Sophie's Success Shortcuts

As far as I remember, I've always wanted to be a winner. Why? Because I felt like a loser.

Just an interesting aside... after writing the whole post, at this point my wordpress crashed and I lost everything I wrote. I have autosave off... silly me. So what does a winner do? I don't know for sure, I tell you what I did: I'll write the whole thing again, not from memory, but like I have never done it before. Why? Because when I started this post, I committed to sharing the insight I got, so you too can become a winner. Yaaay!

Anyway... I left off where I am sharing, that today, specifically this morning, even more specifically about 30 minutes ago, I had a distinct giddy feeling that I am being a winner. And then the thought came: it seems that winner as a feeling comes coupled with winner as an activity... not as an actuality, mind you, you may not win the game but because you have been competing, you have been winning, against the tiredness, the obstacles, the common attitude of "why bother".

This is how it all started: A few months ago, in Robert Plank's class, I saw that with just a little effort and speed, one can become a winner. If you just posted your intention first, it didn't matter when you completed that task, you automatically became the winner.

So I watched the webinars, had a text doc ready with the word: challenge on top, and waited for the challenge to be spelled out. I typed as Robert typed, and in another browser window I was ready to post my challenge. It took 3-4 weeks before Jeanette Cates caught up to me, then Helen Raptoplous... but I got the bug. The bug of ambition, competitiveness, the desire to win. Then I heard someone say "entrepreneurs must be competitive" and suddenly it made sense.

You see, I grew up in a Holocaust survivor family in Hungary, and my parents, especially my mother, were against standing out, against being visible, against any competition. Maybe that's why when I won math competitions she didn't bother to congratulate me. Or singing competitions. Or physics competitions. Or being admitted to architecture school with the highest score... or becoming the third woman ever to become a master bricklayer, so that I can build houses not just design them, and the list goes on.

It seemed that no amount of winning will make my mother love me, so somehow, somewhere, I gave up. I settled for a life of quiet desperation, dreaming of winning but never actually putting myself in the position to win.

I didn't realize that you need a challenge to win... no challenge, no winning, no winner, no energy, no nothing.

OK. What happens when you give yourself over to a challenge? Because it is clear that your usual slow as molasses attitude will not win you any prizes... challenge or no challenge.

hm, I must be up against some strong force, the blog crashed for the third time this morning... write, lose it, write lose it, oh well... I am not giving up

What seems to be happening is quite miraculous.

All your cells, all your brain waves, all your focus start to play the same "tune", which is just another way of saying that there seems to be a sudden and unusual coherence, where the sum of the parts does not even begin to express the whole.

You are smarter. You are meticulous. You are calm. You are, like a precision well oiled machine is able to reach the moon.

This phenomenon is rare, but it is real. Like the mother who lifts a car that pinned her son. She is 120 lbs and the car is 600. Her whole self organizes itself, in that moment, to accomplish that one task:lifting the car.

I am familiar with it in the day before my leaving for a trip. I create and accomplish tasks that come from a sudden creativity I would be silly to ignore. I manage to communicate, back-up my files, prep my laptop, check all details, pack, feed my cats, do the laundry, do the dishes, lower the thermostat... a thousand details, all done, never missing anything. I don't like traveling but love the day or two before.

I love being in this hightened state. But until now, I didn't know how to cause it at will.

But now, thanks to Robert Plank and his challenging me, I have learned it and there is no way back!

These have been the phases of my learning:

1. I attempted to be the first to post my challenge in webinars
2. I worked furiously to accomplish the tasks in the challenges... lots of mess, including my famous or infamous kunaki video
3. I signed up to am2 gold and had to listen to Robert challenging me to complete the 100 point challenge to get into Platinum. Little does he know that the fee for platinum is way higher than what I can wing right now, but who knows, maybe with all this challenge stuff I'll make some money in the end? lol
4. I managed to get 11 points approved. it took me two weeks.
5. I heard that you can win five big ones if you have 65 points approved by Armand Morin Live. I am going for it.
6. I work days, I work nights, I work holidays, it's hopeless, but I am not giving up.
7. I apply to the "better your best" contest, due by October of 2010. I am at about 800 dollars a month now. I apply in the category of increasing revenue and bottom line. I see myself a 100K earner by the deadline. That should do it, going from almost beginner to almost top 2-3 percent... let's do it.
8. I don't know if it is points of percentages, so at the submission deadline I submit 67%. 54 gets approved. the rest declined. Quick decision time: is it an oh-well, or is it a hell-no? I choose hell-no, and keep on working. I resubmit most of those, all that I have the means to correct now.

This was the exact point where I had the insight. You see, being a winner sounds like a pure state of mind. But if you look behind the curtain, there is a lot going on that must be there for this delicious sense to be there: ambition, risk-taking, commitment, dedication, but most importantly putting yourself in the position of winning and in the position of not winning, i.e. losing, failing, visibly, to all to know that I am not perfect.

As if they didn't already know. lol