“In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.”

— Eleanor Roosevelt

We’re continuing our 2019 Success Series by giving you real actions from our Uninhibited Introvert Program to help you succeed in obtaining your new year’s resolutions and becoming the best version of yourself. In week 3, we want you to realise one very important principle that helps to sustain your journey.

In Week 1, you developed your Growth Mindset. In Week 2, you learnt that you need to Focus on Yourself and give priority to your own needs as much as you prioritise others. This week, you need to realise that willpower alone is not enough. Success in achieving the best version of yourself is dependent on PROCESS: a continuing series of small steps that you do on a regular basis that pushes you along on your journey of self improvement. Having a vision of the outcome is great, having the willpower to want to get there is great, reading books that show your all the paths to get there is great. But if you take no action, if there is no process to embed what you’ve read then all of that willpower, vision, and books are worthless.

WILLPOWER IS IMPORTANT BUT PROCESS IS KEY

Willpower is key but willpower without action is useless. Our willpower paints us a picture of the person we want to be or the person we can be. But without action, all we have is a picture of the outcome but no way to get there. And taking a one-off action is not enough. You need a process. You need to identify a series of actions you want to adopt, and then a process that repeatedly puts those actions into practice (hopefully one at a time) until they become a habit. Once an action becomes a habit then it becomes a trait of yours and over time, you are the person you want to be.

Ever since I was young, I’ve always wanted to be a pilot and I’ve been fascinated with airplanes. One of my heroes is Amelia Earheart, who famously disappeared on her attempt to across the Pacific Ocean in the 1930s. I have always found the following quote from her to best reflect that vision and willpower mean nothing. You let false fears stop you. Whoever you want to be, you just need to decided to do and follow a process that works for you.

The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward.

YOU ALREADY HAVE THE PROCESS FOR SUCCESS

Take any person you look up to and I can guarantee you, they have become successful because of a process. Either that process was deliberately created by them or that process was forced upon them by circumstance. You can wish to be successful, you can want to be successful, but if you don't put in a process to repeatedly try actions that help you become successful, then you won't change. Having the willpower to want to break out of your introvert limitations is great but if you don't have a process to set out the actions you want to take and a process to make those actions habitual then nothing will change. Willpower without process actually makes you sad. You know who you want to be (or who you can be) but it seems like you can never get there. You end up feeling unfulfilled, feeling like you have all this potential that the world just doesn't recognise. Without a process, your willpower can actually become a blocker. You no longer want to think about who you can be, because each time you do, you just feel depressed.

You don't need to look very far to see what I mean. Look at sport. The highest paid and highest performing sports starts almost always attribute their success to practice. The world's best tennis players practice in all conditions. Take Roger Federer, one of the world's best tennis players. He practices 11 hours a day, 6 days a week. Take Michael Jordan (who was initially told he'd never be successful in basketball), who practised an extra 2 hours a day after team practice of 6 hours. Nobody is born to be the best tennis player or basketball player. But those who are the best, got there because they had a process to keep practising until their weak spots became their strengths.

Think back through your own life and I'm certain a lot of the achievements you are proud of, are due to you taking repeated actions to make those achievements happen. If you're particularly good at something, it's because you practised and practised. You don't need to have a training regime for 11 hours a day. But you need to have a simple process in place to identify then try simple changes consistently.

Take an action, try it out, then reflect on it and see what you can change to improve it for you. Once you've done that, keep doing that action until it becomes a habit and then you can move on. Hey, how about keeping a journal to jot done what you think went well for the action or what didn't go so well. Try it with a simple action. I recommend my previous blog post on smiling. Adopt the action of just smiling more frequently and at strangers. Then reflect on how it went that day and what you can do different the next day to improve your smile. Maybe even look in the mirror and smile and see whether the smile you see physically is the smile that's reflected. If not, then practice smiling slightly differently until what you see in the mirror is what you see in your head.

At work we're always told to focus on the outcome and not the process. That's fine when it comes to financial or organisational results but improving your weaknesses is not a switch you can just flick on or off. For self-improvement, process is key and through the process, your desired outcome will emerge. So as we kick off into 2019, let's make the next 12 months, the year of process. Just do the following:

identify a series of small actions that you want to adopt (e.g. smile).
Start doing the action
Reflect on how it went then repeat.

Blog photo by Thought Catalog from Unsplash

Further Reading

How to easily command respect in a group

Commanding genuine respect, one that doesn’t rely on your position power is one of the hardest things to do for an introvert. There are five simple actions we can adopt straight away that can help us to establish our presence in the room and command the attention and focus on what we have to say.

How to be Value-Adding

Being seen as value-adding is one of the biggest planks in the foundation of your career success. Here are four simple steps you can take, which if you do consistently, will guarantee that you seen to be contributing meaningfully at work and maximise your chances of promotion and success.

Looking confident while working remotely

It’s hard to project confidence while on video calls. It acts like a barrier that stops us from achieving the best version of ourselves. Be it the sound quality or just trying to get your message across amongst the traffic of voices all trying to chime in at the same time. Here are six simple things to do that will give you the best chance at projecting the best version of yourself on a video call.

How to overcome Social Anxiety

Social anxiety is the single biggest blocker to introverts recognising the best version of themselves. The rapid heart beat, sweat, and mind blanks cause us to lose our perfectly thought through logic. Instead, a jumbled mass of words and ideas come out. The solution isn’t to stop feeling anxious. It is to recognise it and then start focus on the people you are speaking to.

Confrontations - Doing it the right way

Confrontations need not be daunting and one sided. The traditional leadership theories that focus on feelings and behaviours aren’t wrong. But they are missing a core component that make a massive difference. There is a simple framework from Simon Sinek that ties it all together.

STOP your nice guy / girl behaviours

Stop saying yes when you want to say no, and learn to prioritise your needs first. Nobody else is going to make your career goals come true except you. There are simple steps you can take now to stop sabotaging yourself through your nice guy / girl behaviours.

Being the best version of yourself while Working From Home

Don’t let the pandemic cause you to regress on your self improvement journey and fall into the comfort trap while working from home. Take charge of your new routine and refocus on these six foundation steps to get back on your self-improvement journey and use this opportunity to become the best version of yourself.

The key to demonstrating confidence

Your ability to demonstrate confidence is key to your career success, progression, and getting what you want. If you understand frame and can hold it in any interaction, then you will come across as confident. Here are some simple but highly impactful techniques you can use to project confidence.

The key to promotion for introverts

The key to promotion for introverts is to unleash our deep thinking and put them into practice. The mindset shift is to realise, you have to demonstrate you are operating at the next level before you actually get promoted. There is a simple way to demonstrate this by changing what you say and do when you encounter an issue. Use this principle to change your mindset and you will find success.

How to be charming as an introvert

There are a few simple actions you can take, to be as charming as Keanu Reeves, who is a stand-out as an introvert in a very extrovert dominated industry. It doesn’t require you to pretend to be someone you are not, but these five simple actions, give you the tools to embrace your introversion and use them to genuinely connect and interact in the most value-adding way. You will be both charming and unforgettable.