The Mind Makeover:
Six Steps to Reclaiming Your Business Life
by Cheryl Richardson, Life Coach and Author of " Take Time for Your Life"
Industry Magazine Aug-Sep 2006

1. Redefine What “Success” Means
Pursuing success just for the sake of pursuing it is an unconscious perspective; one based on other people’s standards. An example would be going after an outdated goal such as wanting to reach a certain revenue point set five years ago. Does it still apply? Is it worth not seeing as much of your family?  What are you going to do with that money when you make it? Make a constant effort to keep up with what you want from success. Wealth is great, but if success means just peace of mind during a difficult time, listen to that need. The more conscious you are about  what you’re going after and why and what it is truly giving you, the better chances that you’ll wind up happy.

2. Take Control of Your Technology
I have no voicemail on my cell phone, for instance, just on my private and business lines.  I have an assistant who answers the business line and I handle the private.  This frees me from the endless sport of chasing my messages.  We think things like cell phones make us more productive, but it is entirely possible that they are slowing you down by constantly making you react to them.  I also rarely have the ringer on in my office.  A ringing phone is a call to action, and I want to be in charge of when I receive calls, when I receive messages, and when I return them. 

The same applies to email.  If someone copies me on a message that I don’t absolutely have to see, then I reply to them and let them know that they don’t have to do that again. I give them a real answer, and parameters under which I need to be cc’d or not. I also never take a computer with me on the road.  I have good people in place who can handle my communication, so that I have to deal with E-mail as little as possible.

3. Delegate Strategically
Far too many executives think that they must run their assistant’s days as well as their own, to dream up a to-do list for them… and they call that “delegating”.  My assistant knows that it is her job not only to handle the things I need her to handle, but to constantly look for those times when I am doing something she knows that she could do.  I’m open to her feedback, of course, but it’s amazing what can be accomplished when you delegate to people who are smart enough to innovate all by themselves.

4. Make Money Matter, But Not in the Way You Think
When many people are crunched financially, they feel that money – or the lack thereof – runs their life.  It sounds obvious, but the truth is that money starts to flow into our life when we trust ourselves to handle what we already have.  If you’re someone who doesn’t pay your bills on time or continues to use your charge cards when you can’t afford to pay off the debt you already have, you never really know how much money you have and you consistently send a message to yourself that you wouldn’t be a good steward for more.  It’s why some 80% of lottery winners go bankrupt within five years of winning millions of dollars.  Because if you don’t have good money skills in place, there’s a part of you that works really hard to get it the hell out of your hands as quickly as possible. I used to be a tax consultant years ago, and if I learned one thing, it is that the amount of money you make doesn’t matter. It is how you regard money and manage it that matters.

5. The 50 Percent Solution
We actually can get energy from drama, conflict and anxiety, so a lot of people end up living on the adrenaline that gets created as a result of moving too quickly, doing too much, multi-tasking, constantly running through their to-do-lists in their head. As a result, we get burnt out. It usually isn’t until our mid to late 40’s that we start to feel the physical affects of adrenal burnout. It can be chronic exhaustion, depression, hair falling out, and a “tired but wired” feeling that never goes away. 

Try this. Make a list of all your priorities.  Then force yourself to – at least on paper – let go of 50% of these.  People usually freak out first and come up with all the excuses in the world as to why they can’t.  But with a bit of time, they start to look at how many of these priorities really have to be handled by them right now, versus how many reflect an outdated goal that is no longer that important. The results are just amazing.

6. A Smattering of Selfishness
Over the years, I’ve discovered that when an individual makes their own self care a priority – when they start to care more deeply for themselves – they naturally begin to care more for their families, their community, the state in which they live, their country, and ultimately the world.  That should be their spiritual quest, and it is deeply important.  So what happens when they make this commitment to connect with what’s really important instead of what we think is important? It’s as though there is this divine force that rallies behind them to support their efforts. It doesn’t matter whether you believe it or not, whether you call it God or Jesus, Buddha or the universe.  What I see is this higher energy that supports people when they make decisions.