“It’s a small world but still heavy. Stop trying to carry it all on your back.” ~Margo DeGange (Yes, me, that’s right. I can quote things too, ya know!)
Here is a life and business lesson that has nothing to do with products, little to do with numbers, and a lot to do with building real wealth and long-term security.
The word “simple” has been showing up in my life a lot lately. I want to share a few of those instances, so bear with me, because I have an important point in mind that may help you quite a lot.
A very long time ago, my sister had a dream that I often think about. In the dream, she was in a long hallway standing outside of a big courtroom. There were many people standing and sitting in the hall, waiting to go in to see the judge for the final judgment. One by one they would go in, and come out sobbing—both women AND men! After watching this scene play out over and over again, my sister finally asked one of the people who came out of the courtroom, “Why is everyone sobbing?” The answered surprised her as the person replied, “because it was so simple we almost missed it”!
I have recalled that dream many times over the last few days, and then this morning while in my car listening to a talk show, I heard the story of a mother who’s son was dying of cancer. He was at the end of his journey, when his mom got into the bed next to him. She was right beside him as he took his last breath. His final words were powerful, liberating, and sweetly authoritative. “Mom, it’s so simple”. His message changed her life forever.
Then, on that same ride in my car this morning, on another show, someone said, “Life is so short. Why should we live it in turmoil?” Together these words and stories provide a clear (and simple) message that I felt so compelled to share. Live simply!
In our businesses and in our lives, the joy is in the journey (just ask Steven King), and becoming simple-minded is part of a constructive and pleasant ride. Sometimes we get so focused on problems, on scenarios, on results, we miss the in-between, where life and business really happen. We can become too concerned and too intense wrestling with things that really don’t matter much in the long run. What will matter though, in terms of popularity, profits, and plain old peace of mind, is how you use your personal energy, and therefore, how you treat others and yourself.
Simplicity is NOT for wimps. Simplicity has enormous power built right into it. Keeping everything on an even keel, not thinking too hard, and offering a great attitude to everyone you see throughout the day takes unusual strength and deep character, and it is effortless if you let it become your new mindset.
The “thinking too hard” thing gets us in trouble many times, and it makes others uncomfortable, particularly when we expect our colleagues and coworkers, our family and friends, and even worse, our customers, to “get” what we are all freaked out about.
Keeping it simple also opens you up to the creative energy that is vibrating out in the universe (deep, I know). After exercising at boot camp and taking a long ride this morning, I went home for a few minutes and sat on the sofa, and closed my eyes. I wanted to just “be”, and I was keeping it simple (and not trying to). I drifted off into a cat-nap, and awoke a short time later with a brilliant business offering to provide to my Decorators Alliance members. I did not have to think hard, brainstorm till I was blue, get stressed out, or be in turmoil. The simple life just brought the idea directly to me, with no effort at all, and that idea will no doubt help many others.
Simplicity is actually something that elicits good business practices and the creation of incredible products and services that tend to be very profitable. Simplicity keeps us in a place of clarity, and allows us to move quickly at a moments notice, and change directions in an instant. It also helps keep our blood pressure down, and allows others to easily communicate with us, and willingly be around us.
A lot of stress is self-created and totally unnecessary (although sometimes no one could convince us of that). Simplicity is an attitude of choosing NOT to be in turmoil about anything. Things may not be ideal, but worrying, or worse, taking it out on customers, associates, and the people you love, cannot change anything in a positive way, yet your good attitude can change your world, and definitely your business, in ways you never even dreamed of. It’s that simple!
Our stress-free life of simplicity (and real power) proves itself in how we treat our co-workers, family and friends—how we honor our bosses and how bosses appreciate the people who work so diligently to build a company that is not even theirs.
Complaining, not seeing the bright side of things (no matter how dismal the circumstances), and being in turmoil make even great moments a drag, and challenging times pretty much unbearable, for everyone, including you.
Stop stressing. Be kind and laid back and SIMPLE, to others as well as to yourself, and watch your life and business burst into true wealth and profitability. People will want to be near you and work for you, and customers will knock themselves out to buy from you. They may even want to have you over for a simple drink!
“ Often the difference between a successful person and a failure is not one has better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on one’s ideas, to take a calculated risk – and to act.” ~Andre Malraux
This week I want to remind you of a vocabulary word I made up for you last year (please, no laughing). The word is IDEAING (idea-ing).
Although we just finished discussing over the last two weeks about moneytudes (our money attitudes), I’ll say with certainty that your most valuable of all resources are NOT the dollars in your bank account or the investments you have tucked (somewhat) safely away. In fact, your greatest resources are bigger and better than money, because of their ability to sustain you throughout your life, and because of their ability to reproduce and deliver prosperity upon prosperity, in many areas that matter to you. Your greatest resources are your IDEAS.
Ideas are everything. Our ideas are full of power. They have within them the potential to create and to connect, to bring us happiness and to bring harmony into our lives and into the lives of others. New ideas and innovative thinking can drive our businesses and our personal lives to success, in both small and big ways.
Our ideas are what make us wonderful human beings, and fuel us to live well, enjoy relationships, and love to the best of our ability. Ideas help us succeed in business, and excel in personal endeavors. As you get in touch with your creative side through the skill of IDEAING, you will immediately feel strong and energized.
I believe there is something in the air that is calling all of us to use our marvelous brains to create a better experience for ourselves, our families, our customers, and our communities. Stirring up and expressing our ideas will most certainly empower us to live life better than we ever thought we could. Money cannot buy what creativity and marvelous ideas can. Putting great ideas to use over time as well as experiencing them in small ways in daily living is the true essence of wealth and success.
IDEAING is the act of allowing your ideas to be expressed, and capturing them (usually on paper), so that you can look at them more closely and with further purpose. IDEAING involves relaxing and allowing thoughts to flow. It also involves active thinking, innovation, and sometimes problem solving. Most importantly, IDEAING involves planning—putting your thoughts, ideas, and innovations into a plan for potential action.
Within your heart and mind, there is an enormous wellspring of exciting ideas, needed creativity, and useful ingenuity. These thoughts reside in an inner ”container” within you that must be stirred up. YOU must stir them up in the process of IDEAING.
Never let other people, the media, the state of the economy, and even your own negative thoughts tell you to stop IDEAING or to look down on or stop acting on your good ideas. Let your ideas—even the absolutely over-the-top, off the wall, or seemingly laughable ones be what catapult you to new life events, and to new business offerings that customers are ready and eager for. I believe that if you determine to serve yourself and others through valuable ideas that you act upon, your business and your personal life will soar to new frontiers.
Of course, any new and solid idea that has real promise will need to be developed, and that takes resources. Not to worry. Take IDEAING one step at a time, knowing that the same energy (the act of IDEAING) that formed your great idea in the first place will once again be there to help you figure out ways to actually move upon that idea and bring it to full fruition, in other words additional IDEAING sessions will help you to find ways to secure the resources needed. IDEAING is a process that has success and completion built right into it, and it is also a process that is contagious and never-ending.
Our ability to think up ideas coupled with our willingness and confidence to move on them is what brings true success. I know without a doubt that it is my ideas that make me tick and connect me with others. My ideas help me to build and help me to bridge, and they bring joy to me and to others, including my loved ones and my customers. My ideas are also the gold that fills my pocket book. My willingness to shake up my ideas and act upon those that ring out with meaning is what gives me deep joy. This IDEAING process has so energized me every step of the way through my life and career, and caused me to LOVE the PROCESS of success, and not simply the destination. My ideas and especially my ability to dream them up are more valuable to me than all the money in the world.
Your Action Exercise (I like to give this to you once every year or so):
Look for a challenge, roadblock, opportunity, problem or issue in your business (or personal life) this week. Write down the issue. Next (this is SO important), translate the issue or problem into a positive statement about what you WANT. This will give you a positive focus (NEVER focus on what you DON”T want) and the IDEAING STIMULUS for your IDEAING session.
For example, if the problem is “I don’t have enough sales to make ends meet”, give that thought a positive focus by changing it to something like, “I will increase my sales by ________ percent so that I can pay all of my bills each month, pay myself a salary, and have a profit left over for my business account”. This statement is the positive IDEAING STIMULUS for your IDEAING session.
Now, get out a paper and pen. At the top of the blank page, write down a shortened version of your positive IDEAING STIMULUS, in the form of a “how to” statement, such as “How can I increase sales to get paid AND make a profit?”
Begin writing. Brainstorm, and I mean, LET IT STORM! Let all of your thoughts come out on paper all over the place. Don’t try to control the process. Let the obvious ideas come out, and then KEEP WRITING. You must get past the obvious. Have fun with it. Don’t think about the soundness or unsoundness of the ideas. Just jot things down quickly. If a thought really speaks to you, expand on it a bit if you must, but keep the focus on ideas that could possibly help you accomplish your goal of increased sales and profits. The more ideas you write, the wackier they will get, and in a brainstorming session like this, it is usually the last 33 percent of your ideas that are golden and have the potential to really take you to a new level.
Once you have a page full of ideas, sit with this paper over an hour, a day, or a week (it’s up to you). Try to group like ideas together to create a few solid “categories” of ideas. As you study your notes, one idea will speak to YOU (focus on one)! It will feel good and make sense to YOU. Play with it, reconfigure it, and begin to plan some action steps around that idea. Your success will not be far away.
Today, know your ideas can and will work—not all of them, but many of them. Never stop brainstorming just because something didn’t work out. That’s like throwing a fabulous little baby out with the dirty bathwater. We would never do that, and likewise we should never stop IDEAING! Don’t forget, it is not the material things that make your life and your business work for you. It is your powerful ideas that drive you, excite you, and give your feet a reason to be put into action.
P.S. ONLY YOU can contribute the ideas that are in YOUR container.
Have a wildly successful week filled with YOUR great ideas,
September 8, 2010 1157 King Richard I 1886 Siegfried Sassoon 1925 Peter Sellers 1932 Patsy Cline 1931 Jack Rosenthal 1933 Michael Frayn 1934 Sir Peter Maxwell Davies 1940 Frankie Avalon 1954 Ann Diamond
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Monday Message from Margo 2-1-2010
were many people standing and sitting in the hall, waiting to go in to see the judge for the final judgment. One by one they would go in, and come out sobbing—both women AND men! After watching this scene play out over and over again, my sister finally asked one of the people who came out of the courtroom, “Why is everyone sobbing?” The answered surprised her as the person replied, “because it was so simple we almost missed it”!
authoritative. “Mom, it’s so simple”. His message changed her life forever.
coworkers, our family and friends, and even worse, our customers, to “get” what we are all freaked out about.
A lot of stress is self-created and totally unnecessary (although sometimes no one could convince us of that). Simplicity is an attitude of choosing NOT to be in turmoil about anything. Things may not be ideal, but worrying, or worse, taking it out on customers, associates, and the people you love, cannot change anything in a positive way, yet your good attitude can change your world, and definitely your business, in ways you never even dreamed of. It’s that simple!
challenging times pretty much unbearable, for everyone, including you.
Ideas are everything. Our ideas are full of power. They have within them the potential to create and to connect, to bring us happiness and to bring harmony into our lives and into the lives of others. New ideas and innovative thinking can drive our businesses and our personal lives to success, in both small and big ways.
Today, know your ideas can and will work—not all of them, but many of them. Never stop brainstorming just because something didn’t work out. That’s like throwing a fabulous little baby out with the dirty bathwater. We would never do that, and likewise we should never stop IDEAING! Don’t forget, it is not the material things that make your life and your business work for you. It is your powerful ideas that drive you, excite you, and give your feet a reason to be put into action.