Are you facing the "February Blues?" We made it through the holidays and now football season is over. The weather is still cold and Spring is a way off. Most of us have our Business Plans for the year and we're plugging away making calls, sitting open houses and doing the work. We're getting some results, just not as many or as quickly as we want. We're doing everything we can to hold deals together. Many of us are working at least six days per week. We may be feeling overwhelmed or frustrated.
I've seen this before: year after year. It's natural. It's part of the process. It's time to buckle down and get settled in to executing the Business Plans we faithfully created. Many of us are rainmakers. We like talking to people and negotiating. The follow up and the maintenance with its repetition and loose ends can feel mundane. Yet we know it must be done. If we truly want the results we plan to get, we must get through this time.
Mindset is one of the key fundamentals that must be mastered to be a huge success. Having the fierce determination necessary to practice our skills daily, make follow up calls and ask for more business is mandatory. It comes down to purpose and living in vision. Most of us have a Vision Statement or a Big Why. When was the last time we read it or revised it? When seasonality has us down, we must re-commit.
To get myself re-committed, I will often pick up one of the first business books I ever read, and whole-heartedly recommend: The Greatest Salesman in the World, by Og Mandino. In the story, the "salesman" faces failure, heartbreak, and despair in his business and he becomes successful anyway. He is forceful in his self-talk. He is tough with himself, telling himself he can do it. (This is different than being tough on yourself and buying in to negative self-talk.) Through many lessons the salesman develops the mindset of a lion, of a winner.
The following is a brief summary of the lessons, from the book The Greatest Salesman in the World that we can apply to our real estate practice right now:
•1. Today I begin a new life. I shed my old skin with bruises of failure and wounds of mediocrity. I will form good habits and become their slaves.
•2. I will greet this day with love in my heart.
•3. I will persist until I succeed. I will persist until I succeed. I will persist until I succeed. I am not a sheep waiting to be prodded by my shepherd. I am a lion and I refuse to talk, to walk, to sleep with the sheep. I will hear not those who weep and complain. The slaughterhouse of failure is not my destiny. I will persist. I will win.
•4. I am nature's greatest miracle. And nature knows not defeat. Eventually, she emerges victorious and so will I, and with each victory the next struggle becomes less difficult.
•5. I will live this day as if it is my last.
•6. Today I will be master of my emotions. Weak is he who permits his thoughts to control his actions; strong is he who forces his actions to control his thoughts.
•7. I will laugh at the world. These words...will carry me through every adversity and maintain my life in balance...This too shall pass. I will be happy. I will be successful.
•8. Today I will multiply my value a hundredfold.I will do the work that a failure will not do.
•9. I will act now. I will act now. I will act now.
•10. Only for guidance will I pray...and my prayer will always be answered.
Get re-committed. Get re-focused. Why are you here? What is your goal?
Now get out there and practice and take action! You can do it! You're Great!
I'd love to hear from you and help you get clear on your Big Why and give you some feedback on your current plan. There is no obligation.
Dana Whittaker
Certified Advanced Professional Coach
Certified Real Estate Negotiator
Broker/Salesperson
702.300.7653
Coach@DanaWhittaker.com
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