I read a post today by Therese Skelly about losing sales. The article made some great points about value and what we provide to others. We serve people even more than we realize, but we often create a story that says that we have to “sell” people on who we are and what we can provide. We live in a world where we are always being sold. Every moment that we sit down to watch TV, we get bombarded by commercials telling us to buy everything under the sun. We’re told what medications we absolutely NEED to be getting from our doctors. We’re told where to go on vacation. We’re told who to vote for. We’re told what cars to drive. Actually, instead of told, I should say that we are ‘sold.’ Since we are always being ‘sold’, its only natural that we have to ‘sell’ ourselves, correct? That’s how the world works, right?
My attention was piqued when Therese made the statement that one of the reasons we back down or give our services less value is because we take responsibility for the financial position of others. I’ll add that from a business perspective, it may also feel like you are going to lose money. This holds true in regard to our decisions and many of the fears that we allow to create stories in our lives. We pull back, we shy away, we don’t press forward because we have assigned ourselves responsibility for what others feel. As a matter of fact, we think that they are thinking about us and our failures. The reality is that most people are thinking about themselves and how they can get past their next issue. So, the story that you invented, the one that says you can’t act because of what another person thinks is rarely true.
More often than not, in life you just create the story that has you winning, and then you move forward. I love this speech by Steve Jobs at the 2005 Stanford University commencement. He speaks about dropping out so that he could drop in. He speaks about not completing college but creating a story that allowed him to achieve the things he envisioned.
Here’s the speech:
[inspyr_video][/inspyr_video]
Connect your dots! You’ve got great value. You’re better than you think!