Why Doesn’t Anyone Get Addicted To Apples?

Lessons I Learned From Writing My First Book

1. We all know more than we think we know. This goes for business, goes for right and wrong, for excellence and the lack of it. We know it, even if we make a habit of ignoring it. 

When we were in high school, my best friend and I had a talk about our smoking habit and how bad it was. Very quickly we made the observation that people only get addicted to bad things. I still remember my friend's rhetorical questions: 

“Why doesn’t anyone get addicted to apples? Why don’t we wake up in the morning and crave an apple, instead of a cigarette?” His point was well taken. We get addicted to bad things, while we find it difficult, or boring to follow the good ones. Eating your veggies and going to bed on time is not only hard for my 11-year old daughter. It is often really hard for me too. 

All this is very well studied by psychologists. In his book What Makes Your Brain Happy and Why You Should Do the Opposite author David DiSalvo describes how the rewards center in our brains can easily be manipulated. One very interesting feature of this rewards center is that it is a bit like a power grid that can be tapped into, hacked, and even hijacked by external forces. When that happens, our rewards circuitry is used in the exact same way, only the rewards that are imprinted are not beneficial. When this imprinting of negative rewards overwhelms the brain rewards center, we see someone who is “addicted” to a substance or behavior.

It is the same in business. We know more than we think we know. Sometimes we just need this extra grain of confidence. Or we need the extra drop of pain - depending on how we get motivated. Or we are just addicted to one bad habit or another and we need to break it. Acknowledging that we know this is the first step in the right direction.  

2. "Nobody knows anything." Yes, you read that right, and yes - it looks like it contradicts #1 above. The full quote belongs to William Goldman in his book Adventures in the Screen Trade: 

“ Nobody knows anything...... Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what's going to work. Every time out it's a guess and, if you're lucky, an educated one.” This goes for the screen trade, for the writing craft, and for anything in business really. Uncertainty is practically guaranteed. It is the biggest source of anxiety. Especially for entrepreneurs and for business leaders. So how do we find the calm that we need in order to carry on? In the lonely hours of writing my book, my best answer was - you don’t. Because nobody knows anything - you become the source of what you need. Be it calm, happiness, inspiration, or grit. Digging deep, till you find what you need is the second step in the right direction.

One result from this is that original, new ideas are better off when presented in the company of existing ones. 

3. Better done than perfect.  Speed over perfection. We have to complete our work. We have to make it good. Then we need to move on. To paraphrase Albert Einstein - everything should be made as good as possible, but not more than that. 

Find The Excellence Habit here: http://amzn.to/1TQegWu 

The quiet part of your story - by Sharon Sullivan

There's nothing stronger than a person making a comeback.  It can happen in a moment and it happens in your head first. You go back to what you know.  It's the best part of your story, the part when you allow yourself to become what you've always known you could be.

Everyone has a gift and it is when you tap into your ability rather than immediate skills.  Skill follows ability and desire to do something well.  You do not needs anyone's permission to do so. Only a desire and the tough part is the execution.  Harder still is to stay with it.

Everyone has ideas but it is in the time and attention and practice of execution that separates the successful people form the dreamers.  Time and attention is all that is required.  I will tell you the execution and commitment to the idea takes much more time and effort than the immediate conception of the idea.  The successful ones work through the quiet part of execution, where they are putting in the time and effort but have yet to see results.  It's the part with faith is your only coat.  You are the sole believer as you stand there making your own website, painting your own sign, printing up your own brochures, packaging your first products in the mail..wondering; Is this thing going to take? 

It's the part of the story that we love the best.  Probably because we know how easy it is to quit instead of sticking with it, to put the dream down instead of revising it to make it work, to console our immediate lack of acceptance with "friends" who knew we shouldn't have tried such a grand endeavor in the first place. Remember, it's only the ones who stick it out who will be in the story not the ones who politely and quietly ..quit trading reassurance and status quo for a life that could be so much better because you are building the dream.

Some people who have no formal education are highly successful because they worked an idea, they had the grit to work through the quiet, lonely and ...POOR part of the journey.  They set aside a feeling of entitlement to receive the results when they were deserved and earned by the customers or clients that believed in them first. The first sale, the turnaround client, the comeback check, the ones who put on the potholders when the heat gets turned up and can find a coat when the heat is turned down.  These are gritty, push forward people you want to surround yourselves with because it's what it means to be really living.

It's always the best part of the story, it is why poets write poetry, composers write songs,  a gazillion life coaches are out there promising to be the bearer of success but in the end you must do it yourself for yourself.  It's one of the most human things you can do. It is the quiet part of the story where you alone make the decision to press on.  If done well, it will outlive you and be a role model to people you will never meet.  It's where all your loves is, all your grit, all your stubborn will to see something nobody else can yet envision.  It's quiet.  It's powerful.

It is what people remember.  If you notice the news we try like hell to suppress the difficult yet necessary news in favor of something hopeful.  So stay with what you know you should be doing and be that inspiration, that sign of a turnaround,  and really bring it to another level.  The quiet part of the story is the best part, the part where you believe all by yourself to put something good in this world., something productive, something artistic, in spite of everyone and everything around you telling you it's just too much to handle.

Breaking through this part is seeing the brick wall as a thin piece of ..nothing...all you have to do is walk through.

Sharon Sullivan - CEO of First Step Resources

Originally posted on LinkedIn on Jan. 19, 2016

Feeling Stuck? Move Your Own Cheese!

We all face barriers, misfortunes and obstacles in our lives. Most of us also struggle with internal resistance, procrastination, and distractions. To conquer these, often all we need is a one small idea and the courage and tenacity to see it through. Whether it is finishing college after a head injury, overcoming fear of rejection, or choosing to follow an idea outside your comfort zone – in every case success follows. However, despite the occasional victory, many of us still feel stuck. We live with this vague, gnawing sensation that “there should be something more”. Doubt creeps in our souls. Can we all reach higher? Are we made of the same cloth as the top guys? If yes – what is the line that separates us from “them”? From the Elon Musks and Serena Williams of the World.

Part of the problem is that we believe as adults that we are entitled to comfort. We have completed all tests and exams and school is out forever. We graduated and it is now time to live. We can relax, get a regular paycheck and get to enjoy life for a change. It is good to be comfortable. This includes avoiding conflict or rejection as much as possible. This means giving in to our internal resistance or accepting our circumstances. If our paycheck doesn’t allow us to drive the car that we want – then let’s calculate what we can afford. We settle – one step at a time. We call it ‘compromise’, we call it ‘prudence’ and we call it ‘realistic’. We choose words that look good so we can feel comfortable with our choices. We do this to remove ourselves from the feeling of responsibility for our own less-than-100% decisions. What is worse – we don’t even see this ‘comfortable adult’ as a problem. We want to be a comfortable adult. So we make that a habit.

Deep down we are aware of this problem. Kind of. If we do exceptional work, we have to move up, right? It is what we believe and this conviction does not contradict our ‘comfortable adult’ choice. We believe that all we have to do is work hard, do a great job and it will happen. Somehow life owes us this. Oftentimes, during our honeymoon at a new job, this blind belief is rewarded. We bust our chops, we get recognized and we get a pat on the back. It is this pat on the back that changes our attitude from “blind belief” to “justified belief.” Our idea that hard work pays off is proven correct, so we place more trust in the system. When what we think is true turns out to be true, we trust ourselves all the more. And we never revisit our ‘comfortable adult’ choice.

One of the things that make us successful is our ability to change. To recognize when it matters and take active steps to “move our own cheese”. This is how we succeed – no matter what we define success to be. We succeed by learning to use ‘uncomfortable’ and not by avoiding it.

Originally posted on Aug 14, 2015 on LinkedIn