How can you get more done?

Can you really do more than you already do? Is there still room left on your plate for even one more thing? The truth is I don’t know anyone (successful) who has too little to do.

Not one of my many clients–nor any of my friends, acquaintances, or people I meet on planes–none of them has ever said they have too little to do.

Doing more to get more done is simply not an option.

The answer to doing more is doing less.

Less?

Do less?

Are you kidding? How’s that going to help? “I don’t get enough done as it is,” you say, “and there’s always more to do at the end of a day!”

Ask this transformational question: Is each activity you currently do providing the greatest possible payback? Or like many people, are you spending much of your precious time doing things which produce a relatively lower return? The key word is relatively.

To do more, you’ve got to figure out what not to do.

For most people, 100% of our time is filled with 1) routine day-to-day matters, 2) things we told other people we would do and 3) responding to (sometimes trivial) interruptions. To try to make something important happen, we end up shoving that thing into our schedule.

How well does that work? How well does a five pound bag hold ten pounds of stuff? You get the idea–not very well at all. And, of course, all the important stuff ends up spilling out onto the floor.

For some people, the bag is so full–there are so many to-dos on your to-do list, your reach the uncomfortable state of overwhelm. Your creativity gets totally locked out and your mind can’t even consider other, perhaps more important things.

You’ve got to figure out what not to do.

I’ve done casual research on this subject asking audiences of executives what things they do that they know they shouldn’t. This list of guilty pleasures includes answering emails as they come in throughout the day, handling the company finances, interviewing all candidates for all jobs, purchasing, filing, writing marketing copy and advertisements, signing all the checks, exercising final say on small product changes, and so on.

That’s not to say these things aren’t important–some are, even vitally so. The question is–are these the most important things for YOU to be doing, especially at this point in your organization’s development?

Often when I ask these questions, people respond by saying there is no one else who can do THAT as well as they can.

This thinking is typical of what Adam Smith called “absolute advantage.” Smith advocated doing all the things which you do better than anyone else. It is obvious, commonsense thinking. The trap for someone who is by nature highly and broadly capable is that you can end up doing everything, reluctant to let go of anything.

To the rescue is 19TH century economist David Ricardo’s Law of the Comparative Advantage of Nations. In a bold, counterintuitive bit of reasoning, Ricardo said to maximize wealth, each country should devote its energy to producing goods they sacrificed the least to create. In other words, Comparative Advantage says to produce the goods which create the highest value per unit of work. Everything else, regardless of how much better you do it than anyone else, should be done by others.

Assume your company makes a sophisticated high value product and you can sell as many as you can make. The product uses several cheap components, which by the way, you can also make better and cheaper than anyone else. Ricardo says that given limited resources (your time, for instance) it is a mistake to manufacture any of the components; each unit of time spent making the cheaper components instead of making the high-valued product costs you money –opportunity cost. To make the most profit, spend ALL your time making the high-value product, and purchase the components.

Ricardo’s law boils down to this: do the thing which brings the GREATEST RETURN–and nothing else. That which brings you the greatest value, and only that, is your comparative advantage.

Keep a list of all the separate things you do during the course of a day/week/month. You may think you know, but each time I ask an executive to try this exercise, they are surprised by the outcome.

Make a notation of what you are doing every 15 minutes. Keep this record for as long as you can–at least two or three days; a week or even two will reveal even more. (You must write this down. The process won’t work if you try to keep it in your head.)

What have you been doing? Have you been squandering your comparative advantage?

Is each action on your list HIGHLY PRODUCTIVE? Is each thing on your list MAKING YOU MONEY, or CHANGING THE WORLD (at least a little bit?)

No? Most people spend at least some of their time doing low-contribution activities. For most people, even if they consider what are doing important, there are usually even more important things they should do instead.

Once you’ve understood how you actually spend your time, you have three possible courses of action:

You can dump things–there are always some things which are of such little value that no one should be doing them.

You can delegate important things to capable people in your organization or outsource them to firms which specialize in those things.

Lastly, YOU can do the things which make the largest difference.

Apply Ricardo’s principle of comparative advantage. Figure out what specific actions contribute the most and do only those, offloading or dumping the rest. Do the same analysis for each department and each member of your company and create extraordinary results.

To do more–to get more done in terms of value–you have to do less.

(c) Copyright Paul Lemberg. All rights reserved

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Business Coach, Paul Lemberg is the President of Quantum Growth Coaching, the world’s only fully systemized business coaching program helping entrepreneurs to rapidly create More Profits and More Life?. Guaranteed.

Who is the Real You, your authentic self? In the Human Experience, from the time you are born until you are roughly seven you are your perfect, authentic self.

Then you take on layers of personality. That personality is made up of beliefs, decisions, unresolved and unexpressed emotions, real or imagined perceptions of the world, defense mechanisms and all the influences from around you. Thus, what you are doing on a transformational journey is uncovering and sorting out all that is not your authentic self.

Theoretically, you will never be able to completely uncover the Real You except in longer and longer fleeting glimpses. However, you will become adept at sensing the road blocks between your core authentic self and your life.
Envision a golden shining inner core that is continually accessible to you for guidance ? this is your intuition ? this is the Real You.

Further, imagine that you use frosted or opaque glasses through which you perceive and act in your life.

If you choose a personal growth or spiritual growth path, it will help you clear your vision - the glasses you are seeing through will become more and more translucent.

My husband says transformation is like learning golf or tennis. Learning anything requires focus, commitment and practice, whether it be learning to play a sport, an instrument or the game of life. I can teach you the rudiments of transformation however unless you apply the principles with focus, commitment and practice you will always only be a dabbler. The choice is yours.

Self-observation is the act of literally examining the world inside of you, by focusing on your inner thoughts and emotions as opposed to examining the world outside of you. If you give much greater importance to your outer reality ? how you look and how it looks out there, it will be very tough to make inner changes because you will worry about how you appear to the rest of the world. Without training yourself to focus inward ? by becoming aware of your different moods, and those different inner ?selves? both negative and positive - that seem to take over sometimes ? no real change will be possible.

I often speak about a ?part of me?. For example, ?a part of me wanted to buy that Almond Roca candy at the 99? store this morning.? I?ve often been told by friends that there are no ?parts to you ? you are a fully integrated person?. My Real Self is a fully integrated person, however, I have parts or different selves.
You have parts and different selves, too. Built into a transformational journey is the necessity to learn to identify and separate from those parts so that they lose power over you in order that they lose power over running your life.

Recognizing those selves helps in the journey towards integration, leading you closer and closer to the Real You. Once you bring awareness to them, they will be in charge of your life less frequently.

One of the most persistent “selves” throughout my life has been the one that thinks something is wrong with how I look. She used to be in charge a good deal of the time. She made me hate myself. She made it impossible to see what I really looked like. She had become the root of my food addiction. Now, even though her voice is still a memory, she is almost never present. Most of the time I like how I look, regardless of my weight, hairstyle or attire. When she does come around, I recognize her quickly and she loses her power because my Real Self is so much clearer and so much more available. I do not need her any more. Having done the healing I have done, I do not need to find ways to hate myself any longer.

I thank those parts that have protected me and that I no longer need. Each part of us is important when it forms but when it is no longer needed, we have the opportunity to let it go.

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Maia played key roles for author, John Gray & “Men Are from Mars”. Coached, trained, supported 500 speakers to lecture on Mars Venus. I helped train Oprah & staff in a private workshop. Clients say they benefit from gentle wisdom from living what I teach. WhatAboutLifeCoaching.com

The pet dog has often been referred to as the four legged psychologist. He knows how to get on the good side of just about anybody. Let’s have a look at what makes man’s best friend such a winning relationship builder.

Your Dog Is Always Happy To See You

Everyone likes to feel important and that’s exactly what your dog does for you when he is so incredibly happy to see you. Even if you’ve only been gone for an hour your dog will make no secret that he is happy to see you back again

How often do people make you feel that welcome?

Your Dog Lives in the Present

Your dog is very focused in the present moment. He is not interested in making you feel guilty for what you did last week or two years ago. You dog wants to enjoy the present moment and he wants you to enjoy it with him.

Your Dog is Happy to Give to the Relationship Before Taking from it.

Your dog is more than happy to give to the relationship before you give to him. From the time you first bring him home as a puppy he will offer you unconditional love.

But your dog is also good at receiving. He is happy for the attention and food that you give him and he knows how to enthusiastically accept what he is given without any feelings of guilt on his part.

Being good at both giving and receiving is a key to good relationships.

Your Dog is Happy Being Himself

Your dog doesn’t put on airs and graces. He doesn’t try to be someone else in order to impress those around him. Your dog is comfortable being himself and leaves the choice of accepting him or rejecting him up to the people he has contact with.

One of the cardinal rules in building strong long term relationships is to be yourself. Then you mix with people who like you for who you really are and not build relationships with those who can’t accept you as you are.

Your Dog Knows How To Have A Good Time

Your dog sees a relationship as an opportunity to have fun. He wants to go for a walk with you or play in the park or anything else that looks like it might be fun.

We humans often get so distracted by the process of living that we forget to have fun with our life partner. If we learn to approach our personal relationships with the same enthusiasm and fun that your dog does then there would probably be a lot less divorces.

Your Dog Doesn’t Talk

I have purposely left this one to last.

I have always believed that one of the greatest relationship building qualities a dog has is that he can’t talk. This means that your dog never argues with you, never expresses a negative opinion, never says the wrong thing at the wrong time, never criticizes you or sums you up in a verbal expression of judgment.

Of course, as humans we have to talk, but if we could take the dog’s example and never argue, criticize, pass judgment, complain, or express other useless negative emotions then perhaps we would find that people would be as enthusiastic to see us as most dog owners are to see their dog.

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James Delrojo would like to help you by giving you his ebook “Unleash the Success Power of Your Mind” (valued at $27) completely FREE. Go to www.blog.jamesdelrojo.com

We’ve all experienced the same thing at important crossroads in our life when big changes were underway. Often, we find ourselves feeling panic and frozen in time, possibly with indecision, waiting and wondering: Which way to go?; How will things turn out? Sometimes, you just don’t know what to do.

I’m asked frequently about this topic and oddly, I have a lot of experience with it as well. In fact, I find my life in this state of flux often as more changes loom on the horizon. Everyone, myself included, wants answers. What should I do? How do I know? These answers are never forthcoming; we cannot see into the future. Every direction can be okay; one can be the best. The simple truth is, we just don’t know with 100% accuracy. This is where awareness and faith come in to play.

Awareness is important on many levels. Knowing the landscape of your life, you can make calculated decisions that support your goals. In business, and daily life activities, we implement this process automatically without much awareness at all, it has become so habitual. This, in part, is where a problem lies. Habitual behavior may not be appropriate as new data becomes available. Auto-pilot means your flying blind. Even when flying a plane on auto-pilot, the pilot will check the instrument panels to ensure the data is consistent. Why don’t we? Be aware of your data.

Your data comes from many sources and most of us are familiar with these sources. I might surprise some of you with new concepts. The common source that we’re all familiar with is the mind and store-house of knowledge and experience we have gained from life. Again, those who rely solely upon this source risk repeating the same mistakes over and over again. The mystery of life dictates that our ability to identify with life experience as truth results in creating more of this truth in our lives. If this truth is a truth of painful experience, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Utilizing other sources, we are able to objectively assess all sources and come to new conclusions.

The next common source is our emotions and intuition; they often are synonomous. A surprising fact here is that not everyone is in touch with their emotions or permit the emotions the freedom they deserve. Emotions are very useful in interpreting and/or being aware of underlying factors that may not be evident through hard tangible data. For some this is a gut-feeling, others have a flash of insight or conclusion, and others feel twinges in certain parts of the body without being aware of any potential significance. I have scenarios for each and will refrain from elaborating further for the sake of brevity today. Be curious to explore it further though.

A less common source for most is our spiritual awareness. This is a quiet place within that has a higher level of wisdom for the greater good. This can be pertinent to you, your life, your family life, community, work, the world, and so on. The levels of knowledge accessible here are limitless. It is as though we are connected to a universal storehouse of knowledge. This place of knowing is far less judgemental and emotional but has the ability to synthesize the data from the mind and emotions, integrating and offering solutions from a much higher level of consciousness. This is something that many people find themselves seeking as they mature and look for more significance in their lives and meaning in their work.

Finally, we must talk about the role of faith. This is part of what I teach and coach in my profession. It is the co-creative relationship and process that we have as human-beings with the source of all creation. This isn’t religious, it isn’t specific to any religion, yet it doesn’t contradict any religion. This is born from my own quest for truth integrated with my own life and spiritual experiences. It may be incomplete and is a direction to follow, not a destination for you to reach. Such is the nature of our spiritual life; it is the journey and the ever-changing, ever-increasing level of knowledge and wisdom that we gain through life experience. With an open-mind, entertain our relationship with the source of all creation.

Creation exists, as do we. We see it all around us. Scientists study deeper into the stars. More scientists study deeper into the mysterys of time and space; quantum physics. What is witnessed is creation, its’ magic and its’ mystery. Down at the quantum level we discover that we’re mostly made up of empty space and other unusual phenomena that cannot be explained. Out in the stars, they see an expanding universe. Now, going deeper, with probing satellites and quantum sciences, new theories arise. All seem to point to an apex of creation coming from nothing… a God Force.

Mystery is lived by people accessing this God-Force, understanding their co-creative relationship to this mystery. Understanding that this force is abundant love, it supplies us with what is in our intention. What we intend for our lives becomes real. Many people who do this consistently refer to it as manifesting. As children, many of us have had at least one solid experience of this. We may have just known that we would have something in our lives, whether a gift, an experience, a trip, whatever, and then it happens. There was no fear, doubt, uncertainty, only gladness for what was to come. That is the power of intent.

As adults, so much of our lives have instructed us to ignore so much. Don’t dream to big. You can’t do this. Don’t do that. That’s only for the privileged. You need to have a degree. There is too much competition. This is the way things work. Everywhere you turn, you are told how it is and what cannot be and you become conditioned. We have spent too little time in practice with our spiritual origins that we do not understand this mystery and in our need for control, we stifle its’ requirement for room to breathe and work its’ own magic. We measure things by worldly standards and time clocks, not realizing that in the bigger picture, some of those so-called failures actually were important stepping-stones in a grander scheme for our lives. Is our spiritual side still influencing the outcome? Are we making the experience harder, longer, or are we co-operating and making it easier?

Okay, this is long enough for one read. If you want to know more and begin your own journey, feel free to contact me. There are more relevant articles on the website and as a coach, I spend time integrating spiritual awareness into the coaching sessions in unobtrusive ways. It has shown itself to be the single most important success factor regardless of the initial direction goals were set. In some cases, spiritual awareness harnessed the focus to realize a more significant goal for the individual instead of a goal that came about due to conditioning.

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Lee Down is a Professional Coach, Trainer/Facilitator, Speaker, & Writer of One Man Can Human Capital Development that focuses on relationships, the key foundation to success in business and life. With more than 15 years professional experience and a thirst for truth and understanding, he focuses on the human spirit and human capacity.
Working with clients, he facilitates the breaking down of beliefs, barriers or obstacles that bring clients forward on their journey of discovery with spirit, energy, abundance, passion and purpose, integrating the mind and body experience. Working with business, he brings visionary leadership and relationship skills to the forefront that witnesses an empowered culture evolve and develop directly impacting the improvement to the bottom-line.

Are you looking to arrange an appointment with a life coach. There are many people who feel they need a boost of self-confidence or self-esteem. In this article I write about some of the advice you may receive at these sessions.

I am one of these people who at many times in my life have felt down and depressed about various issues that I have had in my life. I have worked hard and had a lot of advice about how to deal with these problems and am now far more confident and content with life.

I always wanted to be liked by everyone and found it difficult to say no when invited to say a party, even though in truth I did not want to go. If I did decline an offer, I would feel guilty and if for example a friend asked me why I did not want to go and perhaps even called me boring for not going, I would often end up changing my mind. This would be because I did not want to be known as boring by anybody and also because I was quite a weak and fragile person.

From reading life coaching and positive thinking books, I realised I had to become a far stronger person, more care-free and to have more respect for myself. I decided that if I did not want to go somewhere I wouldn’t, whatever anyone said. This new found attitude would not be easy to carry off but I was determined to give it a go.

I was soon to be tested, it was at one of my friends(Ian)houses. He was trying to organise a night out for the following Saturday. I was not at all interested in going out on that particular night for various reasons. Eventually Ian asked if I wanted to go and I said that I didn’t. That answer was not enough for him and he proceeded to question my reasons for not wanting to go. I felt all of the eyes of the people present descend on me and I felt quite awkward. Normally in this situation I would give some excuse but instead I asked him why I needed to give a reason and why my answer of no was not enough for him. He seemed quite shocked at my strong response and moved on to question and nag someone else.

I felt proud of my success and have continued to adopt a similar attitude since.

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Stephen Hill has a number of websites including:
std treatment
stutter therapy
life coach advice

Are you maximizing your strengths and promoting your talents at work? If you have sharp analytical skills, have you sought to apply those skills to your current job? I know it sounds crazy to ask for more work when you are already overloaded, but any assistance that you can provide now will ultimately help you advance in your present position or in a future one.

You have gifts and talents to offer the world. Your current or potential employer desperately needs to use your talents NOW, especially since they are focused on increasing revenue.

Just what ARE your talents and how can you apply them to your career?

1. Discover Your Hidden Talents

a. What are your strengths and weaknesses?

b. How can you capitalize on your strengths and improve your weaknesses?

c. Can you enhance your strengths and dissipate your weaknesses by learning on-the-job or by taking additional classes or training?

2. Promote Your Talents Within

a. Once you have an analysis of the talents you have to offer, start promoting them. If you don’t tout them, then no one will.

b. Talk with your boss about helping out the team. Your pathway to the top is by being someone who can be counted on.

3. Take Action

a. After you tell your employer about your hidden talents and your ideas for using them, you must live by your words. Remember your integrity is at stake and that means something.

b. Using your talents is not a one-day project; it is a way to live and work more effectively every day. So go out there, and put your talent to work!

It may be hard to focus on your talents when the world around you is so uncertain. Put your worries behind you, and your best foot forward. You can be proud of your effort no matter what the future may bring, because you swung out and gave it your best shot.

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Sean North primarily helps writers gain focus, motivation, remove mental blocks that help to unblock the writing process.
EVERYONE who writes has been stuck at some point in his or her career. You do not have to accept these mind-boggling roadblocks!
seannorthstn@aol.com
(586) 216-7516