How To Make 2012 The Best Year Ever/ Focus On Principles Vs Strategies

So you've survived another year. You still have a job or your own business. The past few years have taken their toll on you though, haven't they? You wonder about the wisdom of what you're doing. And especially if you own your own business, you wonder about the wisdom of that. As you have grown tired, you may begin thinking that it would just be easier to go to work for someone else. While it's true that you would not have the worries of making payroll, or taking care of Accounts Payable and Accounts Receivable, you would probably miss the satisfaction that comes from controlling the very things that motivated you to become an Executive, or start your own business. I have some answers for you. I refer to them as the Principles of Success. And I offer them to you freely. Why would I do that? Because as I coach, I am reminded of the very principles of success that I need to use in my own business. It also gives me great energy as I engage in those principles and share them with you. And these days, I can use all of the energy I can muster. In fact, I recommend that you begin mentoring or coaching others as you work to use these principles in your business. The best way to coach is to simply do what is right; lead by example. When we engage in doing the right things, we can't help but influence others. We seem almost heroic. They best way to coach yourself is to follow the G.R.O.W. model of coaching. Hold yourself accountable, or create an accountability group of other like minded Executives or Business Owners outside of your company, (it's the most sustainable coaching model that I know of). As most of you know, I prefer to lead by doing and succeeding. Coaching allows me to remember and put into action the principles of success, as well as prove the value of the principles that I have been taught and continue to pass on. Coaching holds me accountable for practicing what I preach.

Business startup in the economy of 2010 has been challenging, but the principles that I have been taught have proven themselves to be timeless and adaptable to any economic environment. Profitability was achieved within the second month. A major change in my largest trading partner’s business model forced me start at square one again in February of 2011. Once again those principles of success proved their value as we once again achieved profitability almost immediately. As we now face a seemingly great challenge again, I was reminded that coaching would help me to find and achieve the successes that I need.

As we begin a new year we see it full of promise and the opportunity to make new choices (if we’re not getting the results that we say we would like to enjoy), or choose new outcomes for this year, or commit ourselves to the choices and activities that have produced the desired, successful, results for us.

Let’s take this new year to focus on learning and applying principles of success, as opposed to focusing on strategies. What are the principles of success?

VALUE 

What do you value, what is your time worth, who shares those values in the form of Co-workers, Customers, and Joint Venture Partners?

SERVICE

Don’t ask how you can make money; simply ask how you serve the world best. What are your unique strengths? Remember the Hippopotamus that is my corporate logo. If you don't know the story behind that choice, no worries, we'll revisit it in February.

VISION

If you don’t know what success looks like, you may just walk past it, past him or past her. When you have enjoyed complete success, where are you, what are you doing, and who are you with; both at home and at work? Can you clearly communicate that vision of success? When you can, you will attract the right components required for that success. What does success look like, feel like, sound like, taste like? Experience that success daily, internally.

GRATITUDE

If you aren’t grateful for what you already have, you can’t have more – meaning that what is the point of accomplishment or gain when it doesn’t register with you? Lack of gratitude is at the core of a scarcity mentality. Lack of gratitude focuses on what you don’t have and provides all the excuses for failure. Gratitude allows you to recognize what you already have and allows you to leverage those assets for greater achievement.

CHOICE

Choose to produce the results that you value. Not getting what you desire, make different choices. Don’t want to make new and different choices? Learn how to be happy with the results that you’re producing. Those two choices are the core choices of our lives.

BALANCE 

Balance work and play, home and work, indulgence and discipline, limits and charity, effort and rest.

INTEGRITY

Keep all of your promises and make no promises that you can’t keep.

ATTENTION

Pay attention and listen to the most important people in your life, at home, at the office and in the marketplace. Give them what is important to them, and in a way that allows them to understand that you’re giving them what they ask for.

MUST DO

If I say it’s going to get done I will get it done.

GOOD ENOUGH

Don’t wait for the perfect amount of time, or the perfect set of circumstances to begin achieving your dreams. Start now, even if you only have 5 minutes, even if you only have $5, even if you only have 5 friends or 5 potential customers.

ACCEPTANCE

Accept what is as good and beautiful, and right for the moment, even if “what is” seems painful.

LOVE

Learn to love and care for yourself as you would love and care for those most important to you. There is no integrity to beating yourself up while extending love to others. You can’t love anyone more than you love yourself. Until you can show yourself patience and acceptance, you can’t show it to anyone else, at least not to the highest levels that you are capable of.

I have not been producing all of the results that I value most; chief among them is the coaching that fulfills me.  One of the reasons that I value Coaching so much is that it allows me to revisit the principles of success that have been taught to me. And frankly, I need to hear those message more than most of you need to hear them. While it appears that I am better at applying the principles of success, it is simply a matter of the fact that I hear the messages more often than the rest of you, because I repeat them over and over again in coaching sessions with my clients, my friends. That said, I choose to post to this blog on a bi-weekly basis, and I will use these principles as my curriculum. Let me know if these posts are meaningful. In fact, take the time to post links to these blog posts on your blogs. I promise to pay attention to what you say to make these posts as productive for you as possible. Let's take our "Knowing" this year and apply it in wise ways to produce much good for ourselves, our families, our friends  and our communities throughout the world.

Make this “THE BEST YEAR EVER!”™
Coach Frits

and remember... "Once a Client, always a friend!" Get in touch with me my friends, let me know what you're grateful for.