Saturday, October 16, 2010

Think Big




Think Big

UPDATE: Learn how to Think Big like Donald Trump with a free 20 minute consultation.
Don't limit yourself. In other words, think BIG. Thinking small when you can be thinking big is definitely limiting your potential. People are capable of doing great things, but not if they don't envision great things being done. You don't have to waste time working your way up to the top when you can start there in your mind.
I remember the old saying "It's lonely at the top." I don't agree. It was probably said by someone who didn't want any competition. I'm secure enough in my success to welcome competition, so I don't mind telling you that being at the top is a great feeling. Thinking big can get you there.
Here's how. We all start with small steps. The point is to get us up to the big steps we're all capable of taking. Would you be satisfied taking baby steps throughout your childhood? Would you be thrilled to be crawling when everyone else is already walking? I don't think so. We start small, but we move on. People like challenges. It's our nature. Keep in sync with that basic premise and you will begin moving forward with the momentum necessary for great achievement. Know that it is a natural progression, not some wild scheme from out of nowhere.
We have to learn to walk before we can start sprinting. But that's no reason not to contemplate sprinting even from day one. Apply that to your thoughts, and understand how your mind reveals the future to you. Do you have big plans or small plans? If all you can see on your agenda are small plans, ask yourself why. Then begin to expand your horizons. Sometimes we have to recognize our own smallness of mind before we can do anything about it.
Another way to move forward in a big way is to concentrate on managing your future, not your past. I've seen a lot of people waste a lot of time by dwelling on the past. Learn from the past, but don't stay there. You have to keep the momentum going; keep moving forward, not backwards. Don't focus on the problem when you should be looking at the solution.
Einstein said imagination is more important than knowledge. Easy for him to say, you might think. What he meant, though, was that without imagination and the ability to visualize possibilities, what would be the point of great knowledge? Knowledge is power, unless you choose not to use it. Knowledge is also the foundation of many great enterprises. Put imagination and knowledge together and in no time you'll have something plenty big in your think big tank.
Take the time to think, but don't risk wasting your time. Think Big.

How to Think Big Every Day

"Think big" towers above most other advice you will hear on how to succeed. In just two words, it lays out a plan for achieving your highest goals.
The greatest challenge is to find ways to think big today, not someday. Here's how to make sure that happens.
Think Big Secret ##1: Seize opportunities you don't think you can handle. When people in authority ask you to take on a challenge you don't think you can manage, say yes. It means they see abilities in you that you have missed. You will prove yourself and make a big impression - fast.
Example: The late Katharine Graham, probably the most powerful woman ever in American media, started life as an upper-class girl who wanted a society life. She married the editor of the Washington Post and her prospects seemed set. But then her husband killed himself in 1963, and the Post board asked her to take over the paper. Her first response was, "Who, me?" But she threw herself into it, built the Post into a world-class paper, acquired Newsweek, and even won a Pulitzer Prize over the course of a long career. The message? When opportunity knocks, answer the door.
Think Big Secret ##2: Put yourself in situations that make you nervous. Seek out high-stakes circumstances that challenge you because they promise the greatest growth.
Example: Terrie Williams, who founded her own public relations firm, represents giants of sport and entertainment. She started her company by walking up to Miles Davis and saying she wanted to represent him. He became her first client, and the next one was Eddie Murphy. She says that if she feels butterflies in her stomach before negotiating with powerful people, she knows she is in the right place, not coasting.
Think Big Secret ##3: Stay alert all day long for opportunities. About 99 percent of the things that happen every day might be repetitive busywork. But there is another one percent that is different because it brings significant opportunities. Stay alert for this one percent throughout the day, and don't let it escape you.
Example: Like many people, I get hundreds of e-mails and phone calls every day. But when a chance came to use my journalistic experience to write for The Trump Entrepreneur Initiative, I saw at once that I had been offered something significant, if I could make it happen. Unless you screen all incoming events for their "think big" potential, some important ones might slip away.
And One More Think Big Secret . . .
Constantly try to envision the significant places that your abilities and enthusiasms can take you in the world. Remember:
  • "Good with numbers" is not a career goal, but "CFO of a Fortune 500 Company" is.
  • "Excellent people skills" is not a career goal, but "head of my own HR consulting firm" is.
If you find it hard to link your abilities to big enough dreams, consider having a session or two with a qualified career counselor who can help you see the big opportunities that lie hidden in your unique gifts. An objective outsider can sometimes see your future triumphs more clearly than you can and help you plan how to achieve them.

Thinking Big: Your Vehicle to Success

Reach for the stars, go for it, man!
- Sammy Davis, Jr.
America is a big country and bigness is essential to the American Way. It's everywhere you look: big money, big portions, big ideas. In a place with so much of everything, there's a lot of smallness, too, like millions of people of modest means, whose lives just don't play out on the grand scale of everything around them. They can turn on a TV anytime or visit a multiplex and see a world that dwarfs their own. Some react with indifference, while others seethe with jealously and frustration. Then there are those who are emboldened by this grand landscape. It helps fuel their ambition to reach their outsized vision. These people think, "I may be little now, but not for long."
When you truly think big, you never feel small. Your vision elevates you above your surroundings. Your vision protects you, too, by providing a bulwark against bitterness and resignation, afflictions common to the smalltime and small-minded.
Your vision of the future may be at odds with the facts of today. Now, this moment, might hold only failure and doubt, but to succumb to the moment before your dream takes shape is to veer toward surrender. Thinking big is what carries you past the moment.
Business, art, or any creative endeavor isn't just a few "eureka" moments. It's hard work, and it's not always fun. Ideas of any complexity advance by increments and require a certain combination of broad strokes and big-picture thinking (the fun stuff), and intense concentration on details (the real work). To do it right and to see it through you need time and energy, but above all, you need discipline. Thinking big is a discipline, a means of getting past the minutiae. You can say to yourself, "Right now is a chore, but just imagine the final outcome!" That's thinking big. It's not a passing thought: it's a mindset.
If you think big, you will have at least the engine of genius. The Trump Entrepreneur Initiative can help add the rest. Knowledge is a vehicle, and our online courses and other learning products are fully compatible with any model of success, whether it's advancing your career, starting a business, or creating wealth through investment. The biggest thoughts need a corresponding strategy to harness them. Marketing yourself and your ideas is key. Our course, Build a Powerful Marketing Strategy will give you practical experience developing a marketing plan for your product or service.

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