You can do a lot of things in 31 days. This is amplified if you focus those 31 days on improving one area of your life. By focusing in on one thing you want to change or do, and making it a priority for 31 days, you will make lasting life changes.
During the next 31 days you could:
learn a new skill
lose weight
create a new habit (getting up early, exercising, etc..)
Naturally the list keeps going. You can do so much in 31 days.
Guess what?
August is about to start, and it has 31 days!
What are you going to do in August?
The Success Professor’s 31 Day Challenge
During the month of August, this blog will be hosting a challenge. The challenge is for readers to pick something to focus on during the next 31 days to change your life.
The concept is pretty simple:
You pick something in your life that you want to do or change in the next 31 days.
You share in the comments of this article what you will change as part of the challenge
You get started and do what you set out to do
You report back how you are progressing
Throughout the month, this blog will feature several update posts. These will be opportunities for you to post your update and record your progress and challenges. The purpose is to provide you with the motivation and the accountability to make a change, to do something important and to make the next 31 days extremely valuable. Further, during each of these updates, I will profile one participant by sharing about their goal and experiences.
What I Will be Doing For the 31 Day Challenge
Naturally, I will participate in the challenge myself. My focus for this challenge will be to make improvements to and grow this blog. I will be following the guide book created by ProBlogger, Darren Rowse, called “31 Days to Build a Better Blog.” My hope is that you will notice the difference. I hope that you will see me in more places on the internet, and that many others will join us in this community. I will use the challenge updates to report on my progress as well.
If you are a blogger, you may want to join me in using the 31 days in the Success Professor’s 31 Day challenge to improve your blog. Pick up the ProBlogger workbook and comment below. There will be an optional email list set up for the people who are working towards a better blog this month. This will provide an extra support platform for this goal.
So what’s next?
Pick the one thing you will change, improve, or do in the next 31 days.
Share what you will work on in the comments below.
Get started!
The Success Professor – Danny Gamache If you liked this article, leave a comment below, or subscribe by RSS!
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Posted on July 29th, 2009 by The Success Professor | 4 Comments »
Do you remember what you were like as a teenager? No, I am not talking about the awkwardness and struggles with self identity or the clumsiness as you wonder about who your next date will be. I am talking about how you looked at the future. The optimism you had about who you could become and what you could do in life. Chances are your thought process was much different than it is today after you have been beaten up by life a little. It is time to change that, to reconnect with your teenage-self, and start thinking big again.
Have Big Dreams
As a teenager you probably had big dreams about life. Think back to that time. What did you dream about? What were your hopes for the future? At one point, I remember dreaming about being able to retire young and play golf every day. Your dreams at this age are not limited by life experiences. There isn’t as much that you think “I couldn’t do that” or “that’s not possible”. Instead you believed that it was possible to live your dreams.
Do Anything/ Achieve Anything
Chances are you believed that you could do anything in life. You could achieve whatever you wanted to. What did you want to achieve? Did you have a list of what you wanted to do in life? If so, your list was probably very extensive. The world was in front of you and you could aim to do anything you wanted to. It was all possible.
Change the World
Not only did you believe that you could do things for yourself, but you knew that you could make a difference. You could change the world. Your dreams were not small dreams limited to yourself, they were world changing. What impact did you want to have on the world? What was the thing that you wanted to change, for the betterment of all humanity?
Unshakable Confidence
The most interesting thing is that your mindset didn’t stop with big dreams and a belief that you could do anything, achieve anything and even change the world. That dream was combined with an unshakable confidence that not only could you do it, but you would do it. You would achieve more, have more and be more. You would make a difference in the world. You would make your dreams come true.
So What Happened?
A drastic change occurred. Likely you don’t have those same dreams anymore. You likely do not see yourself changing the world, and while you have goals you likely have much smaller goals than the “teenage-you”. Somehow things changed.
This change didn’t happen all at once. It was a gradual change. It happened step by step in your life as things didn’t quite go the way you thought it would. One disappointment at a time, you slowly began to accept less in life. You started to lower your goals and to dream of smaller goals.
Photo by: The Consumerist
It started small. Maybe you didn’t get into your top choice for a college. Perhaps you didn’t get the summer job you hoped for. Later, the disappointments got a little bigger. You graduated from college and ended up working in a fast-food restaurant or a retail store. This wasn’t what you went to college for! You started to think more about paying off your student loans than about the dreams you used to have.
Over time, step by step, the burdens of life and the disappointments that occur have diminished your dreams. As a result, you set smaller goals, and you began to accept less and less out of life.
What Can You Do?
It is time to get your dreams back. No, they don’t have to be the same dreams you had as a teenager – although some of them might be. It is not the actual dreams that you need to get back, but your ability to dream; your ability to think big about life, to see the world as full of possibilities instead of full of limitations. It is about being able to see yourself as capable of achieving big things, and getting back your unshakable confidence.
The Irony of It All
The irony of the situation is that you are now in a better place to achieve big goals. You are now far better prepared to do big things, to live an extraordinary life. You have more skills and abilities. You may have more education, or at least a lot more life experience. You know your strengths and weaknesses. You have more connections, a bigger network. You have more potential!
Combine the Two
In the end, what you need to do is combine the two sides. Combine the energy, belief, and dreams of your teenage-self, with the knowledge, wisdom and abilities of the current you! The trick of course is to combine them without letting your current mindset and beliefs takeover again. Stick to your big dreams. Stick to your unwavering belief that you will achieve your goals, and stick to the attitude that comes from those beliefs. This change in mindset and attitude will take time. You will need to work at it and create a new habit of thinking. But if you do work at it, you can replace your current thinking with the type of dreaming that was true of your teenage-self.
When you combine the two, you will move forward rapidly towards your goals. You are better than you think you are and by connecting with the teenage-you, you can reach your dreams, achieve more than you imagine, and you can change the world.
Written by:
The Success Professor – Danny Gamache
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Posted on July 27th, 2009 by The Success Professor | 1 Comment »
Lance Armstrong is inspiring. His story is one that encourages you to fight to reach your goals. The story is so good that you almost think it can’t be true. Think of the sporting accomplishments alone. Before Lance Armstrong, no one has ever had more that than five Tour de France victories. Not only did Lance win five, but he went on to win number six and number seven. Far more than anyone had done before. Now he’s made a comeback, showing that he is still one of the best in the world at 37 years of age, and with three years off from professional cycling. It is inspiring!
And then there is the other Lance Armstrong story. This is the story of the cancer survivor. Lance went through a battle with testicular cancer that had spread to his lungs and brain. When he was diagnosed he was given a 20% chance of survival. Not only did Armstrong survive, but he went on to become a world leader at raising money and awareness in the fight against cancer.
No combine those two stories. Each on their own could make a movie, together they are spectacular. Armstrong’s fight with cancer came in the middle of his professional cycling career. He was out for two years and came back better than ever. The following year he won his first Tour de France, winning the three week race by a substantial margin, over 7 minutes. Some called it a fluke victory, so Lance came back and won again and again and again…. proving to be one of the best cyclists of all times.
Below, we’ll look at some lessons we can learn from Lance Armstrong. To give you a clear picture of Lance’s story, check out this video:
There is a lot we can learn from Lance Armstrong and the Tour. Lance himself tells us that we can learn life lessons from the Tour. He writes,
“It’s not about the bike. It’s a metaphor for life, not only the longest race in the world but also the most exalting and heartbreaking and potentially tragic. It poses every conceivable element to the rider, and more: cold, heat, mountains, plains, ruts, flat tires, high winds, unspeakably bad luck, unthinkable beauty, yawning senselessness, and above all a great, deep self-questioning. During our lives we’re faced with so many different elements as well, we experience so many setbacks, and fight such a hand-to-hand battle with failure, head down in the rain, just trying to stay upright and to have a little hope. The Tour is not just a bike race, not at all. It is a test. It tests you physically, it tests you mentally, and it even tests you morally.”
Whether it is in his fight with cancer or in battling to win the Tour de France, Lance Armstrong is a great example of perseverance. The fact that he made a cycling comeback at all required significant perseverance. He didn’t need to go back to cycling. Success in any goal requires that you persevere.
In the Tour, pain builds from days of racing and mountain after mountain to climb up. What makes Armstrong successful is that he fights through the pain. Cancer taught him how much pain he could endure and cycling can’t match it. Now he pushes through the pain. Perseverance towards your goals will mean that you need to push through pain, and do so more than your competition.
Lance knows that if he keeps pushing on through the pain the competition will eventually fall behind him and he will ride on to victory. The same is true if you are in business. Your competition won’t keep up with you if you keep doing the things that you need to do to become successful even when you don’t want to – perhaps ESPECIALLY when you don’t want to.
2. When You Fall, Get Up and Keep Going
In one of the most impressive Tour de France performances ever, during the 2003 Tour on the important mountain stage to Luz Ardiden, Lance crashed after clipping a spectator with his handlebars. As with everything else in his life, Lance didn’t stay down. He got back up and powered his way back to the leaders catching and eventually blowing past them to take a commanding lead in the Tour.
When something happens in your business or life that gets you down, you need to get back up and keep going. Dust yourself off, get back on your bike, and ride. We will all face obstacles on a daily basis as we work towards our goals. Don’t let them slow you down.
No one prepares for the Tour de France like Lance Armstrong. Certainly Lance prepare physical by getting into peak condition, but what really sets him apart from the others is the other things he does. Armstrong goes to the important mountain stages before the Tour and examines the climbs. He then rides them over and over again making sure he knows exactly where the steepest parts are, where to attack the field, and where to rest.
What kind of preparation can you do that will help you reach your goals more quickly? Perhaps extra practice before you give the big presentation, more research into your potential clients so you can specifically address their needs, or maybe going the extra mile to make sure your blog article has all the facts. Take the time to prepare well. Know that those who prepare and then take action will reach the top, they will get the big client and make the big sale. Do your preparation.
4. Surround Yourself With a Great Team
One of the ironies to professional cycling is that it takes a team to win, even thought there is an individual winner. Lance has consistently surrounded himself with an excellent team that helps him win the Tour. As the team leader, Lance would rely on others to set the pace, block the wind creating a draft, and help him defend the lead.
Whatever goal you are working towards you need a team. This may be a support team that encourages you on, challenges you, and holds you accountable to your goals. It might be a team that you work with on a day-to-day basis trying to achieve a common goal. Look to build a team that compliments your skills, encourage you, challenge you, and help you move on to victory.
5. Don’t Listen to the Critics
If you are attempting to do something great you will face critics. There will be people that will tell you that you can’t do it, or that it can’t be done. There will be people who look at your weaknesses and focus on those, and there will be people who simply try to pull you down because they want to keep you where you are.
As a champion, Armstrong has faced a constant berrage of critics. They said he couldn’t win and when he did, they said he couldn’t do it again. Later they turned to accusations of cheating and anything else they could do that could hurt his image. Time after time, Lance rose up and showed the critics that he was a real champion.
So ignore your critics; or better yet, use their criticism to energize you and provide the fuel you need to push you over the top.
6. Life Is Short, Use it Well
Cancer attacked Lance Armstrong as a young athlete in the prime of his career. This should be a reminder that life is short. We never know when our time will be up. Make every day count. Be thankful for the health you have, enjoy every day, and use it well.
As we leave, check out this inspirational commercial from Nike.
Most readers will be celebrating a National Holiday sometime this week. For American’s July 4th marks Independence Day. Canadians celebrated Canada Day on July 1. These are great times to celebrate, spend time with family and enjoy the summer.
There is one more thing you should take some time to do over this holiday week: review your goals, and set goals for the quarter or half of the year. As I’ve written before, I believe in setting goals for short period of time – such as 3 to 4 month periods. July 1 is the start of a new quarter and the second half of the year. So, amidst the celebrating, fireworks, and time with family, take a few minutes to set your goals for the next quarter or next half of your year. You’ll be glad you did.
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