Giving Yourself Permission to Succeed in 2012

I belong to a world wide business group called Entrepreneur’s Organization (EO). The group is broken into chapters, and the chapters are broken further into forums. The forums typically consist of 8-12 business owners and meet typically for 4 hours a month.

At a recent forum, we invited Jacqueline Cornaby from Dallas, a renowned Professional Coach and Motivational Expert, to speak to us about 2012 goal-setting. Her strengths include reframing your thinking to be open to all the positive possibilities in the world and to diminish your focus on the negative. Self-talk is so important!

Here are the top phrases and definitions I learned from her:

• Worry = misuse of mind and talent
• Stress = buzz word for fear
• Reality = that what you are giving your attention to or that what is occupying your mind
• I give attention to only what is worthy of me.
• “I am” statements are who we are and needs to match our desires.
• What do I want? It’s an important question to ask yourself.
• A great reaction to a negative situation is to say, “Interesting…” and move on.
• Does this serve me? If no, what would?
• The person with the most certainty influences the conversation.
• The same level of thought that brought you into 2011 will not bring you in 2012; your thinking needs to be expanded.
• Magnify your potential, not your problems.

These statements encourage me to live my dreams, but more importantly, manage my time to what I want in life.

The next step she took us through was to create 10 Empowering Beliefs. The beliefs for me are a foundation of who I am, what I stand for, and where I want to be. These beliefs or principals guide my daily life. I like that it is only 10 so I can internalize and memorize them.

Here are three that are meaningful to me:

• I am a visionary.
• I am worthy of success and its rewards.
• I make a difference in this world.

Finally, we moved on to our 2012 goals. What are goals: Dreams with timelines. Jacqueline strongly encouraged us to use the term “Smart Goals”:

S = Specific

M= Measurable

A= Achievable

R= Realistic

T= Timelined

We worked on goals in all areas of our life, including business, professional, family, health and spiritual.

Here were some other great thoughts that helped with the above goals and beliefs:

• Ego’s job is to keep us small.
• Important questions to ask myself:
• Who am I?
• What do I want?
• Why?
• What inspired action will I take?
• Visualize and imagine: The mind does not know the difference between the real and imagined.

I asked Jacqueline to write a brief note for this blog:

“A belief or mantra is simply a conditioned thought. What have you been thinking lately? You are already doing the thinking – may as well think beyond so it serves you. More than positive thinking is the paradigm shift in giving attention to the abundant and desired side of thought rather than the lack or contrast side. I get whatever I think about, whether I want it or not. What do I want? That which you give attention to expands and attracts.

“Look for that which you want to see in your life … and you will find it. Amplify your desires. News Flash: You added stress, worry and fear on your own; shift your attention toward your desires and elevate your mind for living the good life defined by you. If everything you desire is because you think you will feel better once you have it, then you may as well take the shortcut to happiness and feel better now. Get to good! Permission granted!"