Investing In Your Future

As I write this I am sitting in a beautiful hotel in the middle of the Derbyshire Peak District in a quiet lounge all by myself enjoying a lovely pot of tea and lemon drizzle cake. This is on the back of a recommendation from Serena the CEO of The F Word who I coached yesterday and she insisted that this was a great hotel in a great location. I can confirm that this is a beautiful hotel in a beautiful setting. I’m very peaceful, happy relaxed and enjoying writing this blog.

This week has been good and busy again with a Customer Service workshop in Nottingham, a meeting with someone I’m looking at working with, a trip to London to coach my client, coaching in Rotherham, coaching the young jockey, meeting a new potential client, visiting the Well Man clinic and coaching last thing Friday.

A very full week but I feel refreshed and well because of good time management, good Chimp management and keeping a positive mindset throughout. Recently I booked myself into the Well Man clinic because I want to look after myself if I intend to be on stage speaking at the age of 80. It’s like a car which needs an MOT to check things are all in good working order, and if not they can be fixed before the car breaks down.

I am not proud to say that I haven’t had a holiday for 7 years due to building the business and lack of prioritisation and planning. This year following my wedding on the 9^th May I go on my honeymoon with my wife Julie and this will be my first holiday in all those years. I have now made a commitment that I will have at least one holiday every year from now on (hopefully more) because I coach healthy living as part of my programme in mental resilience and I know the importance of recharging the battery and sharpening the saw.

It can become a badge of honour (as someone put it to me) and I realised that maybe it had become that because I was demonstrating how hard I had worked all these years without a holiday, because I was so committed. But this is like running a car without checking the oil then one day the engine blows up. I have got the message loud and clear and because of this I’m having my MOT at the Well Man Clinic.

Today I also had my first voice training session. The lady who coached me today was recommended by Tim who I have got to know from my mornings in Costa and it was a good recommendation. When I was developing as a basketball player I used to work in the gym, run hard and generally develop a body which would serve me well in my career. Because of this I ended up playing for England and also professionally.

This made me think about what I could do to improve my ability to become better at what I do. It became clear to me that my voice is my single most important part of my body in all three areas of my business – speaking, training and coaching. It makes sense therefore to receive guidance on how to improve my voice and keep it healthy and working well.

So I have taken the decision to work with this voice coach to improve this key area. What I’m pleased with is that fits into the Important not Urgent box which I didn’t have to do but in the long run this will pay off. We so often deal with the Urgent and Important things on a daily basis (firefighting) and I’ve realised that as I have actioned more and more Important NOT Urgent things in my business I feel like I am ahead of the game somehow and building the foundations for a good business. This gives me a tremendous feeling of peace and being in control.

If we spend all day in box 1 the Urgent and Important tasks; we feel under constant pressure and we also feel like we are not planning for the future. This then gives the Chimp reason to panic and feel out of control, so we feel awful.

So I suggest you spend a few minutes at the start of each day to look at your entire list of tasks and work out which are the most Important and try to get at least one or two Important NOT Urgent tasks completed each day as this will make a huge difference to the way you feel and the way you perform. Take time out a few times a day to check the actions you are taking and make sure they are Important to you or your business.

Have a great week and stay positive.

John