Turn Learning into Actual Improvement

Turn Learning into Actual Improvement

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The real measure around whether all the effort, time and resources, you are putting into trying to improve yourself, is working and making real and tangible differences in your life, is easily measured in the improved or better results you are getting to enjoy as a result of all your efforts. Remember you attract success by the person you become, as you become more, you most certainly attract more.  If you are investing a vast amount of time, energy and resources into your self-development and you are feeling frustrated, as you seem to just remain trapped in the same place, then you may very well be spinning your wheels, covering a mass of material and learning very little. The most important thing about personal development is not to haphazardly cover as much material as possible. Just like any goal or outcome you are attempting to achieve, you must have clarity of purpose and a definite plan to achieve the outcome you desire.

There are people that attend every seminar possible, they read all the books and listen to audio recordings at every turn, yet they never seem to see improved results in their lives. This is simply because they are only circulating a vast amount of knowledge through their heads and never applying or using any of it. If success was just about knowledge or information, everyone with an internet connection, would be able to have thin thighs in 30 days, earn millions of dollars, spending only two hours a day on the internet or build any success they wanted after paying only three instalments of only $ 39.95. As you know the reality is quite different, sustainable success is never about knowledge. It is about finding the right knowledge and then turning that newfound knowledge into skill, application and new success habits.

There is a massive difference between knowing everything and knowing what you should do and actually taking inspired action, applying the right knowledge and doing what you know. The difference is found in the way that you turn all the information or knowledge into meaningful learning and improvement. Learning will only equal better earning, when you have a vision or reason for undertaking the seminar, reading the book or listening to the audio program. This clarity of purpose and focus allows you to gain real and lasting benefit from your investment into self-improvement. The reason you invest time, energy and resources into improving, is to allow you to get better results. To help you to get better results from all your self-improvement activities, I offer you a summary of my method below.

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1)      Explore your goals and choose an area that needs improving (e.g. Improve presentation skills)

2)      This is the focus of your self-improvement efforts for the next 90 days.

3)      Buy 3 books, 5 Audio books and sign up to do at min one seminar, related to your area of focus (e.g. improve presentation skills)

4)      Set aside 30 minutes – 1 hour a day to consume the three books over the next 90 days.

5)      Read, re-read, underline, highlight, put notes in margins and at the end of chapters, until you have absorbed and understood the book, cover to cover.

6)      Extract the three most important concepts from the book.

7)      Build a plan to include at least one of these concepts into your daily routines over the next 90 days. They must be included into your weekly and daily planning and action lists.

8)      Review your progress and see how well you are integrating these into your life, daily, weekly, monthly and quarterly.

9)      Listen to only those five audio books over those same 90 days. I find I get the most benefit from each program, if I listen to each audio book at least 5 times before proceeding to the next one.

10)   Extract the three best ideas from each audio program.  Commit to introduce the most valuable concept into your routine. It must be added into your weekly planning schedule and actioned daily.

11)   When you attend the seminar, I listen intently, making notes only when you hear something new or valuable. Record the proceedings on a recording pen and listen to this in your car over and over again.

12)   Once again extract the three most useful ideas and introduce these into your schedule.

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My experience has shown me that although I am reading three books, listening to five audio books and attending a seminar, in the field of my focused area of growth, every 90 days. There always seems to be a common theme that emerges from all of these and I manage to find only about three new ideas to implement and introduce into my life.

The secret to make this work for you is to:

·         Choose one area to focus on every 90 days

·         Choose the best three ideas from all the material and implement these into your schedule.  Use willpower to take action and introduce them into your life, until they become part of your new habit set.

·         Measure and review your progress daily, weekly and monthly and ensure that you are actually applying the new ideas in your life.

·         Constantly strive to stay focused on only one area at a time and commit to keep improving.  

Author: Andrew Horton Conference Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

Global Economic Downturn or Greatest Entrepreneurial Opportunity of this Millennium?

Global Economic Downturn or Greatest Entrepreneurial Opportunity of this Millennium?

Time Management  

It certainly looks like we are going through really difficult times on a global and to a lesser extent a national scale. What seems to be real doom and gloom for some is in fact the greatest opportunity that has come the way of entrepreneurial thinking people with vision. If you are willing to make the shift and be one of the people that are able to see this economic turmoil as the perfect storm for entrepreneurship, you will look back in 20 to 30 years’ time and fondly remember these challenging economic times as the greatest window of opportunity for any entrepreneur. It is over the next few really challenging months (18 – 24), that the great entrepreneurial thinkers will begin to shine and the wildly successful companies that will lead the way tomorrow will be born.

I have no crystal ball, which I spend my days gazing into, that is allowing me to make these accurate predictions. Are you aware that 16 out of the Dow 30 companies were started in a recession or even a depression, companies that like Johnson & Johnson, Proctor & Gamble, General Electric, McDonalds and even Disney that are now market leaders? All these companies were tiny entrepreneurial start-ups at one point, are now behemoths within their respective industries. There has never been a better time to make the choice to set your entrepreneurial thinking free and to explore new opportunities.

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There is a massive shake-up occurring and the decks around who holds the capital are being rearranged and shuffled. The global financial crisis and economic downturn has most certainly put the cat amongst the pigeons and disrupted the status quo. It is these very disruptions and challenges that offer the greatest opportunity for new clear thinking entrepreneurs. During the sunny times, when everything is running smoothly, it is difficult for any new entrepreneurial enterprise to penetrate a new market or to really stamp their mark on any industry. During challenging times and economic turmoil, the playing fields are levelled and new opportunities are up for grabs, if entrepreneurs are willing to identify all these great opportunities that abound and grab hold of them with both hands. Industry is giving birth to the new market leaders right now; these are the people that are willing to allow themselves to search beyond the obvious, to explore the limits of possibility and to set their entrepreneurial selves free. You could be one of these remarkable people.

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The very challenges that this global economic downturn has created are the very fuel that great entrepreneurs feed upon. The huge amount of challenges that need to be solved are the very catalyst that will ignite the entrepreneurial spirit in many new entrepreneurs and trigger new ideas and concepts that do not even exist today. The entrepreneurial people that are willing and able to create the solutions to today’s challenges, will become the beneficiaries of great rewards and will become the new leaders of tomorrow.

The final benefit of the current economic turmoil, which can be exploited by entrepreneurial thinkers, that are able to think beyond the obvious, is that everything is on sale. It is far cheaper for anyone entering the market to equip, build and market their new business. Suppliers are more flexible and open to new ideas and places to sell their goods and services, there is a huge pool of untapped talent waiting in the unemployment lines, waiting for the opportunity to work with exciting new companies with new big ideas.

There has never been a more opportune time to look around you and to try to see all the wonderful opportunities that are available to entrepreneurs. Stop looking around and seeing only doom and gloom, open your mind and see these challenges as opportunities to expand and grow, opportunities to find solutions to life’s current challenges and you can be one of the people that rides the wave of this current recession and becomes one of the leaders of tomorrow.

Author: Andrew Horton Time Management

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

Your Thoughts Create your Future

Your Thoughts Create your Future

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It is possible to change everything in your life with one decision or a single thought. All that you need to do, to start this miraculous process, of creating exactly the future that  you desire, is to make that one decision, to begin doing things differently. This single thought can positively change everything in your life.

This one single thought or single decision can:

• ·         Unlock your hidden potential
• ·         Improve your health
• ·         Create great wealth
• ·         Create great relationships and forge bonds of deep love and connection
• ·         Inspire new levels of joy and happiness.

We only get out of life, whatever we create. That sounds like such a simplistic statement and one worth exploring a little further. In other words if we want more of anything in our lives, we must create it. Accept that we are amazingly creative beings that can create and achieve incredible things, if we choose to. Everyone arrives on this planet, naked, scared and ignorant. The way our lives turn out, after that miraculous arrival, is determined by what we create or fail to create in our lives due to our creative activity or our negative inactivity.  

So I hear you ask “What drives our creative Capacity”?

In one word “Expectation” It is very rare that our achievements outstrip our expectations. When you create great expectations around what you are able to achieve, you determine the scope of what you are able to create. In a nutshell, whatever you think about creates your expectations and your expectations become the driving force behind your creative potential. That is why there are so many books on personal development that have titles like, Think and Grow Rich, As a Man Thinketh, The magic of Thinking Big and The Power of Positive Thinking. Our thoughts most definitely drive our expectations and our expectations most certainly manifest into all the possibilities that are available to us. Our expectations manifest into creation.

One of the most powerful thoughts that we experience and one that can transform our lives in the most remarkable ways, is the choice to think thoughts of gratitude. The reason this works so effectively, is because of how our brains are designed to work.  Our brains are in effect only auditing devices that search through our environment, discovering what is wrong, lacking or missing. The major role our brain undertakes is to ensure that we remain safe and that our survival is ensured. This is done through fear, hesitation or suspicion.  If we allow these protective, negative thoughts to dominate our mind, they will become our expectations and as I described above our expectations become the driving force behind what we create in our lives.  These negative thoughts will determine the direction your life will take and will drive the creative process inside your brain. Allowing these negative thought processes to decide on the direction your life will take will result in a lifetime of disappointing experiences and unfulfilling outcomes.

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The amazing thing about our thoughts is that we can control them and make better choices about what we think about. The way we do this is to stop the natural tendency of our mind to think negative protective thoughts, by redirecting it towards thoughts of abundance and what is possible for us, by focusing our thoughts on all the wonderful things we are grateful for in our lives. This small shift away from focusing our energy on the negative can very quickly change the trajectory of your life and put you on the path to super achievement. There are no magical things that happen around focusing your energy on abundance and all the wonderful things that you are grateful for in your life. Whatever you think about and focus your energy and thoughts upon, you will eventually bring about. You only see and experience the things that you look for. You create your reality by what your thoughts focus on and thus your creative energy is always focused on your dominate trend of thought. If you continue to focus on the negative thoughts and scarcity, that will be exactly what your reality will consist of. Open your mind and think thoughts od=f gratitude and abundance and your creative energy will be directed toward creating exactly that in your life. There is really no magic about this at all; it is simply a case of learning how to use the most incredible tool ever, namely your brain, to its full potential.

When you are in an attitude of gratitude you alter the aperture of your mind and you focus your thoughts on positive outcomes. This has incredible positive health benefits as well, you reduce your stress levels, you feel more positive and you are filled with far more joy and happiness. Besides the obvious benefits that your improved positive thoughts bring and how these thoughts help you to become more creative, there are a number of additional benefits too.

When you focus your thoughts on gratitude you improve your health by positively changing your emotions and improving your physical wellbeing. This has been shown to reduce depression, lower blood pressure, reduce or eliminate heart disease and boost the immune system. Your wealth will also start to improve as you choose to feel gratitude for all the abundance that already exists in your life. When you view everything in your environment as being filled with abundance, you have an open mind that is searching for new ideas and opportunities. This opens your mind to be constantly searching and discovering more abundance, prosperity and allows you to see all the opportunities that surround you.

Gratitude is most certainly a choice and choosing gratitude will eventually become an integral part of your new success habit set, if you are willing to practice this crucial concept, every day until it becomes who and what you are. This simple shift toward appreciating everything that you have in your life will help you to create the circumstances, which will help you to enjoy the abundance you deserve in all areas of your life.

Author: Andrew Horton Business Motivational Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

What will it take to unlock the Superhuman in you?

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Have you ever explored the limits of your potential? Or are you limiting yourself by what you believe is possible for you. There are amazing stories going back through history, where humans have exhibited incredible feats of both physical and mental prowess. One of the stories that really stood out for me was when, Marie Payton was using her self-drive mower to cut her lawn in High Island Texas. The mower pulled out of her hands and began to careen out of control across her lawn, heading straight for her granddaughter. Evie tried to stop the mower and was knocked over in the path of the out of control machine. The blade was still running under the mower as the machine began to go over little Evie. In a feat of super human effort Marie covered an incredible distance, grabbed hold of the mower, which weighed more than 300 pounds and tossed it out of the way as if it was made of light plastic. After the incident Marie tried to lift the same mower and was unable to even move it.
This incident highlights the pent up potential that lies dormant in all of us. We are capable of achieving incredible things, when we find a good enough reason, why anything is important to us. Marie managed to perform at levels way above what she thought possible, when the reason to do so was great enough. Are you limiting your potential because you are trapped in a comfort zone that is far below your capabilities?  Or are you performing below your potential because you have not found that really deep rooted reason why you want to achieve something. When you uncover your WHYPOWER, that really meaningful reason why you want to achieve something, you become unstoppable and your world opens up to you.
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If I placed a plank about 8 inches wide on the floor in front of you and I offered you $ 20 to walk over the plank. I am sure that you would smile, as you walked over the plank and took my $ 20. If I changed one thing and I took the same plank and suspended it between two 50 story buildings and once again, I offered you $ 20 to walk over the same plank. I am sure that you would think I was crazy and you would decline. Once again we change one thing, you are on the one building and your child is on the other building. The other building is on fire and the flames are licking at your child’s feet. Would you now run across the same plank and save your child? Everything is the same, yet now you would run across the same plank to save your child. What has changed? The reason why you must cross the plank has changed. It is clear that we will do incredible things and persevere and overcome any challenges when we have a big enough reason why we want something. Are you willing to search deep inside yourself and discover that one astounding, crucial and meaningful reason why you want to have do or be anything at all. When you discover this reason why you want to achieve anything, you have a tool that will allow you to overcome anything and to persevere until you succeed.
We are all imbued with incredible potential and can achieve incredible things, if we are able to create real belief in ourselves and we can uncover that real meaningful reason why we want to have, do or be anything. I am sure that you dreamed about possessing super human powers as a child. As you grew up and you trained yourself to think differently, to be “realistic”, you began to believe that you were limited and constrained by your self-imposed comfort zone. You stopped dreaming about possibility and accepted your “realistic” limitations. You are after all, not capable of much, you are just average and you must accept mediocrity. Well today that all changes, it is time for you to realise that you are only limited, by what you believe is possible for you. That “SELF-IMPOSED” comfort zone is as real as the Easter Bunny and the tooth fairy. You are capable of achieving absolutely anything and it is time to stop limiting yourself and holding yourself away from the lifestyle you deserve.
I want you to see that anything is possible, to highlight this, I offer you another example of super human power. Angela Cavallo, lifted a 1964 Chevrolet Impala off her son. He was working under the car, when the jack failed and the car fell on top of him. She held the car up long enough for two neighbours to replace the jack and pull him to safety. The current women’s deadlift record is 502.6 pounds and is held by Christine Neff. They estimate that Angela lifted about 1200 pounds off her son. There is an enormous difference between the world record held by a trained professional athlete and an average lady, with a huge reason why she must perform at super human levels of achievement. You are amazing and have unlimited possibilities available to you. Now is the time to begin exploring all the things you are capable of achieving and to stop limiting yourself with your own self-doubt.
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Time Management Skills - A Practical Guide

Time Management Skills

Keep an Activity Log

Do you have any idea how much time you spend chatting to colleagues, surfing the net, reading junk mail and making coffee every day?  A study done in the US found that when people wrote down everything they did for seven days, their perception of how much free time they had doubled.  Keeping a log will help you distinguish between time wasting activities and those that contribute to your success.  It will also help you determine when your most productive times are during the day and so you can schedule your most (and least) taxing tasks accordingly. 

Break your day up into one hour slots, at the turn of the hour; record exactly what you did during the previous hour.  This should take no more than one or two minutes to complete.  You only need to do this for one week to get a complete understanding of how you are spending your time.  The time you invest into this exercise will be immeasurable, verse the time you will gain in the future. 

Make a TO DO LIST - to enhance your Time Management Skills

If you are constantly trying to keep up with urgent (but not necessarily important) tasks, you need to prioritize these tasks and make a list.  There is a little saying that goes” for every minute spent organizing, an hour is earned.”  You must clearly distinguish between urgent and important tasks, this way you become both effective and time efficient.  You must break really big overwhelming tasks down into bite size action steps that can easily be accomplished.  This makes the really big and overwhelming tasks easy to manage and complete.  I have found that if  I break my To do list into lists that contain no more than a  maximum of 10 items each, I more readily get a feeling of accomplishment as I move from list to list during the day.  Don’t forget to review your to do list every day during your evening review every day.

Manage Technology as a way of improving your Time Management Skills

Technology has become both a time saver and unfortunately if we allow a huge consumer of our time.  The myriad of communication tools available, which include SMS, email, Facebook and Skype etc are major sources of distraction every day.  The attention we divert to utilize these very valuable sources of information can negatively affect our concentration, attention, productivity and decision making abilities.   Just like with your overall goal of managing your time you must manage your usage of these tools as well.  Your activity log will reveal how much time you are spending on unnecessary time wasting things such as reading junk emails, sending and reading unnecessary SMS, Chatting to friends on Facebook etc.  Don’t leave your email open all day as this will distract your attention every time a new mail comes in.  The best way I have found to deal with effectively utilizing these very valuable forms of communication is to set aside two blocks of time, for example one hour in the morning and one hour in the evening to attend to email only.  You must set a small block of time aside each day for social networking and be very disciplined in sticking to your allocated time.  The allocation of time is obviously made every evening when you are doing your daily planning for the next day.  Please don’t forget to review how disciplined you were that day and how well you stuck to your committed time allocation for emails, social networking etc.  If you are not sticking to your allotted time, put the necessary mental steps in place to stick to your allotted time the next day.

Until you begin to manage all the technology that bombards your existence each day, the technology will manage you.

Learn to Say NO! And you will see your Time Management Skills improve

Lack of assertion can and in most cases will affect your effective time and energy management.  Your inability to refuse unreasonable or unrealistic demands from your co-workers, managers and family members and a deep sense of not wanting to disappoint people around you, can become a huge energy sapping waste of your valuable time. 

This includes learning when to say no to people, when they just want to chat to you or share their problems with you.  It includes saying no to taking on work that can be delegated or effectively done by others.  Never promise more than you can deliver as this will negatively affect your performance and keep you away from doing the tasks that are really important or more importantly will stop you from doing the things that are really important to you such as spending time with your family. 

I have never heard of someone, looking back over their life saying “I wish I had spent more time at the office or away from my family” Life is an amazing journey, put things in place now to get more out of your day, so that you can begin to get that balance we all aspire to have in our lives.  Start to schedule quality time with those people that are near and dear to you, start to schedule time for you and schedule time to rest and recharge your batteries.  Allocate at last 24 hours every week to doing nothing but spending time with your self and your family.

Our Journey through Life

Don’t put all your energy and focus in reaching various milestones in your life.  The milestones are very important, but the journey to each milestone is what this wonderful journey called life is really all about.  Take some time and imagine that you are at the end of your life and ask yourself what you would have loved to do more of? Now start to put plans in place to allow yourself to allow yourself to do exactly that.

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Planned rest, proper nutrition and daily meditation are the power tools of super achievement (Part 2)

Planned rest, proper nutrition and daily meditation are the power tools of super achievement (Part 2)

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In the article yesterday we explored the necessity of regular rest, proper nutrition and for making time in your day to clear your mind and meditate. The greatest challenge you will face, as you try to introduce these three crucial components into your life, is that you will feel like you are slacking off, when in fact you introducing three new tools that will in fact make you more productive. The first step in this very necessary process is to see the huge productivity benefits that will flow to you as you build time into your schedule to recharge, how building good nutritional choices into your daily planning and scheduling time to unhook and allow your brain to replenish are all crucial components of creating the success you desire. If you are like me and the idea of taking time off feels like you are actually just slacking off, then shift your self-talk away from “taking time off” and see the time you schedule into your day for recovery, meditation and ingesting proper nutrition as “Rejuvenation, productivity building time”. This shift has really helped me to introduce these crucial components into my schedule. I now spend less time working each day, schedule rest time, exercise time, nutrition time and I ensure that I make time to meditate every day. Amazingly, since I have introduced these components into my busy schedule, I am getting far more effective work done each day.  Make this shift away from “I am wasting time” by introducing these apparent time wasters into my schedule to I have a new set of amazing productivity building tools that are making me far more effective and productive and you will astound yourself at how much more you will get done.  

The only way to make this work for you is to ensure that you actually schedule all three components into your dairy. As you know “whatever gets scheduled, gets done”. Every Sunday evening, when you are putting your weekly plan together for the week, you need to build the following components into your schedule, time to meet your future and to rest each day. Schedule regular meals throughout the day, make time to exercise and also build in time to meditate. These time slots are penned into your dairy and become unmovable appointments. The trick to make this work for you is to ensure that you defend these appointments on your calendar, like you would an opportunity to appear on the Oprah show. During your appearance on Oprah, you would not take calls, accept interruptions. You must treat these crucial daily meetings the same way, you need to remove yourself completely from the grid and block all other interruptions.

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These components are crucial productivity, energy and efficiency building tools. So break your desire to keep these activities secret from everyone around you. You have no reason to feel guilty about taking care of yourself and for doing things every day that are going to make you more effective. Use yourself as an example to everyone around you and show them how introducing these crucial components into your schedule actually make you far more productive. As you set new parameters and expectations around your schedule and you communicate this to everyone around you. It is amazing how the world seems to reorganize itself and everything seems to align with your new schedule.

The final and very crucial component in this process is to measure how you do each day. As you review how you do each day, week and month and see how you are improving and getting more and more done. You will see a pattern emerge that will give you a way to not only monitor your progress, but a way of constantly improving and making this system work better and better for you.

Measure all the rejuvenation components,

·         Are you keeping your commitments to rest and relax every day?

·         Are you exercising a minimum of 3 – 4 times a week?

·         Are you eating proper, nutritional meals 5 times a day?

·         Are you making time to mediate every day?

Commit to make, introducing these crucial components into your schedule, an uncompromised and productive priority each day and you will see you effectiveness and efficiency improve day after day.

This is what I recommend you introduce into your schedule as rejuvenation time

·         40 minutes for meditation

·         40 minutes to exercise, walk, gym – to move my body away from the office.

·         40 Minutes to do activities that engage and relax your mind. Find something that can challenge and excite you to do.

·         Take one day off a week, 24 hours in which you do not touch anything work related at all. I normally choose a Saturday and from 12 on Saturday until 12 on Sunday I do not think about work or do any work at all.

·         Schedule a 3 day long weekend getaway every 90 days.

·         Take a three week break once a year and travel.

As you introduce a schedule into your life, where you encourage recovery and rejuvenation, you will see remarkable improvements in your creative capacity, level of focus, efficiency, productivity and efficiency. We are creatures of habit, so the only way to make this work for you is to schedule it into your day and to make this part of your new routines and success habit set.

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Planned rest, proper nutrition and daily meditation are the power tools of super achievement

Planned rest, proper nutrition and daily meditation are the power tools of super achievement

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Even those people that have found what they love to do and have managed to turn their vocation into their vacation must schedule time, to rest and recharge their batteries. Building your level of skill and knowledge, on an on-going basis requires that you stretch yourself and that you push yourself outside of your comfort zone. Just like any athlete that wants to build muscle knows, it is not the exercise itself that builds muscle, it is the rest after the workout that allows the muscle to recover, to strengthen and get better. If you do not give muscle enough time to recover after each training cycle, you will actually be breaking muscle tissue down, making the muscle weaker and tearing muscle tissue. As you over train any muscle, it gradually breaks down and the athlete eventually burns out and becomes weaker. The same is true for the mind and body of any super achiever, as you push yourself, day after day, without allowing enough time to recover and to build, you are gradually breaking yourself down and you are weakening yourself. If you do not include time in your schedule to rest and recover, you will gradually see a decline in your performance and you will eventually burn out. Time off is in fact a crucial part of any hard-core super achievement and productivity regimen.

No athlete or machine can operate at its optimal level of performance, if it does not get the right type and quality of fuel. In the same vein, do not expect to get the maximum amount of energy to carry out your daily activities, if you are feeding your body with junk food or high fat, low nutritional value food every day. For optimal efficiency it is imperative that you fuel your performance with the right type, quality and frequency of nutrition. Give yourself permission to take time out of your schedule to supply quality nutrition to your body regularly through the day. The micro breaks that you will take throughout the day will give you the chance to give your body the right fuel that will give you an energy boost throughout the day. I have found that eating small nutritious meals at least 5 to 6 times a day gives me the best spread of energy throughout the day. Plan and schedule these meals the night before during your daily planning session each evening. The short frequent breaks that you take throughout the day to eat small nutritious meals, allow your mind a chance to recover and keeps your body filled with the proper nutrition, which maintains the chemical balance of your body and maximises your energy levels throughout the day. Keeping your body properly fuelled throughout the day is a great way of ensuring that your mood and attitude are at their best at all times. The more energised you feel, the less overwhelmed you are and you never seem to be expending frantic energy spinning your wheels.

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Learn to find time in your day, to empty your mind and to get in touch with your inner self or ch’i. The Chinese and Indian cultures have understood the importance of meditation for centuries and have practiced the art of emptying the mind and switching off the noise of everything around them every day. This simple art is one of the most powerful ways to recharge your batteries and to maximise your energy levels. The amount of noise that goes on around us all the time, in the form of billboards, radio broadcasts, emails, social media etc has made the practice of mediation more important than ever. Meditation is the place where we can switch off for a short while and discover the connection between cause and reaction. If you do not allow yourself to switch your mind off and to turn down the volume of all the noise that surrounds us, you will never get a chance to build up a buffer between all the cause that surrounds you and the way you are able to respond to everything in your world. Until you make time to switch off and connect, you build up pressure inside yourself like a pressure cooker and eventually as you get to full boil, you explode and you blow your lid. We are all aware of the need to rest, eat properly and to give yourself permission to meditate. In the article I will write tomorrow I will highlight a recipe or daily routine that will allow you to get the best from this process.

Author: Andrew Horton Motivational Speakers Johannesburg

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

Ignite the flame under your unlimited potential

Ignite the flame under your unlimited potential

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Ignite the flame of your unlimited potential by allowing yourself to; explore all the wonders of being a child once again. Permit yourself to venture back into that era of wonder and belief and to re- discover how passionate and driven you were, to be something special. Remember all those wonderful dreams you and all the great things you were going to do. Sit and give yourself permission to go back and remember how excited you got every day,  just thinking about what you were going to have, do and be when you grew up. These dreams were so exciting that you could not wait to grow up, so that you could begin to pursue and live them. Those wonderful dreams that flowed so freely through your veins were there for a reason, they were your true, unlimited inner potential casting a picture of what is possible for you.

This vision of possibility has slowly been filed away and your inner passion and belief has been gradually and inexorably killed, day after day, as you have travelled along the journey of your life. All the trials, tribulations and challenges you have faced, have gradually chipped away at your picture possibility, completely diminished your vision of all you are capable of achieving. This has left you accepting a limited picture of your unlimited potential that is keeping you trapped and distant from all you are capable of becoming. As the time has grown between when you were a child and you had all those dreams that anything was possible and today, where you have forgotten about your fantasies and goals. You have become distracted and begun to believe the people around you, the people that have given up on their dreams and who have convinced you that your dreams are not possible either.  Is this OK with you, are you happy to just coast through life and never live that passion you felt as a child? I challenge you to once again awaken that joy and belief that you once had and to allow yourself to explore, discover and become. Rekindle those dreams you once had and give yourself permission to expand and grow into the kind of person that can attract the success that you desire.

The first step in this simple process is to give yourself permission to feel a level of discomfort and to step outside of your self-imposed comfort zone. Your comfort zone is most certainly not a comfortable place to stay, it is the place that you have created in your mind, about what you are capable of achieving. The real possibilities that are available to you are limitless; your comfort zone is something false that you have created to keep you from stretching yourself and feeling a little stress. Have the courage to shift the way you look at everything around you and start to see challenges, roadblocks and difficulties as opportunities to learn and grow. Shift from viewing everything that crosses your path as being IN your way and see everything that comes your way as opportunities and as something that is on your way to the success that you desire. This small shift allows you to no longer look for ways to get through your day or week, but allows you to start looking for all the ways you can get as much as possible, from your day or week. Allow yourself to once again ignite that feeling of passion and believe in yourself once again. You will never achieve more than you believe is possible for you. Grow your belief and give yourself permission to feel a little stress as you stretch and challenge yourself. Give yourself the opportunity to discover and live your greater purpose. Allow the passion and desire to burn long enough so that you can achieve your wildest and most audacious goals. You are capable of the most amazing things, stop holding yourself away from possibility any longer, it is now the time to live your unlimited potential. Why not you and why not today?

Author: Andrew Horton Best Business Inspirational Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za   

Social Media Strategy for Chamber

Social Media Strategy for Chamber

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As we now enter the social media arena and we want to start making our mark in this new medium, it is imperative that we start out by listening to conversations that are going on about the Chamber or any in any other areas in which the Chamber may have an interest.. This will give us an understanding of what people are thinking about the Chamber and an opportunity to identify any trends within the market that could affect us now or in the future.

We need to identify a few key people (5 +) within the chamber that can devote about 30 - 45 minutes a day, to listen in on twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

1)      Their initial role will be to identify conversations relating to the Chamber and to then contribute valuable content to these conversations.

2)      A half day training session is necessary to bring these people up to speed on what is required from them.  

3)      A brainstorming session must be arranged to identify keywords and areas of focus for these searches.

4)      They must use twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn to search for conversations where these keywords that have been identified are occurring.

5)      Once they have located interesting relevant conversations that they feel are aligned with the Chambers strategy. They will leave the Chambers virtual handshake by leaving pertinent comments, offering feedback and delivering value.

6)      The key people identified above, must use their time on Social media, effectively to contribute to the conversations and attract new members, add value to existing members and extend the reach of the Chamber into the social media arena.

The secret to make a success out of the Chambers social media strategy is to ensure that we create good content and then to locate all the possible places that would enjoy this content. The key people that are identified must invest as much time as possible in these forums, identifying the right conversations, contributing ideas and commenting on as many articles as possible in these forums. Over time the Chamber, will become an integral part of these communities and valuable contributor of meaningful value.

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Social media is not instant or an event, it is a process. Becoming successful with any social media strategy is about commitment and patience. Understand that the work only starts after we have posted the feedback, comment or valuable content, or written a blog.  Our goal must be to promote the Chamber on all the forums that can get and give value to the Chamber. This is achieved by listening, searching and identifying all the right forums and connecting with the right people on the right forums. This takes effort and commitment. Do not think that succeeding in social media is just posting great content. It is about listening, contributing and becoming an integral part of the conversation.

There is a real time commitment for the Chamber to become successful with our social media strategy. The secret to succeeding with this strategy is all about consistency and ensuring that we are contributing the right content that is meaningful and of value in the right forums, to the right people. We are in effect in a leadership role and as we expand and build a significant following via our various social media outlets, we are taking on great responsibility and must meet our commitment to provide quality content and to always operate with the highest level of integrity.

Becoming successful in the social media arena is not about simply stepping into the conversation and then just fading away. It must become an integral part of our marketing and daily communication strategy. Social media is about participation and contribution; it is not about taking and offering nothing in return.

As we are contributing to the conversation, it is our responsibility to always be authentic and allow our passion and good intent to shine through at all times. The level of authenticity, commitment we offer on a regular basis and to always provide value and consistency are three of the key factors required, for us to become and remain successful with any social media strategy. As we continue to provide and consistently offer authentic and meaningful content, people will soon realize that they can trust what we have to offer and that our content is of real value.

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We must accept that becoming successful in the social media arena, requires a different approach to some other traditional forms of media. There is a huge element of trust that rests with all the individuals that are contributors to our overall strategy. Social media is not a one man or woman strategy, it requires input from a number of people within the Chamber, every single day. The larger the number of people that can contribute to our social media strategy, the greater and more effective will be our reach.

Social media is an incredible tool for building connection and relationships with the right people in the right places. Social media is an amazing additional tool that we can use to expand our message in our markets and to communicate with new and existing members of the Chamber. It should always be used in conjunction with all the other strategies that the Chamber is currently employing to market itself and to communicate with members and prospective members.

The time for the Chamber to enter the social media arena is now. Our social media strategy will take time to develop and implement. We cannot wait much longer to enter this arena and to begin using all the amazing opportunities this new medium offers the Chamber.

Author: Andrew Horton Best Business Inspirational Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

Becoming a Super Achiever is about taking Calculated Risks

Becoming a Super Achiever is about taking Calculated Risks

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Acquiring great success and achievement, often requires you to take on some level of risk. As most super achievers have taken a number of risks in their lives and it is very often that very risk taking that made them successful in the first place, it seems pretty obvious that super achievement and accepting some level of risk are synonymous. The secret though is to know the difference between taking a calculated risk and blundering into something that is just plain foolish risk. Every super achiever that I have studied understands the art of only taking only calculated risks and most certainly will never fall prey to the kind of hype and commercial propaganda created by Hollywood around risk taking. “Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash.”  General Patton.

The Art of Taking Calculated Risks

Building success and following your entrepreneurial spirit, will most certainly require you to assess many situations, opportunities and events and to take calculated risks that will move you to the next level of achievement. Any big idea or major goal you have, will require you to stretch yourself and to expand your activities and thinking beyond your current comfort zone.

I have compiled a simple plan, described below, to allow you to mitigate the risk, whilst still allowing you to expand your horizons and to take calculated risks only.

Taking calculated risks is Essential

Knowing when to put your chin out there and to accept some level of calculated risk is an essential part of the process of separating yourself from the crowd. Knowing when to take a calculated risk is the one variable that very often separates the super achievers from the rest of the mediocre crowd. It is your willingness to accept some level of risk that will advance you to the next level of abundance and achievement. Accept that you must accept some level of risk to become abundant and successful, but never allow the risk to stretch you into realms in which you could lose everything.

As you climb the ladder to ever greater levels of success and you have more and more to lose. It is wise to assess every risk that you intend to take even more carefully. When you are young and do not have too much to lose, you have not moved too far from the starting line, losing everything and having to start over is not as costly, as when you have created some level of success already. As you move further down the path to super achievement it is prudent to mitigate any risks that you take and to only ever put a small portion of your accumulated wealth at risk. I am conservative and I limit my risk profile as follows:

·         Speculative risk – Max 10 % of your net worth.

·         Moderate risk 10 – 20 % of net worth.

·         Calculated risk 20 – 30 % of net worth.

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I have found this ratio of high risk to moderate risk, a safe bet when exploring any new opportunities. As you get a little older and you have a family that depends on you, it is crucial that you are wiser and more prudent in your risk profile and choices.

Take risks in only in areas where you have knowledge and expertise

My experience has shown me that every time I have entered into a venture that is outside of my area of competency and taken a risk. I have lost my shirt. Never invest or take any risk in any venture that is outside your core area of competency. If you do not understand the business or the marketplace, steer clear and avoid taking any risk at all. The biggest challenge when you try to enter into an area that is outside your area of expertise is that you are taking a risk in an area, where you don’t even know, what you don’t know.  You have no foundation to build on, who to ask the right questions to or how you should go about making the venture work. You can never take a calculated risk in any area where you do not have the competency to know what to calculate or how to weigh the risks.

Mitigate or remove the risk altogether

The secret of most super achievers and great risk takers is that they understand how to mitigate or remove the risk from the equation completely. The way to do this successfully is to never take on any risk that will overextend you, to the point of complete disaster if things do not work out. Conduct in-depth due diligence before accepting any risk and always assess any risk against the potential return. If something appears too good to be true and the returns seem to be just too incredible to be true. Then more often than not they are. Create a bottom measure or floor level where you will pull the plug on any investment. Do not fall into the trap of throwing good money after bad.

1)      Risk is necessary to succeed

2)      The more you have to lose and the more people that depend on you, the more prudent and calculating you must be.

3)      Only invest in areas in which you have expertise – stick to what you know

4)      Conduct in-depth, due diligence and create clear plans and measurement criterion before taking on any risk.

5)      Have discipline to pull the plug on any risk that has gone sour.

Author: Andrew Horton Best Inspirational Business Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

Turning learning into improvement and growth

Turning learning into improvement and growth

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The results that you get to enjoy in your life are the best barometer of how well you are learning from the books you read, the cd’s you listen to and the DVD’s you watch. I am sure that I am not alone when I say that I have read a book, attended a seminar or listened to an audio book and after completing either or all of them, have made a promise to change my life and nothing happened. The reason so few people actually get to make the changes they want and need to make, is not because the material does not work, it is because they do not work the material. The secret to get the maximum from all the material you gather is not found in the learning, it is found in how willing and able you are to take the new knowledge and to apply it in your life. Success is a doing activity, it is an action sport. Taking action and utilising any new knowledge is the next and only logical step after finding any new knowledge and the only way any new knowledge can ever serve you. Possessing all the knowledge in the world, knowing in the finest detail what you need to do, is absolutely pointless, unless you get off your butt and actually do something with the knowledge.

We are creatures of habit and unless we have a system to use that will allow us to use the knowledge we gather effectively, we will continue to blunder through each year, learning much, but using very little. The first thing to do is to decide exactly what area of your life you want to improve. It is of very little value to move from one subject to another, randomly reading and consuming material on every possible subject. This unfocused approach, keeps you trapped in the mire of too much knowledge and very little or no improvement.

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Choose an area of your life that you want to improve.

Break your year back into four 90 day segments. Now choose one area of your life you want to improve and gather specific knowledge on that area only for the entire 90 day period. The secret that makes this approach so effective is that you focus all your energy on only one thing and you do not dilute your efforts, moving from one unrelated area to another. Add your commitment to apply all the knowledge you gather in your life and you will see remarkable growth and improvement every 90 days. For example, my last quarter was invested into improving my presentation and speaking skills. I invested all my learning efforts into reviewing material on improving in this area only.

I research this one area online and ask everyone in my network that can make a positive contribution, to advise me on the best possible resources they know of that will help me improve in that specific area. I then invest into buying five audio programs, three books and I try to sign up to attend at least one seminar that is aligned with that specific are during that 90 day period.

How to do it

Listen to the audio programs in your car, over and over again for the entire 90 days period. Each time you listen to the recording, note one specific skill or idea, you can apply in your life and take action on introducing that skill into your life that day.  Repeat this every day for the entire period, until you have applied all the new knowledge into your life.

Don’t just speed read through the three books; completely consume them over the ninety day period. Underline, circle, highlight and reread each page of the three books, until you have absorbed and introduced all the knowledge into your life. Pick an idea from the book each week and introduce it into your life. As you go through the 90 day period, refine the book and choose three ideas that really resonate with you, introduce these new ideas and tolls into your life, persisting with introducing the new ideas until they become new ingrained habits in your life.

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Getting the most from the Seminar you attend

Listen to all the great ideas that will flow from the person presenting the seminar, but also pay attention to all the ideas that flow to you from deep inside yourself. Take careful notes of all these ideas as sit in an environment of like-minded people that are energised and driven to succeed. This combined accumulative energy is incredibly powerful and most certainly gets the creative juices flowing. The new ideas that flow to you may be the best benefit that flows to you. Whilst at the seminar, search for the three best ideas and create a plan to introduce these into your life as soon as possible after the seminar.

I have found this system to be very effective. I add the additional concept of actually teaching all the new concepts or processes to my clients or friends. The process of teaching seems to cement the new concepts in my life and makes the whole process more effective.

Author: Andrew Horton Informative motivational Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za

How do you turn information overload into knowledge and skill?

How do you turn information overload into knowledge and skill?

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Our world is filled with a never ending flow of information, tips, ideas, quotations, advice and suggestions. There is such an information overload all around us, every second, that we can get lost in a sea of overwhelm, to the point where we are constantly overstimulated and we get to learn very little of value, from this sea of infinite information. The secret to get real value from everything we see around us, is to slow down and to give yourself time to digest and absorb all the information and to extract parts that you can begin to apply in your life. Give yourself permission to slow down from the fever pitch of your life for at least an hour a day. Time where you slow down long enough to contemplate, review, digest and act on anything you have learnt that day. The infinite flow of information all around you is not a source of growth or empowerment, until you learn and apply the knowledge in your own life. Knowledge alone is never power, if it was everyone that had access to an internet connection would be able to achieve anything. They could simply type a question into Google, wait for the answer and change their life. As you know knowledge is not power, it only offers us the potential to improve and grow, if we are willing to learn the lessons offered and apply the new value in our lives.

There is most certainly no shortage of knowledge or information today, knowledge is everywhere and if you have access to the internet it is virtually free. All that is holding us away from the success we desire is a commitment to use this infinite flow of free information and knowledge, as a source of our growth, improvement and on-going development. It is such a privilege to live in a world where we are constantly surrounded by ideas and concepts that can feed our minds with inspiration, positive thoughts and new stimulating ideas. The challenge is to not mistake the constant supply of knowledge and the noise all around you for growth. The infinite sea of knowledge and ideas all around us can become so overwhelming that we become paralysed into inactivity. We are so busy chasing after everything that we achieve nothing at all. Never mistake attempting to keep up with this never ending flow of information as a way to improve and grow. This constant activity and overwhelm is merely activity, it is most certainly not improvement and growth.

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The secret to become a real learner is to commit to not only read through every article, book or magazine that passes through your hands. It is to actively find ways to unlock the useful information contained in all of these by:

1)      Read it through once

2)      Summarize the key ideas or concepts.

3)      Look at each concept in turn and see how you can implement any new ideas into your life.

4)      Check and review any ideas that you do introduce to see how they are working for you.

5)      Keep acting on these ideas, review how they are working and then see if you can improve anything.

6)      Keep repeating this cycle until; you see these new ideas turning into real and meaningful results in your life.

You can master anything you want within about 5-7 years if you are committed and you apply yourself to the process. You can become world class at anything that will help you to change your life and move you closer to the success that you desire. Look into the future and project yourself seven years down the line. What skill or ability would catapult you to the next level and completely change your life? Once you have identified that one skill or area of expertise that you want to gain mastery over. Begin the process of planning a path to start the process of mastering exactly that in your life.

Within three years of focusing your efforts on studying the right material, as I have described in the six point method above, you will most certainly get to be good in your field and you will most certainly stand out from the crowd. Remove that picture of instant gratification from your mind, becoming an expert in any field and changing your life ids a process it is most certainly an event. Commit yourself to a marathon; this is not by any means a sprint. Real, meaningful transformation and growth, takes time and effort. One of the skills you must commit to learn early on is patience. Remove your expectations of becoming an overnight sensation or success. There is no such thing – there are many ten year – overnight successes, but no instant successes.

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So where to start –

Explore your plan to become a master over the next 5 – 7 years. Use this as a starting point.  Now look at your life over the next 90 days and choose a theme or focused area of study that is aligned with this outcome and concentrate all your efforts on only this theme for the next 90 days. Focus all your energy on only this theme for the next 90 days and only read, listen to or apply knowledge that is aligned with this theme. This focused approach will help you to remove the clutter and noise from your life and guide you to actually grow and expand your wisdom and knowledge base.

Now break this 90 period back even further into 45 day segments.  It takes between 26 and 45 days to turn a new routine into a habit. So if you want to develop a new success habit set that will allow you to achieve long term sustainable success that will feel almost effortless. Commit to introduce a new discipline, behaviour or routine into your life that is aligned with your goals or the outcomes you want to achieve and apply your willpower each day to carry it out. These are the new ideas or concepts that you will be learning from the material you have chosen to focus your energy on over each 90 day period. Do this for a minimum of 45 days, after about 45 days each new routine will become an entrenched habit, so it will no longer require willpower to perform.. I have found that you can work on a maximum of five new routines or habits at a time. I refer to these new behaviours or routines as your “Code of Personal Achievement”. Follow the link to view an article I wrote on understanding what the “Code of Personal Achievement is and how to learn this new skill.

I have found this method to be very helpful and have used it very successfully in my own life for a number of years. Please see a summary of the process below

1)      Identify an area of expertise that you want to master. This is an area that when you master it, will completely revolutionise your life.

2)      Create a seven year plan to begin moving you toward mastery.

3)      Break your plan back and look at the next three years and commit to apply focused effort to study the material using the six point method described above.

4)      Break your year into four equal parts of 90 days each. Choose a study or growth theme that is aligned with the outcome you want to achieve over the next seven years and focus all your energy on only reading, learning things that are aligned with this theme.

5)      Invest 45 day segments into converting the new behaviours, routines or skills into habits.

Commit to apply this system into your life and you can remove the clutter and noise from your life and you will be able to start benefitting from all the information that surrounds you.

Author: Andrew Horton Best Business Motivational Speakers

http://www.andrewhorton.co.za