Dr. John Townsend

This Christmas and New Year season, make a resolution for yourself that will actually get you somewhere next year: learn to be “healthily selfish.” You will surprised by the progress and growth you experience in the important areas of your life with this skill.

Let’s first clarify that “selfishness” all by itself isn’t a good thing at all. It puts our own interests out there at the expense of others, and ultimately backfires in life. Healthy selfishness is actually about being a responsible steward of your time and energy, while at the same time caring for, and serving those you care about. Here are some principles and tips that will help you.

· Actually write down your own goals for this year. Healthy people do more than consider what they want to accomplish. They actually take the time, focus and energy to write their goals down. It will take time away from what others want of you, but it will be worth it.

· Before you answer others’ requests for your time, review your priorities. A critical mistake people make in the morning is to answer emails, texts and phone calls before they really consider what they themselves want their day to look like. The result is that the day is controlled by others’ agenda for you, and not your own. Instead, resist the temptation to respond to others first, and simply spend a few minutes reviewing what your priorities are for that day. You will find that the demands and requests of others will find their place within your agenda, rather than hijacking your agenda.

· Express to others what you truly desire and need. Your needs are good things. They are the fuel to your growth and success. You and you alone are responsible for your own needs, and they are yours to convey. It’s not a narcissistic move to say “I need some time with you” “I need some time for myself” or “I’d like to talk about an idea I have with you.” It is simply how life works. No one can say what we need but ourselves. We truly don’t have, because we don’t ask (James 4:2).

· Say “no” every day. I study uber-successful people, to understand their own secret sauce. One consistent habit these individuals have is that they almost NEVER go through a day without at least one polite but clear statement in which words come out like “No”, “Can’t do that”, “That doesn’t work for me” or “Sorry, that won’t happen. ” You have to exercise that “no muscle” on a daily basis, to keep it working smoothly and consistently. And you’ll still be a nice person!

Be “healthily selfish”—that is, be in control of your time and energy. And do good in the world.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,

John Townsend

One of the most beneficial, quickest and cheapest things you can do for yourself, your life and your leadership is to engage in positivity. Positivity is the habit of doing what is necessary to maximize your positive outlook and emotions. This can make a significant difference in outcomes that matter to you. Here are some of the benefits:

• Increased energy
• Better concentration and focus
• Healthier relationships
• Improved problem solving
• More creativity

There is a ton of research on positivity, and one finding is that we need to have 3 times the positive emotions as we do negative emotions to optimize ourselves. Think about that: in your last 24 hours, were your feelings of love, happiness, ambition and joy triple those of the anxiety, anger and sadness you felt? Most of us don’t have that ratio in our experience.

It’s also true that negative feelings are an important part of life, and are actually very helpful to us. We need anxiety to avoid mistakes, anger to protect the good, and sadness to honor our losses. But we also need healthy doses of the positive. Here are some tips to help your 3:1 ratio:

1. Intentionally “think positive” in the morning, afternoon and evening. During your day, look at the good as well as the crummy aspects of your situation, for example: “I like what I do for a living and it helps the world”; “I am so grateful for my friends and family, and who they are as people”; “I have good goals that mean something to me.” This isn’t being in denial or a Pollyanna at all. It’s experiencing all of reality, not just one side of reality.

2. Engage in positive activities. When we do things we enjoy, our brain secretes substances that act as a natural antidepressant. We feel energy and hope. What do you love to do, that you haven’t had time for lately? I had lunch with a well known celebrity couple yesterday, whose time is much in demand. I asked them, “So what do you guys do for fun?” They looked sheepishly at each other and said, “Nothing, we’ve been so busy.” I challenged them to take some “me” time and they jumped at the fact that someone external to them was actually giving them permission. It can be working out, stamp collecting, painting, rowing, or going to shows. But do something that actually “feels good.”

3. Maximize your positive relationships, and minimize the negative ones. We literally become whoever we spend time with. Relationships feed us lots of ingredients for life, the same way the soil feeds nutrients to a tree. But negative attitudes, complaining, blaming and helplessness will slow things down. Make sure most of the people you hang out with are fundamentally positive people. We all have a few people in life who struggle greatly, and we owe it to them to love and support them. But don’t make that your entire relational world.

I’m “positive” that you will see things change quickly with these three tips. Best to your life and leadership!

A trait I find in very successful people is that they regularly say what they want. They make it simple, and, more often than not, they get what they ask for.

The “want list” can be anything, including:

• The results you want your employees to deliver
• A meeting with someone you don’t know well but would like to
• A better price on a product or service
• Where you’d like to vacation next year
• The purpose of a team meeting
• What you want to do on date night
• The desired behavior you’d like to see from your kids, spouse, date or friend

On the other end, I find that people who struggle in being successful, also have difficult in saying what they want. There are lots of reasons for this, such as not wanting to seem selfish or uncaring; not wanting to put people to a lot of trouble; or not wanting to alienate others.

All of these obstacles point to a single issue: the belief that my wanting something is a win-lose transaction. If I get what I want, someone has to lose. I’ll get the better business deal but the other person will resent me. I’ll tell my kids I insist that they clean up their room, but they’ll escalate. I’ll ask for the results from my employees, but they will think I’m demanding.

While this does happen sometimes, if you try to spend your time with reasonable people, no one really minds. In fact, reasonable people prefer to know what you want. Then it’s clear. They are informed as to whether they can say yes, no, or I have an alternative.

Here are a few tips to lead and live better with directness:

• Remember how annoyed you get when someone won’t get to the point and is indirect. You don’t want to be that indirect person either.
• Figure out your “ask” ahead of time, if it’s something important, Think it through: is it reasonable on my part? Is the timing right? Does it take the other person’s interests into consideration, because I authentically care about them?
• Gain access to your internal desires. When you’re hungry, you say “Pull the car over, let’s go to that restaurant.” In the same way, when you can feel the positive excitement of your directs reaching a goal, then use that feeling to say, “He guys, if you hit your quota, it will be an awesome achievement for you and the entire company.”
• Expect a positive response. When you think, “She and I are both nice people and there’s no reason this can’t go well”, you are not afraid. You are confident, and that calms the other person down. But when you are afraid, and expect a tantrum or a negative response, you are more likely to get that. People can sense fear and it unsettles them.
• Look them in the eye. People trust someone who look at them directly and say, “In this meeting, I want us to have a solution for the marketing problem hashed out in 60 minutes, and I’ll do everything I can to help.” It’s respectful and it’s definite. The shifty looking away out of anxiety conveys that something is wrong, and trust becomes an issue.
• Stop talking and give them space to answer. Don’t let your unease make you fill in the blanks with lots of nothing talk, like, “But you know you have a choice” (they know), or “And here’s another reason” (they have heard enough reasons). People need room in their heads to deliberate on what you want and what they’d like to do.

The Bible says we have not because we ask not. Mick Jagger says we can’t always get what we want, but if we try sometimes, we get what we need. I put God way above Mick, but both ideas are helpful! Say what you want.

Best to your leadership,

John

Leaders are highly interested in potential, both for themselves and for their organizations. They want to be high capacity, they want to actualize, and they want to get as much growth out of themselves and their companies as is possible. Yet often, they get started and things get really vague and they just don’t know if they are reaching their potential.

For example, a CEO I had in my leadership training program was, to the other team members, “The Guy” in the group. His company had both the highest valuation, the best annual growth percentages and the most number of employees. And he was a truly nice person, no real ego issues. Yet once I started getting to know him, I realized he was an underachiever and I told him so.

He was a bit put off by that but wanted to understand my observation. I told him, “You’re a very talented person, but you’re running your company in your sleep. What would make some of your colleagues sweat bullets is pretty easy for you. So I think you’re a 12 cylinder Lamborghini who is running on 9. To the world, you look like you’re firing on all of them but I think you’ve got 3 more that you’re not touching.”

He thought a bit and then said, “OK, that’s probably true now that I think about it. So what do I do?”

I said, “Muscle failure.”

He said, “I don’t get it.”

“Muscle failure”, I repeated. “You know, when your workout trainer shows you how to push the weights to a certain number of reps until that point comes where you cannot, just cannot do one more rep. It is not a matter of will, it is a matter of capacity. By definition, your muscles have reached their potential, at least for that session. Then, later you keep developing. I’d like you to start trying things at a higher level that are scary for you, make you insecure, and are a bit overwhelming. Let’s get you higher to your own potential.”

He was and is a motivated person, and took the challenge. The result was that in 2 years his company went scale at a level he had never dreamed. Then, of course he went on to the next challenge, because it all started feeling pretty good.

Most leaders are actually like this man. The world sees us getting lots of base hits but we know, in our heart of hearts, that we’re not really pushing to who God made us.

You don’t have to be a performance-oriented, legalistic, self-hating person. In fact, you’ll never reach your potential that way, as the Law is never enough, and Grace completes things. But you don’t want to be comfortably numb either, do you?

Where is your muscle failure? Start thinking about the next challenge.