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2 Words That Will Change Everything About New Year’s Resolutions

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I hereby resolve… yeah, there’s a better way.

First the bad news on New Year’s resolutions – Only 8% of people who make a New Year’s resolution keep that commitment. Worse yet, if you’re making a dieting resolution, you have a 5% chance of keeping the weight off, but an 83% or higher chance of gaining back more than you lost. Research shows that resolving to lose weight is actually an indicator you are going to GAIN weight!

Now the good news. You get what you intend, not what you hope for. Change can be real and lasting.

The Random Hope Strategy

Most New Year’s resolutions are built on the random hope strategy of life–if I think and feel something, who knows, I might get motivated enough to do something about it. A very few resolutions, 5-8% are built on something very different than random hope–intention. Intention is different than expectation. Intention assumes I’m going to have to work my ass off, but if I do, I’m very likely to get what I am chasing.

Conation

There are two words that describe why 92% of people don’t keep their resolutions and why the 8% do. First, if you really want to keep your resolution, you’ll learn and embrace the word “conation”.

Conation is the most important, least known word you’ll ever learn about success (we use it as a foundation for helping business owners succeed). Conation is

the will to succeed that shows up in single-minded pursuit of a goal,

or, “Get out of my way, I have somewhere I need to be.” Conative people actually don’t have to tell people to get out of their way. You can see the determination in their eyes, and you just step aside.

In the 1970s my Mom was a three pack a day smoker. A doctor told her she had pre-cancerous lesions on her larynx from smoking, so that day she quit and never smoked again. She didn’t need a New Year’s resolution or another week to get her last few smokes in. There was even a full case of Kools in her smoking drawer for another few years before she finally threw it away.

Mom’s actions were classic conation. As soon as she knew what she should do, she did it. No ceremony, no waiting period, no walking on coals, chanting at a vision board, or hypnosis. Conation is defined by this–as soon as we know what we should do, we start doing it. Realizing the need is directly followed by action.

Velleity

Can you see why New Year’s resolutions don’t work? We “resolve” in early December that we need to do something on New Year’s day, while binging on whatever we know we should stop; a sort of extended Mardi Gras that clearly demonstrates we don’t actually want to do what we say we want to do. This brings us to the second word–velleity (vah-lay-ity).

Velleity is the second most important word around being successful and is the direct cause of why 92% of resolutions fail. Velleity is,

the desire, with no intention of doing anything.

Wouldn’t it be nice if…? Someday I’m going to… I sure hope that… – It’s all velleity. We fool ourselves into thinking we actually want change because the emotional desire is so strong–“I really do want it!”. But it’s just emotional desire, with no intention of actually doing anything.

Just Priorities

I can see why Mom was able to be so conative. She once told me, “Chuck, there is no such thing as excuses, there aren’t even reasons, there are only priorities.” Conation is built on deciding that something (losing weight, stopping smoking, being a better husband, etc.) is more important than something else (food, nicotine sedation, being self-absorbed, etc.). It’s all about priorities.

For every well-intentioned resolution to lose weight, stop drinking, call Mom, get sober, be more helpful, control your temper, or finish installing the molding in the kitchen, there are unconscious commitments to keep things exactly the way they are right now. But velleity gives us the cover we need to think we actually want change. The emotional desire to see things differently (velleity) passes for real desire to change something, which results in immediate action (conation).

The Only New Year’s Resolution That Will Actually Change Something

Here it is:

I hereby resolve that going forward, I will never again wait for some future date, including New Year’s Day, to do something I know I should do. I will be conative and decide that anything worth changing, is worth changing as soon as I recognize it, and that any time I want to put off that change, I will remind myself of velleity–the emotional desire, with no intention of doing anything.

Or the short version:

I know I want to change something, because I’m already doing it. Everything else is just velleity/desire.

Remember, there are no such things as excuses or reasons, just priorities. If it’s important enough to change, I will do it now, not later.

Conate!

Be part of the 8% who succeed – resolve to be conative in 2016. It can change your life!

(Pssst – Don’t wait for New Year’s Day to resolve to be conative. Waiting is just velleity.)

Article as seen on Inc.com

Contentment is dangerous.

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Pursuit, Not Acquisition

We work so hard to achieve contentment. Be careful, it could be a wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Since the early 1900s we have been taught to pursue the three S’s of the Industrial Age; Safety, Security, and Stability. The three of them together can lead us to contentment, which at first blush seems pretty cool.

The Contentment Fence
But contentment is a kissing cousin of balance, and both of them are like sitting on a fence; you can’t stay there very long. Pretty soon you’ll either fall off or jump off, and the question is, on which side of the fence? Falling off one side begins a downward spiral to victimology. Making the decision to intentionally jump off the other side leads upward to better things, and the fourth S of the Participation Age, Significance.

How can contentment drag us down? Living in contentment (and balance) could very quickly lead to boredom, because you have no vision for how to challenge yourself to take your life to the next level. Boredom is the first step down and it breeds pessimism, doubt, worry, blame, anger, insecurity, and eventually powerlessness – I’m a victim.

If you find yourself content, the best thing to do is proactively get the heck out of there by figuring out the next challenge and chasing it with everything you’ve got. Contentment can be a great springboard to the next challenge. If you get a solid picture of the future and what you want next, then contentment will lead right into optimism, hope, powerful expectation, enthusiasm, and passion for something new.

Jump Or Fall Off
Contentment is fleeting. You are either going to fall off or have to jump off. You can fall off on the side of victimology, or you can take control of your life, and intentionally jump off on the side of chasing something worth catching.

Have you “arrived”? Are you on cruise control with your business or your life? Be careful. It won’t last, it never does. So take charge, jump off the fence, and intentionally run toward something. You won’t be content while you’re chasing it (or balanced), but that’s ok, because the joy is never in the acquisition, but in the pursuit.

A goal realized is no longer motivating.

What’s the next thing you want to pursue? Jump off the fence and go catch it.

The 2nd Most Important Business Word You’ve Never Heard

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Wouldn’t it be great if…?

All too often I hear people say, “I got it”, when everything about their actions says differently. The process of truly getting it is much deeper.

Today, education means getting something into your head. Learning, in it’s traditional form, means doing and being. Education is what a PHD gets. Learning is what an apprentice does.

Notice the difference – you “get” or obtain the first one, you “do” or become the other one. One fills your head, the other one fills your heart, your hands, your life and your wallet. Learning takes four steps, but education is set up to take us through only two of them.

Step One – Hear
William Glasser says 10-20% of what hits our hearing actually gets to our head, and almost none of that gets any farther to actually change something. Hearing is the worst way to learn anything, but is the most common form of education. For college students, itting through canned lectures is what makes Thursday night drinking attractive.

Step Two -Head
Cognition rarely becomes conviction. A very small percentage of what gets into our head actually makes it to our heart as information that we believe can actually make a difference. Most of college is set up to get things stuffed into our heads, and almost never are we challenged by the orators/professors to build a conviction around the information and go do something with it.

Step Three – Heart
A small percentage of information that goes into our head actually stirs our emotion and creates the desire or conviction that we should do something about it. Who challenges us to take the information and use it to be transformed? This is the kind of thing that happens in life, but almost never in education.

Step Four – Hands
While information is rummaging around in our heart, we’re all excited about applying it to our business or our life. But then we get back to email, the phone and the ongoing Tyranny of the Urgent, and the “feeling” goes away. Nothing has changed. Only when we hear something and the information goes from our head, through hearts and out our hands, will it ever make a difference in our lives. Which bring me to velleity.

The Second Most Important Business Word You’ve Never Heard
Velleity is the 2nd Most Important Business Word You’ve Never Heard. (See the first here – http://chuckb.me/x2) Velleity means, “The desire, with no intention whatsoever of doing anything.” Velleity is at the root of the common wishing and hoping phrase, “Wouldn’t it be great if…?” Velleity is something getting all the way from our ears through our head into our heart, but never coming out our hands. We get excited, but never doing anything about it except wish…”Wouldn’t it be great…?”

Doing vs. Knowing
The Greeks (and our education system) were both wrong. We do not think our way to a new way of acting. We ACT our way to a new way of thinking. Want to change something in your life? DO something different. Otherwise it’s just a bunch of velleity.

From our ears, to our head, through our heart and out our hands. Step Four is what creates success. Before that it’s just wishful thinking.

Only One Type of Bankruptcy Is Fatal

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And it’s not financial

Tons of people have gone bankrupt and succeeded anyway. It’s because they avoided the one type of bankruptcy that would have ended it all. And it has nothing to do with money.

The following Presidents all went bankrupt financially:
– Abraham Lincoln A bunch of really bad general stores
– Ulysses Grant After he was President
– Thomas Jefferson Multiple times before and after being President
– William McKinley Just three years before becoming President.

A very few business people who went bankrupt and were still successful:
– Henry Ford His Detroit Automobile Company went bankrupt in 1899. Henry Ford Company was failing when he left in 1903 to start Ford Motor Company.
– Walt Disney Bankrupt in 1922, created Mickey Mouse in 1928, and in the 60’s had to go to 302 banks before the 303rd would give him money for his insane idea to start an “amusement” park called Disneyland.
– Milton Hershey Went bankrupt twice trying make candy, then hit it big with Hershey’s Chocolate.
– H.J. Heinz In 1875 his horseradish company went bankrupt. The next year he started a ketchup company that does $10 billion a year now.
– P.T Barnum Bankrupt in 1855. Then in 1871 at age 61 he started a circus. a stupid idea no bank would support, especially with a guy who had been bankrupt. It raked in over $10 million in today’s dollars the first year.

Commitment Bankruptcy
I personally know a number of people who went bankrupt financially, but they all share the same trait as those above; they never went bankrupt personally.

I don’t mean personal financial bankruptcy, I mean “commitment bankruptcy”, which would have destroyed their personal vision, personal motivation, personal willingness to pick themselves up and do it again, and as a result, their personal commitment to keep going.

Looking at the example of these people’s lives, financial bankruptcy is clearly never fatal. But if you lose your vision, stop believing you can do it, or just get tired and quit, you’ve suffered the only bankruptcy that is permanent – Commitment Bankruptcy.

Gradually, Then Suddenly
Stay in the habit of getting back on the horse regularly. If you quit the small things, it will create a habit of quitting that can lead you to quitting the big things. We suffer Commitment Bankruptcy the same way we suffer financial bankruptcy – gradually; then suddenly.

Financial bankruptcy is temporary. Commitment bankruptcy is fatal.

Get back on the horse today and ride.

Live Longer – Don’t Retire.

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Golf is bad for your future.

A 90-year study of 1,528 Americans called The Longevity Project shoots holes in the retirement dream. Turns out goofing off for the last thirty years of our lives is a really bad idea.

The idea that work is leading you to an early grave is a myth. This massive study proved what we’ve been saying for years now.

Know where you’re going.
People with the most focused long-term paths in the study were the least likely to die young. Looking at the participants in the study who were in their 70s, those that had not retired were looking at much longer lives than their golfing counterparts: “The continually productive men and women lived much longer than their laid-back comrades.”

Also, those who moved from job to job without a clear progression were less likely to have long lives than those who went deep and long in a focused direction with their business lives. We call this a commitment to the long term, “conation”.

Conate, You’ll Live Longer.
Conation is the most important business word you’ve never heard, but is central to a long life. We define conation as, “Committed Movement in a Purposeful Direction.”

“It wasn’t the happiest or the most relaxed older participants who lived the longest,” the authors write. “It was those who were most engaged in pursuing their goals.”

Knowing where you’re going, and being committed and focused to get there (conation), is going to make you live longer.

Conation – Committed Movement in a Purposeful Direction.

Live With Purpose, Not Just to Play.
This study doesn’t mean you need to go to work for 90 years. It means you need to rethink going out to pasture at 65 to play golf. Amusement isn’t the goal. Think of the Latin roots of that word – “a” means “without”, and “muse” means “to think”

Amusement – something you do without your brain.

Make Meaning
A commitment to a life of retirement leisure is a great way to die sooner. You don’t have to go to work; you just need to figure out how to continue to Make Meaning even if you’re done making money.

Retirement is a bankrupt Industrial Age idea. Live a life of significance your whole life, not just the first 2/3rds of it.

Conate. You’ll live longer.

Why Studying Exceptional People Doesn’t Help Us

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Process vs Result

We all have a desire to be significant. Yet few of us feel we are creating the rules that will get us there. So we study “exceptional people” to find rules for success. But we almost always miss the one rule that makes them successful; struggle.

While we idolize our hero, too often we lose sight of what got them there. With very few exceptions, it wasn’t talent, but struggle. Is it possible that deep commitment to the effort it takes to get to your Big Why is what actually creates meaning, joy and success?

Joy in the Journey
Are we too focused on the result achieved by “exceptional people” to understand how they got there? Why do athletes, music heroes, and business people who are already at the top of their field and financially secure keep going? Why don’t they retire as soon as they get there? Is the result their focus?

I believe it is because they have found the secret (such an over used term) of success. They understand that meaning and joy are not found in the destination but in the journey, and that love of the process of persistent struggle is the key to joy.

Love the Persistent Process
How did your star athlete get to the level they are at? By persistent struggle on the weight machines, on the track, and daily work at perfecting their craft. Relentless, consistent, persistent struggle. And a deep love for that process. Yo Yo Ma, world famous cellist, once told my daughter “The key to becoming a world class musician is to learn to love to practice; to practice every day as if you’re sitting on stage at Carnegie Hall for your debut concert.”

Do you love the Persistent Process, or are you focused on the result? Measure the result, but focus on the process and building your mental muscles through it. Learn to love the process and the ongoing development of both your craft and your business.

You will find the most meaning and joy in having made it through the tough times and having created success by loving the Persistent Process of getting there.

Your heroes didn’t get there by talent. They got there by learning to love the process of getting there. Take the things you learn from them with you into the real world, get beat up, fall down, get back up a little stronger, and do it again. Build your mental muscles one at a time, but relentlessly. Unfailing commitment to the process of getting there is the only thing that will get you there.

No Exceptional People, Just Exceptional Commitment
We get what we intend, not what we hope for. Intend to embrace the process in order to get the result. Don’t read books marveling at people who have achieved great things. Don’t study their result. Marvel instead at the fact that these otherwise very common people were dedicated and sold out to the long process of getting there, no matter their circumstances.

Circumstances don’t make me who I am. How I respond to them does. Respond with tenacity and commitment to the long view. That will get you there! Do what it takes to build a business and a life of significance!

Joy is not found in the destination, but in the journey. Love the journey, the Persistent Process, and success will follow.

Resolve to Never Make a New Year’s Resolution

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I hereby resolve…blah…blah…blah

The best resolution you could make in January is to not make a New Year’s Resolution. They rarely work, and tying them to the New Year nearly ensures they never will.

Last year I reported that 97% of people who make New Year’s Resolutions to lose weight actually weigh more 12 months later. New Year’s Resolutions enrich companies selling diets and ab-duction machines, but they don’t effect real change.

Later, Dude…
A New Year’s Resolution is almost always focused more on celebrating the decision than on resolving to be different. There isn’t a wit of difference between Mardi Gras and New Year’s Resolutions. Both of these “decision” mechanisms are built on putting things off until a special date where you can then celebrate the decision to start losing weight, working out, spending time with family, or giving up smoking.

Until then, you can go on pigging out, being mean, ignoring family and smoking like a chimney. Now that you’ve announced you will quit on some future date, your self-destructive behavior is actually permissible to “get it out of your system”. Mardi Gras and New Years makes your actions downright celebrated – get your glutton on, because soon you’ll be in a forsaken and tortured desert of good living.

Getting Ready to Get Ready to…
Here’s a clue – the more you need to point to January 1 as the day “I will absolutely start doing or stop doing x”, the less you probably mean it. If it’s important, change now. If you have to walk on coals or chant at your vision board to prepare for the big day, you can save yourself some self-imposed guilt and just keep going with what’s not working.

My mother passed away a few weeks ago. She used to tell me, “Chuck, there’s no such thing as excuses, there’s not even reasons, there are just priorities.” She lived that out well, making no excuses and simply doing the things she found important. She didn’t live to make decisions on special days; she just DID what she VALUED.

How to Change Something
We do what is a priority, not what we SAY is a priority. Last year I gave you three few practical suggestions on how to DO our priorities. I added a fourth this year:
1) Don’t “get motivated” Most of this walk-on-coals stuff is emotion-based and has no lasting power. You’re either committed or you aren’t. I don’t get motivated to brush my teeth. I either do it or I don’t.
2) Run toward something, not away from something. People who want to lose weight rarely lose any. “I want to stop being fat,” is running away from being fat. “I see myself living a great lifestyle,” is running toward something. Run toward a great life, not away from being fat. Read, Get a Second Planet.
3) Make decisions through a new lens. See yourself and/or your business AS IF YOU WERE ALREADY THERE. Read last years New Year’s Resolution post on how Peter Arnell went from 406 lbs to 150 lbs and stayed there. If you can’t already CLEARLY envision yourself exercising three times a week, don’t even start.
4) Diligence, not Discipline – Anybody can have the DISCIPLINE to do something for 30 days. But few people will have the DILIGENCE to continue for the rest of the year. Diligence is a drip system. Do the right thing a little bit every day – it will add up to something big down the road. Diligent rules; discipline drools.

The above four steps are all about intentionality vs. hope. Intention is the key because:

You get what you intend, not what you hope for.

New Year’s Resolutions are full of emotion-based “hope”. Real decisions are full of intention and don’t need a special day or audience to be walked out into the open.

Don’t get there. Be there.
Don’t gin up the motivation to do something on a special day. Just start living the way you know will make you more successful. Today. It’s OK to cheat on your New Year’s Resolution and start it a few days before January 1. Especially if you actually want to change.

Where do you want to be in 2013? Tell the world here, be there inside today, and then let’s go do it on the outside for the whole year. Carpe Diem – seize TODAY and enjoy doing changing something that will make your life, and maybe even your checking account, richer.

The Short Straw of Failure

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One Simple Thing

For years I’ve been hunting down reasons why people are successful, or why they aren’t. In the last few weeks an over-arching single reason seems to be forming for me.

The Long List of Success Attributes
If you break it down to the smaller reasons, there are so many why people succeed – clarity of vision, solid values/beliefs/principles, speed of execution, commitment (never giving up), discipline, getting back up/bouncing back, taking good risks vs bad risks (& knowing the difference), being organized, optimistic, being flexible, embracing challenge, seeing the big picture, rising above offense, seeing yourself as successful, being willing to be wrong often…

…and so many more.

The One Big Success Attribute
But as I look at the long list of things that make people successful or keep them stuck, they almost all seem to roll up under one simple, over-arching reason. I’ve been testing it against all the other reasons for weeks, and can’t find one that doesn’t fit under the one big one.

The reason we get where we want to go or don’t is simply this:

Short-term vs. long-term decision-making.

Not very glamorous, but absolutely transformative if you embrace it.

People who make their decisions based on what will help in the short-term are almost never successful. People who make decisions based on what will be best in the long run are almost always successful. Is it that simple? Let’s test it and see.

Testing It Out
Take a look at the list of success attributes above (or any of the dozens I haven’t mentioned) and ask yourself which ones are based on short-term gain and which ones are based on the long-term gain. Success attributes are all about the long-term.

In stark contrast, the following reasons for failure all help us address short-term symptoms, but keep us right where we are:
– survival: I have payroll to make
– feelings: I don’t feel like doing that right now
– fear: I’m afraid they won’t like me, or I might fail
– lack of discipline: shiny object syndrome – oooh! – let’s do that, TOO!
– being tired: the #1 reason businesses fail
– lack of learning: we’re too busy DOING to be learning
– inflexibility: change is messy, we’ll just row over the falls
– lack of vision: I’m too busy making chairs for that woo-woo crap

…and on and on. We do them all for one very simple reason. We are short-sighted and not thinking about how we will ever get to where we want to be.

Ask yourself two long-term questions:

1) What would I be doing right now if I weren’t (in survival, afraid, undisciplined, tired, etc – put your own short-term problem here)?
2) Am I making decisions based on where I am, or where I want to be?

Decisions based on what helps me now, create long-term failure. Long-term success is based on a life pattern of making many small, daily decisions, one after another, that stack up to success down the road.

Our VALUES determine our thoughts
Our thoughts determine our actions
Our actions determine our habits
Our habits determine our character
Our character determines our DESTINY.

Do you value being on the treadmill the rest of your life, making decisions that address short-term symptoms but never solve the long-term problems? Or do you value getting off the treadmill and living a life of success and significance?

You Are Not a Victim of the Short Straw
In business and in life, the short straw is not a guessing game. Nobody’s fist is hiding it. The long straw and the short straw are both laying on the table right in front of us. If we want to be successful we will see clearly that short-term decision-making is just willingly picking the short straw instead of the long one.

Make one decision today that will make you more successful later. It likely won’t make you any money or save you any time TODAY (short-term). But it just might change your life down the road.

Choose the long straw.

The Long Pole of Success

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Truth & Consequences.

A few years ago I spent a day finishing my first book, because I wanted to go to New Zealand 21 months later. If I didn’t do it that day, the trip was in jeopardy. Why? Because the Long Pole of Success is very predictable.

Imagine a mile long pole you’re holding against your stomach, and someone else is holding the other end against their stomach, and the goal is to shake hands without them having to move.

What happens if you take one step toward them? If you both keep the pole against your stomachs, a mile away they will have to take a step back. You’ll never shake hands that way. If the game is to keep the pole directly in front of you, the only way to get there is to start cutting off lengths of the pole. Cut off enough and you eventually end up where they are without them having to move.

I’ll just do it tomorrow
The Long Pole of Success illustrates why today is so important to getting to your objective months or years from now. Too often, “the future” looks far enough off that we feel we can ignore it for now and just pay attention to it later.

To finish my book I needed one solid eight hour day. On Tuesday, June 2 a few years ago, I looked at my 2-Page Strategic Plan and saw that I was supposed to be done with the chapter by May 31. The next day, Wednesday, June 3, was supposed to be a gorgeous 80 degree day and I had no appointments. Memorial Day weekend’s weather blew chunks so I was going to make up for it with golf and a bike ride on Wednesday. But now I had a choice to make – finish the book or enjoy the day.

My Business Maturity Date, with a 3 1/2 week celebration trip to New Zealand, was 21 months off. The book was one of a number of strategic things I needed to accomplish to make it to my BMD, which included taking Fridays and the last week of every month off after I hit that date.

I looked at my schedule and realized that it would be at least six weeks before I had another full day to finish the chapter. Doing it in 1-2 hour pieces just didn’t work for me – I needed to be able to focus and get it all knocked out at once or it likely wouldn’t flow well.

Cutting off a chunk of the pole
I had a Long Pole of Success decision to make. Since finishing the book was one of many strategic keys to hitting my BMD, putting off the completion of this chapter for six weeks would push back the publishing date of the book by six weeks, and potentially push back my BMD 21 months later, by that same six weeks.

To keep the BMD from moving, I had to cut off a length of the Long Pole on Wednesday and get the book done. I finished the book and the other strategic things we needed to do in order to build a business that would run while we’re on vacation (hiring people, putting processes in place, etc.). 21 months later we left for New Zealand to celebrate our BMD, on the exact day we hat targeted almost four years earlier.

Today Matters
When things seem a long way off, we don’t see much issue with putting off doing something that might just impact that seemingly far off goal. But the fact is that every time we turn today into tomorrow without completing the strategic things that will build our business, we automatically push back success by one day.

And it’s really hard to make it up later. With the pole tucked into your stomach, you can’t reach 50 yards in front of you and cut off a big chunk all at once a few months from now. The only way to do it without delaying success down the road, is to cut off small pieces regularly every week.

Success is quite predictable
The Long Pole of Success is unforgiving. Either regularly cut it off in small pieces or expect to push off success by each day that you don’t do the small and simple things that will eventually get you there. But success is actually quite predictable, if you’re doing the right thing. Chipping away at the Long Pole will very predictably get you to your goal.

Next year, will you end up where you are?
Are you making decisions based on where you are, or where you want to be? Think about the Long Pole of Success the next time you say, “I’ve got a whole year. I can do that strategic thing tomorrow.”

Knowing vs. Knowing

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They’re vastly different things.

The ancient Greeks had two distinctly different words for knowledge. One of them is good for business owners, the other one, not so much.

A Tale of Two Words
Gnosis is the ancient Greek word for “knowledge of the head” – 2+2=4. The sky is blue. Gravity sucks. Plants need water. All good stuff to know, but not nearly as powerful as the other kind of knowledge.

Epignosis is the ancient Greek word for “knowledge of the heart/life”. This is voodoo of a different kind and is much more valuable to the business owner. Epignosis is not something you know to be a fact, that can sit in your head unused for decades. Epignosis is applied knowledge. It’s knowledge that directly affects the way you live and act every day. You don’t know it, you do it.

As a business owner we know things with our head that are interesting, fascinating, boring, essential (profit is good, loss is bad), and some of it very complex. We love complex knowledge – understanding markets, watching trends, researching possible products and services – because it all takes a lot of time to learn and makes us feel smart. Even other people are impressed when we talk from our head knowledge about these things.

Get Real
But Epignosis, knowledge of the life, is a special thing and should be cherished by business owners. It is that knowledge on which we act and build a business. Things like calling people because we “know” if we do, some will buy. Or building connections with strategic alliance partners because we “know” they can rain on us for decades with clients. Or getting out of our office and serving our clients or other business owners because we “know” that helping others get to their goals ensures our own success.

We know that we have Epignosis about something because it affects the way we do things. Gnosis is only about what we know in our heads, but Epignosis goes to the very heart of what we BELIEVE (more on that next week), and it is our beliefs that determine our actions. If I believe bicycling will make me fit, I will do it regularly, not think about it. It’s true Epignosis.

I Say Tom-ay-to, You Say Tom-ah-to
The problem is that we get the two confused all the time. We think that knowing something with our heads (I will be successful if I make those phone calls) is somehow valuable. But knowledge of the head is only valuable when it comes out our hands as knowledge of the life.

Successful business owners have a special relationship with life-knowledge, Epignosis. They go looking for the kind of knowledge that can be immediately translated into action that builds their business. Those that struggle are much more inclined to research, think, strategize, analyze, postulate and theorize. That kind of Gnosis may be very satisfying and impressive, but it will leave you poor. When it comes to Gnosis, the old adage, “Knowledge is power”, is wrong. If knowledge (Gnosis) were power, librarians would rule the world.

In Your Head, Out Your Hands
Life-knowledge makes us do something, not think something. It is at the core of Conation – Committed Movement in a Purposeful Direction (CMPD). Conation is the most important business word you’ve never heard because we live in a world ruled by Cognitives, Thinkers – Gnostics who loving knowing but not doing.

Want to be successful? Fall in love with Epignosis. Every time something goes in your head, figure out how it can come out your hands to help you build a better business. Translate Gnosis into Epignosis – it’s a great way to build a business. Stop thinking. Get moving.