Tag Archives: roadblocks

Push or pull, which is the best? Recently I wrote about the concept of push or pull and decided it may be important to explore several tips for how to create less push and more pull when moving towards your goals.

While it is often easy to consider strategies and describe tactics that can help you or your team to stay motivated and move closer towards your goal, the biggest challenge comes from the execution. In short, it is easy to talk the talk, but more difficult to walk the walk. Here are three tips to help keep you or your team navigating a path that is less push and more pull:

1. Count past wins. Too often individuals and teams get caught up in reliving past failures. If you’re taking risks to move forward you’ll most likely encounter some circumstances or situations that could result in failure. Of course the good news is that we can learn from our mistakes or failures and that will better position us for new growth. What is important here is to examine past wins, count those, keep track of them, and relive them. What you focus on is often what you get and the most important tactic will be to keep reliving wins. After all, you are a winner!
2. Make roadblock images smaller. We all form images in our minds. When we are listening, thinking, and even observing we store images that are connected to our thoughts. Those images can be of success, or they can be of roadblocks, hurdles, or past failures. If all that you think about (or “see” in your mind) is the disastrous and painful disappointments that are unfolding for your future, you’ll have to continue to have more push and less of the more desirable pull. Make any of those unfavorable images smaller or replace them all together with images of goal attainment and success. Athletes sometimes refer to this as visualizing the win, getting the trophy, or having a record breaking performance. The same is true for personal or business goals.
3. Get excited. When you start focusing on past wins and visualize yourself positioned in future success you’ll be more excited about what is happening. Remember that push is hard and pull is easy. When you allow the excitement to pull you closer to the goal everything will start to click and you’ll have more energy for momentum and less wasted effort (mental or physical, or both) spent on things that don’t really matter.

I often tell people that there is no rocket science involved, but knowing and understanding the concepts is very much different when compared with implementing them. Your challenge is not to know them, that is the easy part, your challenge is to implement them and do it over and over again until you’re completely programmed for pull, instead of push.

– DEG

Dennis E. Gilbert is a business consultant, speaker (CSP^TM), and coach that specializes in helping businesses and individuals accelerate their leadership, their team, and their success. He is the author of the newly released book, Forgotten Respect, Navigating A Multigenerational Workforce. Reach him through his website at Dennis-Gilbert.com or by calling +1 646.546.5553.

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