Are You Free to Be? (Read Time: 2 min.)

I've had strep throat for the past couple of days... and this is the second case of strep throat for me in the past three months. Needless to say, I went straight to You Can Heal Your Life by Louise L. Hay. I discovered two things:
1) Sore throats relate to being unable to speak up for one's self
2) The blue chakra (the throat) is the area where change happens

According to Louise L. Hay, the affirmation to deal with sore throats is "I release all restrictions. I am free to be me."

One of the greatest lessons in extraordinary success is this: you choose what your success journey looks like. A big part of change comes in being willing to see things differently. You're at the helm of your own success. No one's driving the car but you. When you understand the magnitude of your power in creating your own success, you also understand the responsibility of it.

The only person who can stifle you is you and, for many of us, we do the stifling in small ways. It could be that you refrain from saying how you feel in order to make others feel better about themselves. It could be that you say 'yes' to friends and families when you really want to say no. It could be that you take on projects, events, and chores that you know put you into work overload. Whatever your "stifle" is, it's important to live in a conscious state of choosing.

You choose when you say yes and when you say no. You choose who you'll spend your time with and when. You choose how many hours of sleep you get at night, how much you work, and how many projects you take on. Allow yourself the freedom to be you. Don't overcomit, underestimate, or overcompensate because you "think" this is who you have to be to in order to live extraordinary success.

Remember: Who you are is enough...

Hope Has Its Place (Read Time: 2 min.)

Hope is a good thing… in general. It has its’ place. It’s a beginning point on the journey of extraordinary success but it is not a core concept in the science of staying power. If your staying power is based on “hope”, you won’t be staying for very long. Tony Robbins, author of “Awaken the Giant”, once said, “I don’t hope I’m going to be in a good state; I demand it.”

To stay the course for your goals, to become who you were truly meant to be, you must go beyond “hoping” for things to work out. You have to KNOW that things ARE working out. It’s a critical shift in how you think, what you do, and how you live that is a prerequisite to seeing ANY results.

If you walk through life “hoping” things will work out, you are straddling a fence between success and failure and the in-between is what we call a mediocre life. To be really good at anything, you either have to know that you will do it or believe that you can do it. Hoping that maybe you’ll succeed is lukewarm thinking that results in lukewarm actions that will bring about lukewarm results.

You are not here to “hope” your way through life. You are here to live your way through an exciting, extraordinarily successful life.

Remember: You don’t wake up “hoping” to breathe so don’t live your life “hoping” to be successful. Know that you know that you know…

What is Staying Power? (Read Time: 2 min.)

Momentum... Passion... Purpose... Goals... Desire... Motivation... Inspiration... Success...

Give it a name and there are scores of people who've written, talked and taught about it. There are varying schools of thought about what creates it and there are few people who refute the importance of belief to it.

What is IT? Extraordinary success.

Stay Strong was birthed out of three questions: What? How? Why?

What is extraordinary success? How do people become extraordinarily successful? Why do some people create and keep and other people lose it?

Whether you love Tony Robbins, T. Harv Eker, or Dr. Wayne Dyer, Stay Strong is a premiere membership created to teach one thing daily:

The SCIENCE of Staying Power!

Are you ready to learn how to stay the course?

Become a premiere Stay Strong member today!

Be Vigilant With Your Mind (Read Time: 2 min.)

In The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, A Toltec Wisdom Book, Don Miguel Ruiz says the following: “Seeing the awesome power of the word, we must understand what power comes out of our mouths. One fear or doubt planted in our mind can create an endless drama of events.” The most important (and most difficult) work you’ll ever have to do to be AND stay extraordinarily successful comes in being vigilant with your mind.

The mind will accept whatever is allowed in it as true. That’s why people say things like “You are the company you keep.” Your mind will take in the stimuli it receives. If your goal is to live a positive, upbeat, happy life, spending time with people who complain is a No-No. If your goal is to build a multi-million dollar empire, spending 5 hours a day watching reality TV is not going to get you that.

“We become what we think about all day long.” –Dr. Wayne Dyer

If we monitored our thoughts as vigilantly as we monitor other people’s behavior, we would have more power and prosperity than we’d know what to do with.

The lesson?

You are the master of your own mind.

You control what thoughts you allow in. It’s time to be vigilant about what gains entrance into your mind and, eventually, into your heart.

Releasing the Need to Be Right (Read Time: 2 min.)

I like to be right. No, let me back that up. I LOVE to be right. It’s one of my greatest strengths because I’m thorough in what I do, whether it’s fact checking, blog writing, or customer service. It’s also one of my greatest weaknesses because when you thrive on being right, you don’t like to EVER be wrong… and being wrong is a great opportunity to learn.

What I’m learning is how to be open and willing to be wrong. Instead of jumping to answer questions or relying on myself for all the answers, I now ask questions to no avail. I listen to different viewpoints. Maybe I take the advice, maybe I don’t but I come at them with a different sense of curiosity and openness that, naturally, I’m not too inclined to produce.

It takes work to be open and willing to change but the work is worth it. Some of the greatest ideas you’re ever going to have are going to come from SOMEBODY ELSE and if you’re not open, willing and ready to learn, you’ll miss out on gems of information and wisdom that could truly be your tipping point in the long run.

At the end of the day, you can be right or you can be kind. Kindness may not be what you want to do but it is always what you can CHOOSE to do. Extraordinarily successful people understand the power of staffing their weaknesses, not pretending that they don’t exist.

Release the need to be right. You’ll thank me in the morning:)