Daily Boost - Clarity for Life and Work

Leaders Look For Conflict I admit the title, "Leaders Look For Conflict," might a little over-the-top. But I know that you want to be a better leader. I also know that you hate and don't want anything to do with conflict - especially since I can hear you saying — "Why can't we all get along?" I get it. Saying the word "No" is hard enough. Saying "Yes" when others agree or disagree with your choice can be more difficult. "Why can't we all get along?" The answer is that we can. However, the truth is that conflict will always happen whenever more than two people get together. Especially when there is a common goal, and everyone is on the same page. Conflict will always play a role in your success. What? We're on the same page, agree with each other, want the same result, and there's still conflict? "Why can't we all get along?" It's not that. It's just that no matter how positive your project is, everybody has a different idea of how to reach the outcome. Everybody has a different right way and wrong way. As a leader, when you approach conflict as a simple "Y" in the road of progress, things change. It becomes a decision that is part of the process and leads to the outcome everybody desires. Leaders, Managers, heck, Mom's and Dad's - anybody responsible for moving forward eventually learns to accept conflict. Leaders don't get emotionally fired up, yell and scream, or freak out in some other creative way. Conflict is another step in the process. The faster you can accept conflict, the sooner you can resolve the obstacle and reach your goal. Everybody will respect and appreciate you. They will also remember you for helping all involved achieve success. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Stoic Happiness I'm a fan of Stoic Philosophy. While it may be over 2,000 years old, its practicality is still useful. These rules to live by will help you have a happier life: 1. If you're going to learn and succeed, be humble. There is always someone smarter, more successful, and wiser.   2. Find the right scene. Choose your friends and situations. If you want to rise in life, you can't allow yourself to be held down by others. 3. Protect your time. Seneca said, "We're tight-fisted with property and money, yet think too little of wasting time, the one thing about which we should all be the toughest misers." Life is short. 4. Never do anything out of habit. Always think about how you can do things better and always question yourself.  5. Keep it simple — do your job. Approach every task as if it were your last because it very well could be.  6. Adapt and learn from failure. Using your success to justify complacency is common. It's also easy, which is why most people do it. You can do more and be better. 7. Live below your means. The more you need to work to maintain your needs, the less you will enjoy what you have. Everything in life comes down to keeping things simple and mastering the basics. That's how you get the success you deserve. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get Off The Fence And Get What You Want Okay, I'm feeling a little bit lazy today, so I'm going to cut to the chase and bestow upon you the secret to success you've been seeking.  Are you ready? Success requires that you do the hard work. Bam! Hmm… I think I'll take my advice and rethink that lazy thing. I want to set a good example. It doesn't take a scientist to figure out that if you want more, you will have to do something to get it. Still, we live in a world that makes it seem like it should be easier, and it's not. Success takes a lot of hard work - even if you don't see it. Successful YouTubers make it look easy - after thousands of hours of trial and error. Musicians are seemingly living their dream - after years of living in a tour bus and making pennies after their agents get paid. Even people who do nothing but accept the generosity of society to make their way are working hard at a life that you would never want. It doesn't matter what you want, good or bad, prosperous or not, happy or sad; it's going to take a lot of work to accomplish it. If you have a choice, and you do, why wouldn't you choose to work hard to bring goodness into your life? You become interested in making a change. The problem is, interest is only the beginning, and you never get beyond your fascination. You decide what change you would like to create and begin working hard to get it. Then, life gets in the way, and you stop.  What's missing? Commitment. Life doesn't give guarantees, but you tend to get what you want when you commit and go all-in on your mission. That's just how it works. I'm interested in many things and work hard at making magic happen in my life, the lives of my family and friends, and even yours. Only a solid commitment to how I spend my decades on this planet allows that to happen. Whatever you do - get committed, and you'll see how things change. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Is The Universe Whispering to You? I’m not sure how you feel about the Universe and how things work in the world, but does the Universe whisper to you? Now, before I go on, you need to know that I can go pretty deep into the world of woo-woo in my beliefs. Still, the real-world dude in me makes me realize that while it may be fun to ride a unicorn to the coffee shop, I haven’t yet been able to request one from Uber.  You may believe that your life is already planned for you or that you can ask for what you to manifest. One or both, you can’t deny that something is whispering directions to you all day long. Are you listening? While there are many ways people seek to receive messages of guidance as we make life decisions, my favorite has always been events the occur in triplicate. If something happens three times, I pay attention. Call me hard-headed, distracted, or set in my ways, but life has taught me that wisdom tends to come in whispers - usually when our thoughts are screaming in our head and drowning out our dreams. Now, let me be clear... A friend calling three times to go out on the town doesn’t count in my book. Snoozing your alarm clock three times isn’t a message from the Universe that you should sleep in more. The grocery store being out of your favorite chips three times is not a sign that you should go on a diet.  All that is what they call the “stuff that happens while you’re alive.” So what counts?  If I were to describe messages that resonate with me, it would be… 1) Seemingly random situations and people that happen in quick succession or at the same time.  2) They are different in their approach and appearance, yet each delivers a similar message. At first, it may seem disconnected, but in relation to the other messages, you begin to notice 3) The message you receive is likely something that has been on your mind, keeping you awake a night, and speaks to you. Even though you may not immediately recognize its impact, you find yourself slightly redirected in your search for answers. Your path altered. While this is undoubtedly only my description of how I know it when the Universe is ganging up on me, I have learned to allow space for a message to arrive. Whether I realize the impact or not, I have also known that it always motivates my decisions, choices, and future actions. In other words, things change with little effort. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Empower Your Emotional Triggers I don't know about you. I love it when we miraculously put together the perfect day and then life decides to get in the way.  Well, not life, and maybe I don't love it, but occasionally something or someone will cross your path and cross your wires. I don't know anybody who doesn't get hit smack in the face with a situation that triggers a feeling deep inside their soul, stirs emotion, and results in a reaction or response that makes you say, "Why did I say that?" Of course, we are emotional creatures, so it makes sense that robust emotional responses are a thing for most of us. Still, a little common sense will tell you that it doesn't always serve us. It gets even worse when people sedate their emotions to protect themselves. Not only do they miss great opportunities, when they are triggered, it becomes an 8.0 earthquake. So, how do you deal with it? The way I handle it is to understand that triggers usually happen when I least expect them. Still, my Scott LOGIC tells me that once I experience the trigger and learn the lesson, a little discipline in my actions tends to smooth things out the next time.  Here's what happens. When I get triggered, a feeling emerges inside of me. Like me, the problem is that most folks jump from a feeling to an emotional response before their mouth knows what's happening. A better way is to recognize the feeling, pause, review the emotional dialog running in your mind, and then allow your throughs to become your words.  Life gets better when you have the discipline to recognize what you've learned from a previous trigger, audit your reactions, and deliver your response. Strangely, it becomes as if you were never triggered at all. Look, we live in a world filled with shoot-from-the-hip opportunities, many of them purposely put in front of us to get a response. Don't fall for it. Keep your mind on how you want to experience the world and stick with it. You'll be amazed how all the drama goes away. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get the Daily Boost FIVE days a week and more at MotivationToMove.com. I have an admission to make on your behalf. If I may - You and everybody on the planet talks bad about themselves. Heck, some folks do it every day. If you are really good, you might fall into the category of a professional self-trash talker and even dream bad stuff about yourself. Yes, are THAT good! I have another admission.  I do it too. I’m good at it. Better than you. Not only that, I like it when I dig deep and bury myself in the pain of talking trash about myself. It’s like watching a horror movie about my life without the nine-dollar popcorn.  But why is it good for you? I work with clients who have a natural tendency to talk bad about themselves in their quest to make their lives better. It usually shows up as a reason masquerading as an excuse, which turns into a tool for them to explain their current situation to blame and link to past behavior. That’s as far most people go, good momentum stops, and bad momentum continues.  When you link your old bad stuff with your new bad stuff, you reinforce that behavior. Most folks have done it so many times they give up and go back to their old ways. So how do you make talking trash about yourself a good thing? Just like we learned in grade school, stop, drop, and roll. 1) Stop and recognize what you are doing. I know. It’s hard. But you can do it! Just stop talking bad about yourself. Don’t worry. You’ll get to do more in a minute. 2) Drop in and dig deep. Now that you are stopped drop down into the landfill that you are saying your life and get ready to get messy. 3) Start rolling in the stinky muck at the bottom that you say about yourself. Take a deep breath and say - “That’s not real. What’s the real truth? How do I deal with it? How do I climb out of this landfill before I puke?” Feel free to leave out the puke part.  Look, everybody feels down on themselves from time to time. That’s what life does to all of us. However, when you choose to see those moments as your inner voice screaming for your attention like a baby crying in their crib you can deal with it directly. When you do, you end up in a far better place.  Talking trash about yourself only happens when you are not clear about where your life is heading. It’s also a clue about what you want. Are you listening? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is not a single day that I don’t end up saying to myself, “What are you doing, Dude?” The only thing that makes me feel better is there seems to be a pandemic of that kind of thing going around these days. In my case, I usually have decided what bad habits are getting in my way and have at least a small clue as to what good habits I should be doing every day but… I’m the BOSS OF ME! Why would I tell myself what to do and not do it? Hmm… I’ll have to get back to you on that. Nope. Why wait? The truth is that I’m pretty good at doing what I say I’m going to do, as long as I do a couple of things first. If I don’t, can drift more than a rudderless sailboat. Let’s lay some solid groundwork: 1) Everything about your life is a result of an action or inaction you take. One is productive, the other is lazy, and both are life-changing. 2) Any habit performed in a ritualistic manner will give you results. Good habits make life better. Bad habits make life worse. 3) If you want to take it the hard way, focus your attention on giving up bad habits. If you want the easy way, focus on establishing good habits. What you need is a Good Habit Generator process - something I could spend hours telling you about, or you can do this starting today: 1) Make a list of good habits you must bring into your life. Shorter is better. 2) Decide what single good habit you will do today and do it. 3) Repeat the same habit tomorrow while also choosing another from your list to begin that day. 4) Repeat the process no matter what gets in the way. Keep things simple, and remember that some habits happen every day while others are weekly. Some only take place once a year, and others are only required occasionally. Don’t try to do everything at the same time. Sprinkle them in slowly, as needed, and commit to making them part of your life. Ultimately, your focus should be making so many new habits that you have no time for old and destructive habits. It takes some top-of-mind awareness, but it’s worth it. Faster than you think, if you’re committed, non-productive behaviors will fade into your distant past. If you give it a chance, life is much easier than you think. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

  Are you the kind of person who is searching high and low for anything that will make you happy, get you married, bring in more money, or allow you to ignore the crazy world we live in today? If I may, it’s time that stop searching and do this - Accept that ONE good idea, ONE good realization, or ONE good action can and will change your life instantly. Before I continue, I'm not saying to focus on ONE thing as you'll find in Gary Keller's book. Nope. The ONE thing I'm talking about comes way before that. It has nothing to do with productivity, and it has everything to do with mindset and being specific. You don’t have to listen to me, but I’ll give you a pat on the back if you at least consider it. You see, everything gets easier when you develop, understand, and trust that ONE idea combined with day-to-day committed action will lead you to your dreams. And that's not 16-hour, hair on fire, run as fast as you can, bend all the rules, shatter relationships, and get what you want at all cost days. No. It's the exact opposite. When you buy into the mindset that ONE idea can and will change anything, you give yourself kick in the butt that launches you in a mindful and disciplined approach to find that ONE idea… or things… that you need. After that, steady plodding is all it takes. Hmm… where did I hear before? Another I hear came from Zig Ziglar. He said, "Most of us are walking generalities. What you need to be is a meaningful specific." Owning a ONE idea mindset makes you and your journey meaningful. All you have to do is specifically target the actions required to get what you want every day, and the rest will take care of itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you standing on the edge of your dreams that haven’t become reality? Steve Harvey is a funny man. He is also a wise man. He says, "You must jump. If you want to be successful, you must jump into your dreams, take a leap of faith, and go for it." Many times we stand on the cliff of life and watch others enjoying the success you deserve. They jumped, their parachute opened, and life is good. You must jump. When you finally decide to jump, your parachute will not open right away, and you will get bumped and bruised, but your parachute will open. You must jump. Look, let me get real. If you want success, you must jump to your dreams so your parachute will open. If you don't jump, it will never open. If you are standing on the edge of your dreams, the question is simple. You either you do or don't. If you do, JUMP. If not, find another edge - but make it one that makes you excited to jump. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Get coaching that goes deeper than tips and tricks with Daily Boost PREMIUM. Find out more HERE. Change Your Stories, Change Your Life Today we begin with a truth that on the surface may not seem very motivational. However, accepting this truth will be the singularly most freeing and motivating thing you can do for yourself. We live in a world dominated by agendas. These 'plans of others' are broadcast to propagandize your mind into believing in a way that will pull you off your path and put you on the path of another. Worse, the stories you tell yourself, your Personal Propaganda, is doing the same thing. That's not good. That's not bad. That's the truth. It has always been, and it always will be. In choosing to live life your way and experience freedom at its highest levels, there is a rule that I have always followed - The truth is the most motivating power you can access. If you dare to see and accept the truth in all areas of your life, you will then have the power to respond and act in ways that will change your life - instantly and for the long term. Living your life on your terms isn't about fighting the good fight until you get what you want. It's about accepting the truth of who you are, ignoring the agendas of others, re-writing the stories you tell yourself, and acting in alignment with who you are on the inside. It's simple. When you change your stories, you change your life. That begins by accepting the truth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices