Developing a strong mental flexibility and discipline is a very personal and delicate process that requires a personal touch, assessment and time. We have found that it is very important and we will share with you keys to developing a strong mindset, an eye to sort out opportunities, how to overcome challenges, and much more. We hope that this will give you a chance to see for yourself how important your state of mind is in any aspect of your life.
Developing a strong mindset will open your minds to explore the art of mind feeding and daily mental exercises. By applying the mental skills that you learn to your everyday life, it will lead you to deeper connections, success, and allow you to Make More and Work Less.
Together We are accountable
Tell me if you can relate to this: You wake up in the morning and pumped to get going. You have chapters of 2 chapters of a book to finish, 2 videos to record and upload, an interview to do for your podcast, 5 calls to potential leads, a showing for a potential tenant, 2 chapters of book you want to read, and a coaching session with your coach on some branding strategies. That was your day’s plan. You are so excited about the feeling you will have at the end of the day when you see all of your tasks done. Just when you are about to start writing you noticed an email that needs to be taken care of. Then you get a notification from social media about a new tech in real estate which you want to watch. Then an unexpected phone call comes which you had to answer. Right after the call your door bell rings and you received a package from amazon that you completely forgot about. After opening up your package and playing with the new item that you received you are now feeling hungry. You spend some time preparing lunch and enjoy some down time. You get on your scheduled call and end up with another list of items to complete. You stare at the list and let it sink in. You finally get back to writing and then realize that you are approaching your video post time. So, you scramble to get one of the videos done and you tell yourself that you can record the other video later that night. Now you look at the clock and think…WOW…is need to prep dinner and think that you can stay up later to finish writing the two chapters. You finish dinner and feel a little stressed so you decide to spend sometime relaxing and watch your favorite show. All of a sudden, its 9PM, and you are wondering where the day went. You get back to finishing one chapter and then think I’ll do 3 chapters tomorrow. It is now 1AM and you think… I’ll start fresh tomorrow morning…
Sound familiar? Has this scenario happened to you? Be honest…It happens to the best of us.
When it comes to staying on task and making sure that we complete what we set out to do, sometimes we need a little help to be held accountable. As focused and driven as one might be sometimes, we need that extra push to keep focus and accountable. Throughout this series of topics, we have talked about taking on challenges and offering challenges to others, having the right kick of motivation, implementing a reward or consequence to get us going and driven to complete the tasks we set out to do. This is where we should have others who we trust and respect, and who are also driven to succeed to hold us accountable.
Surround yourself with Like-Minded Individuals
Just like with every championship, there is a team, a family, a group of individuals united for a common vision… to WIN. We must surround ourselves with like-minded people, people who want to WIN. With people we want to become. With people we can build Championships with. People like all of you! It is people like you that can hold each other accountable. When we associate ourselves with others who want to succeed, there is a tendency to want to stay on par if not surpass those around us. Since the feeling is mutual everyone grows.
There are three main groups of people involvement that will enhance your accountability. The first is the spend more time with those that has the mindset that you want to be with. These are people who are driven to grow. Even if nothing is officially said or challenged there is accountability when others are involved. When you do not accomplish your goals, you will feel that you are falling behind and therefore you do what you need to up with those around you.
The second way is to announce to others or tell others what you are going to do. This includes your family and friends, on your social media, those like-minded individuals, and your coaches. Once you tell others what you are going to do, especially the like-minded individuals and your coaches you will now be accountable to those individuals. It is most effective when you ask them to be your accountability partner. This is where you have your coach challenge you and question you as to why or why not you were able to complete your task. Chances are you will want to report that you fulfilled your tasks rather than not. Not only would you be wasting your coaches time but also the investment that you have put into your coaches.
Another scenario is where you have an accountability partner who wants to achieve either similar or same goals as you. This is where the two of you can compete against each other and have consequences set for the person who loses. An example of this was with two individuals who wanted to both wanted to lose weight. Both of them outlined what the target weights are and the timeline in which they will measure the results. The person who does not reach their target weight will need to pay for the vacation that they will go on. One very common requirement with accountability partners is that they cannot be your spouse or family member. This is because your spouse or family member will more than likely give you leeway or accept your excuses as to why you do not achieve your tasks, or you do have a tendency to be more OK with the embarrassment of not completing a task and admitting to it to your family member. Whereas when your accountability partner is someone that is outside of the family, you would be more pressured to complete the task, more embarrassed to admit to not completing the task, and possible fearful of what they will say back to you when you give them the reasons why you did not complete your tasks.
Very often I would challenge my clients to publicly announce what they want to accomplish on social media. Say for example that they wanted to breakout of their comfort zone and finally do daily inspirational posts for a year. My recommendation for them is to announce the day before on social media that they will be posting an inspirational post every day for a year and that they are looking forward to everyone’s comments and likes. Now they need to commit to it for a year because if they miss one or a few days then people will start questioning plus it will show that they do not follow through on what they say. To make them even more accountable, I have suggested that their first post will show that it is 1/365 and keep count daily. This strategy was in fact what I implemented myself in my photo series MakeMoreQuotes.
The third way to enhancing your accountability is being a member of a mastermind group. This is similar to surrounding yourself with like-minded individuals but at the next level.
Masterminds
The purpose of a mastermind group is to draw together like-minded individuals to coach each other and be coached. The group reinforces the growth and success of the individuals in the group while offering support to each other. People gain power by sharing knowledge, visualizing goals, and connecting each other with resources that might not otherwise be available to an individual of the group. Anyone can set up a mastermind group as long as they know like-minded people. However, investing to be in a group of elite individuals will cause you to grow exponentially and the dynamic of the group can last a lifetime.
The key to mastermind groups is that you meet up with them on a consistent basis, no less than 4 times a year, and have a follow session once a month minimum. During these sessions is where everyone shares what is working, what isn’t working in their business and what others recommend they do. It is also during these sessions where challenges are laid out and members hold other members accountable. Not only will it be competitive within the group when people are being kept on track but it also can be a lot of fun as well. Together, the group can find the strengths and weaknesses and also what methods will motivate them the most. For example, having awards and friendly punishments for achievements accomplished or not can be a fun method of motivation. One of our favorite stories about having an accountability group is one where both parties are striving to cut down eating sweets. If one was to submit to their cravings and satisfy their sweet tooth, then they will need to clean the other person’s bathroom! Talk about motivation! It was at a mastermind session like this where I was able to overcome my issue with posting videos.
Accountability Leads to Results
When you have the strategies in place to hold you accountable, whether it is bring a member of a mastermind group, having your coach keep tabs on you, announcing to the world your tasks, and/or competing against an accountability partner, you will find that you will become a lot more results driven and able to not allow distractions to get in the way of you accomplishing your tasks. The more accountable you are, the more focused you get, which leads to a lot more results to becoming someone who Makes More and Works Less.
Until next time, today is the day to unlock your potential. I’ll see You later.
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