John Cow dot Com » Success

Stop Being So Scared and Actually Do Something Or Your Legacy May Be Disappointing

Jason Katzenback — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 18:49:45 +0000

Are you one of those people that sit there and over analyze everything to death…..rarely following through with anything?

Have you joined numerous membership programs (from online business opportunities, to your local gym) only to quit because it didn’t work (or so you say)?

Have you been trying to earn money online but find yourself jumping from one idea to another, never committing, or allowing yourself to be constantly persuaded by others?

Are you so scared that you are too intimidated to take long-term action on pretty much anything?

I feel in my heart that 90% of the people failing at achieving great results (whether that be in business or just life) are failing because they are too scared and it’s that fear that’s keeping them from success.

Is it wrong to be scared?

In my opinion the answer is a resounding…

YES!

Especially if it is preventing you from accomplishing what you want in life.

I am not saying that I haven’t experienced fear or that it’s not normal to be hesitant or reluctant. No one knows what the future holds for us and fear is a normal emotional response to specific stimuli but it’s how you handle that fear that makes you what you are.

Does your fear cause you to give up at the first sign of trouble?

I see so many people who give up so quickly on something the moment things start to get even the slightest bit rough. These people seem to carry this trait throughout their entire lives… in how they handle road blocks, in their relationships, jobs, hobbies, health and pretty much anything else you can think of.

They start out optimistic and have this almost euphoric state of excitement. Kind of like when you start a new diet and can envision what you will look like when you get into shape or you start a new business opportunity and feel so positive that “this is the one”. There is this surge of energy that can cause you to even become vocal about how this time it is different.

Then the road block hits!

Suddenly as you get into the new adventure something happens… the excitement starts to disappear, frustration starts to settle in at how overwhelming the task ahead appears and then fear takes over…. and you stop!

Have you ever heard of Pavlov’s law?

This is a really rough synopsis and pardon me if it is a little different then you remember but basically, it was an experiment where people were electrocuted with a slight but painful shock when a red signal appeared. They would be shown a green light and then shortly after the red light would appear and SHOCK!!!

This happened enough times that eventually as soon as the green signal was fired these people’s bodies would instantly react like they were going to be shocked even though the red light stopped appearing and they were no longer being shocked. They were so afraid once the initial green signal happened that they instantly treated it like the green signal was the shock.

Ask yourself truthfully if you have allowed yourself to become afraid of the green light?

Have you gotten to the point in your life that the moment the “signal” appears you completely give up and react like the worse case scenario has happened… even though it hasn’t?

I do not give a crap what your excuses are. You can blame evil internet marketers, big business, the government, you can blame genetics or you can even blame your mother for not breastfeeding you… the fact is you have no one to blame but yourself.

Life is freaking hard… and trying to get ahead in it is even harder.

Every day I am hit with something negative, whether it is an illness in my family, news of a recession, a failed business project or even a customer that over reacts and takes out their frustration by questioning my ethics. The bottom line is how I react to those situations is what makes me who I am.

If you want to succeed at anything, then you need to accept the bumps in the road. Accept that you are going to have to learn new things and those new things might not come easy to you. Do not blame others for that, you need to figure out how to make them work for you.

Stop being scared and blaming everyone else for your lot in life.

I have 101 reasons I could use to try and justify why I might fail at something… but I have a better one for why I am going to succeed. That reason involves three people that matter to me more than anything. My beautiful daughters Gayle and Jillian and my soul mate Charlene. When it comes my time to leave this world what matters most to me is what my life meant to those three special people.

How will you be remembered by those closest to you?

Stop allowing fear to run your life and stop allowing excuses to prevent your success.

Work Stress Affects Your Overall Life – So Take Time OFF!

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 03:23:11 +0000

Are you happy?

Think about that seriously right now… are you truly happy? I do not mean do you love your job, are you rich or anything like that… I just mean happy.

Are you out of shape, do you eat like crap, do you feel like crap?

Are you always on the computer, always working, always telling family members, “give me a few more minutes”?

Are you stressed out and always worrying about something?

I am sure that these question do not relate to all of you but I can guarantee there are a lot of you that know exactly what I am talking about.

The entrepreneurial spirit is a great thing to have, wanting to grow your business, get out of the rat race and have freedom… BUT AT WHAT COST?

You know there is a funny thing about computers, they can almost mesmerize you in a way that is addictive and this in combination with wanting to get a business running can be a bad combination.

Just the other day, my wife made me laugh when she was doing a blog post for her blog An Aud Life and my youngest daughter was asking her to tuck her in. I heard my wife say 3 times in a row “Just a minute”… and WOW did that make me laugh.

Why?

Because only a few months a go my wife had nothing to do with the computers… she maybe would check email or facebook but spent very little time on it. Now that she is getting into blogging, she suddenly is finding herself getting sucked in. She loves checking for comments, commenting on others blogs, getting involved in her social communities and checking stats.

It felt so good to finally say to her, after the third “in a moment” to say… “HA, I TOLD YOU!”

Having no idea what I was referring to, I explained and she almost could not believe what she had done. I reminded her how she would be so intolerant of it with me because she could not understand why I could not just stop what I was doing. She finally understood and felt terrible and immediately shut the computer down and went to tuck in our daughter.

Now for those that are asking “why did you not tuck her in and let your wife work”.. well I already did, they like us both to tuck them in.

OK, so the point of this little story is to emphasize the point that it is vital to keep priorities in order at all times. We can get so involved into the present moment that we lose complete sight of the big picture and what really matters. We can spend so much time focusing on “Work” or other things that we think are so vital that we miss everything else and later we look back at these moments and absolutely regret missing out on them.

What also happens is we make it even more stressful on ourselves because of guilt… so we exhaust ourselves, do no take care of ourselves and also beat up on ourselves because we know we should not be doing what we are doing!

Do not work yourself to death, do not ignore your spouse or your kids, do not exhaust your mind and body and take some time off.

On Friday I had a situation arise in my office and I truly think I had every reason to use the excuse that I could not go away this weekend because I had to handle it. Well you know what, too bad. I had promised my family we would go away this weekend and so I went. Now believe me, it was not an easy decision but it was the best one.

We had an excellent weekend, it was a tremendous stress relief and you know what… I can truly say… I AM HAPPY!

Enjoy life and keep priorities in order… that is what true success really is.

For me what really brings it all into perspective is this –> What do you want your loved ones to have engraved on your tombstone?

“Your Name Here” was a hard worker who knew how to put work above everything else!

or

“Your Name Here” was a loving husband, dedicated father and lived life to the fullest!

So what are your priorities?

OCD… An Online Marketers Nemesis?

Jason Katzenback — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 02:25:16 +0000

Do you get caught in the “OCD Loop?”

Do you sit there and hit the send and receive for your email inbox repeatedly, anxiously waiting and looking for “something”… not sure what but “something”? Do you log into your ClickBank or AdSense account 25 times a day, in hopes that something magical has happened? Do you find yourself automatically going to a website, even though you were just there 5 minutes ago and nothing possibly could have changed yet? Do you stop what you are doing everytime the phone rings, even though we know it will take us 20 minutes just to get back into the grove of where we just were… destroying all our momentum.

It is like watching TV (not sure if this is mainly a guy thing here) and constantly flicking to the next channel… we are not sure why we do this, perhaps something is telling us that the most amazing show in the world is on and we are missing it. Regardless of why, the fact is we do and the end result is by the time we shut the TV off, we have not really watched anything.

The same is true for growing your business. You are constantly doing things but at the end of the day nothing is done.

You see the OCD Loop involves a phenomenon among many in the “MMO” field where they exhibit a form of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) in the way that they are obsessive about following a specific sequence of actions repeatedly throughout the day, even if they make no sense. If you were paying a person by the hour and saw them doing those activities, you would fire them… or re educate them anyway.

If you’re really honest with yourself, you need to ask yourself how often you actually allow yourself to fall into this OCD Loop, and fail to stay focused on doing the things that bring money into your business. Pinpoint your tendency for falling into this trap, and start thinking of ways to snap out of it when you feel yourself getting sucked into this loop, because it can waste a lot of your time.

STOP THE MADNESS

If at the end of the day you feel exhausted, stressed out and anxious because you know you were busy but are not sure what you have to show for it…. then maybe it is time to do things different.

How… Tell me please.. How?

Well, if there is one thing we have learned is there is no perfect answer for everyone. What works for us might not work for you but what we do recommend you try however, is to ask yourself these two questions…

1. Is what we are doing right now making us or going to make us significant money for our business?

2. If we were paying someone to do what we are doing right now, would we feel good that the money is being well spent?

These two questions might not do it for you, but we hope you see our point here. Busy work does not mean quality work. Focus on your ROI (Return on Investment) and treat your business like a business.

The Dip… is it time to quit?

Jason Katzenback — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 01:54:37 +0000

Seth Godin… WE LOVE YOU!

We just finished reading one of the most fantastic little books we have ever read in regards to business and it is called “the Dip”. It is a very small book but in those short pages we have had more ah ha moments then we dare say any other book we have read in regards to business.

So what is so incredible about this book that we are so passionate about?

In a nutshell, the book covers the idea that quitting is not actually for losers but in fact it is one of the keys to true success. You see, there comes a point in every persons life and or business where a decision has to be made. Are you going to be able to be the best in the world at this or not?

Now be careful before you answer this question because it could shape your destiny.

Is the decision you are making involving your business and livelihood or is it just a hobby?

Let us explain.

We enjoy playing Halo every now and again. We are pretty good but we are not the best. Do we care if we are the best, do we want to spend every waking hour playing, in the grand scheme of things does it matter if we are the best at it?

No.. (well sort of but that is our stupid pride talking). In actual fact we want to be great at it but it is a hobby… more of a time to release frustrations. But the fact remains it does not really matter if we suck at it or are great at it.. we have no interest to pursue a career as a Halo player.

You see we all have hobbies and interests and the fact is many of you reading this are in the internet marketing game as purely a hobby. You have a full time job (or maybe you dont) and you just do this for fun. If that is you, then please have fun with it. If you suck at it, dont worry, it is just fun.

What about the rest of you? Yes you reading this?

Are you the best at what you do?

If you are not, then can you be the best at what you do or better yet do you TRULY want to be the best at what you do?

Think of all those excuses you have for why your business is failing? Are they legitimate? Is the excuse you dont have enough time really an excuse that people who want to be #1 would use?

Every one of us have 24hours, 7 days and so on.

Ok Cow, whats the point of all this.

Well we are probably doing injustice to this fine book but the point of this all is simple. If there are things that you are spending time and money on that you suck at, and these things take time and energy away from the things you are great at… why in the world are you doing them?

It comes down to the fact that if parts of your business are not producing a good ROI in comparison to other things, then stop doing them. LEARN WHEN TO QUIT!

Now before we close off, there are two sides to this coin. The other side is know when not to quit as well. 99% of the most successful people in the world suffer terrible set backs or “Dips” before they strike it rich. These “Dips” are the points in your lives and careers where you need to be able to make the right decision. You need to ask yourself…

1. If we stay will we be the best at it?
2. If we stay will the time and effort it involves be worth it?
3. If we quit are there better things we could focus on?
4. If we quit will we regret it for the rest of our life?
5. What is preventing us from quiting?
6. What is preventing us from not quiting?

(These are not actually in the book, but they are what came to our mind)

The bottom line is there are many who fail because they do not know when to quit and there are many who fail because they quit too early. Understanding when and when not to quit can mean the difference between success and failure.

Now, the one thing about this book that we know many people hate, is it seems to talk about the obvious. Well smart ass if it is so obvious then why are you not doing it then? (Wanted to get that off our chest).

Do yourself a favor and pick this book up the Dip.