If you are struggling to make an offer or close a sale during these challenging times, please know that you are not alone!
So many of us are holding ourselves back, feeling like we shouldn’t be selling. Like no-one has money to buy from us right now. That if we try to sell anything, we’ll come off as slimy, sales-y, mercenary scumbags trying to take advantage of other people.
And yet
. . .
You have to sell!
And there are still people with money out there—People who need and want exactly what you offer!
So what do you do?
I’m on a mission to help small business owners get past this hurdle. Watch the video to see how.
So many of us self-employed are holding ourselves back, feeling we shouldn’t make offers or sell. It doesn’t have to be that way. Please share this page with anyone you know who is self-employed.
Check out the third video in my series on How Tapping Can Help With Money Problems. This one shows you how to identify your specific subconscious money blocks—an important step in releasing them!
In this video I explain how I track down and put words to those types of subconscious money blocks, measure how powerful each one is, and decide which to work on with my clients.
Then I give you ways that you can start uncovering your own subconscious money blocks. Happy Hunting!
To see all the videos on this and other Tapping topics check them out on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/nancy.linnerooth . Hey, let’s be friends! And then you can see my Facebook Lives on Tapping . . . live.
You can also let me know what you’d like to hear about. Just leave a comment, DM me on FB, or send me an old-fashioned email with your Tapping questions and I’ll do my best to answer them.
Over the last two months I’ve only done things that were essential, like taking care of my eleven year old and meeting with current clients. I haven’t done much of anything else in my business like marketing, networking, or creating these videos, even though those things are very important to me. Instead, I’ve rested, puttered about, and cleaned up the kitchen.
But it wasn’t procrastination.
Watch the video to find out what it was, and when it’s right to step away from your To Do list entirely.
You’ll find there are times in life when you need to stop what you’re doing to celebrate, grieve, or put all your focus on an emergency. When that happens, don’t try to guilt yourself into working anyway. Just promise yourself you will get back to your goals when you’re ready. And be gentle on yourself until then.
Watch the video to find out more.
Of course, if you really are procrastinating and you’re ready to stop so you can create the life you are meant to live, email me. We’ll set up a call to talk about what’s going on with you and see if I can help.
Most of us reach for the same tool to get ourselves to stop procrastinating.
We think that the way to get moving is to yell at ourselves. Call ourselves “lazy,” “stupid,” or other names when we don’t get enough done. Call up our inner Drill Sergeant in an effort to force ourselves to get moving.
Actually, that approach makes the procrastination worse. So what do you do?
A sweet, gentle widow I’m working with had a particularly loud, cruel Drill Sergeant.
Watch the video to find out how she learned to dismiss her Drill Sergeant and discovered how to get herself moving.
Sometimes the reason someone procrastinates is a deep-seated block that takes serious effort to root out. This is where I earn my nickel with clients who come to me to get past blocks. But sometimes we procrastinate because our brains are hardwired to choose activities that are easy and convenient over those that take more effort. When that is the kind of block getting in your way, there are three simple techniques you can take to get around it. Each technique will work individually, but when combined they can be almost unstoppable.
Willpower has its limits (and when it’s gone it’s gone)
It turns out we only have a certain amount of willpower to work with over a period of time. The more we use it, the less we have, and when it’s gone it’s gone. That’s why crash diets so often end in a huge binge of the foods the dieters have been denying themselves. The dieters kept using up their willpower each time they told themselves “no” until they had none left.
The limit to willpower reserves is also why it can be hard to get started and keep going on a project —you have to make yourself go work on it. Every time you do that, you draw on your willpower reserves. When the reserves are used up, you can’t make yourself work on it anymore. So what do you do?
Where you put your work affects your willingness to do it.
The short answer is to take willpower out of the equation by making it easier to work on your project than to do anything else. You’ve already made a start on this if you followed last week’s tip and made it harder to access the time-wasters in your day. Now you want to do the opposite and make it easier and more convenient to access your project, whatever it is.
Remove the easy-to-eliminate obstacles ahead of time
Let’s say you are a small business owner with an opportunity to submit an article to a publication that is read by a lot of potential customers. It could really showcase what you do. Not only would that make your cold calls easier since those potential customers would have heard of you, it might even lead to a few of them calling you up to hire you, no cold calls required. The upside is huge. And you just can’t seem to get around to writing the article.
You can call yourself a lazy good-for-nothing (which still won’t get that article written), or you can simply make it easier to get started on the article than do anything else.
If the file of research you need to write it is sitting in the file cabinet ten steps from your desk, move the file to the middle of your desk before you go home. That way when you sit down tomorrow you won’t have to take those ten steps to get started. What’s more, you won’t be able to do anything else unless you physically move the file out of your way. That extra effort to move the file out of the way may be enough to tip your brain into thinking that it is easier to just work on the article than do something else.
Of course this isn’t logical, but logic isn’t the issue here. If logic worked, you would have written and submitted that article months ago. Instead, we’re dealing with a different part of the brain, and that part just looks at initial efforts. That’s why lowering the amount of effort it takes to start up the project can get you moving, even though the overall effort—the “real” work of writing that article—remains the same.
Now if moving the file to your desk isn’t enough to get you going on the article, look at other ways to make working on the article easier. Does the thought of toggling back and forth on your computer between the document with your notes in it and the one you are planning to fill with your brilliant article make you sigh? Then print out your notes and put them on your keyboard the night before you plan to work on the article. Again, you will have removed activities that added effort to your project (opening the notes document and toggling back and forth). In addition, you will have to physically move the notes out of your way to do anything else on your computer, adding a step to working on any other project. Working on the article will become that much easier and more convenient than other projects.
You’ll notice that I suggest you move pieces of your project to a more convenient location the night before. When you do that, you allow your willpower reserves to replenish before starting to work on the actual project. This is in addition to lowering the willpower it takes to get started because the pieces of your project are more convenient. So setting yourself up the night before gives you double the benefit for your effort.
Prove it to yourself—pick a project right now
This approach sounds simple and it is. You actually have to do it, however. So pick something you have been avoiding and put it right in front of you, either physically on your desk or virtually on your computer, so that you have to move it to get to anything else tomorrow. If you trip over your project whenever you try to do anything else, you are on the right track. If you manage to avoid your project anyway, make another simple change that makes it even easier and more convenient to get started on the next day.
Eventually, you will have made enough changes that your brain will decide that you might as well work on your project since it’s right there. Then you’ll “just do it” like you’ve been telling yourself for the past three months. In this way you will see how powerful this technique is, you’ll be more likely to remember how to do it the next time you find yourself procrastinating, and—who knows—you may finally get that project off your To Do list.
If this tip plus last week’s tip aren’t quite enough to get you started on a project you’ve been putting off, there is one more technique you can add to end your procrastination easily. I’ll tell you all about it next week!
