Five Ways to Gear Yourself Up For Success
There are great days. And there are crap days.
On some mornings, you wake up with brimming with energy and ideas. Full of gusto, you’re able to accomplish major milestones and to lead your team to scale new heights.
On others, however, you may find yourself dragging your sorry carcass-like body out of the lazy chair.
How do you ignite the sparkplugs so that you can keep your engines purring like a well-oiled machine?
Inspired by an amazing podcast from HBR IdeaCast featuring Dan McGinn, I decided to write down some of the ways in which top performing athletes, actors and leaders practice to continually perform at their best.
#1 Begin by Visualising Success
First and foremost, you need to have a clear picture of what success is like in your heart and your mind. This can be achieved through the power of visualisation.
Try these five steps and see if it works for you:
1. Find a quiet and tranquil space at your office, home, or other location.
2. Breathe slowly in, hold your breath, and out again. Let your heart beat slow down.
3. Achieve complete calmness and relaxation.
4. Put to mind the clear and vivid picture of what success look, sound, smell and feel like.
5. Envisage yourself feeling, looking and sounding confident, buoyed by the positive interactions of others around you.
If you wish to bring this further, you can create a vision board. This can be a physical one with magazine and paper cuttings and photos, or a digital one.
Include everything you wish to accomplish: Relationships, career and finances, home, travel, personal growth (including spirituality, social life, and education) and health. Remember not to just put down what you want but how you wish to feel.
#2 Develop a Success Ritual
Imagining the future alone isn’t enough. You need to start putting your nose to the grind and work it.
A great way to gear up for the work ahead is to adopt a success ritual. This depends on what stokes your goat.
This can be as simple as plugging in your headphones to listen to stirring music, or putting on a jacket and pacing the room before appearing on stage like comedian Jerry Seinfeld.
Many of the most successful people around have a fixed morning ritual. Some people call this an “hour of power”.
Virgin billionaire Richard Branson likes swimming around his island and going kite surfing before having a healthy breakfast, while motivational speaker Tony Robbins opts to dive into a near freezing pool and meditate for 15 minutes before his day!
#3 Consider Social Contagion
Also known as behavioural contagion, social contagion is the process of spreading ideas, attitudes, or behaviour patterns through imitation and conformity.
There are several ways to do so - some more superstitious than others.
For example, if you wish to get your team members to “bend it like Beckham”, you could get them to watch videos of the famous English football player in action and perhaps give them soccer jerseys with Beckham’s name and number (23 or 32).
In the podcast, I heard about how using the same keyboard which Malcolm Gladwell used could improve the quality of your writing. You could also consider mimicking the style of leaders like Steve Jobs, and how he delivered his epic product launches - carefully choreographed to pinpoint precision while exuding casual cool.
I guess this is why the items owned by celebrities are often auctioned at stratospheric prices!
#4 Prep Your Pep Talk
If you lead a team, you ought to know that pep talks are sometimes needed. However, you need to do this well and be perceived as reaching out and caring rather than boasting and preaching.
According to McGinn, there should only be three main reasons for giving pep talks.
- Direction giving: Provide specific instructions on what’s needed to achieve the goal ahead, and how barriers could be overcome. For example, a pep talk given to a basketball team by the coach, guiding them on the tactics needed to improve their game play.
- Expressions of empathy: Provide support to team members by encouraging and publicly recognising winners. This could be in the form of an awards or prize giving ceremony given to top performing sales personnel.
- Meaning making: Reinforce the “Whys” behind what your organisation is doing, and how it matters to the folks listening in. It is important here to be realistic and not overbearing. For example, you can’t expect temporary workers or student interns to have the same passion as the CEO does in inventing the next cure for cancer.
#5 Ignite Your Energy Levels
Energy and time are the two most important ingredients of success.
To perform at an optimal level, you need to maintain the right levels of adrenaline fuelled energy. For some, it could come from your morning or evening exercise rituals. Others may feel energized when they are engaged in a social activity, or after they’ve read a particular inspiring book.
My energy levels peak in the morning immediately after I have breakfast and cup of coffee. Evening walks or runs every 2 or 3 days are also a must-have in order to boost my energy levels adequately.
Now that you’ve read these suggestions, I’ll love to hear from you. Do you have a favourite way to prepare yourself mentally for success?
Walter is the founder and editor of Cooler Insights - a critically thinking content marketing, public relations and personal branding agency. Fuel your business with the latest insights in digital and content marketing, public relations andpersonal branding.
Helping Leaders Build Better Team Engagement |Leadership Coach | Speaker | Startup Advisor | Author: REINVENT 4.0
7yGood story for a morning start!