I’ve seen people struggling for no good reason, yet when we dig a little we discover they haven’t yet made the decision that they “can” and “will” succeed.

Have you made the choice to succeed?

You may have heard people say that when they made their mind up to do it, everything fell into place. Sometimes we can take forever to make a choice, going backwards and forwards, before making a choice about something. And yet when we make a choice to succeed, everything somehow begins to fit.

Going back a few years I saw personal development guru, Tony Robbins demonstrate this during a game of “Simon says”. He simply whittled the audience down from 9000 to 1, then asked the winner about his strategy. He said, “I decided I was going to win and I just did what it took.”

In sport you can usually see a champion before they raise the trophy. There is a  hunger to win. There’s an air of expectancy. There’s frustration when it doesn’t go well, elation when it does. The moment they sniff victory they seek to kill a game off. If they go behind you’ll see them rise up and throw everything they have at the opponent.

And this is what someone does when they decide they “can” and “will” succeed. Suddenly everything begins to slip into place and pretty soon more and more things start to work in harmony.

And this happens because in making the decision to succeed you create the  time to succeed. The energy then flows because you actually realise that nothing else is more important. You simply make a decision.

Sometimes when we make the choice to succeed we seem to meet everything that’s not what we want. It’s like going on a diet and having people suddenly start offering you chocolate.

In business when you decide to succeed you start to notice your attitude, your professionalism and maybe where you come up short. That’s something I’ve certainly noticed in me at times. You notice where your knowledge is lacking and where you’re a bit naïve, and where there are gaping holes that need filling in service and delivery.

I was standing on a hilltop a while back with a couple of guys who are marketing experts. These guys are at the top of their game, working with corporations and top celebrities. As we were talking, I noticed there were things I needed to do in my business. All these guys were doing was shining a torchlight. And in moments like that you can either shrink or shine.

Mentoring business owners down the years I’ve seen things gelling with people. They morph as their ideas come together, as they pull fragments of their full-self together and their dreams gel and they start to materialise to the point where they change from hoping they can actually sense the victories arriving.

And I can tell you the moment where I see people change. I see them change at the point where their optimism changes to “expectation” and then goes up to knowing and seeing the results.

It’s an exciting time. It’s a very exciting time!

With Good wishes
Neil

Want to Create Exciting Times? I can help.

Visit my website: http://communitysoul.co.uk/

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And while you’re here, leave a comment below and share your thoughts on this blog.

What is the number one challenge for 76% of businesses?

When you learn to drive a car, you start off driving consciously, thinking every gear change, brake, accelerator, clutch movement. Then, over time, it starts to become more and more natural.

Then one day you brake into a corner, accelerate around it and slip through the gears, 3rd, 4th, 5th without thinking and you then realise what just happened and go: “That’s was cool!”

Business can be like that too and it changes when all the things you once did consciously now become second nature and the learning you’ve been doing becomes knowing.

The knowing comes in the results – from the growing expectancy that you now are actually succeeding and can literally see your dream coming true. In driving it’s when your movement becomes instinctive. In business it’s when you have ideas that are grounded in habits, strategies, systems and processes and you know what tool to apply to what problem so that your dream continues to unfold naturally and effortlessly.

The expectancy comes in signs the results are coming. In business that might be signs that a product is right because the research checks out or sales start clocking up or that a marketing campaing is working because it’s generating leads and sales.

But the decision to succeed is made earlier. It’s made when we commit to doing the things you need to do to succeed. It happens when we stop making excuses. It happens when we stop saying “I can’t” and start saying “I will.”

Let me give you an everyday example. A recent CommunitySoul poll said 76% of businesses number one challenge is finding new business. So let’s use that as an example.

Let’s say your currently worried about where the next client’s going to come from and you’ve got a bottle neck of other things that need to get done. You’re waking up in the morning saying I don’t know where to start… I wish I could find more clients… I wish I could make more money… but before I do that I have to do deal with XYZ.

And you’re right. You have to deal with XYZ. In fact you have to deal with it to the extent it’s eliminated or severely reduced because right now it’s choking you.

Many years ago I worked with someone who complained they had no business coming in. I asked them to give me a breakdown of their typical working day. They told me they did yoga at 9am. Meditation at 11. Made lunch at 12. Walked the dog at 1.30. Did computer practice at 2.30pm then began the evening meal. This was an extreme case. But it clearly shows how the hours of “doing stuff” go by. Now for you that stuff might be emails, phone calls, admin, office tidying – it’s all the same.

But you have to realise that all that “stuff” is stopping you from success and all you need to do is put that aside and decide that you’ll stop doing that and start doing the work that will actually keep you in business – making a difference to others and making money while you do that.

With good wishes
Neil

I Can Show You How To Add A Thousand People To Your Mailing List

Getting your business known is where so many people struggle. We had that problem once too. But that’s no longer an issue, because we learnt how. Now you can too in our new business programme which shows you not only how to add a thousand people to your mailing list, but how to create up to £10,000 from the same event. Find out how you can add 1000 people to your mailing list now: http://communitysoulbusiness.com/fillmyve/

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What’s your challenge? Would love to have you leave a comment.

How do you feel about making a difference and making a profit?

For some people that means you’ll be taking your great ideas and maybe doubling your income. And that means your great ideas, your passions, the things you really care about are going to be reaching more people and having a bigger impact in the world.

If you’re going to double your business income, you might be forgiven for thinking, “Uh-oh does that means I’m going to be working 2-3 times harder or longer?”

I hope not! If that was true that would mean you might be working 22-23 hours a day and that’s not what you really want to be doing.

So, what is the way to create a business that doubles in profit on a regular basis, reduces the time you spend in it, and contributes to making a better world?

That’s a big question, but it’s a great question because it drives at the kind of lifestyle most of us got into business to have – one that makes money, gives us freedom and flexibility and creates a contribution or a legacy.

So how do we do that?

I was listening to a former Olympic medallist speak the other day and he was saying, that no medallist wins because they work 2 or 3 times harder than the rest. No one wins a race by 2 or 3 times as much as anyone else. It’s fractions of an inch and 100ths of a second that make a difference.

So it’s the little things they do in training, day after day, that make the difference when it counts. And it’s these little things that will win you medals. It’s these little things that  save you time, energy and money. And it’s these little things, subtle things I want to show you, so you can make a big difference, without selling your soul.

So, how does this translate into business?

In your marketing it may be one subtle thing that makes the difference between no sales and a bucket load – this is your fraction of an inch and your 100th of a second.

And it’s the person who claims gold that goes down in the record books and who hits the headlines and the guys who end up second, third and fourth who get forgotten.

The frustration is to have a product or service that is fantastic, but to end up being forgotten, just because of a 100th of a second or a fraction of an inch… especially when your service or product makes the world a better place and the person who gets gold doesn’t.

It may just need the fine tuning to your business techniques or mindset to make your business rock and for you to profit from your heart-felt passions and ideals.

We know that people reading this have glorious visions for what they’d like to achieve, but often they’re not striking gold. This can be solved. You just need to find a place  where you can get the resources and the inspiration of resourcefulness.

A little goldmine of help can be found at www.communitysoulbusiness.com

Go and take a look

Neil

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Leave a comment below and let me know how YOU feel about making a difference and a profit. Would love your input.

Do you remember the moment in the movie The Secret where the boy had been visualising having a new bike. And then the door miraculously swings open and there it is, all shining and new.

And he manifested this!

Now there are those amongst us – parents – who might teach our children some, let’s call it  “mental preparation”. And like me, you may also suggest to your kids to stop wishing and get off their butts and “Get a paper round” -  or something similar – because that practical action earns the money.

In personal development and in spirituality we are encouraged to meditate, even chant the sound of creation; visualise money coming, shout out an affirmation and “Act as if,” but if the fivers, tenners and twenties are not flowing to your door, what do you do next?

Simple fact is, money knows no reason not to flow to your door. It doesn’t know or probably care if your view to money is spiritual or not. It doesn’t know if you have a zillion degrees and A’levels, what car daddy drives, what accent you speak with, or what you’ll do with money when you get it.

One argument is that money is dumb. It just doesn’t have a clue. It doesn’t know if it’s in your purse or my wallet, and it doesn’t care!

Another argument is that money is infinitely intelligent. Perhaps it would prefer to be with people who respect it, nurture it, look after it and are wise with it. Or…

Maybe money just is! And if this is true then we need to understand this…

If you don’t have enough money, it is not the fault of money.

Sometimes, as we would teach our children, we just need to get up, snuff out the candle and take some good old-fashioned action. Here’s an example of what happened to me…

Some years ago, during a period of intense visualising, affirming and acting as if (or so I thought) a wonderful experience happened. In the space of one afternoon I had three money making opportunities: A request to consult on a project, a request to advertise on my web site and a request for coaching from a new client.

Guess what I did?

I chose to handle the requests later!

So I’m asking for more. And more is coming to me. But I’m pushing it away through my actions.

I caught myself doing this and what I saw was a fundamental difference in attitude from the days when I succeeded with money and the days when I failed.

In the good old days, when money flowed to me, my priority was to ensure my prospective customer got the most immediate service possible. In my days of failure, the opposite became true.

And what did money do?

Money goes to the most available outlet. If we bung up the inlet valve, we send a message to money that we’re not ready to handle it. It will therefore find somewhere else to flow. It doesn’t distinguish anything else other than not you, not now.

If we make it easy for money to flow to us, by returning a call, providing the information the customer needs and closing the sale clearly and emphatically, money flows, no more questions asked.

Something to think about:
• See where you disallow money or push it away.
• See where you feel unworthy
• See when you put off allowing money come to you

Good wishes
Neil

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Neil Fellowes shows conscious entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants and complementary therapists how to make a difference AND a profit. Visit his website at http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

What are your thoughts on this blog? Would love for you to leave a comment.

What if you could double or triple your profits, while cutting your working hours in half?

The information I’m sharing in this article put me in the real flow of my business and we’re going to be looking at how you can do it too.

First off, let’s look at why this subject is important…

I know that a number of you would like to work less hours than you do and you are just not sure where to start.

Also, there are a number of you who have already achieved a level of success and the problem you may have is that you just don’t have enough hours in your day to grow further.

It’s also fair to say that many of you know you need to do something different in your business in order to grow it further, but you’re resisting it because you have a fear – maybe that’s about giving away some control.

If I go back a few years, I worked long hours. Sometimes I’d be working at 2am and would start again at 6am. I was frustrated. I was working long hours, but just didn’t feel I was getting the returns I wanted.

I remember Jo and I talking about this and we decided I should take some of my own medicine. For a while I’d been taking my own clients through a process of how to save themselves hours in business and yet here I was not doing what I taught.

So we began the process, which took 6 months initially.

The first step was to look at what only I can do, that no one else can do. And to cut a long story short that means public speaking, building key relationships and creating resources for our team.

That means that anything else I do, needed to be handled another way.

As I began to look at every task, strip it down and then outsource it, big holes in my diary began to appear where I now had more time to do the things that were most important for me to do.

Just taking this one action meant I had more time and the business had more potential.

Take a look at your daily routine and see where you are doing things you don’t need to do. Look at what someone else can handle for you.

Good wishes
Neil

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Do you try to do it all yourself? Would love to have your input — leave a comment below.

Neil Fellowes shows conscious entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants and complementary therapists how to make a difference AND a profit. Visit his website at http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

In life you either get what you want or you get experiences of failing to have what you want. Life is that simple.

Why is that?

When we say we want something and then don’t do what needs to be done, our behaviour isn’t supporting our intention.

Interestingly our behaviour will always align to what we most want or to our fears about what we most want. What do I mean?

What I mean is when we really want something, our behaviour will align to it or to our anxieties about making the transformation.

So some people may currently have a contradiction between what they say they want and what they do to get it.

When we decide what we want, we create a resonance. That resonance can still include resistance or fear. Only when the resistance or fear is overcome we can achieve what we most want.

And it’s no different to where any of us are now. We have a choice to make our life or the world a better place by taking the steps to do that or to accept the status quo.

What makes the change is gentle action… loving action… spirited action… that keeps us on purpose and helps us be all we can be. And that doesn’t mean ignoring a fear, it means understanding it… accepting it… and working with it.

Fear doesn’t have to stop you. It can propel you!

We resonate with what we want when we make accepting second best a thing of the past. We resonate with what we want when we stop making excuses. We resonate with what we want if we accept our responsibility for everything we do and everything we are.

Contrast that with accepting second best… making excuses… not accepting responsibility… there is immediately a different resonance isn’t there?

Can you feel it?

If you are not currently getting what you want, look at where you accept second best, where you make excuses and where you might not be taking responsibility.

Lots of love and good wishes
Neil

Neil Fellowes shows conscious entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants and complementary therapists how to make a difference AND a profit. Visit his website at http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

A friend of mine called Pete has made a fortune on-line.

While most people reading this article will probably be working from inspiration and passion, Pete is the opposite. He works from logic. The result is he gives people what they are looking for, rather than offering what he is passionate about offering. Following this method has made him a fortune.

I’m not saying Pete isn’t into what he does. He is. He likes following trends and patterns and plonking his products right where demand flows.

But who of you can combine your passion with logic? That then becomes so much more powerful… so this is what we’re going to look at.

Pete will tell you a passion won’t make you money unless there’s a market. He’ll tell you there is no point creating a product unless people are looking for it. And he’ll also tell you all he does is find where the money is flowing and he then puts his offer in front of that flow.

Put in economic speak, he follows demand, checks out the supply, and if competition is low, in he jumps.

Sir Richard Branson follows a similar philosophy with Virgin when looking at new markets to enter. Where there is demand and where the suppliers have been abusing the customers and giving poor service, Virgin will step in and offer something innovative and revolutionary to that industry.

Clearly whereever there is a need and where the market recognises that need, demand for a service or product will be high. There may even be fierce competition, but if the competition is poor, unorganised, unprofessional, lacking a process or a system, then you could quite possibly be the one to turn that industry on its head.

Best wishes
Neil

Neil Fellowes shows conscious entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants and complementary therapists how to make a difference AND a profit. Visit his website at http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

When you gain a new customer or client what journey are you taking them on?

Let’s say you are selling to a business. So the journey you might take a client on is that you might offer the client a service that saves them time. Because you save them time, they now have more time. They might reinvest that time in a number of ways… to innovate in their business, to set up a charity,  to have more time with their family. Because you have saved them time, they have the potential to increase their income, give back or spend more time with their spouse and kids.

A recent personal example I can give you is what one of our web guys did for me. Recently I asked one of our team to do a job for us. It was a job I could have done, but I know it’s something he is niched in.

Because I thought of him and knew clearly what he could do, I was able to give him the work. That left me the time to think about one of our other services and how I improve that. What happened was I was able to reduce the few hours per week Jo puts into that project.

The result was Jo now has more time to spend working with her clients, created more space to make a bigger difference to our clients, which increases our income which means we can again make a bigger difference… and it also represented income for us of over £4300. So when the web guy sends me a bill for $60, around £45, do you think I’m happy?

Another journey you might take a client on is making them money. As someone who mentors businesses on making a difference and a profit, I know that when I work with someone and they follow the steps I give them, they will increase their income.

But I also know increasing their income is just part of the journey. This is true because income is so closely related to what the business owner thinks about money and how they feel about making more.

Sometimes someone needs to increase their income to sustain their family, but they don’t feel comfortable asking for money or closing a sale. So, I know when I work with someone to increase their income, they will go through many things.

As our income shot up, I hit a barrier. And I had to adjust my thoughts to go beyond it. I had to adjust my thought process to avoid self-sabotage and it was an interesting time of self-discovery where I had to really come back to the reasons why I do what I do.

A lovely appreciation to have  as you go about your week is that as you evolve, your clients and customers evolve. And as they evolve, so do you. You’re in it together!

Best Wishes
Neil

Neil Fellowes shows conscious entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants and complementary therapists how to make a difference AND a profit. Visit his website at http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

We all have things we want to make a little better.

We all have challenges…

The challenges might come in relationships, at work, with our kids, with our health or something else. So there is always something we want to make a little better.

The first thing to do is the step so many miss. And yet this step really isn’t that profound. In fact it’s simple. It’s profoundly simple. So let me share what it is…

The first thing we have to do to is to make a decision to change things.

I “made” a decision to make my life better in 2002. And it doesn’t matter how good or bad life is, if you want something you don’t yet have, you have to make a decision. If you don’t, nothing changes.

There will be some people reading this article today, who have made a commitment to live life to the full and who will not turn back. These are people who will make a note and who will never look near them and there are people who are ready to make life different – however big or small the change.

In 2002 I was signed off work with a back injury, broke, obese and at this time 33 years old with two kids, and single again after 5 years of abuse. So I couldn’t really go anywhere or do anything much and… to be honest… even if I could… I’d probably have been so depressed no one would have hung out with me for long.

That left me with one focus. That focus was on what would make life better. Nothing else mattered for me at that point and there has been one question that has made a massive difference to me.

The question I ask is, “What is even better than this?”

To ask this question it doesn’t matter how good or bad life is. Asking this question can always make things just a little better.

One afternoon, after a satisfying day, I was laying on the sofa, grinning at the ceiling and I asked, what would make this even better, so I called Jo in for a hug, because sharing my good mood was better than keeping it to myself and it made the moment a bit more special.

Give the question a try…

Best wishes
Neil

http://www.communitysoul.co.uk

“Ignorance is the night of the mind, a night without moon or star.” Confucius

Living on the outer edge of my comfort zone has helped me explore the mystery of life a little and I’d like to share some of the experience with you in the hope it provides an added source of inspiration to you.

Do you like to have a plan for the day?

When I used to wake up in the morning I wanted to feel certain about the day. I wanted to know where I had to be, how I would get there, how much everything cost, how much money I’d earn, even what I’d eat. I guess it was little wonder then that almost everyday began to follow a pattern, right down to turning off the TV news at bedtime.

After an horrific head injury in 1995 followed by a divorce, I came to understand that life had an impermanent quality and for several years I rebelled against much of the structure and certainties I’d previously created to feel secure.

It was then that I fell in step with a ‘What’s meant to be, will be’, philosophy.

After drifting for a time I began to wrestle with myself. My home was a mess, my car was in a state, my shoes had holes in them, my hair looked like the birds had been having an all night orgy in it. I was so overweight that my clothes were such a bad fit I looked like a sausage about to burst the skin!

In Honest Reflection…

My life reflected a lack of respect and gratitude for the comforts afforded to someone living within one of the most privileged cultures in the world. And here I was; not caring for my body – the vehicle gifted to me for my journey through this lifetime – and not keeping my home space a clutter-less void that left room for the magic of life, instead it was filled with the old and the battered.

But guess what I did?

Each day I made demands on the world, for more – more money, a better life, for unbounded success and love.

In my first novel Black Water, a Place of No Hope, the two main characters, a soldier and a missionary, are in the worst place on earth – a prison pen, held by terrorists, in a jungle full of cannibals on an island surrounded by sharks (and, before you ask, this place really does exist outside of my imagination). While the soldier is searching for an escape, the missionary is meditating, content she has all she needs in the world. The soldier finds her lack of attention on how to escape annoying and confronts her.

Yet she is focussed on the simplicities of life that are all too easily forgotten…

The missionary’s responds to him. She says she cannot ask God for more until she has honoured what she already has – in this case, air, water, sunlight and a few moments of peace from her captors.

From the small beginnings of honouring the simplicities of life, I have, a step at a time, learned to ‘return the favour’ for all I have, just by appreciating what I now have.

In reply for my gratitude I’ve been shown the world in greater wonder and realised I’ve been living an adventure.

When opportunity is put in my path – and sometimes this is quite scary – it somehow takes me to the edge of my comfort zone then flicks out a helping hand. If I want to hold my breath, take the hand and go with it, usually I’m blown away by what follows.

Life with a sort of plan…

These days when I wake up, I may have a few appointments or some work to get done, but I neither wake up to a regimented life or a ‘whatever will be’ attitude. These days I’ve found the balance – what “Might be and what is”.

Best wishes
Neil

http://www.communitysoul.co.uk