7 Surefire Ways to Make Sure Your Ideas Don’t Take Off

So you’ve thought of this idea you think will change the way the world works. You go about creating a business plan, detailing it with bits and pieces of data to build up your point of view, and you even create a vision board to help you stay focussed on your end goal. You get a second opinion from someone you look up to and even they buy into your idea. You’re all set to roll, but there is something that’s holding you back, for some reason.

You think you need to think it over and you do that. And then you think some more. You finally convince yourself that maybe this idea is not the one and you fool yourself into believing that this idea will not work.

What went wrong? One day you think you have an earth-shattering brilliant idea and the next day you just give up. Did you fall into the bottomless pit from where fresh ideas never make it out? Maybe you just did one of these things.

Most of us who come up with new ideas or new ways of thinking; question and then question some more. It’s not because we are not sure but because we want to make sure what we have is flawless, but we fail to understand that nothing that was ever created was without fault. Everything has its glitches or things we haven’t even thought of ,or just things that we missed. This can often lead us to believe that our idea will never work, without even giving it a fair shot.

Very often people who work in teams or are in partnerships wait for the other person to take the first step or to make the first move. This doesn’t ever work. Here’s a piece of advice: never ever wait for someone else. Your idea is your baby, it’s you and only you who has to make sure it comes alive. Don’t depend on someone else—they will never have the same feelings towards another person’s baby.

This is an extension of the earlier point. Never wait for someone in your team to take the first step. It’s your brainchild—you have to do it. You start and lead from the front. You lead by example, the rest will look at your enthusiasm and will be automatically inspired to move, and once the ball is rolling, there is no turning back. You just have to make sure the ball stays rolling and you can do this by making sure you don’t stop.

People who are analytical by nature have a tendency to back their ideas with loads of data and even more truckloads of statistics. This complicates things: ideas should be broken down to their simplest and purest form. Data and statistics can come in later, once the idea has come out in the real world. Not before.

There are ample cribs on forums where people have admitted to making this classic mistake of over-analyzing things. This habit, if not kept in check at the right time, will definitely make sure your idea stays where it is: on paper.

This again may sound like a good thing, but in essence and true to the quote, “Too many cooks spoil the broth”. Adding too many experts right in the beginning is never a good idea.

Everyone comes with their own point of view and expertise and in the muddle to get their voice heard, the idea can often get lost or get too complicated. And just in case, you have to add people or have to work with many people, make sure you have the reins firmly in your hands. You be the one who guides and directs, if ever people stray off course.

Often ideas or businesses don’t make money right from the word go. Some take time to mature and become part of everyday routine. A classic example would be Facebook: it took them many years to finally start making money, but that didn’t stop them—they knew that when the idea matured and the number of fans reached critical mass, the money would come. And it did.

Point is, don’t let money or the lack of it in the beginning, stop you. Invest some of your own money in your idea and nurture it. Just don’t let it die prematurely in your idea book.

Again, not all ideas become overnight successes. Many take time to reach critical mass. All you have to do is keep at it and not give up. Remember the only way, your idea will make it big is if you keep working at it. Stop and it’ll die a premature death.

These are the top 7 things that make sure novel ideas never realise their true potential. Keep them in mind the next time you come up with an idea that you think will make the world a better place.

What ideas actually are: How to Consistently Come Up with Great Ideas

Featured photo credit: Bright Light Bulb close up shot via Shutterstock I’m just a man who made a change for the better by changing the way I think. and I can probably help you make the most of the shit happening around you too. so this concept. it’s about putting the focus on you. on improving you by looking at a situation the way it is, accepting it and finding the positive in it.

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7 Sure-Fire Tips for Conflict Resolution

We live in a world that’s filled with conflict. When you’re a kid, conflict resolution is easy. All you have to do is scream loudly enough for an adult to intervene and end it. Resolving conflict as an adult gets a bit more difficult. It’s not that it’s complicated. It just takes patience and perseverance. Here are 7 surefire tips for conflict resolution:

1. Keep A Cool Head – The first thing you need to understand about conflict is that it can escalate very quickly when emotions get involved. Some people aren’t able to verbalize their thoughts and may get frustrated, which can lead to violence. Before taking on any conflict, stop and breathe for a moment. Keep calm, gather your thoughts, and make sure you keep the conflict civil.

2.  Decide What Outcome You Want – Before you can resolve a conflict, you have to decide what you want to accomplish. Are you trying to change someone’s mind about a personal belief? Are you defending yourself or a loved one? What’s more important: the issue or the person? If you can’t answer these questions, then why are you involving yourself in the conflict? Maybe the best thing to do is drop it. If you feel the conflict is worth pursuing, continue reading.

3.  Be Willing To Compromise – It doesn’t matter who’s right or wrong. If both parties didn’t believe they were right, there wouldn’t be a conflict in the first place. Sometimes people argue with you just for the sake of argument. Understand that you can’t win every battle. You’re going to have to give up a little in order to achieve resolution. Conflicts don’t have to have a loser. Decide what’s most important to you, swallow your pride, and give up the rest so that everyone has a chance to win.

4.  Listen… Actually Listen – How can you find the middle if you don’t know where both ends are? The only way you can meet in the middle is by understanding both sides of the argument. If you’re unwilling to listen to the other person’s side, they’ll be unwilling to listen to yours. By actually listening, you’ll be able to relate to the other side. You may think you already know their side, but may not know the full story. Even if you do, it’s much easier to hold someone’s hand and walk alongside them to your side of the issue rather than telling them what they should do. If you want to lead, do it by example.

5.  Avoid Personal Attacks – Never insult the other person. People tend not to agree with someone who insults them. Avoid belittling, sarcasm, sighs, and eye rolls. Think of yourself as a politician trying to win votes. Do you vote for people who insult your intelligence or attack you personally? If you want to stand a chance of converting someone to your side, they need to respect you. Respect is something that’s earned, and you don’t earn it with personal attacks.

6.  Detach Yourself From The Result – No matter how well you argue your case, there’s always a chance that you won’t get the result you want. It may be necessary to cut your losses and walk away. A good way to end a conflict without either side admitting a loss is to agree to disagree. This means you’re both willing to live with the fact that you have differing opinions. It doesn’t mean that you should harbor resentment over the issue and continue pursuing it later.

7.  Once It’s Over, Drop It – Just like everything else in life, it’s important not to take conflicts too seriously. What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger. Think about it – will this conflict stop the sun from rising? Are you willing to let someone ruin your appetite? Life goes on, and there’s no point in dwelling. Once the conflict is in the past, leave it there.

If you find yourself constantly in conflict with someone, check out these 4 Secrets to Getting Along With Difficult People.

If you find yourself constantly in conflict with someone, check out these: 4 Secrets to Getting Along With Difficult People

Featured photo credit: Two whitetail deer bucks challenge each other during the rut via Shutterstock Brian Penny is a former business analyst at Bank of America turned whistleblower. He documents his experiences van dwelling, working with Anonymous, training to be a yogi, and fighting the banks on his blog.

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The Surefire Way to Make This Your Best Year Ever

You read it right. I have a surefire way to make this your best year…ever.

It does not have anything to do with how many more books you read or how much better your productivity becomes. Instead, it’s the addition of what I consider to be the missing element in many people’s personal or business success planning.

Too often, many folks try to educate themselves in the areas that they want to improve in. There’s nothing wrong with this, but where people often fall short is when they try to achieve their goals as solo efforts. For some reason, some think that the journey to success must be traveled on their own.

The fact of the matter is that there is a much better approach to achieving success, which will guarantee a better year for you compared to all past years. In addition to education and acquiring knowledge, if you adopt the approach that you will no longer attempt to achieve all your goals in isolation, you will reach higher levels faster.

The surefire way I’m referring to is to actively be with other like-minded people who are also interested and committed to achieving the same type of goals that you are. Some of these people may have more experience than you do in certain areas and therefore are in a position to help you.

They can share with you their experiences that made them successful so far and even point out any mistakes they have made or failures they had along the way. These can help prevent you from making the same type of mistakes — some of which can be costly.

By having people share their direct and relevant experiences with you, your learning curve can be shortened which in turn will help you reach your own success faster. But having experienced people to talk about past successes is not the only benefit of being with like-minded individuals.

Not all other like-minded people will necessarily have more experience than you. Some might even have less experience compared to you but that doesn’t make them useless to spend time with. Being with all types of like-minded people, whether they have more, less or the same level of experience compared to you, will have the ability to motivate and inspire you further in working towards your goals.

This is something that you definitely can’t get if you work on your goals alone. You miss out on the motivation that others can provide. This is something that I personally notice all the time in my own experience.

For example, when I attend training sessions with other ski instructors, whether they are on the snow or indoor educational programs, I always feel more pumped up from the group motivation I feel with my colleagues. This helps me work towards being a better ski instructor myself.

You also can get some accountability to ensure that you do the steps that you have to work on in order to progress. This is yet another huge benefit that you can get when you have other people to push you a bit. Quite often, you don’t have any accountability at all when you are solo and therefore can easily slack off on the things you must do to get better.

In order to be with other like-minded people, look for the right groups of individuals in the form of special interest clubs in your area. You can also network with others at events like conferences, meetings and seminars. You can even form your own informal groups of like-minded people to meet on a regular basis to help each other.

I will be using this very approach for an area that I am new to: real estate investing. I want to invest in real estate to help secure my own financial future but I’m a newbie in this area. So to help me, I will be checking out real estate investment clubs in my area as well as networking with other like-minded people I meet at seminars.

I’m certain that this type of activity will help me make this year my best ever, and it will do the same for you just by adding like-minded people into your regular schedule.

Feel free to share below how you would include other like-minded people into your life this year.

(Photo credit: Shallow Depth of Field Shot via Shutterstock)

Clint Cora is a motivational speaker, author & Karate World Champion based near Toronto, Canada. Get his FREE 3-part Personal Development Video Series on how to expand your comfort zone and finally conquer even your most daunting goals in life.

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