Indulge me for a moment. After all, I’m probably a lot older than you — which means I might be wiser or maybe just senile. In either case the proper thing to do is to cut me some slack, give me the benefit of the doubt, go easy on me. I say all this because I’m about to become less business-like and more personal and it makes me a little nervous.
I’ve spent a lot of time wandering this world and I have come to believe that abundance is pretty much all around us. I picture it as a great river of money flowing just above our heads. The trick is to find ways to reach up and pull some of it down. That’s what we’re all trying to DO: pull some of that money down and put in our pockets. So we set goals and work long and hard, we practice, drill and rehearse, and constantly work to improve our performance . . . and so on.
What I’ve noticed is that working to create abundance (jumping and grabbing at that river), while necessary and important, isn’t nearly as effective as attracting it. And nothing attracts abundance better than Happiness. Money loves Happy. It longs to be with Happy and is constantly looking for a time and place where they can be together. It’s a love story.
Happy people have abundant lives; and it starts with getting Happy.
In other words: Abundance doesn’t create Happiness. Happiness attracts Abundance.
I call Help-U-Sell brokers every day and, as I’ve said, I’m always blown away by the Heroes I find out there. This Happiness theme runs through those conversations and it comes out as optimism, determination, faith and confidence.
But let’s also acknowledge reality: it’s been a very difficult couple of years in this real estate business and the chaos of the recent past has left some wounded and bleeding. I’ve talked with a few who are so down, so depressed, so defeated that getting anything started is . . . well, it’s probably not going to happen.
If this is you, if you are one of the crawling wounded who has lost your faith and your hope, then I have something to tell you:
You don’t have a business problem. You don’t have a sales problem or a market problem. You don’t have a recruiting problem or a support problem or a cash flow problem. What you have is a Happiness problem. And if you can’t find a way to get Happy now, you’re probably not going to turn things around.
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How do you get Happy when you’ve forgotten what that feels like? Well, once again, being positively ancient, I have some ideas.
1. Move! Really: get moving! If you want to change your emotion, change your motion. Run. Dance, Work out. Walk. Bike. Climb. I do yoga. It keeps me from becoming a question mark shaped fossil and makes me sane.
2. Revive Grattitude. You want to nurture a spirit of continual gratitude for all of the wonderful blessings you have in your life. What? You can’t find any?!? Then do volunteer work somewhere every week helping those who really have nothing: orphans, victims of abuse, homeless, mentally ill, infirm, elderly and alone. Opportunities to reconnect with just how lucky you are, are all around you.
3. Picture a positive outcome. Spend a little time each morning quietly sitting and thinking about what you’re working on. Picture things working out. Picture successful results. Picture these things in detail. Taste it, feel it, smell it. It’s unfortunate, but most of us spend much of our quiet time doing exactly the opposite. It’s called worry.
4. Put your subconscious to work. As you close out your day, take a few minutes to plan the next day. What are you going to do, when will you do it and what are you trying to accomplish. Do this within an hour of going to bed and do it in writing. You may find a good Day Planner will help or you might do better with a yellow legal pad. If you do this exercise, your brain is going to work on all of that stuff while you sleep through the night. You’ll find it easier to get started the next day, easier to stay organized, easier to get to yes.
5. Get Connected. Everywhere. Plug in. Connect with your family, your friends, your colleagues. The natural tendency when times are tough is to withdraw and it’s probably the worst thing you can do. This is especially true with Help-U-Sell family members who are scattered across the country. You have to seek out ways to connect. Join the teleconferences on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 11am Pacific Time. Get a Facebook account and join the 100+ brokers who have become a friend of Help-U-Sell Real Estate. Every day you’ll get an update of who’s doing what and what everyone is thinking . . . and you’ll feel part of something bigger than yourself. Above all: next time you hear of a Help-U-Sell rally near your home, make reservations and get to it. Really: a day spent in a Help-U-Sell rally is better than a whole bottle of Valium!
Your job is to find a way to get Happy, then stay Happy, then turn Happy into a habit. It’s step one to an abundant life.