Decades ago generalists ruled the roost.  Their knowledge in many fields gave them the competitive edge.  But now most industries are getting so complicated that only when you specialise are you likely to be acknowledged as the best in your field.

Better to be a master of one important area than an also-ran in three or more areas.
 

There are two reasons why this simple technique is very powerful.

The first and most obvious one is that when you bother to ask people what they think, you often hear angles on things you may not have considered yourself.

The second and perhaps the most important reason is that it makes the people you ask feel respected.  One of the great lessons of life is to realise that more than money, business people want respect.

Every time you ask somebody's opinion you make them feel they're included, and what they think is worth hearing.  In other words, you respect them.
 

Want to know the single most important reason that most people don't achieve their dreams?  They give up too early.

Most people simply don't realise that consistent failure is a necessary component to achieving spectacular success.  If you're not failing regularly you're either aiming too low, or not pushing yourself.

Colonel Sanders was turned down 1009 times before 1 restaurant bought his chicken recipe.  Walt Disney got 203 bank rejections until 1 said yes to financing Disneyland.  Thomas Edison is said to have had over 10,000 separate experiements before he succeeded in creating the electric light bulk.

The secret to success is persistence, persistence, persistence!  Yet make sure it's intelligent persistence - vary your methods, be flexible, think laterally.  Then keep on going and going until finally success eventually gives in and gives you what you rightly deserve.
 

Failures work in their business. Successes work on their business - creating systems, thinking about the future, clarifying repsonsibilities, etc..

You can't create something big and special unless you're constantly giving it thought, night an day.  If you're not prepared to devote yourself to that kind of quality thinking time then sooner or later you'll be overtaken by a competitor who is.

Remember, we are not suggesting you work night an day, but think night an day.  The difference beween the two when it comes to results is enormous.
 

When you expect good things to happen and goals to be achieved, you work more confidently and often get more done.

Doctor Martin Seligman, author of Learned Optimism, says positive thinkers are not only healthier and happier, but also more successful.  But it takes discipline.

Train yourself to replace every thought of failure with an expectation of success and your entire life will soon change for the better.

Are you afraid of speaking your truth?

Train yourself to allow yourself to speak out, with kind, supportive words, and be ok with showing your vunerability.

Have the ability to dream

We often focus on what could have been in our life, instead of what you need to do right now.  Too often we give up on our passions and in the process a little piece of our character dies along with it. 

What is your passion?  What do you need to do this week about your passion?  What can you do to rekindle the spirit within you.

Challenges

Challenges are character builders.  But how much character building do we need in one lifetime?  The choice is always ours.  We can accept the challenges life offers and build on them, or we can turn and run.

The funny thing is I don't know anyone who has achieved their goals without facing their challenges head on.

"How you respond to the challenge in the second half, will determine what you become after the game: whether you are a winner or a loser."   Lou Holtz

Peace in the Present Moment

Sanity doesn’t suffer, ever. A clear mind is beautiful and sees only its own reflection. It bows in humility to itself; it falls at its own feet. It doesn’t add anything or subtract anything; it simply knows the difference between what’s real and what’s not. And because of this, danger isn’t a possibility.

A lover of what is looks forward to everything: life, death, disease, loss…anything the mind might be tempted to call “bad.” Life will bring us everything we need, to show us what we haven’t undone yet. Nothing outside ourselves can make us suffer. Except for our unquestioned thoughts, every place is paradise.

~Byron Katie

There are only 3 things we need to let go of

There are only three things you need to let go of: judging, controlling, and being right. Release these three and you will have the whole mind and twinkly heart of a child.                                       ~Hugh Prather

"Each day", writes Hugh Prather, "we walk forth with clean clothes, clean hair, clean teeth, but with a mind stuffed with worthless anxieties, dull resentments, stale outlooks, toxic prejudices, and an endless array of shabby self-images. We haven't even bothered to sweep out the mental junk we picked up yesterday, not to speak of the debris we have been hauling around for a lifetime. What difference does it make if a body is always scrubbed, detoxified, and all its surfaces germ-free if no living thing that the body encounters is comforted?"

In The Little Book of Letting Go, Prather offers a simple, three-step process for shedding our prejudices, preconceptions, and pre-judgments, and facing each moment with freshness and excitement. In this accessible, friendly book, he first explains why it is essential that readers learn to let go. He then takes readers on a thirty-day plan of cleansing the mind, releasing the spirit, and lifting the soul in chapters that include: "Letting Go of Mental Pollutants", "Letting Go of Emotional Fixation","Letting Go of Misery", "Letting Go of Prediction and Control", and "Letting Go of Conflict Addiction".

"Letting go is the bottom line key to happiness," he says, "and I've been working on it, writing about it, and teaching it for more than twenty years."

If you want to know where you can get this timely, useful, funny and easy to read, The Little Book of Letting Go , click here...