Playing The Bigger Game - PART 7 & Final Step

Step 7: Invest Even When It Seems Scary, (Especially When It Seems Scary)

I once worked at a place that was cutting back and micromanaging things, cutting the sales force and scouring phone logs to catch people making 50 cent long distance calls. One experienced worker shook her head and said “If the company’s having trouble, they should spend more on the sales force, not less. My last company did that, and it saved them.”
This company didn’t. 6 months later, *poof*, they were gone (I got out of there well before then, though).

The point is, it’s scary to invest time or money when you don’t have enough of either. But you have to if you want to play a bigger game. And no, I’m not trying to sell you something today. (Though I make no promises to what the future holds). Ask anyone who has made a major leap in their life or business and you’ll find that they either invested a sizable amount of time or money in growing.

Let’s talk about time first, because that’s essentially what I’m urging you to do right now so you can play a bigger game. I want you to start the PLAN and write it down.

You have tons and tons of time to invest in yourself, but you’re just not doing it. Seriously, I wasn’t kidding when I told you to put LOST on your TiVo instead of watching it live. You have pockets of time you’re not leveraging everywhere – TV, web surfing, lunch, 30 minutes before bed / before work … if you were committed, you’d make the time happen.

Time, when invested regularly, changes your game. If you’re harried and overworked, you’re harried and overworked. That’s how you see yourself. But if you spend 30 minutes every Tuesday at lunch improving your game, then you’re not harried anymore. You’re seeing yourself as a player who is going places – and perception becomes reality. One 30 minute appointment with yourself can transform your life. Don’t believe me? Ask the people one level above you and they’ll agree with me.

Time lets you leverage assets you already have. Yeah, you’ve got books / tapes / programs / whatever. But are you using them? No, because you’ve fooled yourself into the idea you don’t have time. You have it, you’re just not committed to using it. Make that sliver of time, keep that appointment with yourself and start using the resources you already have.

I’m not going to lie to you – I want you to make time for your Investment. Hey, I’m going to continue with my Investment, making sure I’m playing the biggest game I can. If you’re not going to invest in yourself, then you’ll never play a bigger game. Start by investing time so you’ll have a container to put new training in as you acquire it.

30 minutes at lunch, one day a week. If you won’t do that, what will you do? Remember, “Nothing works until you do.”

Now I get to the sticky part – the part where I talk about spending money (No, I’m not selling you something today. Easy, tiger). I’m going to be very specific about how you need to consider spending money when you’re moving to the next level.

Your money, like your time, is a resource. You must invest (not spend, invest) it incredibly wisely. Scared money, don't make money!!!

Here’s my advice to you.
Only invest when you can see a return that makes sense for your business. Just because some type of training or product exists does not mean it makes sense to buy. Whatever it promises may not apply to your business, even if it’s touted as having made other people money. Look at the thing you’re about to buy and say “Can I see myself making a solid return on this investment in 30 days or 3 months or 6 months or whatever?” If you can’t, then it’s likely not the thing you need to invest in.

Protect yourself by investing when there are guarantees. My first big-ticket purchase was a $1,000 training course with a 60 day guarantee. I bought it with the express intent that if I didn’t make my money back (and more) in 60 days, I’d return it. I made my money quickly, and kept the product. But if it hadn’t been able to deliver, I would have been safe knowing I could return it.

Take cues from those who are playing a bigger game. Those people you’re networking upwards with? Find out what they’re doing. Find out what they’re buying. Find out what they approve of. Don’t just take other people’s word for things – model the people who are getting the results you want to get. This gives you the highest chance of getting relevant training that will apply to your situation.

Don’t think about price – think about value. Would you trade a dime for a dollar? That’s a no brainer question. Would you trade $1,000 for $10,000? You think you would, but then you balk at training that costs that much. Don’t feel bad, we all do it and it takes time to get out of that mindset. But all that matters is return on investment. If you’re getting 5 times or 10 times what you invested back, what you paid for was free.

Value is the biggest take-away I want you to think about here. When you see these public relations agents charging $20,000 a year or these consultants charging $100,000 for working for a client, you bet your ass it’s because they’re helping the other person get 5 or 10 times that amount in return. They only buy when it’s going to end up free in the long run.

Warren Buffett said “Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.” Never forget that when you’re on your quest to play a bigger game.

Yeah, that’s a direct quote from the second richest person on this planet. I think he’s playing a pretty big game.

If you missed any of the steps, you can search on The Future. Please follow me on Twitter.com/LilMogul.

Thanks for your time. I hope you found it valuable.

Lil Mogul

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 6

Step 6: Surround Yourself with People Playing A Much Bigger Game.

Once you realize that intimidation is for suckers, it’s time to use that newfound knowledge to surround yourself with people who will force you to play a bigger game every single day.

If you’re not actively working to add more of these people to your social / professional circle, then you’re in trouble.

Here’s why:
As humans, we tend to live up to the expectations of our direct peer group. In fact, for the most part, it’s a limit – an average of maybe our five closest connections. Don’t believe me? Rich people hang out with rich people. Overweight people tend to have an overweight social circle. Health nuts chill with health nuts. We tend to hang around with people who reinforce our current set of behaviors, and we don’t deviate much.

Because of that, a small-game crowd can actively pull you down. Yeah, this is the sad part. Hanging with struggling business people? See what happens when you tell them you’re taking a daring risk. (”Are you crazy?”) Trying to lose weight? See how people react around you when you try to eat more sensibly. (”C’mon, live a little.”) If you decide to up your game, you’re rocking the boat for your own crowd, and they will – with the best of intentions – try and draw you back to “safety.”

It’s a tough world for those hanging with small-game crowds. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not advising you to ditch your friends and associates – far from it. Instead, you I’m saying that you need to be working on expanding your own circle to include more bigger-game people and be open to helping your current peers come along for the ride.

If your current peers aren’t willing to play a bigger game, be gracious and understanding. It’s not easy. You may even be squirming thinking about it. But nothing motivates like a good example, so focus on being one.

How do you find people who are playing a bigger game? It’s simple. Look for the people at the top of the food chain in your niche and consider their type of game. Does the thought inspire you or terrify you? If it’s the latter, there’s no shame in that. Maybe it makes no sense for a one-person operation to try and jump to the game of someone with a staff of hundreds.

So go one level down. Who’s one tier down from them? Can you play your game on their level? Inspired? Run with it. Terrified? Drop down another rung, and lather/rinse/repeat until you get to a point where that feeling of terror softens into the sense that “Oh crap, I might actually have a snowball’s chance of pulling this off.”

A snowball’s chance is good enough. It’s a start. Find people at that level and start networking your way onto their radar (more on that in upcoming Tuesday’s when I’ll give you notes on networking). Start stepping out and risking some public failures and they will do what they can to keep you from failing.

There’s nothing a successful person loves more than giving a boost to someone with chops, because they remember when someone a little higher up did the same thing for them. Leverage the hell out of that.

When you hang with people who play a bigger game, they actively pull you upwards. To continue hanging with them, you’ll feel a positive pressure to push yourself in all the right ways and to stop making excuses. They’re not going to accept your excuses and fears of failure. They’ll understand them, and they’ll empathize with them … they just won’t tolerate them.

And when that happens, you’ll push past your limiting beliefs and play that bigger game to the max so you can keep hanging with that group of real players. I’ll step you through how to start the ball rolling on. Game on.

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 5

Step 5: Decide That Intimidation Is For Suckers

You know those people who wish you could work with – or at least get to notice you – that scare the hell out of you because they’re out of your league? Well, guess what – they’re actually real, normal people. (Well, maybe ‘normal’ is an overstatement). Unless they’re truly one of the “diva” types, there are generally a lot of ways to approach them successfully.
Remember, people are people. There is no magical halo around the people farther up the food chain –they are all as screwed up as (we!) are. They freak out over the things just like you do, have the same fears and worries as you do – and in fact their stress levels are higher than yours because everything they do is scrutinized so much more.

(Left to Right: Martha Stewart, Sean "P. Diddy" Combs & Michael Eisner)

So why are you intimidated by them? Why are you afraid to approach them for joint ventures, or call them for interviews, or get some foot in the door that would bring you closer to them?

Two reasons:
If you want their approval, you’re afraid you’ll be rejected. And the world will end if that happens, right? Wrong. See the earlier step about failure. Yes, you will be rejected the first time. All that means is that you’ll need a better strategy (more on that later).

Or

If they’re your competition they are scary to you. Maybe the person / company you’re intimidated by is a direct competitor and you’re freaked out that you could never thrive in their shadow. News flash: There’s room for other people if you’re committed to being remarkable. Go buy Seth Godin’s Purple Cow or Tribes and realize the pie is big enough for everyone.

Bottom line is, you have to consciously decide that you’re not going to be intimidated by other people. Nobody is out of your league, and nobody is indestructible.

Think a “regular person” can’t connect with A-listers? Watch carefully, people do it all the time. Think a “regular business” can’t compete with your dominant competitor? IBM thought that, and Dell kicked it’s butt starting out in a dorm room. And tiny little FireFox tore Internet Explorer a new one. It happens all the time. And there’s no reason it can’t happen for you.

Here’s the thing: Intimidation is just the manifestation of insecurity. You’re afraid someone won’t think you’re worthy to talk to or you’re afraid someone’s so much better than you that the free market won’t give you a fighting chance.
Dra-ma.

Instead of letting that twinge of fear paralyze your brain into thinking “never gonna happen” you need to get to the root of that fear, find out what’s causing it, and defuse it with rational thinking. You know, things that maybe have to do with that whole “define your value to others” thing we talked about earlier?

Intimidation is a sucker’s game because it’s all about your brain tricking you into not thinking your way around your insecurity. It’s a defense mechanism designed to protect you because on some level you don’t feel ready.

Game on. SEE YOU ON OPRAH!!!

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 4

The MEGA World of Lil Mogul

by Lil Mogul

STEP 4: Reduce The Number Of Steps It Takes To Get To Your Goal
Scary food for thought: How hard are you going to have to work to get to where you want to be? Think about it, seriously. With your current business model, how much time and effort is it going to take you to hit your goals? If you want to make 6 figures or 7 figures and you’re starting out with no audience or REAL plan.

Maybe you have a $50 an hour consulting business and want to make $500,000 a year … not going to happen unless you change your business model.

At the first marketing conference I ever went to, I remember talking to a “big shot” who was selling $20,000 a month worth of products. He asked me how much money I wanted to make with my business, and I told him.

He then asked me this question:
“How many steps do you want it to take to get there?”
That’s a game-changing question if I ever heard one. If you truly want to play a bigger game, you need to ask it at EVERY step in your business. If you don’t, you’ll be using small strategies and trapping yourself in the prison of limited thinking.

If you want to make $500,000 a year, being a $50 an hour consultant means it takes 10,000 steps (hours) to get there. Not good, considering there aren’t even that many hours in a year. Sure, you could try and raise your rates to $100 an hour, but 5,000 hours a year is still a 100-hour work week, 50 weeks a year. So what if you didn’t want to take 10,000 steps, or even 5,000? What if you wanted to take … 50? Well… you’d have to change your entire strategy and completely alter your way of doing business.

Yeah, that’s what the bigger game is all about. $500,000 / 50 = $10,000 a step. So how do you get that when you’re used to making $50 an hour?
Maybe you create a product.
Maybe you hold workshops.
Maybe you start a certification program and train people you can outsource.
Maybe you look for affluent clients.
Maybe you … do something crazy … like pick a more profitable industry entirely.

Here’s the insanely powerful effect of reducing the number of steps it takes to get to your goal: It forces you to ask questions that open up opportunities you would have never thought of at the 10,000 step level.

10,000 steps = tiny steps. 50 steps = big steps, requiring a bigger game.
What if you looked at your current business model and cut the number of steps by a factor of 10? In other words, if your average sale is $25, what would you have to do differently to make it $250? If your average client is worth $1,000, what would you have to do differently to start bringing in $10,000 clients?

Chances are you’d have to do a lot of things differently. But if you shorten your journey by a factor of 10, isn’t this question worth asking? Oh, one important thing: This process only works when you reduce the number of steps by a factor of at least 5 or 10. If you just try and reduce the number of steps by a factor of two, you’ll probably just try to work harder at the game you’re already playing. You want to open your mind to a whole new game.

This whole process is kind of scary, kind of fun, and extremely liberating. I’ll walk you through it. Game on.

Until the next time, have a GREAT Week.
Lil Mogul

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 3

The MEGA World of Lil Mogul
by Lil Mogul

STEP 3: Assign Value To Failures (Instead of Fearing Them & Punishing Yourself)

STAY IN THE GAME!

Playing a bigger game means putting yourself out there and taking some chances … many of which will fail.

Let me repeat that:
Many of the chances you take will lead to failure. Not some. Many! However; here’s the secret: Those people who succeed? The ones you’re (secretly) jealous of? They were willing to fail a lot on the way to their success. Even for the “big shots” out there, you’ll find no shortage of people who refuse their calls … reject their ideas … never return emails …

That’s okay, because you’ve got to dig through a lot of rock to uncover those diamonds. Don’t take my word for it – check out what this “loser” has to say:

"I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." – Michael Jordan

Yeah, it’s easy for Michael to say, right, because he was always a big shot, right? Uh … no! He tried out for his high school varsity team and … failed. He didn’t make the cut. So he quit, because he’s a failure and that’s what you should do when you realize that you’re a loser. Oh, wait, no he didn’t. He got put on the junior varsity team instead so he could work on his skills. He went to basketball camp. Worked at it, and got to varsity by junior year. And the rest is history. And that history includes losing over 300 games – 26 of them that were completely his fault. In front of everybody. Oh, the dra-ma.

Here’s the thing: Those failures were part of his strategy of continually getting better at his game and figuring out what strategies worked.

Now, I’m not going to tell you to just think positive and keep trying, for the sake of being motivational. That’s crap and you know it. You don’t care that he lost 300 games because he’s rich and famous and there are shoes named after him. Things are still hard for you. You don’t care that Edison tried 10,000 times (really?) to create a light bulb, because life is tough for you.

That’s because you’re taking your failures personally. You’re worrying about what people will think of you and what it will feel like. You’re looking at failure as a loss. Failures aren’t losses. They’re investments...
Think about this very carefully.

Failures help you aim and focus. Remember the game 20 questions? You didn’t expect to guess the right thing the first time (or even the 10th time). If you’ve played the game enough you know the pattern. Getting a bunch of “No” answers up front is great because it reduces the number of possible things to guess. It’s the same way with business life – you can try something, see if that strategy works, and if it doesn’t you can try a different strategy. Nobody says “You sank my battleship” on the first try, and nobody cares.

Failures help you make progress faster. A paradox, but the truth. Once you actually start taking action, you find out a lot more about what you really want and how you want to go about it. You will often find that your business idea is either flawed or doesn’t scale. This helps you immediately focus on coming up with strategies that will get you there faster. There’s no substitute for putting your ideas out there, watching them flounder and learning from them. If you’re not doing that because you’re afraid of the searing fires of hell that accompany failure you’re looking at it the wrong way.

Those aren’t the fires of hell come for your soul (and reputation!) – they’re a refiner’s fire, burning off the dross and helping get to the gold inside that you’re really after. There’s the old military expression “No battle plan ever survives first contact.” Once you get in the trenches you’ll see where you went wrong – and get valuable clues to what you really need to be doing.

Failures attract the attention of other “failures.” And you want this, big time. Because when you put yourself out there – even if you fall on your face – you’re getting the attention of people higher up the food chain than you are. People who know the value of trying and failing and retrying. You’re showing them you’re willing to pay your dues – just as they did – and you’ll win their respect (and perhaps some cooperation as well). Remember, the people up the food chain have had the stones to fail more than you have. Start catching up if you want their attention.

Failures have essential by-products. Let’s say you try some joint venture with someone else in your field and it bombs. Failure? Not if you have a stronger relationship with the partner, or with affiliates, or even with the people who you were exposed to. Not if you learned something new about technology, or came up with a new product idea, or discovered that your launch bombed because your audience was really looking for ___X___.

Just because you didn’t get what you wanted doesn’t mean it’s not insanely valuable. Dr. Spence Silver came up with a failure of an adhesive in 1968 – it woudn’t stick strongly to anything at all. 6 years later, his colleague came up with the idea of using it for Post-It notes. Missing the original goal can be just fine. Find a use for what you have on hand as a result of the process.

Real winners know that failures are necessary investments for THE FUTURE success. Don’t be afraid to fail. Just make sure you’re failing forward. Don’t accept any other option on the rough side of the mountain. Yeah, it sounds painful but I’ll walk you through some good stuff to make it easier. I’ve got your back. Game on.

Until Next Time… have a great week!

Lil Mogul

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 2

The MEGA World of Lil Mogul

by Lil Mogul

STEP 2: Get Honest with the Truth of Who You Are (And The Value That You Provide)
Maybe you’re not playing a bigger game because of fear about who you are – you’re stuck in the “I’m not good enough” or “People are going to think I’m a fraud.” Let me tell it to you straight:

Unless you are committed to being a quitter, “I’m not good enough” is BULL you’re hiding behind. First of all, you’re better than you give yourself credit for because I know you’re taking yourself for granted. Second, you can’t tell me you can’t get better. Maybe you’re not willing to, but that’s “won’t,” not “can’t.” Practice and training can make anyone with a pulse better.

Unless you actually trying to defraud people, you have no reason to see yourself a fraud. You have certain skills you can offer the world, and whether or not you don’t appreciate them, other people can. You may not see yourself as a 10 on the old sliding scale, maybe you’re a 5, but let me tell you this: To people who are a 0, 1 or 2, your 5 might as well be a 10. You have value they need.

So let’s talk about value: It all comes down to what you can do for other people, and it has absolutely nothing to do with all that emotional baggage and drama you’ve wrapped yourself in. I don’t care who is a better __X___ than you are. I don’t care if ___X____ has a bigger following than you, more credentials than you or whatever.

If you can provide value (which you can), you need to get honest about that. Honest with yourself. Because that’s the only way you’re going to get other people to see it, and pay you for it. The MEGA Motto: People Believe What They See and Buy What They Believe!!! You may not be good enough for you (oh, the drama!), but if you’re good enough for them, freakin’ give yourself credit already.

Imagine: You know CPR well enough. Someone stops breathing, and what do you do? Do you start asking yourself if there are better CPR practitioners than you? Do you wonder if your certification came from a prestigious enough teacher? Or maybe you have no certification at all, someone just showed you how to do it (correctly)? Are you going to dredge up every loser feeling you’ve had about yourself and dwell on that while that person slips off into the great unknown?

No!!! You’re going to get on your knees, do that CPR thing, and save that person’s life. Without a second thought, because the situation calls for value, and you have value to offer. Even if other people are better at CPR than you are, you could possibly save a life TODAY. Now quit imagining, and get real. You can do things other people find valuable, but since they come naturally to you or you’re just used to having the skills and hanging around people with the same (or better?) skills than you have you’re feeling sorry for yourself. Dra-ma. PLAY A BIGGER GAME!!! It’s not about what everyone everybody else is doing, it’s about what you can do for people who need what you can do. Don’t make it more difficult than that.

You can build a six-figure business catering to people who need 5s. Why are you worrying about being a 10. It’s not worth it. Be the best 5 you can be, serve the people who need 5s, and if you want to go upwards, do what it takes to become a 6, 7, 8, and so on. But quit with the drama already. Your skills are not worthless and you can absolutely add value. When I started out as a model talent agent with my small entertainment management company, could I compete with Ford Models, William Morris or Bad Boy Productions? NOPE and sticking with that drama killed my bottom line for years. But once I realized “Hey!!! , I don’t have to compete with them. I still know how to scout, develop and manage talented people and get them to be more productive,” I was able to go out there and fill my talent roster (faster than I thought). Was it because I was a 10? Absolutely not. I was a 5, and believe me, the people who were 2s and 3s got a lot of value out of what I provided. Now they are 5s. Win.

Seriously, if you want to play a bigger game than get a bigger view of who you are and what you offer. Start defusing the lies you’ve been telling yourself about why you’re not good enough and everyone is better than you are. Draa-maa.

I’ll walk you through this process in so you can get into gear so you can appreciate what value you truly have to offer and ultimately get people to pay you what you’re worth. Game on.

Until Next Week… Have a most valuable week.

Lil Mogul

Playing The Bigger Game - PART 1

The MEGA World of Lil Mogul
by Lil Mogul

STEP 1: Accept The Fact That You Will Have To Stretch

(And That The Pain Will Be Worth It)

So far, you’ve been paralyzed by at least one big step you have to take because you know – you just know - that it’s going to be incredibly hard or painful or scary. There’s something you need to do, but it’s beyond your comfort zone. And you’ve made the discomfort of taking that next step so big in your mind that there’s no way in hell you’re going to take it.

Guess what? It’s not nearly as scary or painful or destructive than you think. You’re just blowing it out of proportion. Will it be easy? No, of course not. But it won’t be nearly as hard as you think – you’re just seeing it that way because you’re not “all in.” You have one foot on the train that’s going to take you somewhere and one foot on the ground, and it hurts like hell to live life and do business in that situation.

So you need to decide to go all in and do it. But that’s scary. I get it. But I also get how to defuse that feeling of scariness, and it all starts with the first sentence of the first personal development book I ever read. (a book that literally saved my life during a violently traumatic time as a kid)

“Life is difficult. This is the great truth, one of the greatest truths … because once we see this truth, we transcend it.” – M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled

Don’t let the word “transcend” make you think this is some fluffy woo-woo thing (and to all my fluffy woo-woo readers, no offense, my friends). By transcend he means “get over it.”

Yeah, life and your business can be difficult. It really is. However, it seems much more difficult than it really is because society is training us to think that it should be easy. Microwave popcorn, drive-throughs, magic pills and American Idol have conditioned us to expect everything to be easy and push button and if it’s not, then oh-crap-what-is-wrong-with-me-I-am-such-a-failure.

That’s why we get livid when someone isn’t doing 10 miles over the speed limit, or the drive-through is slow, or *gasp* Twitter is down. We’re trained to believe that trivial things are difficult, and that the things that are actually kind of challenging – well, that’s impossible. Yeah! This happens to me too, and I have to find someone to kick my booty and read that quote again.

.
Here’s the point:
If you wish/expect/hope things should be easy, then getting out of your comfort zone is terrifying and paralyzing and something you will never, ever bring yourself to do it. Goodbye big game. It was nice to pretend I really wanted you.

But if you accept that life and your business is difficult, then it stops being so damned bad. Yeah, it’s a pain sometimes, but you expect it and it’s not so bad simply because you expect it. You know you’ll wince, but you know it’s going to be worth it.

This is the first and most important truth you have to accept if you want To Play The Bigger Game - it’s not going to happen without some uncomfortable stretching. You can’t get there with the muscles that got you here. But you can push yourself, you’ll survive (really), and after you go through the discomfort you’ll be stronger on the other side.

When Omaba was three, he was riding his tricycle at the playground, and he was complaining about how hard it was to go up the less-than-gentle incline. He was worried he wouldn’t be able to go there often on his trike because it was just too hard. So his mother told him the truth: If he just stuck it out today, then his legs would get a little bit stronger, and tomorrow would be a little easier. And then the next day it would be even easier, and so on, until it wasn’t a big deal anymore.

Most kids would have shrugged it off or complained some more. But not him. He actually pedaled slower, so it would be harder, and so he would build up his muscles faster. Holy crap! The kid was three and he was already upping his game.

What if you had that same attitude? What if you decided the temporary pain or discomfort was just a natural part of the process, and that going through it wasn’t “hell,” but just the dues you have to pay to come out stronger on the other side?
You’d Play a much Bigger Game, that’s what.

So why aren’t you? You most defuse the programming that has tricked you into thinking that the challenge of personal and business growth should be feared instead of devoured.

Game on!!! Until next week..

Playing the BIGGER Game!!!

The MEGA World of Lil Mogul

by Lil Mogul

This weekend, I received an e-mail from a business associate that had me really thinking. So, I wanted to share it with all my weekly readers. The article was very long, I decided to create a 7 part series called Playing A Bigger Game. It was written by Dave Navarro; however, I applied and added a number of principles as well as comments/statements from my new business practices.

There’s an old saying that “Nothing works until you do” – and it couldn’t be more true. No matter how much you might wish for heaven and earth to move just because you want it to, you have to cowboy up and take action. The problem is that most of us don’t take actions that match up with our goals - we’re not “congruent” with them and we play small. Hey, that doesn’t get us anywhere.

If you want to shave years off of the time it takes to get to your “stretch” goals you need to do some stretching yourself – you’re going to need to play a much bigger game. No doubt you know this already (you hear it everywhere, don’t you?), but have you really been doing something about it?

You may have been caught up in the urgencies of life so far, but it ends now. We make this work together. I’ve got your back and will tell you what’s worked really well for me. Let’s talk about the reasons you aren’t playing as big a game as you could be right now: Fear and Distraction.

Fear. Playing a bigger game = doing what it takes to get the things you say you really want = doing more and being more than you’ve ever been in the past. That’s scary, but I’m about to help you move past that fear.

Distraction. Yeah, you’ve got a lot going on in your life. Maybe too much. But what do you do? Answer: You make the time (starting with just 30 minutes) and you create a plan. The making the time part is easier than you think – take a lunch hour, but take it by yourself. Put “American Idol or Project Runway” on DVR this week instead of watching it live. Whatever… You can do this! You just have to decide to start with a few minutes soon. Once you’ve decided where you’re going to spend your first 30 minutes of thinking time, with your notebook and bam, you’ve got your plan. You don’t have to start from scratch, the scratch is done for you.

For the next seven weeks, we’re going to dig into seven strategies you can start using playing a bigger game and getting more out of your life and your business.

We can do the exercises together.

Until then… Have a GREAT week.