Will the REAL Free Thinkers Please Stand Up

"Where have you gone, Joe DiMaggio? A nation turns its lonely eyes to you..."

Simon and Garfunkel hit the nail on the head with this line. In today's world, we can substitute Joe DiMaggio for "Free Thinkers" or "Creative Thinkers." We have gotten stagnant, boring, and predictable as a country. There is very little challenge to the status quo and even fewer new thoughts being accepted.

The United States rose to power and significance due to the mentality as whole that there was no limit on our opportunity. People challenged the norms of society and persevered to change the entire landscape of human thinking.

There was no thinking that we had maxed out our potential. Original thinkers continued to push the envelope into developing new limits. They challenged theories and ideologues, which provided momentum into creating a more prosperous country.

Somewhere this has been either lost or postponed. We are in a mental rut as a country which in large part has contributed to our economy slipping a bit.

We need new ideas, new processes, and new optimism. People need to stop being so accepting of silly accepted norms. If you ever get an answer that sounds like "because that's the way we have always done it.."it's time to step up and challenge it.

Challenge does NOT mean confrontation. Challenge is providing a smart alternative to an old thought.

I challenge you to think more about making improvements then accepting anymore silly beliefs.

What would you like to change?

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, “How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income,” Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Can You Change People...or Can People Only Change Themselves?

I would be willing to bet at some point in everyone's life they tried unsuccessfully to change someone.

There are obviously many reasons to change another persons behavior some good and some bad.

The question here is, IF you can change another persons behavior. I say no.

However, you CAN influence the behavior of another in several ways.

• Take away something that person desires.
• Show that person (by example-not words) how you do certain things.


• Give that person small rewards for certain improvements.


• Never be an enabler.


• Always behave in direct accordance to the message you speak about.


• Do not be confrontational in a manner that you come across as "all knowing" or arrogant.


• When explaining about "the change" speak about the benefits they will receive from making that change. Don't use the "just because" line of thinking.

Try some of these scenarios out next time you desire to change another person's behavioral patterns. When doing any of these remember to keep your approach genuine and calm if you want to receive the most beneficial results.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

How bad do you REALLY want it?

Over the years, I have taken part in many "business opportunity" type meetings where friends, colleagues, strangers, or whoever have approached me about an "idea."

In almost every situation, if I have the time, I will meet and listen. I learned a long time ago that I have no false illusions of thinking I know everything or how to do everything. My contention is that for long term financial security it is important to have multiple streams of income.

Therefore, if market conditions dictate the slow down of one aspect of your business, you are not placed in a bad situation. So I will sit and listen to most "new" opportunities.

This is what I have found:

1) There are some great "untapped" opportunities out there.

2) People do NOT lack the ability to formulate the idea, the lack the desire to actually make their idea a reality.

3) People do NOT lack the knowledge for improvement, they lack the motivation to change "old" thinking.

4) People do NOT lack the desire to have more success, they lack the consistency it takes to achieve it.

5) People do NOT lack the vision of new opportunities, they lack the confidence to deal with the initial "vision rejection" that takes place.

The opportunities are there for everyone to take advantage of. You don't have to be wealthy in terms of financial ability to launch your idea or dream. You MUST, however, be Rich with internal fortitude to have the stomach for the fight.

You MUST be wealthy with confidence to know that you are destined for something more which WILL give you the ability to change other peoples "old" mind sets and get on board.

It isn't that people oppose new ideas or changes, it is that they have not yet been shown a better way to do something with unwavering passion that provides them the motivation to do something new.

Give people your passion and a good idea and you will get the change.

Curt Fletcher aka The Likeability Guy, is a Real Estate Professional, Business Development Strategist, Published Author of the book, "How To Sell More Homes and Increase Your Income," Sales Trainer, and Professional Speaker that focuses on improving your Likeability to increase your Opportunities for Success!

Can we Lose the Gloom and Doom already?

I gotta say, I am just about totally fed up with the doom and gloom media coverage and other such "world ending" mantras being thrown about by our countries leaders.

Let's see here, we have Swine Flu, The New Great Depression, Wars, Terrorism...

This is all so ridiculous that there must be some agendas out there.

Let me tackle a couple of these items:

Swine Flu: The world is not going to succumb to some random strain of flu. In a regular year, approx 30,000 people die from the regular flu in the U.S. As of this morning, we have 1 death from the Swine Flu, yet it is the lead for every major news network and the President is actually addressing the issue.

A few years ago, the world was supposed to succumb to the Avian Bird flu...seems that turned out to NOT be the pandemic that was being reported.

The NEW Great Depression: Give me a break. Our country and the world is currently cycling through a downturn. We are NOT in a depression. After 8-10 years of consecutive record shattering growth and boom, we have scaled back. You can't continue to peak year after year without a setback forever.

Many people have lost jobs due to the newer slowed down pace and many companies are now having to pay the piper for years of greed and bad management. I have had several close friends lose jobs as a result of this, but in less than a month, they are all now employed at new companies making the same amount of money. If we were in a depression, there would not be new jobs....

Everyone needs to take a step back and really think about what is being reported and why it is being reported. Do NOT take everything at face value, because very seldom is the published story the real story.

Media outlets like big ratings. Why? Because they don't care about reporting news, they care about the advertising revenue that is received when ratings are high.

Political folks such as congress and even the President ALL have agendas. To further an agenda or goal you need your constituents (the public) to buy in. Fear is the Number One way to deliver a message as it gets to the emotional fabric of every human.

If you want to pass legislation to somewhat nationalize banking, what would you do? Perhaps report stories everyday of failing banks and the non-lending of money...

If you want to pass legislation to nationalize health care, what would you do? Perhaps pray on the fears of the public of a flu epidemic....

If you want to pass legislation and gain support for war funding, what would you do? Perhaps report each day of impending world doom from terrorism....

I'm not making political statements, I'm just saying, that all these people have agendas and your genuine well being is very seldom one of them. Don't be so quick to believe what you read and hear. Use your common sense and start filtering out the nonsense.

Until the masses decide that no more of this is acceptable, nothing will change. Be an individual. Be a thinker. Be different. Don't follow. Lead.

Article Comments..Feeding the "herd" mentality?

For about the last 10 years or so, I have primarily read the news via the Internet rather then the newspaper. The Internet has been my source for basically everything over that period of time. Not surprisingly, that seems to be the case for a huge percentage of people.

Several years back, it became the norm for "reader feedback" via a comments section at the conclusion of every article. The initial thought was to get the readers involved and "feeling" as if they were contributing to something, which leads to greater loyalty and interest.

The results were good. The website (news outlet) would get increased traffic to the site because people that left comments would often tell their friends about it, thus raising awareness of a particular web site or a specific news column.

The writer of the article enjoyed it because they could receive immediate vindication about their article and they would also increase people's awareness about who exactly "they" were. Which has created several quasi celebrity Internet authors.

My theory is this:

At some point in time, with every venture or any idea, you get to a point of diminishing returns. Basically meaning, without corrective action or change, the initial idea / plan no longer receives a worthwhile return on investment. That "idea' actually starts to have a negative effect on business returns or public perception.

If you read any article on a major news type website today there is a comments section. When you click on the comments tab to see what others are saying about that particular piece, it has become a virtual zoo. When people decide to make a comment via the Internet, they write things they would never say in front of people. They insight hatred, nonsense, ridiculousness, or just crazy talk.

It is confusing to me, why they don't just shut off the comments feed to these articles. For any information that is to be gained by reading an article, it becomes diluted in all the nonsense that "cyber" commentators unleash on it.

It doesn't even matter what the article is about anymore. You will find a ridiculous division of wild comments and almost silly view points.

I am all for free speech, but in my world and in my mind, if you are not willing to stand up and make the exact same comment in person, you should not have the ability to make a written comment.

I also believe in different view points. Differing thoughts should be the fuel that creates progress and opportunities. However, adamant "hateful" opinions only further divide people from ever wanting to make a concession or agreement.

With millions and millions of people around the world viewing the same content and reading other people's nonsense type opinions we are falling further and further into a large division of groups. For whatever reason, people read these comments and get rilled up about them.

Here is the truth about what is happening:

Let's use politics as an example since it is a very divisive subject.

An author writes a story that delivers a factual account of the Presidents Actions. The story contains no bias, it is just relating information to the public.

Suddenly, in the comments section, you have certain individuals that make dumb statements that stereotype a Republican view and then you get equally ignorant comments that stereotype the Democrat view point.

To the somewhat non super political following reader (which is most people), they start to believe that ALL Republicans believe a certain thing or ALL Democrats feel a certain way about something else. Truth be told. The wild and careless commentators are not smart people. They are simply representative of random people sitting at home that enjoy inciting chaos.

But guess what? The perception is now out there in the public arena that certain people believe this because they affiliate with Republicans or those people believe that because they are Democrats. It is ALL Ignorant "sheep" type thinking.

Stereotyping has NEVER been a good idea. It still isn't. With gender and race, stereotyping is perceived as one of the worst things that can be done....somehow though, in recent times, stereotyping people based on political thoughts has become accepted.

It's time to cutout the comments field from articles because it perpetuates "herd" thinking and has in some part contributed to many false judgements about other people. It's time for people to learn to form their own thoughts about an article or an individual again. People inherently want to belong to something, it makes them feel "safe." But belonging to groups based on false information and theories is one of the most dangerous things that can happen.

Pressure

What do you define as pressure?

The Thesaurus defines pressure as: physical force, weight, demand, difficulty.

I define pressure as opportunity. Meaning, when I think of pressure, I think of my obligation to take advantage of situations to create a better opportunity for myself, family, or friends.

To me, real pressure is bigger than an individual moment in time to meet a deadline, make a phone call, or get a timely response. It is more about the big picture of the overall scheme of success.

For example:

In many jobs or professions, people are depended on to take care of their business in a timely and results oriented fashion. Basically, the success or failure of that individual is based over a specified / fixed period of time. That is all good. I have no issue with that.

The problem that occurs, however, is that companies / employers become so fixated on certain overall results, they begin to focus on all the small details creating unrealistic and false pressure situations for their employees.

The company goal is simply that if they focus on all the small minutia stuff the overall result will improve. They feel by doing this it will limit certain items slipping through the cracks thus creating a better final scenario. Typical increased pressure means more meetings, increased reports, more employer / employee performance reviews, etc.

What companies / employers either fail to realize or fail to care about is that this behavior of turning up the pressure on their employees actually has the reverse effect over a period of time.

Why?

• Continued increased pressure on everything numbs the employee to focusing any longer.


• Not allowing the employee to prioritize their own business to self generate pressure, creates an employee that will begin to no longer think as a business person and they will stop caring about the company.


• Micro Prioritizing false pressure will result in less efficiency when "true" pressure is needed.

If you are in a position that requires a disproportionate level of pressure, speak with your manager about your frustration. Bring a plan with you of how you can show them you are handling your business and you can self generate your own urgency / pressure when needed.

If you are self employed or in a little more loose sales environment focus on the end results. Create a clear picture for yourself of how you can benefit in the future by creating your own pressure. Focus on the details, but only in the capacity that your future accomplishments are enhanced by it.

Simply put, don't expend vital mental energy on items that do not lead to future results.

Understand what you expend your mental energy on and re prioritize it if necessary. Wasted mental pressure on a continual basis is the largest factor of burn out and future give up. When you maximize your mental focus and mental pressure on the important items only, much better results will be received and your attitude will be improved as well.

Don't be afraid to CHANGE the Status Quo

Status Quo is boring. It's ordinary and everyone else does it.

Make an effort to change it. The Status Quo is what it is because there are so few people out there willing to risk the opportunity for change. Just go do it. Do something.

If your work group does the same pointless stuff all the time, and the reason is, "just because." Guess what? It MUST be changed.

Take some initiative. Ask your boss or co-workers how they would feel about taking a different approach to something. Doing something over and over just because that's the way it has always been done is nonsense.

You have a brain and most certainly have your own thoughts. Why not share a few? Who knows, perhaps your suggestion with be implemented and it will change the course of your once pre-determined future.

If you go to work for 9-10 hours per day and it is mundane, eventually it will lead to your unhappiness. You owe it to yourself to spice things up a bit and make some suggestions. Make it fun. I guarantee other people will appreciate the effort.