As promised, today weâre going to talk about PASSION. This is one of the various Ps that are needed to achieve a remarkable performance as explained in the book The Encore Effect. Stay tuned over the next few days of this miniseries to learn about the other “P” components.
In yesterdayâs post, the author, Mark Sanborn, said, âPassion is the fuel that drives performance.â Today, he expands on a very important point about passion: âremarkable performance isnât just about what we do; itâs also about how we do it.â
And he centers on an important point. âLife isnât just about living our passions but about living passionately.â And while subtle when reading, this makes a world of difference once we understand it.
Sanborn explains, âIn the everyday world, most of us donât get to focus exclusively on doing those things we are passionate about. The solution? Do everything important with passion.â
No matter your role, if you infuse it with passion, creativity, and enthusiasm, youâll guarantee increased value in the eyes of those around you. This, in turn, will generate opportunities and doors will open for you. âAs a parent or spouse, as a volunteer in your church or community, as an employee making a sales call, teaching a class, or leading a company, bringing passion to what you do each day is an exercise in living fully and influencing others by your example.â
âThe good news is that passion can be created and stoked. Itâs up to you to do so.â
So, how can we develop and cultivate passion?
Sanborn suggests the following five things:
1. Study and learn. âYou can go a long way toward becoming a passionate performer by buying the best books, subscribing to the best magazines and going to free university lectures [online]. [âŚ] Given the unlimited amounts of information available today, there is little justification for anyone not being a reader [hmmm, let me tell you about a blog that can help you with this⌠đ ] There is no shortage of ways to become an expert in your fieldâand grow more passionate in the process.â
2. Use small achievements or successes to fuel larger ones. âRemarkable performances are like losing weight. Which goal sounds more achievableâlosing one pound per week for a year or losing fifty-two pounds? The result may be the same, but psychologically these goals are as different as night and day. Focus on achieving a remarkable performance today, then another one tomorrow.â
3. Look to other passionate people as role models. âReach out to people you respect for their passion and performance. Start a group of like-minded people with similar goals. Avoid the people who act as âblockers.â Remember, passion begets passion.â
4. Plug the leaks. âExamine those areas in your life where your resources (your time, talent, and skills) are not being put to the best use. [âŚ] Donât spend time on things that diffuse your focus and do not advance your goals.â
In here, Sanborn tells the story of a student asking Albert Einstein how many feet were in a mile, and him saying he didnât know. Upon seeing the studentâs amazement, Einstein explained, âI make it a rule not to clutter my mind with simple information that I can find in a book in five minutes.â
5. Make passion part of your life. âWhere the head goes, the heart will follow. You may not feel passionate, but when you decide you are going to become a passionate person, you will become one. If you act the part and succeed in the part, one day you will discover that you have become the part! If you deliberately and consciously act with passion, you will come to feel that passion.â
All remarkable performances require effort and energy, but they start with and continue to be fueled by passion all along.
As you know, I’m passionate about sharing the ideas I come across in the books I read (…barely noticeable, huh?). What are you passionate about? Let me know in the comments here.
And please come back tomorrow, as we will take a look at more of the âPâ elements for remarkable performances in this miniseries.
ACTION
TODAY: Letâs plug the leaks today: find your sources of distraction and eliminate [or appease] them. For example, social media. If I donât set limits for myself, I go in to read ONE tweet and Iâll still be there 2 hours later⌠ugh!⌠(#NotProud). While you donât have to eliminate it, can you give yourself a set amount of time, timer-in-hand, so that you donât get sucked into a time vortex? Can you silence or eliminate the notifications on your phone so that they donât distract you until you are actually on your specified time for this? What other leaks are there in your life that you might be able to plug today?
FUTURE: Create the intention and commit to develop and cultivate passion in those areas of your life and business that are important for you. You will enjoy them more and become a remarkable performer at them.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
This miniseries on The Encore Effect has focused so far on explaining and understanding all about remarkable performances. But what do we need to make those performances happen?
According to the author, Mark Sanborn, the formula is simple:
P+D+A = RP
Where: P = Passion, D = Discipline, A = Action and RP = Remarkable Performance.
While this formula is not a panacea, it serves very well to convey the requisites needed to achieve a remarkable performance.
Letâs take a quick look at each:
Passion: âEncounters with passionate people are memorable,â says the author. âYou are captivated not only by what they do but by the way they do it. You may not agree with them, but thereâs no doubt that what they believe is important.â
Discipline: âPassion is the fuel that drives performance. But without discipline, passion is just loud talk and noise⌠When discipline is lacking, results are inconsistent and sporadic. It is discipline that enables us to do what needs to be done even when we are not at our best.â
Sanborn explains that discipline is the things that we do over and over again, âoften behind the scenes, that ultimately result in remarkable performances.â For figuring this out, he suggests asking ourselves questions, such as:
How many times did I rehearse and refine my sales presentation before giving it?
How many books did I read (and re-read) about my industry/career/service/skills?
How much time do I spend each day in the gym and how many days each week, to keep myself physically fit?
How many thank-you notes and follow up e-mails do I send to important customers, clients, volunteers, or friends?
How much of my income do I invest in myself to further my vocations and my passion?
How much space do I make in my schedule to do the things that matter to me the most, whether developing my skills, spending time with my family, or giving back to my congregation or community?
Action: The most important thing, the author cautions, is not to confuse activity with action. âYou can think the right thoughts all day long, but even if those thoughts make you feel good, nothing happens until you take action. [âŚ] Activity is effort without effect. Action is what achieves a desired outcome.â
Sanborn mentions that âsome people hide behind activity and use it as an excuse to absolve themselves of responsibility (âIâm so busy!â).â But itâs precisely that busyness that leads to lots of activity but no specific action to move forward.
The author closes by pointing out that âremarkable performers focus on the outcome theyâre striving to achieve and say no to any activity that would divert their efforts. They know exactly where they are going, and they focus on how to get there.â
Come back tomorrow to read a bit more about passion. I’ve reserved a whole post for it, given that passion is the fuel for powering remarkable performances.
ACTION
TODAY: Sanborn suggests, âto discover what you are passionate about, ask yourself: What would I like to spend the rest of my life doing?â And says, âHow you answer that question will lead you to your true passion.â Take a moment today to answer that question.
FUTURE: Look at your performances and see where they have had or have lacked passion, discipline, and action. Going forward, determine to have these three components whenever you need to do a remarkable performance. Commit to incorporating the three elements into, both, the preparations and the performance itself.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
Yesterday we learned about remarkable performances to achieve the encore effect. Today we are going to look at the five traits of remarkable performances.
In The Encore Effect, Mark Sanborn talks about the importance of establishing an encore brand, whether personal or organizational. He defines a brand as âa promise for the future based on past performance.â
As such, an encore brand is one that has performed remarkably in the past and, based on that, we can anticipate that it will, likely, continue to perform the same way. Here are the five traits that encore brands exhibit:
1. Commitment: âCommitment is the price you are willing to pay to get remarkable results. Performance, on the other hand, reveals the price you have paid already. When we deliver a remarkable performance, we are saying in effect, âThere is no other place or person I would rather spend my commitment on than you.â And when we deliver a poor performance, we convey the opposite messageâthat weâd rather spend our commitment elsewhere.â
We all have to set boundaries on our engagements and commitments on a daily basis. However, âthe challenge,â says Sanborn, âis to commit ourselves to the things that matter to us the most.”
2. Professionalism: âYour problems and opportunities become those of the professionals, who do their best even when they donât have time or feel at their best. [âŚ] When you realize you are in the hands of a professional, you can relax. You know that your concerns will be addressed and that the professional will take care of you. And that is the feeling of confidence that you want to inspire in others.â
3. Skills: âMaking the difficult look easy is a sign of mastery in any profession. [âŚ] To do anything adequately requires basic skills. The encore performer has gone far beyond the rudimentary to hone his or her skills to a high level. Encore performers demonstrate that they know how to do what they do, that theyâve practiced and perfected what they do, and that they still have a commitment to becoming better.â
âAre you able to spot opportunities that others canât? Remarkable performers donât wait for problems and opportunities to come to themâthey actively look for problems and opportunities.â
4. Values: âValues are those beliefs that a person holds most dear. Over time, that which we hold most dear becomes what we are known for. [âŚ] Every performer is known for something.â
5. Character: Sanborn defines integrity as, âthe distance between your lips and your life.â And he says, âyour performance is a visible sign of your integrity and character. [âŚ] Integrity, sincerity, honesty, and transparency are all character traits of remarkable performers [whose] commitment drives them to become the very best of who they are. Remarkable performers have consistent values.â
These are the five traits that, in Sanbornâs opinion, are shared by those who excel: remarkable performers. These are the people who attract our attention and gain our trust. The author points out that, â[we] recognize a remarkable performance when it occurs, but [we] also recognize what it means about the performer.â
Finally, Sanborn invites us to examine our win-loss record of performance in our career and personal life: âeach one of us has complete control over what we do to keep our ‘fans’ coming back for more.â
And on that note, please come back tomorrow for more, as we will look at the role that passion plays in achieving the encore effect.
ACTION
TODAY: Remarkable performers, according to the author, âthink about things that are not being done efficiently or profitably or well in your workplace or industry or community.” Can you come up with suggestions or solutions to a problem that you see?
FUTURE: The author suggests, âThink about how your own life values affect your life, your job, and your interactions with others. Are your values reflected in your actions? If not, what can you do differently?” Over time you will see that âyour brand [becomes] a composite of the values you act on every day.â
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
âItâs not what we know in life that matters most, but what we do with what we know.â
âEvery day is game day,â says Mark Sanborn in The Encore Effect.âEvery interaction is an opportunity to give a remarkable performance. The thing is, whether we realize it or not, we all perform for others in one way or another.â
Sanborn continues, âPerformance counts. If you want to win the loyalty of your customers, coworkers, boss, and other constituents, you need to turn in a consistently strong performance. And if you want to wow them, you need to turn in a remarkable performance.â
But donât mistake a remarkable performance to be necessarily a grandiose thing, the kind that you read about in the newspaper. Most remarkable performances never make the front page. To illustrate this, the author shares the story of a school bus driver whose coworkers teased a lot for not wearing a coat on a freezing day. The driver smiled and took it in stride. When a school administrator asked him why he was not wearing a coat, the driver explained that one of the students didnât have a coat that day, so he gave his own to the student.
The author says that itâs important to notice that there is not one particular approach either. As long as our values and practices are genuine, they will guide us to perform in a variety of roles that are different expressions of our best self. We can ensure that way that our performances will be remarkable. âA remarkable performance⌠moves us and makes us want more.â That’s the potential and the promise of the Encore Effect.Â
Conversely, think how hard it is to perform remarkably when your heart is not in what youâre doing. âItâs difficult, if not impossible,â says Sanborn.
The key is recognizing that our lives are performances of which we are in charge. Every remarkable performance by others affects us positively, and every remarkable performance by us affects someone else positively too.
Remarkable performances can change lives, and âthatâs why creating a remarkable performance is so key to personal success.â
Sanborn closes by saying that it is likely that, âall of us, would like to have our performance described as remarkable. All of us would like to excel at the things that matter most to us. And it is by giving such performances that we achieve the Encore Effect.â
Come back tomorrow to continue learning about the encore effect, we will focus on the traits of remarkable performances.
ACTION
TODAY: What remarkable performance can you give today as an individual, spouse, parent, employee, boss or as any other of the roles you play in life? Sanborn says, âTry this. Do the important jobs or tasks you have to perform before turning out the light tonight remarkablyâeven if youâre alone, even if thereâs no one there to watch you. After all, you will still be aware of how you do what you need to do. Remember: self-respect is the first step toward gaining the respect of others. Ask more of yourself today; it will lead others to expect more of you tomorrow.â
FUTURE: Create the habit of planning, preparing, and creating remarkable performances that will leave your audience wanting more.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
The Encore Effect, a great book by leadership guru and author Mark Sanborn, reminds us that, every day, we are called to perform. âA performance is simply the way someone or something performsâthey way they do what they do.â
And since each one of us has different gifts, the stage in which we perform may be âan office, a sales floor, an assembly line, a pulpit, a classroom, a playing field, a home, a showroom, a hospital,â etc.
Yet, regardless of the kind of stage we perform on, Sanborn says âit can be just as worthy of an encore performance as any concert hall in the world.â
And this is what the author refers to as the Encore Effect: âwhen people constantly demand more and more of whatever it is that you do,â because what you do is simply remarkable.
Sanborn asks, âWhat if you were so good at your work, such an asset to your company, that your employer would do almost anything not to lose you? What if you performed in such a way that people buzzed about your performance and wanted more of your time, ideas, participation and leadership?â
The answers to those questions are exactly what the encore effect is all about.
Sanborn believes that âa worthy goal in life is to have people shouting for more of whatever it is we do that is really important and matters to us.â He encourages us to perform at our best because, âthe world is desperately looking for people who make such a difference, who produce memorable results, who have a positive impact on others.â
Given that encore performers become indispensable and shine wherever they go, over the next few days we are going to understand and learn how to achieve and how to share the encore effect. Keep coming back for this miniseries, as we will learn a lot together!
ACTION
TODAY: Think of your stage and your performances. Where do you perform? What do you perform? And who wants more of your performance? Where are you remarkable and where do you have room for improvement?
FUTURE: While the definition of âbestâ is different in each field, you definitely know what is best in your field of performance. Strive for that by acting in a way that delivers the most value because it comes from your expertise, knowledge, generosity, principles, and character.
Know someone who is an encore performer? Please share this post with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
Steve Siebold, mental toughness guru, asked himself twenty years ago why some people were more successful and fulfilled than others. âWere they smarter? More educated? More talented?â He wondered⌠But, âthe answer is no,â he says.
In his book 177 Mental Toughness Secrets of the World Class, Siebold mentions that he has indeed come across a genius or two over the years. But the answer to his questions is much simpler in 99% of the cases: Great people âbecome great because they are more mentally tough. Through time and effort, they have learned to take control of their thoughts, feelings and attitudes in the game of life and, in turn, life has rewarded them handsomely.â
Much to my delight, the author then goes on to say, âYou can do the same thing if youâll commit yourself to never ending personal growth and development.â (Hint: I know of a blog that will help you with that⌠đ ) âChampions invest time in getting better. School is never out for the great ones.â
Further, I laughed when Siebold asked, âHave you ever been to the bookstore and wondered who reads all those business and self-improvement books?â I think I know someone⌠Now, seriously, he continues, âThe people who need it most wouldnât even consider it, and the people who need it least wouldnât consider missing it. A never-ending cycle of self-education is the centerpiece of world-class consciousness. All it takes to get started is the decision to do it.â
And Iâll leave you with one of my favorite quotes:
âThe more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places youâll go.â â Dr. Seuss. From I Can Read with My Eyes Shut!
ACTION
TODAY: Siebold suggests asking yourself a few critical thinking questions: âAm I really committed to going pro? Am I willing to do whatever it takes to fulfill my vision?â Then make the decision, today, to never stop growing and always keep learning.
FUTURE: Once youâve made the decision, remember that success leaves clues. Who has done what you want to do? How can you learn from this person? Never stop learning in your area of interest. Remember what Earl Nightingale said: âIf a person will spend one hour a day on the same subject for five years, that person will be an expert on that subject.â
Know someone who is a lifelong learner? Please share this with them via email, Facebook or Twitter, thanks!
Yes, alchemy: âLead into gold; creating something from nothing. Turning sand into Pentium chips. Turning a grassy field into a farm and crops. Transforming immaterial ideas into software and websites. Converting chaos into order.â
Marshall goes on to explain, âEven agriculture is alchemy. DNA, water and sunlight transform dirt into corn and grass. Corn and grass turn sperm into cows. DNA is instructions for turning minerals into living creatures and food. DNA is information. Itâs an idea, a plan written in digital code.â
âIdeas are the basis of all creative acts. Thus, the most important resources for modern alchemistsâyou and meâare knowledge, imagination, and inspiration.â
The author recalls having a conversation with Richard Koch, author of The 80/20 Principle, where the latter said, âitâs human energy that creates the magic.â
How is this possible?
Think about it for a moment: âcenturies ago, most people in the world went to bed hungry⌠many women died in childbirth, populations succumbed to famine and smallpox. Today, people at the poverty line enjoy more comforts than kings and queens of long ago.â
Thatâs alchemy.
And this should be the reason, says Marshall, âto be optimistic about the future, instead of getting seduced by the negativity and panic of the news media.â
Examples of alchemy abound: âAn interior decorator walks into every room and considers how sheâd re-do the furnishings, paint and decorations. A contractor drives by a dilapidated house, re-arranges everything in his mind and says, âI fixed it!ââ
âEverywhere you go, every business you walk into, you think of ways to improve their traffic, their conversion, their economics.â
Perry then points out that, âYOU are a builder, a developer, an improver, an alchemist. You canât walk into a pub or visit a website or buy a product or let the lawn service guy into your house without considering this.â
Itâs true. We are all alchemists and our power resides in our ideasâand their executionâwherever we go.
Marshall closes beautifully by saying, âYou are an alchemist. Create. Invent. Imagine⌠in such a way that the world is a better place because you have lived.â
ACTION
TODAY: Find out what your alchemy is. What kind of ideas do you come up with and execute? Whatâs your superpower? Be generous with it and youâll reap the benefits.
FUTURE: Keep a notebook of your ideas. Author James Altucher has a habit of writing down 10 new ideas every day. This is brilliant. The more ideas you write, the greater an alchemist you will become.
Know someone who is an alchemist? Please share this post: Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
We all have our hot buttons that, when pushed, inevitably cause problems in the form of us getting upset, or saying things we shouldnât, etc. And whether we point fingers and blame (âyou made me madâ) or not (âI get so mad when XYZ happensâ), the truth is that the only response we can control is ours.
M.J. Ryan, the author of Habit Changers, addresses this in a masterful mantra: âMy response is my responsibility.â She goes on to say: âThat doesnât mean that the other person didnât do whatever it is Iâm worked up about, but rather that I alone am responsible for my reaction.â
The author shares how she deals with this: âIf I get worked up, I need to deal with my reaction within myself until Iâve cooled down enough to decide whether this is an issue that needs to be addressed with the other person. Because it is only when I am calm that I can talk about it in a way that does no damage to me, the other person, or our relationship. Otherwise, Iâm likely to say or do things that are mean or destructive because the âfightâ of the fight-or-flight response has taken control of my brain.â
Ryanâs suggestion is to give this a try if we find ourselves playing the blame game at home or work. She says, âYou are responsible for your response, and itâs up to you to be as skillful in responding as possible.â
So true!
ACTION
TODAY: Give yourself some time to think about how profound a mindset shift this mantra brings. Identify your hot buttons and put past scenarios of times when theyâve been pushed against this mantra. What happens? I bet they melt away.
Thatâs what happened to me with one particularly ridiculous hot button of mine. It was a stupid, irrational and unfounded hot button (are any hot buttons smart, rational and well-founded??), and when it got pushed⌠Oh, no! It would drive me nuts! Once the realization that my response is my responsibility really sank in, then I felt truly embarrassed: how foolish of me to react in the way I have been reacting all this time! But this helped me become very aware of that particular button and be mindful of my reaction to it should it come up again in the future.
My hope is that sharing this story will help you set the intention to remember this mantra when one of your hot buttons gets pushed. That way you will be able to react better.
FUTURE: Make a mental note of being aware of the times when your hot buttons get pushed. Then keep the mantra in mind until youâve cooled down and can skillfully respond.
Know someone who might benefit from this idea? Please share this post: Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
âThe great successful men of the world have used their imaginations… they think ahead and create their mental picture, and they go to work materializing that picture in all its details, filling in here, adding a little there, altering this a bit and that a bit, but steadily building — steadily building.â â Robert Collier
âWhile [most people] think of imagination as childâs play, the world class relies on it as a mental preview of things to come,â says Steven Siebold, mental toughness guru, in his book 177 Mental Toughness Secrets of the World Class. This is true. In the world of sports, athletes are coached to visualize their efforts, from beginning to end of the competition, and in every possible scenario. (Hereâs a 3-min video of Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps where he talks about visualization at the 1:05 min mark.)
Yet imagination and visualization donât just apply to athletes, it can apply to all of us, and we should use it as the champions in any industry do. Siebold continues, âBefore champions make a move, they have lived out the scenario through imagination. The great ones know imagination is the first step in the design of the perfect house or the perfect life.â
Imagination is a natural, never-ending gift from which we can draw anytime. Siebold mentions that âchampions often go on sabbaticals or places of great natural beauty for the sole purpose of heightening their sense of imagination when pursuing the solution to a problem.â Thatâs why Einstein rightly said that we cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
The author points out that champions combine imagination with their penchant for action, and the results are remarkable and awe-inspiring. âWhile [most people] scold their children for daydreaming and letting their imaginations run, the great ones are impacting the world with the manifestation of their visions.â
Happy imagining!
ACTION
TODAY: Siebold suggests writing a one-page essay where you answer this question: âIf you could be, have and do anything you wanted, what would that look like?â Forget about limits and write as if anything were possible.
FUTURE: Siebold encourages us to take this a step further: âCommit to investing three minutes each day reviewing the essay you wrote. Allow your imagination to run wild with ideas of your perfect lifeâŚForget about the how-to part of the equation during this exercise, and suspend any disbelief you may have. This three-minute, daily habit has the power to transform your life forever.â
Know someone who would love this idea? Please share this post with that person:Â Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
In the last few posts, weâve been learning how to change the habits that hold us back. Today weâll read about another tool to help us in this area. âFeedforward is so simple I almost blush to dignify it with a name,â says executive coach and business guru Marshall Goldsmith in his book What Got You Here Wonât Get You There. âYet some of the simplest ideas are also the most effective. Since they are so easy to do, you have no excuse not to try them.â
Goldsmith points out that âFeedforward is a dramatic improvement on what we traditionally think of as feedback.â And while feedback has its merits, because âitâs a great tool for determining what happened in the past and whatâs going on in an organization,â itâs no different than reading history. âIt provides us with facts about the past but not necessarily ideas for the future.â
âFeedforward, on the other hand, is feedback going in the opposite direction⌠[it] comes in the form of ideas that you can put into practice in the future.â
Here are Goldsmithâs four simple steps to obtain feedforward:
1. Select what you want to change. âPick the one behavior that you would like to change which would make a significant, positive difference in your life. For example, I want to be a better listener.
2. Describe and dialogue. âDescribe this objective in a one-on-one dialogue with anyone you know. It could be your wife, kids, boss, best friend, or coworker. It could even be a stranger. The person you choose is irrelevant. He or she doesnât have to be an expert on the subject⌠Some of the truest advice can come from strangers⌠And when a useful idea comes along, we donât care who the source is.â
3. Ask. âAsk that person for two suggestions for the future that might help you achieve a positive change in your selected behaviorâin this case becoming a better listener. If youâre talking to someone who knows you or who has worked with you in the past, the only ground rule is that there can be no mention of the past. Everything is about the future.â
For instance, the dialogue could go like this: âI want to be a better listener. Would you suggest two ideas that I can implement in the future that will help me become a better listener?â The other person could then suggest, âFirst, focus all your attention on the other person. Get in a physical position, the âlistening position,â such as sitting on the edge of your seat or leaning forward toward the individual. Second, donât interrupt, no matter how much you disagree with what youâre hearing.â
These two ideas are feedforward.
4. Listen and thank. âListen attentively to the suggestions. Take notes if you like. Your only ground rule: You are not allowed to judge, rate, or critique the suggestions in any way. You canât even say something positive, such as, âThatâs a good idea.â The only response youâre permitted is, Thank you.â
And this is it. Simple indeed. Do steps one through four. Rinse and repeat with someone else. âIn seeking feedforward ideas, youâre not limited to one person⌠You can do feedforward with as many people as you like,â says the author.
Goldsmith swears by the effectiveness of feedforward because, he says, âFeedforward eliminates many of the obstacles that traditional feedback has created.â
So, what are those obstacles and why/how does feedforward work? Goldsmith explains that it works because while we may not like hearing criticism (negative or constructive feedback) we love getting ideas for the future. Also, it works because:
âWe can change the future but not the past.â
âHelping people be ârightâ is more productive than proving them âwrong.â Feedback focuses on solutions, not problems.â
âPeople do not take feedforward as personally as feedback. Feedforward is not seen as an insult or a putdown.â
â[When] all we have to do is function as a listener, we can focus on [truly] hearing without having to worry about responding.â
Lastly, the author says, âIâm sure that all of us are surrounded by smart, well-meaning friends who âunderstandâ us better than we âunderstandâ ourselves. I suspect they would love to help us; most people like to help others. But they hold back because they think itâs rude or intrusive to try to help someone who has not asked for our assistance. Asking solves this.â
ACTION
TODAY: Try out asking a few people to give you feedforward. See what happens, Iâm sure youâll get some great ideas!
FUTURE: Keep this technique in mind so that when you feel stuck and want to change something you can ask for feedforward.
Know someone who would like this idea? Please share this post! Email, Facebook, Twitter. Thank you!
TODAYâS IDEA: The Encore Effect â Part 4
