Bankrupt Yourself To Success

I know I have probably said this before but there are two very distinct types of people that come to me for life coaching. About 75% are committed to doing whatever is necessary to get where they want to be and the remainder are somewhat more reticent. That isn’t to say they are lazy and it certainly isn’t a criticism it’s just how it is They need a little more prodding and poking to help them leave their comfort zone because you can’t really change without doing so and it is my job to prod and poke at the requisite times.

 

One lady that I have been working with recently has really thrown herself into things with a level of enthusiasm and dedication that if I could bottle would mean I wouldn’t be typing this post I would be lying on some beach in the South Pacific counting my money and laughing a lot. Unfortunately it won’t go into a bottle because I have tried so I’m sticking with the day job for the time being.

 

The lady I am talking about was working on a few things but one minor area of concern was her penchant for exaggerating. I told her that I had dealt with millions of people like her in the past and that I was probably better suited to help her than any person on the planet. I didn’t actually, I only just thought of that less than sidesplitting and somewhat predictable joke a few moments ago. Anyway, I remembered an idea that I had used once before with some success. It was stolen like all good self-development material from a book I read some while ago called ‘What Got You Here Won’t Get You There’ by Marshall Goldsmith. The book is an excellent starting part for anybody that wants to improve his or her business performance without going to the expense of hiring a business coach. It is full of common sense advice and the bit I remembered involved fining yourself when you commit a discretion that you are determined to get rid of.

 

I suggested that maybe she should fine herself $1 every time she exaggerate and that she should enlist the help of her family to keep her in-line. Not only did she agree but also she went one step further and decided to make it $5 and to donate the proceeds to charity. I was a bit skeptical because I didn’t want to see her filing for Chapter 11 or whatever the individual bankruptcy thing is called but agreed nevertheless.

 

The next time we met this didn’t come up to begin with when all of a sudden she picked herself up on some minor exaggeration that I hadn’t even noticed (bad personal coach!) and said ‘whoops there goes another $5’. To cut a long story down to one not quite so long, she had had great success with her experiment and was exaggerating much less and when she did she was catching herself much quicker and backing up. We even agreed to reduce the amount of cash when she caught herself rather than other people pointing it out which was a really cool way of recognizing how well she was doing.

 

If you really, really want to change some behavior either personal or in business then you may want to try and incorporate a fine system to help you achieve your goal. It supposedly take 30 days to form a new habit so it shouldn’t be something that you have to do for too long, and when you are eating out of the garbage bin because you have no money I am guessing you will make some pretty rapid changes.

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