Are you setting yourself up for a big letdown?

My client just finished his best quarter – at home and work!

At work, he closed his biggest sale in the last few years. His pipeline is strong and he is confident he will finish the year above plan.

At home, he is getting along better with his wife. Fewer arguments with his teenagers.

I said, “Congrats! Well done!”

I then asked, ‘Why is everything better?’

His response to my question was, ‘I don’t know.’

What?!?!?! I was so discouraged by his answer. We have worked hard for growth, yet he didn’t know why.

Why is his answer so common?

Reality is, his response is no different than the majority of ours would be. In the busyness of our lives we often:

1. Never take the time to reflect on the peaks or valleys in our life.

2. Are naive to think the good things will just happen again because ‘we are good.’

3. Also naive to think the bad things will never happen again because ‘it just won’t.’

Wrong.

To repeat good behavior you need to know what to repeat. Likewise, to prevent bad events, we need to know what led up to the fall and avoid them next time.

We need to reflect to have a revelation.

In the reflection and discussion with my client we discovered some of the following:

1. At work, his sales were up because he had more face to face calls. Plus he had more appointments with his target customer. The lesson learned for him was face-to-face meetings are critical for his success in sales.

2. At home, he had been on more dates with his spouse. My client also has spent more time with the kids. One easy win was he usually walked the dog solo, but now he was inviting the kids to join him in the walk.

Next time you hit a peak or valley, be humble, hit pause, reflect, develop a plan and then take action.

Thank you for reading.

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Photo by Ben White on Unsplash

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