I’m not a motivational speaker, and I don’t aspire to be one. But for a minute, I’m going to sound like one. There’s something that I say to myself that helps me achieve my most pressing massage business goal, and I think it can help you.
Here’s what I say: What can’t get done, must get done.
So, what were you thinking after you read that?
Was it “Sounds interesting. How does that work, Mark?” or was it “Go peddle that nonsense somewhere else, Mark”.
There’s no judgment here. I’m just trying to make a point that both responses have an emotional component to them.
“Sounds interesting…” is hopeful, right?
“Go peddle…” not so much.
Your emotional response will probably dictate whether or not you try my advice.
The same is true with finishing projects. Emotions can stop you or start you.
Ever have a 1 day project that took 10 days or 100 days…or a 1000 days to complete?
When a Massage Business Goal Takes Too Long
Time for me to fess up. It took me almost a year to put up our outdoor office sign.
Here’s my brain then: I can’t order the lettering for the sign until I measure the size of the existing sign…but I can’t measure the existing sign because I need a ladder and I don’t have a ladder, so I’d have to borrow my dad’s ladder, but I can’t borrow my dad’s ladder because I don’t think it will fit into my car and I can’t borrow someone else’s car because I’m so busy with work and work projects…so I can’t put the sign up until I get more time so that I can borrow a car to haul my dad’s ladder…
How to Change the Conversation
But what if I had said to myself: “Listen here, buddy, this is how we’re approaching this massage business goal today: What can’t get done (the sign), must get done.”
The conversation in my head may have went this way:
So you can’t find the time to borrow a car to get your dad’s ladder?
Right.
Did you see if the ladder would fit into your car?
Well…no…
So, you don’t know if that ladder will actually fit into your car?
No.
Guess what’s the first thing you’re going to be doing today?
Seeing if the ladder fits into my car.
Uh-huh.
The real barrier wasn’t that the ladder wouldn’t fit into my car. (By the way it did.) The real barrier was that I was nervous that I was going to mess up the job because I had never made a sign before, and I didn’t want to waste money.
In other words, the real barrier for completing the sign project wasn’t something beyond my control. It was an emotional barrier.
Scale Emotional Barrier to Complete Massage Business Goal
Here’s an example of how my new thinking has helped me.
Recently, I was having SEO nightmares with one of my websites. Basically, I had changed the business name a few years back and hadn’t updated the information with the search engines.
When I started to move on this project there were complications with the update, like verification. For example, Bing sends you physical mail with a verification code.
The problem with that was our name and address had worn off our office mailbox, and I was way too busy with clients, articles, new classes, marketing and life in general to find time to fix the mailbox situation…
But then I pulled out the “what can’t get done (website SEO), must get done.”
Guess what?
It got done.
To be honest, I’m not even sure what the emotional barrier was. I just knew that “being too busy” was not a legitimate show stopper. And I was now on automatic pilot to getting things done.
In fact, over the past few weeks, my check marks for jobs completed has increased dramatically.
With every check mark I get an endorphin reward and my desire to continue with this way of thinking gets stronger.
How I Accomplish a Massage Business Goal
Want to give it a try? Here’s what I do:
1. Pick one project to focus on for the week that you haven’t been able to finish.
If you pick to many, you’ll get overwhelmed.
2. Buy into “what can’t get done, must get done” for the week.
So, if you start to have mission creep, remember that you’re only going to do this for a week. if it doesn’t work after a week, you can opt out forever.
As you continue on, you’ll start to figure out the steps needed to get the job done. At that point you’ll be able to tease apart the emotional barriers from things beyond your control.
3. Work through the emotional barriers.
The emotional barriers can be overcome. They MUST be overcome for you to move forward. Get just one itty-bitty win, a small massage business goal accomplished, and that will give you enough fuel to get the next win.
4. Bask in the emotional rewards after you finish the project.
This is an important step because it reinforces the desire to repeat the process.
Gloat, dance, high 5 yourself, think about all the great things that happened because you completed the project—and the thought “what can’t get done, must get done” will be connected to success.
Can you say productivity machine!
Source: Ajale.com
If you try this experiment, let me know how it goes.
P.S. By the way, you can get my updates, links, videos and articles immediately when you join my email group. It’s free and you can unsubscribe anytime:-)
