Doing Business In Deep Waters and Getting a Yes For Help

I just listened to a talk from one of my favorite inspirational speakers. The talk was about "Doing Business in Deep Waters". The speaker talked about people doing extraordinary things and how to spend your time. If you’re going to do anything great in life there is always going to be opposition, setbacks, delays, and critics. Many people get discouraged because of these things. People will ask themselves “why is this happening to me?” The answer is that you’re breaking new ground because you’re making progress. Those that go into deep waters with big dreams are going to face big challenges. Being in deep waters means that you’re not in the shallow waters with ordinary problems. When you’re in deep waters you’re trying to make a mark... you’re a history maker... you’re a world changer.

You need to know there are always going to be critics, and when you have big dreams you cannot expect ordinary problems. People don't talk about average people; they talk about extraordinary people. So take it as a complement when you are criticized, because it goes with the territory. You may try to move forward but find yourself facing major challenges. This is because you have a major destiny, and because you’re an extraordinary person you will face challenges. The good news is that there are people out there willing to help you with these challenges and help you come through those obstacles. Be selective in how and who you spend your time with. The critics that come against you will only bring you back to shallow waters and waste your time. Don't lose sleep over this, but stay in the deep waters and do what you’re destined to do. Set your face like flint and run your own race.

Getting a Yes for Help 

Often times when we are trying to move forward and overcome obstacles we don't know where to turn. When we reach out for help the challenge becomes getting people to say YES to our request. I am passionate about mentoring and paying it forward by helping those in need. I continue to try to create new ways to help build bridges for those that are looking for help and those that are willing to help. Connecting people has been one of my passions and this is the reason I created a mobile app called Hitch+. Hitch+ will give you the ability to explore daily insightful content, to share advice and easily get connected with great experts.

We are also excited to now have the ability to get you connected with over 10,000 experts through Clarity.fm. Clarity is a community of experts who want to help and have created a better way to scale the delivery of their expertise. If you want to know more about how you can get help or be involved with helping others then read Clay Herbert's article: The New Way to Say No (that's actually yes).

We love to hear from you. Please join us to share your dreams, give and get advice, and connect with great experts. Click on the logo below to find out how.

Building my personal brand and not trying to screw it up.

It's been awhile since I posted a personal blog as I have been finding it tough to write. It's not always easy to sit down and put "pen to paper" that people would find worth reading and helpful. I like to mostly share some of my personal journey with the hope of helping someone be better at what they do.

In my last blog post I shared some personal stories of my own failures and some points on what I am doing to find success. One of the things I am working hard on is improving my personal brand in order to fix my weaknesses. For me it's finding the right mentor(s) that are not telling me how to run my personal, career or business life based on their strengths and experiences, but understanding my weaknesses and how I can fix them.

I think a mentor should treat you like a research project. Instead of telling me his life is the blueprint of success they openly acknowledge that there is no single path to success, what is right for them may not be right for you.

 Here are some things to ensure you don't screw up your mentoring relationship:

1. As an entrepreneur or career professional don't leech life lessons from your mentor but engage in with them in order to seek the answers as they are relevant to your business or career path.

2. Help your mentor learn. Mentors should be learning as they are guiding you through the process of making you successful.

3. Mentors should be uncomfortable with the status quo. Mentors should be interested in making themselves better as they are making you better.

4.  The best mentors don't play by the rules.

What are some things you are doing to improve your personal brand?

Here is my online Prezume using Prezi. Would you use this tool to increase your brand? Do you think this would capture interest to potential hires? Recruiters?

You Aren't Trapped... Plan Your Work Around Your Life.

Guest Post by Anna Runyan

How I Changed My Career and Life To Make Me Happy

Have you ever felt stuck in a job just because you have to pay the bills?  I have.  Have you ever realized how debt influences your life and career choices?  I have.  Have you ever thought that you would do a different job if you didn’t have to worry about your student loan payments?  I have. 

After a few years, I got sick and tired of having these thoughts so I decided to make some huge changes in my life in order to take control of my career.  This month begins a new chapter in my career.  But first, here is the back-story:

Photo courtesy of iStockphoto

We paid off $80,000 of Debt in 18 Months.

Seven years ago when my husband and I got married, we decided the best thing to do was take on lots of debt to keep up with the Jones’.  We continued to make large purchasing decisions such as buying brand new cars, traveling abroad and refusing to really think about our financial future.

Three years ago I happened to be reading another blog that was about getting out of debt.  The writer said she followed the advice from Dave Ramsey’s book, The Total Money Makeover and got out of debt.  So I checked it out.  When you have lots of debt, thinking about getting out of it is very overwhelming!  What I liked about this book is he put it all into baby steps, which just made it so easy!  With the advice in this book, my husband and I were able to pile away our income, do as much as possible to decrease our expenses and pay off $80,000 of student loan, credit card and car loan debt in 18 months.  (And yes, we did celebrate when we finished).  We still can’t believe it and are so happy that we made the choice to work our butts off early in our lives instead of just putting it off until later.

I am writing this today hoping that I can inspire just one other reader to take a different path for their financial future just like the other blogger who helped me change my life.

So what does that have to do with my career?

Everything.  Without debt controlling your life, you can make life and career decisions that really make you happy.   You have nothing hanging over your head nor do you have student loan, credit card and car loan bills piling up to pay.  You have savings available for emergencies and you aren’t living paycheck-to-paycheck wondering if you will ever have the life and career you dreamed of.  Not having to worry about debt allows your mind to open up so that you can really think about what makes you happy and what you really want to do with your life.  That is exactly what happened to me.

My husband and I got out of debt in April-12.  For the last few months, I have been able to really think about what I want to do for work.  I have been able to think about what makes me happy and what type of work fits best for my interests, values and mission in life.  I have been able to explore creative work assignments and new career opportunities that I never could have thought about with debt hanging over my head.

So, I decided to take a 50% pay cut.

Yep, that’s right.  Last month, I made the bold move of starting a part-time arrangement at work.  But, I don’t see this as stepping down.  Instead, this arrangement is giving me the opportunity to open up my creative side and apply myself in other places.  Since going part-time a few days ago, I have already received another job offer and a teaching opportunity at a University.  These things would never have opened if I hadn’t taken the time to evaluate my future career and myself.

I un-trapped myself and other options came flooding in for the other “part-time” of my life.

After this experience, I truly believe that your financial decisions and priorities directly affect your career.  If you need to pay bills and students loans, you may continue working at a job that you may not enjoy just because you have to pay those bills.  Which is fine! But, set a goal to pay off your debt in the next year or two and then move on to something that makes you happier! Get yourself out of the debt that is clouding your professional future and instead find areas that you will succeed at even more because you are passionate about them.  There are so many things you can do if you aren’t worried about paying off your debt.  You could travel, start a business, or take a 50% pay cut to explore and evaluate your professional future like I did.

You aren’t trapped.  Plan your work around your life, not your life around your work. Are you trapped? How can you start taking steps to untrap yourself?

P.S. If you want to know how I was able to go part-time, it’s really simple.  I just asked.  That’s it and they said yes.  So what are you scared of asking for at work?  A raise? A promotion?  Just ask.  What’s the worse that can happen?

Classy Career Girl, a blog written by Anna Runyan, provides advice to young professionals on how to be classy as they climb the corporate ladder.  Her blog covers topics such as business chic fashion, career motivation, personal development, networking, and office etiquette. Connect with her at http://www.classycareergirl.com.  If you would like to learn more about how to find a career that you love to go to everyday, check out her free video training series at http://www.getmycareerunstuck.com

3 different ways to tell a good story.

I love to listen to people's personal stories. A good story is something that defines who we are. It makes us memorable. We all have experienced something in our life that makes a lasting impression. If you understand how to talk about yourself, it's a opening for you to connect to others in a meaningful way. It's a way that you can be used to help others that might be going through similar things. 

Here a 3 different ways you can tell your story.

1. The Challenge. You overcame an obstacle to get where you wanted to go.

2. The Eureka. An idea that came to you that changed everything.

3. The Connection. A time when you met someone or a group that had similar skills and experiences that helped you get where you wanted to go.

For me sharing those meaningful experiences with someone that might need help makes life more rewarding.

What's your story? Everyone has one so don't keep it to yourself. Share something you have learned in your life it just might help someone. 

Join in our I AM Forum at Mentorplus.me

Take the leap and sore

Photo courtesy of the Johnston boys.

One thing I love about being a dad is watching my boys grow and discover new things. Unless it's going to put them in critical danger I always let them try and do things that are out of the ordinary. Often times when travelling, we discuss new ways of doing things, inventing a new product, starting a business or coming up with a different way to make something work better.

I always encourage them to dream, ask questions and if it makes sense just do it. So off they go and sometimes they fail and sometimes they succeed.

Discovery is a great journey. Whether it's finding a new job, starting a business or wanting to try something out of your comfort zone.

At Mentorplus.me we want to help people achieve their highest potential by giving them actionable advice. Don't be afraid to seek out someone to help you explore, dream and discover. Then take the leap and sore!

See you soon... ;)

Mentor+me Launches

Today marks the beginning of what we believe to be an evolution in your career, personal and business acceleration. Mentor+me is a new web & mobile application that leverages social networks to connect industry leader mentors with people who want personalized and actionable advice.

Although we've officially launched, the mission has only just begun. As with any beta, the feature set will evolve as the community grows. We are in the middle of recruiting a great selection of mentors who want to help. As we are just beginning to open the site to members, we will quickly grow the amount of participation. We need YOU to sign-up and help promote the site to all your colleagues and friends. Please register at mentorplus.me.

Here are only a few of the cool features the site offers:

• A featured set of mentors available for each special interest group.
• Search and request advice from an expert. 
• Exclusive collaboration tools such as email, chat messaging, video chat and scheduled live events with special speakers.
• The latest in Career, Personal Achievement, Business and Startup news.
• Free access to The #Mentor+ Daily -- Top curated mentoring, career, business and startup content from around the world.
• M+ Library of recommended reading materials brought to you by Amazon.com.
• Doing your own research? Create your own poll to get membership feedback.
• Earn reward points for every time you engage in activity on the site. You will be able to see "My Stats" in your own profile. These points will be used to change your ranking and achievement on the site. Ex. Mentee to Mentor.

For now, take time to explore the network, share your thoughts on the IDEAS page, evaluate and join the groups and forums available. Your feedback is very important, so we will do our best to make improvements on a regular basis.

Please join us in our mission to impact one billion people, worldwide, in a positive way, over the next 10 years (2022). So let the journey begin... Don't go it alone -- EXPLORE, DREAM and DISCOVER. Again, go to mentorplus.me and accept your personal invitation.

See you soon.

"There is no passion to be found playing small." --- Mandela

3 KEYS TO NOT LIVING YOUR LIFE WITH REGRET

During my personal and professional life journey, I have experienced the news of  my two son’s chronic diseases, the tragedy of a failed marriage, the loss of a job and home and the death of a parent to cancer. Along the way, I had the experience to be influenced by some great Giants(mentors) in my life. These people shaped and to continue to re-shape me to the person I am today. The common theme that has come out of their advice is do things that help discover your passion. Although I find myself at times doing things the hard way I follow their advice and ...

SO I EXPLORE...

I have done a lot of crazy things in my life but the past year for me I have journeyed into one of the riskiest decisions of my adulthood... I decided to become an entrepreneur. Over the past few years, as I came to a turning point in a number of personal and career situations I realized that my passion has always been to serve people. I love to see individuals excel and be successful especially when they come out of their own trials and tribulations. I believe adversity makes us stronger.

If you really think about it our lives are like running our own enterprise. We balance what we do between two major departments - Personal and career. The success in one department determines the success of the other. If you want to take it to another level... how profitable the personal determines how profitable our career department or vice versa.

AND DREAM...

I discovered in others and my life journey that people sometime live their life with so much regret. They are not happy with their career and thus personal life suffers. People are just looking for so much hope today. Maybe why so much success of all the reality TV shows?

I want to be a part of the solution now and know there are others that want to do the same. I believe that as the baby-boomer generation gets older that there is and will be a ton of help from people willing to share their professional and personal life experience. I want to bring these individuals of diverse generational groups together in way that makes it easy and simple to get personal and actionable advice. Hence, the reason for Mentor+me. This will be unlike any other social or professional network as it will provide the  successful advice you need in your career and personal life.

The career, job training and self-improvement market is a Multi-billion dollar industry world-wide and close to 200 Million people would be willing to enter into a mentoring relationship. Imagine if these people were able take 5 people and mentor them. That would be 1 billion people that would be impacted.

Mentor+me is a social networking site that connects industry leader mentors with people who want personalized and actionable advice.

THEN DISCOVER.

Mentor+me  is a dedicated community that will ensure that you Don’t go it alone. For mentees, if you are looking to improve your job performance and career growth, expand you personal network or just see what others are doing to become successful then we are here for you.

As a mentor, this will enable you to be recognized thought leader. If you are a person that has something to say or add-value and have the ability reply to calls for help then this platform is for you.  Mentor+me will help you grow your personal network from a diverse community group.

So now Facebook has connected you with your family and friends… LinkedIn has connected your with your collegues…  Mentor+me  now helps people become a mentor(s) and/or a mentee(s) and helps both to achieve their highest potentials.

Please join me as we begin to help you make your life the best ever and help us impact a billion people by 2022. Let's do this!
Sign up today at thementorplusproject.com.

Why you will fail to have a great career...unless?

It was a Thursday night a few weeks ago and I was heading to Toronto to my first advisory board meeting regarding The MENTOR+ project. This was a very important meeting  as I really wanted to dissect our next moves and have a game plan over the next few months.

I have had the privilege working with these great mentors/advisors the past number of months. They are generous, kind and brilliant individuals but what has made them so successful is their passion. My mentors at the meeting spent a great deal of time talking to me about options, being flexible and the sacrifices I have to make in order to be successful. Some people would have left this meeting discouraged and given up because of the fear of failing. But what made me feel good was that I left the meeting more encouraged and motivated to keep moving forward. A confirmation that I wasn't afraid even the slightest to fail.

I think about The MENTOR+ project 24/7 and love to talk to individuals who are passionate in helping others reach their highest potential. So it's fitting that I found this TEDx talk by Larry Smith who shares on one of the key aspects of having a great career.

Here's a small bio of Larry Smith:
Throughout his three-decade career at the University of Waterloo, Larry Smith has inspired legions of students to take up the mantle of economics with his passionate and homespun tales of economic wizardry. A renowned story-teller, teacher and youth leadership champion, Larry has also coached and mentored countless numbers of students on start-up business management and career development strategies.

Highlights of Larry's talk and why I want a great career:

• Good jobs are now disappearing.
• Good jobs are high workload, blood sucking, high stress, soul destroying jobs and then there are those in between.

If you want a great career you have to pursue your passion but most decide not to do it because:

1. In order to have a great career people use the excuse that its a matter of luck.
2. Great careers are made for geniuses.
3. People with great careers are weird. So nice and normal people don't have passion?
4.  If I work hard I will have a great career and success. Are you sure? As all the evidence says the contrary.

Passion is your greatest love not your interests. Passion is beyond your interests. 

• You need 20 interests and then you might find your one passion. 
• Your passion engages you more than anything else in comparison with all your other interests.
• You must look for alternatives so that you find your destiny. Find the highest expression of your destiny. Does that scare you? If you settle for interesting then it's a missed opportunity.
• You will FIND your passion and still fail because your not going to DO IT. 

Larry uses an example of an excuse on human relationships...

• I want be a great friend, great parent but I will not sacrifice them because of great accomplishments. So suggesting you want a great career sounds somewhat unrealistic.
• Do you think it's appropriate to take children as a shield? What about if your son or daughter came to you, who is great in math, but says he wants to be magician. You say to them that is tough life, not much money, no security, etc.
• Are you going to say to them, I had dream to but I was afraid to pursue it? Do you want to use your family and see them as your jailers.
• Instead you could say go for it son... just liked I did! So the sins of the parent are visited on the children.
• Many seek refuge on their kids preventing them from pursuing their passion.

Some closing thoughts on "UNLESS":

Many are afraid to pursue their passion because they are going to fail. Instead of saying unless...

Or there are those that say..If only I had? Instead of saying unless...

Enjoy the video below, I hope it finds you more passionate than ever about your career! It did for me.