn some new sales techniques, have a better product to sell, or did the company do a better job of promoting itself than my former employer? Nope. We sold the same products, I managed customers in the same way, and the company did not do any more or any less promoting than my former employer. The difference was that $80,000 per year was the new starting point. I could no longer see $36,000/year as being realistic earnings and from that, everything flowed. Whatever was needed – contacts, introductions, meetings – to produce this outcome was materialized. I can offer no other explanation as to why this happened except that I was told I would earn a minimum of $80,000 per year and to do that, other things had to happen and they did. It was pure belief the goal would be achieved.

We are shackled by the falsehoods of others. Their limitations, their beliefs, and their worries are passed onto others as “truths” with their poor outcomes proof of what is not possible. Often this is because they don’t feel they are worthy of what they want. This unworthiness, however, is created by another person’s belief they they, themselves, are not worthy so that this must be the state for most humans. Do you see the pattern? But worth is not founded in some universal lottery where there are winners and losers. Everyone is worthy of achieving whatever they dream possible. The “trick" is in believing whatever you want is already yours. There is nothing more you need to do.

You can learn a lot from a cathedral in Barcelona

On a trip to Barcelona last year, we visited La Sagrada Familiá, a cathedral 127 years in the making. Work on the cathedral began in 1882 and continues to this day. I saw a connection in this for those who are looking to ramp up, change, or otherwise begin a career and are probably wondering – when is it ever going to happen? Consider that if it takes 127 years and counting to build one cathedral, the 6, 8, 12 or even more months it may take to create or refashion your career is a mere drop in the time bucket. But, hey, building something spectacular and meant to last takes time. There’s just no getting around it.

This is difficult for those who are supremely cognizant of time and see every minute of not doing something we love or fulfilling our needs as just wasting time even while busy doing the very things you need in order to move in exactly that direction. If you were building a house, you wouldn’t chide yourself for taking time to prepare the land, pour the foundation, construct the walls, and so on. If you didn’t do anything of these things you wouldn’t have a house.

These, then, are the days in which you are laying the foundation for your La Sagrada Familiá.

What is Your One-Hundredth Second Advantage?

Only a mere one-hundredth of a second produced Michael Phelps’ win over Serbia’s Milorad Cavic at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Phelps came in at 50.58 seconds and Cavic at 50.59 seconds. Phelps was later quoted as saying he started to hurt during the final ten meters but pushed himself just that tiniest bit more to victory.

This got me thinking about the close wins that happen when people compete for a job, a promotion, or anything else where a decision must be made as to who will be the winner based upon a personal advantage. For job candidates, this is something everyone fears – that an opponent has one teeny, tiny advantage that allows them to be the first to “touch the wall” and you only a breath away. The question then becomes:

What one-hundredth second advantage do you have?

I recall when I competed for a job against 57 candidates; all of them from inside the organization. Before my interview, their one-hundredth second advantage was that they were already “in”. However, in my pre-interview research, I learned the company had a new CEO who believed they were under-utilizing their resources to reach out to more customers. Realizing that if those current candidates knew how to maximize their resources, they already would have, this knowledge gave me the one-hundredth second advantage when providing examples of how I turned minimal resources into amazing feats of sales success. Game over for the 57.

In the case of interviewing for a new job, it is likely you won’t know, going in, what your competition has to offer or the company’s pain so you won’t know if you have a miles-long or one-hundredth of a second advantage. Pre-interview research can help in some instances but, failing that, ask the interviewer. Consider that Michael Phelps knows his competition for each race. He has the ability to study his competition and prepare accordingly. He knows his competitors’ strengths and weaknesses, the lay of the land (pool), and, as a side note, takes care with what he wears into the pool.

You can do the same thing. Ask the interviewer how many people are competing for the job. Of those competitors, what are the things they like best and the things they like least about that person or persons? In addition to learning how you need to position yourself to take that one-hundredth second advantage, you will also learn what the company values in its employees. If, for example, the interviewer tells you that your competition will bring their former employer’s customer list to the new job and you find this to be unethical, you may want to save your time and energy for a race that really matters to you.