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"Create the outcomes you want...regardless of the circumstances."

Motivational Keynote Speaker

Category Archives: Goals

Three New Habits in 2017

Published on: December 22, 2016 | Author: Dana Lightman Team

This year, a lot of people will make resolutions, but only 8 percent will succeed. Why? Because they’re not really looking to do something different.  Instead, they are just entertaining wishing thinking.  What’s missing is resolve. Without a stronger resolve, there is no real possibility of accomplishing a resolution. In other words, you need to commit to an intentional process that will provide you a successful outcome.

What you need are new habits, a new approach to living that will bring different results.  Unlike goals, which tell you where you want to go, habits tell you  how you’re going to get there.

Here are three important processes worth mastering  if you want 2017 to be better than 2016:

  1. Set aside a time to focus. If you don’t dedicate some time to what you’d like to create or accomplish, chances are you will not last past January 31st in your new desire. The key to success is to remember to put in the time, effort, practice and persistence that are needed.  This doesn’t necessarily mean taking “action” towards your goals.  It could simply mean focusing “mentally” on the outcome, making sure you are energetically in alignment with your vision.
  2. Have fun.  If you are not going to enjoy yourself, why bother.  Life is supposed to be fun.  A resolution is a creation.  Like any artist, you may encounter frustration, disappointment,  or blocks, but you know and understand that this is all part of the process.  You don’t give up, because a creation is inherently exciting.  You engage in the process with anticipation that it will be enjoyable, watching as your creation emerges.
  3. Practice self-appreciation.We are our toughest critics.  You may be judging yourself as not working hard enough, not doing enough, not being good enough.  To all of this, I say, ENOUGH.  An important part of success is recognizing and acknowledging all the mini-successes along the way.  Focus on what’s working, what you’ve accomplished so far.  When you do this, you naturally build up a positive momentum.  Keep on this upward spiral, and you have no choice but to succeed.

So, what’s your take on 2017.  You’ve set your goals.  Now establish new habits that will allow you  meet these goals.  And you’re on your way to a great year.

Categories: Change, Goals, Strategies | Tags: empowerment, Goals, new year's resolutions, Optimism, self-appreciation, success |

Stop Self-Imposed Limits

Published on: August 18, 2016 | Author: Dana Lightman Team

Are you living your life with one foot on the brake, slowing yourself down or preventing yourself from fully realizing your potential, worth and value?  Often we think that the reason we don’t propel ourselves forward is because we lack high self-esteem or a sense of our deservedness.  If you tend to hold yourself back, perhaps the real reason is fear.  FEAR: Fantasy Expectations Appearing Real.  Yes, that’s right, fear is simply your thoughts about what could go wrong projected into the future.  Fear is putting yourself on a premature downward spiral.  Here are some common negative “what if’s” that might be stopping you in your tracks:

1.    What if I fail and embarrass myself? Starting a business, writing a book, applying for a new job or a promotion—any time we declare our intentions to move toward a goal, we risk failing… and having other people know we failed.

2.    What if I succeed and others are jealous? Sometimes what we fear isn’t failure as much as success. We might worry that other people will assume we think we’re a big shot or will envy us, and that our relationships will change.

3.    What if I succeed at first but can’t sustain it? By doing well, we increase others’ expectations. We might worry we’ll be a “one-hit wonder” and will disappoint everyone, including ourselves. This fear might be especially pronounced for artists who depend on creativity for their success.

No one has a crystal ball.  You don’t know what will happen on your life journey as you pursue your goals and dreams. But you do know that you always have a choice as to the story you tell yourself.  The only reason these fears exist is because you have created a story in which you come out as a loser if these situations actually come to fruition.

Let’s look at the first fear…that failure equals embarrassment.  So what if you failed.  That’s life.  Did you learn something?  Did you enjoy the experience?  Are you excited about trying again?  How many people (ordinary and famous) have failed at first, only to come back even stronger?  Why can’t you be one of those people?  You can!  And if someone decides you are a failure, that is simply a reflection of their internal insecurities.

If you succeed and others are jealous or envious, again this is a reflection of their low sense of themselves.  Anyone who is a true friend and support will be cheering you on.  And if you lose a friendship because you are “too successful,” then so be it.  Would you rather hang on to this type of relationship than succeed in energizing your potential?

And if you succeed and can’t sustain it, then I suggest you read this transcript of  Elizabeth Gilbert’s TED talk entitled Success, Failure and the Drive to Keep Creating  below.

“So, a few years ago I was at JFK Airport about to get on a flight, when I was approached by two women who I do not think would be insulted to hear themselves described as tiny old tough-talking Italian-American broads.

The taller one, who is like up here, she comes marching up to me, and she goes, “Honey, I gotta ask you something. You got something to do with that whole ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ thing that’s been going on lately?”

And I said, “Yes, I did.”

And she smacks her friend and she goes, “See, I told you, I said, that’s that girl. That’s that girl who wrote that book based on that movie.” (Laughter)

So that’s who I am. And believe me, I’m extremely grateful to be that person, because that whole “Eat, Pray, Love” thing was a huge break for me. But it also left me in a really tricky position moving forward as an author trying to figure out how in the world I was ever going to write a book again that would ever please anybody, because I knew well in advance that all of those people who had adored “Eat, Pray, Love” were going to be incredibly disappointed in whatever I wrote next because it wasn’t going to be “Eat, Pray, Love,” and all of those people who had hated “Eat, Pray, Love” were going to be incredibly disappointed in whatever I wrote next because it would provide evidence that I still lived. So I knew that I had no way to win, and knowing that I had no way to win made me seriously consider for a while just quitting the game and moving to the country to raise corgis. But if I had done that, if I had given up writing, I would have lost my beloved vocation, so I knew that the task was that I had to find some way to gin up the inspiration to write the next book regardless of its inevitable negative outcome. In other words, I had to find a way to make sure that my creativity survived its own success. And I did, in the end, find that inspiration, but I found it in the most unlikely and unexpected place. I found it in lessons that I had learned earlier in life about how creativity can survive its own failure.

So just to back up and explain, the only thing I have ever wanted to be for my whole life was a writer. I wrote all through childhood, all through adolescence, by the time I was a teenager I was sending my very bad stories to The New Yorker, hoping to be discovered. After college, I got a job as a diner waitress, kept working, kept writing, kept trying really hard to get published, and failing at it. I failed at getting published for almost six years. So for almost six years, every single day, I had nothing but rejection letters waiting for me in my mailbox. And it was devastating every single time, and every single time, I had to ask myself if I should just quit while I was behind and give up and spare myself this pain. But then I would find my resolve, and always in the same way, by saying, “I’m not going to quit, I’m going home.”

And you have to understand that for me, going home did not mean returning to my family’s farm. For me, going home meant returning to the work of writing because writing was my home, because I loved writing more than I hated failing at writing, which is to say that I loved writing more than I loved my own ego, which is ultimately to say that I loved writing more than I loved myself. And that’s how I pushed through it.

But the weird thing is that 20 years later, during the crazy ride of “Eat, Pray, Love,” I found myself identifying all over again with that unpublished young diner waitress who I used to be, thinking about her constantly, and feeling like I was her again, which made no rational sense whatsoever because our lives could not have been more different. She had failed constantly. I had succeeded beyond my wildest expectation. We had nothing in common. Why did I suddenly feel like I was her all over again?

And it was only when I was trying to unthread that that I finally began to comprehend the strange and unlikely psychological connection in our lives between the way we experience great failure and the way we experience great success. So think of it like this: For most of your life, you live out your existence here in the middle of the chain of human experience where everything is normal and reassuring and regular, but failure catapults you abruptly way out over here into the blinding darkness of disappointment. Success catapults you just as abruptly but just as far way out over here into the equally blinding glare of fame and recognition and praise. And one of these fates is objectively seen by the world as bad, and the other one is objectively seen by the world as good, but your subconscious is completely incapable of discerning the difference between bad and good. The only thing that it is capable of feeling is the absolute value of this emotional equation, the exact distance that you have been flung from yourself. And there’s a real equal danger in both cases of getting lost out there in the hinterlands of the psyche.

But in both cases, it turns out that there is also the same remedy for self-restoration, and that is that you have got to find your way back home again as swiftly and smoothly as you can, and if you’re wondering what your home is, here’s a hint: Your home is whatever in this world you love more than you love yourself. So that might be creativity, it might be family, it might be invention, adventure, faith, service, it might be raising corgis, I don’t know, your home is that thing to which you can dedicate your energies with such singular devotion that the ultimate results become inconsequential.

For me, that home has always been writing. So after the weird, disorienting success that I went through with “Eat, Pray, Love,” I realized that all I had to do was exactly the same thing that I used to have to do all the time when I was an equally disoriented failure. I had to get my ass back to work, and that’s what I did, and that’s how, in 2010, I was able to publish the dreaded follow-up to “Eat, Pray, Love.” And you know what happened with that book? It bombed, and I was fine. Actually, I kind of felt bulletproof, because I knew that I had broken the spell and I had found my way back home to writing for the sheer devotion of it. And I stayed in my home of writing after that, and I wrote another book that just came out last year and that one was really beautifully received, which is very nice, but not my point. My point is that I’m writing another one now, and I’ll write another book after that and another and another and another and many of them will fail, and some of them might succeed, but I will always be safe from the random hurricanes of outcome as long as I never forget where I rightfully live.

Look, I don’t know where you rightfully live, but I know that there’s something in this world that you love more than you love yourself. Something worthy, by the way, so addiction and infatuation don’t count, because we all know that those are not safe places to live. Right? The only trick is that you’ve got to identify the best, worthiest thing that you love most, and then build your house right on top of it and don’t budge from it. And if you should someday, somehow get vaulted out of your home by either great failure or great success, then your job is to fight your way back to that home the only way that it has ever been done, by putting your head down and performing with diligence and devotion and respect and reverence whatever the task is that love is calling forth from you next. You just do that, and keep doing that again and again and again, and I can absolutely promise you, from long personal experience in every direction, I can assure you that it’s all going to be okay. Thank you.”

Now you know.  Your self-imposed limitations are just thoughts masquerading as fears.  Change your perspective, your thoughts, and good-bye fears.  So why not go for it?!?

Categories: Change, Goals, Potential, Strategies | Tags: change, Dana Lightman, fear, growth, limitations, Optimism, potential, POWER Optimism, psychology, thoughts |

Reactive Emotions Can Hurt Negotiations

Published on: October 10, 2012 | Author: Dana Lightman Team
Dana Lightman reactions

 

Do you find yourself getting upset, annoyed, or angry when trying to communicate about your needs?  If so, you may be shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to negotiating.  According to Stuart Diamond, author of Getting More: You Can Negotiate to Succeed in Work and Life, emotions hurt negotiations. 

In his experience, powerful people are not always the best negotiators.  Keen listeners are.  This is why women are instinctively better at negotiating than men.  Because they listen more, they collect more information to help them persuade.  And because we live in a male-dominated world, women have less raw power.  So they learn to be more creative in negotiating.

In contrast, emotional people listen less and process less information.  Instead of focusing on goals, emotional negotiators focus on punishment, such as blaming the other party.  When you are in control of your emotions and “use” them sparingly, they can help you make a point.  But if used too much, you lose credibility.

How can you learn to control emotions in negotiations?  If you get emotional, take a break.  And have realistic expectations.  For example, if you expect the other person to be outrageous, you won’t get upset when they are.  If the other person gets emotional, give them an apology, a concession or expression of empathy, such as “I understand.”  It is not in your best interest for the other person to be emotionally reactive, so it is in your best interest to help that person regain control.

Interestingly, the same principles of negotiation apply to personal and professional relationships. These include:

  • Put yourself in the other person’s shoes
  • Listen
  • Acknowledge
  • Communicate clearly
  • Stay focused on your goals
  • Get firm commitments
  • Don’t storm out.

Realize that the world is irrational.  Thus, the more important the negotiation is to someone, the more emotional they will be.  It makes no difference whether you are discussing a billion-dollar deal or your child wanting an ice cream!

Categories: Conflict resolution, Goals, Influence, No More Difficult People | Tags: communication, Dana Lightman, emotions, listening, negotiation, no more difficult people, reactivity |

How to Flow Again

Published on: September 12, 2012 | Author: Dana Lightman Team
Dana Lightman unstuck

You know what you want to achieve, but you are not making any progress.  You feel stuck. You know what to do, but you are not doing it. You are stuck.  Why does this happen, and what can you do about it?

For starters, you can’t get from point A to point B if you don’t know where you are going. Too often, you’re stuck because unfocused desires bring unfocused results. The key:  Focus. Take dating as an example.  The very nature of dating is an opportunity to generate greater clarity and focus.  Do you, or someone you know, simply go out on dates as if you are going through the motions?  An alternative is to approach each date as an opportunity to learn more about who you are and what you want in a mate.  If the date is successful, focus on what made it work. If the date is a failure, learn from the contrast of what you didn’t like to gain awareness of what you do like. The same process works for job searching, house hunting, and clothes shopping. To flow again requires gaining clarity on your wants, needs and desires.

Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you are stuck because you are trying to control the outcome of a circumstance that is really in your “no control zone?”  If so, it’s time to follow the 24-hour rule.  Take a step back and make a decision to do nothing for the next 24 hours.  After that time, revisit the situation.  Do you see things from a different angle?  Are you able to shift from a problem-focus to a solution-mentality?  Do you feel less emotionally invested?  Do you find yourself aligned with your inner being?  Can you call on intuition as well as reason?  Often times, you can get back into the flow by deliberately deciding to do nothing.  When inaction is a choice rather than a reaction, it can work in your favor.

Are you a person who holds onto grudges?  Do you feel resentment?  Do you want to get even?  This type attitude is bound to keep you stuck.  Why?  Because you are holding on to situations from the past that are over and done with.  If this is your approach to life, you need the F word: forgiveness.  The key to forgiveness is letting go of the past so you are free to live in the present and the future untethered by negative feelings.  (For more on forgiveness, see the series on this topic from June and July, 2010 in this blog.)  Whether an act of wrongdoing is momentous or petty, forgiveness is a behavior that removes the obstacles from your energy flow.  It is as if your energy is no longer dammed up. You can breathe and get on with things.

The next time you feel stuck, don’t just stay stuck.  Find your focus, choose a 24-hour period of deliberate inaction, and forgive others (and yourself) of any past resentments.  Now go ahead and flow forward!!!

 

Categories: Disappointment, Forgiveness, Goals, Strategies | Tags: Dana Lightman, flow, focus, Forgiveness, go with the flow, Optimism, POWER Optimism |

Stories of Hope

Published on: November 10, 2011 | Author: Dana Lightman Team
Dana Lightman hope

No one moves forward in a straight line.  If you are in a funk because of the one step forward, two steps back dance you are doing, it can help to remember that you are not alone.  Stories about famous people who succeeded against the odds, who suffered enormous obstacles and setbacks but didn’t cave in or despair, can be uplifting.  Here are a few:

THOMAS EDISON, the inventor of the light bulb, was told by his teacher that he was too stupid to learn anything.

CHARLES DARWIN, the famous naturalist and developer of the theory of evolution, did quite poorly in his early grades and even failed a university medical course.

WOODROW WILSON, a Rhodes scholar and president of the United States, didn’t learn the alphabet until he was eight.  He didn’t read until he was eleven.

ALBERT EINSTEIN did not talk until age four or read until age nine.  He performed badly  in almost all his high school courses and failed his college entrance exams.

MICHAEL JORDAN was actually cut from his high school basketball team.

AGATHA CHRISTIE, the British mystery writer who was called the Queen of Crime, wrote nearly 100 books that have sold some 2 billion copies – even though she had a learning disability called dysgraphia, which makes it hard to write legibly.  (And this was before computers!!)

If you want to persevere on a difficult task and bounce back from adversity, try saying a simple phrase to yourself.  For example:

    • It doesn’t have to be perfect.
    • I can learn from my mistakes.
    • Everybody makes mistakes.
    • I can’t get any better unless I try.
    •  I made a mistake.  Now I’ll correct it.  I can turn it around.

Now it’s up to you.  Like the people mentioned above, you can keep at your dreams until you succeed.  Or, if you’re ready to move on, you can do so from a position of strength, knowing you gave it your all!

Source:

www.WorkingMother.com  (August/September 2011, p. 42) 

Categories: Goals, Resiliency | Tags: adversity, downward spiral, Goals, hope, perseverence, resilience, resiliency, upward spiral |

Find Inspiration, Not Motivation, for New Year Resolutions

Published on: December 20, 2010 | Author: Dana Lightman Team
dana lightman inspiration

It’s a paradox.  Sometimes setting a strong intention to achieve a goal actually works against you.  It seems logical that if you want to accomplish an objective you need to have a certain amount of willfulness, a persistence to pursue the project to completion.  But it turns out from research that the key to success may not be willfulness, but willingness to think of the future as an open question.  How you talk to yourself about your goals determines whether you are motivated or inspired.  And there is a significant difference between the two.

Here’s the experiment psychologist Ibrahim Senay of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign designed to explore willfulness vs. willingness.  He focused on self-talk, that voice in your head that converses with you about your hopes, fears, options, beliefs.  Senay wondered what self-talk could reveal about how you shape your plans and actions; he wanted to determine how self-talk might be a tool for exerting your will or for being willing.

He had two groups of volunteers work on a series of anagrams (changing the word order to create a new word, for example, “sauce” to “cause”).  One group was the “willfulness group,” which thought about the fact that they would be doing anagrams in a few minutes.  Their self talk would be “I will do this.”  The second group, the “willingness group,” was told to contemplate whether they would work on anagrams.  Their self talk would be “Will I do this?”

The results were surprising.  The second group (“Will I do this?) completed significantly more anagrams than the first group (“I will do this.)  Why would this happen?  Senay hypothesized that questions by their nature speak to possibility and freedom of choice. Thinking about them might enhance intrinsic inspiration, thereby creating a mind-set that leads to greater success.

He tested this hypothesis in another experiment.  Telling volunteers they were needed for a handwriting study, he had one group repeatedly write the words “I will” and another “Will I?”  Each group then completed anagrams.  As before, the volunteers who were primed with the open-minded questions outperformed those who were primed by determination.

Now, for a real life test.  Senay ran another version of the study, but instead of anagrams, he measured the volunteers’ intentions to start and complete a fitness program.  Again, the “will I” group prevailed.

What does all this mean for you in terms of achieving your New Year’s resolutions?  Consider these typical responses from volunteers in the gym test.  Those primed with the “Will I?” question said that they went to the gym “because I wanted to take more responsibility for my own health.”  Those primed by “I will” determination stated they worked out “because I would feel guilty and ashamed of myself if I did not.”   Herein lies the key.  Those who were less successful sought to motivate themselves by avoiding negative feelings of shame and guilt.  Those who were more successful found positive inspiration from within.

Why not put this to your own test.  With the New Year just around the corner, don’t set resolutions with the determined self talk of “I will.”  Instead, state your goal and then continue to ask, “Will I?”  This will help you find your internal inspiration rather than depend on the much weaker commitment to change that comes from motivation.  Stay open-minded and tap into the empowerment that comes from freedom of choice to increase your probability of success this year.

Source:

Scientific American Mind, July 20, 2010

Categories: Goals, Inspiration | Tags: Ibrahim Senay, Inspiration, motivation, new year's resolutions, open-ended questions, personal choice, self-talk |

What’s Your Hope Score?

Published on: April 17, 2010 | Author: Dana Lightman Team
dana lightman hope

Hope – the foundation of human improvement, inspiring us to go forward, do better, achieve great things. Hope is a choice, a can-do attitude accompanied by the active intent to reach a desired destination. Hope expert C. R. Snyder explains that hope is not an abstract idea, but is actually goal-directed thinking. “It’s exhilarating to encounter high-hope people,” he says. “How they think about life is infectious. They leave trails of energy and positive feelings wherever they go.”*

Snyder has developed The Hope Scale**, which measures hope from a high-hope to low-hope range. Here’s an abbreviated version of the scale. As you think about these statements, rate your responses from 1 (definitely false) to 4 (definitely true.) The sum of these answers provides your Hope Score.

1. I can think of many ways to get out of a jam.
2. I energetically pursue my goals.
3. There are lots of ways around a problem.
4. I can think of many ways to get the things in life that are most important to me.
5. Even when others get discouraged, I know I can find a way to solve the problem.
6. My past experiences have prepared me well for my future.
7. I’ve been pretty successful in life.
8. I meet the goals that I set for myself.

So, how did you score? If you want to enhance your hope, here are some suggestions based on Snyder’s research.

• Learn self-talk about succeeding.
• Think of difficulties arising due to wrong strategy, not lack of talent.
• Recall past successes.
• Find movies, CD’s, books about how other people have succeeded.
• Find friends with whom you can talk about your goals.
• Look for role models you can emulate.
• Laugh at yourself.
• Reward yourself when you achieve the small steps on the way to your long-term goal.
• If you need new skills to reach your destination, educate yourself.
• If you are absolutely blocked in achieving your goal, set a new goal for yourself.

The difference between achieving your goal and getting stuck is a matter of mindset, a choice to continue to hope. Are you ready to boost your hope score in order to reach your destination and experience the success you desire?

Interested in learning more? Check out Making Hope Happen: A Workbook For Turning Possibilities Into Reality, by CR Snyder and Diane McDermott.

Sources:
*Psychologies, February 2010, p. 20
**The Hope Scale: A Measurement of Willpower and Waypower, by Jerry Pattengale

Categories: Goals, Inspiration | Tags: Goals, hope, hope scale, hope test |

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What automated decision making and/or profiling we do with user data

No automated decision making is done, we simply analyze where traffic is coming from in order to see if our marketing ideas are working well. To see a list of technologies used within this website: https://builtwith.com/danalightman.com

Industry regulatory disclosure requirements

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