It’s time to do a year-end review.

Your year-end review serves a valuable purpose.

As someone who wishes to succeed, it’s important for you to do a year-end review. It serves a valuable purpose.

It’s so easy to not see the forest through the trees and just keep plugging along, thinking you are moving forward and headed in the right direction, but…are you?

How often do you take the time to look back over time to see your successes and your not so successes?

  1. Always
  2. Sometimes
  3. Never

If you answered C, you are not the only one. My clients have told me that they never do it for various reasons. They don’t have the time, they haven’t really done anything yet, and many more.

Of course, you know when they tell me that it’s the very next thing we end up doing.

Once they do a year-end review, what do you think they discover? YES! They discover that whatever reason (ahem, excuse) they have told me why they haven’t done it was because they were afraid that they didn’t have any successes and didn’t want to look at their “failures”.

We all have successes.

No matter what, you have had successes along the way. Since it’s the end of the year, it’s a great time for you to take 15 minutes (see, not long =) and list out your successes.

List out big and small. They ALL matter.

My last blog was questioning whether it was confidence or competence to succeed in your life and in your business. Read it here.

It’s both actually but how do you know you are confident or have competence?

You pay attention to your successes. You have more of them than you know.  And you pay attention to your failures.

Failure only means you took action.

A failure isn’t something to be swept under the carpet. Just like your successes, failures give you information

Let’s say you wanted to land a new client. The client chose another person to work with. You can certainly ask the client and gather feedback, but if you think of failure as bad, you probably won’t.

Knowing how and what to improve in your business is paramount to success.

My suggestion to you is to look at failure as a means to growing and reaching the successes you want.

You can’t move forward if you don’t get out there and if you don’t get out there you can’t have any results. Reframe how you look at “failure” as you are taking action and moving your business (and yourself) forward.

View your results impartially.

When you look at your results, it’s easy to first feel good about those you like and bad about those you don’t like.

Look at both the good and the bad as a way to help you improve. By doing this you are better able to lay out your plan for the future.

As the end of the year approaches, as a business owner, it’s important to know where you are going next. To plan for the new year and more specifically to plan quarterly.

All of your results over the past year will give you guidance and inside knowledge to formulate a clear picture for what is next to come.

When you are attached to the results, you are back to not being able to see the forest through the trees. Give yourself a head start. Imagine you are looking at someone else’s business and be impartial with what you see. Not good nor bad, just information for the future.

Celebrate your successes.

Of course you want to celebrate those successes you’ve had! Why not. That’s am important part too. To say “YES! I did this and I’m so excited for myself.”

You’d celebrate someone else, why not yourself?

In fact, do that right now, what is one success you are really happy about (business or personal) that you want to share? Go ahead and comment or send me a private email at kim@kimravida.com and tell me what it is.

I’m excited to hear about it. And I’ll go first so you don’t feel funny doing it. One of my successes in business is that I let go of a lot of old training materials from coaching programs I took as professional development and helping me get started in business.

It was hard, because well, you know, “what if I needed those.” Yet, I’ve not ever looked back at them. Not only did it help me clear space in my office but it gave me even more confidence that I had the competence to do what I love to do, coach my amazing clients to reach their successes and work through anything they view as failures.

So what is the success that you want to share?

And of course, if you want help with your year-end review let me know.

I offer a free 30 minute Design Your Success with Purpose session. I work with business owners to elevate themselves in order to excel at organizing their thoughts, to-dos and things to accomplish what they set out to do with great confidence and competence. We can use that time to help you get clear on your successes, not so successes and how to use them to get a head start for next year’s successes. Schedule your free 30 minute session now

 

Which Do You Need More Of Confidence Or Competence?

Confidence and Competence go hand in hand.

Have you ever felt that in order for you to succeed in your life and in your business all you needed was to feel confident?

I have. And so have many of my clients.

Yet, for myself and my clients, often what we needed in addition to confidence was competence.

Confidence is definitely a skill you can learn to excel at. And so is competence.

Having confidence is a feeling or a belief that you can rely on and trust yourself or someone/something else.

Competence means having the ability to do something successfully or efficiently.

Why it’s important to have both confidence and competence.

Being a small business owner in any way, shape or form is challenging. There are lots of moving pieces and lots of things to consider.

There is a saying “you don’t know what you don’t know.” Sometimes you can have confidence doing something because you don’t know all that could go wrong with it.

And sometimes you can have competence because you know what will go wrong and can put the necessary pieces in place to successfully reach your end result.

It’s important to have both. They go hand in hand. Confidence and competence are best friends. And we need them both because in being, doing and having what we want we always have to take an action.

Getting to where we want to go.

In business and in life we are constantly doing things to get to where we want to be. Sometimes we are also not doing things (but that’s still doing an action).

When my clients come to a session telling me that they “just need to be more confident” my first question is: more confident about what?

This is where they usually say something about being a better networker or closing more sales or writing copy. They may also say being more assertive, standing up for themselves, or saying no.

Can you see that the first examples are connected to having to do something? And the second are connected to being a certain way?

Do you see that in both instances you can learn to do and be what it is that is wanted?

What about the correlation between confidence and competence. Technically, in both you need competence first and then confidence. That said, for being a better networker you can attain skills that will help you. Having those skills will lead to you “do networking” better and “be confident” because you now know what to do and will feel good about it.

And that more than likely will lead to you actually doing it rather than procrastinating.

In the being more assertive, you still need skills and once you have those, you’ll feel more confident.

I argue that while they do both go hand in hand, that it’s actually competence that is the leader because when you know how to do something, confidence follows.

Do you agree? I’d love to hear your side of this in the comments below. It’s an important topic for business owners, especially women business owners.

Want help with your own confidence and competence?

I offer a free 30 minute Design Your Success with Purpose session. I work with business owners to elevate themselves in order to excel at organizing their thoughts, to-dos and things to accomplish what they set out to do with great confidence and competence. Take a moment to schedule your free 30 minute session now. You’ll walk away with specific ways to increase your confidence and competence immediately.

 

A funny thing happened on the way to the beach

Ripples in the sand.

When we first got Bruin, our puppy Bernese Mountain Dog, he loved to play. We’d take him to the beach to play in the sand.

One day I had my camera and was taking photos of him playing. By the way, there is nothing more fun than to watch a puppy play.

As I was taking photos I looked down and saw these beautiful ripples in the sand. Yes, the photo above is one that I took that day.

The ripples made me pause. They were beautiful, they created a pattern of sorts and they were oh so different.

Ripples in your life.

Just like the ripples in the sand, we have ripples in our lives. Things can often get messy, out of sorts and even fall apart.

We tend to view our life ripples as something to get over or to put behind us. In my last blog post I used a quote from Henry Ward Beecher “One’s best success comes after their greatest disappointments.” You can read the blog here. And the quote holds true for today’s message. Ripples in our lives are really us living our lives. We can’t have good without knowing bad. We can’t have happy without knowing unhappy. How else would we know if we were happy?

Debbie Ford wrote a book about this. I highly recommend it to you. It will give you some amazing perspective to see how all of our emotions are valuable, yes even the negative and icky ones.

Ripples in your business.

I’m part of an amazing mastermind group. During our meeting this month we talked about confidence. Confidence specifically as it pertained to being a business owner and what to do when we weren’t feeling all that confident.

One of my colleagues said we don’t just get confidence or we aren’t confident one day and that’s it. It’s something that comes and goes. Well, kind of like the ripples in the sand. I know first hand that there are days when there are no ripples in the sand at the beach and the sand is smooth as glass. So while all days aren’t going to be rosy in our businesses, knowing they aren’t permanent helps us to be able to take steps every day toward where we want to go.

In time this too shall pass.

When my cousin had her first child, he had to stay in the hospital for about six weeks after he was born. I remember her saying (and we even say this to this day), “In time this too shall pass.”

It’s the same thing with your life and your business. Tomorrow you won’t be where you are today. You just can’t. Things change. Your mindset changes, something you have been wanting shows up, something unexpected but great shows up. An opportunity knocks. You make decisions, you take action and your roll with the punches.

It’s all about the ripples of life that make our lives what they are.

And you know what, you have the power to either get caught in the ripples or accept that ripples will happen. And by looking at your ripples in a way that is positive and enlightening you free yourself to go where it is you want to go.

Bruin 9 weeks old

And if you are like a Bernese Mountain Dog puppy, there is nothing holding you back!

Where in your life can you go with the flow rather than forcing the ripples smooth?

Sometimes it’s helpful to talk things over. If there is an area of your life or your business that you feel frustrated by, I would love to be that person to help you move forward.  Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll smooth the ripples or we’ll talk about how to go with the flow better so that you can move on with your achievements faster, easier and better than before! Click here to be on your way. And if you need a little Berner love, Bruin will be happy to send some!

How To Get Over Disappointment

Disappointment sucks.

Yes, it’s true. Who likes feeling disappointed.

We spend so much time making plans, take action to make those plans come true and waiting for them to happen that when they don’t boy are we disappointed.

So yes, disappointment sucks. It doesn’t feel good. It doesn’t make us happy. I doesn’t make us want to continue on in some cases.

Getting over disappointment.

If we were sitting in a coffee shop, we could probably talk for hours over the disappointments that we have each experienced, endured or suffered. There are no shortage of disappointments in this world.

Yet, what if we could get over them and get over them easily? Would you say tell me how! There is a way and it’s not at all hard.

Though so many people will tell me, “I just can’t” and there in lies the problem. See for some reasons our brains like to go on and on about the negative things. And we often fail to focus on the positive ones.

In order for you to get over your disappointment: 1) acknowledge you were disappointed and 2) move on. Thinking that it couldn’t be that easy? Let’s take a look.

How to acknowledge disappointment.

First know that there are many ranges of disappointment. There are really big ones and really small ones. For our purposes today, I am going to share a personal example of what I look at as a small disappointment.

Second, know that how you view disappointment or whatever happens to you for that matter is in the eye of the beholder. It is all relevant to each individual person and how they feel about it.

I am in the middle of a move, my husband and I decided relatively quickly to put our house on the market and move. I told myself I could do both, manage the move and run my business exactly as I had been doing so. Well, much to my disappointment, I wasn’t able to do both as I had planned. And because I was focused on what I had planned to do and felt I could do when it didn’t happen, I felt disappointed.

Moving On.

At first I was beating myself up over all that I didn’t do. I didn’t blog, create any fresh content, or look at email regularly. Nor did I look for new business. There were all these “didn’ts” in my head. Then I realized wait, there were lots of things that I did do. My clients got the attention they need, bills got paid on time and  the marketing was taken care of as I do a lot of that ahead of time. So what if I didn’t do some of what I like to do regularly. It is what I DID do that I started to focus on.

When I took a step back and acknowledged that I was disappointed in what didn’t happen. I was able to acknowledge what did happen and I was able to let go of my disappointment.

Letting go of your disappointment leads to growth.

By letting go that freed up my mind and my feelings to feel better about where I was. It allowed me to think ahead. Something that we never can do when we are in a state of disappointment. It gave me freedom and peace of mind to be where I am. In transition and excited about what is next. Will I have other disappointments? Yes, and probably on the bigger scale, and that’s ok. Being disappointed is not a bad thing, it is actually a really good thing. If you never experience disappointment, how then, can you experience the thrill of accomplishment.

Your turn.

Where in your life are you feeling disappointed? Are you willing to acknowledge it, see it for what it is (which is really just information for you to grow on) and either begin over or pick up where you are?

If you are, I’d love to hear about it. Simply share your comments here or email me privately at kim@kimravida.com.

If help getting over your disappointments or acknowledging them is something you need. I can help you. Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together so that you can move on with your achievements faster, easier and better than before! Click here to be on your way.

How to make success happen

business success

It’s not all about the To-Dos.

One of the biggest surprises for my clients to wrap their heads around is that success isn’t always about the doing.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a big part of that. How else will you get things done. Right? I mean someone needs to take action on things in order to see results.

Yet it’s also about your thinking. As a business owner, how you think will have a huge impact on your success.

I love to watch the show The Profit. Marcus Lemonis is a master at creating cohesive, successful businesses. His big 3 are People, Process & Product. What’s interesting is the product usually can be improved pretty quickly. It’s the people and the process that often trips business owners up.

How business owners trip themselves up.

If you have never watched the show, Marcus comes in and takes a look at all 3 pieces. People. Process. Product. What I have come to see on the show (and working with my own clients) is that these two can often cause the business to stall or come to a complete standstill.

See, it’s usually the business owner’s mindset about the process that gets in the way.

Sometimes they don’t like what Marcus wants them to do, or they feel it’s not going to work, or they have always done something a certain way and they don’t want to change it.

I work with a lot of business owners on process improvement and systems creation and I can speak from experience that it’s not just about doing something differently.

It’s about how the business owner thinks about doing something differently that can make all the difference. You know, in the corporate world, the leaders always look for the buy-in of the employees. If they are on board, then usually a tweak or a change is easily made. If not, well…let’s just say a lot of time and money can be down the drain.

Your way of thinking is perhaps the absolute key to your success in business and in your life.

What have you been doing recently (or forever), that you know isn’t working and that if you changed it you’d begin to see changes in the direction of what you want?

How to change your thought process.

No article or blog is worth anything unless you can implement what you learned. So, below are several ways in which you can right now change your thought process.

Ask yourself:

  • On a scale of 1-10 (1 being no, 10 being yes), how effective am I in my business?
  • If you want to be more successful, ask: How can I be more successful right now?
  • What is one way (or thing) I could do that would bring me better success?
  • If I were to change how I think today, how would that change my tomorrow? (Remember, your thoughts/actions/decisions today, equal your results tomorrow)
  • I I were to improve my processes today, how would that change my business?

We often make things out to be super hard, and truly they are not. Just a few tweaks in your thinking can bring about massive success. Are you up for that? I hope you said YES! I sure am.

Let me know what you think and if you take action (see there’s the action everyone loves), let me know what you did and what your results were.

If you think that you may be the bottleneck to your success, be it your thinking or the ways you do things, I love to help people re-create simple mindset shifts and processes to help them get what they want in their lives and in their businesses. If you’d like some personalized help let me know. Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together so that you’ll be able to reach your goals faster, easier and better than before! Click here to be on your way.

How to succeed in business by being flexible

flexible

Flexibility, do you have it?

Flexibility isn’t just for fitness enthusiasts. It’s good to have flexibility in all areas of your life. It will save you a whole lot of frustration, aggravation and disappointment.

In life and in business, one key element is to be flexible.

Let me ask you, are you someone who can easily go with the flow, change on a dime, shift in the moment? Or are you someone who struggles with change, can’t seem to keep up and often frustrated and disappointed with the results you are getting?

If you said yes to the latter, you need to bring flexibility into your world. And the sooner you can do that, the better. Trust me, having flexibility in your life and in your business will make things go so much smoother for you. And who doesn’t want things to go smooth?

The beauty of being flexible.

Who wants to go through life being irritable?  I know I don’t. And I’m going to say that neither do you.

One of the best things about being flexible is that you get unexpected results, fun surprises and fascinating outcomes. And usually more than what you initial wanted. I’m all for that, aren’t you?

I recently did a Facebook Live on exactly this subject, you can watch it here. It’s short, under 15 minutes. It will give you some great examples to maybe use for your own. Are you cracking up over the still photo of me?! I am.

https://www.facebook.com/KimRavidaCoaching/videos/2212770752085976/

How to have more flexibility in your life and in your business.

Let me be clear, when I say flexible, I don’t mean lie down and roll over so that everyone can walk all over you. I mean you are able to shift gears quickly and easily. You are able to think and act on your feet in the moment and get results (and often ones you don’t even anticipate) and that you are not stuck on the outcome.

Here are a few ways for you to be more flexible:

  1. Think Ahead. If you want a specific outcome, brainstorm several different ways of reaching it. Kind of like a Plan A, B & C. This will ensure that you won’t get stuck on just one outcome.
  2. Look at the Big Picture. A lot of the time we can get stuck and inflexible because we are looking at the small picture. Look a the big picture, and ask: in the long run, what is the best outcome and what is the best action I can take right now. Another great question to ask is “will this matter to me in x hours/days/months/years?” It helps you get out of your closed-minded thinking.
  3. Be Present. Stay in the present and ask yourself, “what is the best decision I can make right now that will serve me well and I’ll feel good about?”

Of course, you may have some tricks that you use. If so, I’d love to hear them. You can either comment below or send me a private email at kim@kimravida.com.

One of the things that I love to help people do is to create simple processes to help them get what they want in their lives and in their businesses. If you’d like some personalized help let me know. Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together so that you’ll be able to reach your goals faster, easier and better than before! Click here to be on your way.

How to not give in to distractions

Distractions are just a part of our lives.

You probably didn’t want to hear that. I know I don’t! Yet, it is so true.

How then can we cope with them and even overcome them when they appear in our lives?

It’s important to first know that there are different types of distractions that we deal with. There are the small distractions. The telephone calls, text messages and social media bings and bongs. Heck, this blog post might be distracting you from something you should be doing instead.

There are medium sized distractions. If you work from home you might be distracted by your children or spouse or even your pet. Full disclosure, right now Bruin, my 8 month old Bernese Mountain Dog is bumping my elbow wanting his lovies.

And then we have the BIG sized distractions, a sick relative, looming deadlines, things you just have to do and do now or their will be grave consequences.

Oh and let’s not forget odd distractions like your street being paved (I’m raising my hand here as that is also happening right now as I write this). Or an accident that happened in front of your house or things along that nature.

No matter what the distraction is, don’t let it derail you,

Now that you know that there are different kinds of distractions, you can learn how to not let them derail you.

One of the things I help my clients with is to set up solid systems so that if and when (cause ya know it’s gonna happen) distractions hit, they’ll be prepared.

When you are prepared for things to happen they usually don’t have the power to pull you off course for long. Sure they may pull you off for a short time, but with your systems and tools you easily get back on track.

My friend and colleague Ann Rusnak once said to me, when I got distracted and didn’t finish what I wanted to, it’s like sometimes we play whack a mole. That has stuck with me because it made so much sense.

That’s when I set up those systems for myself and what I help my clients with and it made all the difference in the world!

How to not find yourself playing whack a mole in your life and business.

Here are several strategies to take so you don’t find yourself getting caught up in distractions:

  1. Plan for them. Not all distractions we can plan for but the small ones we can. Such as the telephone calls, emails and text messages (even the puppy dog wanting his lovies). Have set times when you will be “doing” what I like to call admin/communicating time. The big ones, if we know what they will be can be planned too.
  2. Follow a To Do and Projects List. Well-thought out lists can help you plan your time accordingly.
  3. Be Mindful. This one is a little less of a step. However, just as important. Do you know when you usually get distracted? When you are mindful of what is going on with your life and business, you’ll be able to avoid them in the first place.

Those are a few ways you can start using to not fall prey to the distractions around you.

Distractions can derail us faster than you can say the word. If you want more personalized help to be able to be productive no matter what is going on around you I can help you do that. Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together to create a plan for you to feel good about your change. Click here to be on your way.

Is it time for a refresh in your business?

A refresh might be just what you need!

In life and business, a refresh could be just what you need right now. If you keep doing what you have always done, you’ll keep getting what you’ve always gotten. That saying is very true for a lot of people.

In fact, so much so that they can’t see the forest through the trees. In other words, they keep doing things because it’s what they always have done. Yet, they aren’t happy with their results.

Many people I work with know that what they are doing isn’t working. And they want to change that. Though there are some who can’t see that what they are doing isn’t working so in that case, we do a little refresh.

How a refresh can help you get different results.

A refresh has you looking at what you are doing differently. Maybe from a whole new point of view. And from there you can see what areas of your life and your business need attention. Once you know that, you can refresh what you are doing and be on your way to having better results.

Here is an example. One client of mine was exhausted. She was frustrated that she wasn’t bringing in new business as fast as she had before. So we did a little assessment. And what she discovered is that she had been neglecting her physical health. You know, she was too busy to exercise and the take time to eat well.

That gave her a starting point. She created a plan of action for improving her health which included daily walks outdoors for 15 minutes and she planned and prepped her meals ahead of time. Just this little refresh gave her renewed energy and a better outlook.

Within a week of doing this refresh she brought in new business. Because her personal energy was so low, she felt ill and tired all the time. So, no wonder she didn’t bring in new business. She did not feel like attending networking events or contacting satisfied clients to do repeat business with her. Just this little refresh gave her different results.

Ways you can get started on your own refresh.

If you get my monthly ezine you may already be doing this as that was my topic recently. Here is how to get started:

  1. Set aside at least 60 minutes in a quiet place and do an assessment of your life and your business.
  2. For your life assessment, review and rate (scale of 1-10 1 being very unsatisfied and 10 being totally satisfied) each of these areas and determine:
    • Your physical health & fitness
    • The personal relationships in your life
    • How much fun you have
    • Personal finances
    • Energy for Life
    • Balance between life and work
    • General happiness with your quality of life
    • Personal Development/Achievement
  3. For your business assessment, review each of these areas and determine:
    • Your business and professional relationships
    • Business building skills and actions
    • Professional Development/Achievement
    • Business finances
    • Leadership
    • Schedule/Organization/Prioritization
    • Time Management
    • Energy for Business
  4. For each of the ones you rated a 7 or less, list out on a piece of paper, separating the life and business ones. You can draw a line down the center of the page and on one side list Life and the other Business. This will help you see the areas you want to improve clearly. Pick ONE area for your business and ONE area for your life that you want to do a refresh in and lay out a plan to do it.

Keep the flow going.

Whenever one area is refreshed, you can move on to the next and so on. As a result, before you know it you’ll have had a whole refresh! And way more of the results you want to see in your life and and in your business!

If you would like to make this even easier to do a refresh, I’m here to help. Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together so that you know exactly the right place to start your refresh in order to focus on the outcomes you desire! Click here to be on your way.

Independence Day

History of the 4th of July.

The tradition of patriotic celebration became even more widespread after the War of 1812, in which the United States again faced Great Britain. In 1870, the U.S. Congress made July 4th a federal holiday; in 1941, the provision was expanded to grant a paid holiday to all federal employees.

I’m always fascinated as to how our holidays came to be. For a lot of folks it is another day off. Which, hey, I’m all for that too. Yet, as with everything there is always more to it.

So I poked around and found this awesome link about the history of July 4th:

“Over the years, the political importance of the holiday would decline, but Independence Day remained an important national holiday and a symbol of patriotism.

Falling in mid-summer, the Fourth of July has since the late 19th century become a major focus of leisure activities and a common occasion for family get-togethers, often involving fireworks and outdoor barbecues. The most common symbol of the holiday is the American flag, and a common musical accompaniment is “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the national anthem of the United States.”

I thought I’d share it with you since it is afterall, the 4th of July! https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/july-4th

May you have a happy, healthy and fun Independence Day (if you are in the United States)! 😊✨ And may you remember that you have all it takes to create independence for yourself and your business.

I know it’s summer and a lot of people put things on hold. If you are one of those that want to keep your momentum going through the summer and need a little support, set up a free 30 minute session with me. We’ll create a do-able plan that still leave room for you to enjoy your summer!  Click here to be on your way.

 

Don’t like your results? Change what you are doing.

Don’t like what you’ve got? Change what you are doing.

Oh now I know that is so easy to say and not so easy to do.

But is it? As a coach, I like to challenge my clients’ thinking. When someone says “I don’t like my results.” or “I’m not getting the results I first want to know what their specific results were.

Once that is clarified, it is easy to work backward and find out what they were doing (or not doing as the case may be). This gives us a great picture of what went on prior to where they are now.

Many times what we discover is that the actions they took (are taking) will in no way, shape or form lead them to their end result. And it’s there that they need to change what they are doing.

Change is a good thing!

You may be rolling your eyes. You may be thinking “no change is not a good thing”. But think about it. If what you were doing was working, you wouldn’t need to change. So if it’s not working, then making a change is a good thing.

Most times it doesn’t have to be drastic. A small change here and there could be all that it takes. Of course, there may be times when you need to completely scrap what you were doing and begin from scratch changing everything.

Start looking at change as a good thing and you will more likely feel differently about it.

Start slow, keep going.

A stumbling block to making changes is we often feel we have to do it all at once. In some cases, yes, that is the best way. And it isn’t the only way. There are times when going slow is in your best interest. The key is to keep going. Just like Dory!

Still worried about change? Still not feeling good about changes you maybe know you need to make yet are afraid to make them? Set up a free 30 minute session with me and we’ll work together to create a plan for you to feel good about your change. Click here to be on your way.