By Jamieson Lee Hill, Head of Content and Copywriting

“The secret of success is constancy of purpose”,

said Benjamin Disraeli (1839 to 1872) many moons ago. Success is also about being consistently motivated and positive about achieving your goals. Now we know that isn’t always easy when faced by the stress of our modern day lives, family duties, pandemic pressure and the need to pay the bills. Nevertheless, there are some tried and tested techniques out there which will help you wake up each day and be a dynamo of positivity!

 Let’s dig into these five great tips...

TIP ONE - THE MIRACLE MORNING

First up, is an absolute beast of a positivity method. Hal Elrod’s Miracle Morning is now a classic in the world of entrepreneurship. If you’re not familiar with it, let me take you through the basics. It is a method to make sure that you are feeling dynamic and souped up before you actually start work. How long you spend on the Miracle Morning depends on your availability. It could be a total of 20 minutes or as long as 90 minutes. Whatever the time frame, there are 6 core stages that you can do each morning before work. I learned this technique from Grant Stain, CEO of Blam Websites. Here are the steps:

A. Meditation/Silence: First sit in a place where you will not be disturbed and meditate or just be in silence for a time e.g. at least 3 minutes.

B. Affirmations: Next repeat affirmations for your business and social life. These could be:

Smart Goal Affirmations:

These are smart because the steps are more measurable and tangible e.g.

• I will develop my business knowledge by reading 5 pages of a business book each day. 
• I will become more successful by onboarding 2 new clients every week via marketing and telesales. 

More General Affirmations:

These are more aspirational and aimed at achieving a business or life achievement e.g.

I will be wealthy enough to go abroad on holiday every year with my family. 

I will be the market leader in my sector within 5 years.

It is down to you to decide whether you want to have measurable goal like affirmations or more general or a mix of both. It is best not to have too many and to repeat the same ones for at least a month for it to have an effect. If you keep chopping and changing then it loses its potency. 

C. Visualisation: 

Sit down and relax. In your mind’s eye visualise yourself achieving your business and life goals. You can take these from your action plan for the short and long term and it can be directly linked to your affirmations. E.g. If your goal is to open a second shop for your retail business within 12 months; imagine your new shop, picture the staff and the furnishings, what products can you see inside etc. 

Visualisation is a powerful tool to manifest your goals in life. Professional footballers and other athletes use visualisation to achieve their sporting targets e.g. strikers visualise scoring goals before the actual game. 

D. Exercise:

However you like to exercise is down to your abilities and limitations. It could be a walk each day, sit ups, press ups, running, swimming etc. Choose a daily exercise routine to do as part 4 of your miracle morning. It can be just a few minutes or much longer depending on your schedule.

E. Reading: 

Each day read an inspiring book from your sector or business in general or it could be non-business related, but inspirational. There is a huge market of books and audio books written by business gurus and also self-development mentors. Whatever floats your boat, read for at least a few minutes each day.

F. Scribing: 

Writing is the final stage. Either keep a journal and write in it by hand your thoughts and reflections each day. This can be cathartic and help you to understand your journey as an entrepreneur. If you don’t want to keep a journal you could write something inspiring each day e.g. a poem, a few lines about life and work or something completely different. The choice is open to you!

Afterthought - The Order of Stages

You don’t have to follow the exact order of the Miracle morning. Change it to suit your schedule. However, Meditate - Affirmation - Visualise is a natural sequence for the thoughts process, but the rest are more flexible as to what you do first, second etc. I often do exercise first as that puts me in the meditative state but everyone is different! 

TIP TWO - THE FIVE PEOPLE YOU HAVE MOST CONTACT WITH

I first heard of this tip from the Mind Coach and author of ‘Let It Go’, David Rahman and Blam CEO Grant Stain on a Blam Websites live session. David asked people to consider which 5 people they have most contact with each month. He explained that it is those 5 people that will have the most effect on your mindset. So if you are regularly in contact with a friend who is negative and leaves you feeling drained and down, this will be a major influence on your mindset.  Of course, with family you can’t always choose how much time you spend with them due to a sense of duty, but identify the people in your top 5 who give you a boost and inspiration. Also, be clear if any of your top 5 people make you feel low. Now, of course, we all have our off days but there is a difference between that and someone who puts you down or ridicules your business and life plans. If you do realise that you have negative influences in your Top 5, then workout ways of reducing your contact time and their effect on you or just be frank and honest with them. 

TIP THREE - BINAURAL BEATS AND MUSIC PLAYLISTS

Binaural Beats

Binaural music is a method to affect your mind in a positive way. Binaural beats are beats within a piece of music set at various frequencies in Hertz or HZ. They help you to relax and induce peace, calm, sleep, creativity and so forth in your brainwaves. At the moment, there is limited research to substantiate these claims but some medical researchers are starting to identify the benefits of binaural music:

“Researchers believe these changes occur because the binaural beats activate specific systems within the brain. An electroencephalogram (EEG) that recorded the electrical brain activity of people listening to binaural beats showed that the effect on a person’s body varied according to the frequency pattern used.”

Source: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/320019.php

With a binaural beat you hear a different sound frequency between your left and right ears. This is what affects the brain and causes a feeling of relaxation, elation etc. The frequency of the binaural waves is lower than 1000 hertz for the brain to detect them. The main types of waves include:

1) Delta waves: at a frequency between 0.1 and 4 HZ. These are the brain waves linked with dreamless sleep.

2) Theta waves: these are at a frequency between 4 and 8HZ and are associated with Rapid Eye Movement or REM sleep. REM sleep is what makes us feel like our energy is replenished.

3) Alpha waves: they are at a frequency of 8 to 13 HZ and they tend to make people feel relaxed.

4) Beta waves: these are set between 14 and 100HZ and are usually linked to concentration and focus.

Binaural beats music can help lower your stress and anxiety levels, help you concentrate on work and unlock your creative potential as an entrepreneur. They also can help destress you, induce a meditative state and give you confidence and inspiration. There is a caveat on all of this; binaural beats music is not yet widely accepted by the scientific community. However, millions of people use binaural beats across the world to help improve their concentration and productivity at work and inspire them to greater creativity. Having used them for many years, my advice is to look on Youtube and find recordings that suit you as a person and remember that different binaural beats have different effects depending on the HZ levels.

This is one of my personal favourites for focusing on work and getting more out of each working day.

Music Playlist

Aside from binaural beats, music in general is a great way to stay positive. This is a favourite tip among many entrepreneurs; making playlists of music can help keep you focused and positive throughout your day. Your mind may wander at certain times of the day and therefore it is important to choose the right music for different occasions. To give an example, in the morning you might choose upbeat music to give you energy e.g. Dance music, drum and bass and so on. In the afternoon, if you feel a little tired, you may need more soothing music such as ambient, classical, blues etc. If you are working in the evening you may choose something different again. 

Build your playlist bearing in mind how you feel at different times of the day as it will usually differ depending on when you have eaten, how much pressure you’ve been under, if you slept well and so forth!

TIP FOUR - AN ACTIVE MIND IS A HAPPY MIND
Life is a journey of learning. It doesn’t stop when we leave school, college or university. The entrepreneur thrives on new knowledge. By reading and listening to new ideas, facts and training you keep your mind active. An active mind is a positive one because it fuels innovation and creativity in your business processes. 

So what can you do? Well, if you don’t like reading, you can always get a subscription to Audible and listen to audiobooks while you workout or in your downtime.

Alternatively, you can read ebooks or old fashioned hardcopy books. Set aside a time each day for your knowledge input i.e. 30 minutes or 1 hour of reading or listening to content. This is obviously part of the Miracle Morning as well.

TIP FIVE - SMALL VICTORIES AND FOCUSING ON THE MOMENT
Two of the enemies of positivity are fear and anxiety. We can get so stressed and worked up about not achieving our goals and dreams. Therefore, I recommend that you set yourself targets for each day i.e. 4 achievable targets per day. Choose the priority goals from your workload and even better write them down the night before each day, so you wake up ready to tackle the day. Equally, be flexible to incorporate new urgent tasks which arise unexpectedly. 

Try to stop your mind from wandering too much into the past and the future. Anxiety is often worrying about what might not happen or go to plan and depression is often about worrying over the past. The truly positive entrepreneur lives for today. So while it is cliched, focusing on the moment is a very positive way to achieve your optimum efficiency each day.

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