What Does It Take to Make a Committment?Written by Susan Dunn, MA, Emotional Intelligence Coach
I attended a seminar other day where presenter was talking about how to sell. One of steps to selling he outlined was making a commitment. He defined this as “binding yourself mentally and physically to do something.”Can you tell what’s missing? Actually making a commitment is easy. It’s just words. You say you’re going to do something -- make your sales quota, stay faithful to your wife, stop yelling at your kids, or lose 20 lbs. There you’ve said it. You’ve made commitment. You can even write it down and put it on bulletin board or refrigerator for all to see, and to remind yourself. What’s hard about that? What’s hard is keeping commitment, and what’s missing from equation is emotions. You must bind yourself mentally, physically and emotionally, because it’s emotions that will sabotage your commitment. You’ve committed to making your sales quota, but a friend invites you to go on a cruise for a week, which sounds like a lot more fun than selling. Or one day you wake up and just don’t feel like working at it that day, and pretty soon it’s been a week. Moods are extended emotions. You’ve committed to not yelling at kids, but one day you’re hot and tired, air conditioner’s broken, one of toilets just backed up, and your child comes in tracking mud across white carpeting, which you’ve told him a million times not to do, and you blow your cool. Anger gets better of you and you yell.
| | What You See is What You Get Written by Glen Hopkins
H. Jackson Brown Jr. once wrote, “Your mind can only hold one thought at a time, make it a positive and constructive one.” As simple as these words may seem, they are in fact, very true. You see, if you are looking for a way to feel better at any given moment, all you have to do is change what you are focusing on. Your brain is a very powerful tool that you own and you should use to your advantage. When was last time you were reminiscing about a great time in your life and it made you feel terrible? When was last time you were thinking about a painful event in your life and it made you feel good? I’d venture to say you answered ‘never’ to both of these questions. That’s because what you focus on in life is what you get! Would you be willing to agree that Mother Teresa felt a great deal of love in her life because love was her main focus in life? Understanding this, next time you find yourself in a less than desirable situation, be sure to find positive side of it and focus your attention on that. Not only will you feel better about situation but also you will actually be in a better frame of mind to work through it. With this mindset you will find yourself focusing on solution rather than problem. The best way to control your focus is to ask yourself good questions. Such as, “What can I find that is good in this situation?” “What have I learned from this that will make me more successful next time?” “How can I make this situation better?” By asking yourself effective questions, you will force your brain to look for and find a solution for what you can do to solve a problem and how you can make a situation better. On other hand, if you ask yourself self-defeating questions such as, “Why does this always happen to me?” “Why can’t I have that?” “What did I do to deserve this?” Your brain will look for those exact answers and tell you why bad things happen to you, why you can’t have something and why you deserve something bad. Do you see what is happening here? You are confirming to yourself why you don’t deserve something and why bad things happen to you. Now it’s one thing when someone else tells you something like that, but when you tell it to yourself, you are sure to believe it! I guarantee you will always believe yourself on a subconscious level if not on a conscious level. In other words, be careful what you ask for!
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