The Inner Game

As you may have surmised by now, I’ve been influenced by Jordan Belfort (The Wolf of Wall Street) I credit him for some of the material in this book and I do recommend you take his Straight Line Selling course. More of that later. Jordan has a unique way of managing the inner game which I will share with you now.
“My past failures and insults are now my muscle”

Do you want to know what the real secret to success is? It’s this:
Be willing to do today, what other people are unwilling to do, to get what you want tomorrow.

There it is in a nutshell, thousands of years of personal development boiled down to eighteen words. I suggest you copy these words and burn them into you psyche. There is nothing else required to succeed. Let’s dive deeper into what it means.

Be willing… this means you are prepared to do what it takes.
… To do today – not tomorrow, next week but today, preferably now.
…what other people are unwilling to do – for instance you practise your craft longer and harder, you make more cold calls, you phone the CEO when other target middle management.
…to get what you want tomorrow – you know your rewards come later; you are prepared to be patient.

Language

I write a lot about language in my other books, but here are a couple of words for you to eliminate from your vocabulary immediately, because of the negative effect they have on your psychology ie the inner game.

The first word is ‘problem’. What does problem make you think of? Aargh! Something has cropped up that has spoiled things and now xyz won’t work. This word puts you in an resourceful state of mind. Contrast that with ‘challenge’. This word has positive connotations. People like challenges, they test us, and they motivate you. Think of if someone says “I challenge you that you can’t do such and such”. You think right then I’ll show you. You roll your sleeves up.

Become a Creator of Circumstance

So two words describing the exact same scenario can affect how you think and therefore what you do next. This is the key – things will always happen and obstacles will always occur, it’s what you do next that counts. Become a creator of circumstances not a creature of circumstances.

The next word for you to eliminate is ‘should’. The word should describes an obligation. If you say to someone else “You should do xyz” they will feel obliged to. People don’t like to feel obliged to do something. They might perform the task but it won’t be as good as if they want to do it. Also catch yourself saying to yourself I “should do” to yourself. Again it implies an obligation to do something, which again implies it is not your goal. For example two people both have a few pounds to shed. One says “I really should lose a few pounds” and the other says, “I’m really motivated to lose a few pounds”. Which one of them is likely to lose the weight? Yet again one word effects your actions and therefore your results.

By the way if you are looking to lose weight contact me and I will show you how I did it.

Managing your State

Have you ever been in a crowded place and spotted someone you know? Think about that for a moment. Recently I saw an old colleague at a football game, where there were 90,000 people. How could I possibly spot someone out in such a crowd? Pure luck or chance? Well yes and no. I will explain.
Our conscious brain can only concentrate on a very small number of things at one time, but our unconscious mind is silently taking in everything we see and hear, as well as noting how we feel, what we smell, how warm or cold it is? For us to function effectively it makes sense for us to be conscious about only a few things, or we get overwhelmed. So the unconscious mind does three things to manage the information overload:

Deletion

Most of the information coming in is irrelevant so we delete it. Until there is a threat or, like a familiar face at my football game something novel to pique our interest. This is great as it stops us from overloading. It’s not so good when you realise how much we miss, including opportunities in business and selling. I go into this faculty of our mind on my post about het law of attraction (LNINK)

Distortion

This is also something to consider. Have you ever heard two people arguing over a referee’s decision in a football game? Clearly, they both can’t be right. At least one of them is incorrect because their mind has distorted what they have seen. Again, what we think we heard or saw isn’t necessarily what really happened. A prospect who says no, might not really be saying no. Ask for clarification.

Generalisation

This is useful because it means we don’t have to re-learn how to open a door every time we approach a new door. Our mind generalises to help us. This is a door and therefore this handle will open it. It is automatic and unconscious. However, we need to be careful with automatic generalisation. Whenever you hear the words – always, never, all, everyone, nobody take note as there is a generalisation coming and with it an untruth.
By being aware of deletions, distortions and generalisations, you can be more precise in your own language but also not take what your prospect says as necessarily the truth. Ask proper questions to pin down the truth. (LINK).

Managing Fear – the three ways

1. Ignore it. This is the victim’s way. They just take it and it prevents them from ever doing anything worthwhile. It leads to failure and is the loser’s way.
2. Act in spite of it. This is better than the losers’ way. They do it in spite of the fear. They are scared and may be successful but anxious.
3. The third and most resourceful way to manage your fears in sales and in anything is to accept it. This fear you feel is masking something much deeper probably from your childhood. It is usually from two core fears that humans have:
a. That you are not enough
b. You want to be loved because you are not enough.