We are all fond of calling our business a vehicle.
The 4Ds are the tires on our vehicles.
Good tires will get you there safe, sound and fast.
Delay Gratification.
Sacrifice? Sure. We all make sacrifices when we want things to change. Heck, we gotta give up sugar is we want to lose weight BUT we have to stay off sugar if we want to keep the weight off. Delaying Gratification is not really the same thing.
I was working 70-80 hours a week delivering seafood in 1993 and raising 2 kids. So I stopped watching 2 football games in Sunday and put those 8 hours into my business. I promised that I would only watch TV when the San Francisco 49er’s were on. They were on about 3-4 times. That was Delaying Gratification.
The life changing conversation that I had with Tony Bowling and then stopping TV altogether, vowing not to fix the plugs I had cut on the TVs until I got to $10,000 a month felt like a sacrifice, it was not.
Not really. We’ve flown from Boston to San Francisco several times over the years to meet with friends and go to 49er games. It was delaying [and then enhancing] gratification.
Dedication.
To this day, despite what I know about people, I am stunned that people do not thirst for skills or practice.
Stunned.
Folks seem pretty hungry for short-cuts, never tiring of looking for gurus and lead generation systems but practice?
Fuggetaboutit
Leaders have one overriding thing in common.
They cheat!.
How?
They practice.
They have well practiced ways to bring up their business, answer questions and guide the conversation in a direction beneficial to themselves and the prospect. Want-a-be’s keep looking for ‘the right people.’
They practice showing the plan.
When opportunity to show the plan presents itself leaders are ready and confident. Go figure.
We’ve already established ‘looking for the right people is the biggest lie in network marketing.
Are we dedicated when we spend hours evaluating systems or just lazy. Â The number of names we have is irrelevant if we don’t know what to say and to do.
We must find out what top earners like the one’s upline from us and dedicate ourselves to finding out what they do and practice.
Determination.
Now this, like delaying gratification is not beating our chests about how we are going to make it…..nor is it doing the same thing over and over that does not work.
Persistent or stubborn or just being stupid? Â It is a fine, fine line. Â This is another blog altogether.
Webster, in this context, defines it this way: firm or fixed intention to achieve a desired end ~ and ~ the fixation on a destiny. Â If we are not spending 30 minutes a day, sitting still and ‘picturizing’ our destiny we’ll be a sucker for every con artist out there peddling ‘secrets.’ Â When we have “the fixation” we stand for something internally.
There’s an old saying, “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”
Real simple. Â Its about faith. Â The size of your faith is equal to your level of determination. Â Read the Faith Chapter from Think and Grow Rich, all of it. Â Come on, do it now….the lead peddlers and gurus will still be there waiting for you. Â Give yourself a gift.
Discipline.
Of the 4Ds, the most crucial of the D’s.
Discipline to Delay Gratification right now. Â If we cannot control the body, we’ll never control the mind. Â Will we turn off the TV right now or after tomorrow’s BIG GAME?
Discipline to Dedicate ourselves to our craft, to learn skills and to practice.
Discipline to personify Determination, to sit still for 30 minutes and think, to pull ourselves away from the ‘puter screen and create the fixation that becomes so powerful that all we come in contact with know that we know where we are going and they know we are going to get there.
It’s so powerful that it is communicated with our eyes, attitude and actions and does not need to be verbalized.
Your business is the ‘vehicle’ that will get you where you want to go.
The 4Ds are the tires.
Have we checked the tread on our tires lately?
believe
mark januszewski
World’s Laziest Networker
You’re definitely on top of it with this one, Mark. When I think of the journey I’ve personally had to take, all four D’s were a factor — and they still are today.
Thanks for the inspiration.
T.Gray
This is so true! Mark J. says it straight and true. We to often look for the short cut and need to really learn what about our industry and how it works, in order to develop the business so many people want, but will not put the effort out to accomplish.
So many temptations……so easy to lose focus……but that’s the trick of the folks like you that make it happen ….honesty, inventory, adjustment
I could not agree with you more strongly….The 4Ds get us there and adherence to them keeps us there…..I find when I am off track all I have to do is look at the 4D’s and I will find the solution instantly….I don’t always have the Disipline to look there first ~ LOL ~ but I around to being honest with myself [another Disipline] faster than I used to.
thanks for stopping by