Are You Blaming Others Because You Don't Have Enough Clients?

QUOTE: "The more you say to yourself, 'I am responsible,' the stronger, better and finer a person you become. And every part of your life will improve at the same time." - Brian Tracy

One of the themes running through my life currently, and in the lives of my clients, is that of Personal Responsibility. If you've been to my workshop and on any of my calls, you know that I believe strongly in Personal Responsibility (I often call it 'The No Excuses Approach') and how I do not believe you can ever achieve BIG success without it. It's a topic that few marketers ever really talk about in depth, but one that is crucial for success.

You see, each time I bump up against a new level of success in my business, a lot of my old "stuff" comes back up. I've caught myself in the past comparing my success to others with more success, feeling resentful, feeling less-than, and sometimes even BLAMING others or my own particular situation or for not being where I would LIKE to be in terms of success in that moment. And believe me, it doesn't feel good. But perhaps you know exactly what I'm talking about...

What I noticed is that I'm not the only one. As different people in my life, both personally and professionally, move up to the next level, or really WANT to move up to the next level, but instead, begin to feel frustrated, I see them pointing fingers OUTSIDE themselves, blaming their situation, a certain person, the system, the economy, a program they took, or whatever else they can find to shuck responsibility for where they are.

What I also noticed is that, in the end, I'm ultimately responsible for everything in my life, every increase in my in-come and success over the last few years. But most importantly, I'm also responsible for every setback. I can blame no one but myself.

Everything I have in my life exists because of my actions, my behaviors, my words and thoughts. And it's the same for you. Every decision we make creates our circumstances and because of that, we are ultimately responsible for each success and failure, happiness, unhappiness and financial situation.

I recently found an article by Brian Tracy, one of the world's leading authorities on personal and business success. This article has become one of my favorites and I refer to it often and ask my clients to read it too, especially when they start comparing their success to others with more success, feeling resentful of their situation, blaming others, or feeling angry and 'less-than' because their particular situation is not what they'd like it to be. Here's an excerpt:

"Responsibility goes hand in hand with success, achievement, motivation, happiness and self-actualization. It's the absolute minimum requirement for the accomplishment of everything you could ever really want in life. Accepting that you're completely responsible for yourself and realizing that no one is coming to the rescue is the beginning of peak performance...

The opposite of accepting responsibility is making excuses and blaming people and things for what's going on in your life. And since everything we do is a matter of habit, if people get into the habit of making excuses, they get into the habit of evading responsibility at the same time.

If they set a goal or objective for themselves, they immediately create an excuse that they hold in reserve just in case the accomplishment of the goal is too difficult or requires more self-discipline and persistence than they had thought.

As soon as things start to go poorly, irresponsible people trot out their excuse and let themselves off the hook. But that won't get them anywhere in the long run... The more responsibility you take, the more in control you are. And the freer you are, especially in your own mind, to make decisions and to do the things you want to do. So there's a direct relationship between responsibility, control, freedom and happiness.

A person who is completely irresponsible is subject to anger, hostility, fear, resentment, doubt - all sorts of negative emotions. And here's why. All negative emotions tend to be associated with blame. Fully 99 percent of all our problems exist only because we're able to blame someone or something for them. The instant we stop blaming, our negative emotions begin disappearing.

What's the antidote to blaming? It's simple! Since your mind can hold only one thought at a time, either positive or negative, you can override the tendency to blame and become angry simply by saying, firmly, "I am responsible!" You can't accept responsibility for a situation and be angry at the same time... The acceptance of responsibility negates negative emotions and short-circuits any tendencies toward unhappiness. In fact, the acceptance of responsibility often gives you insight into what you should do to resolve the situation.

Everything that is happening to you on the outside is due to something that is happening to you on the inside, so the first place to look is within. As soon as you do that, you begin to see things that you had completely missed when you were busy blaming others and making excuses. You begin to see that you're responsible in large measure for the things that are happening to you.

You're earning today exactly what you're worth-not a penny more, not a penny less. In life, we tend to get exactly what we deserve. If you're not satisfied with the amount you're getting, look around you, at people who are doing the kind of work you would like to do and earning the kind of mo-ney you would like to earn. Ask them what they're doing differently from what you're doing. What are the causes of the effects they're getting? Once you know what they are, accept complete responsibility for your situation, apply your wonderful mind and abilities, back them with willpower and self-discipline, and get busy making the changes you need to make to enjoy the life you want to enjoy."

Your Client Attraction Assignment:

You've heard the saying, "Speak the truth. The truth will set you free." In this case, I want you to be VERY honest with yourself in answering the following... stop hiding behind your justifications or get off your high horse and answer the following:

• Have you recently blamed someone or something for the fact that you haven't yet achieved what you wanted in your business?
• Are you using excuses (even JUSTIFYING your situation) so that you don't have to take action in terms of getting clients or be embarrassed in case "it doesn't work out"?
• Have you harbored resentment towards someone or something because you feel you were "gipped" in some way?
• Do you feel anger or have lashed out in the past because your business is not where you want it to be yet?
• Are you pointing fingers, saying "This is the reason I'm not making more"?
• Have you compared yourself to someone else more financially successful than you currently are, feeling less-than? Have you perhaps even JUDGED that person based on their success?

Personally speaking, I know that I've been able to answer "Yes" to all of these questions at some point in my self-employed career. Whether I knew it consciously or not at the time, it all resulted from avoiding responsibility for what I was creating in my life. It didn't feel good, and it certainly did not get me moving forward towards success.

The key for me has been to be honest with myself about my responsibility. No one else can create my life except for me. Only I can control my thoughts, words, actions and behaviors. Blaming or pointing fingers does absolutely no good. In fact, it doesn't work and it's usually just an excuse that we use, in case we fail. That way, we don't need to be embarrassed. We can just say it wasn't our fault. NONSENSE.

Consider this a fork in the road of your success. This is your opportunity to step up in your business, stop using excuses, stop resenting or comparing yourself and STOP blaming others for what you have or don't have in your life. It's time to take a NO EXCUSES approach to doing what you have to do to get clients, start being consistent in your marketing, work through the programs you've bought, or clear your schedule to attend events (no matter what else has "come up") that will give you the solution you SAY you've been wanting. Begin to take FULL responsibility and making different choices and your life and business will never be the same. I promise you that; I'm living proof of it.

As you take a no-excuses approach, it's important to surround yourself with the mentors and tools for growing your business. For unsurpassed marketing know-how, I recommend the Client Attraction Home Study System™. It's everything you need to know to fill your practice quickly and authentically, including how to put together a simple plan that gets you clients and then putting it on autopilot so you can have fun again. It's all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one, and when you're done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. SO easy. That's why my thousands and thousands of customers have gotten such great results from it. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. You can get yours at TheClientAttractionSystem.com. Why struggle when you can just model a system that already works?

© 2008 Client Attraction LLC. All Rights Reserved.

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Fabienne Fredrickson, The Client Attraction Mentor, is founder of the Client Attraction System®, the proven step-by-step program that shows you exactly how to attract more clients, in record time...guaranteed. To get your F.R.E.E. Audio CD by mail and receive her weekly marketing & success mindset articles on attracting more high-paying clients and dramatically increasing your income, visit www.ClientAttraction.com.

Think Like an Instant Billionaire

In sifting through emails from a recent R&D survey I launched, I read the responses, and honestly, I wanted to cry. Don't get me wrong. It's not that I haven't been aware that most solopreneurs have very low expectations of what could be made in self-employment (I've been at this for almost 9 years after all!), but I just didn't know how LOW. Until I got the responses to the following question: "What is the most amount of money you see yourself making as a self-employed person?" Not just this year, but EVER.

Close to 200 solopreneurs (mostly female) wrote in and shared with me their "Most-I'll-ever-make-in-a-year" numbers. What shocked me was that the number itself was really LOW and the majority of people wrote in numbers within a short range: between $50,000 and $75,000. Sure, a couple of them wrote in $150,000, but even THAT seemed like a far cry from what I *know* is possible, when you shift the way you work, get good marketing in place, create systems for everything, outsource, and set up leveraged and passive streams of income.

But what really got me choked up was they didn't BELIEVE it was possible and worse, some didn't feel they deserved it. Their MINDSET wasn't accustomed to thinking BIG, and truthfully that made me very sad, almost depressed. So I went about adding it to my Client Attraction coaching curriculum.

I had to find a way for them to stretch their thinking of what might be possible for them. Then I thought of an assignment I'd gotten years ago from my very first coach, Talane Meidaner, author of Coach Yourself To Success. Back when $3,000 a month seemed like a BIG goal for me to reach in my private practice, she asked me to pretend I was an instant billionaire. The goal was to expand what I believed was possible for me and to do it in just 5 minutes' time.

Essentially, this Billionaire Game was about tapping into my every wish, desire, dream, and hope I've ever thought about. Where I wanted to travel, what I wanted life to look like, what I wanted to have, how I wanted to set up my business. What I liked about this exercise is the 5 minute limit didn't allow me to think too much and instead to just do it.

So, I set my timer and frantically wrote down all the things I wanted for my life, and my business. It was a LONG list, and when I was done, it felt actually freeing to see what I'd written down. What I realized is many of the things on the list weren't that far of a stretch, and I could live many of them NOW, if I made a few changes. But it also got me to start dreaming and imagining BIGGER things for my life.

The coolest part is it helped me expand what was possible for me. Things aren't THAT out of reach and you can live a billionaire lifestyle now, which then feeds your mindset even more that you DESERVE to make mo.re.

When I look back at the list I wrote back then, it's really cool to see I'm pretty much living that exact life now. (Although I still don't have a live-in spa chef and haven't traveled to India and Vietnam for a month each yet, but those will come.) :)

Your Client Attraction Assignment:

Give it a try. This game will help you get past your restrictions around money. Grab a paper and pen. Imagine you've just become the billion-dollar lottery winner. Not just a million. You now have more money than you'll ever be able to spend.

The condition of winning; however, is you must write down 100 different things, whatever you want to be, do, or have on a piece of paper, and you have only 5 minutes to do so. So write fast, without over-thinking. Remember to write down every wish, desire, dream, and hope you can possibly think of.

Set the kitchen timer and see if you can come up with 100 different things. Don't worry about any practical considerations of your list. Don't let anything limit or stop you. You can do, be, or have anything you want. This is about expanding possibilities. Most of us start out way too small.

I promise you one thing. This will not only affect your mindset about what's possible for you, it will also affect your Client Attraction. The more you begin to LIVE like a billionaire (on whatever your budget is), the more Client Attractive you will become. Try it and let me know how it goes, OK.

Having trouble staying in the Success Mindset and believing you CAN make a whole lot more being self-employed? You're not the only one. The good news is, I've developed a way to close the sale 97-98% of the time and I share the entire process in my Client Attraction Home Study System™. I've outlined every Client Attraction technique in detail, and it's all there so you can start using it right away to get similar results. It's all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one, and when you're done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. SO easy. That's why my thousands and thousands of customers have gotten such great results from it. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. You can get yours at TheClientAttractionSystem.com. Why struggle when you can just model a system that already works?

Turn Indecisive Prospects into Paying Clients

Imagine you've worked hard to market your services; you've attracted a prospective client, set up a "sales conversation" and gone through the whole sales process. Great job, but sometimes, no matter how hard we try, prospects don't always sign up on the spot.

Sometimes, a prospect needs some time to make the decision on whether or when they'd like to start working with you. What I've noticed over the years is that when this happens, most always, the sale never happens, probably because life gets in the way and what's out of sight is out of mind.

Often, this means you've lost them for good. UNLESS you use some kind of method to get indecisive prospects to slide right into your practice, instead of slipping through your fingers. So I've come up with a fantastic remedy for this, which helps me and my students close the deal 97-98% of the time. If prospects don't bite on the 'sales' call, use what I call the "bookend" method. Here's how it works.

When a prospect tells me they need to talk to their spouse or needs some time to decide, or wants to ideally start in 2 months, I schedule a 5 minute "check-in" call with them (next Tuesday at 3pm, for example) so that we can follow up with each other without having to play phone tag or have to follow up with one another.

The great thing about this technique is that it puts a time limit in the prospect's mind as to when THEY would like to make the decision, and obviously, you let them choose when they'd like to have that 5 minute chat.

I essentially came up with this because I really dislike following up in this situation. It makes me feel like I'm chasing after them and I don't feel that this is Client Attractive. So instead, we agree that they'll call me on set date and virtually every time they do, and out of those times, they don't feel pressured, have had time to think about what we talked about, and are ready to make a decision to move forward. It's a great tool!

If for whatever reason they don't call during the time of your 5 minute check-in appointment, you can then call them or e-mail them asking if anything went wrong. This usually puts the prospect into a mode where they feel obliged to get back you, as they were the one who missed the appointment. Again, this is much more Client Attractive and ends up saving you a lot of time.

Your Client Attraction Assignment:

If a client doesn't sign up on the spot, make sure to bookend another date, so you don't have to follow up on each other for weeks. Use it as a "let's see where you are in your decision making process then." It works like a charm.

Having trouble with actually getting the prospect INTO the sales conversation in the first place? You're not the only one. The good news is, I've developed a way to close the sale 97-98% of the time and I share the entire process in my Client Attraction Home Study System™. I've outlined every Client Attraction technique in detail, and it's all there so you can start using it right away to get similar results. It's all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one, and when you're done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. SO easy. That's why my thousands and thousands of customers have gotten such great results from it. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. You can get yours at TheClientAttractionSystem.com. Why struggle when you can just model a system that already works?