Keep Your Eyes on the Prize

“Without the promise of success or fruit or reward, life becomes a drudgery. God works by the reward system.”
—Pastor Dave Williams, Mount Hope Church, Lansing, Michigan

I am not a television watcher. However, my favorite TV show is “The
Fear Factor.” I love this show because most of the contestants model the force of confidence. This show teaches us the powerful principle of focus. What would cause a person to eat cow eyes, African cave spiders, and chicken eggs with baby chickens in the egg? What would cause a person to jump off the top of one speeding semitrailer onto another, reach their hand into a fish tank with electric eels, or get into a box the size of a coffin and have snakes, scorpions, and roaches poured on them?

First, it is the reward of winning. Second, it is the reward of $50,000 if they win. These people have learned the art of confronting their greatest fears with action by keeping their focus on the future rewards that overcoming their fears will produce. I have found that people are motivated to action in three basic ways:

Motivator 1. Incentive based on rewards. Your boss says, “Whoever sells the most products today will receive a $1,000 bonus.”

Motivator 2. Fear based on punishment. Your boss says, “If you do not sell your quota today you are fired.”

Motivator 3. Greatness based on the possibility of who you can become—a champion! Your boss says, “You have the ability to be the number one salesperson this month.”

When I first started working as a professional speaker, I thought I could just send out marketing material and people would start calling me out of the blue to have me speak at their business or organization.

I sat by my phone…and I sat by my phone…and nobody, and I mean nobody, called me. Thankfully a friend of mine, who is also in the speaking business, told me clients will rarely, if ever, call you. He also taught me that the main thing a new speaker had to do was make phone calls to potential clients and “sell myself.” I instantly thought, “I hate cold calling. I hate being rejected. I can’t do it.” However, my next thought was, “If I don’t get some speaking engagements really fast, I am not going to be able to put food on the table.”

The reward of food being on the table and my bills being paid moved me to overcome my fear of rejection. So I picked up the telephone and started calling potential clients. My friend told me that I would need to make about twenty calls in order to book one client. I decided that I was not going to focus on the rejections that I was going to receive.

Instead, I chose to focus on the reward of landing one customer that would produce a financial reward for me at that time of $2,000-$10,000. This financial reward motivated me to keep calling until someone said, “Yes!” By focusing on the reward, I was able to confidently move into action and destroy the wall of FUD that was keeping me from success in life. Those early days of cold calling were not very easy. However, by focusing on the rewards I was able to overcome my fear of cold calling and actually got to a place where the rewards for my efforts were so good that I started looking forward to the days I made cold calls.

CONFIDENCE COACHING KEY:
Rewards motivate us to action.

The reward of a paycheck coming to you on Friday motivates you to get out of bed on a cold Monday morning and go to work. Even a stubborn, lazy donkey is motivated to action when you place a carrot in front of its face. Many people go through life and never get to experience the joy of actually eating the carrot. The only way I can stop a really hungry donkey that sees a carrot in front of his nose from moving to action so he can eat the carrot is to break his focus. If I can get the donkey to focus on the vomit that he threw up the last time he ate a carrot, it could cause the donkey to stop moving toward experiencing the same reward of eating the carrot.

“I believe that life is constantly testing us for our level of commitment, and life’s greatest rewards are reserved for those who demonstrate a never-ending commitment to act until they achieve.”
—Anthony Robbins, motivational speaker

Many people major on their fears instead of focusing on the rewards that they will receive by destroying their fears with their corresponding action. Many people stop short of receiving their rewards in life because they allow their focus to be broken. There is nothing more discouraging and draining in life than to work hard and receive little or no rewards for our effort. Now is the time to start moving toward the rewards you desire.

When is the best time to get started? Yesterday! No way.

Right Now! This very minute! Before you take another step, waist another dollar, lose another sale, make another bad decision, work to many long and hard hours, miss another important family event. Get the FUD out of your brain and prepare yourself for the next step of outrageous action coming from outrageous confidence which will produce outrageous success!

When you say “I can do it” your fears go away and your self-confidence increases.

CONFIDENCE COACHING KEY 8:
Rewards motivate us to action.

COACHING QUESTION:

What immediate action step do you need to do this week to move you one step closer to your dreams?

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