The Power of the I AM

I was watching an interview Oprah did with Joel Osteen. He said, "What ever follows I AM will come looking for you." In other words, when we say, "I am tired," we can expect to be tired. If we say "I am never going to find a better job" or "I am never going to have a satisfying relationship," what do you think you'll be bringing into your life.

In the book The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz, the First Agreement is to be Impeccable with your word. Mean everything you say and only say things that you mean.

Here is a video that gives you dozens of positive, affirmative I AM statements.

When YOU Know Best

When I was volunteering for a job readiness program, one of the things I really enjoyed was reviewing resumes. However, I could always tell who had relied blindly on the spelling and grammar checkers. I could tell because I would come across sentences that made absolutely no sense. The job seeker often knew the sentence wasn't correct, their defense was that they just went with the grammar checker.

The assumption was that the grammar checker knew better than they did. Who were they to question something that the computer said. The computer is always right, right? Well, no. The spell check is good if you are close to the word you are trying to spell. However, with a language as complicated as English, the grammar checker is only correct a fraction of the time.

It is interesting that people will often abdicate their common sense, smarts and instincts because something or someone has more credibility. We lose the ability to question. We assume that we don't know enough and rely on the advice of the 'expert', whether it is a software program or a professional.

I remember when I purchased my house. I had a sizable amount in savings. However, I knew that the money was already earmarked for a specific purpose. The mortgage lender pre-approved me for a lot more than I could afford. Sure, I had shared with them some of my larger expenses, but I knew what I had day-to-day. Had I purchased a home for what I'd been approved for, I would have been in foreclosure within six months. Despite what I was told, I knew I couldn't afford that much house.

A close relative almost started a painful and expensive round of treatments based on what her doctor had told her. Luckily, her daughter got her to seek a second and then a third opinion. It turns out that what the first doctor proposed wasn't necessary. If she hadn't questioned that first diagnosis, she'd be going down a painful and costly path that was completely unnecessary.

Whether it is a software program, a doctor, a financial professional or someone else with an air of authority, we have to have the courage to ask questions and seek the information that we need. Real professionals expect us to have questions and would not be offended by a second opinion.

At the end of the day, we are the ones that have to live with our decisions, so we need to make them with all of the information at our disposal.

Get Golden!

Golden Goals are what I call goals that create positive effects that go far beyond the goal itself.

Let’s take getting control of your finances. Your goal may have been to pay off  three bills, set payment arrangements on three others and build up an additional $1,000 in savings. Once you have accomplished that one goal you might notice that you are experiencing less stress, you are arguing less with your spouse and you are sleeping better. All of those are the residual effects of accomplishing that one goal.

Weight loss is another great example. You achieve your goal of losing 30 pounds. Now, you feel better, your cholesterol has gone down, your confidence has shot up and your sex life has improved! One goal with several great results.

Statistics state that the more goals you have, the fewer you achieve. If you have four, five, six or more goals, you will achieve fewer than two. If you have more than seven, expect to achieve none of your goals. Two, maybe three, goals are best. More than that and you spread yourself too thin. Have a couple of goals that you can focus on … and make them Golden Goals!

When you list all of the things you want to accomplish, look at the domino effect that each goal will cause. The ones with the most positive effects are your Golden Goals. Start with those and as you succeed, you will have the momentum to tackle the rest .. a few (well, two…) at a time.

What are your Golden Goals?

Lessons from Reality TV: Really Real?

From The Real Housewives of Atlanta to Honey Boo-Boo, reality TV is here to stay. What can we learn from some of television's most guilty pleasures.

If you are a fan of Reality TV, I want to leave you with one final fact. Reality TV isn't real. It's called reality TV because it features real people, not paid actors and because it is (allegedly) not scripted. These facts do not hide the fact that it isn't real.

Let's start with the casting agents. They cast types: the slut, the player/jock, the diva, the angry black woman, ... I considered going on a reality show several times but I'm not the quintessential angry or manipulative black woman that they frequently cast on The Apprentice, Celebrity Apprentice or Hell's Kitchen. In fact, I had an acquaintance who participated in a reality show with an Apprentice-like format. They went out of their way to make her look bad. However, casting the right types is critical to the success of a show. Real Housewives has been known to recast after a season if a certain wife isn't 'interesting enough.

Story Editors are the 'writers' for reality television shows. They pour over hours of footage to put together a story. In the case of my acquaintance, they took a comment she made days earlier and had it voiced over over another scene to make her appear snobby and a bit rude.

Producers are there to help make the reality a little more real. They egg their hand-picked participants on and get them to 'perform' and move the story in a specific direction. They send cast members to certain places to film coached reactions.Look Honey Boo-Boo is going to a wig shop to find hair. Let's see what happens!

Even competition shows aren't really real. American Idol is notorious for casting types. On the Biggest Loser, they train for hours every day and several winners resorted to starving themselves, not eating solid food, and getting in and out of hot saunas prior to the final weigh-ins. This is not how real people in real life lose weight.

Are you a Reality TV Junkie? Good for you. Enjoy it! Just be aware that reality on TV is a far cry from real life/

You Get What You're Worth

A while back I created a website for a family friend. I made the mistake of  not stating clearly what I would charge him. I said I'd do it for "a few hundred". Basically, I took a one-page flyer and turned it into a five page site. He gave me $100 and thought that covered all of the work I'd done plus unlimited updates. I was insulted. However, I had to admit that it was more my fault than his.

I didn't state what I needed objectively. I left it open and vague. I can't really blame him for taking advantage of that situation. I've learned my lesson. Now I state my fees and my expectations right up front. I even ask for a percentage to be paid before I begin working.

Next, I had to admit that part of the reason I didn't state my fee upfront  is because I might not have gotten the job. In retrospect, would that have really been a bad thing? I've had to learn that it is okay if people say 'no' especially when a 'yes' is going to take up an exorbitant amount of time, cause a number of headaches or end up being far too much work and effort.

I have to know my own worth and recognize that people who don't recognize it are people I don't need to be bothered with anyway. It's one thing to offer someone a deal or a discount. It's another thing entirely to give the cow away for free.

I've found that recognizing my worth goes far beyond the occasional freelance client. It applies to my career, my family, my friendships and my romantic life. It starts when I recognize what I'm bringing to the table. You'll pay more for a filet mignon than you will for a hamburger steak. I need to know my worth and be confident when it coming to knowing what I have to offer and what I still have to learn.

Once I became aware fully of who and what I was, I had to dispel the fear that it wouldn't be enough or that maybe, on the other side, it might be too much. I realize now that not everything is for everyone ... and that is okay. There are people who want more than I can offer and there are also people who think that what I'm offering might be too much for them. ... and that's okay too.

Water seeks its own level and, I've found, so do people. Eventually, you meet the people who connect with you right where you are.

Clarity

What do you want? A job isn’t the right answer. A successful business isn’t the right answer either. Having a relationship, losing weight, going back to school, those answers aren’t working for me.

You need to get clear on what you want … exactly what you want. If you want a job, will any job do? Do you want to scrub toilets? How about picking up trash from the side of the road? That might be fine for some people, but if that isn’t your idea of a job, then you need to get clear.

When I graduated from college, in my youthful arrogance, I turned down a job, a good job. It took me another year to get my foot in the door at a radio station and when I did, I wasn’t getting paid. I toiled there for a year and a half. During that time, I got experience and made a decent demo tape. I also applied to any and every job I could. I applied to places I couldn’t pronounce. I sent resumes and tapes to places I couldn’t find on a globe. My goal was simple, find a job as a news producer. Any job.

Eventually, I got a job as a news producer in a small Midwestern town. The job was fine but I was miserable. Forget dating, I would have settled for just a friend. For a year, every evening, every weekend, I was alone. I ate alone. I went to the movies alone. I never made a local call because no one I knew was local. It was awful.

After a year, I left. I didn’t have another job. I didn’t care. I just had to get out.

I had not been clear about the job I wanted. I didn't want 'any job' 'anywhere', although that was the energy I was putting out. I wanted a job, as a producer, in a medium-sized city that would pay me at least $5,000 more than I ended up making. But desperation overtook clarity. I settled for anything and that's exactly what I got.

Knowing what you don’t want is a good start but you need to know exactly what you do want.

If you want a job, what job? Where are you working? What salary are you making? What are you doing every day? What is your boss like? How long is your commute?

If it’s a relationship, what are your partner’s characteristics? What activities do you share? What do you like about him/her? What does he/she bring to the relationship?
If it is a business, what defines a successful business to you? How much revenue are you generating? How many people are working for you? What are your days like? Who is your ideal client or customer?

Clarity is key.

Lessons from Reality TV: Nice Guys Don't Get Cast

From The Real Housewives of Atlanta to Honey Boo-Boo, reality TV is here to stay. What can we learn from some of television's most guilty pleasures?

If a nice guy or girl manages to get cast, rest assured they will be booted out in the first few episodes. Unless, of course, they are fodder for the angry, manipulative, or evil characters. In that case they'll stay around a while.

Underhanded, unethical behavior and dirty tricks will get you far. This makes for good TV but in real life, no one ones to run across this type of shady individual. On shows like The Apprentice and Survivor,  they call it strategy: making and breaking alliances, under-performing on someone else's project, using teammates to get ahead with no regard or respect for them as people. On shows like The Real Housewives, Jersey Shore and Love and Basketball, materialistic, catty and self-centered behavior is a given. Of course, this is how people behave.

I would be lying if I said that these behaviors never worked in the real world. The fact of the matter is that some times they do. Everyone has worked with the person who takes credit for another co-worker's work, or the one who schemes behind your back to get their way. And most of us know someone who would throw their own mother under a bus if the price were right.

However, is this the type of behavior we really should be rewarding? As our kids watch these shows, is this the type of behavior we want them to emulate - win at any cost and to hell with other people as long as you get what you want? For many people, seeing something on TV, especially repeatedly on TV, is an endorsement of sorts. It gives value to those behaviors as if to say, "This is how people really act. If just a few people acted this way, we wouldn't put it on television."

When it comes to children and teens, I think these shows can be a jumping off point for a discussion about how people in real life should behave and what consequences these kinds of actions generate for people who live their lives off camera.

On Reality TV, nice guys and girls might not finish dead last but they usually don't win either. In real life, it isn't always about winning, it's about living. And in the game of life, they normally do pretty well.