Sharpen Your Mindset To Ensure Success
What To Say Now Episode 47
Are you tired of all of the clutter? Drama? Stress? Noise? These are everywhere and, unfortunately, you can't get rid of it all. You can, however, sharpen your mind to help you cut through all of the distractions so that you can accomplish what you are setting out to do in life.
In today's episode, we discuss the first thing that you absolutely must do in order to sharpen your mindset to succeed.
Listen on the go!
Show Notes and Links:
What To Say Now Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/whattosaynow
Full Show Transcript:
Dan Stewart (00:00): We all know what to do to sharpen our knives, but what do we do to sharpen our minds? How can we create that fine, sharp, hard edge to cut through all the clutter and the drama and the stress, so that we can accomplish what we're actually setting out to do in life? Well, the answer lies in a topic that is near and dear to my heart. It's one that I've been looking so forward to sharing with you.
Dan Stewart (00:36): I feel like I'm going to sharpen the knives again. Let you guys see this right. The topic today is sharpening not knives, but our minds. What can we do to create a sharper version of ourselves? How can we show up in the world, ready to cut, to slice, to chop through the clutter and the drama and the mess and the noise, so that we can spend more time focusing on achieving our ambitions. That's the topic of this episode of What To Say Now. My name is Dan Stewart, Founder of Happy Grasshopper and I'm super privileged to share this with you today.
Dan Stewart (01:12): So let's talk about mindset, right? This is a big issue. There are hundreds and hundreds of books about mindset. There are courses and classes and gurus and coaches. You could take a medication... A medication... Meditation class. You can do all these sorts of things and there's a benefit in participating in each of them.
Dan Stewart (01:33): Today we're going to talk about one very small aspect because no matter how much time and energy you invest in all of those other things, it can't possibly come to fruition unless you understand how to measure your progress. Here's how we do it.
Dan Stewart (01:50): So imagine you're an elite athlete. Think of it from that perspective. Let's imagine that you're training for the Ironman, right? Or you're a gymnast. As my daughter, Emily is who's competing in the USA Gymnastics Regional Championship this week. If you're competing at those highest levels, you have to have a way of measuring, not just your progress, not just your scores, but your recovery time. It's really important. The way cardiovascular health is measured is by how quickly you can go from having an elevated heart rate to it returning to normal. And if you're not fit, if you don't run, if those aren't parts of your life, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Sometimes getting off the couch and walking across the room can leave you huffing and puffing. If that's where you are, that's okay. You do not have to stay there. It's possible to invest a little bit more time and energy in yourself and get better results.
Dan Stewart (02:53): Now we're talking about lungs and heart rate and blood flow. That's important. We're going to shift that same focus over to mindset. So just like getting up off that couch, walking around, we can feel our heart working harder. We're feeling that strain. Every day, between our ears, we feel the mental strain of constant distraction. If you're a real estate agent in today's market, it's kind of unprecedented. If you're a listing agent, you're wondering where the heck am I going to find my next listing? And if you're a buyer's agent, you're about run ragged from constantly filling out offers and so infrequently having them accepted. I see that many people are now getting the offer accepted just to have it fall apart. It's an interesting time and if you don't pay attention to your mental acuity, if you're not sharpening that blade so that you can be ready to perform, you're going to end up dull and disused. You don't want that to happen.
Dan Stewart (04:00): So what I'd like you to pay attention to, starting from this moment forward, is just the reality that there are so many things fired at you constantly, over which you have absolutely no control. You can choose to worry about them. You can choose to feel a sense of pressure or anxiety, and yet you cannot actually change those things. You do not personally have the power to change all the things that are happening in the world.
Dan Stewart (04:33): The only thing that you get to truly control is your reaction to those things. So one of my favorite ways I've heard this described, as you know, we think of our interior experience as something we're experts in. We know what our intentions are. We always understand that. It's the other people in our lives, the people outside us, that are experts in observing our behavior over time.
Dan Stewart (05:03): So if you can just find it in your heart to give the people in your life, a little bit of grace, there's stressors that run high in every transaction. You've got to be that calm, calm voice in the torrent of the storm. You have to train the people that you're associated with. You have to lead them by example. You need to model the way that you'd like them to behave with you when times are tough and stressful.
Dan Stewart (05:33): So the next time that you have an experience where something goes awry, notice what you do. Like right now, today, you may get a call that the transaction you thought for sure would be accepted, wasn't. You may have a buyer who got their contract accepted, who's now trying to back out. Both of those scenarios are things that could cause you to react negatively. So, let's break this down to its final detail. Whether it's a real estate situation, whether it's a health issue, a financial issue, whether it's an emergency, a car crash, a heart attack, a diagnosis, whatever it is, there's some external, unexpected event that's intruding on you and now you have the requirement of deciding what that means. And what's so interesting is that the way most of us are wired, we tend to always interpret these things negatively and that's holding us back.
Dan Stewart (06:38): So the place against which you sharpen your blade is that moment when you're receiving this negative influence from the external sources. It's that moment in time, that you get to sharpen yourself by refusing to give in to that negativity, by actively embracing the fact that you're the expert on your internal experience. You're not the expert on anyone else's internal experience. So, it starts by simply giving them a little bit of grace to try to see this in a light that's not necessarily negative.
Dan Stewart (07:16): Now, for those of us who have the privilege to work with teams of people, if we're in management or leadership positions, if we have employees, it's very important that we model this behavior to the people we have the privilege to work with because if we don't model that for them, how are they going to interact with the clients that they get to serve? We've got to put that perspective in place because to some extent, each employee in an organization is a reflection of the leadership that's been set for them.
Dan Stewart (07:52): So let's recap. Internally, we're all experts on our intentions. We understand that. Externally, other people are experts on our behavior. So when you see someone behave in a way that you find offensive, understand that there's some reason for that. Internally, they feel fully justified in behaving that way, whatever that is, and your job should be to understand first and to criticize second.
Dan Stewart (08:23): So the place where again, where we sharpen ourselves against this reality that's imposing itself upon us, is in those moments when something happens that we were not prepared for and we have the conscious choice when we, the first step in becoming a sharper, having a better mindset, is in recognizing your power in that specific moment in time.
Dan Stewart (08:50): So I'm going to share something interesting with you. The majority of people have negative self-talk and it's really a challenge to overcome that. It can be. If you're accustomed to always chewing yourself up, we've all got that friend or maybe even it's us who say things like, "Oh, I'm way harder on myself than anybody else could ever be." Well, you know what? I would encourage you to show yourself some grace too. Learn to love yourself. Learn, not necessarily to shirk or to slack on any of your duties, just to be more kind to yourself in your pursuit of achievement.
Dan Stewart (09:30): So within your organization, there's a ratio here I'd like you to keep in mind. There's a study done. I'm struggling to remember the source of this study. It's really fascinating, that when you look at organizations that are performing at a very high level, whether it's a sports team, whether it's a small business or, global Fortune 500 company, there's a ratio between criticism and praise. A lot of times it's reverse. You get criticism, criticism, criticism, criticism, very little praise. That the organizations, the teams, the individuals that thrive at the highest levels are exactly the opposite. It's praise, praise, praise, praise, criticize.
Dan Stewart (10:15): So, I know internally I could do a better job of that sort of self-talk and externally, I could do a better job in leadership for the people I'm privileged to employ at Happy Grasshopper, for the thousands of members we serve across the US and Canada. There plenty of challenges in life and I sincerely believe that we get through them together. And very much like, like a lifeguard, sometimes the first person you have to save is yourself.
Dan Stewart (10:47): So, if you're in a place right now where you feel like, "Oh my gosh, I'm just so overwhelmed," the very first thing that you should do is pick up that life preserver called your personal power. Recognize that you have authority over yourself. You're not bound to react negatively to every situation. You can take a breath. You can take a moment and you can choose to react. You can choose to react. You do not have to automatically react.
Dan Stewart (11:16): So, there's a lot here, guys. This is a huge topic. In a few weeks, I'll be hosting something called The Recruitment Success Summit and I'm going to spend a good chunk of time on the mindset of recruitment there. So if that's interesting to you, I'll be sending out information here in the near future. You'll hear all about it.
Dan Stewart (11:35): So thank you everyone for attending. Really appreciate your time. Please feel free to share this group facebook.com/groups/whattosaynow, with anyone that you feel could benefit it and also don't be afraid to put questions in this group. Myself and my writing staff, we monitor this group so that we can answer your questions about communication. Today, those questions have really been internal, because it's not just about what to say to other people, it's also about what to say to ourselves. Thanks for attending.