Who needs you on your A-game?

Sometimes it’s not enough to be on your A-game for yourself. When you get to breaking point, you need to dig deeper and find out who you are really pursuing your goal for.

When I’m all out of energy or I feel like giving up, I ask myself:

Who could I be a better role model for?

Who needs me to show up 100% for them?

Who needs me on my A-game?

The answer is often one of my clients, or my partner, Daniel. I want to be an example of what is possible. I want to practice what I preach. When I’m exhausted and I feel like giving up – for whatever reason – being of high service to my clients or Daniel keeps me going. I think, about how I would support them in this situation.

If you’re feeling like you can’t keep going, answer those three questions and you’ll be unstoppable.

What Commitment Actually Means

Are you committing to trying to make your goals happen?

Or are you committing to making your goals happen?

Because there’s a big difference.

When you commit to trying you’re not really making a true commitment. You’re making a temporary, half-hearted, ‘hopefully, I can do it’ attempt at your dreams.

Would we have got to the moon if we had committed to trying?

51 years ago, going to the moon was impossible. We didn’t have the right equipment or the right understanding. Even up until the last minute, we didn’t know how to do it.

But NASA didn’t commit to trying, we committed to making it happen, no matter what, whatever it takes.

And THAT is why it happened.

So decide today that you are going to stop trying to make your goals happen, and instead commit to making your goals happen. No matter what. Whatever it takes.

What if you squeezed a decade into a year?

If someone told you that you had 24 hours to raise $500,000 or you’d die, do you think you’d be able to get hold of the money?

Hell yes. You’d beg your neighbours, rob a bank vault, or start a viral crowdfunding campaign.

We’ve got preconceived ideas about what we can do in a certain amount of time, but based on what?

My gorgeous friend and coach Nicole Middleton shared an idea with me today in our weekly Impossible Incubator Mastermind Call.

She shared that time is just an illusion (true), and therefore, there’s absolutely no reason why we think we need to wait to achieve our goals. It’s only our mindset that is holding us back. It’s only what we consider “doable” in a certain amount of time.

But some of the greatest discoveries and inventions were made because of a race against time.

Going to the moon
The enigma code
Flying an airplane
Fossil discoveries

If time is only a limitation of our own minds, then just imagine what we could accomplish if we let go of the notion of time.

IT WOULD BLOW OUR MINDS.

What 10-year goal do you have that you could actually accomplish in one year?

We think we know

So many of the things we think we know we really don’t know, because we aren’t actually doing them.

Like, we think we know that exercising daily is good for our health. But did we get ourselves to the gym?

We think we know that posting on YouTube twice a week will grow our channels. Yet where are our videos (hello, guilty: I’m talking to me now).

We have to stop saying “Yeah, I know, I know.” Because we don’t know. Unless we’ve been absolutely crushing it every day with healthy eating or exercising or youtube videos (or whatever it is that we think we know we need to do) for the last 6 months, then we don’t know.

Excuses

If you think you have a problem, you don’t. You just have an excuse. I had to be harsh on myself today and admit that I haven’t been putting in the work I need to, to get me towards my dreams.

My excuses are disguised as problems or struggles, which sound more legitimate than excuses. But the truth is, I already know (and so do you) EXACTLY how to achieve my goals.

I just have to DO THE WORK. 

And I can say I’m doing the work. But when I truly look at myself in the mirror, can I say I put in 100% every day?

Not yet. Not even close.

Because if I truly was putting in 100% every day, I wouldn’t be making excuses for why I’m not there yet. 

You don’t need more strategy.

You know what you need to be doing. 

Now do it.

Committing to my alarm clock

This morning was tough to get out of bed. That’s not a surprise – it’s always been something I’ve found difficult.

But as a high performance coach, I’m incredibly passionate about pushing my limits to be the best I can be. But it was only recently that I discovered I’d never actually integrated being a high performer into my identity. I loved the concept and loved doing the work, but I didn’t OWN it.

So now I’ve changed my identity to include “I am a High Performer.”

And the funniest thing has happened. My motivation has gone through the roof. I’m actually DOING the things I commit to.

This morning, as usual, I heard my alarms go off:

• 7:30am – Snooze. There’s no way I’m getting up yet.

• 7:32am – Snooze. I’m far too tired. Just 5 more minutes, pleeease.

• 7:35am – Snooze. Don’t even with me right now.

• 7:40am – Snooze. I’m far too tired to… hang on. I am a high performer! Now that I’m a High Performer, what do I do? I follow through on my commitments. And my alarm clock is a commitment! Okay, I’m up.

Identifying with BEING a high performer meant that I felt like I was acting out of alignment with my core values when I snoozed my alarm. I felt accountable to my alarm this morning because I felt the way I started my day was a representation of my true level of performance.

I am a high performer. I no longer press snooze.

How to Get What You Want

It’s not because the diet doesn’t work. It’s because you don’t do the work.

It’s not because your plan didn’t work. It’s because you didn’t do the work. 

Any diet works. Any plan works. 

But did you work?

It’s not what anyone wants to hear. But it’s truer than we’d like to admit. We are the ones who don’t show up.

My clients promise me things all the time. I promise myself things all the time. It’s easy to make a promise. It’s easy to make a commitment. I don’t care if you can make a promise. I want to see you keep a promise.

This answer to how to get what you want is almost too obvious, it gets dismissed. I fear I may not grasp it to its fullest extent yet either.

Show up every day and do the work. Every day. No exceptions. No sick days. No cheat days. Every single day.

Hold for more

Watch this space.

Put Your Mind To It & Do It

I had a coaching call with one of my clients today, and she was struggling to get herself to do the things she needed to do towards her goal.

She had a massive breakthrough and told me: it’s almost always easier than you think it is. You already know the thing you need to do, you just think you can’t do it yet. She is SO right.

She went away and applied for her dream job right then and there, and sent me proof. Done.

Here’s a series of journaling questions to make that hard thing easy:

1. What is the goal?

2. What needs to happen?

3. What will that take?

4. What bold action can I take right now?

Put your mind to it and do it.

Two kinds of cool in this world

Ever since I was a small kid, I’ve tried to be like other people. I’ve had idols and obsessions and admired others deeply – including a Hannah Montana phase that those who knew me in 2006 will never, ever, let me live down. I’ve just always admired people for being cooler, funnier, and more attractive than I am. But over time, I’ve come to understand that the people I most deeply admire in this world are not the ones who make me want to be like them, but the ones who make me want to be more like myself.

There are two kinds of cool people in this world.
1. The kind of people who are so cool you want to be more like them.
2. The kind of people who are so cool you want to be more like you.

The second kind makes you think, ‘man, I want to be as good at being me as they are at being them.’
The second kind makes you feel like being you is the coolest thing you can possibly be.

Thanks to the second kind of people, I’ve never had to ‘find’ myself, I’ve never felt unsure of who I am or what I stand for – because I was always building myself. I know who I am through and through, from the day I was old enough to conceptualise what ‘being myself’ meant.

Also thanks to the second kind of people, I’m strong-willed, I’ve never touched alcohol (ever), and I’m quite comfortable telling you that I don’t enjoy skiing, yoga or video games and I probably never will. The beautiful thing about the second kind of people is that by being fully themselves, they influence more people be fully themselves, which influences more people to be fully themselves. and it the cycle continues.

So how can you be one of the second kind of people? Be completely you – because by being yourself fully and completely, you unconsciously give others permission to do the same.