It’s amazing how things you hear as a kid that you think you’ll never remember (or care to), you remember.
I was thinking about my dad and his words of wisdom to me over the years:
•When I was cold walking somewhere with him (and it was winter), he’d say, “What are you going to do in the winter time?” (And, I’d whine, “Daddy, it is winter time” but we’d both laugh and I’d stop comploaining.)
•General advice: “Never put all your eggs in one basket”
•Sales advice offered to me as I was about to embark on a door-to-door campaign to sell raffle tickets for my mother (If she sold a book of tickets for True Sisters Organization, she could go to their luncheon gala for free!): “If you don’t ask, you’ll never get.”
•To keep me talking so he could correct me later: “That’s an idea”
•General life advice: “You can do it if you put your mind to it” (this one was always followed by my first and middle name… Sue Ann).
How lucky I was that he never told me that I wasn’t good at whatever I wanted to do. Because the other day, a friend – an independent planner – told me that she has always been bad at selling. “I stink at selling,” she said. I couldn’t help wonder if she had been told that at some earlier time because really, she doesn’t.
She has built herself a nice small business with a full time employee but what she loves is planning meetings. She doesn’t like thinking of herself as a salesperson.
What a shame! Why selling has such a bad rap is beyond me.
•Do you add value for another person?
•Do you help make their life sweeter, more fun, easier, more productive, more efficient, more joyful?
•Do you help them to create greater success?
Yes! Yes! Yes! Tony Robbins said, “The only thing that is keeping you from getting what you want is the story you keep telling yourself.”
It’s time to update your story. And that is a good idea!
