The Secret Sauce of Success

Tip of the Week Wouldn't it be great if you could receive one tip each week that would help you become a creative genius and master goal setter? Now you can! I'll be releasing a new tip each Wednesday in 2015. This week's Tip of the Week will get you in and out of your meetings 28% faster with increased engagement! Follow us on Vimeo, Youtube, or Facebook  and never miss a tip.

The Secret Sauce of Success   Wondering what your next move is? Where your next career path is lurking or how to step up some aspect of your life? Tune in to this study: Ohio State University researchers have been exploring a concept called "upward self-revision" of our "possible selves." Sound intriguing? uh yah! The study explored key contributors to student success.  Researchers focused on how painting a positive picture of a future career path would influence the student's confidence and eventual success in achieving it. Translated into action it means when you help someone picture a future possible self, they are more likely to believe it could be reality and begin working to achieve it. This is why coaching, mentoring, encouraging and positive connotation is so critical to helping others become more of their best selves.  Picturing that future you is part of it. Hearing others validate you is another ingredient. It builds your inner confidence. One of the reasons I love speaking to coaching groups is that they are able to immediately embed the vision to reality drawing process into their work.  What better way to help someone step up their game then to draw them a picture of the future state they desire with them in it!  Watch them step through obstacles with that added boost of the picture and their belief that it is possible.  That it is evolving right now. Goal setting with a powerful positive intent. Lead a staff?  Have children?  Have friends?  Those few encouraging words that you say to them can go a long way. Do someone thing great for someone around you today. Paint a picture of the their future self and seal it with something positive, it's the secret sauce to success. Genius Toolkits Yay yay yay!  Want to help your team or that person you coach turn their vision into reality? Download our Snapshot of the Big Picture visual goal setting toolkit! Add a visual component to the work you do and show people how to draw their dreams into reality. Creativity Symposium 3.7.2015 Sat 10am-4pm Woodinville WA I'll be kicking off the Second awesome event for women leaders. Spark your creativity, build relationships, and be inspired through keynotes, workshops, and peer advisory mastermind circles!

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Letting Your Brain Fill in the Gap

Those of you who like to revisit your goals might consider this idea:

When you have captured on a piece of page where you are now (on the left side of your page) and where you want to be 1 year from today (on the right side of the page) you can see the gap between the two.

That's where your bold steps or action steps go.  Unfortunately sometimes this is exactly where you and I can get stuck.  Why?  Because it looks a little daunting.  Also the critical part of our brain likes to get in the way and say things like, "If you knew how to do that, you would have done it already!"  or  "That seems too overwhelming, you better go get something to eat..."

BUT did you know, that when you are picking up a glass of water, there is a spot in that process where your brain actually fills in the gap.  Yup, it can't exactly see the whole thing, so it just makes it up and sends that made up solution to the parts of you that move and grab the glass.

If your brain can make up something to fill that kind of gap, why not let your brain make up the steps for your action plan?  It knows what you need to do because it processes a billion more things than you can ever consciously remember.

Try an experiment!  Next time you want to create a plan to get you from where you are now to where you want to be, why not write, "What are the boldest things I can do to get myself from here to there?" on the top of a blank piece of paper.  Then start writing whatever comes to you.

Or write the first 100 things that come to you (including some really ridiculous ones for fun.  1 out of that 100 things is bound to be a good action to take.

The truth is, you do know how to get across that chasm, you just need to let your brain do the work for you.

Prioritize to Get It Right

Goal setting smoal setting.  You can set all the goals you want, but if you don't get your mind wrangled around the right priorities, you may as well forget about it.

In David Rock's book Your Brain at Work, Dave talks about the pre-frontal cortex and how easily that tiny little stage gets overwhelmed.  The secret to keeping yourself on track is to calm down, slow down and set priorities so that you can actually make progress on the things you really want.

Imagine this scene: you are all hyped about your new goal to stay focused on finishing that _________.
But when you have the time to do something with it, you decide you better check your email just in case...and suddenly that little window of time to get the ________done gets dissipated by drivel.

It's part of what all of us have to deal with in the age of information.  So what to do about it?

1.  Take a moment to remember what your goals are.
2.  Look at the things you need to do.
3.  Prioritize them into the ones that are going to require the most brain power first.
4.  When you have finished doing that priority one first, go check your email : -)

In my world, I'm all about rewards. You want to mess around on the guitar? Draw a picture? Get that client's drawing down first, then you can go do whatever you want.  Before prioritizing, if I got behind on projects, I'd have to claw my way back from distractions to do one small thing.  After prioritzing, I had more time for all the fun things and I didn't feel so weighed down by worry.

Next time you feel overwhelmed, try this.  Make a list of all the things you need to do.  Then figure out which takes the most brain power, put that in the number one spot.  Then go through the rest of the list to see where else in your schedule you can do a few other high priority brain items.  Between sets take time to go running, call someone, or do something different. Taking a short break allows your brain to recharge.

Goal set, go ahead!  But be sure to remember to prioritize so you can get what you really want!

ReWiring Your Brain

This year more than ever, my clients have been complaining about feeling distracted by a multitude of issues.  The news, the political shifts, organizational cut backs, restructuring, lay-offs have taken up a lot of their time and energy in our "new economy".  Did you know that you can change your response to these shifts in your environment?

According to Dr. Ellen Weber, you can tweak your amygdala (that tiny sac of neurons responsible for reactions) and make it work for you.  "Simply act deliberately in the opposite direction of any negative or moody feelings,"  she suggests.  She also encourages you to disagree with the brain in mind which rewires your brain.

You can also change your brain by using a visual image of that which you want versus don't want.   What do you want to experience?  Calm?  Clarity?  Control?  (yeah, right!)  How about creativity?  Shift your brain by imagining what it would be like to be completely feeling that feeling, no matter what your outer experience is like.  Get into it, that's right, crawl inside.

Now let's add a visual to accelerate bringing what you do want to you.  Imagine yourself using this quality effortlessly in your world.  Hold that image as long as you can until you actually relax into it and begin to "daydream" about other ways of using it.   Let's turn up the heat in that daydream by adding a symbol that will help keep you on track in your daily life, when you are not daydreaming. 

Imagine that someone you know and trust enters the scene in your mind carrying a gift box in their hands.  Hear them say, "Inside this box is a symbol that represents what you most want right now in your life for you to use as a tool in your outside world."  Take the box from them, open it up and see what is inside.

When you keep your critic, judge, paternal adult out of the room of your imagination, you will actually see something in that box.  If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.  Do this exercise until you do see something.  If you are not successful after a day or two, ask for something to stand out in your everyday life to let you know that IT is your symbol.  Each time you see that symbol, it will remind you to refocus on that quality, thing or goal that you want.

Your mind is a powerful tool.  It needs you to refocus it on what is most important.  With all of the flurry of change that is now a constant state, it is up to you to take the helm of your mind and  rewire it, and in every moment, you can.

The Alchemy of Planning

You've heard the myth that extensive planning breeds the best results?  At Alchemy we are involved in all types of planning, but extensive, tedious - that strategic plan that becomes a book and remains on the shelf - isn't one of them.  We believe that by marrying visuals with a simple planning process you can build the excitement and commitment to get you better and faster results.  Each of our alchemists work with individuals, teams and organizations around the world to help them kick-start their engines of change and burn rubber taking off in that new direction.

How can you accelerate change in yourself, your team, or your company?  We have developed and refined a process called  the Snapshot of the Big Picture.  In short, getting a snapshot of where you are right now, your Current State, where you want to be one year from today in the best possible Desired New Reality, and identifying the 3 Bold Steps that will get you from here to there.  Rocket science?  Not likely.  Download the template above and try it for yourself.

All of us make plans in our head.  At Alchemy, we marry this naturally intuitive process with an external visual to accelerate making that "picture in your mind" happen.  In our work, we actually draw on huge pieces of paper 4' by 8', and that picture packs a powerful punch.  But even if you are simply using a small visual like the template above, when you put that visual in a place where you can see it everyday and take action on your 3 bold steps, stuff happens.  That's the alchemical process - part science and part magic.  Check out what people have been saying about using our Snapshot of the Big Picture process and let us know how it worked for you.