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Motivational Thought: Failure is Progress
If I take a step back and look at my last six years in sales I can see a pattern emerge. It is the times that I was struggling to make a sale or to get a new job that I grew the most. Two years ago, when I decided I wanted to jump from finance to tech I saw rejections come by the boatload. I got rejected from jobs online I didn’t want and passed up on interviews with BuzzFeed, Yext, and Pandora. For more than eight months I networked and interviewed and at the end, I almost gave up hope.
But as I look back at that time period now I can see this is when I took one of the greatest steps forward in my life. It’s during this time I launched Straddle The Line. It’s during this time I developed interview skills that I teach to clients today. And it’s during this time that I developed the resilience and discipline that I try to pass onto my readers. So, if you’re struggling right now, know that there’s a reason for it. You’re meant to be in this situation, and you’ll come out of it stronger. Failure is progress.
Life Hack: Your Habits Are Your Life
What if I told you that habits don’t only determine simple outcomes in your life such as what you’re going to eat for breakfast today and the route you’ll take on your commute to work, but they also have larger implications on your life – such as determining your career trajectory, success in relationships and overall happiness. In the book, Power of Habits by Charles Duhigg, he explains just that. In fact, much of our life is controlled by our engrained habits rather than conscious decisions. Because of this, the better habits we can build into our life, the greater the longterm effect will be.
How to change a habit? In order to change a habit you first must understand what they’re made up of. Each habit consists of three parts:
- The Cue – when you feel the urge for your habit
- The Routine – the habit itself
- The Reward – the craving your habit satisfies
Once you’ve identified the cue that triggers the routine and the reward that follows, you’ll want to simply replace the routine with something that is equally as satisfying. Say your habit is walking across the office to eat a cookie every day at 3:00PM and the reward you get is a 5 minute break from your job. If you replace the cookie with a 5 minute stop over at your friend’s cube, you can replace that bad habit with a healthier one. This is simple example, but the idea is that you can use Charles Duhigg’s simple process to change any habits in your life and recreate who you are in the process. See a detailed info-graph about changing your habits here.
Career Tip: Confidence is Coveted
Although it’s normal to feel nervous before a big presentation or interview (it still happens to me all the time) it’s critical to find a way to portray confidence. In the book, The Science of Selling by David Hoffeld, it explains that listeners love a person who exudes confidence. So even if you don’t feel 100% confident yourself before going into a big meeting, it’s essential to trick your mind into feeling confident.
Tips to build confidence: Before you go into the room take about 5 minutes and recall back to a time where you had a successful presentation or interview. Close your eyes and envision yourself in that time and place. What did it feel like? This will ease your brand and help you remember you’ve done this before. Also, standing in a “power position” (like putting your hands on your hips) and taking deep breaths before going into a presentation are other great techniques.
Article to Check Out: Gary Vaynerchuk is Trying to Kill You
Ever caught a glimpse of one of Gary Vaynerchuk’s videos or podcasts? He’s freakin intense. He’s always ranting and raving about business, entrepreneurship, and how to make a $hit ton of money. He’s a self-made multi millionaire who hustled his way to the top. But at what cost? In this blog post by Jon Westenberg, Jon expresses his concern for anyone who follows Gary V’s advice of hustling until 3AM every night to achieve a dream. What are the longterm health implications of this sort of strategy? What are the costs to your social life? In the end, as Jon explains, it’s possible to hustle for your dream without burning yourself out mentally and physically. So, when it comes to Gary V’s advice, proceed with caution.
Quote of the Week:
“Keep your face to the sunshine and you can never see the shadow.” – Helen Keller
