The 12 Traits Of Successful People

Your network is going to be your accountability. Your network is going to be the thing that reflects back to you. If you can or can't do something, your network is going to tell you what is possible for your future. And if you are not building your network as much as you are building your business, your business will max out at a certain point. Hey everyone, welcome back to the show. It's time for another quickie because there's always time to fit in inspiration. And I have just gotten off of a week of getting my rear end handed to me being sick. I'm sending all of you tons of love if you have been sick as well. It is the ultimate lesson in surrender, isn't it? It feels like we should be doing everything else but laying there and resting, even though that is the most important thing that we should be doing. And whether or not you are somebody who sets all of your New year goals before the New year is even here, or whether you are someone who gets really overwhelmed by New Year's goals, this topic is for you because it is just all about being a better person and leader. Somebody who has the traits of a successful person will eventually become successful. So I've written down the 12 traits that I think make a successful person and there are many that I'm going to be focusing on in the new year. In fact, I'm going to be focusing on all of them. But I don't want that to overwhelm you because I am just focusing on them as the opportunities arise. And so once you realize what the traits are of a successful person as they show up every single day, because we use all of them, you can just kind of notice where you need a little bit more work and, and where you can focus a little bit more of your energy. But eventually, if you start strengthening even a few of these, I believe that you're gonna notice more success in your life. So number one is just being goal oriented. And I think even having one to three goals, I think a lot of people get very overwhelmed this time of year because the calendar flips and they write down 10 things that they wanna do. I know that this used to be me. I'd put like 10 new things on my vision board every year. And what is two weeks in, I'd be so overwhelmed that I'd be back to my old self and I'd actually feel even more defeated sometimes. So a goal oriented person can just mean that you have one to three things that you are focusing on. And in fact, I think that that is a much better way to gain success is maybe this year you're just focusing on eating better. Maybe you're not even focusing on working out yet. Maybe you're just like, I just want to dial in my nutrition this year because I'm finding that I feel so terrible I can't even focus on business. Go goals. Maybe that's your first six months, whatever that looks like. Maybe you are focusing on wanting to learn how to invest your money this year. And that is gonna be the one thing where if you have some extra time and energy that you are going to listen to some podcasts in the morning or in the evening or when you're on your walks and you're going to learn more about investing your money. Just picking those one to three and getting really clear is gonna make a big difference. And I think that that's the difference with successful people is they hon on what that thing is for that year or what those three things are that they're really dialing in. But they know that they don't have all of the time and energy for a ton of things. So backing it down to one to three things. Number two, resilience. I don't know of a person who is successful who cannot cope with a great deal of uncertainty and cannot cope with failure. I know that most successful people view failure and even having fear in a very different relationship than people who are not successful. Chris and I were just talking about people that we've known through the years and we wish that they something would click for them because there's some things that we notice that they are not able to handle uncertainty or fear around different things or not knowing. And unfortunately in the world, in order to be successful, you have to handle a great deal of uncertainty. You have to just keep moving forward and creating because life is very uncertain. The world is very uncertain. In fact, the only certain thing is that the world will always be very uncertain and that nothing is guaranteed. And I think the more that you can really dig deep into being grateful for what you have and also if you have a hope of something or if you have faith in something as well. I know that my belief in God and that everything is happening for me has been the biggest thing that's gotten me through things. That's been the thing that has helped me be resilient is knowing that even if I lost everything all over again, I could start again and I would still have my relationship with my creator and I would still figure things out. And I put a lot of trust and faith in that. And that's helped me be really, really resilient throughout the years. And it's that ability to face adversity. Number three is self discipline. So what are the things that you, every single day, day in and day out, know that you are going to do no matter what? For me, I know it is gonna be to always come back to making better food choices. Even if I go off the rails a little bit here and there, it's just so in me that I know food is my mood. And so for me, if I'm in a bad mood, a of lot, a lot of it I know is because of what I've eaten and of course, what I'm focusing on mentally. But food plays such a massive goal in how easy it feels to choose a positive mindset or not, because it really weighs on us. It's either a positive energy that we're eating through food or really a negative energy that makes us tired and makes us feel like we can't do anything. So for me, self discipline, I know that I'm always gonna go back to eating well, and that's taken years and years and years to do that. I know I'm always going to work out. I'm always going to go for a walk because I know what that does for me every day. I know that I can literally solve all of the world's problems by walking. Another thing is I had to learn to get very self disciplined with how I was going to be working every single day with getting focused. I still struggle to this day with getting really distracted because I really, really have a short attention span and I have to work very, very hard on staying focused and that I stay disciplined and that things stay in my calendar. And the way that I do this is through a lot of other people. Like, I stay very accountable to people. I pay people to help me stay on track. I pay people on my team to help me get things done. I pay people to do certain things that I can't do and I couldn't always do that. And when I couldn't always do that when I did not have money. Because, you guys, if you've been listening long enough, you know that Chris and I had lost everything and we were really in debt and we had to figure out how to do these things with. Without help, I would trade with people. I would get really scrappy and figure out how I could either trade my fitness training or how I could do a favor, how I could give them something for free in exchange for what I needed. So self discipline can come by way of Other people as well, holding you accountable. I even had accountability groups, and obviously those were free. So I found other people who would really hold me to my goals, who also wanted to be held accountable, who also didn't have the money at the the time to really be spending on other people. Number four is continuous learning. So successful people are always, always learning, whether they're listening to podcasts or books or hanging out with people who are ahead of them. And something that is really big for me is obviously listening to podcasts and listening to books, reading books, because I cannot have had this podcast for. For what, almost eight years now, seven years, and not have had continuous learning. I would have nothing to tell you. I would have nothing to teach you. I would have absolutely nothing to say. I would have nothing new to say. So continuous learning, I find, not only is wonderful for being able to stay really relevant, but it has strengthened a lot of my relationships. Because as I'm going to dinner with these more successful people, I'm telling you, they just want their brain stimulated, too. So the more that you can share that's new for them, the more interesting you are to them as well. And obviously we know learning how to ask, if that just got you in your head and you're like, oh, my God, do I have to be interesting and smarter than these people? No, not always. But you can also learn. That's continuous learning. Learn how to ask better questions. And so listen to really good podcasts and listen to how the host is asking the question. Listen to other people when they're having conversations and really look at how intently they ask those questions. Listen to great interviewers, right? Go and listen and see what they're asking. And what really is the thing that's driving that conversation that you're enjoying so much. Number five, adaptability. This is really also just the ability to be uncertain and really lean into not knowing what the heck is coming up next. But adaptability is the ability to adapt in ever changing circumstances. It's really to change your strategies and your approaches. And I think of all the people in our world of maybe launching things in digital courses, and I can tell you that in the last few years, the landscape has changed so much. Ads are not working the way that they used to be working. Social is not getting the attention that it used to. And there are a lot of people out there who are like, this is done. This is failing. This is not working. And then there are a lot of people who are really successful, in fact, getting more and more successful. And it's because those People have changed and pivoted and learned where the attention is going and learned how to get it again. And so the people who tap out and give up and say, you know, things are hard, things are changing, I'm not able to figure this out. Obviously, those are not adaptable people because they figured out one way and they're not willing to figure out another way. To be adaptable means that you will always have success because you will always be looking for how things are changing. And the money never goes away. It just changes hands. You always have to go and see where is that money going and what are those people doing who have it. Number six, initiative. People who are successful show initiative first. Something that I did early on when I was starting my career. And a lot of people see me on a lot of big stages now, and they ask how I got on those stages. And I will tell you that it was creating initiative first, meaning I did not wait to get invited on stages. I created my own stage for years and years, over and over again. And it was through those stages that when I got invited on big stages, they had already seen that I could pull people into a room. They had already seen that I know how to handle a room. They had already seen over and over talks that I had given on my own stage so that they were not risking their stage. I showed initiative. I did not wait for someone to anoint me good enough to be chosen on a podcast on Spotify or paid for it or said, hey, here's a show for you. You're so amazing. We noticed how great you were on social media. Hell no, that does not happen. I started my own podcast, and 1200.

Episodes later, we're here.

Now, no one's still offering me a show or a bigger show somewhere, but when I want that, I don't actually know because I like what I have created. And people who are successful always show initiative first. They're not waiting for somebody to tell them that they are good enough. And what happens from that is when you anoint yourself good enough all of a sudd, and people see that you are because you're doing the damn thing. And then they can invite you to their stuff based off of the facts, based off of the data, and based off of the results that you're already getting in your life. Number seven, successful people have effective communication skills. And if I can tell you one thing that I learned right away in network marketing was the people who could learn how to effectively communicate and effectively lead and have conversations when conflict comes up were the people who were going to win. I cannot tell you how many leaders I saw literally destroy themselves and their business from falling out with other people. Like, hundreds of thousands of dollars in their business world lost because there were conflicts with other leaders or they got upset or the accusations of people stealing other people. Oh, my God. It was absolutely insane what I saw. Without effective communication and also without knowing this is not on my list, but without knowing where to put your energy. Like, some battles are just not worth being fought. Like, they're just not a hill worth dying on. Did we have people steal people from us? Yes. But I was very aware early on because I watched people sabotage themselves. I was like, you know what? That is just not worth my time. Because the time I'm gonna spend fighting on that, I could have enrolled five more people. I could have enrolled 10 new people. And so I've always been this way. I've always had the ability, which you can also learn to not give big energy to small things. I give big energy to the big things, which was at the time enrolling more people interested in the business because I knew that that effort would go so much further than trying to recover someone who maybe didn't even want to be on my team anyway if they did allow themselves, quote unquote, to get stolen. So I've always known when to just let those small fires go and when to really pay attention and fuel where to put my fuel, where to put my energy. Number eight, time management. Now this one, let me just tell you, if you want to know where I am going to be focusing in the new year, it is going to be time management. Because I just am so not great. I don't even want to say that out loud. I am someone who really needs to get more just more focused on making sure that I'm spending my time in the right places and that I'm not getting distracted, which means turning my devices off so that I am not getting distracted by email. I'm not getting distracted by text messages from my team. I'm not getting distracted by social media. I'm not getting distracted by what someone else is doing. So I will be turning more of my devices off while I'm doing one project at a time. And I know that this is where my secret sauce is going to lie. This year is where really getting focused when I'm in each project so that I can be in the task that I'm in and not everywhere else. Number nine is positive mindset. And this is obvious. You listen to this podcast, you guys, I know that you are either super great at this or you're listening because you want to get even better, but always focusing on more of what you have than what you don't. And I know that this is kind of counterintuitive because I also always tell you that you have to be okay with worst case scenario and you have to allow yourself to go there, but you only allow yourself to go there for a short amount of time until you come up with the solution that you would do when worst case scenario hits. And the reason that I have you do that is so that you can get into a positive mindset more often. And I think the people who don't do that actually struggle with a positive mindset because they never come up with a really solid plan for what happens if things are not going their way or things don't go well. So instead of their free time being able to really focus on what they want to create and having that positive mindset, they're always dwelling on what could happen, what could happen, what could happen. Instead of going, okay, this could happen, yes, let's go to the worst case scenario. This could happen. And I have a plan. So I don't need to focus there. I literally don't even need to spend my time there because now I can focus on what I want to be doing. Number 10, network and relationship or networking and relationship building. I will go down screaming this to you guys. Your network is going to be your accountability. Your network is going to be the thing that reflects back to you. If you can or can't do something. Your network is going to tell you what is possible for your future. And if you are not building your network as much as you are building your business, your business will max out at a certain point. It just will. You have to be able to have the people in your present life who can help you get answers. Even if this means that you are paying for one of their courses, paying for one of their masterminds, paying for access to them. You need to make sure you have some form of access so that you can get to the next level that they have been to. Right. Somewhere that they have been before. And that is why Chris and I have always, for years, been a part of a mastermind. Or you've seen us always building new relationships. You've seen us always getting into new groups, going to events. And this is also why we're super passionate about our dinner series that is happening all through 2024 that you can join literally at any time. You guys, this is an incredible, incredible, incredible event that we are doing this year. I also have the Girlfriends in Business event which is a one day event that we do twice per year. It's coming up on February 3rd. I hope that you can be there in Scottsdale, Arizona. It is all about expanding your brand and building your network.

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So number 11 integrity and ethics I will always do what is right. Even sometimes the right thing can be one of the most challenging things. And the right thing can make you choose from some of the worst things. Meaning nothing looks good. Sometimes the right right thing to do isn't the fun thing to do and it's not the best thing for your business. Right? But I think that through the years, Chris and I have always had a great business reputation because we sit down and we sit down with our team when we are in tough positions and we say what would be the right thing? Because there is no black and white. Sometimes in business there's different scenarios and different things that pop up and different situations and different situations in the world. Like when the pandemic hit, like what on earth are we supposed to do? What keeps the business afloat, but then what also is right by our people and our customers? And those are not easy decisions to make. So integrity and ethics is not going to be just something that you can take lightly. This is something that you, that you have to have a lot of conversations around. Because sometimes the decision that I thought was right, once I've sat down with people, I'm like, I'm so glad that I had everybody weigh in to get different perspectives because now I can see that this is the right decision. So really using different people, using your team, calling someone who's been there before, I know, I have a girlfriend who calls us a lot who is always asking, hey, have you had this situation come up amongst your customers or anything in events? Like, what happened? How did this pan out? What did this look like? Did you have to give refund? Like all of these different things that you may not know. So really tapping into people around that and then 12 the last one is just passion and drive. And I want to tell you, you're going to lose this and find it over and over and over again. And I talk a lot about passion, drive, and purpose. And purpose is something that you have to create and recreate. I don't think that we come out of the womb and we're like, hey, here's my one true purpose. And yeah, maybe it's like, to help people or something like that, but the way in which we do it is going to be different throughout the course of our lives and the way that we the things that we're passionate about and the topics that we're interested in. And so really asking yourself, this year, is my passion the same as it was last year? Maybe it's changing. Maybe last year you wanted to help transform women's health, and this year you're really noticing that you want to help them make money. You're like, you know, health is amazing, and I know it's so important, but I've noticed that I can't help women change their health if I don't help them make money because they don't have the money to stay on these programs, or they don't have the money to pay for the food they want, or they don't have the money to get themselves out of this negative situation or marriage that they're in. And so maybe you're shifting and you're noticing that your passion and drive is going to something really different this year. And that's okay. You just have to be able to name it. That's it. What are you passionate about this year? It doesn't matter if it's not some big grand life. You know, I want to go save children in this country over here. It doesn't have to be that way right now. I promise you. As you start to take care of these different dreams and really nurture them and fulfill them, you're going to notice how your purpose will get bigger and bigger and it'll multiply and help more people. So Chris and I call this not judging the carrot. Your carrot this year might just be that you want to make a little extra money so you can go shopping in a store and not look at the price tag of something so that you can check out at the grocery store and not worry about should you not have bought the more expensive cottage cheese or Greek yogurt. Right. Your why might be small right now. And that is okay. I had small Y's all the way leading up to bigger, and I got really overwhelmed. I'll Never forget, we were at some network marketing events and they always said, let your why be so big that you can't fear isn't even an obstacle. And I was like, but I don't even know how to make my why that big when I really just don't want to have panic attacks at the grocery store anymore when I'm checking out, when I'm paying, wondering if I have enough money in the checking account to pay for this. I. And so I want to remind you never to judge the carrot and that big things start small. So, you guys, I'm sending you so much love. I'm so excited about this new year. I really think that if you can just focus on a couple things this next year and get comfortable with uncertainty, your life will absolutely change. And I think the way we get uncomfortable with that uncertainty is to really strengthen our relationships and to always have something that we're excited about, have something that's stretching us, have something that's really challenging us to keep our heads out of our problems and into creative problems, into bigger, better problems. In all honesty, all we're doing is trading problems. And it's like, what are the quality of problems that you want to solve? I want to solve better quality of problems that give me a better result. I don't want to be solving stupid, petty problems in my life anymore.

Right.

I want to be solving bigger, better problems. And I think that that really keeps you out of your head. So I'm sending you guys so much love. I am so grateful for you. As the new year wraps up, I'm just really thinking about how much I have loved being able to come and have conversations with all of you and see all of you who share the podcast and all of you who've helped grown this podcast and who've been with me throughout the years. And here is to another year of bigger, better growth, more gratitude, more fulfillment in our relationships, deeper connections, and whatever you want to create can absolutely happen for you this year. All right, you guys, I will see you on the next episode. Sam.