Author Archives: Guest Author

Three Values that Drive My Success

December 24, 2013 9:32 am ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅

With 20 years’ experience of negotiating the sale of businesses (at last count 327 businesses sold), and four bestselling books under her belt there’s no denying Jo Haigh is a successful businesswoman. Jo describes the three main values that inform everything she does.

I’ve worked with many successful people, and one of the things I’ve noticed is they have uncompromising Positivity. Time and again successful people are the ones who expect to succeed, with no doubt about the outcome. It’s a cherished value of my own, and at the heart of so many entrepreneurs.

I’ve got 4 children as well and each one has done amazing things. I’m sure that it’s because, like me, they never expected to fail. When they were young I I told them they could do anything, and it’s that message they’ve taken through their lives.

All of us, we never expect to fail. In fact it’s quite a surprise when things go wrong for any of us.

To borrow an analogy from Harry Potter, I deliberately avoid “Dementors” – the people who look on the down side and suck the life out of you. My glass isn’t just “half full” – it’s absolutely overflowing!

Kindness is another of my values. I really believe in mentoring people to success and in giving back. The truth is, for everything I give, I get back masses more, so in a way it’s very selfi sh. I can’t tell you the buzz I get from seeing people I’ve advised succeed.

For example, two people I’ve taken on as apprentices, who were literally stacking shelves in Tesco, have outperformed every expectation I had of them.

There’s nothing like passing down skills and information to others and seeing them grow in skills and confi dence.

I love sharing my knowledge and I think it’s vital to send the elevator back down again, so that others can follow you up. Hard Work is my third value – and to anyone who knows me it will come as no surprise. With three business to run, books to write, clients to work for, alongside lecturing and keynote speaking, life is pretty full. That’s the way I like it. I don’t do it all on my own. I think there’s a bit of a myth that you can have it all. You do have to make sacrifices.

I’ve sacrificed a lot of my time with my family in pursuing the business, but I have also managed to get the time with my family when it counts. I’ve got four great kids and they’ve grown up very balanced, and they are my friends. So I believe I have got it right.

So, I work hard and that’s probably also because I am a control freak and have to have things right. I’m creative: I come up with at least one new idea every day and I apply my full energy to my three businesses. That requires a certain degree of management, so I tend to be fairly hands on, even though I try not to be! It probably makes sense to you when I tell you, then, that I actually get worried if I don’t have work to bring home with me!

Those three values – Positivity, Kindness and Hard Work have been with me all my life, and I’d say they’re what really drive me, as a businessperson, forward to more success.

Article by Jo Haigh Courtesy of The Best You Magazine.

Posted in: Abundance ⋅ Tagged: ,

The Diminishing Returns of Meditation

December 20, 2013 2:32 pm ⋅ 1 Comment ⋅

Meditation is a practice that can yield incredible results. It can calm you down, allow you to access your inner world, and even change your level of consciousness. However, it is a practice that must be understood if we are to benefit from it. Many people treat meditation as an all-or-nothing thing. They think that by diving into it head first (and then giving up when results are mediocre) they are going to reap all the rewards. I’m here to tell you how to put meditation in perspective and get as much from it as you can.

Just about everything in life is subject to the law of diminishing returns. What this means is that when you do something over and over, you start to get less from it. For example, let’s say you see a piece of delicious, gooey pumpkin pie. Pretend that you are a fan of pumpkin pie even if you aren’t for a moment. Under normal circumstances, you would probably want to try some of the pie - after all, pie is a good thing. But imagine if you had just stuffed yourself and simply couldn’t have another bite. All of a sudden, the pie is no longer appetizing. In fact, it could even be disgusting to you.

Most things work about like that. Whether it be food, exercise, work, or anything else. There is a sweet spot where you get the majority of what you need out of it. Anything after that is either not very rewarding, or even worse, detrimental. As I have said, meditation is no exception.

The Sweet Spot for Meditation

Just as spending hours a day eating pie is probably not the best use of your time, devoting hour upon hour to meditation probably isn’t either. Take this from someone who meditates every day, and is so much a fan of the practice that I wrote a book about it. Meditation is an incredible, life changing thing. But I would not devote hours to it each day, even if I did have the time. The reason is simple: diminishing returns.

So at what point can we expect to get the best results from our contemplative sessions? From personal experience I have found this range to be within the 10-30 minute period, dependent upon how experienced you are at meditation. The better you are, the less time you need to spend to get in a really Zen-like state. On the other hand, if you haven’t meditated in quite some time, then you may need longer before your thoughts start to recede.

Currently, I only spend about 10 minutes a day meditating, which is usually done in the mornings. I find that this helps me to be refreshed and ready to start the day off right. While 10 minutes a day can seem like a small amount of time, consider the following. The goal of meditation is to clear your mind. If you get good enough at it, then you will find that your mind stays clear even after meditation. Over time it takes less and less energy to return to that state of inner peace. Therefore, meditation becomes a way of life and not so much something you sit down and do. That’s why a quick 10 minute session can do the trick. As I said, if you’re just getting the hang of it you may need longer, but 30 minutes should be plenty.

You Must Meditate Consistently

Make sure that you understand the goal of this article isn’t to get people to meditate less. On the contrary, when you only need 10-30 minutes a day to devote to something, you will find it very easy to incorporate into a routine. Personally, I meditate after I exercise. I find that it is easier to clear the mind when the body is tired. But you can do it at pretty much whatever time you want.

What matters is consistency. After all, those 10 minute sessions will add up pretty fast when you do it every day - which is exactly what meditation is; an everyday routine to slowly change your inner world. The process isn’t quick, but I can guarantee that it is worth it.

Article by Fred Tracy

Fred Tracy is an experienced meditator who writes deeply on the topic. He has created a website devoted to sharing tips and tricks to increase your inner peace and contemplation. He has also written an ebook called The Simple Art of Meditation.

Visit his website … Art of Meditation

Posted in: Spiritual ⋅ Tagged:

Your Most Enjoyable Year Yet

December 17, 2013 9:21 am ⋅ Leave a Comment ⋅

Since 1994, I have begun each year by going through a wonderful process developed by Jinny Ditzler called your best year yet.

I would review my achievements and failures from the year before, look for any limiting beliefs that might be holding me back, check in with my values and set my goals for the year ahead. and year after year, I have had my best year yet.

Which is why it was such a surprise to me when my friend Robert Holden asked us a simple question during his weekend at Supercoach academy last June:

Imagine it’s one year from today and you’ve had your most enjoyable year yet… What’s happened? What have you done? What’s different in your life now?

Somehow, that tiny shift from looking at my “best” year yet to my most enjoyable one shifted something fundamental.

My most enjoyable year yet would be filled with things I stopped doing, not new ones that I started. Instead of a new list of achievements to pursue, I found myself with a list of things to let go of. and so I began to look at the activities of my life in a new way. I created an ABCD grid for myself:

“A”s were things I wanted to do regardless of whether or not they paid well or worked out the way I hoped.

“B”s were things I enjoyed doing and would happily say “yes” to if they fell into my lap, but had no desire to try and “make” happen.

“C”s were things I was only doing for the money.

“D”s were things I just fl at out needed to stop doing.

Once I had my list, I didn’t really know what to do with it, but I had a sense that I’d glimpsed something significant, so I just sat with it for a week or so, taking it out from time to time and reading back through it, waiting for inspiration to strike.

And strike it did…

Suddenly it dawned on me that if I only did my “A” activities, but I did them really, really well, I could actually make as much or more money than I had been making running myself ragged trying to do the whole alphabet. and in that moment, a plan was hatched.

My business manager flew out and we redesigned the business, streamlining things that would no longer be needed and building in structures to support the successful implementation of a straight “A” life. I eliminated the “D”s, started saying no to the “C”s, but left enough time in my schedule to say yes to any “B”s that came along which appealed to me.

Earlier this year, I came across a story about the Reverend Fred Craddock, who was visiting family when he struck up an unlikely conversation with an old greyhound dog his niece had recently adopted… I said to the dog

“Are you still racing?”

“No,” he replied

“Well, what was the matter? Did you get too old to race?”

“No, I still had some race in me.”

“Well, what then? Did you not win?” “I won over a million dollars for my owner.”

“Well, what was it? Bad treatment?”

“Oh, no,” the dog said. “They treated us royally when we were racing.”

“Did you get crippled?”

“No.”

“Then why?” I pressed. “Why?”

The dog answered, “I quit.”

“You quit?”

“Yes,” he said. “I quit.”

“Why did you quit?”

“I just quit because after all that running and running and running, I found out that the rabbit I was chasing wasn’t even real.”

The true joy in life is not in achievement, though achievement certainly can be fun.

It is not in fame or fortune, both of which open some doors while closing off others. But if you’re willing to slow down and create a little bit of space, you might find it inside you right now. And wouldn’t it be a shame to have a wonderful life and not notice?

Article by Michael Neill Courtesy of The Best You Magazine.

Posted in: Personal Development ⋅ Tagged: