The Ultimate Sales Machine - Chet Holmes [122]
As you’ve learned throughout this book, mastering anything is not about doing 4,000 new things, but doing 12 things 4,000 times. To master your business, you will no doubt go through each of the competencies in this book again and again, each time seeing more and more improvement and growth in your business. You can’t be a master at all of these skills instantly, but setting periodic goals will speed the process. The latter half of this chapter will give you detailed processes for tracking all your major initiatives, especially your Dream 100 effort.
What if in addition to all the steps, tools, workshops, and insights you have learned in this book, you had one more added advantage—a computer programmed to exclusively focus on seeking out opportunities and generating success for you even while you sleep? This computer does nothing else all day but look at the world around you, searching for anything and every thing that will create more success in every aspect of your life. Sound good?
In fact, you do have exactly that kind of computer in your brain. It’s called the reticular activating system (RAS), and the problem is that most of us have unknowingly set it to seek out things we don’t want instead of achieving the amazing results we dream about.
In this chapter you will learn what the RAS is and how to harness its power to create success in every area of your business and your life. You will also understand exactly how to set goals and mea sure effectiveness to put you on the fast track to growth. Finally, you will get a detailed look of the best example I’ve ever seen of a company using pigheaded discipline and determination to master and execute the 12 competencies you’ve learned in this book so it could become the Ultimate Sales Machine.
What We Think Defines Who We Are
The reticular activating system is that awesome computer in the brain that most of us never use on purpose.9 Every day we have thousands of thoughts that seem to leap in and out of our minds. The truth is that those thoughts affect every cell in our body. Our cells are completely reactive to the environment in which they dwell, and thought is one of the most powerful sources for creating that environment. Some now say that if you’re angry, fearful, or anxious when you eat or drink, you literally poison the food you’re putting into you’re body (see the 2004 documentary film What the #$*! Do We Know?! for more on this). But when you keep your thoughts focused on all the positive things in your life and the positive things you want to happen in your life, you awaken and purposefully focus your subconscious to create outstanding improvements on every front.
Take a minute and think about the kinds of thoughts you’ve had today. What has been the predominant tone and character of those thoughts? If you’re like most people, your thoughts are dominated by problems and self-criticism. People tend to dwell on what’s not working in their lives and, as mentioned before, people bond easily over shared unhappiness, sorrow, or complaints.
Listen to the people around you. It’s amazing how many times you will hear things like “I hate when that happens” or “I’m so out of shape” or “I can’t do that.” The reticular activating system is the attitude programmer of the brain, and its power lies in the fact that the subconscious accepts all you feed it as reality. So if you’re telling it you can’t do something, guess what? You won’t be able to do it. The subconscious cannot make judgments about the thought and say: “Oh, she doesn’t mean it. Let’s do it better this time.” It cannot distinguish between a real perception and an imaginary one. So if you perceive you can’t do something, you’ll probably fail. Worrying has the same impact. If you worry about a problem, your subconscious thinks the problem is what’s important to you and it won’t help you find solutions. To find solutions, you have to change your thinking from worrying about the problem to demanding solutions. I’ve done it 100 times in seemingly impossible