We all have experienced those pressure packed situations in our life.  You are about to go in for that big make or break job interview/presentation…you’re about to give that big speech…or step into the ring for any one of the many pressure packed or nerve racking things we all experience in life.  How do you prepare for those pressure packed moments? I know how those moments can be nerve racking…especially when you are not doing it on a regular basis or even worse it is your first or second time.

What would you say if I told you just before you “step on stage” to go into the bathroom and get big, take up space, open up, and get into a power pose…now hold it for two minutes.  What’s a power pose you ask?  Stand tall with your shoulders back, put a smile on your face and put your hands on your hips like you are a badass…now stand there like that for 2 minutes..  Do you think I’m nuts and it is just hocus-pocus…do you think this kind of stuff does not work?  Think again…your body and what you do with it can change your mind…there is science to prove it.  One of my wife’s good friends, Carolyn Driscoll, who subscribes to Monday Morning Mojo sent me this video a couple of weeks ago thinking it might have good content for a mojo. It is a bit long, but I promise if you take the time to watch it, whether you are a kid in school, an athlete, a business person, or you are just looking to have a better life you won’t be disappointed.  It may make the difference between knocking it out of the park in those pressure packed moments or getting your block knocked off…really.   So, grab your cup of Joe and watch it to the end…you will be moved and you will be a believer…I guarantee it.

Get Big, be powerful and fake it until you become it!!!!!

“Massive and Consistent Action = Massive and Consistent RESULTS!!!”

For whatever reason, the “fast as a leopard” mantra stuck with me.  But it wasn’t until a Navy SEAL buddy of mine said to me, “You know, Kelly, a leopard never stretches”– that this notion of becoming a supple leopard drifted into my consciousness.

Of course a leopard doesn’t stretch.  A leopard has full capacity available at all times.  It can attack and defend with full power at any moment.  Unlike humans, it doesn’t need to prep for movement.  It doesn’t need to activate its glutes: it doesn’t have to foam-roll: it doesn’t have to raise its core temperature – it’s just ready.

Obviously, we do not share the same physical playing field with leopards.  We have to warm-up for strenuous activities and practice and ingrain good movement patterns.  But that doesn’t mean we all can’t be working toward the goal of having full physical capabilities available to us instantaneously, or having the motor-control and range-of-motion to perform any physical feat at any time.  Leopards don’t have to work at being supple: they naturally are.  But people are brutally tight and missing key ranges of motion that prevent them from moving as supplely and powerfully as a leopard.

Every day I travel to Intero offices as a Title Rep for Orange Coast Title.  This means several hours spent in a car as I travel between offices.  I spend 2 hours in the morning a day inside the gym training for my Crossfit season.  By the time I am on my sales calls, my body has tightened up enough to start feeling the ramifications of the work I put in earlier in the morning.

Over the years I have noticed the importance of becoming a “Supple Leopard.”  The pain in the knees, back or any major joint was not worth it.  3 years ago if I had 15 more minutes before I had to go to an appointment, I might spend that last 15 minutes hitting another exercise or running a little longer.  Now I choose to stretch and become mobile.  Your workout routine and your diet are important.  But the key to longevity is stretching.  I can assure you that without proper stretching, all the hours you spend running or biking can be cut to zero without a strong emphasis on stretching.

If you are looking for great stretches to do inside your office while you’re working, click here -à http://www.mobilitywod.com/

Also if you find this information valuable, please listen to this webinar while you’re traveling during the day or at your office -àhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtJ3Ag4kpjM

*Finally, as I continue to travel to different Intero offices, I would be happy to meet with anyone pertaining to any fitness questions or goals they may have – FREE OF CHARGE!  Please feel free to contact me.

It’s also quite the challenge to keep track of it all.  I’m sure most of you end up emailing yourself login information or storing it all in a word doc on your desktop.  It’s just sitting there waiting for someone to find it.

Well, DataVault Password Manager just might be able to help you out with keeping all of your sensitive information secure and organized.  It is the best-selling password managers for mobile and desktop environments on the market and allows you to store all of your confidential data related to credit cards, financial accounts and logins using the most powerful encryption technology available.

DataVault is super easy to use and customizable just for you.  Choose from 25 pre-defined templates or make your own.  Customize screen colors and backgrounds by selecting from 6 themes.  Define the categories that fit your needs – make them whatever you want, the sky’s the limit.  Display information in tree view for intuitive organization by category or type, or in list view to maximize the number of items per screen.  The app adapts to your needs by providing numerous customization options and personalization settings.

The app can also help you generate strong passwords using options for length, letters/numbers, uppercase, lowercase, and punctuation marks.  Set advanced security settings on the app such as password masking, master password hint and security time out to make it even more difficult for people to get your information.  All of your information will be backed up on iCloud and it synchronizes to Dropbox, Webdav and Wi-Fi options securely so you wont have to worry about losing anything.

The benefits of this little app are endless, best of all, you can rest easy knowing your information is safe.

Get DataVault Password for Android, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, BlackBerry, Mac and Windows today!

Physical Discomfort

Any physical discomfort can affect your visible and external state.  This can be anything from an itchy suit to the sun in your eyes.  Although you may try to hide this discomfort during a conversation, the other person does feel the effect of your status; even if only on a subconscious level.

Luckily, this obstacle is easy to manage with some simple steps:

1. Prevent – Plan ahead to prevent any discomfort you have control over. Wear comfortable clothing and recommending a location where the surroundings reflect your needs.
2. Recognize – Be aware of your physical discomfort.  Check in with your face from time to time to confirm it’s not tense.  Staying present in the conversation will help with this as well.
3. Remedy or explain – Once you become aware of your discomfort, do something about it.  If the sun is in your eyes, suggest the meeting move inside.  This way, the discomfort will not be misinterpreted by those around you.

Mental Discomfort

More challenging to conquer than physical discomfort, mental discomfort can result from anxiety, dissatisfaction, self-criticism, or self-doubt.  These are all forms of internal negativity.  Knowing how to handle this negativity is a person’s greatest challenge in becoming more charismatic, but also their greatest success as it lays a foundation of understanding themselves.  Some of these can be managed through a Responsibility Transfer.  This involves entrusting a benevolent source (the Universe, God, Fate) to take on the uncertainty.  It allows you to be less affected by the anxiety, dissatisfaction, self-doubt or whatever might be keeping you from being at your best, and draws you out of your negative mental and physical state.

You can be guided by Cabane through the Responsibility Transfer exercise by going to Charisamyth.com/transfer.  Hopefully, at the end of the exercise you’ll feel an instant sense of relief and warmth, calm and serenity rising.

Key Takeaways from Chapter 3

• Any internal discomfort – either physical or mental – can impair how you feel, how you perform, and how others perceive you.
• Physical tension caused by something as simple as the sun in your eyes produces the same changes in body language as a more serious discomfort, like anxiety or irritation.
• Prevention is optimal: plan ahead to ensure comfort in clothing, location, and timing.
• Aim to stay aware of any physical sensation of discomfort.  If physical discomfort arises during an interaction, act promptly to alleviate it or explain it.
• Use techniques such as the responsibility transfer to reduce the feelings of anxiety, uncertainty, and dissatisfaction that play out in your body language and inhibit your charisma.
• Understand that mental negativity such as anxiety, dissatisfaction, self-criticism, or self-doubt is normal and something that everyone experiences.

So, who came up with this 80/20 rule anyway and how can it help me be more successful in my life…in my F5 (Faith, Family, Friends, Fitness, Finance)? The 80/20 principle is also known as the Pareto Principle. Business management thinker Joseph M. Juran suggested the principle and named it after Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto. Pareto was a noted economist and sociologist, best known for his law of income distribution and gave birth to the Pareto’s Law or the 80/20 rule. Pareto was one of the first people to analyze economic problems using mathematics. In the late 1800s, he observed that 80 percent of the land in Italy was owned by 20 percent of the population. While gardening, he later observed that 20 percent of the peapods in his garden yielded 80 percent of the peas that were harvested. And thus was born the universally accepted 80/20 rule.

Think about it, nearly everything in life works that way.

• We wear 20% of our clothes 80% of the time
• We eat 20% of the food in our kitchen 80% of the time
• We actually get 80% of the results at anything we do in life with 20% of our time and effort

So, that is all good, but the part that is real scary and eye opening is if we are getting 80% of our results from 20% of our time and activities, then what are we doing with the other 80% of our time? I am not going to bore you with the math, but trust me when I say that when we are in that zone of doing 20% to get 80% we are actually sixteen times more effective and efficient than when we are in that zone of doing 80% to get 20%. SIXTEEN TIMES!!!

That means that in an 8 hour work day you get 80% of your results out of 1.6 hours of work and 20% of your results out of the other 6.4 hours. Check this out…if we could just stay “in the zone” for 30% of your day, or for 2.4 hours, and went home after that, we would get 120% done of what you are doing today and could work 5.6 hours less. An even scarier number is if you currently make $100K and could find a way to stay “in the zone” 100% of the time you would make $1.6 million. There are people in every profession and area of life that do it. They are the most successful ones…they are the MVP’s of their team…their profession…their life.

The 80/20 rule is probably one of the most powerful ideas which is universally applicable in practically every sphere of our lives. The best part is that it is easy to understand and apply. Yet many people know little about it. The irony is that those who are aware of it, do not use it as often as they should in making decisions.

So, my challenge to everyone this week…this year…this life is that we all stay in “The Zone” just a little longer every day each week and start doing more of those activities which lead to our success.

Get in the Zone.

If you have ever tested the pH of a pool or hot tub…our bodies are kind of like this…wherein we have a pH balance.  That pH scale goes from 0-14 with 7 being neutral. Below 7 is ACID; above 7 is ALKALINE with the optimal blood level being 7.365.

You can buy pH Strips from most health foods stores.  Might be interesting to test yourself (directions are in the packets)

The pH level of our internal fluids affects every cell in our bodies. The entire metabolic process depends on an ALKALINE environment. FACT: The majority of the foods typical of a Westernized diet are ACID-forming; meat, bread, dairy products, alcohol, caffeine, sugar, refined carbohydrates, saturated fats etc. Chronic Over-acidity corrodes body tissue and can interrupt all cellular activities and functions. It is the root of all sickness and disease…scary; but powerful to know.  It is also what’s keeping many of us overweight! (I’m not saying you are carrying excess weight; but if you’re struggling to shift those pounds, then it’s very likely that you’re system is too acidic!)

Tragic…but it’s known that cancer LOVES an acidic environment. Just one more very valid reason to limit the intake of meat and cheese and dairy products, artificial sweeteners, and all that other refined stuff that we try to convince ourselves are not that bad. (I lived in that place of denial for many, many years!)

Okay, so you’re probably wondering what you CAN eat if all the other “good” (read toxic) stuff is out of the question?! (At least for a good 70% of your/our diets)

If you were to guess the answer to that question – what would it be? Something green?! You betcha!!  YES…this is why you see me drinking down a plant smoothie every morning!

As human beings, we need oxygen to survive; we simply cannot live without it.  Something you might never have really considered is that oxygen isn’t found in cooked or processed foods, nor is it found in meat or cheese. Oxygen is found in green chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is the substance in plants that allows them to absorb light from the sun and covert that light into usable energy.

Here’s a little known fact…; Chlorophyll is chemically related to blood – the only difference being that the main atom is hemoglobin (blood’s oxygen transporter) is iron, while in chlorophyll it’s magnesium. Chlorophyll contains a powerful blood builder that is said to increase red blood cells, improve circulation, ease inflammation (which we know promotes angiogenesis or cancer cell growth), oxygenates the body and counteracts free radicals.  Yes, you can gather that Chlorophyll is really, really good for you.  So by eating fruits, veggies, dark greens especially, we fill our bodies with liquid oxygen, the single most important element keeping us alive and it doesn’t hurt our cycling performance either!

Here’s a list to help you know which foods are alkaline:
Veggies; cucumbers, kale, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, spinach, chard, lettuce, parsley, lentil sprouts, onions, garlic, leeks, alflalfa sprouts, broccoli sprouts, wheat grass, arugula, parsley, cilantro, artichokes, green beans, winter squash, sweet potatoes, bok choy, beets (golden and red), carrots, etc.

Fruits; avocados, (many of you smiled at this one) tomatoes, limes, lemons, apples, watermelon, grapes, berries. (Note; lemons, limes and oranges are acidic fruits but actually become alkaline once they are consumed)
Ideally, eat a lot of “raw” foods that are living to give you oxygen, enzymes, energy, minerals, vitamins, cancer-fighting phytonutrients etc.  Cooked is great too, however to really maximize the alkaline benefits, foods in its most natural state (except tomato paste) give us the highest level of nutrition.

Eat foods that are low glycemic (ie: do not send your blood sugar soaring)

If you do enjoy meat/dairy products then try to eat free range~ organic AND adopt an 80/20 or 70/30 rule where you eat 80/70% raw to 20/30% cooked food.

I know this is a lot…and this is “ideal”…so just starting with having more “Green” in your diet is a wonderful way to start the alkalinity cycle!

Enjoy and please ask me if you have any questions about this.

Updater is a free app that helps with all the paperwork associated with a move.  You know, things like changing your address, forwarding your mail, scheduling utilities, and updating your accounts.  It even provides an easy way to let your loved ones know about your move.  Pretty amazing to think that you can do it all in one place.

Updater is the only site that lets you file your official change of address form with the USPS for free.  It also sends secure address change notifications to any business, organization, or publication with the click of a button.  That means your bills will not get lost in the mail, your Wall Street Journal will show up without missing a day, and your subscription to California Home & Design will arrive next month.

It will also help you set up cable, internet, and other utilities for your new residence.  You can even access time-saving government resources for registering your vehicle, updating your voter registration, and other government services.

My favorite part about this whole app? The ability to send an email out to all of your friends and family letting them know about your new address.

Just think how much time Updater will save you during the big move. It will give you more time to focus on unpacking the office and acclimating yourself to your new home.  We like that.

Reminding us that you don’t need to be born with charisma in order to have it, chapter one gives us some basic lessons on being more charismatic in simple conversations:

• Lower the intonation of your voice at the end of your sentences.
• Reduce how quickly and how often you nod.
• Pause for two full seconds before you speak.

These simple tweaks can really help to make someone else feel special, like they’re the only person in the room.

Chapter two breaks down the three core elements of charismatic behavior: presence, power, and warmth.  These elements come through to others in our body language, words, and general behaviors whether we realize it or not.  It is important to understand how each element influences these areas so we can improve upon them to become the charismatic person we are working to be.

First things first: being present in the conversation. Engagement is more than just looking at the person you’re talking to.  It’s having an awareness of what’s happening; paying attention to what’s going on rather than getting caught up in your own thoughts.

Cabane suggests a great way to practice remaining present through a simple exercise:  Go to a quiet place, set a timer for one minute, and close your eyes. Try to focus on one of the following three things: the sounds around you, your breathing, or the sensations in your toes.  Your mind may wander even though you’re trying not to let it, but just by doing this exercise you’ll find yourself feeling more present.

If you find yourself getting distracted during conversations, bring yourself back by focusing on the areas mentioned in the exercise: your breath or your toes for just a second, and then get back to focusing on the other person.  This will not only get your mind more engaged, but it will also get your body language engaged as well.

Next up: power and warmth. Power is perceived by our ability to influence the world around us through our authority over others, money, expertise, intelligence, physical strength or high social status.  Warmth is what tells someone else whether or not this power will be used in their favor. The combination of both of these (never one or the other) is what makes someone charismatic.

Applying the three core elements (presence, power and warmth) to your body language and mind is the start in presenting yourself as a more charismatic person.  Let me sum up the five key takeaways of chapter two to help make this happen:

• Charisma has three essential components: presence, power, and warmth.
• Being present – paying attention to what’s going on rather than being caught up in your thoughts – can yield immense rewards.  When you exhibit presence, those around you feel listened to, respected, and valued.
• Because your body language telegraphs your internal state to those around you, in order to be charismatic – to exhibit presence, power, and warmth – you must display charismatic body language.
• Because your mind can’t tell the difference between imagination and reality, by creating a charismatic internal state your body language will authentically display charisma.
• In terms of achieving charisma, your internal state is critical.  Get the internal state right, and the right charismatic behaviors and body language will pour fourth automatically.

Recently I was doing some research on changing habits and behaviors.  I think we have all heard the rule that it takes about 21 to 28 days to change a habit…right?   Well, maybe not.  I have always said it takes 21 days to create a routine, but more like 90 days to create a habit or ritual that will last for the long haul…where you go from doing something because you feel good when you accomplish it to doing it because of how horrible you feel if you don’t.

A researcher at MIT’s McGovern Institute has shown that neurons in our brain change their firing patters when habits are learned, and then change their firing patterns again when unlearned.  Unfortunately, as soon as something kicks back in, like a bad habit, they are fired back up and we can self-destruct.  That is why it is so easy to pick up negative addictions to things like food, smoking, drugs, alcohol, laziness, etc…especially when that is what our world pushes on us daily.    However, the good news is, if you establish good habits, but lose them, you can kick them back up much easier as well.

So, how long does it take to establish habits?  A study recently came out with research that found it took on average 66 days to form a habit.  I would agree that it takes an average 66 days for most people…that if we can do something for 66 days straight, then we can do it for a year, or five, or a lifetime.  21 to 28 days seems to be just enough to make it questionable, or make you fired up and confident, but not long enough to make it stick for the long haul.

Now, remember that is if you are average…the good news is, it may be a bit faster for some of you…the bad news is, if you are like me, it may take longer.  For example, if you are like me with diagnosed ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder) it is especially hard to break habits, behavior and patterns because when you are ADHD often times you lose focus and are on to creating the next greatest thing or habit before you let the first one grab hold.  You have a tendency to start a lot great new approaches, but they never seem to stick.  So you have to be super radical and diligent…yes that is why I am the crazy nut I am.  So for me I think it takes more like 90 days to create a solid habit that will last for the long haul.  By the way…all of you out there in denial, there is a lot of you like me with ADHD or some other issue…close to 1 in 10 have ADHD…probably more like 1 in 4 if you are in sales.  Don’t stress though…the good news is it can be a gift as much as a disorder if you learn how to manage it and use it to you advantage.

So…what to do is the question…this is what I would go with: It takes 21 days to develop a bad habit and 66 days (or 90 days if you are like me) to develop a good one, to be on the safe side.

Accountability partners can apply to fitness as well.  Everyone, regardless of their fitness level, needs an accountability partner.  It is only human to make excuses, cut corners or just blatantly not show up.  Recently I found myself in a rut.  I was still going to the gym everyday but it was hard to do it alone.  I had to think of workouts alone, do them alone and could not follow a baseline of how I was performing.  I recently reached out to a good friend who was on my team.  We were pretty close in all workouts we did but he trained in the afternoon and I trained in the early morning.  I convinced him to start training in the morning because it would push us both to be better.

In the last few weeks, both of us have grown exponentially.  We are able to brainstorm ideas about how we can perform better overall.  We know each other’s weaknesses and make sure that we can schedule those into our sessions.  Although it hurts our ego every day, it makes us better as a whole.  I will never be perfect.  But the more weaknesses I can make strengths, the stronger both mentally and physically will be.

I would challenge all of you to find an accountability partner to push you every day in life, including fitness.  Find someone who can push you on your runs, biking or any fitness activity.  Not only will you become a better athlete, you will be mentally stronger and be in better shape then you were before.

But just remember, just as in real estate when you have to put money aside to hold yourself accountable to your goals, you have to do the same in fitness.  For example, my accountability partner and I will hold ourselves to 400 meter sprints or burpees as a penalty for not achieving our weekly goals.  *Please remember that these goals are not large ones, they are small weekly steps.  But knowing there is a penalty waiting if you if you don’t do the prescribed work, will push just a little bit harder.