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What is it that you want to take action on?  Is there a goal you want to pursue?  Is there a habit you want to create? Sometimes it seems like a mystery as to how people are able to accomplish some things and other things they leave to procrastination or simply don’t ever get started. When I examine my life I know there are things that I should do and just don’t do.  You likely face the same situation at times.  Understanding the “Theory of Planned Behavior” developed by Ajzen and Fishbein can help.  This theory shows what PLANNED behavior is most likely to become ACTUAL behavior.  Understanding it can help you move more of your behavior from planned to actual.

There are three things that determine the likelihood that you will take action.

1.    Attitude Towards the Behavior/ Action

This concept is pretty simple. What is your attitude towards the action or behavior?  If you have a positive attitude, you are more likely to take action. Think of a couple of examples.  If you have a positive attitude towards exercise you are more likely to exercise.  If you have a negative attitude towards exercise, you are less likely to exercise.  If you have a positive attitude towards making that next sales call, you are more likely to make it.  This is true for any action or behavior.

2.    Subjective Norms

The second factor is the subjective norms related to the action.  This relates to the perceived social pressures around the action.  In other words, will others approve of the action or behavior. This is why having someone to exercise with makes such a difference.  It provides a built in positive social reinforcement.  The strength of the social pressure comes in to play here as well.  The more people that will react positive to your behavior and the more important those people are in your life, the more likely you are to take action.

3.    Perceived Behavioral Control

The final factor is the likelihood of being successful.  This really relates to the perceived difficulty or ease of the action. If it is something you think is easy and that you will be successful in it, you will more likely do it.  If you think it will be difficult and that you might fail, you are less likely to do it. If you think it is going to be difficult to lose weight, you won’t try.  On the other hand if you think it will be easy, you will get started right away.

Notice that this is all based on your PERCEPTIONS. Of course you may perceive something very difficult than it actually is.  How often have you resisted doing something because you thought it would be hard and take a lot of time, only to find it was much easier than you thought once you got started?  This is because your perceptions were out of line with reality, however it was your perceptions that controlled your actions.

Bring It Together

Bringing it all together this theory teaches us that if there is something we really want to accomplish, there are three things we can do to make it more likely we will actually do it:

• Have a positive attitude about the action or behavior
• Bring others around to support and challenge us – people that would approve of our success in this behavior
• Believe you will be successful and that the task is not as hard as you think

What is one action you’ve been putting off doing? Or what is one habit you want to create in your life?  Take that action or habit and analyze it under the three factors and use them to help spur yourself into action.

Written by:
Danny Gamache – The Success Professor

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As I mentioned in the last article, there were many reasons why I went so long without posting to this blog. Many of them would be just simply excuses and I won’t share those with you. The fact is that I could have kept up with my normal blogging routine if I had been more persistent and focused. I didn’t. What I do want to share with you are some of the exciting life events that have happened in the last four months. In many ways, the last four months has seen the accomplishment of a number of significant goals in my life.

OLYMPICS

Back in the late 1990s I set a goal of going to every Olympic Games starting in 2002. I took the goal, wrote it down, and worked toward achieving it. The Olympics in 2002 were in Salt Lake City. The fact that it was only a long day driving from where I lived (western Canada) made me believe that I would achieve it. I took photos of Salt Lake City and the Olympic logos and put it up on my goals poster board. I focused on achieving that goal.

And I made it. I went to the Olympics in Salt Lake City and had a great experience. As I mentioned, my goal was to go to every Olympics, so I continued on and went to Athens (2004), Torino (2006), and Beijing (2008). While my goals have changed and I no longer feel I need to go to EVERY Olympics, the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver were extra important. I really wanted to experience the Olympics in my home country.

As a professor, the Winter Olympics are a little harder to make work. It is in the middle of the semester. In order to go I needed permission from my Dean, and I needed to arrange for guest speakers to teach the class. Thankfully all of that worked out and I was able to be at the Olympics for 8 days in February. One unique thing this year is that I stayed in Whistler, the mountain host venue for the Olympics. That meant a different atmosphere than I was used to, but also a few different events. Tickets were a little harder to come by than in past Olympics, however I was able to attend Cross Country Skiing and the two days of competition for Skeleton. It was great to be at a home Olympics, and especially to witness a gold medal for Canada on home soil!

PHD

Another goal of mine has been to get my PhD. You may recall that last summer I focused in on writing the GMAT. The GMAT is the entrance exam required for graduate studies in most business schools. I scored very well on my GMAT, and spent the fall applying to different schools. In the end I was accepted and offered funding at three top schools. The month of March involved trips to visit each of the schools as I worked through my decision making process.  It was challenging as I was choosing between good options and looking to make a choice for where we would live for the next four to five years.

In the end I choose Michigan State University. I am very excited about this opportunity. I will begin studies in September, but we will be moving at the end of June. (If you live in Michigan let me know, I look forward to connecting with more readers!)  Over the last two months we have sold our house in Canada, and purchased a house in Michigan. Thankfully this is allowing us to achieve another goal.

DEBT FREE

As a result of this move we are going to be completely debt free. Over the past few years we had aggressively paid off our debts and for some time now have been down to only owing our mortgage. We had even been paying off large chunks of our mortgage. (Read about how we paid of 15% extra on our mortgage here.)  On top of this, we are selling our home in a great housing market and moving to a market where prices are low. Because of these two reasons we are purchasing our new home with cash. It is going to be a great relief to be a student and have no housing payments aside from property tax and insurance.

So there you have an update on my life. Three big goals; three exciting accomplishments. We feel very blessed and are excited as we move to this next phase of life.

What are your goals? Remember, everything starts with a goal. Determine what you want and go for it.

My recommendation: Set the goal of getting debt free. This is a goal for everyone. Not everyone wants to go to the Olympics. Even fewer people want to do their PhD. But everyone can and should work towards being debt free – more on this next article!

Written by:

Danny Gamache

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Have you ever had a project where you were going along great for some time, and then somehow you let it stop? Perhaps you had a goal that you were pursuing and you were making progress, doing the right activities, and then somehow you stopped? Of course all of us have had something like that at some point.  There is something you should be doing, something you used to be doing but you are not doing it any more.

What is that activity for you?

Is it….

• Exercising?
• Eating right?
• Reading?
• Working on your side business?
• Writing?

What is the one activity that you used to do, know you should do, but just are not doing right now?

For me it is this blog.  If you look carefully you will notice that it has been nearly four months since I last posted.  For someone who used to, and wants to, post three times a week, this is unacceptable.

Sure, I have excuses.  I’m sure you have excuses to. There are likely really valid reasons why you have stopped doing that activity.  Likely you didn’t plan on stopping – something just happened – and then something else, and something else…..   I didn’t plan on taking this time off from writing for this blog, it just happened.

So now what?

You have an activity that you know you should be doing, that you want to do, but that you are not doing.  What now?

Do something.

The first step is to do something.  Anything.  It doesn’t have to be big. Just do it.  This isn’t going to be the longest post I’ve ever had.  And, while I hope it is a great post, it probably won’t be my best ever.  I’m writing something and getting something out there.

Taking action breaks the negative inertia that is holding you back. It gets you moving in the right direction.  The start is the hardest part, so just doing something is extremely valuable.

After that?

Determine your next activity.

If you can do it now then do it.  If not, schedule it and commit to it.  I commit that by Thursday at the latest there will be another post on this blog.  I’m going to get back into the routine that I used to have.

To summarize, there are three simple steps:

1.  Recognize what activity you have let slip.
2.  Do something on that activity.
3.  Determine your next activity.

Written by:
Danny Gamache – The Success Professor

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Each year you should take some time to conduct a review of your accomplishments in the past year.  This should be a review of your successes.  What did you do well?  What did you accomplish?  Here is my 2009 list.  (You can see the 2008 version here)

MOST IMPORTANT

BABY

At the end of April we welcomed a healthy baby boy into the world.  He continues to be healthy, happy, and big!   He brings joy to our lives on a daily basis and certainly is the most important thing about 2009.

Travel

Unlike previous years, we stayed closer to home in 2009, but did travel significantly throughout North America:

• visited 12 States and 4 Canadian Provinces
• highlights include Old City Quebec & Johnson Space Center in Houston

Business

Continued to focus on both the Success Professor blog and on our Home Business Program where we help people to get healthy, go green, and earn extra money while they do it:

• had over 10,000 page views in one month
• again earned over $10,000 in our home business program
• helped three people reach the leadership levels in our home business program

Volunteer

• completed time on leadership of our church after over 4 years of service
• continued to oversee bookkeeping and finances for our church

Career/ Work

• successfully completed the GMAT, scoring in the 98 percentile!
• applied to PhD programs for fall of 2010
• once again taught my largest ever classes

Personal

• maintained my weight (after losing 14 lbs in 2008)
• established a full emergency fund (article on this coming soon!)
• saw the Broadway musicals: Jersey Boys, In The Heights, Chicago
• visited another Major League Ballpark (Milwaukee) to watch a game

Most Read Posts of 2010

1. How to Make a Good First Impression
2. The Importance of Keeping Consistent
3. How to Stay Consistent
4. What is Holding You Back?
5. 6 Steps to Defeating Self Doubt
6. 8 Ways to Pay Off Your Mortgage Quickly
7. Lou Holtz’s 5 Keys to Success
8. How to Work in Bursts
9. WIN NOW
10. What is Your 4 Minute Mile?

Thank you all for your support in 2009, and best wishes for 2010!

Written by:

The Success Professor – Danny Gamache

Hi everyone!

I’m back after a break to mark exams and for Christmas.  I’m excited about the New Year.  Are you?

Here’s some of the best articles I’ve come across over the last couple of weeks!

1. Chris Guillebeau from “The Art of Non-Conformity” shared about how to conduct an “Annual Review“.

2. On a related note Michael Hyatt shares “7 Questions to Ask About Last Year.”

3. Here’s a great system on how to integrate habits into your life from Freestyle Mind.

4. Wasabi Burger shares the scientific “Formula of Motivation.”

5. Learn about the power of “1000 True Fans” on The Technium.

Now start the year right by doing something that will help you reach your goals!

The Success Professor – Danny Gamache

PS. I just helped another team member reach the leadership level with our home business, which means I have more time available to help someone else.  If you have a goal of increasing your self-employment income in 2010 visit http://dannyg.makemoreathome.com

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In the last post, I shared about why it is important to stay consistent as you work towards your goals. That leads to the next question: how can you ensure that you stay consistency?

The struggle for consistency will look different in every person’s life based on their individual goals and lifestyles. The following are general tips which will be helpful to many of you.

1. Make a decision

Without making a conscious decision to pursue your goals consistently, week after week and day after day, you will not be able to do so. It takes a true effort on your part to be consistent so you must decide to do so. This can’t be a light decision where you say “I’ll try to be more consistent”, rather it must be a committed decision. You must be firm about your decision to pursue consistency.

2. Determine a realistic time commitment

Take some time and evaluate your life. Evaluate all the different roles you have in your life. You might be a mother, a husband, an employee. You might have roles with your church, with other organizations, or with a sports team. Determine how much time you realistically should be putting in to each role on a weekly basis, and if possible schedule in your committed times. Use this as a starting point to determine how much time you should realistically put towards your various goals every week. Whether that is two hours, four hours, ten hours or more; determine the appropriate amount of time that you can commit consistently – ever week! Make sure this commitment is realistic, so probably take your initial estimate and scale it down a little. If you set a commitment that is too high it will lead to burnout and you won’t follow through. You may want to use my weekly planning system as part of determining your time commitment.

3. Set specific times

The next step is to take your weekly calendar and mark in when you will actually be spending your time pursing your goal. Determine what days you are going to do activities, how much time each day, and when those hours fall. For example, one of my goals is to grow my blogs. That means taking the time to write good articles. To do that, I have set aside thirty minutes a day for writing. These thirty minutes occurs almost immediately after I get up in the morning. Because it is a specific time, it quickly develops into a habit. Another goal I am pursuing is growing my affiliate home business. Part of this goal involves phone meetings with business partners and potential clients. On my schedule, I have one time slot each day set aside for one of these phone meetings. I used to try to do as many as possible, and found that I would do a lot for a little while and quickly burn out. After burning out, I wouldn’t do any for a long time. That is NOT staying consistent. By scheduling only one time each day for a phone meeting I keep up a steady consistent pace.

4. Stick to it

To be consistent you need to stick to your plan. You likely will get off track from time to time. When you do, get right back on your plan and start moving forward again. You will need to refocus in this way from time to time. Also periodically revisit your time commitment and scheduled times and examine whether they are still appropriate. You will need to make revisions as you go along and move towards your goals. Also, at some points you will achieve a goal you are pursing. Take some time to celebrate and then determine what the next step or new goal that you would like to accomplish.

5. Try, try and try again

Staying consistent is a learning process. It takes time to learn how to build your life around consistent action. Certainly some people find this comes naturally, but for most of us it consistency does not come easy. That may be true even if you are excited and passionate about what you do. It is easy to burn out on your passions by spending too much time in those areas. As you continue to work towards consistency, you will get better. If you have made a firm decision to make consistent progress towards your goals, you will get there. Work your plan each day and each week. If you find yourself losing consistency, recognize it and refocus yourself. Over time you will get more and more consistent.

The great thing about consistency is that as you pursue it, you will see results. You will see yourself moving towards your goals step by step. You will find yourself breaking through the difficult inertia of the early stages and building momentum. Whether your goal is losing a few extra pounds, getting out of debt, building a part-time business, or learning a language, consistency will help you succeed.

Written by:

Danny Gamache – The Success Professor
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One of the biggest problems that most people face as they work towards a goal is the ability to put in consistent effort. Staying consistent in your activities and effort is one of the keys to success.

Consistency is even more important than simple mathematics may make it seem. By this I mean that consistently putting in 5 hours each week over the course of a month towards building business, growing a blog, or achieving a goal, is more valuable than putting in 30 hours one week and nothing for the next three weeks. Yes, the 5 hour a week plan only puts in 20 hours for the month while the other plan has 30 hours, the 5 hour a week plan is still more effective. The same applies on a month-by-month basis. You need to be consistent month after month, not work for a month, and then take a month off. Being consistent will help you reach your goals much more quickly than a sprint-and-stop plan.

You can see this idea really clearly when you think of exercising. Having a big long work out once a month is not nearly as effective as having a smaller workout every day, or even every second day. Similarly, working out every day for a week and then taking the rest of the month off is not as effective as working three times each week across the entire month. Being consistent is more effective. This same principle applies to other goals you are pursuing.

Consistency like this is important for a few reasons:

1. Inertia

The hardest part of any accomplishment is getting started. If you work in spurts you are spending a lot of energy getting started. You will work hard to get started and then before you know it you are stopped again. The law of inertia says that “a body at rest tends to stay at rest.” If you then take a significant amount of time off from pursuing your goal, things will have stopped completely and you will need to use all of that energy again. If instead, you do a little bit every day, you will be able to carry over some of that energy. Think of the exercise program again. The first workout is the hardest, because you have negative inertia. Your body doesn’t react the same, and you mentally aren’t as in to it. After a while your daily workout becomes routine and you carry forward from one day to the next. If you only exercise once a week, it feels like you are starting over each time. Both mentally and physically it requires more effort to get started again.

2. Momentum

Moving past the initial steps of negative inertia allows you to build momentum. Momentum is when the activities you do start to snowball in their effects. The work you are doing starts to build up speed because everything you are doing is building on itself. The efforts of today are building smoothly on the efforts of tomorrow. Momentum is positive inertia. The positive side of inertia is that “a body in motion tends to stay in motion.” Momentum is clearly seen in many areas of life. In politics, momentum is a powerful force for a candidate in an election campaign. In sports, many games are filled with momentum swings where one team has all the energy and everything seems to go just right. In business, momentum helps companies grow more quickly than they have before. As you work consistently towards your goal you will develop momentum that makes things happen more quickly and with less effort than before.

3. Power of Mental Focus

In life people consistently move towards the things that they focus their minds on. If you work in spurts, your mind will be focused on your goal for a short period of time. After that time you forget about it, or at least it is not part of your focus. By consistently focusing on your goal, even just a little bit each day or week, will keep your mind engaged in the process. If you mind is engaged and focused on your goal, you will notice when other things come along that might help you achieve your goal. For example, if you are growing a part time home business, you may find potential clients while doing other things. If you are consistently working on your business, you will make those connections. If you are not, you might miss out on that opportunity. Being consistent keeps your goal in your mind and helps you move towards it more quickly.

4. Keeping your life in balance

You need to allow all the areas of your life, family, work, business, spiritual etc. have some level of balance. That means you need to spend an appropriate amount of each aspect of your life. If you pursue your goals with quick spurts where you put in a huge amount of time in for one week, then during that week everything else in your life will be out of balance. Of course the opposite is also true. If you take three weeks off from pursing your goal, you will be out of balance in that area. Take exercise as an example. If you go overboard one week, then you will have taken time away from other things you should be doing; you will be out of balance. If you then stop working out for the next three weeks, you are equally out of balance, this time short on the physical activity side of life.

Consistency in life is vital. In almost every situation in my life where I haven’t achieved my goal, or where I am unsatisfied with my progress towards a goal it is because I have been inconsistent in my efforts. Being consistent allows you to use inertia instead of working against it, it allows you to build momentum, use the power of mental focus, and keep your life in balance. The next post will discuss HOW to improve your consistency.

Written by:
Danny Gamache – The Success Professor
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Lou Holtz is known as one of the top college football coaches of all time.  Most recently he came out of retirement to coach South Carolina and before that had a successful run coaching at Notre Dame.  He is the only coach ever to have brought six different teams to bowl games and is a member of the College Football Hall of Fame.

Recently I was at a conference where Lou Holtz was the keynote speaker. Aside from being a great football coach, Holtz is a great LIFE coach.  His lessons are clear and powerful and delivered with a mix of inspiration and humor.  Here are his five keys to success.

1. Choose Your Attitude

In life you will face many difficulties and problems. It is guaranteed that life won’t be easy.  You choose how you respond to adversity or difficulties.  You choose how you respond to rejection.  You choose how you approach life.  Be self discipline and be enthusiastic about everything you do.

“You cannot let others people determine your attitude.”

“Life is ten percent what happens to you and ninety percent how you respond to it.”

“Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.”

2. Have a Passion to Win

You need to develop a deep passion to win. As you do, obstacles will slip away.  If your passion is strong then there will be no obstacle that will keep you from being a success.  You will pursue, persevere, and endure.  You will sacrifice and have no excuses.

“You can evaluate your passion to win by what you are willing to sacrifice.”

“Focus on why you can win; no on why you can’t.”

“You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.”

3. Understand Your Purpose

Do you know your purpose?  Your purpose is your WHY: the reason WHY you are pursuing your goals.  You need to have clear objectives, and have a team ready to help you move towards your goals. Based on your purpose, ask yourself the WIN question: “What’s Important Now?”  Ask yourself this at least 25 times a day.  This will help you push back towards your purpose.

“If you’re bored with life – you don’t get up every morning with a burning desire to do things – you don’t have enough goals.”

“I can’t believe that God put us on this earth to be ordinary.”

4. Be a Dreamer

Your purpose should be connected to your dream. Have a dream, share your dream, and use your dream to identify your goals.  Develop a dreams list of all the things you dream to do.  Have something to do, something to hope for, something to love, and something to believe in.

“Don’t maintain where you are – everything is either growing or dying.”

“Don’t be a spectator. Don’t let life pass you by.”

5. Lift People Up

You need to develop and maintain meaningful relationships with others.  Do what is right to others.  Do everything to the very best of your ability. Show people you care. All the people you meet have their own struggles and are carrying some burden. They are just like you.

“Do right. Do your best. Treat others as you want to be treated.”

“If you burn your neighbor’s house down, it doesn’t make your house look any better.”

Read more of Lou Holtz’s wisdom by picking up his book “Winning Everyday”.

Written by:
Danny Gamache
Based on a presentation by Lou Holtz

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