How to Handle Money

I know it’s tough to face this situation in life, especially when you still have dreams you’re trying to pursue and goals you want to accomplish. When the bank account reflects hopelessness, that’s a difficult place to be. I’ve certainly been there. There is something you can do. You can improve your circumstances – you must believe that and get to work doing that.

Here are 5 steps to start digging out:

1. Don’t Lie. Face the situation, be real, and be honest with yourself and others. If you don’t face this reality, you can’t fix it. Avoidance might feel like a great short term strategy to find comfort, but avoidance is also a guaranteed long term strategy to achieve misery. Avoiding this situation will only empower you to continue the same spending behavior that got you into trouble in the first place. It’s time to get real and realize this is a dire situation and you must develop new ways of thinking, spending and saving.
2. Take immediate action. As soon as you realize you are in financial trouble, it’s time to take immediate action. Sit down, go through your bills, itemize everything, be honest about your spending, and immediately start cutting out services and expenses that are not absolutely necessary for your survival. Rather than taking the approach of whittling away your excess spending over a period of months, go in and literally obliterate expenses starting right now, today. Don’t worry – you can always add things that you love back into your life later one, once you’re back in a stable financial place. But for now, slash spending mercilessly. 
3. Ask for Help. Verbalize the reality of the situation with the people in your life. The longer you tell yourself  lies and avoid seeking external help, the longer you’re going to continue with problematic behavior… and the longer the situation will persist and grow. Asking for help can include asking your family, friends and colleagues for ideas on how to add value in your career, how to grow revenue, and what to do in order to stand out in the marketplace. Asking for help can also include asking for a financial handout, depending on the kind of financial situation you’re in. Asking for help may require that you swallow your pride and sacrifice the ego. However, over the long term, asking for help can leave you feeling strong, bold and supported while also setting you up to receive abundance and wealth later on.
4. Save 10% to 20% now. Regardless of your income level, get into the habit of saving or safely investing at least 10 to 20 percent of your income. You may be in the position you’re in right now due to a lack of a decision to save responsibly and appropriately years ago. Do whatever it takes, but do not live beyond your means and make sure to start putting aside money now.
5. Retool. You need to transition from leisure time to learning and training time. Ask yourself “What new skills can I learn right now? What new competencies must I develop? What’s everybody else doing in my industry or career that I can follow or that I can implement?” Retooling is a very important step to take when you’re broke. See below for previous posts that can help you.
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   What To Do When You’re Broke

   Here are five important strategies to follow when you’re broke.
   
   Now, you came here because this is The Charged Life, but by no means am I lacking sympathy for the reality of lacking money in life. So, I get this.
   If you are in the position of being broke, keep your head up. I know it’s hard. I know it’s difficult when you still have dreams and you want to accomplish so much in your life, but the bank account says that there is no hope. That’s a difficult place to be. I’ve certainly been there.
   At the beginning of my career as a writer and a trainer, I immediately went broke. I mean, really broke.  And unfortunately, I was living in San Francisco at the time, a place where at the time a burrito was $9. So, it was difficult.  Also, I grew up in an economically depressed Irish mining town in Montana. I’ve been around financially difficult circumstances throughout my life, from my career to my childhood, wherein we lacked funds and were unable to live a good quality of life. I just share all of that because I want to let you know that I understand the difficulty and severity of the situation.
   If you’re struggling financially, I think this is an important episode for you. It doesn’t matter if you have a nice house, a car and kids, but honestly, you’ve got those four or five credit cards and you’re actually drowning in debt while everyone else sees you doing well on the outside. Or, you’re in a place where you’re just starting out and you graduated from college or you graduated from high school, and now the credit card debt or the house or the mortgage or some bad decision has left you lacking money.
   Regardless of the situation, these five things are a must. You must pay attention to them. If you don’t, you will only dig yourself further and further into the hole. They’re important.
   #1: Don’t Lie
    Stop lying to yourself. That’s what we do when we’re broke.
   

   When we’re painted into a corner, concerned, and all of a sudden we’re in debt, we just say, “Ah, it will get better.”

   Meanwhile, you continue with the same spending behavior, or you lie to yourself and say, “Well, something will come along. Something will change. Fate will turn my corner and everything will be fine.” However, that’s usually not true. And what you end up doing is you avoid the harsh realities of life that you don’t like.
   

   Avoidance is a great short term strategy to find comfort. But avoidance is also a great long term strategy to guarantee misery.

   So, do not avoid the situation. If you are in financial despair, do not pretend it doesn’t exist. I did that. I’ve had friends do that. Millions of our readers and followers and commenters over the last decade have shared their experience with this, asking me, “What do I do Brendon?” And the first thing I advise is: don’t lie.
   

   Face it, be real, and be honest. If you don’t face this reality, you can’t fix this reality, and you can’t fix the revenue issue.

   It has to be something you take into real consideration, and you need to be aware of and in acceptance of the fact that it’s time to deal with this. Maybe you’ve known that you were broke six months ago, but you haven’t changed any behaviors because you’re scared to face it.
   Face it, or you will not change it. This is the most important step.
   

   Stop lying to yourself. When it’s bad, you have to accept that it’s bad.

   You can’t say with hope or optimism, “Eh, it will get better,” because when people do that, they dig themselves further and further into pain.
   #2: Take immediate action
   As soon as you realize you are in financial trouble, it’s immediate, swift, SWAT team time. It’s time to sit down, go through your bills, itemize everything, and be honest.
   Ask yourself: “What am I spending?”
   

   This isn’t just about creating a budget. Itemize everything and then be ruthless. Cut it out.

   You don’t need that cable subscription. You don’t need that subscription over here for the $49 music subscription you signed up for four years ago and then never used.
   You need to be ruthless. You need to start axing expenses immediately. That is what I mean when I advise you to take immediate action. Rather than keeping some of the things that you like, axe everything. Reduce down to the simplest survival terms, only including the stuff that you need. For example, you may need an internet service for your small business or your career. However, even with the internet, you can get a free connection down at a local coffee shop near your home. Basically, consider this question: “Do I need that bill?”
   When you’re in a lot of trouble, just axe it all. Don’t worry: you can add it back to your life later when you are back to financial abundance. But for now, axe everything. Literally clean house of all expenses. You might find yourself saying: “Yeah, I know, but I can go out with my friends and drop $50 on sushi.” Don’t follow through with that idea, because if you don’t take immediate action now to change that spending behavior that got you in trouble in the first place, you’re never going to get out.
   It has to be a cold turkey halt on spending.
   

   Rather than taking the approach of whittling away your excess spending over a period of months, go in and literally obliterate expenses.

   Some people respond to this advice by saying: “Well, Brendon, you’re just telling people to live a hard life.”
   My response to that is: “Yeah, you’re in trouble. Let’s get honest.”
   If you are in trouble, you need to obliterate expenses and itemize everything.
   

   If you’re going to get on track sooner than later, you need to reduce your expenses to support minimalist survival.

   Some people believe that the short term pain is too much. I’m here to tell you, though, that the long term payoff is worth it. I advise you to continue taking responsible action, pay the bills that you can afford to pay, and continue taking care of your family at the utmost of your ability. But do not be extravagant in any area. Cut everything out that you can because you can always add it later.
   If you take the approach of slowly cutting things out over a period of months, you’ll just widen the length of time it’s going to take to course-correct. Like a SWAT team, you need to take immediate action and you need to be appropriately hard on yourself.  Accept the fact that you don’t need that new pair of shoes when you’re out. You don’t need the fancy dinner.  Just go Spartan. Strip it all down, and itemize.
   I can’t believe how many people today are wandering around broke, but they’re still buying nice stuff, luxury goods, and subscribing to 20 things. They’re avoiding reality. They’re in so much pain that they are avoiding the credit card statement; they’re not even looking at it. They’re avoiding everything that they can, and they’re not getting real.
   

   They’re doing everything that they can to create a falsehood that’s only digging them deeper.

   You need to take immediate action.
   #3: Ask For Help
   

   You have to verbalize this. You have to ask for help.

   If you are broke, you have to discuss it, because the longer you tell yourself the internal lie and don’t seek external help, the longer you’re going to continue in this behavior pattern and this problem will persist. So, you have to tell your spouse, “Honey, we have to have a talk. We’re broke”. You have to go to your parents and be honest by saying: “Mom, dad, I screwed up. I’m broke.” You need to tell the team, “You know what? We are in a harsh situation in the business right now. I’m going to have to make some cuts.”
   You have to take immediate action and you have to ask for help. One way to do this is by asking your team: “What else could we do to generate some revenue”
   

   This may seem very vulnerable, but what’s worse would be to lie and then lay them all off one day without giving them the opportunity to offer their input on how to improve the business. In this scenario, they can’t afford their mortgages because you weren’t honest earlier.

   And now, you’re living at your parents’ house again because you didn’t ask the people around you the following questions:
   “What else do you think I could do here at this job? What else you think I could do in this marketplace? What else could I do to add some value here?”
   That’s the secret. When your back is against the wall, you need to ask for a lot of help, even if ‘help’ just takes the form of some ideas. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you ask for a handout, though that might be a part of it, depending on where you’re at. You might approach asking for help like this: “Hey, I’m in this financial situation. For a person in my situation, what else do you think I could do? Do you know of any opportunities or better jobs?”
   

   Put it out there. If you’re not going to put it out there, no one’s going to suddenly raise their hand and throw you a life raft. No one sees you drowning.

   You have to call for help. It’s necessary. Does that mean swallowing your pride? Yes,  it does.
   

   But look, if you’re going to let pride keep you from a life that you deserve to live, you must reassess by looking at what’s more important: your ego or ultimate long term life experience.

   I recommend that you sacrifice the ego by asking for help so that over the long term, you can feel strong, bold and confident while having abundance and wealth later on.  But, in order to get there, you have to be willing to ask for help.
   #4: Save 10%-20% now
   If you won’t save 10% when you’re making $100, don’t think 10 years from now when you’re making $100,000, $1 million or $10 million, that you will save 10%.
   

   People always think that one day, they’ll start to save. Today’s the day to start saving. 

   You need to start saving right now. Matter of fact, aren’t you in the position you’re in right now due to a lack of a decision to save responsibly and appropriately years ago? You need to change this mindset. When you receive money, 10% minimum goes into savings or intelligent investments immediately. The only intelligent long term investment is S&P 500 index funds. They are the only thing to beat the market. If you’re not at the level of investing, put your money in your savings account. Then pay the bills, and do everything else.
   

   People used to know to create a rainy day fund. Now, people are living such luxurious lifestyles way beyond their means. They’re not facing a rainy day; they’re facing a tsunami of bills because they didn’t live responsibly.

   They felt entitled. They believed that they should live like everybody else lives: $500 watches, $200 pairs of shoes, and $300 dollar jeans.
   If they have those things, why shouldn’t I? You shouldn’t because you’re broke. There is no harm, no foul in buying your clothes from Goodwill. Do whatever it takes, but do not live beyond your means and don’t forget to start saving. Otherwise, you’re going to be in trouble.
   #5: Retool
   What new skills do you need? What do you need to master in order to get to that next level?
   
   Here’s an example of the best thing I did when I was dirt poor. I was in a situation where I owed thousands and thousands of dollars. I was in a really bad position and I had no revenue at all. It was difficult. My then girlfriend was buying me groceries. I had to move into her apartment. I had already couch-surfed with friends at that time, and they were tired of me. I can’t tell you how many blow-up mattresses I lived on at that time. It was a rough time.
   And luckily, I believed in my ability to figure things out. I had confidence. I was facing reality. I stripped down all of my expenses, while also looking at what new skills I was going to have to develop in order to either grow my business or get a new job. I had to locate what was relevant at the time that was going to help me.
   I stopped pursuing hobbies and I started saying, “What are the skill sets needed to make money?” At the time, the answer for me to learn online marketing, getting my message out there, copywriting, functional aspects of doing what I do as a writer and as a trainer online. I had to figure those things out. I studied everybody.
   And the questions that guided my research included: “What do they do to make money? What kinds of products do they create? How do they sell it? What sales psychology do they employ?”
   
   At the time, I had to learn those things.
   I don’t know what career field you’re in, but you better identify the skills you need to develop to go to the next level of your career. You need to start learning on the side.

   You need to transition from leisure time to learning and training time.

   Ask yourself “What new skills can I learn right now? What new competencies must I develop? What’s everybody else doing in my industry or career that I can follow or that I can implement? What are the masters doing?” Everything must shift to from leisure to learning.
   You need to learn and retool in order to get to the next level. It’s very important to focus in on this while you’re broke.
   Some people think that since they’re broke, they should wait until the situation gets better before they start learning or retooling.
   You need to learn now. You need to stop your expenses to the utmost ability, learn now, and save now. I know it’s hard, I know you want to just avoid it, I know it sucks and I know sometimes you’re mad at yourself. You know what? That’s okay, too.
   You were mad at yourself. You had the appropriate amount of guilt. Now, believe in your ability to figure things out.
   

   You’ve figured out things in the past, and you got through it. You will survive this situation if you address it appropriately and you keep believing in yourself.

   Continue looking for new ways to add value. Ask for help. Retool. You can figure this out.
   If you’d like to learn more about how to handle money or add value, please check out more of my videos on YouTube. And as always, believe in your ability to figure things out.
   You can still have confidence when you’re broke, meaning that you believe in your ability to figure things out.
   

   Believe in your ability to figure things out, and you will.

   Believe and trust in yourself, and take appropriate action right now. You can do this. It’s going to be difficult in the short term, but by facing it now, you will get back on track for the long term. You will back to living The Charged Life.

How to Overcome Adversity

When that adversity strikes, rather than seeing it as some terrible moment, perhaps perceive it as a called moment; a moment in which you are being asked to rise up, a moment in which you’re being challenged and brought to task to be able to summon your real strength. It’s a moment calling you to summon more empathy, more love, more caring, more strength, more ambition, and more go-to-it-ness.

I don’t know what it is for you, but when adversity strikes, I always keep a pretty positive head on my shoulders while accepting that this particular situation is hard. I don’t pretend it doesn’t suck, but I have to be able to move through it if I’m going to survive.

So, now I’d like to share five big ideas with you that address the following questions:

• How do you manage adversity?
• What should you do when it strikes?
• How can you deal with it better than how you’ve dealt with it in the past?

If you’re reading this, then you’re already a striver. You have some of the basics down, and you have some resilience. However, maybe it’s harder now.

There are so many things going on for so many people, making it harder to bounce back.

When everyone’s juggling so many obligations, big ambition and opportunities, sometimes it feels like a real crash and burn when you stumble now. So, what do you do?

#1: Have Confidence.

I know that might sound silly, and it may sound like some self-help, motivational crap.  But, here’s the deal. You need to be confident that you’re going to deal with this, that it’s going to go okay, and that you will turn it around. And, at the very least, you need to be sure that you will confidently deal with it in a way that leaves you feeling okay with the situation.

Now, let me qualify my usage of the word ‘confidence’. When I refer to ‘confidence’, I am not implying that you should approach a negative situation by saying, “I’ve got this. I can handle this.” What I mean when I refer to the word ‘confidence’ is this:

Real, genuine, authentic confidence, to me, simply refers to a belief in your ability to figure things out. That’s all.

When stuff hits the fan, just say, “Okay, I didn’t want that, but I’ll figure it out.” That’s all I want you to say. “I will figure it out. I will handle it. Things will be okay. This is difficult. I will survive.”

I know that seems so basic, but if you don’t frame everything else that comes after that, then it becomes too difficult. We’ll get sucked into negativity, dread, bitterness or sadness. Before we go to that place, we just have to immediately say to ourselves, “I’m going to have confidence. I know I can figure this out.”

The reality is that, you’ve figured things out in the past that were equally as difficult or even harder. And if you haven’t, and this is the biggest adversity you’ve ever faced in your life, guess what? You’re going to need to survive, my friend.

Believe in your ability to figure things out. That’s confidence. That’s the first stage. 

#2: Keep perspective.

When it comes to the adversity that seems so difficult, here are two things to know.

Firstly, you’re not the first person to be challenged with that adversity. Out of 7 billion people and thousands of collected years of recorded human history, none of us are going through anything that unique. I’ve always found that people who really believe that their adversity or difficulty is different from everyone else’s, and that nobody can understand them, either become bitter and/or fail to ask for help. So, they either get mad at everybody else or push everybody else away, subsequently avoiding the very thing that could serve them, which is seeking some assistance.

So, keep perspective. No one is the first person to ever get cancer anymore. No one is the first person to lose a child anymore. No one is the first person to lose a limb anymore. No one is the first person to be in a car accident anymore. Other people have gone through it, so keep perspective.

Remember that there’s only two stories in humanity’s narrative: struggle and progress.

Lots of people struggled through what you’ve been through, but a lot of people have also progressed through it. So, never feel alone.

Also, when keeping perspective, remember previous times in which you did have some adversity, and you summoned some kind of strength. What helped you get through it before? Remember those times; that will help maintain perspective. You’re not alone.

You’ve been through difficulty before. Believe in your ability to figure this one out, too.

#3: Schedule action.

When adversity strikes, so many people say, “Oh my gosh, that’s horrible,” and they sit and wait, or they lay in bed, depressed. They keep hoping for something to change.

However, there’s only two things that change your life. Either something new comes in externally, including a new opportunity, person, or luck. Or, something new emerges from within, including new power, strength, ambition, belief, resolve, or even a new willingness to fight and make it happen.

The reason I share this with you is this:

You can’t just wait and hope that everything gets better. If it’s real adversity, it’s going to require action.

Rather than sometimes taking action to deal with it, schedule it. Even if you set three daily goals, what are you going to do every single day to handle, deal with, and cope with the issue?

One of the three actions can be as simple as taking a shower. Sometimes your win is just getting out of bed and taking a shower to start the day. I remember when I had my brain injury, it was a huge struggle to do basic things. Sometimes sending an email, making a call, and making sure I ate lunch to keep glucose coming into my brain, were wins. But I had to schedule actions because, left to my own devices, I wouldn’t do anything. I’d end up on the seventh season of some TV show.

You have to schedule action each day, especially when it’s difficult.

#4: Ask for help.

I don’t mean that you should ask for help when you are at rock bottom, all your stuff is gone, you’re bankrupt, you’re broke, and awful things are happening. Most people ask for help way too late.

As soon as adversity strikes, ask for help.

If something seems in any way overwhelming, ask for help. Explain what’s going on to your spouse, partner, or another trusted person in your life. Share that you don’t exactly know how you’re going to deal with the issue, and ask if they have any ideas as to how you can address the issue.

Or, if it’s a bigger issue, you can ask for help by going to your business partner or team, saying, “Hey, here’s the situation; let’s brainstorm some ideas on how to deal with this.”

If the issue is very traumatic, ask for help from a professional, including individuals in the fields of medicine, therapy, or psychology. Just get some assistance in thinking through things. Sometimes, that’s the greatest help you can get.

Even just going out with some friends, sitting around the table and saying, “Hey, this thing happened on Monday. I’m wondering, can I tell you guys about it and just get your perspective?” Sometimes listening to other people talk about how they are dealing with a similar issue, or how they’ve dealt with it in the past, can truly serve you.

Remember, you’re not alone. You’ve been through stuff before, and so have other people. Believe in your ability to figure things out, and things will start to go well.

#5: Honor the struggle.

Maybe sometimes the adversity sticks around for a while; that’s when you honor the struggle. If you’ve been with me in my High Performance Academy program or any of my seminars, you know this:

 Honoring the struggle is a critical element and mindset to sustaining success in life.

Sometimes, the struggle is put there for you. Sometimes, life is happening for us to get better. It can be demanding and challenging, but know that that struggle is necessary at this moment now. You need to deal with it. You can’t avoid it. You’ve got to face this thing and say, “Okay, what can I move? What can I shake?”

Accept the fact that we can’t change or influence everything, but we can change and influence our attitude and our actions each day.

We can figure out something to move forward in our lives. And when we focus on the little things that we can move forward, we feel a little bit more confident.

The struggle is something to be honored because it’s going to forge a greater capacity and character later on. So, honor it. Don’t hate it, because anything that you direct negative energy toward quickly amplifies into flames of fury. Instead, have patience with it, see it and recognize it as a necessary thing at this time of your life. Even if you don’t want it, that’s why it’s been put there.

Adopt the mentality that says, “Okay, I’m meant to deal with this now. I didn’t want to, but here it is. So how do I keep my confidence? What can I remind myself about perspective? How can I take some actions today? How can I ask for some help?” And make sure to honor this entire process.

If you do that, you will survive this adversity. You might just thrive through it. But no matter what, it will put you on that other end where you start to live The Charged Life.

Time Management Rules

Summary

Time management is ultimately about working a vision backwards into strategic and scheduled chunks of time and tasks.
It’s about yearly, monthly, weekly, and daily goals. Easy, right?
Well, don’t overcomplicate it. Strip everything away. Get back to the basics and stay focused on just a few essentials. Remember, the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.
Watch the video above for the full lesson so that you can continue living #TheChargedLife!
Like this episode? Please share it! I can keep this blog and all my podcasts and videos ad-free and sponsor-free ONLY because you share my work! Please share or subscribe to my podcast andYouTube channel too!

When I started working for myself I knew I would have to put some limits on how much time I’d devote to my business. Without “regular hours” or a boss telling me exactly what was required of me, I was in danger of working 24 hours a day in an effort to meet all the unlimited goals my mind threw at me. I knew that would lead to burnout.
Burnout is the result of a lopsided life that focuses on one thing at the expense of everything else. I want my life to be well-rounded. And I’m sure that’s what you want, too. But whether you’re in business for yourself, like me, or you work for someone else, you probably feel overloaded and stressed at times.

Are you working too much?

Maybe you feel that you could be headed for burnout, where you lose your enthusiasm and creativity and you feel cut off from everything else you enjoy doing. Have you experienced any of the following symptoms?

• You feel overwhelmed by everything you have to do, and you may even get that ‘BLANK’ feeling where you can’t seem to make a plan of action for what steps to follow next.

• You’re become increasingly irritable and you lose your temper easily.

• You feel mentally and physically exhausted at the end of the day, but the minute your head hits the pillow your thoughts bombard you, and you can’t get a good night’s sleep. 

• Taking care of normal things like eating seems like an inconvenience.

• You feel that in spite of all your work, you’re unable to accomplish what you think you should.

• You feel self-doubt and very little positive motivation. You just keep plodding away with no reward.

• You push people away and don’t want anything to interfere with your work, but you get no pleasure out of your work.

If that list describes you, you can’t be doing your best, most creative work. Even worse, you’re not enjoying your life. And you can only keep that up for so long before you snap, crackle, or pop.

The solution is time management.

Real time management is not about doing your job well. It is about living your life well. You should have time for everything you want to do, and that includes work, play, and just taking the time now and then to sit and stare, because that’s when you get your most creative ideas. So here are my nine rules for successful time management:

1. Start your day right. Don’t rush into the day. Take a few minutes to sit quietly and gather your thoughts. Remember what’s really important to you and prepare yourself inwardly to meet whatever the day brings.
2. Have a plan for what you want to accomplish. Have a set of reasonable goals for what you will be able to do that day.
3. Break tasks into reasonable units. Looking at a big task can make you feel overwhelmed and hopeless. And unless you’re careful, it can keep you from doing other things you need to do. So break it up into chewable bites so you know what you’ll get done today, and what you’ll do each day over the coming week.
4. Prioritize tasks and refuse inessential tasks. Decide what’s the best order to do things, what needs to get done no matter what, and what you can forget about. That may mean saying “no” to other people who want you to do things that you don’t have time for.
5. Delegate if possible. For myself, I’ve put together a great team of assistants. I let them do what they’re good at so I can do what I’m good at. I don’t get burned out doing things I don’t like, and I have more creative energy for the things I’m naturally better at.
6. Plan time for meals, exercising, and socializing. That old Puritan ethic can keep you working non-stop – until you burn out and decide to stop for good! Before that happens, make the time to do things that make your life complete.
7. Follow a big push with relaxation. Sometimes I have to work hard to meet a deadline. Or maybe I feel inspired and I work well into the night. That’s great. But I know I can’t keep up that intensity forever. Even if you have to force yourself to take time off, do it. There’s a clever sign on a local restaurant that says, “We give our cooks time off. Do you?” That’s a question you should ask yourself.
8. Practice the 10-minute rule. We all have tasks we dread to do. We put off starting them and they loom before us, keeping us in a state of anxiety that drains our energy. The rule is to just work on it for 10 minutes. Chances are, once you get started, you’ll keep working on it, but start out planning just 10 minutes. Do that over a number of days, and the task will get done – and off your back.
9. End each day with a plan for tomorrow. I like to end my day by making a quick list of what I need to do the next day. Everything is fresh in my mind and clear. Then the next morning I don’t have to try to remember what I was doing and what’s needed next. It’s like I have a headstart on the day and I’m eager to get going. That’s the opposite of burnout!

How To Reaching High Performance

Brendon defines “high performance” as “succeeding beyond standard norms over the long-term.” In other words, consistently performing at your best.
Brendon will be teaching this topic at his upcoming High Performance Academy event in San Diego. For ticketing information, visit HPA.Brendon.com
To be able to reach high performance, you have to master these four areas of your life:

1. Psychology. You have to gain control over your thoughts, emotions and behavior so that you can stay motivated, positive, resilient, and empathetic.
2. Physiology. We all know that we should closely manage our sleep, workouts, nutrition and health. But few people consistently care for their well-being, which is why so many people drop off or plateau? This must become a priority in your life if you wish to succeed long term (and enjoy the journey!).
3. Productivity. There’s a science to setting goals, prioritizing and scheduling blocks of time. If you lack this knowledge or the ability to get things done and to be effective in what you’re doing, then you’re toast. Always remember that the main thing is to make the main thing the main thing. Do what really matters and you’ll be in the zone.
4. Persuasion. Have you ever been taught exactly how to get people to believe in you, listen to you, follow you, buy from you, support you? Unfortunately, few have.  And they don’t prioritize learning this topic even though it’s one of life’s most important skills. Look, you can’t always face your challenges on your own. You have to have the people skills so that you move to the next level where your family, peers and followers support your dreams.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[The following is the full transcript of this episode of The Charged Life with Brendon Burchard. Please note that this episode, like all TCL episodes, features Brendon speaking extemporaneously–he is unscripted and unedited. Filmed in one take, The Charged Life has become one of the most viewed unscripted, direct-to-camera self-help series in the history of Youtube. It has also been the #1 Podcast in all of iTunes and is regularly in the top podcasts in Self-Help and Health categories around the globe. Subscribe to the free motivational podcast on iTunes or Stitcher.)
There are four skills related to personal growth and achievement that we must master in our life to go to that next level and so many people never learn these and so, they kind of go through life wandering in and out of opportunities to kind of grow or succeed but they don’t have any tools. They have no capabilities to do well and so, these are four things you must put on your own personal curriculum to master in your life and when you do, you reach higher levels of performance and we can prove it. The first area is psychology. Mastering your own psychology, developing the skills of psychology so that you can have the right mindset to be able to go out and navigate life’s challenges. So many people have such terrible thoughts and emotions and behaviors on a consistent basis, it’s no wonder they’re always struggling.
So, what do you got to master in this area? If you really want to master your psychology, you got to master what I call more. MORE, it’s like an acronym, right?
M stands for Motivation. You’ve got to learn how to motivate yourself. You have to look at your goals. You have to know why you want what you want. You have to know what you expect of your life and you have to learn how to master and sustain that motivation. If you don’t know how, read one of my books called The Motivation Manifesto.
O stands for Optimism. Learning to develop a positive mindset and a growth mindset that says, “I know I can handle life’s challenges, I look forward to doing that and I look forward to contributing.”
R stands for Resilience. The ability to bounce back up when life knocks you down. The ability to change your thoughts from those thoughts that feel like disappointment or doubt or depression or just angst and anxiety and turn that energy around so that you can pick yourself up.
E stands for Empathy. To learn to be more kind, compassionate, sympathetic, empathetic to other people. To bring out the best qualities involved in that. The values of patience as an example.
That’s just one skill set called psychology. We talk all about this at one of my programs called the High Performance Academy. I hope you will join us in it someday.
Number two, that big second area of the two or the four big skills, number two is physiology. Learning to manage your well-being, your health. Learning to manage as an example your breath so that you can be calm amidst all the craziness of the world, so you can find your center. Learning to control your nutrition, your exercise routines, your sleep. All these things we know we should do but come on, be honest, how are your skill sets in those areas?
How is your sleep?
How is your workout?
How is your food?
How much are you taking care of yourself and revitalizing and rejuvenating yourself?
These things really matter to long term success. So, make it a goal to master them.
The third big skill: Productivity.
Productivity: The ability to get things done and to be effective at what you’re doing. It’s really kind of the science of achievement. How do you set a goal, prioritize, break things down and chunk them out so that you can schedule things? Block time, work on your daily tasks, being focused but making sure you’re doing the right things as well. You’ve heard that old saying: The main thing is to make the main thing the main thing.
So you can just stay right in the zone of doing what really matters and what’s important. Well, that’s the art and the skill of productivity. And there’s something you need to learn. If you’ve never read books on productivity as an example, make sure that you do that. Time management; make sure that you do that. And if anything, if you ever get anything at all out of productivity mastering your life, own your morning. Learn to use your morning as preparation and structure and setting up the perfect day. Not that the day is going to be perfect but at least you thought through the day and how you want it to go so that you are intentional throughout the day versus distractive and reactive throughout the day.
And the fourth big, important part of personal development and achievement is (guess what?) persuasion. • The ability to get people’s attention. • The ability to persuade. • The ability to influence other people. So that they: • Believe in you. • Buy from you. • Support you. • Follow you. • Cheer you on. • Mentor you. • Help you. • Assist you.
In your path to succeeding at the next level. If you can’t get other people around you to buy into you or to support your dreams, then you just fighting an uphill battle by yourself all the time. So, if you haven’t read any books on people skills or how to have a better conversation or how to have better relationships, do that work because it’s going to support you in achieving the next level. You can only go so far yourself. You have to be able to enlist other people to support you to go the other level.
If any of this sounds like something you need assistance in, please attend my High Performance Academy seminar. It will take you to an entire other level. Read my books. Do whatever you have to do but design some type of curriculum or put yourself in an environment where you can learn these things because these are the things that will help you break through to that next level, I promise you.
If you are interested in learning about our event, go to hpa.brendon.com. Come join us at our next live big event in San Diego and no matter what you do, go out, build yourself a curriculum on psychology, physiology, productivity and persuasion.
Master those areas, you master your life. Look forward to seeing you at one of our events or out on the road someday. Until then, go out there every single day of your life. Know that you can live, you can love, you can matter and you can experience what we call, The Charged Life.
 

Take Action In Your Life

How to Take More Action: 9 Powerful Tips

by Henrik Edberg

“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”
Leonardo Da Vinci

To get things done you need to take action. Things seldom happen on their own.

But taking action can be difficult and hard. And so it’s easy to wind up in Lazyville or Procrastinationland a lot. How can you break out of such behaviour and develop a behaviour of taking more action?

Here are 10 tips that you’ll hopefully find useful.

1. Reconnect with the present moment.

This will help you snap out of over thinking and just go and do whatever you want to get done.

This is probably the best tip I have found so far for taking more action since it puts you in a state where you feel little emotional resistance to the work you’ll do. And it puts you in state where the right actions often just seem to flow out of you in a focused but relaxed way and without much effort.

One of the simplest ways to connect with the present moment is just to keep your focus on you breathing for a minute or two. Check out 7 more tips in 8 Ways to Return to the Present Moment.

2. Be accountable to others.

If you tell a bunch of people that you are going to do something then it will be hard to not do it. You don’t want to disappoint them. Or have to face up to them the next time you meet.

If you have a hard time getting going with something get some support. If you for instance workout, do it with a friend to motivate each other to take action – and actually go to the gym – when motivation runs low. Motivating each other and bringing enthusiasm when one of you is feeling low can really help to develop consistency and useful habits.

Think about how you can involve others to help all of you to take more action.

This tip works well. But it can put you in situation where you take action to avoid pain, to avoid judgement. And it can help you create pressure within yourself. Such a state may not always be the best one to be in to take action and perform well. One way to lessen such problems is to use this tip and then when you are about to take action you reconnect with the present moment to quiet negativity within yourself.

3. Be accountable to yourself.

In the long run a more consistent and perhaps healthier way to develop a habit of taking more action is to answer to yourself instead of others. To set your own standards and principles for how you will behave.

The problem with this one is that you are likely to cheat on yourself and rationalize how you don’t need to take action or follow your principles. When the social pressure of having to answer to others isn’t there it’s easy to slip and fall into laziness or procrastination.

But over time you can become more and more consistent with acting according to your own standards. I believe that one of the keys to develop this kind of thinking is to get off a dependence on external validation and be more internally validated. You can read more about that at # 8 in 9 Great Ways to Make Yourself Absolutely Miserable.

If you can develop accountability to your own standards then it can be more consistent than the one you get from relying on being accountable to others. It comes from within so it doesn’t have to rely on other, outer circumstances that may fluctuate.

It is also very useful to help you feel good about yourself and to help you grow. If you rely on being accountable to others and their validation then you may grow but also feel confined by what others expect from you. If you are accountable to yourself then you set your limits wherever you want them.

4. Lighten up.

One way to dissuade yourself from taking action is to take whatever you are about to do too seriously. That makes it feel too big, too difficult and too scary. If you on the other hand relax a bit and lighten up you often realize that those problems and negative feelings are just something you are creating in your own mind. With a lighter state of mind your tasks seems lighter and becomes easier to get started with. Have a look at Lighten Up! for more on this topic.

5. Use a limited to-do list.

A to-do list is a simple and great way to remember what you are about to do. But it’s easy to get overly enthusiastic when writing it and putting in to many items. And then when you look at that big list you feel drained and an urge to procrastinate.

But do you need to do all those things?

Think about what the absolutely most important items on the list are. Just two or three. Then put them on a new to-do list. This list will seem less daunting and I have found that it makes it easier to actually take action and get those things done.

6. Choose instead of should.

Here’s a small but useful tip. You don’t really need to do anything. You always choose what to do. Thinking about things this way removes the “shoulds” and “need tos” that take your personal power away and make you feel like you aren’t in control. When you think that you choose to do whatever you do then you regain the control and power. And it becomes easier to take action.

7. Focus on the how instead of the if’s.

What if’s can really mess with your mind. You can spend days, weeks or years thinking about what may happen if you take action. So instead of letting your mind get lost in what if’s focus on the how. In a situation focus on how you can do something, how you can solve a problem or achieve a goal. Do some research if you need to. Or get support and help from other people.

Focusing on the how puts your mind to better use and creates a positive attitude within rather than a negative and uncertain one. This makes it easier to take action without too much hand wringing and time spent over thinking things.

8. Get enthusiastic.

Enthusiasm is great emotional state to be in to get going and take action. And if you aren’t feeling enthusiastic then that’s OK too. You can pretty much always create enthusiasm within yourself. Check out 4 Powerful Reasons to Up Your Enthusiasm, and How to Do It for tips on how you can do that from both me and you (there are some really good suggestions in the comments section of that article).

9. Start small.

To get from a state where you just feel like sitting on your chair and doing nothing much to one where you take action over and over you can do this: start small.

Getting started with your biggest task or most difficult action may seem too much and land you in Procrastinationland. So instead, start with something that doesn’t seem so hard.

One of my favourites is simply to take a few minutes to clean my desk. After that the next thing doesn’t seem so difficult to get started with since I’m now in a more of a “take action” kind of mode.

How Millionaires Schedule Their Day

Let’s face it. One of the most difficult areas of most people’s lives is time management. We all want enough time for our work, our family, and ourselves. So how do the most successful people manage their time?

Photo courtesy of ©ShutterStock.com/merzzie

I’ve been lucky enough to interview over 130 millionaires. They know the value of their time, and use it to the best of their ability. I’ve curated the top tips on their time management to help you have more time to work, and more time to play and be with your family.

So how do you stay productive when faced with a seemingly endless to-do list? Here are four awesome tips for greater productivity, straight from the millionaires themselves. At the end of each one, I provide an action item.

1. Get everything out of your head. David Allen, author of Getting Things Done, shared this tip with me in an interview:
   

   What are all the things you need to pay attention to? Getting all that out of your head, it’s really game-changing when you do that. It doesn’t solve your problems, but it makes them evident. It makes it a lot easier then to make good intuitive choices about where you ought to be putting your focus, and where’s it okay that you don’t put your focus today.
   As I say, you need to know what you’re not doing before you feel comfortable about what you’re not doing. Getting a map of all the things you’re not doing, what are all the projects right now that you’re not doing if you’re listening or watching this? You better know what that is, or you won’t be present with anything that you’re doing.
   Nothing is holding your attention hostage, and you’re able to give your full attention to whatever that is, whether that’s playing with the dog or writing a business plan. That’s really where you want to be, and that’s a critical component.”

   Action Item: Stop what you are doing right now (or put a time in your calendar right now) to write down everything you have in your head. Both personal and professional. Write it in your to-do list or on post-it notes—it doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you write all of it down and then take the time to put it into your to do system.
2. Actively procrastinate. Rob Rawson, CEO of TimeManagement.com and Staff.com, shared this tip in his interview with me:
   

   I have a list of over two hundred tasks right now, all of those things could be good to do, but I can’t do all of them. I identify what are important tasks, but either way they are sitting there. A lot of them I will never do. That procrastination is so powerful. Then every week or every other week review that list, and ask, ‘Is that still necessary?’”

   Action Item: Don’t feel like you need to do everything on your list. Some items will sit on your lists for a while. That’s okay. They might not have the same urgency later.
3. Have a purpose and plan for your day. JV Crum III, CEO & Founder of Conscious Millionaires Institute, shared this tip with me.
   

   One of the most crucial parts of being productive in your work is to have a purpose for your day. Getting up in the morning and working without any goal or purpose can be a major downfall in accomplishing your goals. A person can start off the day getting ready to accomplish tasks, but without a clear purpose, you will more than likely not be as productive as you could be.”

   Rob Rawson, said something similar:
   

   I only use priorities for my today tasks. I don’t add email or any random task on my list. I do that in order to make sure I’m only doing the more crucial tasks. Right now I work on my highest priority first thing in the morning. I identify what will move me forward from the long term goals. I put that item top on my list.”

   Action Item: Either the night before, or the morning of, decide what your top tasks are, and stick to doing those first thing—before you get derailed by email or any other trivial task.
4. Practice the Friday 15. This is a system that was introduced to me by my millionaire friend, Hugh Culver. It is a great way reset your week, even though you want to be relaxing or going home early. It sets you up for the next week, so you can be more productive.
   

   [In this exercise] you only have fifteen minutes. The first thing I do is look at my plan for the week. [When I do] I see this disaster that started out so beautifully organized. I got a lot of stuff done but a lot of times my list is longer than when I started.
   So I looked at that and decided what it is that I can just finish in a couple of minutes. Because sometimes I just need to return a phone call, pay a bill, or change something on my blog. I get it done!
   The second thing I look at is what I want to move to next week or I want to either delegate to the people that I outsource to or that I want to get rid of. So I delegate it or dump it.
   Then the third thing is to create a new plan for next week. One of the mistakes we often make when we create a plan or a list is we put everything in there that we hope to do. But our expectations are too high. What I encourage people to do is keep it down to about a dozen things that are really critical for next week and that’s what I call your flight plan. So, just like a pilot taking of, I now know where I need to land. So by Friday those need to be completed.
   The last thing that I do is I clean up my area. I put stuff away. I get rid of clutter. I get rid of the Post-It notes, those three felt pens, two pens, and a pencil, because when I come in, I want to feel successful. And I never feel successful if I’m surrounded by clutter. Because clutter is not only a distraction—I look at it, and I think about it!—clutter reminds me I have not completed something.
   So when I come in on Monday, I feel successful, I’ve got my flight plan and I’m ready to go. So that’s why I call it your ‘Friday 15.’”

   Action Item: Action Item: This week, implement the Friday 15 and finish your week on a productive note.

You may not have the time to do all of these (since if you are reading this you are time starved!) But commit to one or two of these tips. I use them in my own life and have found my productivity increases when I manage my time, keep a clean environment, and live out my workweek with purpose.
When I feel in control of my time, instead of my time controlling me, I make better decisions and am more able to enjoy my life.
All the millionaires I have interviewed have one thing in common: they take responsibility for their time. As the ancient philosopher Lao Tzu said,“Time is a created thing. To say, ‘I don’t have time,’ is like saying, ‘I don’t want to.’”

How Successful People Think

Successful people come from all walks of life, yet they all have one thing in common: where others see impenetrable barriers, they see challenges to embrace and obstacles to overcome.

Their confidence in the face of hardship is driven by their ability to let go of the negativity that holds so many otherwise sensible people back.

Obstacles do not block the path; they are the path.

This perspective helps successful people to think differently to everyone else, which is important, because if you think like everyone else, no matter how smart or experienced you are, you’ll hit the same ceiling. By thinking outside the box and going against the grain, successful people rise above their limitations.

We all know how important it is to approach problems with radical optimism and creativity, but this is easier said than done. In a study conducted at Adobe, 96% of employees identified creativity as essential to their success, both in terms of their income and the value they bring to the world. What’s more, 78% wished they were capable of thinking differently, believing that they would progress through their careers more quickly if they did.

Too often we attribute creative and “different” thinking to natural, innate characteristics that belong only to the lucky. The truth is that you can study how ridiculously successful people think and incorporate their approach into your repertoire.

1. They’re confident. If only we knew of all the great ideas that never came to fruition because people lacked the confidence to put them into action. Successful people confidently act on their ideas, because they know that a failed idea is not a reflection of their ability; instead, they see it as a wonderful learning opportunity.

2. They’re composed. Ultra-successful people are composed, because they constantly monitor their emotions and understand them and they use this knowledge in the moment to react with self-control to challenging situations. When things go downhill, they are persistently calm and frustratingly content (frustrating to those who aren’t, at least). They know that no matter how good or bad things get, everything changes with time. All they can do is to adapt and adjust to stay happy and in control. If you’d like an objective measure of how you do at this, consider taking an emotional intelligence test.

3. They’re honest. Super-successful people trust that honesty and integrity, though painful at times, always work out for the best in the long run. They know that honesty allows for genuine connections with people and that lying always comes back to bite you in the end.

4. They seek out small victories. Successful people like to challenge themselves and to compete, even when their efforts yield only small victories. Small victories build new androgen receptors in the areas of the brain responsible for reward and motivation. This increase in androgen receptors enhances the influence of testosterone, which further increases their confidence and eagerness to tackle challenges. When you achieve a series of small victories, the boost in your confidence can last for months.

5. They’re always learning. Super-successful people often know more than others do, because they’re constantly trying to learn. They vow to constantly grow, and they fill every spare moment with self-education. They don’t do this because it’s “the right thing to do”; they do it because it’s their passion. They’re always looking for opportunities to improve and new things to learn about themselves and the world around them. Instead of succumbing to their fear of looking stupid, truly exceptional people just ask the questions on their mind, because they would rather learn something new than appear smart.

6. They expose themselves to a variety of people.There’s no easier way to learn to think differently than spending time with someone whose strengths are your weaknesses or whose ideas are radically different from your own. This exposure sparks new ideas and makes you well rounded. This is why we see so many great companies with co-founders who stand in stark contrast to each other. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak from Apple were a prime example. Neither could have succeeded without the other.

7. They keep an open mind. Exposing yourself to a variety of people is useless if you spend that time disagreeing with them and comforting yourself with your own opinions. Successful people recognize that every perspective provides an opportunity for growth. You need to practice empathy by putting yourself in the other person’s shoes so that you can understand how their perspective makes sense (at least, to them). A great way to keep an open mind is to try to glean at least one interesting or useful thing from every conversation you have.

8. They’re fearless. Fear is nothing more than a lingering emotion that’s fueled by your imagination. Danger is real. Danger is the uncomfortable rush of adrenaline you get when you almost step in front of a bus; fear is a choice. Exceptional people know this better than anyone does, so they flip fear on its head. Instead of letting fear take over, they’re addicted to the euphoric feeling they get from conquering their fears.

9. They turn tedious tasks into games. Every job entails some degree of tedium. For most people, tedium leads to sloppy, rushed work. Only the most successful people find ways to make the tedious interesting. By turning tedious work into a game, they challenge themselves and produce high-quality work, making things interesting in the process.

10. They dream big but remain grounded. Successful people reach for the seemingly impossible, but they do so in a way that is actionable and realistic. While you may not know exactly how you’re going to achieve your dream, you need to make progress no matter how small the steps. For example, Elon Musk’s goal at SpacEx is to “Occupy Mars.” While this is a big dream, Musk keeps it realistic by engaging in regular steps that, some day, may get him there. SpacEx just landed a rocket upright on a boat in the ocean for the first time ever. It’s a far cry from colonizing Mars, but it’s an essential step in the process.

Bringing It All Together

The above behaviors can make any of us more successful if we use them every day. Give them a try, and see where they take you.