Let me ask you a question: how do those words make you feel?

Do they make you think of anything in particular? Something that is relevant to you specifically?

If that’s not the case right now, they may do, once you’ve had a chance to read this article and really absorb what’s being said.

If you’re running an independent business, you’ll no doubt have dreams of a better tomorrow. You’ll also probably have researched and read about creating business success.

Many elements cover the subject of business success, but none are more fundamental than how you think and act when working on or in your business.

These five words serve as a practical framework, a roadmap, guiding you towards genuine and sustainable success in all your business endeavours.

All it takes is to understand what they mean in this context. More importantly, what they mean to you deep down and how you can develop your understanding so they can inspire you to take the right action.

As a business that specialises in content creation and coaching on value ladders and funnels, you’d probably expect us to focus on those areas in our articles. However, we often point out our characteristics are to think differently and encourage the same in those we meet along the way.

You see, the way you think is just as important to your success as the art of brilliant content creation. I want you to benefit from brilliant content and refine your knowledge of funnels and online sales skills. But I also want you to take advantage of the power you have over your performance. 

The subject of how you think to influence success is less tangible than content production and funnels and will often polarise opinion, which is actually good for the conversation on business success.

The way you think and therefore the way you act will enhance or retard success. Believe me when I tell you the two are linked. These five words are a huge clue into what you should be striving to achieve in your thinking.

Focusing on these five words and their relationship with you and each other will, by default, create significantly more opportunities to achieve the success I am sure you’re looking for. I should explain…

This relationship was first made popular in the 1930’s by Napoleon Hill. He wasn’t the first to talk about the subject, but history shows he is, along with Tony Robbins of our own generation, one of the biggest proponents of the phrase you become what you think about most. I know that Russel Brunson, from whom I have learnt so much is also a fan of Napoleon Hills Work and rightly so!

Perhaps we should look at that phrase “You Become What You Think About Most” and what it actually means.

Undoubtedly, our prevailing thoughts have a significant influence over our actions, and we are far more susceptible to subconscious thoughts than the ones we consciously force.

For example, it’s little value saying “I’ll be successful” if your subconscious is saying, “I can’t do this, I’ve failed before, I’ll fail again!”

This is often referred to as negative self-talk or limiting beliefs.

This is where using those five words becomes so important. The more you understand how to use them to engage yourself and the more intention mixed with emotion you use, the better equipped you’ll be to change your world from the current version to the version you truly desire.

Let’s look at each word in turn, their relationship to the other words in the group of five and how they relate to success.
​

The word desire is used to describe your deep-seated reason why. Ask yourself this question: why are you doing what you’re doing?

What is the driving force behind your work, your overriding desire?

If you can’t immediately answer this question, there's room for improvement. You need to be able to answer that question with great clarity.

This doesn’t need to be all about your business, although if that is the case, there’s nothing wrong with that, as long as it is the core reason why.

But at some point, the business needs to be very close to the top of the list, and you need to develop it into a healthy obsession. If you’re not obsessing, you’re not giving it your all!

My deep-seated desire is centred on my belief that I have but one purpose, and that is to help others. It is at my very core. I am on this earth to serve those that I come into contact with.

From my history, you’ll see from the beginning that this has been a constant theme in my life, from the early days in the Army to my Service with my local Lifeboat. It is reflected in my writing and the services and products I offer through my businesses.

I desire to help as many people in business as possible, and to achieve this, I have built and continue to develop my business to reach them!

You’ll find it difficult to create the success you so richly deserve without a true desire to embrace. You’ll know when you’ve got this right because your desire becomes an obsession, a most desirable one. You’ll find this characteristic in most successful people you encounter. As I’ve already mentioned him, take a look at Russel Brunson, you’ll find all the evidence you need to support this view!

​All that said, all the desire in the world alone won’t cut it; you also need belief.

Earlier, I talked about the voice in your subconscious mind, which, for many of us, tells us some unhelpful things, like we can’t or we won’t. Desire has to work closely with belief.

Look at it this way, if you tell yourself you can’t, it is most likely that you won’t. If you say and believe you can and add to that true emotion, your chances of success increase tenfold.

You may still not reach the top of your specific mountain, but I am certain you’ll be far closer than you would have been without the belief!

When Desire and Belief work closely together, amazing things can start to happen; what’s more, you’ll feel happier, too. One is very much reliant on the other, that is without doubt, and there’s empirical evidence in support of this view!

Both Desire and Belief need focus…

With a deep-seated desire and a belief in your ability to work toward the ultimate aim, you will need to focus. The kind of focus that so often alludes the majority of people limiting their belief and keeping them in a world of Average or, some might even say, Mediocre!

I don’t think anyone decides to make the very courageous decision to go into business for themself to be average or mediocre; I think they do it because, like you, they want to be exceptional, they want to change the world (their world)!

Trust me when I tell you, you will only do this with a deep seated desire, unstoppable belief and focus on the goal.

This kind of focus will always avoid distractions that divert you from the mission and always follow the path toward the success you seek rather than easy, quick wins with no longevity.

​Focus is difficult with all the noise around you pulling you off course. Focus is so much easier when joined by Desire and Belief. Where these three elements reside, you would hope to then find Action!

While it’s obvious, of course you’d expect action to be the result of Desire, Belief and Focus, the reality is somewhat different. Have you ever wondered why so few people actually achieve the success they desire?

Well, I can tell you the reason is too few employ the right levels of appropriate action. Too many people spend their time thinking about what they’re going to do without actually seeing it through into the physical action.

The reality is we also let doubt or false beliefs take centre stage and prevent us from taking the actions that are needed to create the success we desire! We procrastinate because we are naturally wired to conserve energy. Thinking about it is easy and gives us some pleasure, doing creates the risk of disappointment, pain and even failure, which is why so many avoid tasking action and just think about it or talk about it.

But, like I’ve said before, failure is not just part of the process, it’s actually essential to the process. We need to accept that fact and keep on keeping on, provided you’re keeping on with the right stuff!

This is why building our resilience, along with other aspects of emotional intelligence is so vital to the process of learning, growing and pursuing success.

Action requires a degree certainty, action also requires clarity. At this point, I need to say a word of caution about certainty.

The certainty I speak of is certainty of mission and not certainty of result. Those who seek certainty for each result they’re chasing, will run the risk of not enough or no action while in the pursuit of certainty of result over clarity of mission!

Action becomes the key to the door of success when merged with the other four key words. Certainty and clarity are needed for action and take you right back to Desire and Belief.

From desire comes clarity of vision and mission and from these same two elements comes certainty of mission. All of these elements come from your mindset, the right mindset! Remember you become what you think about most. Or if you prefer, your prevailing thoughts will have significant influence on your behaviour and the actions you take! It’s worth noting that your subsequent actions will also influence how those around you act too.

​Now we focus on the last of these pivotal keywords: Consistency…

Success has a price, nothing comes to you for free. Success can never be achieved without paying that price. To get you have to first give!

I know it’s obvious but you need to turn up and turn up consistently, to achieve the success you desire.

The top-ranked sports personalities, musicians, and other trade experts achieve success by consistently performing their training routines. To be the best is about consistent practice, consistent learning, and consistently showing up despite the temporary defeats they must all experience on the road to ultimate success. The same is true for you.

Those who make it do so through consistency and an understanding of the balance between a lost and valid cause.

The phrase, ‘Keep on keeping on’, doesn’t always mean doing so without adjustments, pivots and the ability to slow down and sometimes stop for evaluation and more adjustment. Success comes from learning, testing assumptions and adjusting.

Those who fall by the wayside do so because they stop and don’t get started again! In most cases, people tend to miss the balance and stop too soon or keep going too long!

There’s a tendency for success to follow on from what may first appear to be a major failure and it is the consistency of doing the right things that will always win the day. As the saying goes, it’s always dark before dawn!

I would like to share an anecdote with you to help show what I've been saying.

Two people can start identical businesses in the same space using the same product or service and get completely different results over time; the difference is how they think and, therefore, act.

Consistency of thought and action is the key, or should I say the right thoughts and actions! Success has a price; nothing comes to you for free. Success can never be achieved without paying that price. To get, you have to first give!

I know it’s obvious but you need to turn up and turn up consistently, to achieve the success you desire.

Two people can start identical businesses in the same space using the same product or service and get completely different results over time, the difference is how they think and therefore act.

Consistency of thought and action is the key, or should I say the right thoughts and actions! This story illustrates the significant influence your thoughts will have on your performance and how consistency builds performance over time, there are no overnight successes but a slow and definite climb to the top:

Two friends started their business in the same space at the same time doing the same thing for the same price and they both started out doing the same activities for marketing, sales and delivery of their service. In the beginning they were also experiencing the same results.

At the beginning of this journey it’s impossible to see the difference between them in terms of the results they experience. As time passes there is little change in the results either are attracting from their efforts, but there is a difference, and it is that difference and it builds as time passes.

At the end of each working day or week Paul either goes to the gym, or the bar or something else that enables him to relax. He will often meet with friends, maybe go to the game or watch a movie.

Meanwhile, Pauline is so focused on her mission and filled with desire and belief in what she’s doing that her focus is on her business, and she has limited time for other activities, family commitments excluded, of course (never short-change your family, or those closest to you)!

Both Paul and Pauline are regular visitors at a local networking event. They often share stories, and Pauline invariably talks about the business. While Paul does the same, he also shares entertaining stories about the party he went to, the match, the drinks with friends, and the occasional all-nighter!

What Paul doesn’t know is Pauline is still working while he is out, apparently having the time of his life. She is working late with content production and engagement. At weekends she’s going into the office and working on new ideas for content to create brand awareness and engage with her target market and of course her existing customers. That’s because they are a great source of repeat business travelling up the value ladder she’s created for them and of course referrals.

Pauline becomes frustrated because in her frequent interactions with Paul she discovers that she is working longer and harder than he, yet they are pretty much in identical positions. While she’s burning the midnight oil, he’s out with friends. Pauline starts to ask questions, is she really cut out for this and perhaps she too should go out and relax more!

In my recent book, ‘The Seven C’s Of Why,’ I call this the danger zone because so many feel this way and give up or change what were really good habits because they aren’t getting the expected results. This is a mistake because what they were doing was consistently showing up and doing the right things. It takes time to get the right levels of momentum, and the growth curve is well known for starting very slowly.

But believe me when I say the curve will start to rise. Just a little at first, but slowly and surely, the distance between you and the average will grow.

This is exactly what happened to Pauline. Suddenly, it seemed to Paul that she was successful and he was not so successful. When they met, he asked her what he should do, and she was glad to help him.

Because she had done the hard work, she was now finding time to do the things she wanted to do. Paul, on the other hand, had spent too much time at the front end of his journey having a good time. As a result, he was flatlining, and the habits would be difficult to change, but Pauline was helping him as much as she could!

For Paul the story could have been so different if only he had used the five words to guide his mindset and grow his obsession with the desire, belief, focus, action and consistency. The good news for Paul is he has Pauline to guide him, also it is never too late to make the change, it just gets more difficult with time!

Can I ask you how are you doing with these five words in your business?

Are they a high enough priority in your mind?

Are they taking up your time in the right way for the right reasons?

Deep-seated desire needs belief, and belief needs focus to survive. Focus becomes a chore without action, and action is just burning time and, in some cases, resources without consistency when it comes to business success…

Two friends started their business in the same space at the same time doing the same thing for the same price and they both started out doing the same activities for marketing, sales and delivery of their service. In the beginning they were also experiencing the same results.

At the beginning of this journey it’s impossible to see the difference between them in terms of the results they experience. As time passes there is little change in the results either are attracting from their efforts, but there is a difference, and it is that difference and it builds as time passes.

At the end of each working day or week Paul either goes to the gym, or the bar or something else that enables him to relax. He will often meet with friends, maybe go to the game or watch a movie.

Meanwhile Pauline is so focussed on her mission, and filled with desire and belief in what she’s doing, that her focus is on her business and she has limited time for other activities, family commitments excluded, of course (never short-change your family, or those closest to you)!

Both Paul and Pauline are regular visitors at a local networking event they often share stories, invariably Pauline talks about the business. While Paul does the same he also shares entertaining stories about the party he went to, the match, the drinks with friends and the occasional all nighter!

What Paul doesn’t know is Pauline is still working while he is out, apparently having the time of his life. She is working late with content production and engagement. At weekends she’s going into the office and working on new ideas for content to create brand awareness and engage with her target market and of course her existing customers. That’s because they are a great source of repeat business travelling up the value ladder she’s created for them and of course referrals.

Pauline becomes frustrated because in her frequent interactions with Paul she discovers that she is working longer and harder than he, yet they are pretty much in identical positions. While she’s burning the midnight oil, he’s out with friends. Pauline starts to ask questions, is she really cut out for this and perhaps she too should go out and relax more!

I call this the danger zone, in my recent book called ‘The Seven C’s Of Why’, because so many feel this way and give up or change what were really good habits, because they weren’t getting the results expected. This is a mistake because what they were doing was consistently showing up and doing the right things. It takes time to get the right levels of momentum and the growth curve is well known for starting very slowly.

But believe me when I say the curve will start to rise. Just a little at first but slowly and surely the distance between you and the average will grow.

This is exactly what happened to Pauline, and suddenly it seemed to Paul she was successful and he was not so much. When they met he was asking her what he should do and she was glad to help him.

Because she had done the hard work, she was now finding time to do the things she wanted to do. Paul on the other hand had spent too much time at the front end of his journey having a good time, as a result he was flatlining and the habits would be difficult to pull out of, but Pauline was helping him as much as she could!

For Paul the story could have been so different if only he had used the five words to guide his mindset and grow his obsession with the desire, belief, focus, action and consistency. The good news for Paul is he has Pauline to guide him, also it is never too late to make the change.

Can I ask you how are you doing with these five words in your business? Are they a high enough priority in your mind? Are they taking up your time in the right way for the right reasons?

​​Deep seated desire needs belief and belief needs focus to survive. Focus becomes a chore without action and action is just burning time and in some cases resources without consistency when it comes to business success…