Tag: #personaldevelopment

The Five Principles to help you step away from average and unleash your inner greatness. Principle number Three

There are 5 principles that I believe are critical if you are going to step away from accepting an average existences and unleash your inner greatness. You must learn them and live them. I’ll be sharing each of the five in a series over the next few weeks. Over the last two weeks we covered the first two, as a reminder they are;

1. You are responsible for everything in your life, everything.
2. Continuous learning and personal development are essential in living your life to the fullest.

Principle number three

Action drives change and results


Nothing happens without action. They say knowledge is power but I disagree, knowledge is stored power. knowledge only becomes power when it is applied through action.

Everyone has hopes and dreams, everyone want a fit body, they want money and wealth, well why doesn’t everyone have these things? Why don’t people who say they have dreams and goals achieve those goals and make their dreams a reality? I say the biggest reason is that most people wont take the actions required on a consistent basis. The issue is not in the knowing what to do, but actually doing what you know needs to be done. Everyone knows that if you want a fit healthy body you must eat right and exercise, yet most will not commit to this on a long term consistent basis. Its no different with every other area of your life.

Action drive all change, results, achievement. The problem is not in the knowing what to do, but actually doing what we know needs to be done.

You must accept principle number one understanding you are responsible for your results. you must adhere to principle number two by continually learning and growing your knowledge base, but without action, nothing happens, nothing changes, dreams die.

Often the reason we don’t commit to taking the action required is because we look at the goal or dream as a whole and it seems too daunting so we procrastinate. The pain in the discipline it takes to do the work seems like its to much to handle, especially when sitting on the couch and watching just one more episode of what ever show you are into is much easier. Keep this in mind while you sit there, the actors in that show are pursing their goals and dreams while you are sitting on the couch as time keeps marching on and you are falling further behind. Every day you don’t start is another day you are behind.

We often over estimate what we can do in a day and underestimate what they can do in a year. Breakdown your goals into small components and milestones and then commit to daily action in achieving the smaller components of the bigger goal. I hear a lot about having to take massive action, I think this sets many up for failure. What if you took small “bite” size actions every day, first for a week, then and month? Soon you start developing the habit of taking action every day, what would you look like a year from today if you developed the daily action habit? If you are thinking, a year out is to far out to try and conceive, ask your self this question, if I don’t start now and take consistent action, will I ever be, do, or achieve what I want in life?

You must be intentional about what you want out of your life, Intention means an act or instance of determining mentally upon some action or result. Be intentional about taking those small actionable steps every day, the compound effect of those small steps will carry you to the realization of you dreams.

Knowledge is the fuel, action is the engine. Get your motor running.

The Five Principles to help you step away from average and unleash your inner greatness. Principle number Two

There are 5 principles that I believe are critical if you are going to step away from accepting an average existences and unleash your inner greatness. You must learn them and live them. I’ll be sharing each of the five in a series over the next few weeks. Last week we discussed Principle number 1 and that is, you are responsible for everything in your life, everything.

Principle Number two

Continuous learning and personal development are essential for living your life to the fullest.


We are here on this earth to pursue, stretch, and test the limits of our potential. We can not do that unless we are continuously improving ourselves, learning new skills, and developing our ability function at a high level.

They say success leaves clues, Tom Corely studied wealthy people and found that 83% of the wealthy read at least 30 minutes a day for education or career and 63% listen to audio books on their commute.

You’ve heard the saying that failure or mistakes teach the best lessons. I would agree with that, we certainly want to learn from our mistakes and not repeat them but I would add, while your failures may teach lessons, it is even better to learn from the failures and the mistakes of others.

This is where reading books, listening to podcast, and taking courses have the most value. Learn from others who have already done what you are trying to do, they’ve already made the mistakes. You don’t have to always reinvent the wheel. Learning from others can help you avoid mistakes and delays in the pursuit of achieving of your goals and can even propel you forward.

Want to be number one at your company? Number one in your industry? Why not seek out who is number one now and study that person. Learn what it is that is making them successful and implement it. What if you chose a career or industry specific subject every 90 days and studied it, read a book a month on it, researched on the internet, study industry product literature, etc. What if you reached out to others with the skill or knowledge you want to learn and asked questions? If you picked a subject every 90 days and studied it like I suggest, how far ahead would you be in a year? Three years?

Jim Rohn always said, work harder on yourself than you do on your job. What he meant was by continuously learning and improving your skills you become more valuable. It is a fact that your value in the market place is in direct proportion to your skills and knowledge. You want to make more? Be more? You must continue to lean. The real learning starts when you leave school. Mr. Rohn also said, formal education can make you a living, continuous learning and personal development can make you a fortune.

Continuous learning and personal development is essential to living life to the fullest

Lastly, developing your interpersonal skills and emotional intelligence is key in any business, job, or personal relationships. Learning how to communicate which also means focusing on the lost art of listening. One way I have found to hone these skills is by reading and listening to sales trainers, not the shading used car salesman guy but real salesman. Real sales trainers teach communication skills with an emphasis on listening skills. It is important not to just hear the words of the person in front of you but to know what they mean, what the really mean, what they feel, what the pain points are. We are all selling, maybe not a product but maybe an idea, maybe a path forward, maybe that we understand. If you learn, build on, and exercise great communications skills this skill alone can take you a long way.

Continuous learning and personal development are essential, If you don’t continue to grow and learn, you are falling behind. Continuous learning and personal development are like fuel in the fuel tank, without it the race car isn’t going anywhere. They say that knowledge is power, I disagree with that, Knowledge is stored power. We’ll discuss in the next article how we turn knowledge into real power.

5 Principles to step away from average and unleash your greatness. Principle 1

There are 5 principles that I believe are critical if you are to step away from accepting an average existences and unleash your inner greatness. You must learn them and live them. I’ll be sharing each of the five in a series over the next few weeks, Here is my thoughts on number one.

I believe as Les Brown always says, you have greatness within you, we all do. I believe we are here on earth to pursue, stretch, and test the limits of our god given talents and potential. You have greatness within you

I also believe that we live in a society that has accepted mediocre and thrives on being average. The statistics bear this out. 78% live paycheck to paycheck and that’s pre-pandemic, 67% are disengaged at work or in their career, 63% of Americans don’t have $500 on hand to cover an emergency, 50% of marriages end in divorces and of the remaining 50%, almost half of them are unhappy. I could go on but you get the point.

We are not here just to get by. We are here to expand, create, and to live in abundance in all areas of our lives. We grow and expand by thoroughly exercising our talents and exploring the limits of our potential. By doing this we live a more fulfilled exciting life filled with meaning and significance.

A by-product of this is the creation of wealth, meaning, impact, and blessings. We should pursue being blessed so we can bless others. We should be a conduit of blessings.

So how do we pursue the limits of our potential and unleash our inner greatness? Live by and execute on the five principles, number one;

Principle # 1. You are responsible for everything in your life, everything.

Every decision and action you have taken in your life has delivered you to where you are right now, financially, career, relationships, everything. Every decision you make and action you take moving forward will drive you to where you’ll be in the future and will determine whether or not you live a life of achievement, meaning, and success. You can set that course starting today. Are you going to commit to growing, expanding, and intentionally becoming everything you can be? You have greatness within you, you aren’t meant to live an average mediocre existence.

Once you understand that your condition and your destiny is not captive to what others think, the economy, who the President is, whether people are biased against you, or anything else outside of you. Once you stop looking outside of yourself for reasons why you aren’t where you want to be, you take control. Focusing on outside forces is just a way to rationalize to yourself why you wont do what’s required to get, do, or be what you want.

That doesn’t mean there wont be challenges, setbacks, failures or problems. The only people who don’t have problems are in grave yards. That doesn’t mean there wont be people who let you down, that’s life, and by the way, life isn’t fair. You get out of life what you put in, what you go get, and what you intentionally become.

We should not be arrogant enough to believe that we should not have any problems. Problems are an opportunity to grow. Problems should not be impediments that cause you to fold up and quit and settle for average. Problems and set backs are just indications that its time to re-evaluate the path forward, pivot, adapt and charge forward.

We all have problems, we are all going through something. The difference between the successful and average? Successful people understand they are responsible for everything in their life so when they encounter the same problems everyone has, they quickly find solutions, they adjust, and they plow forward through the problem. Most importantly, they don’t quit.

Stop listening to Yourself and Start Talking to yourself.

If you are going to do big things, make your dreams come true, be the best at your job or industry, you must stop listening to yourself and start talking to yourself.

You’ve got to shut down the negative self talk. You know, that voice in your head that plants the seeds of doubt and fear. I don’t care what level of success one has achieved, we all have the negative self talk that impacts how or if we take action, our confidence, and our performance. Studies say that we have 50,000 thoughts a day and of those, 70% are negative. That’s 35,000 negative thoughts a day, that’s an astounding number, its a wonder we achieve anything.

The majority of your thoughts are subconscious with a limited number making it to the conscious. Its my belief that this massive number of negative sub couscous thoughts shape the conscious thought, impact your attitude, and feed your fears and doubt.

How do you fight those negative thoughts both conscious and subconscious?

Eradicate the negative limiting talk in your mind

Fill your mind with so much good only good can come out


We are inundated with thousands of negative messages every day all day from the media, television shows, news, and social media post. You must tune these messages out. I suggest filling your mind with so much positive information and messages that it overrides the negative stored in subconscious, deprogramming and replacing stored negative beliefs and thoughts with better positive mental data.

You’ve probably seen the presentation with the pitcher of dark water representing negative thought, and then clear clean water is poured into the pitcher and the water is cleared representing positive mental beliefs and thoughts flushing out the negative. You can do the same.

Having said that, I am not one that believes all you have to do is think positive and all will be well and achievement is assured. In any endeavor action is required, but action fueled by a positive mental attitude will out perform a negative mindset every time, easily.

A positive mindset also doesn’t mean that bad things wont happen to you, we all face adversity, but if you’ll focus on a positive mental attitude you will deal with and handle hardships better.

Look for books, podcast, videos, and mentors that feed your positive mental state. Its probably unfair because there are so many great examples out there but I’ll give you one that I’ve been obsessed with recently, check out Ed Mylett

Be intentional about Eradicating Negative Speak


We must be self aware of the thoughts that make there way into our mind. We all have heard that voice, I don’t think I’m good enough, What if I fail, what will they think of me, I’m going to look stupid. We all have these messages running around inside our heads at some point or another, based on the statistics of 35,000 negative messages a day, I’m pretty sure I am correct.

I am suggesting that the moment we start hearing these messages that we don’t entertain them. We must immediately be intentional about shutting down the negative speak. It may be tough at first but I am telling you to develop the habit. The second that voice starts, you shut it down. You tell that voice that you are good enough, you do have what it take, that you can do it. I suggest sentences that start with these small but powerful words, I can, I am, I will, I must. Keep this in mind, it doesn’t matter who says you can as long as it isn’t you.

Stop Making Excuses


Stop making excuses because when you do you are focusing your control outside of yourself. Excuses are how we rationalize to ourselves that our doubt and fears are valid because of outside forces. When you accept that you are responsible for exactly where you are, relationally, financially, or career, you own your power. Once you own your power you can believe and be confident in yourself when you say you can, you must, you will.

Life Lessons we can Learn from the Super Bowl Champions

What life lessons can you learn from the Super Bowl Champions?

I believe there are strong lessons to learn from every player on that field last night.

Obviously Tom Brady is getting a lot of the attention and rightly so, he deserves it But every player on that field can teach us all a lesson, a lesson that if we applied to our lives, our goals and dreams would radically change our destiny.

Super Bowl Champion Tom Brady
TAMPA, FLORIDA – FEBRUARY 07: Tom Brady #12 of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers celebrates with the Lombardi Trophy after defeating the Kansas City Chiefs in Super Bowl LV at Raymond James Stadium on February 07, 2021 in Tampa, Florida. The Buccaneers defeated the Chiefs 31-9. (Photo by Patrick Smith/Getty Images)

Every player on that field had a dream since they were little kids playing Pop Warner football to play in the NFL and to play in a Super Bowl. Yes, every player was born with athletics ability and potential. But so were tens of thousands of others who never made it to the highest level, What’s sets these players out above the others?

The players on the field last night relentlessly pursued and stretched the limits of their potential their entire lives for this moment.

Since they were little boys they had the dream and they committed do doing what ever it took to get there. Yes we see all the money, the life style, the fame and we think somehow it was easier for them. False.

These players worked every day of there lives up to this moment to push every ounce of talent out of their bodies. They pushed through the pain, through injuries, through setbacks, and they never quit.

That is the difference, they never quit. every step of the journey they worked harder, studied more, trained more. When others were taking off, playing video games, giving limited effort in practice, they were working, giving everything.

What if you applied this discipline to your goals and dreams? What kind of exponential growth in your life would you see in a year, three years, and decade? You could achieve any goal you set your mind to. You could create the life you dream of.

I challenge you to commit to relentlessly pursuing the limits of your potential. Its your responsibility, your duty.

Don’t be lazy with your potential.

A little levity to the situation, some calm, reason, and logic.

With all that going on in our country right now I think its important to bring a little levity to the situation, some calm, reason, and logic.

Let me start by saying its clear what the officer did was 100% wrong, he murdered Mr. Floyd. I have no understanding as to why the other officers didn’t stop it. This whole scenario could have been prevented so easily. Im waiting for the other officers to be charged as well.

Having said that I think the whole perception around what many call a “systemic” problem is being viewed from a skewed perspective. The problem will never be solved if it is continued to be viewed as Police are all bad, white people are all racist, white people villains, black people all victims, or vise versa. It’s more complex, if you want to solve it or even understand it you need to ask hard questions of white people and black people. Both must be honest about all the components that make up the environment that creates these issues and the societal generally . Former Attorney General Eric Holder said and I’m paraphrasing, we are to scared in America to have a true conversation about race. I believe that to be true. We cannot have a true conversation about race until BOTH sides look within and honestly answer some hard questions.

I’m not going to solve the issue here but here’s my message for anyone who wants to be free, live a life of significance, and achieve their dreams.

Contrary to the scenes on your television or in your neighborhoods, contrary to what the media would want you to believe, and contrary to what some closet to you are believing, you can, in this country, dream big. You n set big huge audacious goals and achieve them. In America you can still dream big and live out your dreams. Don’t let those who wont do it poison your mind set. Don’t let those in the media dictate your mindset and indoctrinate you to believe that you are a victim who’s life is at the mercy of others. The media is not your friend, most have an agenda and most are in the business of hype and division to make money at what ever means necessary. Don’t be used.

In this country if have a dream and you put a plan together and you work that plan you can live out your dream, everyone. If you make consistent effort daily towards achieving your goals, the compound effect of your actions can only lead to success. If you focus on your continuous self improvement and personal development building your knowledge and personal skills you will function better in business and personal environments. If you move away from negative influences, those who say you cant, those who believe their destiny lies in the hands of others, those who skirt whats right or the law and toward others who say you can and I will, you will propel yourself forward. They say you are the sum total of the five people you spend the most time with, look around.

Don’t be played, don’t be used by those who have an agenda. An agenda that does not have your best interest at heart. The truth is, the number of people out their with the ability to control your future, derail your dreams, or have disdain for you is so minute that its insignificant. They cant impact you destiny unless you let them. Yes there are travesties of injustice and grotesque wrongs. The good thing I see is that overwhelmingly we all agreed that this particular instance was wrong and demanded action. It shows we are closer than what divides us.

You focus on you, you devise the plan, you work your plan every day. You’ll find that most people fall within three camps, some don’t think anything about you, they are living their lives and trying to get by. The second are those you make insecure because your positive action calls their inability or unwillingness to take action on their own behalf into question, obviously those are folks you don’t want to be around anyway. And third are those who know what it means to chase their goals, they are happy for you, they are pulling for you, they want you to succeed. These are the folks you need to find and surround yourself with. They are out there, find them.

Step away from the TV, put your face in a book, put your plan together, and create a life of significance.

Our pursuit of personal devleopment and self improvement

In our pursuit of personal development and self improvement we are constently working on honing our leadership skills and our ability influence others. You know the better you can communicate your vision, respect for others, and your ability to influence others to want to follow you, the more successful your projects, plans, and goals will be. Your hands on application and training is most effective and accomplished by developing the potential and skills of those you work with and those around you.

In this effort I often use issues and incedences that I experience to study and improve my own skills and the skills and leadership approach of those around me.

Think back over the last few weeks, were there incedences where maybe you came up short with regard to leading your team? Did your team or someone you know experience a challenge or setback that may have been responded to better or possibly avoided completely? Did you have folks around you complaining about other people but not willing to address and resolve the problem?

I’ve experienced or seen all three of these issues recently.

True leaders take extreme ownerships


The best leaders take what retired Navy Seal and leadership expert Jocko Willink call’s Extremme Ownership, The leader develops the vision and with his team develops the plan, then leads, supports, and empowers the team to achieve project goals. I personally fell short recently. One of my pet peeves and something I preach about is NOT assuming someone else is takig care of a task or a loose end. Dont assume, take the initiative and be sure. Yes, team members have their responsibilties and they should live up to the requirement of those responsibilities but they are human, errors are made. I should have as the leader verified everything was in place. I assumed a subcontractor’s paper work for access to a project was in place and being processed.

I try not to micromanage folks, I think it kills individual ownership. Having said that, as the leader of the project and all it entails it is my responsibility, I did not make sure a loose end that can derail progress was tied up. It caused some chaos and scrambling at the last minute. I own that. The leader, and all of us should hold ourselves accountable. Assuring that your team has all it needs, knows exactly what is required, when it’s required, etc. is your responsibility. When they fall short you as the leader have fallen short. Remember, those who want to be their best consider themsleves as leadrs at what ever “level” they are, you need to take the same extreme ownership approach.

When mistakes and set backs occur


As good as you think you are you will experience mistakes and set backs, either by you, your team, or others you interact with. Its how you respond to these experiences that determines first how successful you’ll be and second, how much respect and reverence you build with those you come in contact with. Our goal should always be to learn from mistakes, if you do not dissect the mistake or set back, you won’t learn and you won’t improve. Mistakes are not failures if you learn from them. The goal in life is though to learn as much as you can from other peoples mistakes.

Your very first thought should be, what did I do or not do that created or played a part in this mistake. Our first thought in any issue whether it be work or private life should be to look within. Most fail here, they never look within. Most look at others, pointing fingers, and assigning blame. These are not leaders, these are losers. They lose because they will never learn, their ego does’nt allow it. You must understand that the greatest influence you have in improving any sutuation is YOUR OWN ACTIONS. Humble yourself and reflect inward, ask yourself, how could I have approached this issues differently for a better outcome. The folks that can do this are the confident respected leaders.

Your second thought should be how can I use this setback as a teachable moment for the team or an individual to make them better. Educate them to get better without humiliation or ridule. When they trust that you are correcting them or teaching them for their best interest, in a safe environment, and because you care, you build respect and a loyal ally. Some dont like to be “educated” so this is where your soft skills and savvy come in to play. The best leaders can teach a lesson without talking down to people.

Complainers and whiners


Many people like to talk about a problem, a bad situation, or other people while making no attempt to resolve an issue or problem. Your job when there is a problem is to start facilitating an environment for ideas and solutions. If you dont bring a solution to the problem you are just whining, nobody likes a whiner.

The quickest way to have a team breakdown is to have people talking about a problem they have with an individual with everyone but the individual. Ive seen it first hand myself recently. There is no room for this in your work life or personal life. If you have problem with someone else and if you are confident in yourself you should be able to bring the subject up in a respectful productive manner. If you are’nt confident bringing the subject up you may need to look inward as discussed above. Confront the situation in a respectful manner. A good tactful way is to bring up the issue in the form of questions instead of accusations, examples, can you help me understand? I thought I was in charge of this, was I wrong? Questions like these open the conversation up in a non-threatening accusational manner.

Be intentional about improving, think about how you reacted in the past and how you may want to change that reaction in the future. Always look within, its where you have the most power. Do these things and by your leadership example you make others around you better as well.

You are in control, dont let anyone derail your dream. 3 Tips to achievment

You are in control, dont let anyone derail your dream. Just wanted to send out a reminder that where ever you are in your life, financially, job, career, business, or relationship, whatever, it does mean you have to stay there. Its a fact that we are all where we are because of the decisions we have made and the actions we either have taken or not taken. But the truth is, those past decisions do not have to dictate your future.

You have the ability to choose the future you want right now. Once you decide what your goals and dreams are you have started the process of changing and shaping the future you want. However, this is the easy part.

The key to making any change and achieving any goal requires action. This is where people stumble and fail. Everyone wants the money but are’nt willing to commit to what it takes. Everybody wants the fit and attractive body but manny are’nt willing to put the work in, to sacrifice. You can achieve your goals and dreams but you must be willing to work and sacrifice. Nothing great comes easy.

Commit goals to paper


Once you decide what it is you really want to accomplish or what you really want to become you must commit it to paper. I know we all have high tech devises but Im telling you to pick up a pen and a sheet of paper and write your goals out. Right out exactly what it is you want to achieve or become. Detail what your plan is and the effort you will put in to achieve your goal. Review those goals every morning and every evening. Hold yourself accountable. For a time tested method for setting and achieving your goals and dreams I highly suggest you read “think and grow rich” by Napolian Hill.

Commit to massive action


Commit to taking consistent massive action. We get fired up starting off while we are all excited about our new goals that will deliver the life we dream of. Once we experience a little friction and that excitement wears down, it gets a little tougher to keep putting out that effort. It can get diffuicult pushing forward without seeing results or at least the results we think we should be seeing. Keep in mind that results follow momentum, keep pushing, cosnsistent effort is always rewarded. The reason why most fail is because they fail to accurately consider the work required to accomplish their goals. Understand up front that what ever your first thoughts are on what action is required, double it, tripple it. Doing this you start to find out if you are actually committed. Grant Cardone author of “The 10X rule” says that what ever goals you have, what ever effort you think it will take multiply that by ten. Its actually a great mindset, I agree with Cardone that we think to small, we must think much bigger and set our goals higher. We set our goals to low and hit them, we should be setting our goals so high it stretches the limits of our potential.

Prepare for the cynics


Prepare yourself for the naysayer, the critics, cynics, and detractors. There will always be naysayers and critics, people who will always find the negative in everything and everyone. When you start stepping out of your comfort zone, you’ll be putting your self out there for the world to see. You are going to be vulnerable, again, here is where you find out how committed you are. Some will criticize and try to ridicule, they do this mainly because you are a threat. You by your actions are challenging them to question their own abilities and commiment to pursuing their own potential, some cant handle this. Rather than re-evaluate themselves they feel better criticizing you. You must get your friends and family on board also, share with them what your trying to accomplish and the effort it will take. You’ll need them to understand that you must block out the time required to acieve your dreams, Its in their best interest as well. Make sure you commit special time for them as well. You need them on your side, on your team.

Where ever you come from, lower financial background or status, High school drop out, over weight, what ever it is doesnt matter. What matters now is that you have decided now to make a change,set goals, and chase your dream. Whatever they may be, you want to achieve financial freedom, you are going to become a Senior Poject Manager, or you are going to get in the best shape of your life; whatever you dream of it can become real. You are in control, dont let anyone derails your dream.

Unemployed by the Coronavirus Pandemic? Take these actions

Unemployed by the Coronavirus pandemic? Over 20 million Americans have been put out of work in the last 6 weeks or so. Unfortunatly the lay offs may continue and we don’t know when this virus will be under control and we can start going back to work. The question is this, how are YOU going to get through this? What actions are you going to take to make yourself more valuable in the marketplace?

How you use your time right now will deterime how you land and how quickly you recover. When the economic engine gets started back up and businesses start hiring, theres likley to be a staggard opening and staggard hiring. This will result in heavy competition as the positions become available. How will you differenciate yourself from the masses?

There will be many who have the “pandemic” gap in their resume, what if you are the only one who shows the potential employer how proactive and productive you’ve been throughout the shutdown? Others will be able to explain exactly what the Tiger King is all about, you’ll be able to show that you are a committed self starter who is driven, autonomous, and hard working.

What if at the top of your resume you listed what you worked on, studied, and accomplished while you were Coronavirus unemployed, here are a few examples;

You owe yourself all you got

Industry specific skill


Honed your computer skills, mcirosoft office skills, project managemet skills, Sales skills, etc. What ever industry you are in, there are task required, pick just one that would make the biggest impact and study it, practice it, perfect it.

Study Industry literature and product data


Become the expert, the go to person in your industry. What ever products, equipment, or material you work with or sell reseacrh it in depth. Go to manufacturers websites and study the specifications, installation instructions, care and maintenance, etc. Chef, cook, or waitress? learn new recipes, restaurant data analytics, study food alergies to better understand your customers as an example.

Read Personal development books


Yes, list a couple a books you read to improve your soft skills, your people skills. In many industries it is those who have the best soft skills that excel. There are many good books out there on the subject but these two are the must reads; The 7 Habits of highly effective people, Steven Covey. How to win Freinds and Influence People, Dale Carnegie

Earn an industry credential

Listing your industry certifications could tip the scales in your favor. It is posible to work in many industries without a credential but earning a credentail lends more credibility to your resume. Earn that Journeymens license, food handlers certification, vendors license, computer certifications, etc.

These are just a few examples. You know your work, what is needed in your industry, take action now for your self improvement. No on is going to come to you, you must take action and make it happen. Pick out what would make the most impact, maybe an area you need to sure up, and pour yourself into it. Put yourself in the best position to succeed on the other side of this pandemic.

Three ways to come out of the Coronavirus pandemic stronger.

Three ways to come out of the coronavirus pandemic stronger. You have to find a way to make it through this pandemic, not just make it through but come out better than before. These are tough trying times for us all, if you’ve lost your job, lost income its even tougher. its sucks but its going to suck even more, its going to get worse before its gets better.
The decisons you make, the actions you take, right now, will determine where you stand six months from now, a year from now, three years from now.

Your future is in your hands
Your future is in your hands, take ownership

Do you want to fetal up on the couch and cry victim or do you want to man up or women up and get going? Are you going to hold yourself accountable for your well being, your families well being? You can’t wait for someone else, the government to solve all your problems. The government or no one else for that matter is going to look out for you, and care for you and your family like you can.

Thats the negative, the tough medicine, now for the opporunity. I believe while its going to get worse before it gets better there will be great opportunity coming out of the coronavirus pandemic. There will great opprotunit for new careers and businesses. The time is now to position yourself for a better job, career, or to start a business.

Now is the time but first you’ve got to stop the bleeding. If you’ve lost your job and your income as been shut off or reduced you have to make some moves.

Stop the Bleeding


Sell what you can, now is not the time to wait for top dollar. Its time for survival of the smartest. We have no idea how long the virus is going to hang out but one thing I can tell you, the financial impact is here to stay for a while. Get rid of what ever liabilities you can.

Generate cash flow


Get cash coming in. Find a way to generate income, go find a job, they are out there. I spoke to a VP of a Site Contracting Company today and he told me something that shocked me, considering 20 million people were put out of work over the last six weeks, not one person has called or walked through his door asking to fill out an application. Im blown away by that. The job you dream of or a job in your line of work may not be available but its time to grind. What is it you did at your job? Couldyou perform that service for folks directly and charge a fee? Start a lawn mowing business, what ever, get creative. Its time to fight and claw to feed yourself and your family.
There are opportunities out there but you have to go get after it. There is the unemployemnt route. Im typically not and unemployment guy. My view is that the only reason you should be unemployed is by your choosing and you can support yourself or you have your own company and you are’nt an employee. Having said that these are unprecedented times. Almost everyone put out of work now are in this position due to no fault of their own. If you do seek and get unemployemnt you must obligate yourself to number three below.

Make yourself more valuable


Use this time to make yourself better. Learn new skills and knowledge to make yourself more valuable. Jim Rohn used to say “you are paid for the value you bring to the market place”. Many think just showing up is the value. Make yourself more valuable, read personal development books. read industry literature and product literature, take online classes or courses. Make yourself the expert of your industry. Get a credential in your industry. This is the time to get better and make yourself more valuable. If your on unemployment you must demand of yourself this requirement as a condition for accepting the payment. If you’ve ever thought of starting a business, put the plan together now, set some goals, big goals, take massive action now. Start a home based busness. Even if you go back to a job keep working that side hustle. You must have more than one stream of income. Wakeup early, do not sleep in. Get yursself cleaned up and pull yourself up to the desk at home or beat the streets, and get after it.

If you’ll do these things you will not only have self respect but you will put yourself in a better position to succeed and come out of this Coronavirus pandemic stronger menatlly and financially.